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12 views10 pages

U2 - Brit - LIt - Middle Ages - Canterbury Tales - The Canterbury Tales Intro Jfaulkner

Uploaded by

Jalen Joseph
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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The Canterbury Tales:

Snapshot of an Age
The Middle Ages of England (1066-
1485)

By Julie Faulkner
Essential Questions
• How does an author convey purpose?
• How does literature reflect a time period?
• Should we place certain expectations on
upper and/or lower classes based on their
social role?
• How do values affect the journeys people
take?
• How do we tell the tales of our journeys?

© Julie Faulkner
Society in the Middle Ages
King – all powerful
• In 1066, William the
Conqueror defeated Nobles – religious
leaders
the English king. He
installed himself as Knights – armed
king and implemented services
the social structure
known as feudalism. Merchants &
• A social class system Tradesmen – middle
class
Serfs/Peasants –
working class

© Julie Faulkner
Issues with Feudalism
• People generally couldn’t move from one class to another.
• Serfs were bound to the land, even though they didn’t
own it. They were not, however, bought and sold.
• After serfs provided services to the lord, they had to pay
money to the church as well. Ordinary people across
Europe had to “tithe” 10 percent of their earnings each
year to the Church; at the same time, the Church was
mostly exempt from taxation. These policies helped it to
amass a great deal of money and power.
• Women were classified differently. Like men, medieval
women were born into the second or third estate, and
might eventually become members of the first by entering
the church, willingly or not. They had no rights.
© Julie Faulkner
The Dark Side of the Middle Ages
• No scientific accomplishments made, no great art
produced, no great leaders born.
• The people of the Middle Ages squandered the
advancements of their predecessors
• After the fall of Rome, no single state or government
united the people who lived on the European continent.
Instead, the Catholic Church became the most
powerful institution of the medieval period. Thus,
kings, queens and other leaders derived much of their
power from their alliances with and protection of the
Church.
• TWO KEY DESCRIPTIVE WORDS: “Barbarism and
Religion”
© Julie Faulkner
Other Events During Middle
Ages
• The Crusades, a series of “holy wars”
waged by European Christians against
Muslims. Thousands of Jews and
Muslims were slaughtered.
• Thomas a’ Becket (archbishop of
Canterbury) was murdered for
speaking against the king on
numerous occasions.
• Magna Carta signed, which later
became the basis of English
constitutional law
• Black Death, reduce the population by
a third, causing a labor shortage and
giving lower classes more bargaining
power
© Julie Faulkner
The Canterbury Tales:
Intro to the Text
By Julie Faulkner

© Julie Faulkner
Author and Purpose
• Geoffrey Chaucer (1343-
1400), merchant from the
middle class
• The Canterbury Tales is
a collection of 24 fictional
stories of over 17,000
lines of prose and verse
written in Middle
English in the late 1300s
• To reveal the people and
society of the age
▫ Was The Canterbury Tales
the original Wikileaks?
© Julie Faulkner
Structure
• #1) The Prologue where the
characters are introduced
• #2) Stories told by each of the
pilgrims on the journey as a
competition for a free supper (they
will each tell four along the way)

• Frame story, when Chaucer has


each of his pilgrims tell a story on
the way to Canterbury, it’s a story
within a story
• Chaucer is one of the pilgrims and
plays the role of the narrator.
• Chaucer never finished all the tales.
© Julie Faulkner
The Pilgrimage
• Begins at Tabard
Inn in Southwark,
just outside
London.
• Ends at Cathedral
of Canterbury, 55
miles southeast
of London
• Visiting the
shrine of Tomas a
Becket
© Julie Faulkner

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