What do you know about the
Middle Ages?
The Middle Ages was a time
period where many things that
don’t happen today happened.
There were kings and queens,
knights and squires. Don’t forget
about the jester! There were
jousting competitions, the feudal
system, and chivalry. Life was
especially hard back then
because women couldn’t do
much. All they got to do was
watch over the babies that they
had. They weren’t even allowed
to own land. Like I said, life was
hard, so I’m going to tell you all
about it.
Samantha Baron
Jester
Popes
Noblewoman
Merchant
Priest
Serfs
Heralds
Squire
Falconers
As you can probably see, there were many people in the Middle Ages.
Most of them you might never have heard about because this period of time
was so long ago. Some of these people you might have heard about such as
kings and queens. A king’s purpose was to rule the countries, while at the same
time, a queen influenced with the politics of the Middle Ages mostly through
alliances for their husbands. Everyone in the Middle Ages was different, but
that makes them special and unique.
A way of government based on obligation between a lord, a king, and a vassal is called a
Feudal System. The Feudal System was in medieval Europe and society depended on it. It
worked like this:
1. The Kings gave out land to his most helpful and important servants, which were barons
and bishops, also known as noblemen. The only things that they had to do to gain that
land were to be loyal to the king and to supply him with soldiers during wars.
2. Barons and bishops then divided their land between knights and lower lords, who were
commanded to become their vassals, (servants) in order to keep the land
3. The peasants were then hired to work on the knights’ and lower lords’ land.
Did you notice that everyone works for at least one other person besides the king?
Peasants wok for knights/lower lords/ vassals/nobleman/king. Knights/lower lords/vassals
work for nobleman and the king. Nobleman just works for the king and the king works for
no one. The Feudal System best represents a pyramid as shown below.
King
Nobleman
Knights/lords
Peasants
Chivalry was something that existed back, way back in the Middle Ages. The word
“chivalry” comes from the French word horse, cheval. You might be
wondering…What is chivalry? Chivalry was something that was like the code of
conduct for the knights. If you were described as chivalrous, that meant that you
were good on a horse of some sort. It didn’t have to be a specific horse, just any
horse in general. I think that’s why they called this act chivalry because cheval
meant horse. For the knights, they had to be thought of as kind, loyal, truthful,
noble in battle, and polite to women, (including their sisters.) This was a lot to live
up to for a knight in shining armor. Most of the time, the knights didn’t. They were
lucky knights if they did!
A knight being loyal to the queen
The code
As you probably realized, there are no new
castles in today’s time. But what were castles
like? There were many different kinds of castles
back in the Middle Ages, but what parts are
found in a castle? Where are all of the pieces to
the puzzle found? Well you will soon find out!
The parts of a castle include:
•Keep
•Inner bailey
•Postern gate
•Wall or curtain
•Outer bailey
•Parapets
•Gatehouse
•Portcullis gatehouse
Murder holes
Rocky ledges
Barbican
Drawbridge
Marchicatitions
Moat
Arrow loops
Back in the Middle Ages, there were different ways of hiding and protecting
yourself. Defense was just like protecting yourself, while offense included all
of the fighting. You might be wondering, how did the people of the castle
protect themselves without getting killed? Many of them did die, but many
still lived. This is why.
Different kinds of defense included:
Different kinds of offense included:
•Mangonels
Tunnels
•Moats
Battering rams
•Arrow loops
Towers
•Murder holes
Mangonels
•Rocky ledges
•Postron gate
•Machicolations
As you can tell, there are many more defenses
•Portcullis
than offenses. This is why many people
•Thick walls
survived.
•Trebuchet
•Ballista