HistoryExtra Home of Britain’s bestselling history magazine and award-winning podcast 2026-09-09T12:36:36.000Z https://www.historyextra.com/tag/medieval-life/feed/atom HistoryExtra <![CDATA[The making of the Bayeux Tapestry: who made it, how long did it take, and how has it survived?]]> https://www.historyextra.com/period/norman/bayeux-tapestry-where-make-how-long-who-when-stitch-penises-visit/ 2026-09-09T12:36:36.000Z 2026-09-08T17:50:24.000Z Who made the Bayeux Tapestry? How many people were involved in its making?
We have no sources to tell us who made the Bayeux Tapestry; however, most scholars agree that it was made in Norman England, probably by Anglo-Saxon embroiderers. At present we do not know how many people were involved in creating the Tapestry. We can say it would have been embroidered by women because all the surviving evidence demonstrates that only women in early medieval England embroidered.
Men could have created the design, however – there is a famous example where Ӕthelwynn, a 10th-century noblewoman known for her embroidery work, wrote to Saint Dunstan (c924–88) asking him to design an embroidery pattern for a priest’s stole that she and her girls could embroider in gold. Also, monks were well versed in drawing and transferring images onto manuscripts for illumination, so it is not unlikely that men were involved in this part of the process.
Women in Anglo-Saxon England were famed for their embroidery skills. Documentary sources tell us that embroidery was considered a commendable occupation for women in elite circles, while the Domesday Book and the 12th-century chronicle Liber Eliensis both highlight women who embroidered as a profession. Written sources for embroidery production in Normandy point to it being a “worthy occupation” for high-ranking Norman women.
Previously nuns or elite women were thought to have made the Bayeux Tapestry. However, recent research I have undertaken studying the embroidery’s technical attributes as seen on the reverse of the hanging shows the embroidery was stitched to a set standard, indicating a certain level of training. Meanwhile, certain motifs were worked to set formulas – for example, the castles can be divided into three groups: outlines stitched first, then fillings; blocks of colour stitched from left to right and top to bottom; or simply different colours stitched from left to right.
This all points to the possibility of three workers (or groups of workers) completing all the castles featured in the tapestry. This, combined with the fact that each of the eight panels of ground fabric was embroidered before they were joined together, means that they could have been worked simultaneously and leads to the conclusion that a sophisticated level of overall organisation was required.
The story of the Bayeux Tapestry
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It can therefore be hypothesised that a ‘manager’ was in charge of the production process. This person would have needed knowledge of embroidery working practices, so it is likely that it would have been a professional embroiderer who was familiar with training and organising others and had experience working on large commissions. This level of organisation would need to have taken place in a professional workshop-like setting. Anglo-Saxon charters give examples of possible workshops – for instance, one dating to the ninth century records Bishop Denewulf of Worcester giving an embroiderer named Eanswitha an estate as payment for looking after and making textiles for the church. This estate most likely housed some form of workshop, much as other central estates are known to have done for textile production.
My research, too, has highlighted archaeological evidence for possible embroidery workrooms. Such places would need to have been clean so that dirt could not contaminate the embroidery, and they would also have needed access to good light. Larger and more elaborate pieces of the tapestry would have been attached to a slate frame (a large rectangular frame made of four pieces of wood that slot together), so generous space would have been required.
Space would also have been needed to store materials (even if the materials were not being bought in bulk), and for workers to move around and work comfortably. It may be that in good weather, embroidery was undertaken outside under a canopy, much like the illustrations of women weaving depicted in the Utrecht Psalter.
8 quickfire facts about the Bayeux Tapestry
It is almost 70 metres long
More precisely it is 68.3 metres long (224 feet), which is about length of three short-course swimming pools.
The Bayeux Tapestry is really an embroidery
The Bayeux Tapestry is not a tapestry at all, but rather an embroidery. A tapestry is something that’s woven on a loom, whereas an embroidery is thread stitched onto a cloth background.
It's made from 9 panels of cloth and 10 thread colours
The panels that were produced separately and then eventually sewn together to form one long whole. In one case the joining of the panels is inexpertly done, as the marginal lines don’t match up precisely.
There's an astronomical object on it – a comet
Halley's Comet is shown on the Bayeux Tapestry after Harold’s coronation, appearing as a portent of disaster.
The Bayeux Tapestry probably wasn't made in Bayeux
There are a lot of indications to suggest that it was most likely produced in England by English embroiderers. The Latin textual inscriptions above the story-boards use Old English letter forms, and stylistically the work has parallels in Anglo-Saxon illuminated manuscripts. Plus, some of the vignettes in the tapestry appear to be based on designs that we know were found in manuscripts held in the library of a monastery in Canterbury, so there are those who argue that it was actually made not just in England, but more precisely in Canterbury.
The Bayeux Tapestry doesn't tell the entire story of the Norman Conquest
It omits pivotal parts and players, notably the other battles of the Conquest year that took place in northern England – Fulford and Stamford Bridge – and one man in particular, Edgar Ætheling, who might have been king in 1066.
The final section of the Bayeux Tapestry is missing
It's believed that at least one scene – possibly more – has been lost from the end of the Bayeux Tapestry.
There are 93 penises on the Bayeux Tapestry
Four of these are attached to men, and what may be a fifth appears on a soldier’s corpse. The remaining 88 are attached to horses.
