alt Hacker NewsEven in France I'm willing to bet the majority of people outside of Avignon have no idea about it.
Any history major with interest in medieval Europe, yes, any middle schooler? No way.
Even in France I'm willing to bet the majority of people outside of Avignon have no idea about it.
Any history major with interest in medieval Europe, yes, any middle schooler? No way.
It was part of the elementary school curriculum in Finland in the 90s, and it sounds like something that would have been in the traditional curriculum for earlier generations.
The Finnish term translates as "Avignon captivity" rather than the more neutral "Avignon Papacy", which could be a clue. It's easy to imagine that a traditional Protestant society would use a debacle like that to illustrate how silly those Catholics and their power struggles are and why the Reformation was necessary.