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Celebrating Tolkien’s Birthday: The Medieval Scholar Who Created Middle-earth
January 3, 1892 – September 2, 1973 Today marks the birthday of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, born on January 3, 1892, in Bloemfontein, South Africa. While millions know him as the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, fewer appreciate that Tolkien was first and foremost a medieval scholar—a Professor of Anglo-Saxon Continue reading
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This Week in Medieval History: The Murder of Thomas Becket
December 25-29, 1170 This week marks the anniversary of one of the most shocking events in medieval English history: the brutal murder of Archbishop Thomas Becket in Canterbury Cathedral on December 29, 1170. But the story truly begins four days earlier, on Christmas Day, when Becket made a fateful decision that would seal his doom. Continue reading
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A Guide to the Medieval Castles of England by Malcolm Hislop
This is a well illustrated expert guide to the castles of England, providing concise accounts of what remains to be seen at each site. Spread across the medieval kingdom of England in a network of often formidable strongholds, castles, like cathedrals, are defining landmarks of their age, dominating their settings, in many cases even to Continue reading
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Rebellion by Richard Cullen
The start of an epic new historical adventure series from Richard Cullen introducing The Black Lion As war approaches, the lion will roar… 1213AD. King Richard the Lionheart is dead, and his brother, John Lackland, sits uneasily upon the throne of England. Across the sea, Prince Louis, heir to the powerful King Philip Augustus of Continue reading
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God’s Own Gentlewoman: The Life of Margaret Paston Diane Watt
The remarkable story of Margaret Paston, whose letters form the most extensive collection of personal writings by a medieval English woman. Drawing on what is the largest archive of medieval correspondence relating to a single family in the UK, God’s Own Gentlewoman explores what everyday life was like during the turbulent decades at the height Continue reading
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Crusaders and Revolutionaries of the Thirteenth Century: De Montfort by Darren Baker
One of the families that dominated the thirteenth century were the de Montforts. They arose in France, in a hamlet close to Paris, and grew to prominence under the crusading fervour of that time, taking them from leadership in the Albigensian wars to lordships around the Mediterranean. They marry into the English aristocracy, join the Continue reading
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Book Review: Edward II’s Nieces, The Clare Sisters by Kathryn Warner
The de Clare sisters Eleanor, Margaret and Elizabeth were born in the 1290s as the eldest granddaughters of King Edward I of England and his Spanish queen Eleanor of Castile, and were the daughters of the greatest nobleman in England, Gilbert the Red’ de Clare, earl of Gloucester. They grew to adulthood during the turbulent Continue reading
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The First Cousin’s War? The Two Matildas and the Anarchy
The Wars of the Roses of the Fifteenth century is sometimes known as the “Cousin’s War” because of the relationship of the leaders. Henry VI of England was a cousin of Richard Duke of York and Edward IV, Edward was by turn a cousin of the Earl of Warwick, etc. My second book which will Continue reading
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Reviewed: Murder During the Hundred Years War by Melissa Julian- Jones
In 1375, Sir William Cantilupe was found murdered in a field outside of a village in Lincolnshire. As the case progressed, fifteen members of his household were indicted for murder, and his armor-bearer and butler were convicted. Through the lens of this murder and its context, this book will explore violence, social norms and deviance, Continue reading
The History Lady 