Human Affairs
King Before Concubine
“Can we guess what affection for his monarch burned in this soldier, who reckoned it better to risk his safety in obvious danger rather than save himself for pleasure.” […]
12th Century AD
Human Affairs
The Disrespect of Marie de France
“But just because spiteful tittle-tattlers attempt to find fault with me, I do not intend to give up.” […]
Violence
When It Shall be OK to Torture
“What a splendid deed! The plunderers themselves were plundered and the torturers tortured with the same or even more pain than they had used to torture others.” […]
Eastern Europe
The Death of the Old Gods
There was joy in heaven and upon earth to behold so many souls saved. But the devil groaned, lamenting, “Woe is me! How am I driven out hence! For I thought to have my dwelling-place here.” […]
Supernatural
A God-Given Double
“He himself was amazed, unconscious as he was of having earned praise, and in the end with difficulty realized that the Lord had supplied him with a substitute.” […]
Viking
A Regretful Do-Gooder
“He tied their dead bodies to planks and stretched them upright in such a way that they seemed to be standing.” […]
History
The Wrath of Louis the Fat
“Thus he humbled the man beneath the powerful arm of God, whose affair it was, and made Drogo subject to the dominion of his will like some bedridden patient.” […]
Eastern Europe
Warming Up with Some Bull-Killing
“The bull ran past the youth, and he seized the beast’s flank with his hand. He thus pulled off the skin along with as much flesh as he could grasp. Then Vladimir remarked, “You are well qualified to do combat with the champion.”” […]
Britons and Celts
Concealing Nothing From the King
“He fell in front of the feet of the king’s horse, and the wind blew his habit right over his neck, so that he was entirely exposed to the unwilling eyes of the lord king.” […]
History
Throwing Bones in the Court of the King
“They decreed that he should be seated last of all, and pelted with bones at any man’s pleasure.” […]