: In the early Middle Ages, the Church played a very important role in protecting ancient works, and monks were heavily involved in the “reproduction and preservation of the literature that had been inherited from earlier writers,—writers whose works had been accepted as classics.”
The monks who were not yet competent to work as scribes were to be instructed by the others.”
The copying of books was also slow, tedious, and very time-consuming; it took years for a scribe to complete “a particularly fine manuscript with colored initials and miniature art work.”
it is, therefore, no surprise that monks sometimes jotted remarks about their frustration and relief in the margins, or the colophons, of their manuscripts. Examples of these remarks included “Thin ink, bad vellum, difficult text,” “Thank God, it will soon be dark,” and “Now I’ve written the whole thing: for Christ’s sake give me a drink.”
The rooms where the lord of a castle, his family and his knights lived and ate and slept were in the Keep (called the Donjon), the rectangular tower inside the walls of a castle. This was meant to be the strongest and safest place.
The outer wall of a castle was called Bailey. This was where buildings for the castle's cattle, horses and servants lived. Some of the soldiers needed to defend the castle might live in part of the gatehouse known as the Barbican.
There were kitchens and pantries where food was stored for everyday preparation. The Great Hall and the bedchambers were there too.
The Great Hall
The Bedchamber
Kitchen
A wealthy knight, his family and guests ate well. Unlike most people, they had plenty of meat like deer, goose and rabbit. On Fridays and Holy Days meat was forbidden by the church, so they ate fish or eels. If there was a special feast, the people working in the kitchens would prepare wild boar, roast swan, or even roast peacock, served with all its feathers as decoration. Some of these would be caught by the lord of the castle and his friends while out hunting with their hawks.
Many castles had stone toilets built over holes in the outer walls. These emptied into a pit way below.
Medieval castles did not have running water, yet people did like to bathe at least once a year. In some castles there was a room next to the kitchen where they bathed in groups. The lord might have hot water brought to his bedchamber and poured into a big wooden tub, where he sat on a low stool in. The water might have perfume or rose leaves sprinkled in it. Soap was made of sheep fat with ashes and soda. Teeth were cleaned by scraping them with a hazel twig and rubbing them with a woollen cloth.
Serfs could buy their
freedom from the manor, but where
would they get the money?
If a new lord
took over the
manor, he would need the serfs for labor.
Peasants
were free to leave if they wished
Peasants worked the land and made
the goods in exchange for protection.
Other than that,
their life was just like a serf's life.
A few peasants escaped the
hard work on the farm by joining the church. But most lived and died
on the manor where they were born.
Everyone had to pay taxes to the lord
To pay the crop tax, some crops went
to the lord, and some they kept. To pay the bread tax, some bread they
made went to the lord, and some they kept. To pay the coat tax, some
of the warm coats they made went to the lord, and some they kept.
Everything was paid in barter. Coinage or money did not exist on the
manor.
People believed that the only
way to get to Heaven was to follow the teachings in the Bible.
The
common people could not read or write.
The priest told them who
they must marry and when. You had to do everything the priest said if
you wanted to get to heaven.
peasants and serfs were mostly content with their lot.
work kept
everyone on the manor fed and comfortable, including themselves.
They were not slaves. These people
could not be bought and sold. But they could not leave the manor without
permission.
It is estimated that by 1330, only 5% of the total population of Europe received any sort of education
Even then education, as we understand it, was not accessible or even desired by everyone. Schools were mostly only accessible to the sons of high lords of the land.
In most kingdoms in Europe, education was overseen by the church.
The very fact that the curriculum was structured by the church gave it the ability to mould the students to follow its doctrine
Unofficially, education started from a very young age. This sort of early education depended on the feudal class of the child’s parents
Even the children of serfs would be taught the skills needed to survive by their parents. The boys would be taken out into the fields to observe and to help their parents with easy tasks, while the girls would work with the animals at home, in the vegetable garden with their mothers, or watch them weave.
Children of craftsmen and merchants were educated from a very young age in the trade of their fathers. Trade secrets rarely left a family and they had to be taught and understood by all male (and unusually, female) heirs, in order to continue the family legacy.
Young boys of noble birth would learn how to hunt and swing a weapon, while the young ladies of nobility would learn how to cook
The main subject of study in those schools was Latin (reading and writing). In addition to this, students were also taught rhetoric – the art of public speaking and persuasion – which was a very useful tool for both men of the cloth and nobles alike.
Lessons frequently started at sunrise and finished at sunset
University education, across the whole of the continent, was a luxury to which only the wealthiest and brightest could ever aspire
Since the creation of the first university in 1088
Students attended the Medieval University at different ages, ranging from 14 (if they were attending Oxford or Paris to study the Arts) to their 30s (if they were studying Law in Bologna)
The dynamic between students and teachers in a medieval university was significantly different from today. In the University of Bologna students hired and fired teachers by consensus. The students also bargained as a collective regarding fees, and threatened teachers with strikes if their demands were not met
A Master of Arts degree in the medieval education system would have taken six years; a Bachelor of Arts degree would be awarded after completing the third or fourth year. By “Arts” the degree was referring to the seven liberal arts – arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, music theory, grammar, logic, and rhetoric
The sons of the peasants could only be educated if the lord of the manor had given his permission
Any family caught having a son educated without permission was heavily fined
Historians today believe that this policy was another way in which authority figures attempted to control the peasants, since an educated peasant/villein might prove to question the way things were done and upset the balance of power which kept the nobles strong.
Students held the legal status of clerics which, according to the Canon Law, could not be held by women; women were therefore not admitted into universities.
Feudal SystemThe Feudal System was sustained by the rights and privileges given to the Upper Classes and in most cases enacted by laws. Everything was a source of privilege for the nobles. They had a thousand pretexts for establishing taxes on their vassals, who were generally considered "taxable and to be worked at will." Kings and councils waived the necessity of their studying, in order to be received as bachelors of universities. If a noble was made a prisoner of war, his life was saved by his nobility, and his ransom had practically to be raised by the "villains" of his domains.
Knights had the right of receiving double rations when prisoners of war; the right of claiming a year's delay when a creditor wished to seize their land; and the right of never having to submit to torture after trial, unless they were condemned to death for the crime they had committed.
Reviving Double Rations when Prisoner of war. The right to not pay money for the land for a year. The right to have no tourture after a trail.
of claiming the goods of a person dying on their lands who had no direct heir. They also had the right of claiming a tax when a fief or domain changed hands.
the right of common oven required serfs to make use of the mill, the oven, of the lord