This gives her plenty of confidence to pick and choose the most fascinating aspects of the 14 th century, and she slides with ease and grace into the most illustrious periods in that century, making her narrative engaging and exciting to read. Perhaps we never get bored with Tuchman’s book because she is not a traditional historian, but a self-taught one, being a writer first. Although we follow the French history and the Coucy in Tuchman’s book, the text often makes excursions onto general topics of interests, commenting on this or that fascinating aspect of medieval history. A curious situation arises involving Enguerrand VII de Coucy, a distinguished French Knight, who acquired a double allegiance when he married Isabella, the daughter of the King of England, only to forsake this allegiance and fight for the French later in his life. This was a time of complex political ties and confrontations between England and France, with their allegiances and territories mingled. The book opens with the description of the castle of Coucy in Picardy, northern France, a magnificent structure, which showcased the extent of the power of the clan of Coucy in the region in the 14 th century: “ the Coucy maintained a sense of eminence second to none and conducted their affairs after the usage of sovereign princes”.

This was a historical period that was deeply paradoxical and chaotic, in which famine, peasant revolts, foreign wars, the bubonic plague and religious struggles were all taking place in a non-stop succession amidst the existence and the proclamation of a high moral code of chivalry among the nobility, and where magic and superstition reigned inexplicably alongside one strict religious canon. Providing vivid insight into various aspects of the medieval life, from childhood to tournaments, and from the state of medicine to the status of women, Tuchman’s book makes one truly step into the intriguing world of the Middle Ages and into the mentality of its people. The centre of the narrative here is the lifetime of Enguerrand VII de Coucy, whose double allegiances and adventures could be compared to some mythical storytelling.

In this book, Barbara Tuchman explores the 14 th century Europe focusing in particular on the situation in France and on the powerful clan of lords – the Coucy of Picardy, whose ambition at that time almost rivalled that of the King.

A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century – ★★★★★

A distant mirror by barbara w tuchman