World Affairs Board - View Single Post - The Problem of Middle Ages Historical Research

Maggot · 10-25-2007, 17:55 PM

One of the biggest difficulties in researching anything about the Middle Ages is source material. Since most of us don’t have the benefit of having a bunch of dusty, vellum books laying around, we have to rely on translations that are often secondary or much further from the source than is practical. Worse there is a great body of Victorian writing on the Middle Ages that is frequently quoted in most coffee table history books, which are wildly inaccurate. Not only was there a lot of bad research in Victorian times, but there was such a slant towards having a love in with the Renaissance that a lot of the writing was done to minimize any possible contribution to civilization that might have occurred during the Middle Ages. Because someone in the Victorian period mislabeled a spiked mace with the name for a ball and chain mace variant, in many subsequent texts people incorrectly refer to a spiked mace as a morning star. The word Middle Ages was even mistranslated from the French and should read Middle Age, but I think we’re too far beyond correcting that error.

A lot of English source books on the Middle Ages, with some notable exceptions, tend to be overly focused on just how cool it was that the English won all those battles. The French focused on just how pretty their knights looked and how unfortunate it was that they lost all those battles. If you want really good nuts and bolts, technical works, for the most part it seems you have to rely on the Germans. Fortunately, there are a lot better books coming out these days. Unfortunately, there are also a lot of badly researched ones coming out at the same time.

10-25-2007, 17:55 PM	#1 (permalink)
Maggot Regular Join Date: 10-20-07 Location: British Columbia Posts: 109 Country:	The Problem of Middle Ages Historical Research One of the biggest difficulties in researching anything about the Middle Ages is source material. Since most of us don’t have the benefit of having a bunch of dusty, vellum books laying around, we have to rely on translations that are often secondary or much further from the source than is practical. Worse there is a great body of Victorian writing on the Middle Ages that is frequently quoted in most coffee table history books, which are wildly inaccurate. Not only was there a lot of bad research in Victorian times, but there was such a slant towards having a love in with the Renaissance that a lot of the writing was done to minimize any possible contribution to civilization that might have occurred during the Middle Ages. Because someone in the Victorian period mislabeled a spiked mace with the name for a ball and chain mace variant, in many subsequent texts people incorrectly refer to a spiked mace as a morning star. The word Middle Ages was even mistranslated from the French and should read Middle Age, but I think we’re too far beyond correcting that error. A lot of English source books on the Middle Ages, with some notable exceptions, tend to be overly focused on just how cool it was that the English won all those battles. The French focused on just how pretty their knights looked and how unfortunate it was that they lost all those battles. If you want really good nuts and bolts, technical works, for the most part it seems you have to rely on the Germans. Fortunately, there are a lot better books coming out these days. Unfortunately, there are also a lot of badly researched ones coming out at the same time. __________________ Work is the curse of the drinking class.