ABSTRACT
There is more agreement on the three dominant aspects of medieval popular culture—religion, hierarchy, and combat. The Roman Catholic Church was at its peak of power, and the crusades were a demonstration of religious fervor and devotion. There are no complete breaks in history—no clear-cut beginnings, middles, and ends. Instead of speaking of the Dark Ages, the people might use another metaphor—the Frozen World. Like the anonymous cave painters, Menes, Tutankhamen, Pericles, Plato, Cicero, and Caesar, Charlemagne reaches a high plateau in the history of popular culture. Some idea of the climate of popular opinion that fostered a series of crusades emerges from the Children’s Crusade. In the modern popular imagination the Middle Ages fostered sumptuous castles, homes of noble lords and knights who went about doing good deeds. Medieval culture was basically agrarian, and popular culture centered on the peasantry.
