Top 15 Barbara W. Tuchman Quotes

The Hundred Years' War, like the crises of the Church in the same period, broke apart medieval unity.

The emphasis on sorcery reflected accusations by the authorities more than it did actual practice. Being threatened, the Church responded by virulent persecution.

As the era of the sword was ending, that of firearms began, in time to allow no lapse in man’s belligerent capacity.

The ills and disorders of the 14th century could not be without consequence. Times were to grow worse over the next fifty-odd years until at some imperceptible moment, by the some mysterious chemistry, energies were refreshed, ideas broke out of the mold of the Middle Ages into new realms, and humanity found itself redirected.

Vainglory, however, no matter how much medieval Christianity insisted it was a sin, is a motor of mankind, no more eradicable than sex. As long as combat was desirable as the source of honor and glory, the knight had no wish to share it with the commoner, even for the sake of success.

Nothing is more certain than death and nothing uncertain but its hour.

When truth and reason cannot be heard, then must presumption rule.

Chroniclers habitually matched numbers to the awesomeness of the event.

On being shown a relic said to be a bone of St. Elizabeth, he (Sigismund) turned it over and remarked that it could just as well be that of a dead cobbler.

Modern historians have suggested that in his last years he (Richard II) was overtaken by mental disease, but that is only a modern view of the malfunction common to 14th century rulers: inability to inhibit impulse.

Governments do not like to face radical remedies; it is easier to let politics predominate.

If it is not profitable for the common good that authority should be retained, it ought to be relinquished.

The real reason for his attitude lay deeper. Essentially, Gloucester and the barons of his party were opposed to peace because they felt war to be their occupation. Behind them were the poorer knights and squires and archers of England, who, unconcerned with rights or wrongs, were “inclined to war such as had been their livelihood.”

Voluntary self-directed religion was more dangerous to the Church than any number of infidels.

Whatever solace the Christian faith could give was balanced by the anxiety it generated.