Looking for books/sources on a medieval blacksmith's everyday life...

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13 Spider Bloody Chain

Grandmaster Knight
I'm trying to do some research on how a medieval blacksmith might have lived ca. 1000-1100 AD, Western Europe (preferably around France). Does anyone know of any good books or sources I can take a look at?
 
Dushatar 说:
Why you need it? Just curious.

I'm writing several fiction stories for a medieval fantasy setting, and one particular story features a young blacksmith living in a small village in northern France/Normandy, so I wanted to try to portray his everyday life as historically accurate as possible.
 
Sounds like the start of Kingdom of Heavens :wink:

I guess there isn´t one. You would prolly be better off with tax rolls of abbey´s and monasteries or something like that.
 
Hmm, best book I could recommend off the top O the head is Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett. It's not about blacksmiths per-se, but gives a very good and down the earth view of medieval life. Downside is that it would be R rated. Baring that stuff though, extrapolating how a blacksmith might live and ply his trade would be quite easy.
 
any non-fiction book about the everyday life of any of the essential crafts(like smithing and wood processing). and it depends if the smith lives in a city or village.
but you said he lived in the country, right?
 
So is he an apprentice, journeyman, or craftsman, cuz that also makes a difference in how his day goes by.
 
Ludial 说:
So is he an apprentice, journeyman, or craftsman, cuz that also makes a difference in how his day goes by.
You would hope that whatever book tells about the one, tells about the other.  :razz:

None-fiction you say? Well, there's Life in a Medieval Town and Life in a Medieval Village, by Frances and Joseph Gies. Been a while since I read them, so I'm not sure how much they have on blacksmithing in particular.

I think you will not find many books dedicated specifically to medieval blacksmiths, but rather to life in general. You'll just have to pick out what deals with blacksmiths.
 
yes, but still ,there's a difference in how exactly will the person's day go through.
 
Look for any books on historical metalurgy, as far as their everyday life goes why should it be any different than anybody else, they still eat and sleep and work right?

What I know....the blacksmith was often also the barber and also the doctor/dentist (sounds wonderful no?)  A "black"smith worked with making tools with the "black" metals and working with weapon-grade steel or soft metals was the profession of specialised craftsmen.  A blacksmith's most important possession were his tools, he normally had to design his own for his own specific jobs and they were passed down from generation to generation.  All craftsmen at the time were also repairmen of their own craft and always tried to repair before replacing things.  The stereotype at the time of the blacksmith was a rather dull-person with muscles in his arms to compenste for the lack in his head.

You picked a time before many of the essential technologies were available so for historical accuracy there should be no water-wheels, and there should be no blast furnace, meaning no higher grade iron above bloom.
 
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