IIRC, William the Conqueror could leap onto his horse whilst wearing full armour.
They didn't need cranes, or even steps, to get onto their mounts.
There were Maya states that formed regional empires, though.
Popular misconceptions about pre-modern History
- Thread starter ray243
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IIRC, William the Conqueror could leap onto his horse whilst wearing full armour.
They didn't need cranes, or even steps, to get onto their mounts.
There were Maya states that formed regional empires, though.
Well yeah (looking at you, Mayapan), but the widespread misconception that I have seen is people assuming there is a Maya empire just like there is a Aztec Empire / Inca Empire.
The medieval period did have a strong belief in magic, it's just that for most of that time they didn't see magic as inherently bad (after all, for them Christianity was full of magic. The distinction was whether the magic came from respectable or non-respectable sources).
I was thinking about the K'iche, actually, but your point stands as well.
It would be more appropriate to compare the Maya with the Ancient Greeks - city states, shifting alliances, love of maths etc.
Burying dead cats into the walls of their houses, hiding shoes, crazy-arse cures, etc.
People weren't stupid, but they sure were superstitious.
Okay maybe it is just that I hang around a lot of online history communities but I swear these 'misconceptions' are things people always say are misconceptions and yet I never see anyone actually make. Like I swear I have never seen anyone on this site or anywhere else say that the Byzantines were a degenerate rump of an empire as one guy said. I mean I don't doubt that there are people who have made these misconceptions but I don't know, I don't recall ever having seen anyone actually make any of these misconceptions. I have, however, seen a lot of people say that they're common misconceptions, I just never see them anywhere. Again, maybe it is just the communities I hang around with?
maybe it's because 'people who know anything about history' are a smallish group? It might be hard to find people who have misconceptions about the Byzantine Empire when there are scads of people who don't even know that it ever existed...
Skallagrim
Banned
The most commonly cited factor is a difference in diet. Another factor, derived from studies into reproductive success, appears to be that Dutch women just like tall men, and Dutch men have no particular dislike of tall women. (In many other countries, men - on average - noticably prefer women on the petite side.)
Mind you, I'm not at all sure whether these observed factors are the entire explanation.
Skallagrim
Banned
Do note that during the medieval period, the Church did officially hold the position that there was no such thing as magic. The idea of medieval Catholic witch-burners is the big misconception. When the Catholic Church sent people to invastigate claims of magic, they pretty much invariably found that there was no magic at play, and that was case closed, then.
Indeed. Most people in England that were accused of witchcraft were...wait for it - acquitted.
Also, those found guilty were usually hanged - burning was more common on the continent.
There were plenty of "witch-finders" who preyed on people's fears. Their "success" rate in finding witches was heavily down to cheating.
I may be wrong, but is it not true that the image we have now of King John may be giving hm the short end of the stick?"
Skallagrim
Banned
Absolutely true. He certainly had his flaws and then some, but he was a far cry from the caricature he's often depicted as.
John Lackland? Failed to conquer Ireland, tried to take control of England when his brother was on Crusade (as he was oft to do), lost Angevin lands in France after years of getting taxes and men for it, and then kept demanding more... and seems he lost the French lands partially because he recognized the French King as his overlord and later divorced his wife, tried to marry someone engaged to a French nobleman, crushed him, fought others, was rude to his allies, ended up with everyone in France basically giving him the boot, yards yada... And of course giving allegiance to the Pope and asking him to let him nullify his previous promises with the Magna Carta, which he did. He doesn't have to be a good person, just a good king.
As you guys mention though, people did make him a caricature, if only because people stuck Robin zhood there for the sake of drama, while others ignored how King Richard only saw the English as a resource base.
My impression is that Holy Roman propagandists liked to downplay the Byzantines during the Early Modern era but that that perception is largely gone now.
On the other hand, the importance of the Byzantines (and of the Islamic Mideast as well) during the early Middle Ages is vastly underestimated in Anglo-American historiography in favor of discussing minor “kings” squabbling about in Western Europe...
