The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in the Middle Ages: The British Isles from 500 to 1500

by Sherrilyn Kenyon

Book Overview

Writers will save hours of valuable reasearch time and bring a richness and historical accuracy to their work as they reference the slice-of-life facts depicted for each of these major time periods.... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0898796636
• ISBN13: 9780898796636
• Release Date: January 1995
• Publisher: Writer's Digest Books
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 1.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.2" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

Good reference book; it's not a text book.

I bought this book and have been using as a quick reference while reading other texts; sort of how one might use a dictionary. I have to say: this is one of the easier to use reference guides I own. And contrary to the critics, the information provided is accurate, even if the photos are of real people who wear glasses. Some of the books I read that this guide is a handy reference for include: Chaucer, Geoffrey of Monmouth, Edmund Spenser... Authors how were actually alive during the middle ages. This guide is very helpful in understanding the specific items and ideas those long ago bards were talking about.

Wonderful Book

This is a wonderful book, and very helpful research. The information is thorough and it's good for just casual learning, as well as a good source of information for writing and other applications.

Stop scavanging for errors, everyone...

I think that this book is extremely useful, especially the chapter about food, as it tells you things that is almost impossible to find elsewhere - such as a brief list of what they ate, what they did, when they ate, who served what, how they were seated, etc etc etc. I've been hearing all this trashing about how horrible the pictures were, but I don't think they're nearly as bad as everyone keeps making them out to be. So what, a person left his glasses on - they weren't depicting a full-size model of someone from the middle ages, he was only modelling certain features. And also, below the picture of the Viking it says "the model wears a Viking CEREMONIAL horned helm with ear flaps." It never stated that that was the everyday helmet of a viking, if anybody bothered to read what was underneath. The robes of the two monks in the picture looked different to me, and it says "the man on the left wears a Benedictine robe; the man on the right wears a Franciscan robe."Everybody here is looking for a textbook for school, as opposed to a guide book. She even says so in the Introduction - "this book is designed as a mere starting point or as a reference to look up much needed information as quickly as possible."I think this book is a terrific guide and can't honestly see what all the fumes and steam are about. Some of the vocabulary words and definitions are utterly useless for me, but then most of them are gold. I'm not a professor of Middle Ages, so obviously I'm not picking up the grittiest mistakes, but that doesn't matter - I'm a fantasy writer, I don't need to know the specifics, and after being one of those people who went to the Library to look for information.... half of the books were crap meant for someone who had five years to read and understand a 900-page manual on FOOD that only talked about how they had no information and could not get any information on the food. And frankly, if you're a fantasy writer, you don't need to get into the nitty-gritty stuff. I really don't care if the peasant-garb existed or not (and yes, it did, because I used to go on the internet on all sorts of sites on the middle ages, and for every typical female peasant garb it looked remarkably like the one in the book.)This book has to be the clearest and quickest way to get information on the middle ages, and it gives you all the information you need to write an entire scene on something in detail and clarity, without blurring the background and hoping everyone won't notice the lack of detail and knowledge. You all can trash this book or toss it in the flames, but it's going to stay with me for a looooong time.

Concise primer

I agree with another reviewer here who says this book is good for a concise reference on the Medieval ages. This book is meant as a writer's reference and therefore is not designed to go as far into detail as say a college text book. I'm a writer of a dark fantasy series based in a feudal society and I've found this book not only invaluably helpful but also extremely easy to handle. Let's face it, there are just times we writers want a quick fact about etiquette, dress, etc and not an entire lecture. That's when I pick up this book, page to the correct section, and 9/10 times will instantly find what I'm looking for. It sure beats scanning mountains of academic text to find a simple fact or two. I also like how the authors list short bibliographies at the end of each chapter for authors who'd like more indepth material to research. The vocabulary lists are my favorite. I actually have each marked with tabs now for instant access. This really is the perfect starter (primer) for those just beginning or considering the possiblities of a series set in a Medieval society. Highly recommended.

Great for writers but even better for gamers

Another of the "Great for writers but even better for gamers" series, this book is exactly what I wanted from a reference, unlike the somewhat meandering Body Truama in the Howdunit series. The book hits on so many topics, it's impossible to list them all: food, clothing, medicine, economy, measures, titles, saint, weapons...the list goes on and on. All are referenced in an easy to read, no commentary style that provides keywords in bold text with their definitions in each section. Even better, there's a Further Reading section at the end of each chapter.As a springboard for further research, What Life Was Like is a prime resource. Of most immediate ues to gamers with a historical bent are the date of clothing styles (to avoid anachronistic styles of dress) and a description of the day to day activites of a castle. While it's probably a bit extreme to apply all of these principles to role-playing fantasy, which is, after all, FANTASY, this book goes a long way in providing a sense of feel to an environment that's so different from the modern world, it seems fantastic.Thus this scene: "The warrior takes a slurp from his soup bowl, then sticks another forkful of meat in his mouth as he mumbles, 'Yeah, I know him. What's it to ya?'"Becomes this: "The warrior takes a slurp from his trencher, then sticks his knife into a hunk of meat and stuffs it in his mouth. He mumbles, 'Yeah, I know him. What's it to ya?'"No forks til the late fourteenth century! Forget wooden bowls, people used hollowed out bread as bowls.Also prevalent throughout this Writer's Guide are the pictures and lists. Although my own personal preference is for line drawings in a work such as this, the pictures (of period actors) do the job. Also, the lists, when they appear, are relevant and to the point, including a list of popes and kings.There are other books in the series that would probably find an application in role-playing: Guides to Victorian England, Renaissance England, and even the Wild West. If they're anything like Everyday Life in the Middle Ages, they're worth checking out.