Book review: ‘Community, Urban Health and Environment in the Late Medieval Low Countries’ by Janna Coomans (2021)

August 17, 2025

Medieval Hygiene hasn’t been a serious topic of research for historians till relatively recently, the topic is more related to the daily life of common people, not knights, royals or other famous people, so less interesting for some, but for a long time the old opinions held since Victorian times were just repeated for generations.Luckily … More Book review: ‘Community, Urban Health and Environment in the Late Medieval Low Countries’ by Janna Coomans (2021)

List of medieval towns, villages & cities with bathhouses

August 6, 2025

As it’s sometimes still difficult to comprehend how common (or uncommon) bathhouses were in medieval Europe, I thought it might be interesting to make a list of all the places that had a functioning public bathhouse/bathing facility in Europe between 500-1500AD with connected sources/evidence.This list does not tell us how many bathhouses each city/town/village had … More List of medieval towns, villages & cities with bathhouses

Book review: ‘Urban Women: Life, Love, and Work in the Medieval Low Countries’ by Andrea Bardyn, Chanelle Delameillieure, Jelle Haemers (2019)

August 4, 2025

For a long time historians have been more interested in the stories of royals, nobles, knights and other important and powerful people, than they have been in the lives of the common folk.But I’ve always cared more about what life was like for people like me, not rich, not powerful, not living in palaces, etc. … More Book review: ‘Urban Women: Life, Love, and Work in the Medieval Low Countries’ by Andrea Bardyn, Chanelle Delameillieure, Jelle Haemers (2019)

Youtube review: “What Hygiene Was Like During the Black Plague” by ‘Weird history’

July 13, 2025

Let’s review a youtube video. “What Hygiene Was Like During the Black Plague“, made by ‘Weird history‘, a channel with 4.6 million subscribers. This video has 1 million views.First illustration is from 1625… not medieval. The thumbnail: The video is about the “black plague”, but it’s actually about the Black Death.Plague was the disease, Black … More Youtube review: “What Hygiene Was Like During the Black Plague” by ‘Weird history’

Article review: Why Medieval Castles Were Filthy Places You’d Never Want to Live In

March 25, 2025

Time to review yet another nonsense online article with no sources or references. “Why Medieval Castles Were Filthy Places You’d Never Want to Live In”https://talesofthemiddleages.com/why-medieval-castles-were-filthy-places/ Oh dear.Okay, this is mostly just a rant, a flood of words, me screaming into the void.There are some sources for what I’m saying in the thread I link to … More Article review: Why Medieval Castles Were Filthy Places You’d Never Want to Live In

Book review: ‘The medieval pig’ by Dolly Jørgensen

August 5, 2024

I love history books that are all about a specific subject, it shows that a historian has become obsessed about one thing and that they’ve likely spend more time than is healthy researching it.Which is of course a good thing because it can result in the ultimate publication on the topic and I think that’s … More Book review: ‘The medieval pig’ by Dolly Jørgensen

Book review: ‘Het middeleeuwse openbare badhuis’ by Fabiola van Dam (2020)

July 15, 2024

I recently read ‘Het middeleeuwse openbare badhuis’ by Fabiola van Dam, I read it twice. I realise it is not available in English and VERY specific, but it had some interesting stuff in it I want to share with you anyway, so here we go. Oh if you’re a history book publisher, check this book … More Book review: ‘Het middeleeuwse openbare badhuis’ by Fabiola van Dam (2020)