HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2024-12-12T18:16:55.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: Medieval influencers: 4 women who brought change to the Middle Ages
items: Tails from the deep: separating the real folklore of mermaids from Disney stories
items: The real magic of Harry Potter: 15 details the wizarding world borrows from history
items: The medieval mystics with a hotline to God
items: Heavenly dew: crying in the Middle Ages
items: A brief history of medieval magic

Medieval influencers: 4 women who brought change to the Middle Ages
type: item
date: 2024-12-12T09:00:43.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Historical people
subject: Medieval life
description: Medieval women rarely wielded political or economic power – yet, a little like the most persuasive doyennes of social media today, their words could shape minds and lives far beyond their own circles. Hetta Howes introduces four female literary and spiritual trailblazers
encoded: Christine de Pizan: the trailblazer who used her literary brilliance to wage a war on misogyny Christine de Pizan (1364–c1430) was the definition of a hustler. One of the most prolific writers of the Middle Ages, with a career spanning almost four decades, her poems and books are still enjoyed today. Christine grew up in luxury. Her father, astrologer to King Charles V of France, moved the family from Venice to France when she was just a little girl. She had a happy childhood and was pleased with the husband her father chose for her, Etienne du Castel, whom she married when she was just 15. But disaster struck when Etienne died of the plague a decade later. Finding herself the sole provider for her children, Christine refused to remarry but instead picked up a quill. In doing so, she became the first known woman in European history to make a living as a writer. Read more | The gender pain gap: perceptions of women's health through history Christine was not only a talented author but an astute businesswoman. She became expert in book production, and leveraged her networks to ensure that her writing ended up in the hands of the highest echelons of French society. She started her career writing love poetry, but switched gears when she began to attract the attention of a wealthier audience. She wrote political treatises for princes and other nobility, including a manual on how to be the perfect knight. She strategised, often choosing to write in French, a language “more common throughout the world than any other”, so that her books didn’t become “useless and forgotten”. She was even commissioned to write a biography of the late Charles V. With her readership secured, Christine set out to effect change. In her political works, she called for an end to the in-fighting then plaguing the French nobility. She devoted a poem to Joan of Arc, confident that the peasant girl would lead the French to victory against the English in the Hundred Years’ War. Most famously, she wrote …

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Tails from the deep: separating the real folklore of mermaids from Disney stories
type: item
date: 2023-06-14T06:42:00.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: General ancient history
subject: General Early Modern
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Renaissance
description: Mermaids are beautiful, benevolent and captivating – or at least that is the Disneyfied version. Writing for BBC History Revealed, Dr Hetta Howes separates the real-world legends from the fishwives’ stories...
encoded: What image comes to mind when you hear the word ‘mermaid’? For many people, it will be Ariel, the redheaded Disney princess who trades her tail for legs and her voice for a chance to win herself a life on land. For others, the word will conjure the wan heroine of Hans Christian Andersen’s original fairytale who, unlike her Disney counterpart, is rejected by her prince and dissolves into sea foam, losing the chance to gain an immortal soul. It’s largely thanks to the popularity of Andersen’s fairytale that mermaids have become standardised in the west over the past two centuries. Like Ariel, they are depicted as hybrid creatures, with the torso and head of a beautiful woman and the tail of a fish. They often carry a mirror and a comb, and have the speech and personality of a human woman. On the podcast | Sirens, succubi & sex symbols: a history of female monsters However, the history of the mermaid myth, and its many manifestations across the globe, reveals a far more complex picture. Mermaids transform depending on which seas we find them in. Sometimes beautiful, sometimes monstrous, sometimes seductive, sometimes maternal – and oftentimes all of these at once – these enchanting entities can be a far cry from the tragic victim of Andersen’s influential tale. Mermaids, regardless of where they call home, are persistently contradictory, ambivalent and powerful figures, used to represent the unknown and the undiscovered. Were mermaids and sirens one and the same? The origins of mermaids are difficult to trace. While some cultural historians believe that fish goddesses in early religions were their ancestors, others consider sirens to be the first models for mermaids. Made famous by Homer’s epic poem the Odyssey, sirens are bird-woman hybrids who lure sailors to their deaths through song and who may eat the flesh of men who do not please them sexually. In the 13th century, writer Richard de Fournival recorded three kinds of sirens, two of which are actually half woman a…

