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In this episode Ellen and Richard talk about what a "crusade" was in the Middle Ages. Richard explains what modern historians mean by the term "crusade"--and why there is so little agreement. He also offers a response to a question posed by Nicholas Morton in the previous episode: How did the medieval Church reconcile its doctrine of love of enemy and its pacifistic underpinnings with papal sponsorship of crusades?


Recommended reading:

Western Historiography of the Crusades 

Riley-Smith, Jonathan. What Were the Crusades? 4th edition, Ignatius Press, 2009. When this was first published in 1977, it represented the first serious effort to explain what historians mean when they refer to crusades, and remains a key work. It is also short, 177 pages, and clearly written. As I took the title for this episode from this book, it is only fair that it is listed first. Riley-Smith's The Crusades: A History and the volume of essays he edited, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Crusades are good introductions to the subject.


Constable, Giles. Crusaders and Crusading in the Twelfth Century. Routledge, 2020. Constable is responsible for the categorization of modern crusading historiography into four schools, Traditionalists, Pluralists, Generalists, and Popularists. He is also the scholar most responsible for recognizing the importance of charters as source material for crusading history. Giles, who passed away in 2021, was a welcoming and generous scholar who helped me appreciate the importance of culture in medieval warfare.

Housley, Norman. Contesting the Crusades. Blackwell Publishing, 2006. A survey of the key historiographical debates over key crusading issues (defining the crusade, origins of the First Crusade, Intentions and Motivations, etc.).  

Tyerman, Christopher. The Debate on the Crusades. Manchester University Press, 2011. From the blurb on the back cover: “This is the first book-length study of how succeeding generations from the First Crusade in 1099 to the present day have understood, refashioned, moulded and manipulated accounts of these medieval wars of religion to suit changing contemporary circumstances and interests.” It is a bit idiosyncratic—Tyerman has strong opinions about the work of fellow scholars--but the author clearly knows his stuff. Tyerman also has the distinction of being the author of one of the longest single volume histories of the Crusade (God’s War, Harvard U. Press, 2009) and one of the shortest (The Crusades: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford U. Press, 2006).

Muslim views of the Crusades

Hillenbrand, Carole, The Crusades: The Islamic Perspectives. Edinburgh University Press, 1999. This is a monumental (704 pages), groundbreaking study of how Muslims viewed the crusaders and the West in the era of the crusades, and later. 

Niall Christie, Muslims and Crusaders: Christianity’s Wars in the Middle East, 1095-1382, from the Islamic Sources. Routledge, 2014. This is a concise and well thought out survey of the crusades from the contemporary Muslim perspective, with a well-chosen selection of excerpts from medieval Arabic sources.

Sivan , Emmanuel.  "The Crusaders described by modern Arab historiography". Asian and African Studies , 8 ( 1972 ): 104-49. One of the few studies of modern Arab historiography of the Crusades (written, interestingly, by an Israeli scholar).

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My guest for this episode is Dr. Nicholas Morton, whom you may remember from our first episode about the Mongols. Today Nick and I will be talking about crusading warfare, in particular, about the military activities and challenges faced by the Crusader States established in the Levant by the First Crusade.  Among the topics we will discussing are the different approaches to warfare practiced by the European Crusaders and their Turkish and Fatimid adversaries; how the crusaders and the leaders of the Latin Crusader states adjusted--or failed to adjust--to the novel challenges presented by warfare in the Middle East; why the First Crusade succeeded while the others failed; and whether, militarily, the Crusader states were doomed from the start.

Recommended reading:
Nicholas Morton. The Crusader States & Their Neighbours: A Military History, 1099-1187. Oxford University Press, 2020.

R.C. Smail. Crusading Warfare, 1097-1193. 2nd ed. Cambridge University Press, 1995 (originally published 1956)

Christopher Marshall. Warfare in the Latin East, 1192-1291. Cambridge University Press, 1992.

John France. Victory in the East: A Military History of the First Crusade. Cambridge University Press, 1994.

