Beryl Smallet ,,Historians in the Middle Ages” (nedideli defektai)

What is a fit subject for history? How should it be presented? On what authority, does it rest?

The period from 800 to 1150 saw a significant change in the answers to these questions.

In this book, the first on the subject in English, Beryl Smalley traces the development from Einhard, who saw his Life of Charlemagne as an imperial biography in the tradition of Suetonius, to the recorders of conquest and crusade, who were freed by the novelty and excitement of their story trom dependence on ancient models. Men such as William of Tyre, who was himself adviser to the kings of Jerusalem, and Ville-hardouin, who went on the Fourth Crusade, directly participated in the events about which they wrote. The author also examines the basic ideas which shaped the historians thought-what they inherited from the Roman world, and what they took from the Bible. In the same way, the pictures accompanying the text illustrate not only the histories themselves, but also medieval man’s view of the world and its impact on his interpretation of events.

Dr Smalley is a distinguished medieval historian and former Vice-Principal of St Hilda’s College, Oxford. Her other books include The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages and The Becket Conflict and the Schools: a Study of Intellectuals in Politics in the Twelfth Century.

jacket: Medieval historians found chapter-divisions for world history in the apocalyptic books of the Bible. Here, the statue and the tree seen by Nebuchadnezzar and interpreted by Danic are identified with six ages of the world, from Adam to Christ. From an illustrated encyclopedia, Lambert of St Omer’s Liber floridus, before 1120. Ghent University Library