Tag: medieval
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Palfrey Pony Club: Horses in the Middle Ages
It’s been a busy couple of weeks on this end since my last post between travel for the Easter holiday and at last getting cover finalization for Daughter of Scorpions completed (paperback proofs are in the mail!), and this week I’m stuck in six hours of legal continuing education to maintain my attorney’s license. What…
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She’s Just Not That Into You: Orlando Furioso and the Making of the Modern European Novel
Who will ascend to heaven, mistress mine, to fetch me back my lost wits? (Orlando furioso, XXXV.2) Before we get into Orlando, I did want to assure some of you that I didn’t forget about giving updates about the release of my next novel, Daughter of Scorpions. I would personally love to have a concrete…
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Lions, and Tigers, and Bonnacons: Zoology and Allegory in Medieval Bestiaries
This week, I thought we’d take a look at one of the most interesting cultural artifacts to come out of the medieval period: the medieval bestiary. Although present throughout the Middle Ages and all over Europe, these elaborately illuminated animal catalogues were most popular during what is now often referred to by modern historians as…
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House of Cads: The Unlikely Destiny of the Lusignans
“I spent nearly five years at the knees of the Poitevine princesses, my lord. They taught me to trust a Turk before a Lusignan.” – The Gourd and the Stars, chapter fourteen Much like with the world of The God’s Wife, there’s a lot of ancillary tangents to explore in the medieval Mediterranean of The…
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Religious Fights and Disabled Knights: Charity, Crusade, and the Origins of the Order of Saint Lazarus
“The king’s light manner vanished, and an unheard-of look of fear came into his scarred face. ‘I can’t. I—’ He suppressed a small shudder and whispered, ‘I’m afraid that if I ever enter the Lazarus Postern, they’ll never let me out.’” – The Gourd and the Stars, chapter 16 After a few months off, I…
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Day Tripping at the Met, Part 3: A Little Bit of Everything Else
Okay, folks we’ve made it to the third and final entry in my Met roundup, where I try to wrap up everything else that I saw after I escaped the first floor of the museum (and try not to think about all of the stuff I didn’t have time to see). A truly impossible task,…
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Christendom’s Favorite Frienemy: the History and Hagiography of Salah al-Din in the Western Imagination
“[Saladin] gave [the stolen Christian baby] to the mother and she took it; with tears streaming down her face, and hugged the baby to her chest. The people were watching her and weeping and I was standing amongst them. She suckled it for some time and then Saladin ordered a horse to be fetched for…
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The Tangled Web We Weave: The Royal Houses of France and England in The Gourd and the Stars
“Henry was eighteen when we met, and I was queen of France. He came down from the north to Paris with a mind like Aristotle’s and a form like mortal sin. We shattered the Commandments on the spot.” – The Lion in Winter “Marguerite and Alys [are Constance of Castile’s daughters], but you shouldn’t worry…
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Angling for the Fisher King: Baldwin IV of Jerusalem and Constructing Characters in Historical Fiction
“Amalric died in the same year, succeeded by perhaps the most gallant figure of the whole Frankish venture, the leper king, Baldwin IV ([reign] 1174-85), who inherited the throne at thirteen, a year after his leprosy had been discovered [sic]. He literally dropped to pieces during his reign, a via dolorosa on which he showed,…
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The Fifth Horse-Man: Apocalypse and Allegory in the Roman de Fauvel
“Le jugement contre Fauvel est déjà prêt, et il sera jugé; lorsqu’il aura été condamné, il subira le châtiment éternel avec le prince des démons.” [“The judgment of Fauvel has already been set, and he will be judged. When he is condemned, he will undergo eternal punishment with the Devil.”] – le Roman de Fauvel…
Sarah Holz 