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The real magic of Harry Potter: 15 details the wizarding world borrows from history
type: item
date: 2021-11-16T08:30:43.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: General Modern
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: HistoryExtra Academy
subject: HistoryExtra Academy history of witchcraft course
subject: Witches
description: To mark the 20-year anniversary of the release of the film Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Dr Hetta Howes investigates the real history that inspired JK Rowling’s magical world…
encoded: Since the publication of The Philosopher’s Stone in 1997, the Harry Potter franchise has exploded globally. Harry, Ron and Hermione are some of the best-loved characters from children’s literature, and their adventures in the Wizarding World have even reached the big screen and stage – with November 2021 being the 20th anniversary of the first film in the series being released. The Potterverse is one of staggering imagination, though that’s not to say it is devoid of truth. From fantastic beasts to the mysterious science of alchemy, JK Rowling’s world of witchcraft and wizardry is filled with historical and mythological influences just waiting to be uncovered… Spoilers ahead for both films and series Nicolas Flamel was a real person In the first book (and film) of the series, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone – Sorcerer’s Stone in the US – Harry eats his first chocolate frog on the train to Hogwarts and discovers a ‘Famous Witch and Wizard’ card, which describes a man called Nicolas Flamel. In the books, Flamel is a friend to Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore, and the man responsible for creating the titular Philosopher’s Stone. Flamel is not Rowling’s invention, however – he really existed. Born in Pontoise, France, in around 1330, he was a successful scribe and bookseller. After his death in 1418, rumours began circulating that he had learned alchemical secrets on a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, in north-western Spain. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2021/11/GettyImages-526776510web_readyl-e650c0e.jpg" width="620" height="413" alt="Coloured engraving depicting French scrivener and manuscript seller Nicolas Flamel, who developed a posthumous reputation as an alchemist due to his reputed work on the Philosopher's Stone" title="Coloured engraving depicting French scrivener and manuscript seller Nicolas Flamel, who developed a posthumous reputation as an alchemist due to his reputed work on the Philosopher's Stone…

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The medieval mystics with a hotline to God
type: item
date: 2018-03-17T12:26:50.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Medieval life
description: They ate lepers' scabs, starved themselves to the brink of death, and had themselves permanently bricked into solitary cells. Hetta Howes gives six examples of the extreme lengths to which some believers were prepared to go to get closer to Jesus in the Middle Ages...
encoded: This article was first published in the April 2018 issue of BBC History Magazine Pleasures of the flesh For many medieval mystics, the key to spiritual ecstasy lay in degrading acts such as drinking the pus from wounds In the 1360s, a young woman called Catherine of Siena experienced a vision from God during which – according to her biographer, Raymond of Capua – she drank the water from the wound in Christ’s side. Catherine’s vision proved a life-changing experience. From that day, she was in an almost constant state of contemplation. She no longer menstruated, or defecated. She refused food and drink, and began substituting it with other, more revolting liquids. Raymond tells us that Catherine drank the pus from the cancerous wound of a nun in her care – imagining that she was ingesting the fluids of Christ. To the 21st-century eye, this was a bizarre – and repulsive – way of displaying your devotion to God. But it was far from unique. Catherine was one of a new breed of medieval women who rejected the everyday temptations of the material world and gave themselves over to the life of the mystic. They were determined to communicate with God more directly, and fervently believed that degrading themselves before him, and propelling themselves into a state of ecstasy, was the best way to do it. Catherine of Siena – who died in 1380, aged 33 – certainly found fulfilment in establishing this new hotline to the divine. She told Raymond that she had never tasted any food and drink sweeter or more exquisite than the leaking emissions of this wound. Men, too, could choose the life of the mystic. But the vast majority were women, and this emphasis on fluids – the water and blood from Christ’s side, the pus from the nun’s wound – goes some way to explaining why. While medieval Europeans thought men to be hot and dry, women were considered cold and wet. While men’s bodies were regarded as strong and intact, women’s were, it was believed, more susceptible to external influence,…

