Category: Medieval
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Colmar Remembered
Most people have never heard of Colmar, a tiny French Alsace town near the German border. Charlemagne knew it as a Saxon settlement, and it existed as one of the many little spaces connecting the Holy Roman Empire. Not all of its residents were Christians. Colmar’s “street of the Jews” once housed a synagogue, a…
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When A Pope Quits
Today, Pope Benedict XVI made the decision to step down. For Roman Catholics, this is a shocking surprise. For historians, it is a moment in which we “watch history happen” – a very overused phrase, but one which means that we witness an unusual event which will be discussed long after we’re no longer here.…
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Bringing Up the Dead – How Something (or someone) Lost Can Be Found Again
In our Medieval classes, we mentioned the story that Attila the Hun was buried in a three coffins made of gold, silver and iron, and then buried below a river. One student asked if there is a chance of ever finding this coffin, which, if the story is true, should be somewhere in Hungary (or,…
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