9-12 Grades LOC TPS APWH Primary Source Work/ SAQs 600-1450 Medieval Europe Paige Solomon, Norfolk Collegiate This activity is sponsored in part by the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources Eastern Region Program, coordinated by Waynesburg University. One class period of 45 60 minutes Description of activity: Students will examine and analyze primary sources to learn about the culture of medieval Europe. Development of historical thinking skills is a focus. Activity Goals Focus Question: What was the culture of medieval Europe really like? How can primary sources help build a deeper understanding? What are their limitations? Context: Students should have some basic knowledge of the political, economic, and social structure of medieval Western Europe. Objectives: Students will determine the relevance of each source to its culture, explain how each is representative of the culture of its origin, note the historical significance of each source, and assess and explain the value/limitations of each source. APWH 3.1.IV; 3.3.III; Virginia SOLS WHI.1, WHI.10, WHI.12 Assessment: Students will answer analysis questions for each source. The teacher should discuss each document with the class to check for understanding and build analysis skills. Activity Details Primary Sources: see below Procedure: Students will examine and analyze the primary sources. Class discussion will check for understanding and help students develop their historical thinking skills. What you will need before implementing: This lesson would be most effective with computer access for all students. The documents and direction could shared digitally with all students (in Google Doc.s. or another format). This activity could be accomplished with paper copy of the materials for each student.
LOC TPS APWH Primary Source Work/ SAQs 600-1450 Medieval Europe Doc. 1 Author unknown. Danse macabre (Dance of Death). Troyes, France, after 1500, leaves a ii/b, a iii/a. Paper. Based on a fourteenth-century morality poem, the "Dance of Death" evolved into a set of illustrated verses depicting a dialogue between Death and people of all rank. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/dres/dres1.html#obj14
Doc. 2 French Bible of Acre, third quarter of the 13th century, Library of the Arsenal, MS 5211 Rés. Parchment Copied around 1250 54, this Bible is probably the oldest and most beautiful illuminated manuscript to come out of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem which was founded in the aftermath of the first crusade (1096 1099). Saint Louis probably commissioned this richly-decorated Bible on one of his visits to Acre, a flourishing port on the Palestine coast, and, after the loss of Jerusalem in 1187, the de facto capital of the Latin Kingdom and the Patriarchal See. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bnf/images/bnf017.jpg
Doc. 3 Probably commissioned in the 1070s by Bishop Odo of Bayeux, half-brother of William the Conqueror. It is over 70 metres long. http://www.bayeuxtapestry.org.uk/bayeux18.htm
Doc. 4 Guillaume de Saint-Pathus (active 1277 1315), Vie et miracles de Saint Louis (Life and Miracles of Saint Louis), Paris, around 1330-1340, Manuscripts Department, Western Section, Fr. 5716, Parchment. Right page. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bnf/images/bnf023a.jpg
Doc. 5 Coronation Ordinal of 1250, Paris, Manuscripts Department, Western Section, Lat. 1246 The fifteen miniatures of the Coronation Ordinal of 1250 present the oldest known iconographic cycle showing the coronation of a French king in the cathedral of Rheims, virtually as it would be staged until 1825. http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bnf/images/bnf015.jpg
Formative assessment task Which documents support one another? Do any have contradictory or contrasting messages? Group these documents according to what points you can make about religion, politics, society. What linkages can you find between them? Use these documents to support at least three assertions about the culture and politics of medieval Europe.