MYTHS ABOUT THE MIDDLE AGES
By Tim Lambert
In the Middle Ages 9 out of 10 people died before the age of 40
Nonsense! We do not know exactly what average life expectancy at birth was in the past but historians think it was about 35 years in the Middle Ages. (So 50% of the people born reached that age). However that does not mean that people dropped dead when they reached 35! Average life expectancy at birth was around 35 but a great many of the people born died in childhood. We don't know exactly what percentage died but if we say about 25% of people died before they were 5 years old we are probably not wide of the mark. Perhaps as many as 40% died before they reached adulthood. However if you could survive childhood and your teenage years you had a good chance of living to your 50s or your early 60s and even in the Middle Ages there were some people who lived to 70 or 80. People in the Middle Ages were much smaller than we are Not true! People were slightly smaller. Skeletons from the Mary Rose show the sailors were, on average, between 5 foot 7 inches and 5 foot 8 inches tall. Burial grounds from the Middle Ages and other periods also show that people were, on average, a little bit shorter than modern day people but they were not much smaller. There was once a female Pope called Pope Joan This is very unlikely to be true. According to the story a female Pope reigned for more than 2 years from 855 to 858. (In reality Leo IV reigned from 847 to 855 and Benedict III reigned from 855 to 888. There was a gap of only a few weeks between them). Anyway according to the story the female Pope was disguised as a man. Remarkably nobody ever suspected she was a woman. The truth only came to light when the Pope gave birth in public! (Incredibly nobody ever noticed she was pregnant). However the first mention of a female Pope was 200 years after she is supposed to have reigned. If the story is true why did nobody write about it at the time? It would have caused a sensation throughout Europe so why did nobody mention it at the time? Almost certainly the story is fiction. King John signed the Magna Carta No he did not! He sealed the Magna Carta by pressing a seal into hot wax but he did not sign it. In the Middle Ages scholars spent hours debating how many angels could stand on the head of a pin There is no truth in this silly story whatever. There is no evidence that anybody in the Middle Ages asked this ridiculous question. People who lived in the Middle Ages were not stupid. Far from it.
In the Middle Ages some armour was so heavy knights sometimes had to be lifted onto their horses with ropes
This is quite untrue. Armour was heavy but certainly not that heavy.
As The Year 1000 AD approached people across Europe panicked. They feared that Jesus Christ was about to return and the World would end
This is an old wives tale. There is no evidence that any such panic occurred. No writer of the time mentioned anything unusual. It was not till hundreds of years later that writers claimed that people panicked as the year 1000 approached. It is part of a more general myth that people in the Middle Ages were foolish and gullible (any more than we are!).
Richard III was a hunchback
There is no evidence that Richard III was a hunchback. Nobody at the time mentioned any such deformity. Furthermore we know he was skilled at jousting, which would have been impossible if he had a serious disability. The story that he was a hunchback first appeared decades after his death. The story may have been invented to discredit Richard III. In those days many people believed that if you had a physical abnormality it was because you were a wicked person.
Vikings wore helmets with horns on
There is no evidence that Vikings ever wore horned helmets when they went into battle. There is no evidence either that Vikings went into battle wearing helmets with wings on. A related myth is that Vikings drank from human skulls. They did not!
To read about the Vikings click here.
Most churchyards have a yew tree because men would use the yew's wood to make bows
This is almost certainly a myth. Records show that bowyers preferred to use yew from Southern or Eastern Europe to make bows. (English yew was not particularly good for that purpose). In fact churchyards probably had yews because their leaves are poisonous. Villagers might let their animals graze in the churchyard. Growing yew trees was a good way to stop them.
Joan of Arc was burned as a witch
This is not true. She was burned for heresy (because she dressed as a man).
Before Columbus people thought the world was flat Nonsense! In the Middle Ages people were well aware that the world is round. Columbus Discovered America He did not. Obviously the ancestors of todays Native Americans entered North America thousands of years before Columbus. Furthermore Columbus was not even the first European to discover America. The first European to sight the continent was Bjarni Herjolfsson. He was sailing to Greenland in c.985 AD when he sighted a new land (he did not actually land). About 15 years later a man named Leif Ericsson led an expedition to the new land. He called parts of North America, Helluland, Markland and Vinland. Ericsson spent the winter in Vinland. Although he did not return other Vikings did but they failed to establish a permanent colony. Centuries later Columbus believed he could sail direct from Europe to China across the Atlantic Ocean. (Columbus underestimated the size of the earth. He did not know that North and South America and the Pacific Ocean existed). Columbus made four voyages across the Atlantic and although he landed on several Caribbean islands he never set foot on mainland North America. Blackheath in London got its name because victims of the Black Death from London were buried there This is definitely untrue. It was called Blackheath at the time of the Domesday Book (1086) nearly 300 years before the Black Death of 1348-49. There is also a myth that Blackheath got its name because black slaves were sold there, which is obviously nonsense. We do not know for sure were its name came from. Perhaps the area had dark soil? At any rate it had nothing to do with the Black Death or black slaves. Golf is an acronym of 'gentlemen only ladies forbidden' This is nonsense. The word golf is derived from an old Dutch word 'kolf' which meant club. (In the Middle Ages the Dutch played games with clubs but golf proper began in Scotland). The Scots changed the word slightly to 'golve' or 'goff'and in time it became our word golf.
Archers carried their arrows on their backs
Only if they were riding horses. Normally, when on foot archers would carry arrows in containers attached to their belts. (It is much easier to retrieve a longbow arrow from your belt than from over your shoulder). Robin Hood is usually shown with a quiver of arrows on his back. If Robin Hood ever existed it is much more likely he carried his arrows on his belt.
In the Middle Ages Spices were used to disguise the taste of tainted meat
This is not true for a simple reason - spices were very expensive and only the rich could afford them. The rich, of course did not eat tainted meat. They only ate the best quality meat! Spices were used to enhance the taste of meat.