The propriety of my writing a History of Chivalry, as a companion to my
History of the Crusades, was suggested to me by a friend whose
acquaintance with middle-age lore forms but a small portion of his
literary attainments, and whose History of Italy shows his ability of
treating, as well as his skill in discovering, subjects not hitherto
discussed with the fulness which their importance merits.[1]
The works of Menestrier and Colombiere sleep in the dust of a few ancient
libraries; and there are only two other books whose express and entire
object is a delineation of the Institutions of chivalry. The first and
best known is the French work called "Mémoires sur l'ancienne Chevalerie;
considérée comme un Etablissement Politique et Militaire. Par M. de la
Curne de Sainte Palaye, de l'Académie Françoise," &c. 2 tom. 12mo. Paris,
1759. The last half, however, of the second volume does not relate to
chivalry, and therefore the learned Frenchman cannot be charged with
treating his subject at very great length.[2] It was his purpose to
describe the education which accomplished the youth for the distinction of
knighthood, and this part of his work he has performed with considerable
success. But he failed in his next endeavour, that of painting the martial
games of chivalry, for nothing can be more unsatisfactory than his account
of jousts and tournaments. As he wished to inform his readers of the use
which was made in the battle field of the valour, skill, and experience of
knights, a description of some of the extraordinary and interesting
battles of the middle ages might have been expected. Here also
disappointment is experienced; neither can any pleasure be derived from
perusing his examination of the causes which produced the decline and
extinction of chivalry, and his account of the inconveniences which
counterbalanced the advantages of the establishment.
Sainte Palaye was a very excellent French antiquarian; but the limited
scope of his studies disqualified him from the office of a general
historian of chivalry. The habits of his mind led him to treat of
knighthood as if it had been the ornament merely of his own country. He
very rarely illustrates his principles by the literature of any other
nation, much less did he attempt to trace their history through the
various states of Europe. He has altogether kept out of sight many
characteristic features of his subject. Scarcely any thing is advanced
about ancient armour; not a word on the religious and military orders; and
but a few pages, and those neither pleasing nor correct, on woman and
lady-love. The best executed part of his subject regards, as I have
already observed, the education of knights; and he has scattered up and
down his little volume and a half many curious notices of ancient manners.
The other work is written in the German language, and for that reason it
is but very little known in this country. It is called Ritterzeit und
Ritterwesen, (two volumes octavo, Leipzig, 1823,) and is the substance of
a course of lectures on chivalry delivered by the author, Mr. Büsching, to
his pupils of the High School at Breslau. The style of the work is the
garrulous, slovenly, ungrammatical style which lecturers, in all
countries, and upon all subjects, think themselves privileged to use. A
large portion of the book is borrowed from Sainte Palaye; much of the
remainder relates to feudalism and other matters distinct from chivalry:
but when the writer treats of the state of knighthood in Germany I have
found his facts and observations of very great value.
Attention to the subjects of the middle ages of Europe has for many years
been growing among us. It was first excited by Warton's history of our
national verse, and Percy's edition of the Relics of ancient English
Poetry. The romances of chivalry, both in prose and metre, and the
numberless works on the Troubadour, and every other description of
literature during the middle ages which have been published within the
last few years, have sustained the interest. The poems of Scott convinced
the world that the chivalric times of Europe can strike the moral
imagination as powerfully and pleasingly in respect of character, passion,
and picturesqueness of effect, as the heroic ages of Greece; and even very
recently the glories of chivalry have been sung by a poetess whom Ariosto
himself would have been delighted to honour.[3] Still, however, no attempt
has been hitherto made to describe at large the institutions of
knighthood, the foundation of all that elegant superstructure of poetry
and romance which we admire, and to mark the history of chivalry in the
various countries of Europe. Those institutions have, indeed, been allowed
a few pages in our Encyclopædias; and some of the sketches of them are
drawn with such boldness and precision of outline that we may regret the
authors did not present us with finished pictures. Our popular historians
have but hastily alluded to the subject; for they were so much busied with
feudalism and politics, that they could afford but a small space for the
play of the lighter graces of chivalry.
