We covered the fall of Rome first, we learned who they were, where the empire spread, and its disputes, eventually leading up to the empires untimely demise.
Barbarian” groups like the Goths had attacked Rome from the north over and over, most of the goths were ex-roman soldiers. the Roman empire was too big, which made communication difficult and therefore made it difficult to govern. the Romans tried to solve this problem, by splitting Rome into eastern Rome and western Rome. But the two sides began to split further and further, resulting in minor border disputes, and eventually leading to fully fledged battles and wars. Rome also relied highly on slaves, but with the rise of Christianity, many of these unhappy slaves followed the word of Jesus and rebelled against the empire, which led consequently, led to its ultimate demise.
Above: Map of the Roman Empire at its peak.
We covered the difference between myth and history. And how they are related, and we talked about how one could not exist without the other, and that they are interconnected.
Then we talked about How European society changed after Rome. We spoke about this, and we know this period as the Rise of feudalism. We spoke about the 3 f’s of Feudalism, (Faith or Religion, Fief or land, and Fealty or loyalty)
Above: A diagram explaining how the feudal system worked.
The King/Monarch had total power over everyone, they owned all the land in the country. They leased land to the barons, and they decided how much land to lease to the barons. They also had full power over the judicial system.
The Barons had land provided by the king/monarch. They came up with their own legal system and their own currency. They had to provide the King with Knights to tackle with any form of war, and they had to provide food and lodging facilities to the king when they traveled to different locations.
The Barons gave land to knights. Knights would be responsible for defending the Barons and going to war when asked by the king. They kept some land for themselves but distributed the rest to serfs.
The serfs were the peasants. They had no rights, They had to provide food and service to their superior classes on demand. They were not allowed to leave the Manor without prior permission, and they were also not allowed to marry without the permission of their Lords.
We learned about what is a hero, what is a Hero’s journey. The Heroes journey/monomyth is a method of storytelling created by Joseph Campbell, commonly used in Disney films! think of your favorite film, and see if it follows this kind of structure: 
then we learned about what brought Europe and the east into contact. The Crusades.
We learned that the Crusades were a war against the Muslims because they had control over Christianity’s holiest city, Jerusalem. They were also to spread Christianity to the rest of the world. They started around the year 1095 and ended around 1291. The outcome? Jerusalem remained under Muslim occupation.
Then our learning about religion and its related wars, and our learning about the Hero’s Journey or monomyth was combined into one epic group project, making a tiny blanket.
But in all seriousness, we had to make a quilt, with a story of our own writing, design it ourselves, sew it.
I was in a group with Jason, Gabby, and Lucy.
The story we made was… SO AWESOME! Here is the first rough copy of our story:
Joseph gets hurt on the Jerusalem wall, Muhammad, is against the war, and he wants to help him. Joseph refuses. But Muhammad saves shim anyways. Then out of hate and anger for the Muslims, Joseph attempts to fight and kill Muhammad. Muhammad defended himself but he did not hurt Joseph, however, his injury became worse with the movement in the fight.
This time the injury is worse, and Joseph nearly dies. He lets Muhammad help him. They become frenemies. Muhammad take Joseph to the imam who is also against the war, for advice on their current situation, imam lets them know about a magic object that will reveal what would happen if the fighting and suffering continued. This object is a sentence, that they must find, however there is a riddle protecting it, they must crack it. They crack the riddle. They enter a secret room that the imam told them about. They see a pedestal, the walls appear like computer chips, sparkling, and humming, the pedestal has 3 symbols, a pair of eyes, a crescent moon, and a ball like object. They try to understand what it means, they eventually come to the conclusion, “seek higher things” they say it, it doesn’t work, they wait a few moments, Muhammad realizes something he says mysteriously, “ascende superius” (seek higher things)
The walls of the chamber glow and hmmm loudly, they radiate heat, and they fall unconscious, they wake up on a battle field they see lots of futuristic weapons/tech, they get captured my modern day soldiers, taken to a prison, they fight their way out, muhammad gets shot, while they are injured they hide in a bomb crater, Joseph goes to find supplies to help muhammad, but he runs into a soldier, at first he is scared and runs, but then he hears the soldier yelling that he wants to help, and that he is against the war. He stops for a moment, still suspicious of the soldier’s intent but he eventually gives in and takes medical supplies from the kind soldier. He runs to the crater to help Muhammad, but when he looked at the med kit to help Muhammad, he noticed that most of the supplies fell out while he was running to Muhammad. He runs back, and then he picks up the med supplies, and goes back to the crater and heal him. Then a group of soldiers found them in the crater. They were scared at first, but the soldiers explain that they need each other. These soldiers were nor Christian nor Muslim, they were against the war, and they needed Muhammad and Joseph to help them open the portal to go back in time because the ancient language of Latin had been forgotten since medieval times. However Muhammad still knows it, so the anti-war group goes with Muhammad and Joseph back to the chamber/portal but this time there is a different set of symbols: eyeballs, fire, ball object. “Seek, lower(hellish) things”
They discover the secret phrase again: Quaerite rebus inferioribus
They go back in time, the rebels use their weapons to stop the war, the end.
You can see below, we have made some very significant improvements and alterations to the story, anyways the chart below is how we made the story into quilt squares. If you want to see a quick video summary explaining the quilt squares, watch this video I made today while I was puking my brains out with the flu:
And here it is with less detail, in writing:
Story 1
Block 1
(Beginning)
- Joseph is injured while on a Crusade
-
Muhammad saves him
We will be stitching both triangles, the outline of the red, and the rising sun.
We will not have any additions to the first block, as it is supposed to be simplistic, or metaphorically black and white, as Joseph and Muhammad do not know much about each other.
Story 2
Block 1
(Beginning)
- Muhammad sees an injured crusader
-
Muhammad saves Joseph
As said above, both triangles will be stitched, along with the green outline and the rising sun again.
We will not have any additions to the first block, as it is supposed to be simplistic, or metaphorically black and white, as Joseph and Muhammad do not know much about each other.
Story 1
Block 2
(Middle)
- Joseph perceives Muhammad as an enemy and tries to attack him
Both triangles will be stitched, as well as the sun and the red outline.
We will appliqué some yellow embroidery on the white space to represent how Joseph sees his anger.
Story 2
Block 2
(Middle)
- The injured crusader tries to attack Muhammad
Both triangles will be stitched, as well as the sun and the green outline
We will appliqué some grey or black embroidery on the white space to represent how Muhammad sees Joseph’s anger.
Story 1
Block 3
(End)
- They find peace and escape Jerusalem
Both triangles will be stitched through, along with the star.
We can put beads on the background for stars.
Story 2
Block 3
(End)
- They leave Jerusalem together to escape the crusades
Both triangles will be stitched through, along with the star.
We can put beads on the background for stars.
THAT’S A WRAP!
(shh its a burrito)
SOOOOOOOOOO…. to wrap things up, or, burrito things up, this was a very fun unit, and I learned, a lot, now I’m sure that I’m never gonna need to make quilts with stories on them, but you never know! What if a dragon who has been a Serf all his life got hungry and chased me into a cave to escape, and I needed to make a blanket for comfort? if I make a quilt, well, its entertainment, AND warmth. Hopefully, that’ll never happen though. Well, time to say bye. 3! 2! 1! Bye! AND THAT’S A BURRITO EVERYBODY!