ASMR 100 History Facts About Medieval England (Whispered)

[00:00:00]Hey everybody and welcome to another ASMR R video here on the channel.

[00:00:18]Now, in tonight's video, I've got a requested one for you. I I must have done a video like this at some point, surely, but it just doesn't ring a bell.

[00:00:30]Can't remember the name of the person who requested it, but they basically listed a load of videos and one of the ideas was a fact video about medieval times.

[00:00:42]So, that's exactly what I've got for you this evening. I've got 100 whispered facts about medieval England. Obviously, a very fascinating time period. And I skimmed through these facts and there are some definitely interesting ones that I wasn't aware of myself.

[00:01:02]So I hope you find this video informative, entertaining, and most importantly relaxing.

[00:01:10]And let's get started. Fact number one, most people never traveled more than a few miles from their birthplace their entire lives.

[00:01:26]Life expectancy was around 30 to 35 skewed heavily by a high infant mortality rate.

[00:01:39]Peasants typically ate two meals a day.

[00:01:45]bread borin o bread bodage which was a thick vegetable stew and ale were the staples.

[00:01:59]Speaking of ale, ale was often safer to drink than water and was consumed by children too, though it was weaker than modern beer. Most homes had no chimney.

[00:02:17]Smoke from the central path simply rose through a hole in the roof.

[00:02:27]Furniture was minimal. A bed, a chest, and a table might be all a peasant family owned.

[00:02:38]Soap existed, but bathing was infrequent.

[00:02:44]People often washed by wiping with cloth.

[00:02:52]Toothbrushes didn't exist.

[00:02:55]People clean teeth with cloth, and some used a mix of herbs and salt.

[00:03:05]Spoons and knives were common at the table, but forks were considered odd and effeminate until much later.

[00:03:18]Fact number 10.

[00:03:20]Lefthandedness was viewed with suspicion, sometimes linked to sinister or unlucky traits.

[00:03:32]Most clothing was wool or linen.

[00:03:38]Color often indicated status since dyes were expensive.

[00:03:46]Underwear for men were simple linen braise. Is that how you say that word? B R A I. Yes.

[00:03:56]Women wore a shift called a smok. Smok children as young as seven might begin working or apprenticing.

[00:04:14]Marriage could legally happen very young, though consummation was often delayed.

[00:04:25]Surnames became common only gradually often derived from occupation such as Smith, Baker, location or father's name such as Johnson.

[00:04:43]Trial by ordeal as hot iron or boiling water was used to determine guilt via supposed divine judgment.

[00:04:58]Trial by combat was a legal option in some disputes well into the medieval period.

[00:05:10]Sanctuary in a church could protect a fugitive from arrest for up to 40 days.

[00:05:20]Benefit of clergy let literate men escape harsher secular punishment by claiming clerical status.

[00:05:34]And fact number 20, the stocks and pillery were common public punishments for minor crimes.

[00:05:47]Hanging was the standard execution method for common criminals.

[00:05:52]Nobles might be beheaded instead.

[00:05:59]Boaching the king's deer in royal forests could carry severe penalties, including death in earlier periods.

[00:06:13]Women accused of murdering their husbands could face burning.

[00:06:20]Considered a form of treason, petty treason.

[00:06:27]Juries in early medieval England often judge based on personal knowledge of the accused, not just evidence presented.

[00:06:40]Outlaws were literally placed outside the law so anyone could kill them without penalty.

[00:06:54]The church dominated daily life. Belle structured the rhythm of the day for both prayer and work.

[00:07:06]Pilgrimages [snorts] to sites like Canterbury, where Thomas Becket Shrine is, were hugely popular and economically important.

[00:07:19]Relics such as bones, cloth, or objects tied to saints were traded, venerated, and sometimes faked.

[00:07:34]Many believed in the healing power of holy wells scattered across the countryside.

