Medieval Information

It is commonly believed that during the Dark Ages people were shorter than today. Recent studies conducted to British skeletons have shown some very interesting results. First of all, peasants were on average shorter than nobles. This helds true because of the poor nutrition to which peasants were subject to whilst nobles had a better nutrition and a much better way of life (including enough sleep and other necessary factors for growth).

A person was on average slightly shorter than today. During the XII century, taller people lived but this declined slowly in the following centuries until the XVIII century when the shortest people of the millennium existed. The reason is debated, though some believe that food and plague contributed to this phenomenon.

A recent study based on twins shows that 90% of a person's height is inherited whilst the 10% is based purely in environmental factors. While this difference might seem minor at a first glance, it is to be considered that a person who should have been 6' would be only 5'3. This makes evident that if medieval people had had a good nutrition, they would be as tall as we are today.

There are records of many dwarfs during the Middle Ages. This was surprisingly more common among nobles probably because of family members marrying each other. More notoriously is the case of a British king who was so short that his throne had to be shortened especially for him. Of course there is no evidence to support this and it may simply be a myth - but, the fact that many dwarfs existed is well documented.

However, height did play a major role among warriors who were chosen based mostly on their height. A short knight was very rare or almost unheard of since he, when young, was chosen based on many factors in which height was fundamental. To learn more about knights, read the medieval knighthood article.

Height is a very reliable way to determine a place's economy. Many historians today measure skeletons and based on the acquired data they know how life was in that given place. The shorter the people (compared to today's average), the poorer - the taller, the richer.

Britons were on average 5'8 in the XI century. Today they average 5'9 so even though there is a difference, it's minimal and one should note that our genes (height) are the same but nutrition is different.