Medieval Crisis to Renaissance Revival: Unveiling the Transformative Epoch - Paper Example

In the knight's tale, we begin with the power of Duke Theseus, who returns from the battle of withdrawing Scythia and his family members, who consisted of Scythia himself, his new wife, Hippolyta, Emilie, and her sister. On his arrival, he meets a group of women in Athens crying and weeping, and in his analysis, he realizes that Dictator Creon has executed their people and he has left them unburied, thus dishonoring the dead. Duke Theseus reacts quickly in the manner that he overthrows Creon's rule and he grants the freedom of burying the dead bodies to the women. After he has overthrown the ruling of Creon, his crew finds two young knights who were Palamon and Arcite, not their last breath, which means they were not dead. Due to the duke's kind heart, he decides to imprison them instead of executing them, unlike Creon.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Order now

Years pass by, and one morning, Palamon sees Emilie, wandering out in her yard, and cries for help. On the other hand, Arcite, upon seeing Emilie, proclaims his love to her too. The drama begins when both knights try to claim their love for Emilie, and as a result, their friendship turns into hostility. Accusations begin to pour against each other as each of them thinks that the other one is better than the other one. Arcite release was secured by his friend, who was still a friend to Theseus in a manner that he would not return to Athens again. Arcite considers Palamon lucky because he is in a position to see the beautiful Emilie, whereas Palamon considers Arcite as a lucky person (Phillips, 2019). After all, he is now in a position in which he can raise an army and capture Emilie.

"The knight's tale"actually convulsions the knight-errant himself, i.e. he chooses a story that is filled with adventure, love, chivalry, knights, and honor. The story "The Knight's Tale" emphasizes the decree of honor and appropriate demeanor. It is evident whereby Theseus and the knights have the characteristics of the quintessence of superlative human fairness. The two wars by Theseus depict the presence of two diverse social disorders. The Amazon society is good but really it requires a good male leader. The leaders who are women, the likes of Hippolyta are characterized by resilience and a lot of just, which is said to be among the social disorders. The rule by Theseusover Athens, which is a center for learning and justice, is characterized by chivalry and wisdom, and due to that, Theseus must quiet Hippolyta. The worst form of social disorder is then represented by Creon's tyranny; his ruling is centered on antagonism and immorality.

Everything has its significance in a way, the two wars are also significant since e they depict the relationship of women and the knights. Weakness is evident in the ruling life whereby Theseus, in the war with Hippolyta, defeats her and marries her; later on, he directs his power to the women of Thebes who are weak and cannot help themselves. The episode which describes Emillie and the two knights, who are Palamon and Arcite, is the one that is elevated the most in the whole tale. Chaucer describes Emilie using in a poetic manner, describing her as being like a flower. The fight and struggle between the two knights do not end as they base it on fortunes, which later change the position of Arcite. Arcite release did not please him; this is evident in his dramatic speech, which is full of irony, he wishes he had never known Paratheus, who was so instrumental in his release though he is materially greedy. Due to the love that he has for Emillie, he wishes that it would be better for her to remain in the prison where he could see Emilie every day than her to be in the army.

In the knight's story, we can find that Theseus has the character of accepting the requests of women, thus defining his trait as his reason. Due to this, he understands what Arcite is feeling in terms of love towards Emilie since he has never been a victim. Palamon, on the other hand, states that both he and Arcite need to be killed for the crimes that they have done; this is a clear demonstration of his inclination to either live or die by the chivalric cryptogram. In the tale, we also encounter a lot of customs and pacts, which are valuable within the primitive culture. A good example is when Arcite goes back to Athens, he is termed as "all alone, save only a squire." The state of being all alone in a primitive community is significant whereby nobody of significance would travel or walk alone in such a community, and since Arcite is all alone, he ends up being taken by Theseus. Another encounter where we meet with a conservative of primitive society in the passage is where the knight tries to explain the Chivalric code, this is a code that defines the proper form of behavior and enhances the best interactions among the community. The tale portrays the fact the two knights are perfectly bound to a chivalric demeanor. They fight like wild animals and not normal human beings, thus indicating how far they have fallen away from the knightly knowledge.