Who commissioned the making of the Bayeux Tapestry?
There is no direct evidence for who commissioned the tapestry. A number of candidates have been postulated including Queen Edith, wife of Edward the Confessor; William the Conqueror; or the monks of St Augustine’s Abbey in Canterbury.
Most researchers support the suggestion that Bishop Odo, William the Conqueror’s half-brother, is the most likely person. However, Elizabeth Carson Paston, Stephen White and Kate Gilbert explored this theory in 2014 and concluded there is no real evidence to support it.
Who was its intended audience?
The answer to this question changes when we consider where the Tapestry was meant to be displayed. If we take recent arguments put forward by Gale Owen-Crocker and Chris Henige, the Tapestry would have been hung in a room in a castle keep, which Henige suggests is Dover Castle.
In this case, the audience would have consisted of Norman nobles and their families; guests and other dignitaries; and servants/slaves who would have most likely been Anglo-Saxon. Therefore a cross-section of people would have viewed the Bayeux Tapestry.
When and where was the Bayeux Tapestry made? How did it end up in France?
There is no concrete evidence for when the Tapestry was made, nor how it ended up in France. Currently the agreed date for its creation is sometime before the end of the 11th century. Scholars agree that the first positive record of the tapestry in France is the Bayeux Cathedral inventory of 1476. At present we do not know what happened to it between these dates.
Professor George Beech has argued that the tapestry could have been made in France, but most scholars believe it was made in Anglo-Saxon England, with the most likely centre being in or around Canterbury. This is because the artistic style of the tapestry’s design is a type known to have developed in Canterbury during the 11th century, but its precise name is unknown.
How long would it have taken to make the Bayeux Tapestry?
It is difficult to say how long it took to make and there has been no specific research on this. The answer would depend on how many women were working on the embroidery simultaneously; the size of the building(s) in which it was being made; access to light and access to materials.
Any estimation of the time taken to make the tapestry would need to take into account the time taken to manufacture the required materials; plus the time involved in the production of the design itself; plus other logistics. From an embroiderer’s perspective, the stitches employed (more of this anon) are not particularly time-consuming to work.
What is the Bayeux Tapestry made of? What renovations and restoration work have been carried out on the tapestry?
The base textile (ground fabric) of the Bayeux Tapestry is linen. It was stitched with wool threads dyed with natural dyes. A small number of linen threads were also sporadically used.
Over the intervening centuries a number of linen textile patches were added to the back of the tapestry to cover tears and holes. During the 19th century, areas of the missing embroidery were re-stitched with wool thread dyed with chemicals – on the front of the hanging these appear more garish than the original threads. On the reverse, the level of stitch-work is not as neat or precise as the original.
Running along the top of the tapestry is a strip of linen fabric. The French conservators who studied the tapestry during its 1982 conservation thought the strip was old, but they were not sure how old. An early backing was lost during restoration work on the tapestry in the 19th century, therefore a new lining was attached.
- Read more | Why is Harold a hero of the Bayeux Tapestry?
Can you explain why the Bayeux Tapestry is not really a ‘tapestry’ at all, but rather an embroidery?
Correct, the Bayeux Tapestry is actually embroidery. A tapestry is a woven textile where the design is woven into the fabric as the textile is being created on the loom. Embroidery, on the other hand, is stitched onto a piece of textile that is already woven. The design is often, but not always, drawn onto the ground fabric for the embroiderer to follow.
When you view a tapestry the design and the ground fabric appear meshed together because they were created at the same time, whereas when you look at embroidery the stitching often stands proud of the ground fabric. This is particularly true of the Bayeux Tapestry.
What embroidery techniques were used? What can you tell us about the specific ‘Bayeux stitch’ used to make the Bayeux Tapestry?
Four embroidery stitches – stem stitch; split stitch; chain stitch; and laid work – were used on the Bayeux Tapestry. Stem stitch was predominately used as an outline stitch (ie for the lettering and as an ‘open’ filling stitch to emulate chain mail). It was occasionally worked more densely to fill in small areas such as a horse’s cheek.
Split stitch and chain stitch were used rarely – both were worked as independent lines for objects such as the handle of a spear; ship’s rigging; or to add depth to some letters. All three of these stitches are worked in single and double rows.
Laid work, sometimes called ‘Bayeux Stitch’, is the most predominant stitch. It is used for nearly all fillings throughout the hanging. Variations of this stitch were also popular in 17th-century crewel-work embroidery [a type of surface embroidery using wool].
All the stitches used in the Bayeux Tapestry were popular during the medieval period, with stem stitch, split stitch and occasionally chain stitch being worked in wool and silk threads. Laid work does not survive as well, but there are examples from fragmented hangings discovered in Viking contexts, all worked in wool threads.
Which section(s) of the Bayeux Tapestry do you think would have been the most difficult to make?
This is a difficult question to answer. With regard to the embroidering process it would depend on how the design was divided for each worker (or group of workers). I think that, to begin with, the most difficult sections would have been where complex embroidery covers the seams – for example, the horses depicted in the final battle sequence at seams 5, 7 and 8 (there are a total of eight seams joining nine pieces of ground fabric together which make up the surviving length of the tapestry). Here, the technical evidence shows that workers finished the embroidery on one panel some way short of a seam, while starting it slightly further in at the beginning of the next panel.
