Terry Jones!

Last night I went up to the Cities to hear a talk about life in the Middle Ages by none other than Terry Jones. Now I like medieval history to begin with, and when it's presented a Monty Python member, it's even better. His history is also pretty good - most of his methodology seemed quite strong, and I'm willing to chalk the weak points up to the fact that he was limited to a 45-minute talk to a group that wasn't all history students or scholars.

He's a very engaging speaker with a hilarious slideshow, including a painting from the 14th century of someone reaching up through a crack in a platform and pulling down a magistrate's underwear. Hilariously uncharacteristic of Middle Ages art, though of course his point was that it wasn't all that uncharacteristic. Nor were people who lived in that time the benighted, ignorant rubes that we commonly think of them as (at least, not all of them). All in all, a very good and informative presentation. Plus, really damn funny.

Also they had a trio playing late medieval/early baroque songs, followed by a group of Gregorian chanters. I noticed that they all had little hard leather folders for music in their hands, but that they weren't open, so I hoped for the best. And after a few pretty well-done chants, they marched out, singing the song from Holy Grail, and hitting themselves in the face with their books. It was stupendous.