For a description, indeed, of antique manners, our materials are not so
ample as for that of their public lives. But still the subject is not
without its witnesses. The monkish chroniclers sometimes give us a glimpse
of the castles of our ancestors. Many of the knights in days of yore had
their biographers; and, for the most interesting time of chivalry, we
possess an historian, who, for vividness of delineation, kindliness of
feeling, and naïveté of language, is the Herodotus of the middle ages.
"Did you ever read Froissart?"
"No," answered Henry Morton.
"I have half a mind," rejoined Claverhouse, "to contrive that you should
have six months' imprisonment, in order to procure you that pleasure. His
chapters inspire me with more enthusiasm than even poetry itself."
Froissart's[4] history extends from the year 1316 to 1400. It was begun by
him when he was twenty years old, at the command of his dear lord and
master, Sir Robert of Namur, Lord of Beaufort. The annals from 1326 to
1356 are founded on the Chronicles compiled by him whom he calls "The
Right Reverend, discreet, and sage Master John la Bele, sometime canon in
St. Lambertis of Liege, who with good heart and due diligence did his true
devoir in writing his book; and heard of many fair and noble adventures
from his being well beloved, and of the secret counsel of the Lord Sir
John of Hainault." Froissart corrected all this borrowed matter on the
information of the barons and knights of his time regarding their
families' gestes and prowesses. He is the chronicler both of political
events and of chivalric manners. Of his merits in the first part of his
character it falls not within my province to speak. For the office of
historian of chivalry no man could present such fair pretensions. His
father being a herald-painter, he was initiated in his very early years
into that singular form of life which he describes with such picturesque
beauty. "Well I loved," as he says of his youth, in one of his poems, "to
see dances and carolling, and to hear the songs of minstrels and tales of
glee. It pleased me to attach myself to those who took delight in hounds
and hawks. I was wont to toy with my fair companions at school, and
methought I had the art well to win the grace of maidens."--"My ears
quickened at the sound of opening the wine-flask, for I took great
pleasure in drinking, and in fair array, and in fresh and delicate viands.
I loved to see (as is reason) the early violets, and the white and red
roses, and also chambers brilliantly lighted; dances and late vigils, and
fair beds for my refreshment; and for my better repose, I joyously quaffed
a night-draught of claret, or Rochelle wine mingled with spice."
Froissart wrote his Chronicles "to the intent that the honourable and
noble adventures of feats of arms, done and achieved in the wars of France
and England, should notably be enregistered, and put in perpetual memory;
whereby the preux and hardy might have ensample to encourage them in their
well-doing."[5] To accomplish his purpose, he followed and frequented the
company of divers noble and great lords, as well in France, England, and
Scotland, as in other countries; and in their chivalric festivals he
enquired for tales of arms and amours. For three years he was clerk of the
chamber to Philippa of Hainault, wife of Edward III. He travelled into
Scotland; and, though mounted only on a simple palfrey, with his trunk
placed on the hinder part of his saddle, after the fashion in which a
squire carried the mail-harness of a knight, and attended only by a
greyhound, the favourite dog of the time, instead of a train of varlets,
yet the fame of his literary abilities introduced him to the castle of
Dalkeith, and the court of the Scottish King.
He generally lived in the society of nobles and knights,--at the courts of
the Duke of Brabant, the Count of Namur, and the Earl of Blois. He knew
and admired the Black Prince, Du Guesclin, the Douglas, and Hotspur; and
while this various acquaintance fitted him to describe the circumstances
and manners of his times, it prevented him from the bias of particular
favouritism. The character of his mind, rather than his station in life,
determined his pursuits. His profession was that of the church: he was a
while curate of Lestines, in the diocese of Liege; and, at the time of his
death, he was canon and treasurer of the collegiate church of Chimay. But
he was a greater reader of romances than of his breviary; and, churchman
though he was, knighthood itself could not boast a more devoted admirer
of dames and damsels. He was, therefore, the very man to describe the
chivalric features of his time.
