HistoryExtra
type: channel
link: https://www.historyextra.com
description: Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast
date: 2025-12-30T10:16:04.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: After 1066, this medieval fine was imposed to deter anti-Norman violence
items: Warhorses were one of the most deadly weapons on a medieval battlefield. But why didn’t they run away?
items: Live locally, live sustainably
items: Meet the shadowy assassins who were seconds from taking out Saladin – and upending the Crusades
items: The Bayeux Tapestry is beautiful, but what was its purpose? New research might have the answer
items: The Book of Kells: "a masterpiece of medieval calligraphy and painting"
items: Margaret Beaufort: life of the week
items: Has history’s most famous comet been misnamed for centuries? “The answer is clear,” say historians
items: Assassins vs Templars
items: How William the Conqueror brutally secured rule of England

After 1066, this medieval fine was imposed to deter anti-Norman violence
type: item
date: 2025-12-30T10:15:48.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: Introduced in the wake of the Norman Conquest, the murdrum fine was meant to protect Norman settlers from revenge killings. But it quickly became a blunt instrument of inequality and exploitation
encoded: It’s early in the 13th century. You stumble across a corpse: clearly the victim of murder. What should you do? To modern eyes, there’s no question; no reasonable grounds for equivocation. The only option is to tell someone. But in medieval England, finding a dead body was a more fraught – and risky – incident. Entire villages and communities could be fined not because they had committed a crime, but because the burden lay with them to prove who the deceased was – or, more precisely, whether they were English or Norman. This wasn’t a quirk of legal technicality. In the decades after the Norman Conquest of 1066, questions of identity were difficult and tense. To deter violence against Norman settlers, a striking piece of collective punishment known as the murdrum fine was designed. It was created to limit violence against Normans in post-Conquest England, but in practice, all it did was expose resonant inequalities within medieval society. Speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast, historian Luke Foddy explains how the murdrum fine emerged, how it operated on the ground, and how it was later manipulated in ways that caused real hardship. A legal system under strain after the Norman Conquest The Norman Conquest in 1066 had reshaped England’s ruling class with extraordinary speed. William the Conqueror replaced much of the Anglo-Saxon aristocracy with Norman lords, bishops and officials, creating a sharp national and social divide between rulers and the majority English population they governed. The legal system struggled to cope with this change, and it was in this strained legal environment that the murdrum fine took on particular importance. What was the murdrum fine? The murdrum fine was enforced by King William I after 1066, although, as Foddy notes, “there’s some evidence that it was around before then, particularly in the Danelaw” – referring to the English region where the Vikings and Anglo-Saxons coexisted uneasily together from the late 9th century. It was imposed …

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Warhorses were one of the most deadly weapons on a medieval battlefield. But why didn’t they run away?
type: item
date: 2025-12-27T10:45:36.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: Horses are instinctively wired to run from danger. So how did medieval armies train them to thunder towards enemy lines without breaking?
encoded: The medieval warhorse is, seemingly, a contradiction in terms. Horses are prey animals. Their instinct, when confronted with loud noises, sudden movement or danger, is to run as far away as possible, as quickly as possible. And yet, for centuries across the Middle Ages, these animals were incredible weapons of war. With armoured warriors in the saddle, they charged directly into some of the most terrifying scenes imaginable: walls of sharpened spears held by lines of screaming men. And warhorses weren’t a peripheral tool, either. They were at the centre of medieval warfare. Mounted combat dominated European battlefields for hundreds of years, shaping the grand military strategies that upheld political power. Cavalry charges could decide entire battles, and the men who could afford to fight on horseback were part of a powerful military elite. None of that was possible without horses that could be controlled under extreme stress. So how did they do it? As historian Robert Liddiard explains on the HistoryExtra podcast, these horses were honed through immense financial investment and extraordinary, long-term training. Why medieval warhorses mattered But first, what was so special about warhorses anyway? The answer, according to Liddiard, can be found in 1066’s battle of Hastings, which was a potent demonstration of the differences between a force that deployed warhorses – the Normans – in contrast to a force that didn’t – the Anglo-Saxons. “Arguably it's horses that allowed Duke William of Normandy to gain the edge,” he says. “The warhorses provide mobility on the battlefield in a way that Harold Godwinson’s forces simply haven't got, and this has great tactical benefits. The possession of trained cavalry allows William to have greater tactical options and flexibility.” A trained warhorse was, therefore, a force multiplier. And alongside the tactical advantage, they offered a psychological one, too. The sight and sound of armoured men charging toward you at speed could …

