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The Middle Ages
Main Contents
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History about Middle Ages
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Manor and Feudalism
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Knighthood and Code of Chivalry
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The power of Church
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The Crusades and the Influences
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Black Death and Its Influences
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Literature
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Architecture
Middle Ages/Dark Ages/Age of Faith
History of Middle Ages
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Why is this period of time called Middle
Ages?
Francesco Petrarca first divided the
European history into three parts: Ancient
times, Middle Ages and Modern times
476 A.D. ----------15th Century
Fall of West
Rome
Ancient classical period
rebirt
h
The rise of
renaissance
Modern times
why are the early Middle Ages often called
“Dark Ages”?
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Disintegration of Rome and constant wars;
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Great civilizations of Greece and Rome had fallen.
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Very few people could read or write, even the
kings and nobles; Only priests could read;
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Life in Europe during the Middle Ages was hard;
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Hunger and diseases like Black Death killed many;
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Only hope: strong belief in Christianity; heaven
would be better than life on earth--the denial of
earthly happiness
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The Middle Ages are also called “Age of
Faith”, why?
During the Medieval times there was no
central government to keep the order. The
only organization that seemed to unite
Europe was the Christian church.
The Christian church continued to gain
widespread power and influence.
People had a strong belief in Christianity;
The church touched everyone’s life from
the richest king to the lowest serf.
Characteristics of Middle Ages
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Politics: disintegration; frequent wars
and invasions
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Economy: Slow development
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Culture: Christianity culture
idealism
Middle Ages: General Timeline
1095-1291
Crusades
450 A.D.
AngloSaxons
invaded
England
1066 A.D.
Norman
invasion of
Britain
476 A.D.
Fall of West
Rome
1306-1321
Dante’s
Divine
Comedy
1386
Chaucer
begins
writing
Canterbury
Tales
Beowulf
Composed
sometime
between
700
1347 A.D.
Bubonic
Plague
750
1337-1453
100 Years War
France &
England
1453
Fall of East
Rome
II. Feudalism and Manor
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The word “feudalism” was derived from the
Latin “feudum”, a grant of land(封土）
Growth of Feudalism
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land + service
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peasants
protection
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large land-owners
serfs
free workers
lords
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Feudalism: system of land holding
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Feudalism: system of loyalties and
protections during the Middle Ages.
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Feudalism: system of government—a form
of local and decentralized government
forests
fields
stable
Wine press
cottages
barn
church
Manor house
meadows
rectory
mill
bread oven
pastures
II. Feudalism and Manor
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Nobles/Lords became independent rulers,
they had rights to collect taxes
make laws
coin money
raise armies
Feudalism
a form of local and
decentralized government
Economy based on agriculture, with limited
money exchange
III. Knighthood and Code of Chivalry
III. Knighthood and Code of Chivalry
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Only the sons of Nobles and Knights had
rights to be trained as knights
Knighthood should be earned.
The training was both long and hard.
Page—squire—knight—dubbing
Wrestling
Horse riding
Jousting
Javelin and shot-put
Courtly manners
Code of chivalry
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Live to serve King and Country.
Live one's life so that it is worthy of respect
and honor.
Live for freedom, justice and all that is good.
Never attack an unarmed foe.
Never attack from behind.
Avoid lying to your fellow man.
Avoid cheating.
Avoid torture.
Protect the innocent.
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Show respect to authority.
Respect women.
Exhibit courage in word and deed.
Defend the weak and innocent.
Destroy evil in all of its monstrous forms.
Fight with honor.
Avenge the wronged.
Never abandon a friend, ally, or noble
cause.
Die with valor.
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Always keep one's word of honor.
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Always maintain one's principles.
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Avoid deception.
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Respect life and freedom.
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Die with honor.
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Exhibit manners.
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Be polite and attentive.
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Be respectful of host, women, and honor.
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Loyalty to one's friends and those who lay
their trust in thee.
Code of chivalry
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To protect the weak
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To fight for the church
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To be loyal to his lord
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To respect women of noble birth
A duel
for honor
A duel
for love
IV The power of the church
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Religious workers are called clergymen.
In the Middle Ages, the Pope ruled the
Christian Church. Other clergy included
bishops, priests, nuns, and monks.
Three classes of people in western Europe
under feudalism
Clergy
Lords
Peasants
IV The power of the church
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Christianity became the universal faith of
almost all of the people of Europe.
A child was baptized a few days after his
birth;
A child would be taught the basic prayers;
The Church was often the only way to get
an education.
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Every people was required to live by the
Church’s laws and to pay heavy taxes to
support the church;
Besides, the church also accepted gifts of
all kinds from individuals including land,
flocks, crops and even serfs.
The church used its power to influence
kings.
V The Crusades—a series of holy wars
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Reason: to gain control of Jerusalem
Process:
First Crusade
1096—1099
Second Crusade
1147--- 1149
Third Crusade
1189--- 1192
Fourth Crusade
1202--- 1204
Fifth Crusade
1218--- 1221
Sixth Crusade
1228--- 1229
Seventh Crusade 1248--- 1254
Eighth Crusade
1270
End: failure
Significance:
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Why were they called
crusaders?
