[每日电讯报] 中世纪历史和其他历史一样重要

来源：《每日电讯报》
原文刊登日期：2022年7月4日
Alexander Stafford MP says that medieval history should be taught more in England’s schools: the focus on Henry VIII and Hitler is too narrow, and vast chunks of our story are left out. He is right. An approach to history that deals with characters and events in isolation gives the impression that they came out of nowhere, but modern Britain did not fall from space. The roots of our political order lie in 19th-century reform, the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the Reformation and, stretching back to the medieval era, Magna Carta.
下院议员亚历山大·斯塔福德表示，英国的学校应该更多地教授中世纪历史：对亨利八世和希特勒的关注太过狭隘，我们的历史中有很大一部分被忽略了。他是对的。一种孤立地处理人物和事件的历史方法给人的印象是，这些人物和事件是凭空而来的，但现代英国并不是从天而降的。我们政治秩序的根源在于19世纪的改革、1688年的光荣革命、宗教改革，以及可以追溯到中世纪的《大宪章》。
How often do we hear that a present-day idea or situation is “medieval”, implying ignorance or poverty? This is sheer prejudice. Visitors to last year’s British Museum exhibition on the life of Thomas Becket discovered that 12th-century England was part of a worldwide empire stretching from the Scottish border to the Pyrenees; that Canterbury Cathedral installed a water-pumping system; and that Archbishop Thomas was debating the very issues of power and liberty that would be more famously picked up in the Enlightenment.
我们多少次听说当今的观念或情况是“中世纪的”，意味着无知或贫穷？这纯粹是偏见。参观去年大英博物馆托马斯·贝克特生平展的游客发现，12世纪的英国是一个从苏格兰边境延伸到比利牛斯山脉的世界性帝国的一部分；坎特伯雷大教堂安装了抽水系统；托马斯大主教在讨论权力和自由的问题，更为著名的是，托马斯大主教的讨论在启蒙运动中被重提。
To understand the concept of the division of church and state, why the Mexicans speak Spanish, why the word “crusade” is so packed with meaning in the Middle East, one has to study this critical bridge between the Roman and modern world, whose inhabitants included Dante, Muhammed and founder of one of the largest empires in history, Genghis Khan.
为了理解政教分离的概念，为什么墨西哥人会说西班牙语，为什么“crusade”一词在中东意义如此丰富，我们必须研究这座连接罗马帝国和现代世界的重要桥梁，这一时期的居民包括但丁、穆罕默德和历史上最大帝国之一的创始人成吉思汗。
History teaching shouldn’t be overly preachy. The joy of the subject is how wide and alien so much of it is, and by teaching as much of it as possible, we can send pupils off with a better understanding of their own era.
历史教学不应过分说教。这门学科的乐趣在于它的许多内容是如此广泛和陌生，通过尽可能多地教授这门学科，我们可以让学生们更好地了解自己所处的时代。