Medieval Literature

Quiz: Literature in the Middle Ages

1. Which hero of an Old English epic poem becomes king of the Geats and is mortally wounded in defeating a dragon?
2. Who wrote in Middle English the collection of twenty-four stories known as The Canterbury Tales? And at the end of which century?
3. The Canterbury Tales feature a group of pilgrims as they travel to Canterbury to visit the shrine of which saint?
4. Considered one of the most important poems of the Middle Ages, who in 1321 completed the Divine Comedy?








5. The Domesday Book is our earliest public record and was a remarkable survey completed in which year?
6. What name is given to the first part of the Divine Comedy?
7. Who wrote the Ecclesiastical History of the English People in about AD 731?
8. Book of the Marvels of the World is a 13th-century travelogue written down by Rustichello da Pisa from stories by which explorer?
9. Which book was completed by Sir Thomas Malory around 1470 and published in print by William Caxton?
10. Name the famous Middle English narrative poem by William Langland?
11. Thomas of Britain is best remembered for which Old French poem?
12. Name the collection of short stories which is the most notable work of the 14th-century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio?

Answers

1. Beowulf
2. Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century (between 1387 and 1400)
3. Saint Thomas Becket (at Canterbury Cathedral)
4. Dante, Dante Alighieri
5. 1086
6. Inferno
7. The Venerable Bede
8. Marco Polo (in English this book is more commonly called The Travels of Marco Polo)
9. Le Morte d'Arthur
10. Piers Plowman
11. Tristan
12. The Decameron