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Heavenly dew: crying in the Middle Ages
type: item
date: 2015-05-27T13:58:29.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Medieval life
description: When we think of the Middle Ages, what comes to mind tends to include epic battles, knights and their ladies, a lack of hygiene and perhaps even brutality. However, scholars like Johan Huizinga have painted a contrasting picture, describing medieval people as wracked with uncontrollable emotion...
encoded: So did people really cry in the Middle Ages? And if so, what did they cry about? Hetta Howes investigates… Real men do cry The idea that ‘real men’ don’t cry permeates modern culture, but some of the most heroic fictional medieval characters don’t just get teary – they weep. In the Anglo-Saxon poem Beowulf, one of the main characters, King Hrothgar, sheds tears of gratitude when Beowulf rescues his people from an evil monster. At the end of the poem, when a dragon kills Beowulf, his warriors are “disconsolate/and wailed aloud for their lord’s decease”. Their communal tears become a sign of their love for him, and proof of his virtuous character. Nevertheless, it is clear that outpourings of emotion have their time and place, and should be limited. Earlier in the poem, when King Hrothgar mourns the death of one of his friends, Beowulf warns him: “It is always better/to avenge dear ones than to indulge in mourning.” When it becomes excessive, crying is self-indulgent and prevents proper action – in this case, violent vengeance. King Arthur, another famous British king and hero, cried often. Medieval printer William Caxton published Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur in 1485, which records the mythical adventures of Arthur, Guinevere and the Knights of the Round Table. Tears flow freely in this book, soaking it in nostalgia for a better time. Arthur weeps when he goes to war against his old friend Sir Lancelot (who, unfortunately, has slept with his wife); Sir Gawain cries “heartily” when Arthur announces that Guinevere must be executed for this transgression, and when she is led to her execution (spoiler: Lancelot will save her), there is “weeping and wailing and wringing of hands” from both lords and ladies. There is more of the same when King Arthur’s dying body is taken away to Avalon. These are, of course, fictional tears, but they reveal something about actual medieval readers, too. King Arthur and his knights were national legends; clearly Malory didn’t think tha…

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A brief history of medieval magic
type: item
date: 2015-02-24T10:03:01.000Z
creator: Dr Hetta Howes
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Medieval life
description: From Narnia to Harry Potter, so many modern manifestations of magic come from the Middle Ages. Hetta Howes investigates...
encoded: Want to get rid of an unwanted husband? Coat yourself in honey, roll naked in grain and cook him up some deadly bread with flour milled from this mixture. Want to increase the amount of supplies in your barn? Leave out child-sized shoes and bows-and-arrows for the satyrs and goblins to play with. If you’re lucky, they might steal some of your neighbour’s goods for you in return. These unusual charms and medical tips, which featured in medieval books, sound suspiciously like magic. But alongside these weird and wonderful spells and superstitions, medieval history paints a picture of a people actually more enlightened than their Renaissance successors. So what was medieval magic really like? Season of the witch The now all-too-familiar figure of the ‘witch’ – that frightening old hag with warts on her nose and curses at her fingertips – didn’t appear until the 15th century. Despite being dubbed ‘The Renaissance’ and ‘The Age of Discovery’, the centuries that followed [the Renaissance lasted from the 14th to the 17th century] were witness not only to ruthless witch-hunts, but also to a new belief in the reality of magic. In the Middle Ages, the practice of magic was not yet imagined to be essentially ‘female’. In fact, according to court records from the first half of the 14th century, the majority of those tried for maleficium (meaning sorcery, or dark magic) were men. That was because the most troubling form of magic – necromancy – required not only skill, learning and preparation, but above all education, which was less readily available to women. Necromancy involved conjuring the dead and making them perform feats of transportation or illusion, or asking them to reveal the secrets of the universe. Because many books describing necromancy were Latin translations, anyone wanting to practise the craft would need a good working knowledge of Latin. It wasn’t until the publication of Heinrich Kramer’s Malleus Maleficarum (or, Hammer of Witches) in 1487 that the specific …

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