I've seen plenty enough of them in my own time, maybe some of them haven't been used on this forum in a while and others are common misconceptions outside of the crowd that knows history. Stuff like decadent Byzantines doesn't show up as much because pop-history doesn't acknowledge the Byzantine Empire was a thing and this site in particular has had an enduring obsession with them for at least as long as I've been a member. But I have seen stuff like people trying to write "the Mayan Empire" (ignoring, as previously stated, that there was no such thing nor is "Mayan" the correct demonym for the people) into TLs and talking about cities that were long abandoned by the time the TL takes place, even using Spanish names for some cities and modern archaeologists' names for some kings. By which I mean, certain names like "Smoking Frog" or "Curl Snout" weren't the actual names of ancient Maya kings but rather the descriptions of the glyphs representing their names that archaeologists used until they could be properly translated.
Also, another misconception that has been rife for the entire time I've been a member up to the present even is that it's easy to set up a colony in the New World. People continually act as if all it takes for Europeans of any era (or sometimes Chinese, Japanese, Malians, etc) to create a functioning colony is to pack a boat full of people crammed up like sardines and point it west. That's not how it worked at all, surprisingly few people ever even ask why certain people should even be trying to colonize the new world, or if they could even plausibly suspect the new world exists, and don't realize that historically there were numerous failed colonies, including the first several. Vinland was not a success. Columbus's La Navidad was not a success. Roanoke failed, and even Jamestown barely scraped by and most of the colonists died. And these were the attempts by people with good sailing knowledge and actual reasons to go to America.
Eh, if anything the reverse is the problem wherein people discussing the early Middle Ages dismiss Western European kings as mere tribal warlords when they ruled rather sophisticated and important kingdoms that saw trade from far afield. Particularly with England, where seemingly even the English seem like they're in a hurry to write off early Anglo-Saxon monarchs as backwater despots so as to paint themselves as plucky underdogs rather than the people who got lucky and got their hands on one of the most important cities in Christendom very early on.
That’s probably because the Byzantine Empire never even came close to conquering France, let alone England, even at its height. The King of England in like 1200 is probably more important than the Byzantine Emperor when talking about our history, as Americans. The Islamic issue is a totally separate one, I would imagine.
How about the idea that the Roman Republic was a free democracy with a fair court system? I mean, it did have some representative elements, but it was no more a democracy than the Republic of Venice!
How about the idea that the Roman Republic was a free democracy with a fair court system? I mean, it did have some representative elements, but it was no more a democracy than the Republic of Venice!
Basically this. The Roman Republic, even at it best, was a oligarchical state with a grand total of at least fives classes and an huge web of the patronage system called the clientalia.
That all ancient/medieval people were tiny and short.
I think matt easton did a video explaining it, but to be brief: the average hight of a medieval person was only about one inch shorter than today's average, although the range of heights was wider back then compared to today. Also the start industrial revolution saw the average height drop for a while.
I think matt easton did a video explaining it, but to be brief: the average hight of a medieval person was only about one inch shorter than today's average, although the range of heights was wider back then compared to today. Also the start industrial revolution saw the average height drop for a while.
Social structure that in fact is easily recognizable in the social structures that the Spanish Imposed in Latino-America, and the Patronage system still functional in Latino america,with the Clientelism
and Cronyism so endemic in the region, will be not alien to a Roman
I vaguely remember the observation/claim that historical average height in Scandinavia is sort of a U-curve. The average height in the viking period wasOn the other hand, the tallness of some Northern European peoples is a recent development. In the Netherlands, I know it to be a product of a great upward surge in standard of living starting in the 19th century. If you look at doorways to ruilly old buildings in the Netherlands, you'll see at once they're very low. almost all modern Dutchmen have to duck just to avoid banging their heads into the doorframe.I assume it's much the same for Scandinavians.
roughly the same as today, but there was a period in between (can't recall when or for how long) when it wasn't...
Lamarckism. France and the UK are not below sea level, so the French and British do not need to be tall enough to look over dyke walls.
Of course that could be said about people today too (e.g. rugby players always taking the same number of step backwards before a place kick, people refusing to walk under ladders, etc, etc). But yes, superstition was much more prevalent then.