It is probable that each panel was not worked consecutively or even by the same embroiderer, so each worker would have had to establish how much space to leave in order for the seam to be constructed and to make sure the finished design looked right.
Once the panels were ready to be sewn together, the design would have been matched up but a space would have been left. Once the seam was completed an embroiderer would have finished stitching the design over the completed join. This would have required forethought, vision and creativity, and would likely have been rather an intense mental process. Eventually, of course, it would have become second nature to the embroiderers.
Is it true that the final scenes of the Bayeux Tapestry are missing? If so, what happened and what might they have depicted?
Yes, the final scene (or scenes) are missing. We know that from 1476 onwards, at no time was the tapestry displayed indefinitely, and at other times it was stored in a wooden chest – and much later on a large roller. When textiles are stored and displayed only occasionally, their edges tend to get handled more often – because people need to hold and hoist them as the textile is being taken out of storage, moved into position, hung, tweaked and then later taken down and put back into storage. This leads to more degradation at the edges. It is also possible that when the tapestry was stored in the wooden chest mentioned above, the final scene(s) were laid on top, making them more vulnerable to damage. In fact, we are lucky any of the Bayeux Tapestry survived at all!
Most scholars believe the final scene(s) of the tapestry would have depicted the lead up to and the coronation of Duke William as king of England, as a fitting end to the story being told. It would also make sense from design a perspective: Gale Owen-Crocker has shown that if the tapestry was hung in a square room of a secular building (possibly a castle keep, as suggested above), the layout design is geometric, with particular motifs mirroring each other across the display space. As such, the coronation of William would mirror the first scene in which King Edward is seated on his throne.
Unravelling The Bayeux Tapestry
Member exclusive | Expert historians unpick some of the biggest questions surrounding the Bayeux Tapestry, from its creation and purpose, to the incomplete story it recounts and its modern-day legacy
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How has the Bayeux Tapestry survived over the centuries?
The Bayeux Tapestry has survived due to a fortunate set of circumstances. Although we do not know how or when the hanging arrived at Bayeux Cathedral, the fact that it did is an important part of its survival story. Stored in a religious setting and given special status, the tapestry was likely displayed only occasionally. As such it was handled less frequently than other hangings that would have adorned secular buildings, meaning there was less opportunity for damage, loss or destruction.
The Bayeux Tapestry has also, through history, become an icon for different political personalities such as Napoleon and the Nazis who studied and kept it safe in order to highlight their political messages (of French military might over the English; and German pan-nationalism respectively).
Finally, the Bayeux Tapestry’s importance as a cultural artefact has ensured that it has been kept safe and well-looked after – particularly in the modern era, by a trained and knowledgeable multi-disciplinary team at the Bayeux Museums Department.
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Alexandra Lester-Makin has a PhD in early medieval embroidery from the University of Manchester and is also a professional embroiderer.
This article was first published on HistoryExtra in October 2018. Find out more about the Tapestry's move to its temporary home in the British Museum.
]]> HistoryExtra <![CDATA[How grim was life as a medieval farmer? Here are 6 things you need to know]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/how-grim-was-life-as-a-medieval-farmer-here-are-6-things-you-need-to-know/ 2026-09-28T10:16:13.000Z 2026-08-24T15:00:29.000Z 1. Do your apprenticeship
The best medieval farmers learn their trade on the job
To make a success of your life as a farmer, you need training. And that will come by getting your hands dirty on the family holding, or as a servant in a neighbour’s household.
With an area under crops, some hay meadow – not to mention cattle, sheep and pigs – holdings are the perfect place to hone an array of farming techniques. You’ll learn how to yoke a team of oxen to a plough, weed a field, shear a sheep, treat a lame ox, mow hay with a scythe, and drive a cart loaded with manure.
But don’t get ahead of yourself. Learning takes time – as Richard, servant of Henry Sprot, discovered to his cost in the 14th century. He displayed his lack of experience of driving a cart by running over an unfortunate pig in the Warwickshire hamlet of Blackwell.
And it’s important that you avoid such blunders. After all, farming is a serious matter. It’s the main occupation for most of the population, working on close to a million small farms over England – and most households live on produce they grow for themselves. Get it wrong, and you could go hungry.
This advice applies to women, too. Young servant women, having learnt such domestic skills as brewing, dairying and horticulture, might be able in adult life to market their own ale, cheese, fruit and garden produce.
This could be the story of Agnes Waleys, who after some years as a diligent servant for Henry and Emma Talbot at Brigstock in Northamptonshire, gained the means to live independently when they gave her a small house in 1339.
Every young person at the meal table will hear conversations about such matters as paying the rent, attending the lord’s court, and meeting with the other villagers to discuss the running of the fields. After about 10 years you will be ready to run your own holding. And, with any luck, you’ll soon be skilled enough to pass on your own training to the next generation.
2. Get your hands on some land
And if you own it yourself, all the better
It’s all very well fine-tuning your farming skills. But you’ll need somewhere to practise them. You would, no doubt, prefer to own your own land – that is, as a freeholder – but a great deal of land is rented from the lords of manors under some restrictions.
You might be in line to inherit – particularly if you are an eldest son. But in some places, especially in eastern England, land is divided among all the sons. In the absence of men to inherit, daughters might take the land. However, women often only become tenants as widows, when their husband’s land is passed on to them on his death.
