Medieval and Early Modern History
Medieval and early modern history examines the roughly eight hundred years from around 1000 to 1800, a period that encompasses the height of medieval European civilisation, the Black Death, the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Scientific Revolution, the age of exploration and discovery, and the beginnings of the early modern state. It is a discipline that requires working with primary sources in their original forms, from chronicles, legal records and theological texts to early printed books and correspondence, and developing the interpretive skills to understand those sources within their historical context rather than through the lens of modern assumptions.
At Prifysgol Aberystwyth you will study medieval and early modern history over three years of full-time study, exploring a period of approximately eight centuries that shaped the world from which modernity emerged. You will engage with topics including violence and kingship, travel and discovery, economy and trade, and the body and mind, examining how people in the pre-modern world understood and organised their lives, their societies and their place in the cosmos. Aberystwyth offers a rigorous and research-informed education in a distinctive Welsh university setting, and the typical tariff of 104 reflects a programme accessible to students with genuine intellectual curiosity about the pre-modern past.
Graduates of medieval and early modern history programmes work in education, heritage, archives, museums, publishing, journalism, the civil service and a range of roles where the analytical, research and writing skills developed through historical study are valued. Many pursue postgraduate study in medieval or early modern history, historical musicology, manuscript studies, heritage management or a range of humanities disciplines, and the detailed archival and palaeographic skills that pre-modern history develops are particularly valuable for careers in libraries, archives and special collections. The ability to read complex sources critically, build evidence-based arguments and communicate findings clearly is among the most durable of historical skills.