Roger Bacon – Medieval science
Roger Bacon's diagram of a human eye When did Roger Bacon live? Roger Bacon was born in England maybe about 1210 AD. It was late in the reign of King John. (That's the one [...]
Roger Bacon's diagram of a human eye When did Roger Bacon live? Roger Bacon was born in England maybe about 1210 AD. It was late in the reign of King John. (That's the one [...]
Math was a very exciting subject to be working on during the Middle Ages in Europe. Little by little, math experts in Europe were learning from Islamic math experts about what we call Arabic numbers (0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9) (though the [...]
Astrolabe in Hebrew, probably from Spain (1300s AD) In the early Middle Ages, most people in Europe were too poor to have much time for astronomy. But some people were still interested in [...]
Medieval science: an Italian pharmacy jar, about 1400 AD (Metropolitan Museum, New York) Learning from Islamic science During the Middle Ages, the best scientists and doctors weren't in Europe. They were [...]
Medieval tithe barn (Germany) In the Middle Ages, the Catholic church in Europe collected a tax of its own, separate from the kings' taxes, which was called a tithe. Tithe means "one-tenth", because people were [...]
The first view of the pilgrimage: Chartres on the horizon Who went on pilgrimages? In the Middle Ages, many people - both men and women - went on short or long [...]
Mary window at Chartres Cathedral People think of the Middle Ages as a very religious period, when the Christian Church was the most important institution and everybody prayed all the time. Certainly [...]
Francis of Assisi gives his father back his clothes (Giotto, in Assisi) Who was Francis of Assisi? By 1200 AD, the Catholic Church was very powerful. Bishops and popes were often rich men. They cared more about [...]
Nativity mosaic (St. Maria in Trastevere, Rome ca. 1300 AD) showing the birth of Jesus on Christmas When did people start to celebrate Christmas? Beginning about 300 AD, people began to [...]
A book in Thomas Aquinas' handwriting For many years before Thomas Aquinas was born, men like Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd in the Abbasid Empire had been reading the Quran, and reading Aristotle, and trying to find ways to [...]