An heir might have to wait while members of the older generation occupy the holding. But it is possible to speed along the process by persuading your parents to retire. That’s exactly what William le Clerk did in 1341. William took over his father, John’s, 15-acre holding at Winslow in Buckinghamshire, promising to supply him for life with wheat, barley, peas and beans.
If you’re not an heir or a widow, don’t despair. There are other alternatives available to you. You could search out a widow with land who might be in need of a husband. Or, if a holding falls vacant, you could persuade the lord that you have what it takes to become a tenant. You’ll have to pay him for the privilege but, if your funds are low, relatives could be willing to fill the gap – as happened to the fortunate Thomas Doget of Enstone in Oxfordshire. In 1362, Thomas’s father went to the lord and took land “for the use of his son”.
A relative might help in other ways: fathers sometimes give younger sons cash or some oxen as a start. You could also borrow money, as long as you are confident that you can repay eventually out of your profits.
In some parts of the country, land can be won from heathland or the edge of woods (in the North York moors or the Forest of Dean, for example), or reclaimed from fens and marshes. However, clearing or draining is hard work and you gain only a few hard-won acres. In short, without family support and a background of landholding, you’ll have to pull out all the stops to avoid a lifetime labouring in service.
3. Tie the knot
When it comes to farming, two pairs of hands are better than one
Secured a holding of land? Then your next step should be to marry. Running a holding is a work-intensive operation, and it helps if you have a family to lighten the load.
A young man should seek out a wife who has had years of preparation for the role. She will, ideally, come from a family able to provide a dowry – such as the cow, three sheep, dress and overcoat that came with Avis Maud of Belper in Derbyshire when she married John Wade in 1312.
If you’re a young woman, you too will be looking out for a capable husband – and your parents will, in all likelihood, have preferences. Women are expected to look after livestock, make bread and cheese, brew ale and tend the garden.
You can also be effective at marketing, either selling ale to other villagers, or poultry, eggs or fruit in a nearby town. You could follow the example of Elena Graise of Bishop Wilton in Yorkshire. She kept 12 geese from which she reared goslings – many more than her family needed – and sold the birds in the nearby town of Pocklington.
A woman might also be left in charge of the holding if she is widowed. This may appear daunting, but your experience of helping your husband make important decisions will set you in good stead. You can learn from the example of Alice Avice of Brigstock in Northamptonshire, who was married to Peter Avice for at least 24 years. After Peter died in 1316, Alice took charge of the holding until 1332. She was active in farming her land and participating in village life, buying land and disputing with other villagers.
Many widows will not feel able to go it alone in a male-dominated society (instead living off hand-outs or surrendering to pressure to remarry). But Alice Avice proved it could be done.
- Read more | Were medieval toilets as filthy as you think?
4. Play by the rules
If you go rogue, the entire community will suffer
For a village community to thrive, everyone has to pull in the same direction. And when it comes to farming, that means following the agreed routines of cultivation. Much of the land for growing corn lies in common fields. By a long-established custom, up to a half is planted each year; the other half is rested as fallow, without crops, but covered with grass and weeds that animals can graze.
You can grow bread corn, wheat and rye, planted in October and November. Crops planted in the spring are drink corn (barley or oats) and pottage corn (peas and beans, but also oats). Oats and peas and beans can also be fed to animals.
If this sounds as if you have to follow a set routine, remember that you can change the way the fields are managed – if you can gain the assent of your fellow villagers. This happened in 1296 at Hailes in Gloucestershire, when it was agreed to fence off (or inhok) part of the fallow field and plant crops, increasing the amount of corn for each villager. The official document tells us that the lord, Walter, abbot of Winchcombe monastery, “gave a licence to [the petitioners for reform] and their associates and neighbours to inhok a number of acres, for 2d for each acre in compensation for the common pasture”.
You also have a degree of choice in the animals you rear – though, to prevent overgrazing, their numbers are limited by village quotas. Cows and oxen are all common sights. And, if you have enough grass and hay, you should invest in sheep, because their wool can be sold, their manure benefits the crops, and mutton from older animals can be eaten. You might be able to match the 36 sheep owned by William Johan of Pinbury in Gloucestershire in 1290, yielding wool worth 18 shillings per year, enough to pay the rent. Pigs are worth keeping, too, to ensure that you have a flitch of bacon hanging by the fire.
Above all, if you want the fields to be run well, you need to persuade the lazy, incompetent or selfish to improve. That’s what the villagers of Romsley in Worcestershire did in 1334 when Simon de Fulfen failed to clean a ditch, diverted another one and flooded his neighbours’ land. De Fulfen was fined 12d (about £500 in our money), and apparently put his ditches in order.
5. Learn how to handle the lord
And remember: he can’t thrive without you
As a medieval farmer, you have a degree of autonomy. Yet such freedom has its limits. When push comes to shove, the lord or lady is in charge.
Under the customs that govern much landholding, inheritance is supervised. You pay the lord to acquire land, and subletting needs his permission. You may even be required to work on his land.
