The Museum of the American Indian

The Museum of the American Indian may seem like an unlikely place to discover the medieval past. But like the Dumbarton Oaks Pre-Columbian Collection, this museum offers a different way to think about the Middle Ages. In particular, the topic of The Inka Road  has provided a pathway into comparing how different civilizations mirrored each other and how we might begin to reconceptualize the Middle Ages in global terms. There are many other examples to explore, even in the Americas, in searching for the medieval. When we take the 'medieval' as a broad chronological framework to understand the pre-modern world, then we open ourselves to comparing and considering the global medieval world in all its diversity and variety.