>"Are you referring to Francis and Joseph Gies the authors of Life In A Medieval Village and Life In A Medieval City?"
Oh, yes! My personal favorite popularizers of Medieval Life 101. :-) They are also the authors together of a third in that batch, Life in a Medieval Castle, and there's a lavishly illustrated color omnibus of those three called Daily Life in Medieval Times. My favorite of those is the City one, but my favorite of what I've read by them overall is The Knight in History by Frances Gies alone; it's a different kind of book, with many more incidents and anecdotes and connections drawn.
I miss having access to a university library, but the Internet is an awe-inspiring resource, and probably does me as well for my mere fanfiction flashbacks when I back it up with the public library.
Last spring, when I ended up writing a Fleur and Lacroix story set c.1233 for a ficathon, I really wanted to write a Fleur and Andre story set c.1303 -- naturally Fleur would not have died in 1247 in this scenario -- but I pushed it aside for lack of information on daily lives of the clergy at that time. Information on theology and politics was easy to come by, but not the day-to-day routine. That's why I like the Gies books so much, even if they're not always just at the right decade for what I'm doing at any given time.
My favorite medieval history book discovered this year is The Hound and the Hawk by John Cummins, about medieval hunting. It blew me away.
The Gieses
Oh, yes! My personal favorite popularizers of Medieval Life 101. :-) They are also the authors together of a third in that batch, Life in a Medieval Castle, and there's a lavishly illustrated color omnibus of those three called Daily Life in Medieval Times. My favorite of those is the City one, but my favorite of what I've read by them overall is The Knight in History by Frances Gies alone; it's a different kind of book, with many more incidents and anecdotes and connections drawn.
I miss having access to a university library, but the Internet is an awe-inspiring resource, and probably does me as well for my mere fanfiction flashbacks when I back it up with the public library.
Last spring, when I ended up writing a Fleur and Lacroix story set c.1233 for a ficathon, I really wanted to write a Fleur and Andre story set c.1303 -- naturally Fleur would not have died in 1247 in this scenario -- but I pushed it aside for lack of information on daily lives of the clergy at that time. Information on theology and politics was easy to come by, but not the day-to-day routine. That's why I like the Gies books so much, even if they're not always just at the right decade for what I'm doing at any given time.
My favorite medieval history book discovered this year is The Hound and the Hawk by John Cummins, about medieval hunting. It blew me away.