The year 1215 saw a time of global upheaval from which the ripples can still be felt today - but it was also an age of domestic changes and the development of a way of life not entirely different from our own. From the oddest detail to the grandest political struggle, Danny Danzinger and John Gillingham paint an extraordinary picture of this fascinating age, featuring a cast of some of the most enduring names in history - Bad King John, Genghis Khan, St Francis of Assisi - as well as the thousands of ordinary people whose lives were affected by the historical events happening around them. The power struggles are balanced with the social issues of the day - fashion, communications, education, medicine, religion and sex - as the authors explore the attitudes and habits of a nation in flux, and the ways in which they sculpted the modern world.