Sinais

Belgians Hail the Middle Ages, The New York Times

"In Belgium, a country of 10 million, there are at least two dozen groups re-enacting the Middle Ages, rubbing stones together to make fire, eating their dinners out of caldrons, re-enacting heroic battles and staging mock hangings. Ms. Janssens leads one such group, the Order of the Hagelanders, and said: “We have doctors and lawyers, people from all walks of life. It has become a national passion.” Such is the country’s obsession with the past that in a recent poll of 1,000 Belgians, ages 35 to 65, by the Flemish Heritage Foundation, a majority of respondents said that if they could go back to high school, they would study history, with 30 percent choosing the Middle Ages, compared with 11 percent for the 20th century. "

A diferença entre a Idade Média e o Século 20? Não existia Estado na sua concepção moderna de imperium sobre todas as coisas. Autonomia política atomizada, ou seja , localismo extremo (por isso ainda à época das invasões napoleónicas, a Alemanha era constituída por cerca de 300 entidades políticas independentes) - municipalismo em Portugal. Várias fontes de direito coexistiam.