During the dark age, you would have been lucky if the village priest even knew the scriptures himself. Don’t even think about having a church school where someone could teach the peasant’s children how to read.
Depends on where you lived, of course. Literacy was much more widespread in southern Europe (Spain, Italy and southern France) where written documents were often used (for such things as, for instance, wills) than in Northern Europe, due to the written Roman law (as opposed to customary law) being still used there.
During the dark age, cities were rare and small. The urban population fell to a ludicrously low level. Most of the necessary skilled trades were done in large villages or simply within large agricultural domains that had their own skilled workers. You’d have to wait for the low middle ages for anything like a “city life”. Except in some areas, like Italy.
That’s hilarious. Thanks for the link.
I was going to mention arranged marriage, too. The geeks didn’t have to have the social skills to be able to meet someone and date them for a while, which is something a lot of geeks have trouble with now- people just didn’t do that. When I was a geeky and socially awkward teenager, I sometimes wished an arranged marriage was an option for me… Social skills probably weren’t required to maintain a marriage, either, with divorce being so hard to get for most people.
The vast majority of them wouldn’t have had to deal with job interviews, since most people stayed in the same job all their lives. Most of them wouldn’t have even had to deal with meeting strangers that often, since most people stayed in or very near the village they were born in all their lives.
There’s a whole list of medical conditions that they won’t let you join the military if you have, or that would exempt you from the draft if there were a draft. This has been true back to the Civil War in the US.
You can be kept out of the military or exempted from the draft for being overweight- supposedly, John Engler, former Governor of Michigan, got out of being drafted to go to Vietnam for that reason. They will take you if you’re slightly overweight, expecting you to lose the weight in basic training, but it is possible to be too overweight to join the military.
You can be kept out if your vision is bad enough, as well. That was one of the exemptions from the Civil War draft, in fact. If your uncorrected vision is bad enough, or your vision can’t be corrected well enough, the military won’t take you.
These kinds of exemptions presumably vary from country to country and time to time. But I’d be surprised if there were any military anywhere that didn’t recognize that some people are just not physically capable of being a soldier. If there’s a draft (or mandatory military service) and you don’t meet the military’s physical standards, they either let you out of it entirely (as we do in the US) or have you do some other sort of work for the country that you are capable of doing.
Oddly enough (your mention of engineering reminded me), it was pointed out on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (geeky enough?) that Quark’s brother, Rom, was a mechanical genius who had the potential to become an outstanding engineer, but due to the expectations of his culture he’d focused all of his efforts at earning Profit, an area in which he had no talent whatsoever (no head for business). I guess that made him something of a “Ferengi geek” 
I think this one explores the idea of dark ages/medieval geeks nicely (starting at about 1:07)
This is very true. Some of the geekiest people I know are kids in the FFA. They don’t do sci-fi. They don’t read much. They don’t play on the computer. They geek out about their livestock.
Ever been to the RenFaire? 
No, seriously, Back in the dark ages, there was no Star Trek, no comic books, computers, or other things that would get a person categorized as a geek today.
So for the purposes of this discussion (gawd does that sound geeky), I would define geek as someone with a high amount of technical (specialized) knowledge and intelligence along with the awkward social skills. Lets throw some physcial awkwardness in there as well. So lets go back in time and try out some employment prospects for our nerds…
Ok, our Geeks are not going to be the mighty hunters, quaffing barrels of strong ale and bringing down mighty stags with a great bow. They’re not going to be found at the town square challenging all comers with a quarterstaff (this passed for entertainment in most places). They’re more likely to be scholars, collecting knowledge for it’s own sake. Aggression is not something geeks are known for, so they’re going to get pounded on by the Town Bully (yes they had those back then). Some possibilities would include:
Scholar: Ok, the dark ages were a bad time for the pursuit of knowledge. Learning was frowned upon, and most of the worlds knowledge and literature up to this point was being preserved by monks (who, in most cases, just copied text without understanding what it was). So that’s pretty much out if you’re talking about the dark ages. Be a good profession for medieval times though, once the world started to come back into the light.
Nobility: Yes, I could see our geek being the middle child in some nobleman’s lineage, picked on by older brother and ignored by dad in favor of the youngest. He’d try to be a good master, arguing for the needs of the serfs with his dad, helping manage the estates, etc. 50% chance of being killed by the town bully by age 30.
Shopkeeper: High intelligence and patience make this an ideal profession for budding nerds. Would try to be fair and honest with everyone. 80% chance of being killed by the town bully when catching said bully in the act of shoplifting.
The church: Well, there was a lot of corruption back then. Geeks don’t really slide too far down the evil scale, Revenge Fantasies notwithstanding. I could see a geek being some lower level clerical employee, maybe rising to lower management but not much higher. I can’t see brother nerd as a pastor or anything, but a clerk or religious scholar, definitely.
