Explores how the Middle Ages have been dramatized and mythologized over centuries

In this entertaining book, the authors trace the evolution of the artistic traditions of medievalism, beginning with their origins in manuscript illumination and visual culture. They chart the development of character archetypes, iconic locations such as ruined castles and forbidden forests, and magical creatures and supernatural events in building medieval worlds. The authors discuss why the Middle Ages, more than virtually any other historical period, have captured the popular imagination for such a sustained period of time and how this era has been a source for many generations to explore their own era's concerns and anxieties.

• Draws upon the recent scholarly turn away from an exclusively white European view of the medieval past and toward a global approach to the study of the Middle Ages
• Illuminates the societal factors that have conditioned the uses--and misuses--of medieval archetypes and iconography over time