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Live locally, live sustainably
type: item
date: 2025-12-23T13:44:39.000Z
creator: Dr David Musgrove, FSA
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Climate
description: Ian Mortimer suggests that we should look back to the medieval period to seek inspiration for sustainable living
encoded: We know we should all be living sustainably if we can. Bestselling historian Ian Mortimer suggests that we should look back to the medieval period – an era in which people took a very local attitude to life – to seek inspiration for sustainable living.

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Meet the shadowy assassins who were seconds from taking out Saladin – and upending the Crusades
type: item
date: 2025-12-16T14:12:13.000Z
creator: James Osborne
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: Two near-fatal attacks on Saladin by the Nizari Ismailis reveal a Middle Eastern landscape far more complex than the usual Crusader-versus-Muslim narrative – and show how close the Crusades came to taking a very different path
encoded: When Saladin sat down to supper in the spring of 1175, he was already one of the most significant figures in the Islamic world. The former commander of the Fatimid armies in Egypt had, within a decade, dismantled the Shi’a caliphate there, restored Sunni rule, and begun extending his authority across Syria. He was building the first unified Sunni power in the region since the Seljuk empire, and it was set to transform the balance of power in the Crusades. That evening, encamped outside Aleppo in Syria during a campaign against a regional Sunni rival, Saladin’s camp was busy with the hum of military life. It seemed an unlikely moment for immediate peril. But amid all the bustling activity, a small group of strangers, disguised as common merchants, slipped inside Saladin’s tent. Moments later, as medieval historian Dr Steve Tibble recounts on the HistoryExtra podcast, “all hell [broke] loose, and they [went] straight for Saladin.” These were deadly members of the Nizari Ismailis. A group who would later be labelled as ‘the Assassins’ in Western chronicles, the Nizari Ismailis were a small, embattled Shi’a sect who, says Tibble, “took the art of political murder to a new level of sophistication”. But why had Saladin become a target? And what might have happened if they had succeeded? Why the Assassins saw Saladin as an existential threat By the 12th century, the Middle East was a patchwork of competing powers. Two Islamic powers, the Sunni and Shi’a, battled among themselves while Crusader states took and held key territories along the Levantine coast. The Nizari Ismailis were a minority Shi’a community centred in remote mountain fortresses in Persia and Syria. And they had their own desires. Their strategy, Tibble explains, stemmed from necessity. “From their perspective, they were a tiny group fighting for their survival in the only way that they could.” Surrounded by larger Sunni powers and despised by many for their beliefs, they honed assassination as a tool that …