Artist: Possibly, if the geek has a strong creative streak, but most geeks are not insane enough to become full time artists. Chance of paintings/artwork being trashed by the town bully: 83.9%
Farmer: The geek is quite capable of hard work, but the complete lack of imagination required for a career in farming rules this one out. There’s not a lot of time for intellectual stimulation: most farmers work from sunup to sundown. I could see a geek keeping a handful of chickens or pigs though. Until they completely forget about them for a week (amidst a brainstorming session over how to build better pens) and they all die. Chance pigs/chickens will be stolen by Town Bully: 65%
Life of Crime: Hmmm. The problem is, most geeks have a very finely defined sense of right and wrong, and would be morally opposed to theft and crime in general. However, I could see a geek joining a Robin Hood type band and being known as “the smart guy”. Not the leader, that requires charisma, or a henchman, which requires physical skills, but a lieutenant, a planner. Someone who knows the routes nobles and clergy travel by and who can plan out heists. Requires constant support from the leader to keep from being bullied and killed by the rest of the gang.
This isn’t entirely true. From the wikipedia page on Christian Monasticism
“Irish monks needed to learn a foreign language, Latin, which was the language of the Church. Thus they read Latin texts, both spiritual and secular, with an enthusiasm that their contemporaries on the continent lacked.”
Bolding mine.
From the Britannica entry on Ireland:
“Both at home and abroad the saints were succeeded by scholars, whose work in sacred and classical studies and particularly in elaborating an Irish Christian mythology and literature was to have profound effects on the Irish language and was to be a major factor in its survival. The Irish monasteries—with those in Clonmacnoise and Clonard among the most famous—became notable centres of learning. Christianity brought Latin to Ireland, and the writings of both the Church Fathers and Classical authors were read and studied.”
So being a scholar was viable in this period, in Ireland at least.
In Northern Europe, farmers had a lot more free time in the winter, although the milking/slopping/mucking never ended. I bet that’s when a lot of the clothing and shoes were made, beer was brewed, horses got shoed, leather was tanned, pottery was fired, all sorts of things got fixed or overhauled, and if there was any time after that, a guy might carve himself a meerschaum pipe or something.
A woman’s work was never, ever done, especially if she had a dozen kids. Female geeks were probably rarer than hen’s teeth and were probably limited to those crones who’d never married or at least had never had children. (And God forbid one should know too much about herbs and healing and then have a run-in with someone spiteful… “she… is a witch!” Scratch one Ur-geek.)
Apocalypso writes:
> Scholar: Ok, the dark ages were a bad time for the pursuit of knowledge.
> Learning was frowned upon . . .
This is at least an exaggeration. The notion that the Middle Ages (or even just the Early Middle Ages) were a period of ignorance is a creation of the Renaissance. It wasn’t really that bad.
I would imagine that like nerds and geeks today, they enjoyed a relatively lonely and frustrating life at the mercy of those who were stronger, more attractive, more socially skilled and better connected.
To a certain extent, the modern Nerd or Geek is a product of our modern Western society. The modern American suburb is a very different place from the Dark Age village. Suburbs by their nature are very isolating and they exist in a country that is wealthy enough for the majority of it’s citizens to be engaged in educational institutions until their early 20s instead of producing for society. So in other words, we have Geeks and Nerds because we have the luxury of excluding people based on looks or how they dress or whathaveyou.
In the Middle Ages, the “Nerd” was probably the weakling. The kid who was always behind with the farm chores or who sucked at swordfighting. I would imagine they found themselves mocked and laughed at a lot. They probably got stuck with shit jobs (literally). Maybe if they were lucky they served as like an apprentice to a baker or architect or something.
What, you think that anyone in a technical or learned profession, even then, didn’t have to spend years in some kind of training or apprenticeship? If you include in ‘nerd’ an element of book smarts, then just about every architect, engineer, doctor, or similarly respected professional had something of the nerd in them, themselves.
AS you say, it was a different world, and there probably weren’t any parallels to ‘anime geeks’ or ‘SF geeks’ or any of that. Anyone who did have specialized knowledge in something useful, like translating languages or writing, could probably make a good living anywhere. If they were just fantasists, in a world without electronic entertainment they might have been in demand as bards or minstrels. Things might have been better for them back then.
And everyone was more or less at the mercy of the better connected.
May we burn her?
I’m not sure I get your point. In modern times, intellectual professions like engineers, doctors, etc DO attract many people who may have been ‘nerds’ when they were younger. Or are nerds and geeks just losers who grow up to be 40 year olds living in their parents basement?
It seems perfectly reasonable that Ye Olde Nerdling would also pursue careers that leaned to the more academic and intellectual.
But I agree that there probably wasn’t much of a way for people to overly indulge in fantasy like they do today.