[00:07:43]And fact number 30, excommunication was a powerful social weapon cutting someone off from community and salvation.

[00:07:57]Astrology was taken seriously even by physicians who consulted star charts before treatments.

[00:08:09]belief in fairies, hobgoblins, and other folk spirits coexisted with Christian faith.

[00:08:19]The church calendar dictated agricultural life. Feast days often marked planting or harvest times.

[00:08:33]Monasteries were centers of learning, medicine and recordkeeping.

[00:08:40]Often the only literate institutions for miles.

[00:08:47]Anchorites and anchoresses voluntarily sealed themselves into small cells attached to churches for a life of prayer.

[00:09:03]The four humors, [snorts] blood, flem, black bile, yellow bile, formed the basis of medical theory.

[00:09:18]Blood letting was a common treatment for almost any ailment.

[00:09:27]Barbers often doubled as surgeons performing bloodletting, tooth extraction and minor surgery.

[00:09:41]Herbal remedies were widespread and many had genuine medicinal value such as willow bark for pain.

[00:09:54]Fact number 40.

[00:09:56]The Black Death killed an estimated 30 to 50% of England's population.

[00:10:08]Plague doctors of later medieval Europe wore beaked masks stuffed with herbs, though this was more prominent postmedieval.

[00:10:21]Leprosy sufferers were often isolated in leper houses upside down walls.

[00:10:31]Child birth was extremely dangerous for both mother and infant with no anesthesia and no antiseptics.

[00:10:43]Sweating, sickness, and other unidentified epidemics periodically swept through England.

[00:10:55]Urine, color, and taste were used by physicians to diagnose illness.

[00:11:07]The long bow, especially in Welsh and English hands, became a decisive medieval weapon, notably at Cy and Ain court. Cressy, is that how you say that?

[00:11:24]Long bowman trained from childhood.

[00:11:28]Skeletal remain show bone deformities from repeated bow use.

[00:11:35]Knights armor evolved from male to full plate over the medieval centuries.

[00:11:45]Castles served dual purposes, military strongholds and administrative centers.

[00:11:55]And marking the halfway point is fact number 15.

[00:12:00]Siege warfare included trebuchets, hurling stones, and sometimes diseased animal carcasses.

[00:12:13]The feudal system obligated lords to provide knights and soldiers to their king in exchange for land.

[00:12:24]Mercenary companies like the free companies sometimes turned to banditry between wars.

[00:12:34]The hundred Years War was fought primarily over English claims to the French throne.

[00:12:44]Chain mail could weigh between 20 to 30.

[00:12:49]plate armor even more.

[00:12:52]Despite being designed for mobility, Heraldry developed barley out of necessity to identify armored knights in battle.

[00:13:09]William the Conqueror's 1066 invasion introduced Norman French as the language of the English court for centuries.

[00:13:21]The Doomsday Book was a massive survey of English land and resources for taxation purposes.

[00:13:30]Is it doomsday or doomsday? I always thought it was doomsday, but maybe it's not.

[00:13:37]King John's signing of the Magna Carta in 1215.

[00:13:41]Limited royal power and influence constitutional law for centuries.

[00:13:50]Many medieval English kings couldn't read or write fluently, relying on clerks and scribes.

[00:13:59]And fact number 60, the Wars of the Roses was a dynastic struggle between the houses of Lancaster and York.

[00:14:13]Coronations involved elaborate anointing rituals that emphasized the king's divinely sanctioned rule.

[00:14:24]Regide and usurbation were common.

[00:14:28]Several medieval kings were opposed or murdered.

[00:14:34]Parliament evolved gradually from royal councils, gaining more power over taxation by the 14th century.

[00:14:45]King Richard III's remains were lost for centuries and rediscovered under a Leester car park in 2012.

[00:14:57]The anarchy was a civil war between Steven and Matilda over the English throne.

[00:15:08]Middle English, the language of Chauer evolved from a mix of old English, Norman French and Latin influences.

