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Self-Help from the Middle Ages: What the Seven Deadly Sins Can Teach Us about Living
In this charming journey into the past, a historian reveals medieval wisdom that can still guide us...
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In this charming journey into the past, a historian reveals medieval wisdom that can still guide us today "One of the most compelling medieval history books I have ever read."
-Ian Mortimer, author of The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England Peter Jones was teaching medieval history at a university in Siberia when his third icy winter there plunged him into a dark place. Luckily, he knew something few of us know-- that for all its reputation for darkness and superstition, the Middle Ages were the golden age of self-help. So he set out on a journey to explore the wisdom of medieval scholars, saints, and mystics, looking for an alternative path through the challenges of modern life. Never in history, Jones marvels in Self-Help from the Middle Ages, has so much energy and talent gone into studying how the mind works as in the medieval centuries. Although today we think of the Seven Deadly Sins as a catalog of forbidden behavior, in the Middle Ages, at the height of their currency, they were a path to self-knowledge and self-forgiveness. Together, pride, envy, anger, sloth, greed, gluttony and lust were a psychological map that laid out seven basic patterns of thought, showing how our thinking can go astray and how we can find our way home. In Self-Help from the Middle Ages, Jones explores each sin, searching the hellscapes of Hieronymous Bosch and Giotto, the intimate confessions of Dante and Margery Kempe, and the personal struggles of Francis of Assisi and Catherine of Siena. Along the way he discovers a treasure trove of lost truths about temptation, frustration, addiction, compulsion, burnout, rage, fear, anxiety, and grief that still pulse with life. With beautiful illustrations drawn from medieval art and literature, his book is a gift to all who love history and anyone who has ever sought wisdom from the past.
Author: Peter Jones
Publisher: Doubleday Books
Published: 04/14/2026
Pages: 368
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.25lbs
Size: 9.14h x 6.07w x 1.51d
ISBN: 9780385551687
Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 02/01/2026
Publishers Weekly 02/09/2026
About the Author
PETER JONES received his Ph.D. in medieval history from New York University. He taught at the School of Advanced Studies at the University of Tyumen in Siberia, where he was Chair of History. Today, he is a Marie Curie fellow at Complutense University of Madrid.
-Ian Mortimer, author of The Time Traveler's Guide to Medieval England Peter Jones was teaching medieval history at a university in Siberia when his third icy winter there plunged him into a dark place. Luckily, he knew something few of us know-- that for all its reputation for darkness and superstition, the Middle Ages were the golden age of self-help. So he set out on a journey to explore the wisdom of medieval scholars, saints, and mystics, looking for an alternative path through the challenges of modern life. Never in history, Jones marvels in Self-Help from the Middle Ages, has so much energy and talent gone into studying how the mind works as in the medieval centuries. Although today we think of the Seven Deadly Sins as a catalog of forbidden behavior, in the Middle Ages, at the height of their currency, they were a path to self-knowledge and self-forgiveness. Together, pride, envy, anger, sloth, greed, gluttony and lust were a psychological map that laid out seven basic patterns of thought, showing how our thinking can go astray and how we can find our way home. In Self-Help from the Middle Ages, Jones explores each sin, searching the hellscapes of Hieronymous Bosch and Giotto, the intimate confessions of Dante and Margery Kempe, and the personal struggles of Francis of Assisi and Catherine of Siena. Along the way he discovers a treasure trove of lost truths about temptation, frustration, addiction, compulsion, burnout, rage, fear, anxiety, and grief that still pulse with life. With beautiful illustrations drawn from medieval art and literature, his book is a gift to all who love history and anyone who has ever sought wisdom from the past.
Author: Peter Jones
Publisher: Doubleday Books
Published: 04/14/2026
Pages: 368
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.25lbs
Size: 9.14h x 6.07w x 1.51d
ISBN: 9780385551687
Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 02/01/2026
Publishers Weekly 02/09/2026
About the Author
PETER JONES received his Ph.D. in medieval history from New York University. He taught at the School of Advanced Studies at the University of Tyumen in Siberia, where he was Chair of History. Today, he is a Marie Curie fellow at Complutense University of Madrid.
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