The Middle Ages

1. The Middle Ages By EshaNittoor

2. The Feudal System The Feudal System was basically the social system of the Middle Ages. I like to think of the feudal system as a pyramid with the king on the top to the serfs at the bottom. The king ruled the country with his wife the queen. They made the laws, owned the land ,and collected taxes. The kings appointed nobles and barons to rule the land on their behalf. The nobles in turn appointed knights to protect themselves and the king. Next come the craftsmen who made things for the merchants to sell. Finally, most common folks who were the serfs did not own land, but rather worked on land that belonged to the nobles or king. The church was important to the people of the Middle Ages. The church picked the king and said they were doing this on behalf of god. This takes us right back to the kings. That is the feudal System.

3. Knights If you wanted to be a knight it would be a long and hard process. If you were of noble birth and a boy usually you would be sent out to become a knight. You would be about six years old and sent out to another family with boys to begin your training. There you would become a page. As a page you would learn how to be polite, chivalrous, and obedient. At age 14 you become a Squire. Now you start training to be a knight. You would learn how to ride a horse, do archery, use a lance and fight with a sword. At the same time you are serving a knight and learning how to do things such as put on armor which is a long and complicated process. At school you would learn how to read and write, sometimes you could even do math. After you’re a squire you become a knight, but this is a very complicated process. First, you bathe and get dressed. Next, you spend an entire night praying in the church. The next morning you get dressed and go to the chapel where you kneel down in front of the king or other important person. Then, they tap you on the shoulders with a sword. You are now a knight.

4. Chivalry What is chivalry? Chivalry was like a code of the Knights. During the Middle Ages, knights used to go around taking land away from helpless people and causing chaos every where . The church thought that they should take control of the knights, so they taught the knights that they had a duty to the lord and not just the king. The church told the Knights that they should be kind and courteous to all. Here are some of the things that a knight had to do to be chivalrous. Do you think they are good? If a knight falls in love with a women he should do whatever she says, no matter how difficult. A knight should protect the innocent and help the poor. A knight should help orphans and protect families. Finally a knight has a duty to his king and his people

5. Daily Life of a Serf A serf was a working class person in the Middle Ages. The serf would have to get up early in the morning and go to work. The serf would probably work in the fields for something like land. One of the bargains a serf might get would be that if he or she worked on the land, he could live there . However the serf’s living place may not be what you picture. They probably lived in a small hut and they had to sleep on the floor together. Sometimes in the winter it would be too cold to have the animals sleep outside, so you would have to sleep on the floor with pigs, sheep, and cows. The life of a serf wasn’t so easy.

6. Castles Castles during the middle ages had lots of protection. They don’t really look like the picture of the castles that are probably showing up in your head. These castles are armed with lots of walls. They even have holes in the wall to drop boiling hot water and rocks on their enemies. Some castles had small slits in their walls just big enough to shoot an arrow through. There castles didn’t have really big fancy towers, instead they were a large cube shaped. That was where the family lived. The castles in the Middles Ages really are different than something you would picture today.