The Story of the Middle Ages

Week 12: Exam Review


Hi everyone!

This will be the last blog post for our unit! :( No need to worry about commenting this week, the information here is just to help you continue preparing and revising for the exam.

Before I get started with my exam revision tips please do take a moment to click on the following link and fill in the attached survey on the tutorial blogs. Clare and I would really value your feedback on the blog aspect of this course we have tried this year. This is the first year we have incorporated blogs into the unit and your feedback will help us improve any online teaching component included in future years. Please go on and have your say!

Click here to take survey

Remember that the exam for our unit will be held next Wednesday (May 23rd) at our usual lecture time of 10am. You will have two hours to write a 1000 word essay on the given exam question and primary source extracts. If you are unable to attend our exam time you can also write the exam at Clayton (on Monday, May 21st at 10am), or email Clare to request an alternate sitting.

In preparing for the exam you may wish to......


- Look over the mock test on Blackboard – practice creating an essay outline
- Look over all lecture notes
- Review primary sources: chronology, thematic significance, relationships between texts
- Remember your document analysis skills: The 5 ‘W’ Questions
- Create a timeline of sources
- Review key themes and how they are connected

For fun I've pasted a couple of links below to some quirky youtube history videos. One of your classmates discovered them and brought them to my attention. To me they contain the right mixture of humour, fun and geekiness that history is all about! As a revision exercise watch these videos and see what interpretations you agree with, and which you don't. Why do you agree with some and perhaps not others? What have you learned in our course to help you support or critique the arguments presented in these videos? For instance I think he's missing the boat big time on the backwardness of Europe during the 'Dark Ages' but that video is a great intro into understanding what was happening in other parts of the world during the European Middle Ages. I hope you enjoy! There are loads of videos in the series but I've just pasted three here that I think are particularly relevant to us.

The Crusades

The 'Dark' Ages

The Rise of Christianity

Finally, as another revision exercise, I've included a medieval image below that is quite famous. Using your knowledge of the Middle Ages learned in our course what could you tell someone about the Middle Ages from looking at this image? What key themes and concepts does it combine?

God the Geometer - Codex Vindobonensis 2554
French, c.1250

I wish everyone the best of luck with the exam and your future history endevours! If anyone has any last-minute questions about any of the course material please let me know via email.

All the best,

Diana

The Black Death: Europe in the Later Middle Ages

Hi everyone,

Before beginning this week's blog post I've been asked to pass along a message from Clare.

Dear Students,

You will have received en email from SETU (Student Evaluation of Teaching and Units), inviting you to evaluate ATS 1316. Please do so! We really want to know what you think.

These surveys are taken extremely seriously by the University. They are used when staff members apply for promotion, or for other jobs. They are also used to make changes to the units for next year, drawing on student comments. These blogs, for example, emerged out of comments by students that they sometimes felt disconnected during first year. Hence, we have tried to build community and encourage your readings by running these blogs.

So let us know what you think of the unit. YOU ARE VERY POWERFUL!

Many thanks, Clare

 ...

Week 11: Famine and Disease: The Calamitous 14th Century - Tutorial Discussion Post

By: Samantha, Jane, Georgia and Lachlan

Hi everyone,

This week we’ll be discussing ‘Famine and Disease: The calamitous 14^th century’, so basically the Black Death! Although the readings take a very thorough look at the social and economic issues of this time, there are some great accounts of the plague included this week as well. A particular focus in this week's reading is the economic state of pre-plague Florence. It looks at the boom of the wool and banking industries and the general expansion/urbanisation of Florence and thus the social, political and economic ramifications.

Florence, Italy

 This week we’ll take a look at this enormously successful period in Florence that would later develop into the Renaissance and the tremendous blow to that success which was the Black Death, arriving in the summer of 1348, and how it spread throughout Europe. 

Attire worn by doctors as protection from
the Bubonic Plague

Below are a few answers to some discussion questions for this week to help get the further discussion in comments rolling:

Explain the nature of the ‘flourishing urban civilization’ that Margaret King describes in Italy prior to the Black Death. What were the economic foundations of the civilizations of Florence and Venice?

King describes work being so well that it could be completely neglected for some time. She goes on to describe the amounts of people thriving in Florence, “90 000 mouths…80 000 men in the territory and district of Florence.” Prior to the Black Death were thoughts that would re-emerge during the Renaissance; ideas of new buildings, young writers and thinkers etc…

Florence was well known for its banking and wool. Both these industries had papal support and of course noble support. Thereby, these markets would always be in business. Considering the expanse and necessity of cloth, Florence’s wool industry was a huge investment in the trade industry.

Venice was and still is recognized for its shipbuilding and also its trading industry. Venice’s galleys were ideal for dangerous trading journeys. This reputation had been built up over the years and became an important investment for traders to try and utilize.

Does the extract from Petrarch's Letter to Posterity indicate an optimistic or pessimistic sense of his legacy?

