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The Middle Ages 1066- 1485. Begins with William of Normandy (France) who conquered England He granted land to lords. Lords granted land to knights. This created hierarchies and a rigid class structure. British Class Structure in the Middle Ages. Ruling class Clergy Class Middle Class
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The Middle Ages1066- 1485 • Begins with William of Normandy (France) who conquered England • He granted land to lords. Lords granted land to knights. • This created hierarchies and a rigid class structure
British Class Structure in the Middle Ages Ruling class Clergy Class Middle Class Trade Class Peasant Class
Chivalry • Knight is the symbol of chivalry • Well-born boys left home at age 7 to train • Page –> squire -> knight • Learned manners, courtesy, horsemanship, and use of sword, shield, and lance
Society • All classes came together in church • Afterlife emphasized over worldly life • Education was handled by the church • Church was tied to politics (the king)
National Government • Two families ruled England for over 4 centuries – the Normans (William) and the Plantagenets (Henry II) • Three important events: • Judicial reform • Magna Carta • Parliament
Geoffrey Chaucer 1343 - 1400 • “The Father of English Poetry” • Wrote in vernacular • Vernacular = common everyday language – the emerging standard English • Everyone else was writing in Latin and French
Traveled to Italy • Read Boccaccio’s Decameron and was greatly influenced • Came home and modeled The Canterbury Tales after it
The Canterbury Tales • Is Chaucer’s greatest work because • 1. His language (vernacular) • 2. It left a concise portrait of an entire nation – young, old, high, low, male, female, lay, clerical, learned, ignorant, rogue, righteous
The Canterbury Tales • Chaucer uses iambic pentameter U/ five beats (iambs)per line (10 syllables total) Ex. It happened in that season that one day Heroic Couplet = rhymed couplet in iambic pentameter
The Canterbury Tales • Premise = stories told on a pilgrimage from London to the shrine of Thomas a Becket at Canterbury Cathedral (70 miles) • The group begins at the Tabard Inn • 30 pilgrims embark together
The Canterbury Tales • Host of the Inn suggests that they exchange tales on the way (2 each) and on the way home (another 2) • 30 pilgrims x 4 tales each = 120 tales • Chaucer died before completing the tales