It's controversial, but I don't see any evidence that it wasn't as racially biased as our current century. This was the era of the Holy Roman Empire and the Crusades. Of Kings and Queens, and feudalism. People didn't own their homes or land, the landowners had tenant farmers, indebted to them. I honestly think it was possibly worse than it is now - due to the lack of education across the masses. This was the era in which masses were done primarily in latin.
Keep in mind in 1492 - Columbus sailed to the Americas and was responsible for the deaths and enslavement of natives.
During the Middle Ages, torture was considered a successful way to extract information. Go HERE AND HERE.
Granted we had Thomas Aquinas. But unlike modern times, education was limited back then.
"In the Middle Ages, this was not the case. Only the wealthy had access to education, and then usually only for boys. There were no public schools, and those who had the privilege of getting an education usually either learned at home with a tutor or from a school run by the church. Because of this, religion informed every subject that students learned. Some of the things that students learned then we might consider to be superstitions today.
What did students study in the middle ages? All kinds of things! Just like today they learned math and grammar (or, the study of language) as well as music, art, and science. And, they played sports like archery, hammer-throwing, horseshoes, and wrestling.
Unlike today, most subjects centered around theology (or, the study of religion). There were also colleges and universities in the middle ages. Though, very few students got to attend, unlike today."
When scholars state it was a time of cultural renewal - they mean for the wealthy, and male upper classes.
In regards to Racism, while scholars argue that the "word" and general concept of "Racism" is a modern term, it does not mean that it people in medieval times didn't discriminate based on religion or other identifiers or wouldn't have ostracized based on skin color or nation of origin.
Accordingly, the treatment of Jews marks medieval England as the first racial state in the history of the West. Church and state laws produced surveillance, tagging, herding, incarceration, legal murder, and expulsion. A popular story of Jews killing Christian boys evolved over centuries, showing how changes in popular culture helped create the emerging communal identity of England. England’s 1275 Statute of Jewry even mandated residential segregation for Jews and Christians, inaugurating what would seem to be the beginning of the ghetto in Europe; and England’s expulsion of its Jews in 1290 marks the first permanent expulsion of Jews in Europe.
Similarly, Muslims in medieval Europe were transformed from military enemies into non-humans. The renowned theologian, Bernard of Clairvaux, who co-wrote the Rule for the Order of the Templars, announced that the killing of a Muslim wasn’t actually homicide, but malicide—the extermination of incarnated evil, not the killing of a person. Muslims, Islam, and the Prophet were vilified in numerous creative ways, and the extraterritorial incursions we call the Crusades coalesced into an indispensable template for Europe’s later colonial empires of the modern eras.
Even fellow Christians could be racialized. Literature justifying England’s colonization of Ireland in the twelfth century depicted the Irish as a quasi-human, savage, infantile, and bestial race—a racializing strategy in England’s colonial domination of Ireland that echoes from the medieval through the early modern period four centuries later.
In reading the articles? I think it is a matter of interpretation? From what I'm reading - Were Medieval People Racist? - yes, they were. The question is were they more racist than we are now? No. About the same.
I think the difficulty arises in that we get caught up in the label. Just like today, not everyone in the Medieval Times was racist. Quite a few weren't. Just as not everyone was misogynistic and/or sexist. Or homophobic. But we're also talking about a time period that ninety percent of the population had no access to education. And most didn't travel very far. And religion was in charge. So the question is were the people in charge racist?
Some were, some weren't.
I'm guessing you loved Catherine Called Birdy? I fell asleep during it.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2022-10-23 09:18 pm (UTC)It's controversial, but I don't see any evidence that it wasn't as racially biased as our current century. This was the era of the Holy Roman Empire and the Crusades. Of Kings and Queens, and feudalism. People didn't own their homes or land, the landowners had tenant farmers, indebted to them. I honestly think it was possibly worse than it is now - due to the lack of education across the masses. This was the era in which masses were done primarily in latin.
Keep in mind in 1492 - Columbus sailed to the Americas and was responsible for the deaths and enslavement of natives.
During the Middle Ages, torture was considered a successful way to extract information. Go HERE AND HERE.
Granted we had Thomas Aquinas. But unlike modern times, education was limited back then.
"In the Middle Ages, this was not the case. Only the wealthy had access to education, and then usually only for boys. There were no public schools, and those who had the privilege of getting an education usually either learned at home with a tutor or from a school run by the church. Because of this, religion informed every subject that students learned. Some of the things that students learned then we might consider to be superstitions today.
What did students study in the middle ages? All kinds of things! Just like today they learned math and grammar (or, the study of language) as well as music, art, and science. And, they played sports like archery, hammer-throwing, horseshoes, and wrestling.
Unlike today, most subjects centered around theology (or, the study of religion). There were also colleges and universities in the middle ages. Though, very few students got to attend, unlike today."
Education in the Middle Ages
When scholars state it was a time of cultural renewal - they mean for the wealthy, and male upper classes.
In regards to Racism, while scholars argue that the "word" and general concept of "Racism" is a modern term, it does not mean that it people in medieval times didn't discriminate based on religion or other identifiers or wouldn't have ostracized based on skin color or nation of origin.
Accordingly, the treatment of Jews marks medieval England as the first racial state in the history of the West. Church and state laws produced surveillance, tagging, herding, incarceration, legal murder, and expulsion. A popular story of Jews killing Christian boys evolved over centuries, showing how changes in popular culture helped create the emerging communal identity of England. England’s 1275 Statute of Jewry even mandated residential segregation for Jews and Christians, inaugurating what would seem to be the beginning of the ghetto in Europe; and England’s expulsion of its Jews in 1290 marks the first permanent expulsion of Jews in Europe.
Similarly, Muslims in medieval Europe were transformed from military enemies into non-humans. The renowned theologian, Bernard of Clairvaux, who co-wrote the Rule for the Order of the Templars, announced that the killing of a Muslim wasn’t actually homicide, but malicide—the extermination of incarnated evil, not the killing of a person. Muslims, Islam, and the Prophet were vilified in numerous creative ways, and the extraterritorial incursions we call the Crusades coalesced into an indispensable template for Europe’s later colonial empires of the modern eras.
Go Here.
Even fellow Christians could be racialized. Literature justifying England’s colonization of Ireland in the twelfth century depicted the Irish as a quasi-human, savage, infantile, and bestial race—a racializing strategy in England’s colonial domination of Ireland that echoes from the medieval through the early modern period four centuries later.
In reading the articles? I think it is a matter of interpretation? From what I'm reading - Were Medieval People Racist? - yes, they were. The question is were they more racist than we are now? No. About the same.
I think the difficulty arises in that we get caught up in the label. Just like today, not everyone in the Medieval Times was racist. Quite a few weren't. Just as not everyone was misogynistic and/or sexist. Or homophobic. But we're also talking about a time period that ninety percent of the population had no access to education. And most didn't travel very far. And religion was in charge.
So the question is were the people in charge racist?
Some were, some weren't.
I'm guessing you loved Catherine Called Birdy? I fell asleep during it.