John France. Western Warfare in the Age of the Crusades: 1000-1300. Cornell University Press, 1999.

David Nicolle.  Crusader Warfare Volume I: Byzantium, Western Europe and the Battle for the Holy Land. Bloomsbury Academic Press, 2007.

David Nicolle.  Crusader Warfare Volume II: Muslims, Mongols and the Struggle Against the Crusades. Bloomsbury Academic Press, 2007.

John Gillingham, “Richard I and the Science of Warfare” - from War and Government: Essays in Honour of J.O. Prestwich (1984); "William the Bastard at War," in Studies in Medieval History Presented to R. Allen Brown, ed. c. Harper-Bill, C. Holdsworth, and J. Nelson (1989); "War and Chivalry in the History of William the Marshal." Thirteenth Century England v.2 (1991); "'Up with Orthodoxy': In Defense of Vegetian Strategy." Journal of Medieval Military History, vol. 2 (2004): 21-41."

Clifford Rogers. "The Vegetian 'Science of Warfare' in the Middle Ages." Journal of Medieval Military History, vol. 1 (2002): 1-19.

Stephen Morillo. "Battle-Seeking: The Contexts and Limits of Vegetian Strategy." Journal of Medieval Military History, vol. 1 (2002): 149-58.

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In this episode my guest host Professor Larissa 'Kat" Tracy and I discuss my favorite medieval romance, Chrétien de Troyes' late twelfth century poem, "Yvain, the Knight with the Lion."   We place the poem within its historical context--the first European industrial and commercial revolution, and the emergence of a courtly society and culture--and analyze what it reveals about aristocratic values and conceptions of love, gender relations, and chivalry in the late twelfth century.

The translation I used for the quotations is by Carleton W. Carroll (Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances. Penguin Classics. Penguin Books, 1991).

This episode includes a musical snippet from Andrei Krylov's "Noble medieval knight song" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=imdIX--ZYJo

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Last May, I spoke with Professor Nicholas Morton about the Mongols and their impact upon the medieval Near East.  This episode digs deeper into that subject, focusing on the Mongol conquest and destruction of Baghdad in February of 1258.  The Mongol sack of Baghdad is notorious for its brutality. Estimates of the number killed range from 90,000 to the 200,000 claimed by the leader of the Mongol army, Hulegu Khan.  Much like Alaric's sack of Rome in 410, the Mongol conquest of Baghdad, the seat of the Abbasid caliphate, had a symbolic significance beyond its political and military importance. It signaled both the end of an independent Abbasid caliphate and announced the Mongol intent to dominate the entire Islamic Near East, a goal that was to be thwarted by the Mamluks of Egypt. 

In this episode, I interview Peter Konieczny, the co-founder and editor of Medievalists.net, about his research into the Mongol conquest of Baghdad. Peter explains the role played by non-Mongols in instigating the invasion of Iran and Iraq for their own profit, why the Mongols targeted Baghdad, what that city was on the eve of the Mongol assault, and the real historical significance of the event.  I hope you will join us.

I've turned a number of the podcast episodes into YouTube videos using PowerPoint to add relevant images.  These can be found at https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsLl5BdGBDlAlYULY1zeckOOdVPrSIN2X

If you have questions about this or any episode, feel free to contact me at [email protected]

If you are enjoying "'Tis But A Scratch" on a site that has reviews and ratings, please consider giving it a good review and high rating so that others interested in the Middle Ages might give it a try. Thanks!

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In this episode, the second of a two part series, Dr. Chrissy Senecal and I continue our discussion of the Old English epic poem Beowulf.  In it we talk about the challenges of translation and look at literary and cinematic adaptations of the poem.