All the soldiers going
to Palestine wore a
red cross on the
tunics as a symbol of
obedience to God.
Significance
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Bring the West into contact with the East
Break down feudalism, and lead to the rise
of monarchies
Western Europeans changed many of their
old ideas
Peasants and serfs grew discontented with
their lives and demanded more rights
Renew people’s interest in learning and
inventions.
VI Black Death (1347—1351)
The influence of the Black Death
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A total of 75,000,000 people died;
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New attitudes towards death;
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Values of life;
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A loss of respect for the Church;
Assignments
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How much do you know about the great epic
Beowulf?
The Canterbury Tales, a collection of stories
about of a group of thirty people who travel
as pilgrims to Canterbury (England). The
pilgrims, who come from all layers of society,
tell stories to each other to kill time while
they travel to Canterbury. Find information
about some characters: The Knight, The
Merchant, The Wife of Bath and The
Prioress
Literature
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1. National Epic
Beowulf (700-750 A.D.)
the oldest surviving epic poem written in
old English
the adventures of Beowulf, who saves the
Danes by defeating the monster Grendel
and his mother, a sea monster. However
later he was defeated and killed by a fire
dragon.
Fighting with Grendel
Destroy evil in all of its monstrous forms
Fighting with Grendel’s Mother
Fighting with a Fire Dragon
Dante
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1265—1321
Dante became increasingly involved with
politics.
Dante fled Florence and lost hope of ever
returning.
Beatrice’s death—a turning point in his life
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The Divine Comedy
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Beatrice
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她首次出现在我面前，而我看见她时，她刚满九
岁。
她一身朱红，最高贵的颜色，谦虚而富于美德；
束带和装饰与她的年纪两相和谐。
那一剎那，说真的，我内心最深处开始颤抖，颤
抖那么剧烈，连我的心最轻微的搏动也猛烈得可
怕。
它颤声吐出这句话：“看，一个比我强大的神，
将会来统治我了。
Beatrice
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“啊，我要糟了，从今以后，我将烦恼经常。
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从那时起，爱神主宰我的灵魂。……
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她举止如此高贵可佩，真的可以用荷马的话
来形容她：“她仿佛不是凡人之女，而是神
的女儿。”
但丁（1265-1321）
《新生》，XXVI，1293
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我的女郎和别人打招呼时
如此优雅，如此美德洋溢
所有舌头都颤抖噤声，
没有眼睛敢看她。
她经过，听见他们的赞美，
那么温良谦卑；
仿佛是天国派她
来人间显示一个奇迹。
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对看见她的人
她无比悦目，
透过眼睛
她的甜美进入人心，
你感觉到了，就会相信：
从她双唇，似乎
有个甜美的精神发出，
充满了爱，
对灵魂说：叹息吧。
但丁路遇贝阿特里丝
The Divine Comedy
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1. 1307-1321
2. “Comedy”---幻游形式，但丁以自己为主人
公，假想他作为一名活人对冥府进行了一次游
历。
3. The Divine Comedy is comprised of 3
works:
Inferno
 Purgatory
 Paradise
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The structure of Inferno
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Dante describes a journey through Hell;
His companion for the travel is Virgil, a mentor
and protector.
Dante’s Hell carefully categorizes sinners
according to the nature of their sins.
The sinners in the nine circles of hell are guilty
of one of three types of sin:
 Incontinence: losing control of natural
appetites and desires
 Brutishness: attraction to things which repulse
the healthy soul
 Malice: abuse of reason, a human's most godlike quality
The Divine Comedy:1307-1321
Dante在Virgil带领下，穿过地狱湖
Purgatory（净界）
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Those who recognize their sins are
given a chance to purify themselves in
Purgatory.
Dante feels Hell is a necessary,
painful first step of any man’s
spiritual journey
Comments on The Divine Comedy
1.对教会的憎恨—地狱中一切罪恶的中心是圣城；
“日夜在那里用基督的名义做着买卖，干着买
卖圣职，敲诈勒索、荒淫无度、迫害基督徒等
丑恶的行为”
“到处断绝上帝赐给人民的面包，树立了导致
人民走上邪路的坏榜样”。
2.表露了反对中世纪的蒙昧主义，提倡文化，尊
重知识的新思想。
“你们生来不是为了走兽一样生活，而是为着
追求美德和知识。”
Geoffrey Chaucer
杰弗里·乔索
The representative writer in the
Medieval English literature
Geoffrey Chaucer (1340—1400)
Chaucer’s three literary periods:
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First period or the French period :
1) The Romaunt of the Rose
《 玫 瑰 传 奇 》a translation, popular in
Middle ages
2) The Book of the Duchess
《悼公爵夫人》, the best work of the
time
Second period or the Italian period:
Son of Priam
Troilus and Criseyde: 《特罗伊拉斯
和克莱西德》
A beautiful widow, a fickle woman
a poem of a love story
Chaucer’s longest complete poem of
8,000 lines
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The third period or the English period,
his best period:
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The Canterbury Tales
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《坎特伯雷故事集》
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His masterpiece and a representative
works of the Middle Ages.