Worse still, you may be unfree – a serf – which means that the lord has special authority over you. He’ll levy a fine for giving permission for your daughters to marry, and for your sons to move away. This intrusion into your family life not only limits choices and costs money, it can also be humiliating. In 1315, when Emma le Cockes requested a marriage licence but lacked the money to pay the fine, her lords, the monks of Worcester Priory, ordered her to plant beans on their land for 15 days.
If all this makes you feel a little vulnerable in the face of the lord’s power, remember there are limits to his ability to exploit his authority. He cannot behave like a dictator, because excessive demands may leave the serfs and tenants unable to pay their rent. The lord relies on the tenants to manage the manor and its court – after all, he has no policemen, and only a small band of paid officials. In short, he must co-operate with the people he wishes to dominate.
The villagers’ strength lies in acting together, presenting a united front during negotiations and, if these break down, agreeing not to pay a rent, or withdrawing labour on the lord’s land. You could follow the example of Nicholas, son of Henry the Reever, who in 1280 led the serfs of Mickleover in Derbyshire in seeking the king’s support for a legal claim that they were free. Their lord, the abbot of Burton, won the case in the courts (he argued that the cattle and all their goods belonged to him, because as serfs “they owned nothing but their bellies”). However, the rebellion warned him against pressing his tenants too hard.
You also owe a duty to the church, especially your own parish church. Paying for the building and running costs can be expensive, but a well-maintained church makes a statement: this is a village that takes pride in itself.
- Read more | Live locally, live sustainably, live medieval
6. Expect the worst (and pray for luck)
When disaster strikes, it pays to be prepared
So you’ve learned the ropes. Acquired land. Got married. Followed the rules. And kept your lord onside. But if war, flood or famine strikes, it still might not be enough. When it comes to making a success of farming in the Middle Ages, some things are beyond your control.
In 15 of the 100 years after 1250, the weather reduced the yield of crops seriously, and there was a ‘great famine’ in 1315–17, caused by excessive rain. Your livestock are vulnerable to disease, like the scab that reduced sheep flocks in the 1280s, or the epidemic of rinderpest among cattle in the 1320s. In these years of adversity, your family might have to go hungry; more often, you will not have enough grain or wool to sell to pay the rent and taxes.
If you live in the north of England, you should beware of another potential menace. Imagine the plight of the villagers of Embsay in north Yorkshire who in 1318, having endured the great famine, then suffered “the invasion of the Scots”. Their losses of buildings and animals made it impossible for them to pay their rents to Bolton Priory, their lord, which pardoned payments of more than £7 (in our money, well in excess of £50,000) over the following two years. As for the poor peasants, they bore the expense of putting right their own barns and houses.
You may not be able to change the weather, or ward off marauding Scots, however there are a few measures you can take to mitigate against the bad luck that life throws your way. Your normal practice of planting a number of types of grain is a precaution against crop failure. If the wheat rots in a wet winter, you may get a good yield from the barley planted in the spring.
Scattering your land in parcels over the entire village might mean a lot of time spent travelling from one plot to another, but it does at least increase the chances of you growing crops in a variety of soils. You may, for example, have land in a sandy area yielding well in a wet year when your corn is struggling on heavy clay. Building a good barn will keep your corn crop dry through the winter, and there might be room to shelter sheep and cattle in bad weather.
Finally, if you do sink into poverty, you could appeal to your family or community for support. However, the bottom line is that you cannot count on their assistance – as John Bray of Cartworth in Yorkshire discovered to his cost. In 1316, Bray was brought to court for stealing a bushel of oats. And the man who reported him to the authorities? That was his father.
Christopher Dyer is emeritus professor of history at the University of Leicester. He is author of Peasants Making History (OUP, 2022)
This article was first published in the September 2026 issue of HistoryExtra Magazine
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: V-Z]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-v-z/ 2026-08-18T11:45:14.000Z 2026-08-18T11:45:14.000Z You can't understand life in the 14th century, says Dr Ian Mortimer, if you don't appreciate how violent it was. That's where this episode starts – with 'V' for violence. Find out what the remaining letters of the alphabet stand for in this final instalment of our A-Z on medieval life, as Mortimer continues his alphabetical exploration for the HistoryExtra Academy.
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Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: Q-U]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-q-u/ 2026-08-18T11:45:46.000Z 2026-08-12T09:11:47.000Z In the penultimate instalment of our A-Z on medieval life, Dr Ian Mortimer continues his alphabetical exploration for the HistoryExtra Academy – beginning with Q for queenship.
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Missed the first four episodes? Catch up now, discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: M-P]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-m-p/ 2026-08-05T15:24:12.000Z 2026-08-05T15:24:12.000Z In the fourth instalment of our A-Z on medieval life, Dr Ian Mortimer continues his alphabetical exploration of for the HistoryExtra Academy – beginning with M for money.
The four subjects in this episode "should give you some idea as to what makes medieval English people tick. We touch on their open-mindedness to new ways of thinking and their compassion," says Ian. You'll hear more about the devastation of the Black Death, and what life expectancy really looked like in the 1300s.
In this six-part series, Mortimer explores the everyday realities of the 14th century – from medieval fashion and farming to mechanical clocks, relics and the cult of the dead, discover the surprising details that bring life in medieval England vividly into focus. Find episode three below.
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Missed the first three episodes? Catch up now, discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: I–L]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-i-l-video/ 2026-07-30T07:38:26.000Z 2026-07-28T14:26:00.000Z Just how dangerous was life in medieval England? In this third episode, historian Ian Mortimer explores the brutal realities of illness, childbirth and the Black Death, revealing why plague transformed English society forever.