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The Bayeux Tapestry is beautiful, but what was its purpose? New research might have the answer
type: item
date: 2025-12-15T16:12:18.000Z
creator: Dr David Musgrove, FSA
subject: Anglo-Saxon
subject: Early medieval
subject: Medieval
subject: Norman
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: A new theory proposes that the Bayeux Tapestry was designed to deliver moral messages to medieval monks over dinner
encoded: The Bayeux Tapestry is one of the most astonishing artefacts to survive from medieval Europe. It tells the story of the end of Anglo-Saxon rule at the hands of Duke William of Normandy, whose victory in 1066 ushered in the Norman Conquest – one of the most significant turning points in British history. But beyond recounting the rise of Norman supremacy, what was the Bayeux Tapestry really for? Was it only an extraordinary work of propaganda, designed as a display of righteous power? Or was it intended to have a more specific and purposeful role? The answer to that latter question is: yes, according to historian Professor Benjamin Pohl of the University of Bristol. He argues that the Bayeux Tapestry was created to be a moral aid viewed by medieval monks while they silently ate their meals in a communal refectory. What was the Bayeux Tapestry for? Professor Pohl explains his argument in a new article 'Chewing over the Norman Conquest: the Bayeux Tapestry as monastic mealtime reading', in which he makes the case that the embroidery was designed specifically to be hung in the monastic dining hall of St Augustine’s Abbey, Canterbury, where it would have accompanied spoken readings and prompted moral reflection. Following the rule of St Benedict, which governed monastic life across much of medieval Europe, medieval monks were expected to maintain complete silence while eating, aside from the voice of the reader delivering the day’s text. These readings delivered moral instruction to the diners, in a setting where any visual imagery would have reinforced spoken words and offered a focus for contemplation. A tapestry made for monks The Bayeux Tapestry famously depicts the events leading up to the Norman Conquest of England in 1066 through a series of cartoon-style embroidered scenes, accompanied by short Latin captions. Most scholars agree that the embroidery was probably made in, or near, Canterbury in the 11th century. That conclusion rests on similarities in its style an…

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The Book of Kells: "a masterpiece of medieval calligraphy and painting"
type: item
date: 2025-12-12T08:55:00.000Z
creator: Michael Wood
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Celts
subject: Column
subject: Medieval life
description: "The Book of Kells is a masterwork of medieval calligraphy and painting", writes Michael Wood
encoded: The Book of Kells, one of the greatest pieces of medieval art, is today displayed in the library of Trinity College Dublin. This illuminated gospel book is named after the monastery in County Meath where it was kept in the Middle Ages. It’s a masterwork of medieval calligraphy and painting, with its Celtic knot patterns, scintillating colour, and the staggering intricacies of the display pages and canon tables – all smoky golden magnificence. An Irish annalist called the book “the great Gospel of Columcille [Columba], the chief relic of the western world”. It may be the work described by the historian Gerald of Wales in the 1180s, in his book on Ireland. “Look more keenly at it and you will penetrate to the very shrine of art,” he wrote. “You will make out intricacies so delicate and so subtle… that you might say that all this were the work of an angel, and not of a man.” The book survived war, plunder and the English – Cromwell’s troops were once billeted in Kells. In the 19th century, it was a huge influence on the Celtic revival movement in the arts, and today is seen as the pinnacle of the western tradition of illuminated manuscripts. Read more | Michael Wood on amazing insights into medieval daily life The book was produced around the end of the eighth century, just at the moment Britain and Ireland were about to be changed forever by the arrival of the Vikings. It was long believed to have been created on Iona. But in The Book of Kells: Unlocking the Enigma, published in October, Victoria Whitworth suggests that it was actually written at the Pictish monastery of Portmahomack on the Moray Firth in north-east Scotland. This is one of the least known areas of the medieval British Isles. The Pictish monasteries were destroyed in the Viking age, and with them virtually all written records. The kingdom of the Picts became part of the Scottish kingdom of Alba in the ninth century, and gradually the memory of the Picts faded, leaving many unsolved mysteries. One key …

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Margaret Beaufort: life of the week
type: item
date: 2025-12-09T08:00:50.000Z
creator: Emily Briffett
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
subject: Tudor
subject: Life of the week (podcast series)
description: Lauren Johnson charts how Margaret Beaufort skilfully navigated the chaos of the 15th century – and ultimately gave us the Tudor dynasty
encoded: Born in the tumultuous 15th century, Margaret Beaufort – mother of Henry VII – endured personal tragedy, dynastic danger, and the ever-shifting fortunes of power. Yet she emerged as one of the most influential figures of late medieval England. In this episode, Emily Briffett is joined by historian Lauren Johnson to delve into the remarkable life of Margaret – a mother and patron whose autonomy, determination and political acumen helped forge the Tudor dynasty. Lauren Johnson is the author of Margaret Beaufort: Survivor, Rebel, Kingmaker (Apollo, 2025). Buy it now from Amazon