Poet’s Corner in Westminster Abbey
Homework
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Who else has been buried in the Poets’ Corner?
Charles Dickens; William Shakespeare; Robert
Browning; Tomas Hardy; John Milton;
Laurence…
Without Byron and Shelly whose ideas and
thoughts are regarded as heresy.
The Canterbury Tales
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1. It has 24 stories.
2. It is the description of the
pilgrims（朝圣者）who tell stories.
3. It is about the life of ordinary
people.
4. It gives vivid characters, with
humor and satire.
Canterbury Cathedral
The Tales
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The famous ones are the story of :
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1) the wife of Bath（巴斯城的妇女）,
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2) the Knight（骑士）,
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3) the Pardoner（卖赎罪卷者）,
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4) the Nun’s Priest（尼姑的教士）,
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5) the Prologue（序诗）.
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The wife of Bath:
wears scarlet red
stockings;
wears a broad hat
Powerful, beautiful,
stubborn and
independent
The Wife of Bath
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She is the owner of a cloth factory,
light-hearted, merry, somewhat vulgar
and exceedingly talkative.
She had been married five times; the
first three of them are good to her and
rich; the other two of them are bad,
her fourth husband has a mistress; the
fifth tries to control her and hits her,
which leads to her deafness;
Comment
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The wife of Bath presents herself as the
authority of marriage and marital life.
It was very rare for a woman in the
fourteenth century to travel as a pilgrim.
She talked about her experiences and
thoughts in public.
She married five times.
She strongly believed in herself. she
questions the authority of the bible.
She was powerful and independent.
Other Characters in the tales
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The Knight: a warrior who relies on
the code of chivalry. Represents
the romanticized standards of the
feudal system.
The Prioress: A nun. She makes
every effort to be refined and
elegant, and she cannot bear to see
any harm come to any of God’s lesser
creatures, like mice. However, when
it is her turn to tell a story, hers is
violent and full of blood and sorrow.
Other Characters in the tales
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The Merchant: The merchant is obsessed
with his wealth, and talks about money
constantly.
The Miller: a large and strong man, and is one
of the best at telling vulgar stories.
The Pardoner: A clergyman who is outwardly
corrupt. His main motivating factor was
money, and so if the sinner had the gold, the
Pardoner would favor the sinner and help
pardon him.
Social Significance
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Affirm men and women’s right to pursue
their happiness on earth.
Oppose the dogma of asceticism (苦行主
义;禁欲主义) preached by the church.
Attack the greed of the clergies.
Chaucer’s language
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1. His language is full of humor and satire.
2. His language is vivid, exact and smooth,
a master of word-pictures.
3. He is the first to use heroic couplet
which he introduced from France.
4. He is the first great poet who wrote in
the English language, making the dialect of
London the standard for the modern
English speech.
Comment on Chaucer
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1. He is the first English short-story
teller and the founder of English
poetry.
2. He is the founder of English realism.
3.He is the master of English language,
the greatest in the Middle Ages.
Romanesque Architecture
massiveness
Solidity
Monumentality
Gothic Architecture
Height
Gothic Architecture
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Light
stained glass
windows
The Middle Ages is also called the ____.
A. “ Age of Christianity”
B. “ Age of literature”
C. “ Age of Holy Spirit”
D. “ Age of Faith”
 Who is the author of The Canterbury Tales?_______
A. Roger Bacon
B. Dante Alighieri
C. Chaucer
D. St. Thomas Aquinas
 According to the code of chivalry, which of the following
is not pledged to do for a knight? _____
A. to be loyal to his lord
B. to fight for the church
C. to obey without question the orders of the abbot
D. to respect women of noble birth
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 Under Feudalism, what were the three classes of people of
western Europe?_____
A. clergy , knights and serfs
B. Pope , bishop and peasants
C. clergy , lords and peasants
D. knights , nobles and serfs
 Which of the following about the knight or noble in the
Middle Ages in Europe is NOT true?_______
A. Almost all nobles were knights in the Medieval.
B. A noble began his education as a page at the age of seven.
C. As a knight , he was pledged to fight for the church.
D. At about fourteen , the page became a knight.
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Who wrote , “ I came, I saw, I conquered ”? _______
A. Horace
B. Julius Caesar
C. Marcus Tullius Cicero
D. Virgil
Julius Caesar was assassinated in the year of ___.
A. 146B.C. B.44B.C C. 27B.C. D. 40B.C.
8. Who is the first Roman Emperor?
A. Agamemnon B. Alexander
C. Julius Caesar D. Augustus Caesar
9. Who is not one of the greatest philosophers in ancient
Greece?
A. Plato B. Galileo C. Socrates D. Aristotle
10. Who is not involved in the Trojan War?
A. Achilles B. Priam C. Hector D. Dido