Mort et folie : comment ne pas parler de la mort
The Middle Ages was one of the deadliest periods in European history, perhaps the most devastating. It would take countless pages to fully describe the scale of the disasters and calamities that ravaged medieval Europe, transforming the continent into a vast metaphorical morgue. European populations...
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| Médium: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Jazyk: | Français |
| Vydáno: |
2025
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| On-line přístup: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Shrnutí: | The Middle Ages was one of the deadliest periods in European history, perhaps the most devastating. It would take countless pages to fully describe the scale of the disasters and calamities that ravaged medieval Europe, transforming the continent into a vast metaphorical morgue. European populations were in no way prepared to face such horror. One of the consequences was the emergence of madness as a social phenomenon, beyond just an individual mental disorder. How can one rationalize the irrational? How can one cope with the absurdity of mass death? Umberto Eco, although addressing this question in a different context, offers us a suggestion: In the face of the inescapable reality of death, the only tool we have left is laughter. In a sense, this is what medieval Europeans did, constantly stalked by death. There is much to learn from the history of the Middle Ages, especially since the “Great Death” has not disappeared in the twenty-first century. New pandemics, perhaps deadlier than that of 2019, and the ever-present threat of total nuclear war could bring it back. Homo sapiens has been capable of facing death, at least since the end of the Pleistocene, but has never been prepared to confront the “Great Death,” the one that struck European populations during the Middle Ages. |
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