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Has history’s most famous comet been misnamed for centuries? “The answer is clear,” say historians
type: item
date: 2025-12-06T10:45:53.000Z
creator: Dr David Musgrove, FSA
subject: Anglo-Saxon
subject: Early medieval
subject: Medieval
subject: Period
subject: Discover / Apple News
description: David Musgrove reports on new research that casts light on the appearance of the comet in the 11th century, and its depiction in the Bayeux Tapestry
encoded: Halley’s Comet was last seen from Earth in 1986 and is expected to return in 2061. It’s widely taken for granted that the Stuart astronomer Edmond Halley was the first to recognise its roughly 76-year cycle, an insight he formalised in 1705 and which ultimately gave the comet his name. However, new research by professors Michael Lewis of the British Museum and Simon Portegies Zwart of Leiden University says that attribution might be wrong. Their work suggests that credit may instead belong to an English medieval monk named Elmer. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2025/12/GettyImages-514079858-a25607f-e1764931346339.jpg" width="1500" height="1000" alt="Halley’s Comet streaks across the sky in this 1986 photograph taken from the Ford Observatory, marking its most recent visit to the inner solar system. Once feared as a portent of upheaval, the comet is now a predictable visitor whose returns chart centuries of astronomical discovery." title="Halley's Comet, 1986" /> Elmer the flying monk Elmer, also known as Aethelmaer, lived in Malmesbury, Wiltshire, and is best remembered for leaping off Malmesbury Abbey attached to some homemade wings, attempting human flight, at some point between 1000-1010. In the words of chronicler William of Malmesbury, Elmer “had by some contrivance fastened to his hands and feet in order that he might fly as Daedalus, and collecting the air, on the summit of a tower, had flown for a distance of a furlong”. As well as recording Elmer’s early exploits in aviation, William also noted that – perhaps unsurprisingly – the flight did not end well. The monk ended up crashing to the ground, breaking his legs and becoming lame as a consequence. Despite this disability, he lived a long life and was still around (albeit elderly) during the Norman Conquest in 1066. Notwithstanding his very rough landing in 1005, Elmer’s legacy as the flying monk was secured, and even now, Malmesbury boasts a Flying Monk Brewery. Arguabl…

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Assassins vs Templars
type: item
date: 2025-12-05T08:00:58.000Z
creator: Emily Briffett
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Steve Tibble explores how fear, loyalty, and faith shaped the two medieval orders – and how myth and memory transformed them into enduring symbols of secrecy, power, and intrigue
encoded: The Assassins and the Knights Templar are two of history’s most intriguing, enigmatic and legendary groups. While they may seem vastly different on the surface, their intertwined stories reveal a surprising number of parallels – from an almost fanatical strategy fuelled by the 'promise of death' to the nature of their downfall. Speaking to Emily Briffett, Dr Steve Tibble compares their stories, and reveals what these two organisations can tell us about medieval conflict, religion and power — and why they continue to captivate us today. Steve Tibble is the author of Assassins and Templars: A Battle in Myth and Blood (Yale University Press, 2025). Buy it now from Amazon

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How William the Conqueror brutally secured rule of England
type: item
date: 2025-12-02T10:33:49.000Z
creator: Dr David Musgrove, FSA
subject: Medieval
subject: Membership
subject: Period
description: Marc Morris discusses the long and bloody conquest of England that followed William's victory at the Battle of Hastings
encoded: William of Normandy’s victory at the battle of Hastings in October 1066 was far from the end of the Norman Conquest of England. It took many years, and putting down no small amount of rebellion, for William to fully establish control. In the final episode of our new series on 1066, Marc Morris discusses the long story of the Norman Conquest with David Musgrove. Watch now, or listen to the ad-free podcast below: View Green Video on the source website Want to hear more? Browse more episodes in our podcast series on 1066

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