[00:15:21]Joffrey Ch's Canterbury Tales offers one of the richest windows into medieval English social life.

[00:15:32]French was the language of the nobility and court for roughly 300 years after the Norman conquest.

[00:15:42]Most literature was passed down orally since lit literacy rates were low outside of the clergy.

[00:15:53]In fact number 70, mystery plays dramatizations of biblical stories were performed by local guilds on movable stages called pageant wagons.

[00:16:09]Illuminated manuscripts handcopied and decorated could take monks years to complete.

[00:16:19]Riddles and word play were popular entertainment found even in serious religious texts.

[00:16:29]Minstrongs and traveling entertainers provided music, storytelling and news to rural communities.

[00:16:39]Board games like chess, back gammon, and merrils were popular pastimes.

[00:16:49]Falconry was a prestigious sport with specific bear types assigned to different social ranks.

[00:17:02]Wool was England's most valuable medieval export, fueling trade with Flanders and Italy.

[00:17:13]guilds regulated craft trades controlling quality training and prices in towns.

[00:17:24]Markets and fairs were central to local economies, often chartered by royal permission.

[00:17:34]The medieval English economy was overwhelmingly agrarian.

[00:17:39]The vast majority worked the land.

[00:17:44]And fact number 18. Number 18.

[00:17:48]Surfs were legally died to the land and owed labor to their lord, though not literally enslaved.

[00:17:59]The Black Death by killing so many laborers actually improved bargaining power and wages for peasant survivors.

[00:18:11]The statute of laborers in 1351 tried largely unsuccessfully to cap wages after the plague.

[00:18:24]Coinage was minted locally in various towns before becoming more centralized.

[00:18:33]Ursery or usery which is lending money at interest was condemned by the church pushing much of England's early money lending toward Jewish communities until their expulsion in 1290.

[00:18:51]Fishing, especially herring, was a major industry along the English coast. Gothic architecture with pointed arches and flying buttresses transformed English cathedral building from the 12th century onward.

[00:19:13]Timber framed houses were the standard construction method for common homes.

[00:19:21]Many parish churches doubled as community gathering spaces beyond religious use.

[00:19:30]Moes weren't purely defensive.

[00:19:34]They also served practical functions like fish farming and waste disposal.

[00:19:41]In fact number 90 before we head into our last 10 facts.

[00:19:46]castle latrines emptied directly into the moat or a bit below.

[00:19:56]Stained glass windows in cathedrals told biblical stories visually for an illiterate population.

[00:20:07]Many medieval bridges had chapels built onto them for travelers to pray for safe passage.

[00:20:16]Cats was sometimes viewed with suspicion due to associations with witchcraft, though they were also valued for best control.

[00:20:30]The peasants revolt of 1381 saw commoners briefly storm London and confront the young king Richard II directly.

[00:20:43]Medieval people used sundials, church bells, and candles to track time.

[00:20:50]Mechanical clocks only appeared in towers from the 14th century.

[00:20:58]Beating the bounds was an annual custom where villagers walked the parish boundary to reinforce collective memory of land limits.

[00:21:12]Barber stir barber surgeons's striped bowl red and white is thought to symbolize blood and bandages from their surgical role.

[00:21:27]Dorns though celebrated as chivalic sport were genuinely dangerous.

[00:21:34]Several English nobles died in jousting accidents.

[00:21:42]Rats likely weren't the primary black death carriers as long assumed.

[00:21:48]Some modern research points more toward human fleas and lice.

[00:21:56]And finally, fact number 100.

[00:22:01]The word medieval itself wasn't coined until centuries later.

[00:22:08]People living through it had no sense of being in a middle age.

[00:22:17]And there we have it. That was 100 facts about medieval England. I really hope you did enjoy that. If you did and you are able to, then please do give this video a like and subscribe if you're new. And until the next video, everybody, take care. [clears throat]