The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England

A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century

Ian Mortimer

2008 • 319 pages

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Jamie RevellSupporter

I should probably begin by saying that, judging from how other people I know on Goodreads have rated history books I've read, I seem to have rather different tastes from them - things I've rated five stars have often received a mere two or three. I can also hardly argue that it's unputdownable, since I did, in fact, put it down for several months while I read other things. But I liked it, so take that for what it's worth.

The conceit of this book is that it's a guide to visiting 14th century England. It's not, however, what an actual guide book (in, say, the Lonely Planet style) would be like in that it doesn't have, for example, a list of places you might want to visit or things you might want to go and see. What it actually is is a guide to how people lived their lives in this particular period of history and in this particular country.

It starts with an explanation of general society; what cities and towns were like, and how the feudal system worked. That's followed by sections on such things as clothing, food, medicine, and the legal system, concluding with a look at some popular works of literature from the period. While much of this framed as advice for what a time traveller could expect to encounter, it perhaps comes closest to the book's title when it's discussing matters such as what you can expect from inns and what you need to know about travelling through the countryside. And, if fine details of practicalities are what you're after, there's plenty of that.

The primary impression I get from this is that, compared with today, life in the 14th century largely sucked. Modern creature comforts obviously don't exist yet, disease and lawlessness are rampant, and you can completely forget about modern sensibilities on gender and the like. On the other hand, the food was pretty good if you were wealthy, and people were a lot cleaner than the modern stereotype has it. (For instance, pretty much everyone washed their hands five times a day).

There was much here that I already knew, but plenty I either didn't, or hadn't really thought about. The writing style is aimed at the layman, rather than being drily academic, and scattered with references to everyday historical people whose records have fortuitously passed down to us. It's not necessarily a light read, on account of the aforementioned gloom; this is, after all, the century that saw the Black Death. But I found it an interesting look at what it was actually like to live in 14th century England, and how much things have changed... and, in many cases, how much they have stayed the same.