Social hierarchy:

-pope

-king

-nobles

-serfs

The Middle Ages

- religion

- chivalry code

Religion: regular, the main theme of literature of the “ common people” was religion. These were ballad and they were transmitted orally, they had a simple vocabulary

Chivalry code: worldly, secular. The literature that told about the chivalry code and epic poem was for the aristocracy, it had a more refined vocabulary.

The languages of literature were: Latin à Church ; old English( language of Germanic origin) à people;  French à at court

The Middle Ages covered a period  of history that goes from 1066 to 1485.

1066 is a crucial date, because it marks the first and last conquest of  Great Britain by a foreign power.

In 1066 there was the invasion of Normans, these came from Northern France but they were from Viking origin.

Before the Normans, with the king William the Conqueror there were the Anglo-Saxon: they came from Northern Germany so they were of Germanic origin. The name England means “ land of the Anglo” , they spoke Germanic dialects and were organised in seven kingdoms.

The figure of William I was so important because he gave rise to a form of hierarchic pyramidal organisation called feudalism. He divided his land among his knights and they divided its among other less powerful vassals. Feudalism wasn’t a new form of organisation for the Europeans it was new for English.

William I applied the Feudalism in the same way had been applied in Europe, because he was afraid that the barons became stronger than him, in order to avoid the risk he divided the land, sp they were not so big and in this way barons, knights and vassals couldn’t became stronger than him.

At the top of the hierarchy there was the Pope. During the middle ages whatever social class people belonged to their most important ambition was salvation. So the Pope was the most important person because he was the symbol of religion that was the most important institution