Status Updates From Life in a Medieval Castle

I mean, both the War of the Roses in England and the Civil War in England were both civil wars.

"The decline in military importance of the castle, apparent in the fourteenth century and rapidly accelerated in the fifteenth, is associated, like that of the armored knight, with the introduction of gunpowder. In the closing stage of the Hundred Years' War (1446-53), the old strongholds of western France that had withstood so many sieges fell with astonishing speed to the ponderous iron bombards..."

The last chapter is "The Decline of the Castle." I'll be finished by the end of the day.

"Lammas (August 1) was the end of the harvest. Lammas — from the Anglo-Saxon hlaf-mass ("loaf mas")— was a feast of first fruits, a day when bread was made from new wheat blessed in church." I wonder if this inspired Tolkien to write lamlas (lemlas?), elvish bread?

"In June, Midsummer...boys collected bones and rubbish and burned them, and carried brands about the fields, to drive away the dragons that were believed to be abroad poisoning the wells. A wheel was set afire and rolled down the hills, to signify that the sun had reached its highest point and was turning back." I love the dragon detail.

Imagine if modern day continued some of these festivities. "Bringing in the May" sometimes meant a couple spending a night in the forest. "Rogation Days" or "Gangdays" were days where sometimes small boys were ducked in brooks and ponds and their buttocks bumped against trees and rocks to help them memorize the village boundaries.

Never heard of a vetch before. Apparently it's some sort of bean.

"A third penetration by means of a special ingress, such as a mine, a disguised well, or a latrine, as in the case of Richard the Lionhearted's Château Gaillard in 1204." I think I just recently saw an Instagram skit based off of this. Either that or I spoke about it previously and imagined it, which I think I did when they were discussing the layout of a castle and spoke of the latrine chutes.

Oof, got some crossbow/longbow debate going on here. Seems to me that the authors favor the crossbow despite its slower rate of fire, weight, and strength needed for the draw string. Longbows continued to be more favorable with faster rate of fire, lighter weight comparatively, and less strength needed. They do point out that longbows were favorable in open battles, while crossbows were used in castles.

I'm not sure where they got their source for the "fire-bearing arrows." All historians I've seen analyzing Hollywood depictions of castle sieges and battles have said that fire arrows were a work of fiction, or at the very least were not at all as good as Hollywood made them out to be. Certain arrows were designed as an open, iron basket container that could be stuff with flammable material.

"A custom of English nobles that may date to the thirteenth century, that of hanging their heraldic banners outside inns where they were staying, led to the inn sign of later times." Really? I did not know that! That's cool!

"The Church joined Henry in its opposition, not only because of the violence of the combats and the danger of sedition. Besides such innocent auxiliary sports as wrestling, dart shooting, lance hurling, and stone throwing, the tournaments were famous for eating, drinking, and love-making. Jacques de Vitry...liked to use the tournament to illustrate all seven of the deadly sins." That's hilarious.

"Until the latter part of the fourteenth century, there was little individual jousting." That is the popular depiction of tournaments and jousting in Ivanhoe, GoT, and Renaissance Fairs.

"The field was open-ended, because when one team was defeated and sought to retreat, the other, exactly as in real war, pursued it through wood and dale to capture prisoners. When it was over, the defeated knights had to arrange with their captors for their ransom, usually the value of horse and armor, redeemed by money payment." That's different than fantasy depictions of tournaments like in Ivanhoe and GoT.

"Ransom of an important personage could reach astronomical figures — like the 'king's ransom' of Richard I when he was captured by Leopold of Austria and turned over to Emperor Henry VI: 150,000 marks, which had to be raised by special taxes levied in both England and Normandy, on knights, laymen, clergy, churches, and monasteries. The sum could not be raised...[Richard] had to give hostages for the remaining debt."

Well, that was quite the morbid poem.

"Despite precepts, codes, and admonitions from the Church, however, the knight's life was normally lived on a lower plane than that embodied by the chivalric ideal. The reason was that the great majority of knights were, horse and armor aside, penniless. The system of primogeniture left younger sons even of great families without fiefs, and so without income." You're not going to allow eldest sons to become knights.

About time that we got some King Arthur references and a little reference on how his legend grew and shifted depending on who was writing it, whether that was Anglo-Saxon English or Norman French.
I also like the little picture in upper corner depicting military training for a knight. The posture, the poses, the way they handle sword and shield.

"Through the twelfth century the tendency toward exclusivity grew in the knightly class...sovereigns forbade peasants to become knights or carry a sword or lance, and by the thirteenth century the knightly aristocracy was in theory a closed caste, set apart from the rest of society...villeins did indeed become knights in the twelfth century, and in the thirteenth the process was almost commonplace."

"Thus the knight was a member of the noble class socially through the possession of arms, economically through the possession of a horse and armor, and officially through the ceremony imbued with a religious sanction." Something to keep in mind.

Lol! "You are are knighted!" *Smack across the face* "And don't you forget!"

Teens were made into knights at 15?! That's insane! I was expecting it to be in their later teens to early twenties!

Each one of these chapters is so interesting. Now we got to the one about the making of a knight.

"To the villagers the bailiff was the collector and enforcer—collector of rents and enforcer of labor services. Understably, he was little loved." So, the popular depictions and writings of Robin Hood combined the Sheriff of Nottingham with the duties of the bailiff. Interesting.