Editing The Seventh Seal (section)

===Portrait of the Middle Ages===
Medieval Sweden as portrayed in this movie includes creative anachronisms. The [[flagellant]] movement was foreign to Sweden, and large-scale [[Witch-hunt|witch persecutions]] only began in the 15th century.<ref>Said by Swedish historian [[Dick Harrison]] in an introduction to the movie on [[Sveriges Television]], 2005. Reiterated in his book ''Gud vill det!'' {{ISBN|91-7037-119-9}}</ref> In addition, the main period of the [[Crusades]] is well before this era; they took place in a more optimistic period.<ref name="Tuchman"/>

With regard to the relevancy of historical accuracy to a film that is heavily metaphorical and allegorical, John Aberth, writing in ''A Knight at the Movies'', holds
<blockquote>
the film only partially succeeds in conveying the period atmosphere and thought world of the fourteenth century. Bergman would probably counter that it was never his intention to make an historical or period film. As it was written in a program note that accompanied the movie's premier "It is a modern poem presented with medieval material that has been very freely handled... The script in particular—embodies a mid-twentieth century existentialist angst... Still, to be fair to Bergman, one must allow him his artistic license, and the script's modernisms may be justified as giving the movie's medieval theme a compelling and urgent contemporary relevance... Yet the film succeeds to a large degree because it is set in the Middle Ages, a time that can seem both very remote and very immediate to us living in the modern world... Ultimately ''The Seventh Seal'' should be judged as a historical film by how well it combines the medieval and the modern."<ref>John Aberth (2003). ''A Knight at the Movies''. Routledge. pp. 217–218.</ref>
</blockquote>
[[Image:Taby kyrka Death playing chess.jpg|thumb|upright|Death playing chess, from [[Täby Church]], fresco by [[Albertus Pictor]]]]

Similarly defending it as an allegory, Aleksander Kwiatkowski in the book ''Swedish Film Classics'', writes
<blockquote>
The international response to the film which among other awards won the jury's special prize at Cannes in 1957 reconfirmed the author's high rank and proved that ''The Seventh Seal'' regardless of its degree of accuracy in reproducing medieval scenery may be considered as a universal, timeless allegory.<ref>''Swedish Film Classics by Aleksander Kwiatkowski'', Svenska filminstitutet p. 93</ref>
</blockquote>

Much of the film's imagery is derived from medieval art. For example, Bergman has stated that the image of a man playing chess with a skeletal Death was inspired by a medieval church painting from the 1480s in [[Täby kyrka]], [[Täby]], north of [[Stockholm]], painted by [[Albertus Pictor]].<ref>Stated in Marie Nyreröd's interview series (the first part named ''Bergman och filmen'') aired on [[Sveriges Television]] Easter 2004.</ref>

Generally speaking, historians [[Johan Huizinga]], [[Friedrich Heer]] and [[Barbara Tuchman]] have all argued that the [[Late Middle Ages]] of the 14th century was a period of "doom and gloom" similar to what is reflected in this film, characterized by a feeling of pessimism, an increase in a penitential style of piety that was slightly masochistic, all aggravated by various disasters such as the Black Death, famine, the [[Hundred Years' War]] between France and England, and the [[Papal schism of 1378|Papal schism]].<ref name="Tuchman">Barbara Tuchman (1978). ''[https://archive.org/details/distantmirror00barb A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century]''. New York: Alfred A. Knopf. {{ISBN|0-394-40026-7}}</ref> This is sometimes called the [[crisis of the Late Middle Ages]], and Tuchman regards the 14th century as "[[A Distant Mirror|a distant mirror]]" of the 20th century in a way that echoes Bergman's sensibilities.