Customer Reviews
Absorbing - A Great Starter Text on the Period - By: Mr. Ross Maynard, 24 Dec 2008 
With an upbeat & very readable style, Terry Jones & Alan Ereira give us a fascinating insight into the lives of different groups of peoplein medieval times. Eight groups of people are covered from Peasant to Minstrel to Knight. I found the chapters on the church & the role of women to be particularly good. The book is well researched with a host of references for further study. It cannot hope to give us a comprehensive historyin 250 pages, but I like the approach it takes. It is accessible & informative & will provide readers of all ages an excellent starting point for further exploration of the history of the times.
A Review - By: Jamie Beckwith, 21 Sep 2008 
I hadn't seen the TV series which this accompanies but I did know of the Former Python's keen interestin History so I was sure I wasin for a good book. I'm glad I wasn't dissapointed.
An extremely informative book, it debunks the whole concept of the "Middle Ages" as a Reformation construct & sets about trying to present an accurate picture of life post Norman invasion & up until the end of the War of the Roses. By taking the stereotypes of the Medieval era such as peasent, minstrel, damsel, knight & monk & devoting a chapter to each, the author is able to set the context & then show how the reality differed from the image. We learn that by todays standards peasents probably had a better lot & were far from illiterate, the church was a money spinning enterprise, women were outspoken (and horny!) & knights invented the chivalric code simply as a way to legitimise institutionalised violence.
Some reviews found Jones's use of modern allusions too jarring but I personally thought they were infrequent & when they did pop up helped us see the historical absurdities with a modern eye. Given the state of affairsin the world today I'd be very interested to read Jones's book on the Crusades.
I learnt a lot of new things such as the role minstrels playedin the propoganda of war, & about King Louis the First & Last, the de facto ruler of England towards the end of King John's reign & that of his child heir Henry III. Whilst the book was very easy to read & suffused with a sense of humour there were plenty of scholarly footnotes as a useful springboard for anyone looking for a more weighty & academic read.
Brilliant and Very Readable Reappraisal of the Middle Ages - By: D. Evans, 09 Sep 2008 In this book Terry Jones discusses his view of the Middle Ages, as he attempts to show that our view of the period as being one of darkness & stagnation is only half the picture. Jones explains how our view of the Middle Ages have been skewed by nearly five centuries worth of negative propaganda. From Renaissance scholars who disparaged the Middle Ages to make their own period seem greaterin comparison (Jones notes that the Renaissance men were backward looking & conservative) to 19th century Romantics who created bizarre Medieval stereotypes for their own amusement. Later on 20th century filmakers would combine these sterotypes, &in doing so, they created "a period of history that never existed" - that is, the Medieval World which we often imagine to exist is actually based on biased sources from centuries past, written by people with axes to grind, or by romantic day-dreamers.
Jones attempts to tackle these stereotypes head on, & he uses first hand accounts, the most up-to-date scholarly research & modern archaeology to create a different view of the Middle Agesin Britain.
Each chapter tackles a different stereotype, examples being: The Peasant, the Minstrel, the Outlaw, the Monk, the Philosopher, Knight, Damsel, & King.
Jones gleefully deconstructs these images & shows us another side to these groups. For instance he argues that Medieval peasants often had more days off work & rights than their descendantsin the Victorian industrial age, or that fourteenth century Medieval women had a sort of semi-emancipation (making them much better off than their descendantsin the Renaissance) or that Knights, far from being dashing, were often the Medieval equivalent of Mercenaries & arms dealers.
Jones also explodes many infamous myths that have entered into popular cutlure, such as the flat earth & mass witch burning. He explains that the old story of Christopher Columbus sailing to the New World to proove that the world is round has its originsin Washington Irving's novel about the man, & provides several first hand accounts from the Middle Ages that show that educated men at least, knew that the world was round. He also shows that the worst cases of witch burning occured during the Early Modern period (16th to 17th centuries) & that small scale witch hunts did not occur until the very last decades of the Middle Ages. In these cases there seems to be a chronological mix up with many of the brutalities of the Renaissance being imposed on the Middle Ages instead.
This is a fascinating & lively read through 500 years worth of Britain's Medieval History. That said, it should be taken with a pinch of salt. Jones tends to be overly enthusiastic, & as one reviewer pointed out, he does tend to take exceptions as a rule. For instance he points out how archaeology has revealed how Medieval Welsh Peasant houses were well stocked with French wine, or that they were spacious, well built & comfortable. Yet this doesn't necessarily mean that every peasant house was the same.
Still, Jones should be congratulated for attempting to give another view on the period. A few years back a viral article became very popular on the internet called 'Lifein the 1500s'. It detailed all sorts of 'facts' about Medieval life, none of which were true. Yet most people accepted them as such, simply because we automatically believe evey negative thing we hear about the Middle Ages. It seems fair therefore that Jones should attempt to balance out this negative image with facts. He doesn't attempt to create a view of the Middle Ages as an idyllic golden age, (as a matter of fact he discusses the brutality of war & the corruption & hypocrisy of the Church) butin his own words, he would like to "adjust the spectacles by which we view the Middle Ages". He does a good but not thoroughly convincing job.
This is a well written, enjoyable & witty book, & one that deserves to be read by any history or Medieval buff, or anyone who'd like to understand this fascinating period.
Disappointing - By: Mrs. RM KLEPPMANN, 27 Oct 2007 
I suppose I should have anticipated it - a book of just over 200 pages cannot do justice to all aspects of lifein Britain over a period of hundreds of years. It is `history light' - oversimplified to the point of being misleading. It gives partial pictures & picks out exceptions, presenting them as the norm. This, of course, makes easy & amusing reading but gives a distorted impression of the period.
Amusing look at medieval people. - By: L O'connor, 02 Jul 2004 Each chapterin this very enjoyable book deals with a different type of Medieval person, the Peasant, the Lady, the Knight, the Monk etc, & shows that the reality is often very different from the popular stereotype. For instance,in the chapter about the Peasant we learn that the lot of the common people was not as bad as we might have been led to believe, & that Medieval peasants hadin gneral a higher standard of living, & far more legal rights than is generally believed. The chapter on the Lady shows how womenin Medieval society also had far more autonomy than is usally thought, & we learn about women managing estates, running businesses, & being able to obtain divorce for a variety of different reasons (the bit about impotent men being examined by a jury of matrons is particularly hilarious). The chapter on the Philosopher is one of the most interestingin the book, it shows that science & medicine were far more advancedin medieval times than is generally thought. Medieval doctors were much more effective at curing diseases than they are usally given credit for, & they even understood the use of anaesthetics. I would have liked it if the book had said a little more about womenin general (for istance,in the chapter on the Philosopher, there is no mention of the fact that there were women physiciansin the Middle Ages). And I was a little surprised to fidn that Terry Jones apparently takes seriously the apologists for Richard III. But these are minor quibbles. Overall, this is a very amusing & interesting book, & it gorgeously illustrated throuhgout with exquisite colour pictures from Medieval art.
