 | Term | Definition |
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Charlemagne |
King of France, also crowned Emperor of the Roman People in 800 |
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Papal States |
a region in central Italy ruled by the Pope |
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Counts |
officials chosen by Charlemagne to rule parts of his empire in his name |
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navigation |
planning a course of travel, such as the Vikings crossing the sea |
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sagas |
long Icelandic stories about great heroes and events |
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knights |
highly skilled soldiers who fought on horseback |
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fief |
land given to a knight in exchange for his services |
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vassal |
a person who accepts a fief from a lord |
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feudal system |
the political and social system of exchanging land for service |
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fealty |
a knight’s loyalty to the lord who gives him land |
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manorial system |
an economic system built around large estates called manors |
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serfs |
people who were legally tied to the manor on which they worked |
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William the Conqueror |
Duke of Normandy, conquered England in 1066 |
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Domesday Book |
the record of William’s survey of England’s people and their property |
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Eleanor of Aquitaine |
powerful French duchess; divorced the king of France to marry Henry II of England and ruled all of England and about half of France with him |
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Magna Carta |
document that restricted the king of England’s power, considered to be the first step toward democracy in England |
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Parliament |
governing body that was the result of the king’s council in the 1260s and which still makes England’s laws today |
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Holy Land |
the region where the site of the Holy Temple of the Jews was located and where Jesus had lived and taught |
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Pope Urban II |
Leader of the Roman Catholic Church who asked European Christians to take up arms against Muslims, starting the Crusades |
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Crusades |
a series of religious wars launched by European Christians in the Middle Ages |
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Saladin |
Muslim sultan who overthrew the Seljuk Turks and drove the Christians out of Jerusalem, leading to the Third Crusade |
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Richard the Lion-Hearted |
King of England who led forces against the army of Saladin during the Third Crusade |
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guilds |
trade organizations in which all members set standards and prices for their products |
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apprentice |
someone who spent several years with a skilled crafter to learn basic skills of the craft |
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journeyman |
a person who has learned the basics of a career as an apprentice but is still learning from masters and has not yet opened his own shop |
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Gothic |
building style that used advances in engineering to make churches taller and brighter than earlier churches |
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flying buttresses |
supports that helped hold up church walls from the outside, allowing for much higher ceilings and an interior that had no columns |
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illumination |
the process of decorating a written manuscript with pictures or designs |
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Geoffrey Chaucer |
English author of the Canterbury Tales |
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Heresy |
beliefs that oppose the church’s official teachings |
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Inquisitions |
legal procedures supervised by special judges who tried suspected heretics |
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Black Death |
a devastating plague that swept across Europe between 1347 and 1351 |
