It is a fact that I am fascinated by the Middle Ages, or the Dark Ages, as this period is often called. But I don’t think that times were so much darker then. If you try to compare the time between let’s say 500 and 1500 to our century, there are surprisingly little things that really changed. The whole life is faster now, but is that to be considered as an advantage? We drive fast cars, fly aeroplanes and we kill ourselves while doing so. Back in the Middle Ages people went on long journeys, too. It may have taken them longer to reach their target, but they probably saw and learned a lot more than we do now. Generally, people died much younger then. But again, I wonder if it is an advantage to grow old and let machines keep you alive and prevent you from dying in dignity. We build enormous towers where people have to live without knowing each other. Now try to compare those to the cathedral of Chartres. It may have taken a few centuries to finally finish this imposing building in 1260, but it is still standing. As a side note : Ken Follett wrote a wonderful book about building a cathedral. It is called “The Pillars of the Earth”.

I read a lot of books about the Middle Ages, and I still do not know much. So what I tell you here is some information that I gathered from different sources and may have been described in a completely different way by someone else. My respect goes to the historians and research scientists who try their best to paint a realistic picture of how life could have been a thousand years and more ago. You may say that there was a huge gulch between the rich and the poor. And that is of course true. I wouldn’t say that the situation is much different now, though. We are more slaves to the money than to anything else, but I wouldn’t exactly call that living in freedom...

Although I never got the opportunity and probably never will to touch one, I admire the books that have been manually created in the Middle Ages. Reading and writing was not a common skill and mainly dominated by clerics, doctors and lawyers. So most books were the result of the hard work of monks. Many of those treasures, like the “Codex Aureus” from the 9^th century that you can see below - are overlaid with gold-leaf.

Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and live in the Middle Ages for a while. But then again, I am not sure if I would choose to be a woman. Not only did the women not have any rights, for quite a while the church pretended that they did not even have a soul. There was only one perfect woman, and that was the Holy Virgin. For common girls it was of course at least very difficult to reach that status. Women were bad and evil by nature. It was not even their fault. But there was unfortunately not much you could do about it. Apart of burning many of them as witches of course. I’d rather not even start a rant about the inquisition. That is indeed a very dark chapter of the Middle Ages.

Another rather unpleasant chapter is the plague. In a way I compare this disease to AIDS, because it could have been stopped from spreading if people only would have known more about it. Although the plague has been mentioned for the first time in 1347, it probably had struck people long before, but not in such an overwhelming, lethal way. In early October 1347 a ship coming back from the Black Sea arrived in the Sicilian town Messina, most men of the crew lying dead or dying on board. Without taking any special precautions, the citizens of the town brought the few who were still alive to the hospital, the dead were burried. How could they have known that they had brought death into their town? Only 2 or 3 days later, the first victims of the bacillus got sick and discovered big, dark boils all over their bodies. Let’s not go into detail too much. Hardly anyone survived but most lived long enough to infect many others. The “magna mortalitas” (big dying) had begun and spread all over Europe. The bacillus was hosted by rats and transferred by flea-bites. So most probably the rats on the ship coming from the Eastern part of the world had brought the plague to Europe. But rats as well as fleas had always been in Messina, so nobody cared more about them now than before. Nevertheless, someone had to be found who could be held responsible for all this. So why not the Jews? They had been accused of having poisened wells before, so the scapegoat was found rather quickly. The church did not intervene. Actually, most clerics were relieved that nobody thought of them as being guilty.

And that persecuting the Jews kept people from realizing that the church left them alone with their pain and fear. In many towns, the Jewish community was completely destroyed, the possessions distributed. But none of the horrible acts stopped the disease from spreading even wider. Nobody was safe, the rich no more than the poor. Places like hospitals or prisons were afflicted even more and after a while it was difficult to find people to take care of the sick or to bury the deceased. In many towns, only a third of the population survived, for whatever reason. Some doctors ordered that a patient’s house should be washed with vinegar. That was of course no cure against the plague, but it helped at least to get rid of the fleas for a while. It was only in 1722 that the plague disappeared for good in Europe. Some scientists think that this was due to the bacillus having become too weak to spread, because the hygienic situation had not changed much during all these years. Actually, it was still so bad that another epidemic disease, the cholera, could easily spread 200 years later…

Montségur

A few years ago I had read the sad story about the cathars, a religious community that had spread in France during the 11th century and been destroyed in a crusade lead by Simon de Montfort in the 13th century. It is almost impossible to explain the complex view of the cathars on religion and life in general. And I am not even sure if I really understand it. One of the main differences between the faith of the cathars and the “true Christian” faith is that the cathars believed that God created good AND bad. So they thought that mankind with its physical needs is bad, but the pure soul is good. The ambition of the cathars was to abstain from all earthly joys and so become perfect - they then called themselves “les parfaits” - in order to gain eternal life. To do so they had to go through several reincarnations.

 Unfortunately, these peaceful and modestly living people were a thorn in the eye of the Roman Catholic church, and they soon were pursued as heretics. Those who did not officially withdraw from their religion were burnt alive. One of their last refuges was the fortress Montsegur on a mountain in the Pyrenees. The ruins of this fortress attract many people, specially around the solstice in spring. Ever since I had become interested in the history of the cathars, I wanted to visit that special place myself. I finally did so in 1998. To touch those old stones and rocks was an amazing, almost spiritual experience. A huge site about the cathars as well as the knight templars can be found here, but unfortunately only in French. The people seem to work on an English version though.

But please do not get me wrong. I do not at all try to find my salvation in the doctrine of the cathars. My interest and passion is more of a historical kind of nature. I am of course fascinated by the legend that tells about a couple of “parfaits” who were able to escape from the fortress Montsegur very shortly before the surrender.And about the box they took along, that contained an immense treasure that has never been found. The story says that the treasure was indeed the Holy Grail, in whichever form. But I have no intention to participate int he quest for the Holy Grail. At least not now and not here.

Abbeys & Churches

I think I mentioned before that I am not a very religious person. But nevertheless I love it to visit old abbeys and churches. A very peaceful and calm place that always attracts me is the abbey of Orval in Belgium..Apart of the relatively new abbey and the old herbal garden, the ruins of the old abbay can be visited. The Trappist monks in Orval brew their own beer and produce their own cheese, which are sold in a store in the new part of the abbey.

Whenever I am in a town I try to visit at least one church. It is not always the huge cathedrals that impress me the most. Some old little churches have a very special, peaceful atmosphere. I am not much a fan of modern churches. What I need is colorful windows, ancient statues and the smell of a very old building. One of my dreams is to visit the cathedral of Chartres in France one day.

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