The romances of chivalry are another source of information. Favyn says,
with truth and fancy, "The greater part of antiquities are to be sought
for and derived out of the most ancient tales, as well in prose as verse,
like pearls out of the smoky papers of Ennius." The romance-writers were
to the middle ages of Europe what the ancient poets were to Greece,--the
painters of the manners of their times. As Sir Walter Scott observes, "We
have no hesitation in quoting the romances of chivalry as good evidence of
the laws and customs of knighthood. The authors, like the artists of the
period, invented nothing, but, copying the manners of the age in which
they lived, transferred them, without doubt or scruple, to the period and
personages of whom they treated."
From all these sources of information I have done my devoir, in the
following pages, to describe the origin of chivalry; and, after escaping
from the dark times in which it arose, to mark the various degrees of the
personal nobility of knighthood. An enquiry into the nature and duties of
the chivalric character then will follow; and we cannot pass, without
regard and homage, the sovereign-mistress and lady-love of the adventurous
knight. After viewing our cavalier in the gay and graceful pastime of the
tournament, and pausing a while to behold him when a peculiar character of
religion was added to his chivalry, we shall see him vault upon his good
steed; and we will accompany him in the achievement of his high and hardy
emprises in Britain, France, Spain, Germany, and Italy.
As a view of chivalry is, from its nature, a supplement or an appendix to
the history of Europe, I have supposed my readers to be acquainted with
the general circumstances of past ages, and therefore I have spoken of
them by allusion rather than by direct statement. I have made the
following work as strictly chivalric as the full and fair discussion of my
subject would permit me, avoiding descriptions of baronial and feudal
life, except in its connection with knighthood. I have not detailed
military circumstances of former times, unless they proceeded from
chivalric principles, or were invested with chivalric graces. Thus the
celebrated battle of the Thirty had nothing in it of a knightly character,
and therefore I have left it unnoticed. Judicial combats had their origin
in the state of society from which both feudalism and chivalry sprang; but
they were not regulated by the gentle laws of knighthood, and therefore
have not been described by me. I have not imposed any dry legal facts and
discussions upon my readers; for the incidents attached to the tenure of
land called the tenure in chivalry were strictly feudal; and the courts of
the constable and marshal, holding cognisance as they did of all matters
regarding war, judicial combats, and blazonry of arms, relate not so much
to chivalry as to the general preservation of the peace of the land, and
the good order of society. And it should be mentioned, that it has not
been my purpose to give a minute history of every individual cavalier: for
a work strictly confined to biographical detail, however convenient it
might be for occasional reference, would be tiresome and tedious by reason
of the repetition of circumstances only varied with the difference of
names, and would be any thing but historical. I have brought the great
characters of chivalry, who have received but slight attention from the
political historian, in illustration of the principles of knighthood. Thus
full-length portraits of those English knights of prowess, Sir John
Chandos and Sir Walter Manny, will be more interesting than pictures of
Edward III. and the Black Prince, whose features are so well known to us.
From the lives of these royal heroes I have therefore only selected such
chivalric circumstances as have not been sufficiently described and dwelt
upon, or which it was absolutely incumbent on me to state, in order to
preserve an unbroken thread of narrative.
I shall not expatiate on the interest and beauty of my subject, lest I
should provoke too rigid an enquiry into my ability for discussing it. I
shall therefore only conclude, in the good old phrase of Chaucer,--
"Now, hold your mouth, pour charitie,
Both knight and lady free,
And herkneth to my spell,
Of battaille and of chivalry,
Of ladies' love and druerie,
Anon I wol you tell."
While these volumes were passing through the press, the Tales of the
Crusaders appeared. In the second of them is contained a series of
supposed propositions from Saladin for peace between his nation and
the English. The conclusion of those propositions is thus
expressed:--"Saladin will put a sacred seal on this happy union
betwixt the bravest and noblest of Frangistan and Asia, by raising to
the rank of his royal spouse a Christian damsel, allied in blood to
King Richard, and known by the name of the Lady Edith of Plantagenet,"
vol. iv. pp. 13, 14. Upon this passage of his text the author remarks
in a note: "This may appear so extraordinary and improbable a
proposition that it is necessary to say such a one was actually made.
