Armor Hall at the Metropolitan Museum is the Daily Pic by Blake Gopnik
The Daily Pic: Museums gave us our Middle Ages.
(Courtesy the Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Donald La Rocca, curator of arms and armor at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, sent me this view of his armor hall as it looked in 1967, about the time I first came across it as a small child. I can honestly say that that experience changed my life, helping to send me on a chase for all things medieval that lasted well into adulthood. (Getting me to dress in full medieval regalia as I rode my bike around our apartment complex; decades later, getting me to read a vast pile of 10th-century Lombard land contracts – in Latin.) I’ve been thinking a lot about medievalism recently, even to the point of rereading Walter Scott’s goofy “Ivanhoe”. But I’m still not sure how it is that modern European culture has built such a strong notion of something called “The Middle Ages”, when it has so little to do with how things ever were. Does it have to do with the fact that humans, as social animals, are wired to ascribe a coherent, person-like “character” to almost anything we come across, including a remote period in history?
For a full visual survey of past Daily Pics visit blakegopnik.com/archive.
See more of our coverage in your search results.
Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.
Register below to read this article for free or subscribe
to unlock unlimited access to The Daily Beast.
Monthly
$1
First month then $5.99/month
Annual
$35
First year then $59.99/year
Premium
$79
First year then $119.99/year
*Substack access provided by the next business day, using your subscription email. Choosing the Premium plan constitutes your permission to share your subscription email with Substack and your agreement to Substack’s Privacy Policy.
Already have an account? Sign In
Looks like you already have a subscription!
You're all set!
Thanks for subscribing.