Along the way, he uncovers bizarre medieval beliefs, mythical travellers, the evolution of kingship and the surprising rise of literacy in an age often dismissed as the 'Dark Ages'. Why was this so important? As he explains, the whole political history of the Middle Ages can be understood as "holding power to account" – and literacy became one of the key forces that made that possible.
In this six-part series, Mortimer explores the everyday realities of the 14th century – from medieval fashion and farming to mechanical clocks, relics and the cult of the dead, discover the surprising details that bring life in medieval England vividly into focus. Find episode three below.
View Green Video on the source website
Missed the first two episodes? Catch up now, discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Charlotte Vosper <![CDATA[How to survive a day in the 14th century]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/how-to-survive-a-day-in-the-14th-century/ 2026-07-22T16:15:17.000Z 2026-07-22T16:15:17.000Z What threats might you have faced on a daily basis in England in the 1300s?
In this episode, Ian Mortimer guides Charlotte Vosper through a day in the 14th century and argues that it would have been surprisingly difficult to stay alive... From struggling to put food on the table to breathing in the scent of your neighbour's cesspit, Ian discusses the perils that came with everyday medieval life.
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: E-H]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-video-e-h/ 2026-07-25T11:27:33.000Z 2026-07-21T07:41:02.000Z How hard was life in medieval England? The answer, says Dr Ian Mortimer, is far harder than most of us imagine.
In this episode of Ian Mortimer's A–Z of medieval life, discover how a tiny shift in climate transformed England, what ordinary people actually ate, and why a single chicken could cost an entire day's wages. Join us to hear the full story about the surprising arrival of gunpowder in medieval warfare, why castles became obsolete, and what it was really like to live inside a 14th-century home.
In this six-part series, Mortimer explores the everyday realities of the 14th century – from medieval fashion and farming to mechanical clocks, relics and the cult of the dead, discover the surprising details that bring life in medieval England vividly into focus. Find episode two below.
View Green Video on the source website
Missed episode one? Catch up now, or discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Dr Ian Mortimer <![CDATA[A-Z of medieval life: A-D]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/a-z-of-medieval-life-video-a-d/ 2026-07-25T11:27:07.000Z 2026-07-21T07:28:14.000Z Did you know medieval cows were a fraction of the size of today's? That men's fashion became so revealing that people complained they could see each other's buttocks?
In this six-part series, Dr Ian Mortimer explores the everyday realities of the 14th century – from medieval fashion and farming to mechanical clocks, relics and the cult of the dead, discover the surprising details that bring life in medieval England vividly into focus. Find episode one below.
View Green Video on the source website
Enjoyed episode one? Find more in episode two. Discover more episodes in our HistoryExtra Academy
Dr Ian Mortimer is the author of the four Time Traveller's Guides - to Medieval England, Elizabethan England, Restoration Britain and Regency Britain, and Medieval Horizons: Why the Middle Ages Matter, Mortimer's A-Zs of English History, and the forthcoming Through the Windows of an Ordinary House: A History of England (Bodley Head, September 2026)
]]> Nick Higham <![CDATA[How did the Anglo-Saxons triumph in Britain? You can blame it on the Romans]]> https://www.historyextra.com/membership/how-did-the-anglo-saxons-triumph-in-britain-you-can-blame-it-on-the-romans/ 2026-07-02T11:49:39.000Z 2026-07-01T14:30:01.000Z Throughout history, many Scots have harboured a lingering mistrust of the English. Plenty in Wales felt similarly. Edward I, the ‘Hammer of the Scots’ who also conquered swathes of land west of his kingdom, must take much of the blame. But the fundamental roots of these tensions stretch back to a time centuries before that bellicose English king, to the slow, messy, turbulent collapse of Roman Britain and the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons.
A whistle-stop précis of the textbook history goes something like this: Iron Age Britain was inhabited by tribes of Celts. Then came the Romans: nearly 100 years after Julius Caesar’s exploratory forays, in AD 43 the Emperor Claudius launched an invasion. Within half a century, the southernmost two-thirds of the island was conquered, creating the Roman province Britannia. As part of the Roman empire, it was subject to externally appointed governors and protected by its army.
But in the fifth century – the pivotal year often cited is 410 – events in continental Europe drove the Roman authorities to abandon Britain. Within a few decades, Roman-style artefacts had been replaced in the archaeological record of eastern Britain by metalwork, pottery, burial styles and buildings indicative of ‘Anglo-Saxons’ – an umbrella name coined later to encompass Germanic tribes known as Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Frisians from north-west Europe. These settlers – or invaders – were those described by Bede in 731 as gens Anglorum: English people.
It’s a neat story, and one with which many readers will be familiar. However, it’s also a story that raises a number of questions. What drove the collapse of Roman rule in Britain? How did Britain differ from its neighbours on the continent in this period? What attracted Anglo-Saxons to Britain from the fifth century? And how, by the beginning of the seventh century, were they well on their way to becoming the dominant force across much of the British Isles?
To answer these questions, we must first examine the relationship between the people of Britain and the Roman administration through those centuries of imperial rule. The bonds that tied Britain to Rome – or, more to the point, the lack of them – would have an enormous impact on what happened after that relationship began to fracture.
