How was life in the Middle Ages brutish?

Answer 1

I am not sure the Middle Ages were so brutish.

Consider:

Under the Roman Republic, the pater familias had the right to accept or reject a newborn infant. Since the pater familias was the head of an extended family, this meant that a mean old man had the right to reject the infant child of his grandson because he did not like his granddaughter-in-law. If the baby was rejected, it was literally thrown out with the trash. Enough babies were thrown out that there were people who made their livings collecting them and raising them to be slaves.

It is well known that people of Roman times often went to arenas to watch entertainment consisting of people killing each other or being killed by animals. On the other hand, the great witch hunts we like to put into the Middle Ages were not of that era, but mostly of the Renaissance and Reformation. The Carolingian Empire had a law making it a capital crime to burn a person accused of witchcraft. In fact belief in witchcraft was condemned as superstition.

During the Middle Ages, there were some other, very interesting laws. For example, a woman who was running away from an abuser could seek asylum in a convent, without becoming a nun, and she could not be removed against her will, even if she was a queen running from a king.

And a person accused of a crime could sometimes mount a successful defence by swearing he was innocent, and get twelve other people to testify they believed his oath was valid.

A serf was not a slave, but a person bound to the soil of the manor. He could not move away from the manor without agreement of the lord. But if he ran away, he was considered free after a year. And while he was bound, this meant he also had a right to live and work on the manor, and the lord had a responsibility to protect him. If the manor was sold, the rights of the serfs remained, and the new owner could not evict them.

Indeed, people of the Middle Ages were cleaner than those of the Renaissance. Medieval people believed that bad air with foul odors could carry diseases, and they believed that cleanliness was next to godliness. During the Middle Ages, most larger villages had public baths, but people in the Renaissance stopped using them, with perfume being a substitute.

All times have their problems, and I would not claim the Middle Ages were the best of times. But I am sure they were not simply brutish.

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