Category: Medieval
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Paul B. Sturtevant’s ‘Middle Ages’: Learning a little history from popular culture
Paul B. Sturtevant is tired of quantitative studies that aim to broadcast the public’s ignorance of history. To him, they reduce history to memorizing facts and dates while taking “an explicitly negative position when framing the results,” typically focusing on the small minority of people who failed the test. Sturtevant, an American with a Ph.D.…
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Petrovskaia’s Defense of Medievalism on Screen
Before diving into depictions of Merlin in medieval texts, film, and television, Natalia I. Petrovskaia offers a full-throated promotion and defense of academics tackling popular medievalism instead of the romanticized art and literature from the 19th and 20th centuries. While this field has grown considerably over the past 40 years, Petrovskaia offers some interesting arguments…
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The Twisted Arthurian Legend of Thanos
With The Infinity Gauntlet, an epic, romantic quest began and never stopped both in and out of the comic books. The Marvel Universe lends itself to an Arthurian comparison, and nowhere is that clearer than with Thanos, the most flawed of knights, and his quest for the six Infinity gems.
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Popular Medievalism is Demanding
The Middle Ages are as popular as ever and, as such, we need continuous scholarship on medievalism, especially in movies and television. Case in point, consider Lee Ann Tobin’s research in 1990, surveying students on their familiarity with medieval films.1 The results are a fascinating time capsule. 82% of them had seen Robin Hood –…
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Medievalism on Screen: An Annotated Bibliography
29 May 2026 This bibliography is up to 278 entries and growing. If you have any suggested additions, please do not hesitate to reach out. Although the field of medievalism on screen is fairly young, there is already a massive amount of work on the topic in English alone. By medievalism, I am referring to…
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What’s the Point of Judging Medieval Films for Accuracy?
Public opinion varies on the value of judging anachronisms in medieval films. When I analyzed some depictions of trebuchets in medieval and fantasy films, Internet opinions ranged from “who fucking cares” to “oh, that’s interesting” (actual quotes from social media). Academic opinion varies as well, but the general consensus tends to be that judging a…
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Book Review: Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology
I wish I could delete the first few chapters of Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology, or at least move them to the back. Like any book of myths, it’s difficult not to glaze over the initial inundation of unpronounceable names (e.g., Yggdrasil, Hvergelmir), origins, and outrageous creation tales. But once you make it past there, this…
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The Arthurian version of “rope-a-dope”
800 years before Muhammad Ali defeated George Foreman in Rumble in the Jungle using his “rope-a-dope” technique, one of King Arthur’s knights used a similar technique in a joust gone awry. The rope-a-dope technique In the 1974 bout called “Rumble in the Jungle”, Ali scored a knockout in the 8th round against the undefeated George…
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Jean d’Alluye: A Crusader and his Chinese Sword in New York
A crusader in remarkably accurate 13th-century armor and his cherished Chinese sword have been set in stone for nearly 800 years and on display in New York City for the last century. So it’s no wonder the medieval limestone effigy that once covered the tomb of Jean d’Alluye now dons the cover of the newly…
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Trebuchets on Screen: Chronicles of Narnia
Last month, I emphasized that nothing says medieval like a trebuchet when it comes to film. The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008) turns notion on its head by enhancing the traditional trebuchet with an industrial-like enhancement. In the climactic battle of the film, one of the armies employs a double-armed trebuchet that continually swings, seemingly using…
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In Film, Nothing Says Medieval like a Trebuchet
In Remaking the Middle Ages (2011), Andrew B. R. Elliott coined the term “historicon” to identify a film’s “visual conventions which each aim to evoke to the spectator an element of ‘medievality.’”1 He provides numerous examples including knights, castles, and princesses, but obviously there are so many more.2 A moviegoer can see these historicons and immediately associate the…
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Joan of Arc Fired Cannons, not Trebuchets
We know a lot about Joan of Arc including that she besieged cities with cannons, not trebuchets. Yet, when it came time to showcase Joan’s army using siege weapons in The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc (1999), director Luc Besson went with a siege tower and a trebuchet. It’s easy to let this medievalism…