The historians, however, substitute the widowed Queen of Naples,
sister of Richard, for the bride, and Saladin's brother for the
bridegroom. They appear to be ignorant of the existence of Edith of
Plantagenet. See MILL'S (MILLS') History of the Crusades, vol. ii. p.
61."
In that work I observe, that "Richard proposed a consolidation of the
Christian and Muhammedan interests; the establishment of a government
at Jerusalem, partly European and partly Asiatic; and these schemes of
policy were to be carried into effect by the marriage of Saphadin
(Saladin's brother) with the widow of William King of Sicily."
M. Michaud, the French historian of the Crusades, makes a similar
statement. He says that Richard "fit d'autres propositions, auxquelles
il intéressa adroitement l'ambition de Malec Adel, frère du Sultan. La
veuve du Guillaume de Sicile fut proposée en marriage au Prince
Musulman." Hist. des Croisades, vol. ii. p. 414.
Whether or no "the historians" are ignorant of the existence of "Edith
of Plantagenet" is not the present question. The question is, which of
the two opposite statements is consistent with historical truth. The
statement of M. Michaud and myself is supported by the principal
Arabic historians, by writers, who, as every student in history knows,
are of unimpeachable credit. Bohadin, in his life of Saladin, says,
that "the Englishman was desirous that Almalick Aladin should take his
sister to wife. (Her brother had brought her with him from Sicily,
when he passed through that island, to the deceased lord of which she
had been married."[6]) To the same effect Abulfeda observes, "Hither
came the embassadors of the Franks to negotiate a peace; and offered
this condition, that Malek al Adel, brother of the Sultan, should
receive the sister of the King of England in marriage, and Jerusalem
for a kingdom."[7] That this sister, Joan, the widowed Queen of
Sicily, was with Richard in the Holy Land is proved by a passage in
Matthew Paris, p. 171. She and the wife of Richard are mentioned
together, and no other person of royal rank.
Thus, therefore, "the historians" are correct in their statement, that
the matrimonial proposition was made by the English to Saladin, and
that the parties were to be the brother of Saladin and the widowed
Queen of Sicily. The novelist has not supported his assertion by a
single historical testimony; and we may defy him to produce a tittle
of evidence on his side.
In the composition of his tales, the author of Waverley has seldom
shown much respect for historical keeping. But greater accuracy than
his no person had a right to expect in the text of a mere novel; and
as long as he gave his readers no excuse for confounding fiction with
truth, the play of his brilliant and excursive imagination was
harmless. Thus in the Talisman, the poetical antiquarian only smiles
when he finds the romance of the Squire of Low Degree quoted as
familiar to the English long before it was written; and when, in the
Betrothed, Gloucester is raised into a bishoprick three centuries and
a half before the authentic æra, we equally admit the author's licence
of anachronism. On these two occasions, as in innumerable other
instances, in which the novelist, whether intentionally or
unwittingly, has strayed from the path of historical accuracy, he has
never given formal warranty for the truth of his statements, and he is
entitled to laugh at the simple credulity which could mistake his
Tales for veracious chronicles: But his assertion respecting the
marriage of Saladin with his "Edith of Plantagenet" is a very
different case. For here he throws aside the fanciful garb of a
novelist, and quits the privilege of his text, that he may gravely
and critically vouch in a note for the errors of our historians, and
his own superior knowledge. If this can possibly be done merely to
heighten the illusion of his romance, it is carrying the jest a little
too far; for the preservation of historical truth is really too
important a principle to be idly violated. But if he seriously
designed to unite the province of the historian with that of the
novelist, he has chosen a very unlucky expedient for his own
reputation; and thus, in either case, he has rather wantonly led his
readers into error, and brought against others a charge of ignorance,
which must recoil more deservedly on himself.