Sound clips in this episode:

“The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly” soundtrack (composer: Ennio Morricone) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOl73VQOS9M

Trailer for “Beowulf” (1999) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOrfinPSqyQ

Beowulf seduced by Grendel’s mother: “Beowulf” (2007) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IyltO_ump0s

Recommended:

“The Saga Thing” podcast’s “Hwæt a Movie” episodes on “Beowulf” (1999) and “The Thirteenth Warrior”

https://sagathingpodcast.wordpress.com/2023/09/20/hwaet-a-movie-episode-1-beowulf-1999/

https://sagathingpodcast.wordpress.com/2023/12/20/hwaet-a-movie-episode-2-the-13th-warrior/

(For those who love Norse sagas, this is the perfect podcast. Each episode the co-hosts John and Andy [Dr. John Sexton and Dr. Andrew Pfrenger] describe, discuss, and rate sagas. They have recently branched out to “Beowulf” movies.)

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This is the first of a two-part series on the most famous monster story in pre-modern literature, the Anglo-Saxon epic poem Beowulf. My co-host for both is Dr. Christine Senecal of Shippensburg University. In this episode Chrissy and I talk about the poem itself. We begin with the story of the hero Beowulf and how as a youth he kills two monsters ravaging the mead-hall of King Hrothgar, the fearsome Grendel and his even more fierce mother, and how as an aged king he fights and kills a fire-breathing dragon, saving his kingdom and winning the dragon's treasure, but at the cost of his life.  We then discuss when the poem was written and what we can learn from it about the warrior aristocratic culture of early Anglo-Saxon England.  In the follow-on episode, Chrissy and I talk about modern literary and cinematic adaptations of the Beowulf  story. I hope you can join us.

Passages are quoted from
Beowulf, A Dual-Language Edition, trans. Howell D. Chickering, Jr. (New York: Anchor Books, 1977).
Beowulf: The Donaldson Translation Backgrounds and Sources Criticism, ed. Joseph Tuso (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1975).
Beowulf, A New Translation, trans. Maria Dahvana Headley (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020).
The Heliand: The Saxon Gospel, trans. G. Ronald Murphy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992).
The Dating of Beowulf, A Reassessment, ed. Leonard Neidorf (Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2014).

Music:
"Wælheall," composed by Hrōðmund Wōdening (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQfdqIyqJ4g)
"Caedmon's Hymn" on a lyre, sung and played by Peter Pringle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A8WaPIu1tAc)

If you are interested in the Middle Ages--and I assume you are if you listening to 'Tis But A Scratch--you might want to check out Dr. Christine Senecal's Instagram page (https://www.instagram.com/chrissysenecal/) and her webpage, "Weird History Stories" (https://chrissysenecal.com/). Both are well worth a visit.

I would same about Medievalists.net,  a website dedicated to offering readers news, articles, videos and more about the medieval world and how that history is presented today (https://www.medievalists.net/)

Finally, if you are enjoying 'Tis But A Scratch, please tell friends and family about it. Good ratings and good reviews help spread the word!

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This is a revised--and a lot longer--version of our twenty-first episode ("Some thoughts about Hanukkah by a (secular) Jewish medieval historian").  That episode was  just what the title said, some thoughts about the role of Hanukkah in contemporary America and the Middle Ages. In it Ellen had a throwaway line about the Puritan war on Christmas. I thought that our listeners might be interested in why the Puritans objected to and tried to suppress Christmas, and, related to that, how Christmas, as well as Hanukkah was celebrated in the Middle Ages. I know that the result is a mishmash, but I hope it's an enjoyable and informative mishmash.

Happy Holidays!

This episode includes snippets from

"Here we come a-wassailing" The St. Michael's Singers conducted by Paul Leddington Wright https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m29jEvTfVFU

Ma'oz Tsur sung by cantors from across Canada, Temple Sinai Toronto, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFY--az4z3w

Adam Sandler's "The Hanukkah Song" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KX5Z-HpHH9g


Reading:

Hanukkah:

Cait Stevenson, “Celebrating Hannukah in the Middle Ages” by Cait Stevenson, posted on Medievalists.net https://www.medievalists.net/2018/12/celebrating-hanukkah-middle-ages/

Susan Weingarten, “Medieval Hanukkah Traditions: Jewish Festive Foods in their European Contexts, Food and History 8 (2010)::41-62

Dianne Ashton,  (2013). Hanukkah in America: A History. New York: New York University Press, 2013. 

