THEY LIVED LIKE THIS IN CHAUCER'S ENGLAND

by Marie Neurath ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1968

Ungraced by quasi-medieval illustrations, these vague, misleading statements will raise more questions than they answer. Of calligraphy: ""In Chaucer's time. Gothic letters were used""; not only Gothic letters, or in preference to some other kind. On diets: ""The villagers got extra meat by poaching, which was punished but could not be prevented"": not how punished, why not prevented or even why necessary. Skimpy mention of peasant plantings and town guilds, increase in trade and shipbuilding, the role of the church (""In those days everyone feared the Day of Judgment, when sinners would suffer hellfire after death.""), the spread of the plague and the subsequent change in the feudal system. Stippling, ostensibly in medieval proportion, barely suggests the minimal specifics. They lived more specifically than this, and they never wrote or illustrated with so little regard for informing.

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1968

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Watts

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1968

Categories: NONFICTION