They inhabited a lost world of splendour and brutality, a world dominated by religious change, in which there were few saints.
The formal education of women was rarely considered important. Girls of good birth were taught domestic skills at home or in a convent, and rarely learned to read and write, for it was feared that if...
Perhaps the Queen's prayers, and those of Bernard, had been efficacious, or perhaps Louise had been more attentive in bed, for during 1145--the exact date is not recorded--she bore a daughter, who was...
I must bear it well as I may. As my sainted mother used to say, we never come to the kingdom of Heaven but by troubles.
Maundy Thursday
Although, by todays standards, he set a vast amount of work, he believed as he told Mrs Ashley, that 'If you pour much drink into a goblet, the most part will dash out and run over'. In Ascham's view,...
Again, she may have made the equation that sexual involvement was inextricably linked with death.
This obsession with death and suffering revealed itself in literature, poetry, art, and particularly in sculpture, with the appearance of cadaver tombs with an effigy of the deceased in life above, an...
The King ruled in consultation with his chief nobles, who fromed the nucleus of what was in effect a military aristocracy, whose power was centered on the castles they used to subdue and dominate the...
This led to a lessening of confidence in the judicial system. Justice, it seemed, was available only to those who could pay enough to secure a ‘right verdict
Often, little brother, there is no smoke without fire.
Each man was born to his degree, and a happy man was one who did not question his place in life.
When these with violence were burned to death,We wished for our Elizabeth.
Giladi states that Jews from
An objective viewpoint was beyond her; she was single-minded to a fault.
Between Scylla and Charybdis,
Arthur managed to speak to his grandmother [Queen Eleanor of England], demanding that she evacuate the castle with all her possessions and then go peaceably wherever she wished, for he wanted to show...
At school, up to the age of sixteen, I found history boring, for we were studying the Industrial Revolution, which was all about Acts, Trade Unions and the factory system, and I wanted to know about p...
I will never give him the satisfaction of knowing how much he has wounded and enraged me. In my silence lies my strength.
Henry VIII owned more than eight hundred carpets,