Regional divide
During the Roman period, there were key differences between Britain’s western uplands and its less-hilly eastern areas. In the west, the dominant language remained Celtic Brittonic, evolving into Welsh. Towns, villas, manufacturing facilities, extensive field systems, mosaics and churches were lowland phenomena, leaving the westerly uplands as military spaces – particularly in the north – or areas given over to pastoralism.
Yet a key point here is that, even in lowland Britain, the Brittonic language survived. Britons were barely engaged in imperial frameworks: none was made emperor before 400, nor did any Briton enter the Roman senate or attain high office. To Rome, Britain was always liminal, its inhabitants mere “savage ploughmen”, as the Gallo-Roman poet Rutilius Namatianus put it.
True, Britain’s fertile lowlands contributed taxes in cash and in kind, and sufficient profit for landowners to commission sometimes lavish Roman-style villas. But in 353, these landowners’ peace was shattered by the defeat of the usurper western Roman emperor Magnentius at the hands of his eastern rival, Constantius II. Magnentius’s defeat was followed by savage reprisals in Britain, where he had enjoyed support. The contemporary soldier-historian Ammianus Marcellinus wrote that Constantius’s notoriously cruel representative Paulus Catena (‘Paul the Chain’) “descended like a sudden torrent upon persons and estates”, whether guilty or not.
This was a critical moment in the decline of Rome’s influence in Britain. Catena’s violent intervention seems to have triggered a transfer of confiscated property to overseas magnates – which may explain why so many villas became derelict. The resulting economic haemorrhaging from the province lowered demand and stifled manufacturing, importing and service industries. Britain suffered, economically and socially.
The chaos didn’t end there. Across the final quarter of the fourth century, western Roman armies endured further defeats in civil wars, leaving them undermanned, ill-funded and politically impotent. Britain’s northern garrisons may have remained largely in post following this tumult but, crucially, Britain’s lowlands to the east were undefended, opening the door to seaborne attacks.
Britain was part of the Roman empire for perhaps 14 to 18 generations. During that time, imperial protection had invariably been reimposed following crises. This time, though, was different. Honorius (emperor from 393 to 423) is recorded as responding to a plea for aid by advising British towns in 410 that they would need to defend themselves. This would have been understood by all sides to be an interim strategy pending the return of normal Roman governance to Britain. However, barbarian intruders and internal struggles on the continent continued to prevent the Roman recovery of Britain.
Edge of empire
Post-410, then, Britain was neither properly inside nor truly outside the empire, and the likelihood of intervention by western Roman forces oscillated according to circumstances across the Channel. Even so, archaeological finds imply that members of Britain’s elite retained much of their power, adhering to Roman dress codes until the third quarter of the fifth century. They continued to increase their commitment to Christianity, by then the imperial religion, and enjoyed ongoing access to Roman-style education, evidenced in Latin works by Britons including Gildas, a learned sixth-century church deacon.
As late as 429, a bishop from Gaul took command of British soldiers confronting Saxons and Picts, indicating continued efforts to deter attacks despite the lack of military expertise locally. According to one fifth-century writer, Britain remained “a very wealthy island” that the military-minded bishop “rendered secure in every sense” – against both heretics and ‘barbarians’, as Romans termed pagan tribes who didn’t speak Latin. Despite those efforts, though, Britain’s lowlands remained vulnerable to barbarian incursions. A Gallic chronicler noted Saxon raiding in 410, and Gildas knew of Pictish and Scottish assaults.
Meanwhile, it seems there was a shift away from agriculture towards livestock, presumably resulting in a falling tax-take, but another source of income was found. Land previously exploited on behalf of the state or overseas magnates (absentee Roman landowners) likely provided resources that could be used to pay mercenaries to replace the depleted garrisons. This measure, intended to be temporary, meant recruiting barbarians – often men from the Germanic tribes that would become known as the Anglo-Saxons – to help defend against sea-raiders. And it had far-reaching consequences.
The earliest Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in Britain date from c420, so people from northern Europe had clearly begun settling by then. From such sites, including Spong Hill in Norfolk, we can infer that incomers arrived mostly across the decades from around 420 to 460. Anglo-Saxon – and, occasionally, Irish – artefacts found farther inland can be taken as evidence that barbarians were also hired to provide internal security or as bodyguards.
The patterning of Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in, for example, Lincolnshire and Sussex is consistent with settlement initially overseen by British regional rulers. In the long term, though, employing barbarians against attacks potentially launched by their own kin was risky. Mercenaries had more to gain by increasing their own numbers and dispensing with local elites altogether.
Aggressive incomers
Our Gallic chronicler reported that, c441, “the British provinces… were reduced to the rule of the Saxons”. This seems simplistic, and was written at a considerable distance, but it does suggest that incomers had by then seized regions perhaps including Norfolk and the east Midlands.
Gildas noted that Britons sought aid from the western Roman general Flavius Aetius in defending themselves against Picts and Scots between 446 and 454, but no help arrived; Flavius’s assassination in the latter year effectively ended any prospect of Rome’s return to Britain. It was at this point in his narrative that Gildas began remarking on British kings, perhaps implying that some kind of government was emerging in a Britain independent of Rome.
