“He seems to me a very foolish man, and very wretched, who will not increase his understanding while he is in the world, and ever wish and long to reach that endless life where all shall be made clear.”
-King Alfred the Great of Wessex, c. 895
A college professor for whom I served twice as a teaching assistant liked to begin his medieval survey course by addressing the question, “Why study the Middle Ages?” He had two answers. First, because people in the Middle Ages were not like us today. Second, because people in the Middle Ages were like us today. These, I think, are pretty good reasons, but I would like to add one more of my own. The Middle Ages are worth studying (as opposed to other, though still perfectly valid historical subjects) because so many people think they understand the Middle Ages (even if that is to say “I don’t care about them”) when in fact their flawed knowledge not only hurts their understanding of the past but endangers their ability to function well in the present. In other words, reason three to study the Middle Ages is because you think you know all you need to about them when you actually don’t. In correcting this deficiency and studying the Middle Ages, one can live better in the 21st century. There, we have three reasons to study medieval history. Now let us unpack each of these reasons one by one.
First, people from the Middle Ages were not like today. It seems absurdly simple: of course people on a different continent speaking a different language (even English before about 1500 would be taxing at best for most Americans to understand) living mostly rural lives without the technological, scientific, political, and social resources we do would be different. To that extent, learning about the Middle Ages is an exploration into a different world, a different mentality. The simple act of investigating something that is new and strange is intellectually stimulating and provides someone with a new perspective on the world. In order to understand medieval history, one must learn a whole set of new ideas and concepts that one is unlikely to encounter in everyday life in 21st century America. Concepts like hagiography, humoral theory, dualistic religion, simony, investiture controversy, ethnogenesis, crusade, Convivencia, disputation and scholasticism, courtly love, partible inheritance vs. primogeniture, consanguinity, compurgation, and more. There are certainly many other historical periods and regions besides the European Middle Ages to provide someone with ideas that are new, interesting, and thought-provoking, but the medieval era is certainly filled with them.
Second, people from the Middle Ages were like us today. This, too, should be obvious, but it is worth considering in more detail. For all the oddities present in medieval European life, there was much that was very recognizable to us today and which can also be seen in other eras and locations. People were born, grew up, lived, worked, were educated by the standards of their time and means, loved, fought, blessed, cursed, took people to court, played games in fields, were petty toward neighbors, were giving to strangers, were bigoted, were curious, were inventive, were traditional, debated whether change or consistency was better, debated what change and consistency even meant, schemed, plotted, argued, stole, killed, donated, forgave, married, parented, cheated, seduced, partied, died, and more. The stories of medieval people are human stories. They had different ways of doing things, and their priorities and worldviews were often dissimilar from ours, but, ultimately, they acted as humans acted, how we would act in very similar circumstances. As such, learning about them is learning about ourselves. This, of course, can also apply to other peoples and times. For myself, at least, there are so many things in the European Middle Ages that still resonate directly today, like the Abrahamic religions, the conduct of politicians, the practice of education, the make-up of family life, the pursuit of love, the search for scientific knowledge, the wonder of invention, the building of communities, the warping of prejudices, the imagination of writers, the expression of artists, the propagation of myths and legends, and much more. Whatever might interest someone about our present world can be found in the Middle Ages as well.
Third, the Middle Ages were not what you think they were. Sure, when you hear “Middle Ages,” you likely think of kings and queens, knights and serfs, monks and nuns, stone castles and dirt roads, and a host of other things. Yes, those existed then, but almost none of it is what you think they were. What is a king? Well, you might say, a king is the ruler of a country. But did you know that the concept of a country, as we understand it, didn’t even exist during the Middle Ages? Think about that for a moment. One cannot say that one understands something as seemingly basic as a king if we don’t even understand the thing he is supposed to rule. And what about science? Oh, you might exclaim, they were against it, right? Wrong. When Isaac Newton in the 17th century talked about being a dwarf standing on the shoulders of giants, he meant, in part, the scientists of the Middle Ages, people who studied plants, animals, medicine, metallurgy, astronomy, optics, navigation, engineering, chemistry, and much else besides. Or how about this: how credulous were people in the Middle Ages? Ah, you might say, this I know: they were all gullible, ignorant, credulous rubes who believed anything that came their way. Again, nope! First of all, “gullible” isn’t even a word in the dictionary (go check, seriously). Second, upon what do you base the claim that they were ignorant? Think for a bit. Who told you that? When you actually learn about the Middle Ages (as well as other times), you find out just how clever (and ignorant) they really were. It is only modern prejudices that assume the old is outdated and the new is superior (some new things are, but “newness” alone does not make it so). Learning the history of the Middle Ages helps expunge many misconceptions that so many people have. Now, you might wonder, what does it matter if I don’t know the right facts about the Middle Ages: they are over, so it doesn’t matter, right? Well, two things. First: how do you know they don’t matter? (They still do.) Second: the Middle Ages are a good example of an era with modern prejudices weighed against it, and as such learning better about it does not simply help educate an individual about that time and place but also teaches them a valuable lesson about the ways in which any era or subject can be misunderstood through neglect. In short, studying the Middle Ages teaches one how most people today perpetuate bad ideas about that era, and learning that in turn helps people today practice discernment and critical thinking about other pieces of “information” from untrustworthy sources that might best be questioned rather than accepted as “common knowledge.”
There you have it, three reasons to study the Middle Ages. (1) The people were not like us, and so it is of value to study unusual people in unusual circumstances doing things in a way we would not today. (2) The people were very much like us, and studying them helps us better understand ourselves by seeing what real human beings have done and whose actions and ideas still affect us today. (3) For better or for worse, out of prejudice or nostalgia, the people of the Middle Ages are very misunderstood by people today, and if we study them, then not only will we shed the false ideas we have of them but we will practice our critical thinking skills so that we may better avoid false ideas that people peddle about our own world and era, many of which are based on these very myths about the Middle Ages.
“For the things of this world cannot be made known without a knowledge of mathematics.”
-Roger Bacon, “Opus Majus,” c. 1267
Stables of the Apocalypse 