Distant Mirror: The Calamitous Fourteenth Century

Seldom have the Four Horsemen ridden a populace to ground as unmercifully as in late medieval Europe. Through the life of Enguerrand VII, Lord of Coucy (among the foremost French nobles of the era), Barbara Tuchman illumines in rich detail the agonies of a century in which it seemed God had abandoned humankind to every vice and cruelty of which it was capable. Do we at the start of this millennium confront in this pitiless mirror an image of our own turbulent age?

"Wise, witty, and wonderful . . . A great book, in a great historical tradition." Commentary

The 14th century gives us back two contradictory images: a glittering time of crusades and castles, cathedrals and chivalry, and a dark time of ferocity and spiritual agony, a world plunged into a chaos of war, fear and the Plague. Barbara Tuchman anatomizes the century, revealing both the great rhythms of history and the grain and texture of domestic life as it was lived.

Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Distributor: Random House, Inc.
Publication Date: 07-12-1987
Pages: 704
Measurements: 8.25in X 5.21in X 1.32in X 1.1875lb