Petrarch’s Letter to Posterity defies the optimism-pessimism binary. In this work he settles on a balanced middle ground; he is confident of the work he has completed in his lifetime and yet uncertain of whether or not it will endure. This position is exemplified in the excerpt from the opening section of To Posterity contained in this week’s readings.

Take, for example, the phrase “You may perhaps have heard something about me- although it is doubtful that my poor little name may travel far in space and time” this phrase is a perfectly contained example of the ambiguity of Petrarch’s outlook on his own significance. In the first clause, he implies that an undetermined reader of the letter may have heard of him, while the second is a supplementary phrase indicating a humbly realistic awareness that he may well have faded into obscurity after death. He further acknowledges mortality but not complete insignificance in the phrase “But I was one of your own clock, a little mortal man”.

Letter to Posterity is fascinating because it reveals Petrarch’s extraordinary sense of self. He realises the subjectivity of his position in time, looking to the both the past (and the great minds that came before him) and the future, conscious that he mediates the transmission of a great legacy of human spirit.

Hope those answers gave a bit more insight into the readings this week. Here are some further discussion questions to consider:

1.     How does the summary of the narrative Ascent of Mont Ventoux (mentioned in this week’s readings) relate to the themes that emerge from a reading of the excerpt from the introduction from To Posterity?

2.     Do you think the humility of To Posterity is real or disingenuous?

3.     According to Margaret King, why was banking and the wool industry successful in Florence?

4.     In the beginning, how did Venetian trading start to flourish? How are Venetian galleys depicted through King’s description (are they seen as good or bad ships)? 

5.     What does King suggest started the plague? What were the death toll figures of the Black Death?

Thanks guys,

Sam, Jane, Lachlan and Georgia.

Here are a few more images of medieval artistic interpretations of the Black Death:

Sufferers of the plague being blessed

Plague sufferers

Victims of the plague

The Sack of Constantinople and Later Crusading

Week 10: Courtly Culture and Literature in the Middle Ages/Later Crusading 
Tutorial Discussion Post
By: Jarrod, Bonnie and Nam

Hi guys, thought we'd just throw some thoughts out there with no coherent structure which is inevitable with a conglomeration of ideas I guess. There is so much literature on the crusades that I wasn't too surprised when I came across the differences in Riley-Smith's and Runciman's historical analysis, one bordering on apologetic, the other with the opinion of it being destructive. What's interesting is that they are (or were) both very important commentators on the Crusades. I was also happy to finally get a hold of some Byzantine-related stuff again, which always interests me.

A returning crusader

Now lets get some discussion going!

• Do you believe the Crusades were a defensive or offensive campaign against Christendom's enemies?
• Were any of the Crusades successful in their aims to protect the Greek Christians?
• If you've read Riley-Smith's argument, what do you think of his contention that crusading was an act of love?

• What defines an enemy? The term is very loose, as it's turned against heretics, state enemies as well as utilised as an excuse to invade a neighbouring state.

• How was the Church to appear humble and poor when they needed the funding to save the kingdom of Jerusalem?

• Why are they considered a movement of the people? True, the armies were amongst the largest Europe had ever mobilised at the time, why was it a movement?

The conquest of Constantinople

The crusades' purposes ranged from defending kingdoms, assaulting states, seizing trade, funding and holy sites. The offer of pay and redemption from sins and legal fines was also a partial coarse of Crusaders reputation as a pillaging force, attracting criminals. The advent of mendicancy was also of a concern for the crusades.

Also to consider was how as crusading armies became more professional, mercernaries made up greater numbers. This was due to Pope Innocent involving the people as whole, utilising the crusades to revitalise religious fervor throughout Christendom. Asking simply for money, instead of military action, allowed for a replacement of a conscripted army with a mercantile army whilst simultaneously creating a 'movement' of the people.

This act increased social tensions as those with money could afford to recieve redemption from the Pope indirectly discluding the poor from such possible services.

Thanks guys,
Nam, Jarrod, Bonnie

Orlando Bloom trying his hand at crusading

....

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to take a moment with this week's blog post and highlight a couple of links you all may find interesting. 

Firstly, you may wish to check out the online access to an exhibit currently being held at the Bodleian Library in Oxford. It is entitled 'The Romance of the Middle Ages' and I think may be interesting to check out especially as this week in lecture we will be learning all about courtly love and culture during the Middle Ages. Part of my own work involves the study of courtly love so I couldn't resist telling you all about this!

http://medievalromance.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/romance-home

Exhibition Poster

Secondly, here is a link to the medieval and renaissance courses Monash offers in November-December of every year in Prato, Italy. Clare mentioned them in our last lecture and I've posted the link here for anyone who wishes to find out more information. Who doesn't love Italy right?

http://www.asatours.com.au/cc21212-monash-renaissance-florence/1405-cc21212-monash-florence-overview

http://www.ita.monash.edu/study/non-monash.html

All the best,

Diana