Medieval cures for the black death: Did you mean...?

Medieval literature is defined broadly as any work written in Latin or the vernacular between c. 476-1500, including philosophy, religious treatises, legal texts, as well as works of the imagination. More narrowly, however, the term applies...

People in the Middle Ages have acquired something of a bad reputation when it comes to cleanliness, especially the peasantry. However, despite the general lack of running water and other modern amenities, there were common expectations of...

The knights of medieval Europe were meant to be the finest fighting men of their age, even more important, they were expected to be pure in thought and deed, as exemplified in the chivalrous code which they (usually) followed. Here are the...

Black Elk Speaks (1932) is the popular and controversial book of the narrative by the Oglala Lakota Sioux medicine man Black Elk (l. 1863-1950) on his life and people as given to the American poet and writer John G. Neihardt (l. 1881-1973...

Heraldry, which is the use of inherited coats of arms and other symbols to show personal identity and family lineage, began on the mid-12th century CE battlefield as an easy means to identify medieval royalty and princes who were otherwise...

On the eve of the American Revolution (1765-1789), the Thirteen Colonies had a population of roughly 2.1 million people. Around 500,000 of these were African Americans, of whom approximately 450,000 were enslaved. Comprising such a large...

The medieval period of Japan is considered by most historians to stretch from 1185 to 1603 CE. Stand out features of the period include the replacement of the aristocracy by the samurai class as the most powerful social group, the establishment...

Throughout history, epidemics and pandemics of plague and other diseases have caused widespread panic and social disorder even, in some instances, when the people of one region were aware of a pervasive infection elsewhere. In the case of...

People have been sending letters to each other ever since paper and pen were invented, but it was not until 1840 that a new idea was introduced where people could prepay the cost of delivering their letter to their chosen destination using...

Religious practice in medieval Europe (c. 476-1500) was dominated and informed by the Catholic Church. The majority of the population was Christian, and "Christian" at this time meant "Catholic" as there was initially no other form of that...