updated 8d ago
She’s speaking English, the bastard horse-trading language that people have been speaking since the Normans arrived. It still sounds new and vulgar to him, ringing strangely in his ears, but Merlin’s magic makes it so that they can understand each other. Part of the covenant. The gift of tongues. Give him knowledge of the words which are spoken by
... See morefrom Perilous Times by Thomas D. Lee
Margaret Leigh added
- Like chess masters and firefighters, premodern villagers relied on things being the same tomorrow as they were yesterday. They were extremely well prepared for what they had experienced before, and extremely poorly equipped for everything else. Their very thinking was highly specialized in a manner that the modern world has been telling us is incre... See more
from Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World a book by David Epstein by David Epstein
sari added
By AD 1000 this seigneurial system had hardened into an elaborate structure of obligations and overlordship, and had become a powerful engine for exploiting land and labour to produce military power – in the characteristic form of the mounted knight.
from After Tamerlane: The Rise and Fall of Global Empires, 1400-2000 by John Darwin