Medieval People Michael Prestwich by Michael Prestwich 9780500772300, 0500772304 instant download after payment.

A rich and revelatory exploration of the medieval world, conveyed through intimate biographies by a renowned historian

This engrossing, exquisitely illustrated, often witty account tells the life stories of some seventy individuals who "made" the Middle Ages. There are kings and queens, popes and politicians, soldiers and merchants, scholars, authors and visionaries. They range from the important, such as El Cid or Frederick Barbarossa, to the little known, such as the dissolute Venetian nun Clara Sanuto. Some were astonishingly successful: the empire created by Chinggis Khan was one of the most extensive ever seen. Some, such as Charles the Bold, the over-ambitious 15th–century duke of Burgundy, were failures.
Contrary to modern myth, medieval people did not believe the earth was flat; torture was far less common than in later centuries; and technological advances included guns, printing, blast furnaces, spectacles, stirrups and the compass. Full of insights such...