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Medieval Europe’s main entertainment was feasts, banquets jousts and tournaments, mystery plays, fairs, games, sports, hun

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Medieval cookery books

There are over 50 hand-written medieval cookery manuscripts still in existence today. Some are lists of recipes tucked into the back of guides to medical remedies or apothecaries' instruction manuals. Others focus on descriptions of grand feasts. But most are devoted to recording the dishes of the medieval kitchen. The majority of recipes recorded in these manuscripts will have been cooked in the houses of wealthy noblemen.

Food across the social scale

A nobleman's diet would have been very different from the diets of those lower down the social scale. Aristocratic estates provided the wealthy with freshly killed meat and river fish, as well as fresh fruit and vegetables. Cooked dishes were heavily flavoured with valuable spices such as caraway, nutmeg, cardamom, ginger and pepper. Other commonly used ingredients included cane sugar, almonds, and dried fruits such as dates, figs or raisins. The wealthy treasured these goods which were imported from far away lands, and were hugely expensive. Indeed, there was an ancient department at the Royal court called the 'spicery', which was entirely devoted to spices. Spicy sauces were extremely popular, and entire professional careers were dedicated to saucemaking.

Cooked food

All fruit and vegetables were cooked - it was believed that raw fruit and vegetables caused disease. The Boke of Kervynge (carving), written in 1500, warns the cook to: 'Beware of green sallettes and rawe fruytes for they wyll make your soverayne seke.' (Beware of green salads and raw fruits, for they will make your master sick.') Gardeners grew fresh herbs which were used for both medical remedies and cookery, and were therefore an essential part of the nobleman's garden.

Banquets and plain food

Banqueting tables at grand feasts were decked with spectacular dishes - providing the perfect opportunity for the nobleman to show off his wealth. Everyday jellies, pies, fritters and stews were accompanied by magnificent animals such as peacocks, seals, porpoises, and even whales. Jellies and custards were dyed with vivid natural colourings - sandalwood for red, saffron for a fiery yellow, and boiled blood for black. But the most visually alluring pieces at the table were special sugar sculptures known as sotiltees (or subtleties). These sculptures came in all sorts of curious forms - castles, ships, famous philosophers, or scenes from fables. Sotiltees were also known as 'warners,' as they were served at the beginning of a banquet to 'warn' (or notify) the guests of the approaching dinner. Unlike today, meals were not separated into savoury main courses and sweet desserts. Instead, many dishes were laid out together in luxurious chaos. Special courtesy books, which were popular at the time, instructed diners not to fart, scratch flea bites, or pick their noses.

Poorer diets

Those lower down the social scale ate a less impressive diet. Unless you served in a large household, it would have been difficult to obtain fresh meat or fish (although fish was available to those living by the sea). Most people ate perserved foods that had been salted or pickled soon after slaughter or harvest: bacon, pickled herring, preserved fruits for instance. The poor often kept pigs, which, unlike cows and sheep, were able to live contentedly in a forest, fending for themselves. Peasants tended to keep cows, so a large part of their diets would have included dairy produce such as buttermilk, cheese, or curds and whey.

Rich and poor alike ate a dish called pottage, a thick soup containing meat, vegetables, or bran. The more luxurious pottage was called 'mortrew,' while a pottage containing cereal was a 'frumenty'. Bread was the staple for all classes, although the quality and price varied depending on the type of grain used. Some people even used bread as plates: 'trenches' were thick slices of bread, slightly hollowed out, and served bearing food at meal times.

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Medieval peasants had been taught by the church that any illness was a punishment from God for sinful behaviour. As important, no-one knew how diseases spread – the fact that people lived so close together in both villages and towns meant that contagious diseases could be rampant when they appeared; as happened with the Black Death.

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medieval art and how artists used clothing and costume as codes to help viewers interpret an image. In these works of art, what people wear is a clue to their identities and moral characters.

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There are over 50 hand-written medieval cookery manuscripts still in existence today.

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Parties
Music
Shops
Theater
Poetry
Art
Festivals
Church
Watching acrobats
Chess
Ball sports

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In Europe, on the weathly could dress in fashionable clothes. Only royalty could wear g

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The women's headdresses were also long and pointed. It was also fashionable to wear the high double horn headdresses

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Their food was mainly vegetables, rice, and fish, they were used to make pottage, which was thick soup. They also had sushi, soy beans and rice dish, rice cake soup.

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The bubonic plague, or 'Black Death', was one of the most devastating events  of the medieval period.

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People wore tunics, togas, trousers and laced sandals

The early Medieval period featured a simple shape with a long, wide gown decorated with embroidery at the edges or borders

Fitted tunics remained the basic item of clothes

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it was believed that raw fruit and vegetables caused disease.

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Only the wealthy could dress in fashionable clothes. Sumptuary Laws  restricted ordinary people in their expenditure including money spent on clothes, which impacted Medieval fashion.

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There are over 50 hand-written medieval cookery manuscripts still in existence today.

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Outdoor Entertainment during the Middle Ages centred around the Village Green and at local fairs and included a variety of Medieval Sports:

Archery - Archery contests were especially popular

Bowls

Colf - the ancestor of Golf

Gameball - a simple football game

Hammer-throwing

Hurling or Shinty - a similar game to hockey

Horseshoes - throwing horseshoes at a target

Quarter-staff contests

Skittles - an ancestor of modern ten-pin bowling

Stoolball - an ancestor of Cricket

Wrestling

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Medieval food was mainly cabbage, beans, eggs, oats and brown bread. Somtimes they had cheese, bacon or poultry. Commonly that drank ale or beer. Milk was also available but mainly for young people.

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The following board games were played and enjoyed as entertainment during the Middle Ages:

Chess

Tables - Backgammon

Nine Men's Morris

Alquerques - A classic period strategy game, an ancestor of Checkers

Fox & Geese - a game of strategy

The Philosophers Game - a game of strategy and numbers

Shovelboard - the ancestor of shuffleboard

Knucklebones - Early game of dice

Hazard - an ancestor of Craps

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it has been estimated that, besides Sundays, about eight weeks in every year were free from work. Festivities at Christmas, Easter, and May Day, at the end of ploughing and the completion of harvest, relieved the monotony of the daily round of labor.

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Rich people’s entertainment includes jousting and feasts

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Types of Medieval Entertainment varied according to status but included feasts, banquets, jousts and tournaments, Mystery Plays, fairs, games and sports, hunting, hawking, animal entertainment using dogs, bears and monkeys.