Different people use the terms differently, I’m sure. I usually avoid such pejorative expressions, but when I hear or read them, I picture a person who’s bright, does very well in some significant technical area at work or school, and knows a lot about that area and perhaps a number of additional off-the-wall topics–but comes across as socially inept. The way I’ve heard the term used, though, both the intellect and social awkwardness are necessary parts of the concept.
To touch on another point, I suspect that aristocratic birth would to some extent have insulated anyone who didn’t measure up in one or more ways. Apart from the intellectually gifted but socially awkward, this could even extend to those who were actually challenged in some way; IIRC there was an early Czar of Russia, Feodor, who is now thought to have been borderline mentally handicapped. I’m sure the regents kept their eyes on him closely, but at least he wasn’t kicked out into the wilderness.
Although he lived much later than the Middle Ages, I’d suggest King Ludwig II of Bavaria (1845-1886) as a good example of a historic “geek” of noble birth. Socially awkward? Check. Obsessed with fantasy? Check. Liked dressing up in costumes? Check. Spent excessive amounts of money on entertainment and collecting decorative objects? Check.
His money and position gave Ludwig some freedom to do as he liked, and he was able to work on a scale most geeks can only dream of. He didn’t just build a model of his ideal fantasy castle, he built an actual castle. But he was eventually deposed by his own cabinet ministers on trumped up charges of mental illness. (It’s quite likely that Ludwig really was mentally ill, but much of the “evidence” against him was exaggerated or outright fabricated.)
One of the big disappointments of Ludwig II’s life was that in his time the king was already mostly a figurehead. He had somewhat more power than the Queen of England today, but not much more. Ludwig was (like so many modern geeks) very interested in the Middle Ages and often wished he’d been a king back in the days when the title really meant something. But had he really been a medieval monarch he would have had to spend a lot more time running the country and a lot less time geeking out over his favorite composer. Had he not been able to keep from getting distracted from his duties, his brother or one of his cousins probably would have just killed him and seized the throne.
I think it’s interesting that the first replies (solutions) for socially inept people were the monasteries, because after hearing sisters who still today live in monasteries talk about their life there, the first impression that a monastery is the default choice for those who can’t cope with normal interaction in the real life (to exaggerate a bit) is wrong.
Imagine a High School, and the social interactions. Now imagine you don’t go home in the afternoon, but stay the whole time (and no, it’s not as rosy as Enid Blyton’s novels about English private schools sound). And now imagine you stay with these people for the rest of your life. Or imagine a submarine, where people stay together for months, without the possiblity of leaving.
In other words, because in a monastery - esp. in the Middle Ages, where there was far less focus on outside work helping the poor, but more on staying inside and doing work there - people are constantly together with each other, sharing cells and meal times and services and prayers and everything else, you need to be good with people in order to cope. You can’t retreat to your own room - you share a cell with somebody. And your day is planned for you by the higher-ups; you can’t go outside in the garden to be alone if Brother John upsets you during breakfast, or if you’re feeling blue*. Plus, not everybody was there completly voluntary - the Church in general was an acceptable way to get rid of nobles who might otherwise be in competition about titles/inheritage/thrones etc. So you have people frustrated with the place they are in, and no possiblity for anybody to escape.
- If you join an order with a vow of silence, then this is harder than you may think - you can’t discuss the interesting things with anybody.
(Today it’s better because Church/an order is no longer mandatory or a respected career option, but a selection only very few people make, and because of the longer trial period before the vows, where people can experience how difficult that life can be. Also, there’s more social work, since hand-copying ancient texts is no longer needed.)
That’s a new interpretation for me. I always had the impression from reading about him that the poor guy would’ve been happier if he’d been completly out of the political game with the power-scheming and obligations (he would still have wanted the money for his projects, of course!)
There was an article several years back in the weekly magazine of my newspaper (Sueddeutsche Zeitung) where they compared King Ludwig II to Michael Jackson, saying that Ludwig was a king who wanted to be a pop-star (the idea, nto the word), while Michael is a pop-star who wants to be king.
There were a few kings who had serious mental problems. The Wars of the Roses were partly triggered by Henry VI’s going insane. His maternal grandfather, Charles VI of France, was insane and supposedly believed himself to be made of glass.
Of course, when a medieval king was mentally handicapped or insane, factions within the country or other countries might take advantage and get some territory or the throne for themselves. Henry VI’s Yorkist cousins did that, and Henry V of England took advantage of Charles VI of France’s insanity to fight against the French. Feodor the Tsar of Russia was luckier- he had a capable brother-in-law, Boris Godunov, to run things for him (and to claim the throne after Feodor died leaving no surviving children).
“No social skills, but not mentally handicapped” is a fair description of Richard II of England (reigned 1377-1399). He was well-read, intelligent, and more than a bit on the arrogant side (he may have been mentally ill toward the end as well). He eventually managed to alienate enough powerful people that Henry IV was able to overthrow him, and probably had him murdered.
Dubya would have thrived in that environment. Imagine the heights he would have scaled during the Spanish Inquisition.