Almost Time To Be a Student Again

My regular readers (all 2 or 3 of you) know that I am interested in Medieval Europe. I occasionally cook a medieval dinner and find that The Name of the Rose is a favorite film and book. If I hear of something related to the Middle Ages, it just piques my interest. I'm not sure when my fascination with the period started but I think that I've had an attraction to it for some time.

As I've gotten older and more knowledgeable (though still grossly ignorant) on the subject, I have found that my perspective has changed. For instance, learning about it in high school history class, I was taken with the differences between than and now – the feudal system, the lack of modern technologies, etc. But some 20 years later, I often find myself more interested in the commonalities of that time and mine. It is especially interesting for me to learn about the origins of modern devices and practices that are from Medieval times. As far as food goes, people cooked roasts just as we do now; they baked bread and boiled vegetables; and they used salt and pepper too. Modern accounting practices as well as the rifle (arquebus) date from this time. And so does time. Our conception of it, anyway. It was during the so-called Dark Ages that the mechanical clock was invented and began transforming how people structured their lives. The more I look into it, the less dark this period appears.


(Photo by J. Podolsky.)

I'd love to audit a credit course at the UW but, alas, there are no Medieval Studies classes offered during the evenings. (I'd love to take some folklore classes as well but, again, they're all during my work hours.) However, this Thursday my non-credit class on the Medieval world starts. It's called "Early Christian and medieval monasticism" and I'll learn about "various monastic orders, the lives of monks and nuns, and monastic architecture and spaces from the early Christian period through the late Middle Ages". Should be very interesting. This will be my third or fourth non-credit Medieval studies class.

In addition to my class starting, I see that BBC Four has started The Medieval Season, a series of programs on Medieval Britain and the Middle Ages generally. In Search of Medieval Britain started last week It's a 6-part series featuring Medieval art historian Dr. Alixe Bovey who journeys through Britain using the oldest known route map of the country.

Stephen Fry and the Gutenberg Press aired last night. They build a working replica of Gutenberg's original press! Tomorrow we get The Saint and the Hanged Man which examines the "clash between reason and the supernatural at the heart of the medieval mind". On Thursday the first of a four-part series called Inside the Medieval Mind airs: "Professor Robert Bartlett of St Andrew's University, investigates the intellectual landscape of the medieval world." Episode 1 is "Knowledge" wherein Bartlett "explores the way medieval man understood the world as a place of mystery, even enchantment - a book written by God".

Later in the spring we get Christina: A Medieval Life where a historian uses court records to illuminate the life of a Medieval peasant family. Lastly there's The King's Cookbook where recipes from England's oldest cookbook – The Forme of Cury – are dragged screaming from the vaults.

So get your torrent client or newsreader ready.