One leader named by Gildas, writing the following century, was Ambrosius Aurelianus. He is described by Gildas as being Roman, with parents who had “worn the purple” – suggesting a continental family who had attained wealth and power in Britain. This war leader reportedly led a British force to victory over Saxon raiders.
The pivotal figure in these struggles, though, was apparently a man Gildas described as a “proud tyrant”. This ruler, named Vortigern by Bede, hired further Saxons from overseas and supplied them via Roman-style taxation in kind. The ninth-century Historia Brittonum (History of the Britons) provides Vortigern’s genealogy, indicating his descent from a Christian Roman family connected with Gloucester.
That location suggests that the political focus had shifted from the south-east to the still-wealthy lowlands at the heart of the western province Britannia Prima, ruled from Cirencester. Recent excavations at nearby Chedworth villa have revealed a mosaic floor laid no earlier than the second quarter of the fifth century, implying that investment in Roman material culture and social norms continued significantly later here than it did farther east.
Act of folly
To Gildas’s mind, the hiring of ‘barbarians’ to defend the eastern coast – though common Roman practice – was an act of folly, leading to their rebellion and a great raid “from sea to sea”. While victories were won by both sides, and despite British success at the siege of Mons Badonicus (Badon Hill, which some think may have been Little Solsbury Hill near Bath, or Badbury Rings in Dorset) around the turn of the sixth century, the Saxons ultimately triumphed. An unnamed treaty to end the war, referred to by Gildas, seems to have recognised Saxon control of most of lowland Britain.
Our knowledge of Anglo-Saxon population numbers, movements and interactions in this period suffers from a paucity of relevant material evidence. But, certainly in the more open, lower-lying regions of the south and east, a substantial labour force must have worked the land, implying that numerous Britons survived external takeover and remained in those areas – albeit not always toiling for their own benefit.
Gildas noted that many of his grandparents’ generation were “made slaves forever”. Tellingly, the Old English wealas – from which ‘Welsh’ derives – meant both ‘foreigners’ and ‘slaves’. Unfree agriculturalists appear in early English law documents. And when Bishop Wilfrid was granted the Selsey estate by the formerly pagan South-Saxon king in the 680s, it came with 250 slaves. Most such enslaved people were almost certainly of British ancestry.
Again, the patchy nature of Anglo-Saxon material culture in the archaeological record from this period makes it difficult to plot accurately the English presence versus enduring British populations. One hint comes from Bede who recorded a war against British adversaries won by the Anglo-Saxon king Æthelfrith of Northumbria in c600. As a result, some defeated regions were forced to pay tribute, while others were settled.
In his polemical De Excidio et Conquestu Britanniae (On the Ruin and Conquest of Britain), Gildas compared events in Britain to the occupation of Judea by Assyrian forces detailed in the Old Testament. He painted the Saxons as ungodly incomers to be expelled, not assimilated.
That view contrasts with the near-contemporary willingness of Gallo-Roman bishops to baptise Franks and Burgundians. So Germanic tribes were being embraced by Christians on the continent while racial, ethnic and ideological distinctions were reinforced in Britain. Clearly, England was established through warfare. But the incomers were encouraged to invest in their inherent German-ness by the racial and ideological hostility they encountered.
- Read more | Saint killer, warmonger, tyrant: was the Anglo-Saxon king Offa as bad as history makes out?
The result was that Britain came to host the largest pool of pagans anywhere in Roman (or formerly Roman) western Europe. Frankish kings sought to spread Christianity in south-east Britain in the later sixth century, and in the 590s Pope Gregory I sent Italian monks led by Augustine to Canterbury, assuming that British clergy would assist his missionaries. They didn’t, instead clinging to their expectation that God would expel the ‘barbarians’.
In consequence, Christianity in Britain fractured. Rome’s mission dismissed the Britons as heretics, and threw its considerable ideological weight behind the new English converts. The combination of Rome’s religious authority and Anglo-Saxon secular power triggered the wholesale acculturation of Britons wherever they were vulnerable, undermining the Welsh language and British identity throughout England. People of Welsh and British ethnicity were increasingly restricted to regions subject to British lords, lands distant from both English kingship and the Anglo-Roman clergy.
Difficult relationship
That rift sealed the fate of the British – and the dominance of the English in the lowland south and east of the island. But the foundations of England and its cultural robustness have far deeper roots. The triumph of the Anglo-Saxons can ultimately be traced to Britain’s problematic relationship with the Roman empire. The Britons’ retention of a Celtic language, their absence from imperial structure, the fact that much of their island’s best agricultural lands were owned by magnates overseas, the fact that they identified primarily with Britain – all contributed to a peripheral status in the Roman world. So when the Saxon mercenaries they hired to help defend Britain against other ‘barbarians’ rebelled, Britons were isolated and vulnerable, receiving no assistance from their former imperial rulers.
The northern uplands of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland fell to Anglo-Saxons across the later sixth and seventh centuries, leaving British communities under their own kings only in the Clyde valley, alongside those in Wales and Cornwall. Here Celtic survived, along with the belief that, when God willed, the English would be forced out. The 10th-century Welsh poem Armes Prydein (The Prophecy of Britain) predicted a time when Saxons would be expelled from the stolen lands and the British people would recover all Britain. They’re still waiting.
This article was first published in the July 2026 issue of HistoryExtra Magazine
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