Tsi Freeman, “Why Couldn’t Jews and Greeks Just Get Along?” https://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/64639/jewish/Couldnt-the-Jews-and-Greeks-Get-Along.htm

[The Wikipedia entry on Hanukkah is quite good]

Medieval Christmas:

Katie Ihnat, “The Middle Ages,” in The Oxford Handbook of Christmas, ed. T. Larson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020).

Sophie Jackson, The Medieval Christmas. The History Press: Stroud, 2013.

Peter Konieczny, “Seven Medieval Christmas Traditions.” Medievalists.net. https://www.medievalists.net/2012/12/seven-medieval-christmas-traditions/

Compton Reeves, Pleasures and Pastimes in Medieval England. New York: Oxford, 1998.

Puritan war on Christmas:

Stephen Nissenbaum, “Christmas in Early New England, 1620-1820: Puritanism, Popular Culture, and the Printed Word.” American Antiquary Society (1996): pp. 79-164 (https://www.americanantiquarian.org/proceedings/44539478.pdf)

J.A.R. Pimlott, | “Christmas under the Puritans,” in  History Today Volume 10 Issue 12 December 1960

“Why did Cromwell abolish Christmas?” The Cromwell Association https://www.olivercromwell.org/faqs4.htm

The Puritan Cultural Revolution

David Underdown, Revel, Riot, and Rebellion: Popular Politics and Culture in England 1603-1660.  Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987

Christopher Durston. "Puritan Rule and the Failure of Cultural Revolution, 1645–1660." In: Durston, C., Eales, J. (eds) The Culture of English Puritanism, 1560–1700. Themes in Focus. Palgrave, London. 1996.

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“Feudalism” was once accepted by academic and popular historians alike as a defining, if not the defining, feature of medieval society. For military historians, the High Middle Ages, the period from around 1050 to 1300, was once the Age of the Feudal Knight. This is no longer the case. If academic historians use it at all in their writings or classrooms, it is usually to dismiss it. For most medieval historians, feudalism has joined Viking horned helmets and “the right of the first night” in the ranks of myths about the Middle Ages.

Richard, however, isn't most historians. In this episode, Richard and Ellen talk about the meanings of "feudalism" and why Richard is reluctant to throw it upon the cart of dead historical constructs.

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In our third and final episode of the series, Richard talks with Professor Ryan Lavelle of the University of Winchester in the U.K. about Alfred the Great. Dr. Lavelle is a leading expert on Anglo-Saxon and Viking warfare. He is also the historical consultant for the BBC/Netflix television series "The Last Kingdom," based on the Saxon Chronicle novels of Bernard Cornwell. In this episode, Richard again poses the question whether Alfred deserves to be called "the Great." He and Dr. Lavelle then discuss the portrayal of King Alfred in "The Last Kingdom," and why he is portrayed that way.

This episode includes short snippets from Season 1 of "The Last Kingdom."
The intro and exit music is by the talented and generous Alexander Nakarada. 

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This is the second of a three part series about King Alfred of Wessex (reigned 871-899), the only English king to be called "the Great." In this episode Ellen and I chat with Dr. Barbara Yorke, Professor Emeritus at the University of Winchester in the U.K.. Professor Yorke is arguably the world's leading expert on Anglo-Saxon Wessex. She and I share the distinction of being among the host of biographers of King Alfred.  The basic question I pose to her is whether Alfred deserves to be called "the Great." Her answer is a bit more nuanced and less adulatory than mine was in episode one, which is one of the reasons I thought it important that you hear her assessment of Alfred.

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Intro and exit music are by Alexander Nakarada

If you have questions, feel free to contact me at [email protected]