Furthermore, the reading clearly states the role of both genders in a primitive community. One of the rules is that women are expected to appeal to men's forte, understanding, and concern. Men, on the other hand, are expected to rule over the other gender and maintain law and order as well as the usage of reasoning over sentiments. Therefore, in our passage, we have women's appeal for compassion for the cavaliers and Theseus' associates. In a similar case, the decision on who shall win Emilie is in the hands of a man and not Emilie herself.

The nature of the late medieval crisis.

The late medieval situation was the most turbulent, exciting as well as transformative era in European history. It was marked by a series of events that took place in the 14th and 15th centuries. These events altered the stability of Europe. The crisis caused radical changes in all sectors of society; there was political instability, demographic collapse, and religious upheavals. The medieval turmoil started with the great famine in 1315-1317, the collapse of the banking houses, and the Black Death that took place between 1347-1351 (Ruiz, 2013). As a result, the population of Europe was reduced by half. Besides, civil wars arose in medieval Europe that led to severe consequences. Internal conflicts were also evident between the King of France and England. Consequently, the Hundred Years of War arose. Western schism led to the collapse of the Roman Catholic Church. After the Great Interregnum 1247-1273, the Holy Roman Empire began to decline, and it lost its cohesion. Historians consider these disasters as a dramatic sign of the end of the age. They believed that the collapse of the medieval age led to the Renaissance period.

The 14th and 15th-century crises reveal not only the downfall of Europe but also a remarkable era or Renaissance that began after that. The situation experienced during this time acted as an eye-opener to the new season. It marked the end of the Middle Ages. The process of rural-urban migration that had taken place in the 14th century was affected by pandemics, famine, and War. Nevertheless, the resources that had been created during this migration survived the crisis. First, the cities began to be populated, and the resiliency of Europe helped in its recovery from the tremendous Medieval crisis. The comeback continued from the 16th up to the 17th century. There was some hope that the archeologists would be involved in the crisis, which did not happen. The crisis started all the way from the fourteenth, and there were several doubts about its existence. The British historians had a strong belief that there were decisions that were made and could have a great impact on many issues such as trade, among other issues.

The crisis took place for a period of more than one thousand years and affected several areas such as the church. The end result was instability in many of the countries around the western regions, such as the Germans. There were a series of disasters from one to the other thus bringing many of the countries to their knees. The Great Famine was one of the disasters, and the Black Death was one of the great ones. Medieval Europe was common for many revolts that took place during that period of time. These entire crises made it impossible to conduct trade and made life much harder for the citizens. In this regard, the structural problems were many and resulted in the suffering of many nations of the world and thus resulted in much suffering. Climate change was another problem that was common and resulted in floods and harsh temperatures and resulted in famine. Many crops were swept away by the floods, and thus the farmers were not in a position to harvest any grain that they had farmed. During the period, there was low rural-urban migration thus minimizing the growth of the cities. The plague pandemic was another problem of the time and caused much suffering for the people. All these problems signified the end of the medieval period. The challenges were addressed by the era coming to an end.

After the era, there was new life as many aspects changed living became much better, and people became more aware. Thus life became much better than during the medieval period, and there was more movement of people freely. The number of revolts was minimized as the politics of the day changed in a great way as the political leaders became friendly to the people. They started to listen to the concerns of the people, and thus the number of revolts reduced in a great way. Thus there was a great change, and the lives of the people became much better, and the climate changes reduced significantly. The field of art was improved at this point as the number of people drawing increased. There was a huge change almost in all aspects of life, and thus the quality of life became much better. The change was evident in many areas, and the economy of many nations started to improve. The change was real in many aspects of life as the quality of life had really improved in a great manner. Trade became easier, and there was an improvement in many countries economies. The medieval was a great period in world history that was surrounded by many problems. This period in history needs to be studied in most schools to help the world have an understanding of the time in history.

References

Phillips, H. (2019). Love. A New Companion to Chaucer, 255-267.

Ruiz, R. W. (2013). Medieval Europe and the World. Oxford University Press.