Project Gutenberg 2012-02-07 Public domain in the USA. 244 Keightley, Thomas 1789 1872 17021617 Secret Societies of the Middle Ages Reading ease score: 58.1 (10th to 12th grade). Somewhat difficult to read. Produced by Delphine Lettau, Clive Pickton, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net "Secret Societies of the Middle Ages" by Thomas Keightley is a historical account written in the 19th century. The book delves into the origins and characteristics of secret societies that emerged during the Middle Ages, focusing on groups such as the Assassins, the Knights Templar, and the secret tribunals of Westphalia. Keightley's work aims to offer a comprehensive exploration of these societies, revealing their political, social, and religious implications. The opening of the book introduces the concept of secret societies as a response to the retention of knowledge by select individuals in an environment of general ignorance. Keightley discusses how these groups formed as a means of protecting knowledge and facilitating covert gatherings for political discourse and reform. He hints at the socio-political ramifications of such societies, noting that their clandestine nature often invokes suspicion, leading to misrepresentation and persecution by governing powers. The foundation for understanding the subsequent chapters, which detail specific societies and their historical contexts, is firmly established in this introduction. (This is an automatically generated summary.) en Secret societies HS Text Browsing: Culture/Civilization/Society Browsing: History - Medieval/The Middle Ages 825054 825036 2024-10-16T10:53:16.906813 2023-09-17T05:25:55.485600 text/html text/html 833007 2012-02-07T13:01:42 text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 1751098 2012-02-07T13:01:44 text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 application/zip 2073062 2024-10-16T10:53:30.970769 application/epub+zip 2077436 2024-10-16T10:53:21.525803 application/epub+zip 384177 2024-10-16T10:53:19.621797 application/epub+zip 2404422 2024-10-16T10:53:38.021751 application/x-mobipocket-ebook 2342654 2024-10-16T10:53:29.434760 application/x-mobipocket-ebook 641457 2022-09-17T16:34:02.442637 application/x-mobipocket-ebook 746904 746780 2024-10-16T10:53:15.368843 2023-09-17T05:25:54.251590 text/plain; charset=us-ascii text/plain 746392 2012-02-07T13:01:42 text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 274585 2012-02-07T13:01:44 text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 application/zip 746563 2012-02-07T13:01:42 text/plain; charset=us-ascii 274395 2012-02-07T13:01:44 text/plain; charset=us-ascii application/zip 21184 2024-10-16T10:53:38.163721 application/rdf+xml 15879 2024-10-16T10:53:20.242797 image/jpeg 3673 2024-10-16T10:53:19.949836 image/jpeg 1831998 2024-10-16T10:53:17.018816 application/octet-stream application/zip Archives containing the RDF files for *all* our books can be downloaded at https://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Gutenberg:Feeds#The_Complete_Project_Gutenberg_Catalog en.wikipedia