Some days intervene between the wedding festivities of the sister of
Messire Conon and the adubbement as knight of his brother with the
tourney which follows this second ceremony. No baron can be rich enough
to make presents to all the knights who frequent the tourney, if they
were also guests at the wedding; on the other hand, numerous cavaliers
who have no interest in the affairs of Olivier and Alienor are glad
to come and break lances in the jousts and to shatter helmets in the
mêlée. Most of the original guests at the wedding, however, stay on
for the adubbement, and are joined by many others. Meantime there are
hunts, hawkings, dances, garden feasts, and jongleur recitals. It is
all one round of merry excitement. Yet gradually there creeps in a more
martial note. Maître Edmond's chants have less to do with parted lovers
and more to do with valiant deeds. The bride and groom recede from
central gaze. Young Squire Aimery is thrust forward.
While the lists are being prepared for the jousting, one can examine
the public economy of the seigneury; discover how it is a military as
well as a political unit; and learn the process of education which has
enabled Aimery to claim the proud status of a knight--a _miles_--a
first-class fighting man.
[Illustration: BANNER OF THE THIRTEENTH CENTURY
From a manuscript in the Bibliothèque nationale (Viollet-Le-Duc).]
[Sidenote: Types and Privileges of Fief Holders]
The status of St. Aliquis is typical of that of many baronies. Fiefs
are not necessarily composed of real estate: for example, one of
Conon's vassals does homage to him merely for the right to fish for a
mile along the Claire, and another for the privilege of maintaining the
baronial mill, with corresponding perquisites, in an outlying section
of the seigneury.[37] Nevertheless, as a rule a "fief" means a section
of land held by a person of noble family. He does not own this land by
complete right, but pays a kind of rent to his suzerain in the form of
military service, of sums of money in various emergencies determined
upon, and of various other kinds of moral and material assistance.
Ordinarily every feudal lordship will center round a castle; or,
failing that, a fortalice, a strong tower capable of considerable
defense, or a manor house not vulnerable to mere raiders. Every noble
fief holder claims the right to have his own banner; to a seal to
validate his documents; and of late there have been appearing insignia
soon to be known as heraldic coats of arms, which will be used or
displayed by everybody of "gentle condition." Many fief holders also
claim the right to coin money, even when their lands are on a very
modest scale; but suzerains are gradually curtailing this privilege,
base-born merchants churlishly complain that the mints of the lesser
seigneurs strike money too full of alloy and of vexatiously variable
standards; and, indeed, there is even talk that this privilege of
coining is likely to be monopolized by the king.
[Illustration: THE COAT OF ARMS OF THE DUKES OF BRETAGNE (THIRTEENTH
CENTURY)]
Feudalism, if systematized, would seem an admirably articulated
system, extending upward from the petty nobles to the king or even
the emperor.[38] The little castellans would do homage to the barons,
they to the viscounts, they to the counts, they to the dukes, and
they to the supreme suzerain, His Grace Philip Augustus, at Paris.
Actually, of course, nothing of the kind occurs. Not merely do many
fief holders have several suzerains (as does Conon) and serve some of
them very poorly, but there is no real gradation of feudal titles.
Conon, a baron, feels himself equal to many counts and superior to most
viscounts. The mighty Count of Champagne holds his head arrogantly as
the equal of the Duke of Burgundy. Of late years, especially since
Philip Augustus began to reign (1180), the kings of France have made it
clear that they are the mightiest of the mighty, and deserve genuine
obedience. Yet even now many seigneurs grumble, "These lords of Paris
are only the Capetian dukes who began to call themselves kings some
two hundred years ago. Let them wax not too proud or we will send them
about their business as our forefathers sent the old Carolingians." In
short, the whole feudal arrangement is utterly confused. "Organized
anarchy," despairing scholars of a later age will call it.
[Illustration: SEAL OF THE DUKE JEAN OF BRETAGNE (THIRTEENTH AND
FOURTEENTH CENTURIES)]
[Sidenote: Duties of Fief Holders]
Yet there are some pretty definite rules about fief holding. Generally
speaking a fief includes enough land to maintain at least one knight
and his war horse. This warrior is obligated usually to lead out a
number of armed villeins, proportionate to the number of knights. The
conditions on which the estate can be held vary infinitely. The great
obligation is military service. The average vassal is bound to follow
his suzerain for forty days per year on summons to an offensive war.
He is required to give much greater assistance in a strictly defensive
war, and especially to aid in the defense of his lord's castle. He has
to wait on the suzerain at times, when the latter may desire a great
retinue to give prestige to his court. At such gatherings he must
likewise assist his lord in dispensing justice--a matter sometimes
involving considerable responsibility for the judges. When his seigneur
marries off his eldest daughter, bestows knighthood on his eldest son,
or needs ransom money, if held a prisoner, the vassals must contribute,
and the St. Aliquis fief holders are blessing their patron saints
that Alienor and Aimery are not their overlord's children--otherwise
they would pay for most of the high festivities themselves. They must
also, when their lord visits them, give him proper hospitality in
their castles. Of course, they must never betray his secrets, adhere
to his enemies, or repudiate the pledges made to him. To do so were
"treason," the worst of all feudal crimes.
We have seen that holding a fief usually implies military service, and
that if the estate falls to a woman the suzerain can administer the
property until the maid is of marriageable age, and then give her to
some competent liegeman. It is about the same if the heir is a boy.
The overlord can exercise guardianship over the fief until the lad is
old enough to lead out his war band and otherwise to prove a desirable
vassal. Even when the vassals are of satisfactory sex and age, the
suzerain is entitled to a _relief_, a money payment, whenever an old
knight dies and his battle-worthy son takes over the barony.[39] This
is always a fairly heavy lump sum; and is still heavier if the fief
goes not to the son, but to a collateral heir. Also, when the vassal
wants to sell his fief to some stranger, not merely must the suzerain
approve the change, but he is entitled to an extra large fee, often as
much as three years' revenue from the entire holding.
Nevertheless, when all is said, many fief holders act as if they were
anything but humble vassals. Happy is many a suzerain when he is so
exempt from squabbles with his feudal equals and his own overlord that
he can compel his loyal lieges to execute all their promises, and when
he can indulge in the luxury of dictating to them the manner whereby
they must rule their lands. Some of the mottoes of the great baronial
houses testify how little the feudal hierarchy counts with the lord of
a few strong castles.
Boast the mighty Rohans:
"Dukes we disdain:
Kings we can't be:
_Rohans_ are we!"
And still more arrogant is that of a seigneur whose magnificent
fortress-château is in the process of erection; "No king am I, no
prince, no duke: I'm just the Sire of Coucy." And to be "Sire of Coucy"
means to dispose of such power that when the canons of Rheims complain
to King Philip against his deeds of violence, the king can merely
reply, "I can do no more for you than _pray_ the Sire of Coucy to leave
you unmolested."
Sometimes, in addition to money payments or personal or military
service, a vassal is required to make symbolic gifts in token of loyal
intentions. Thus annually Conon sends to the Duke of Quelqueparte three
black horses; while for his holdings of the local abbey, every June he
presents the abbot with a basket of roses and a bunch of lilies, and
many other estates are burdened with some such peculiar duties.[40]
[Sidenote: Barons Largely Independent]
So long as he discharges his feudal obligations a seigneur can run his
barony practically to suit himself. If he treats his own vassals and
his peasants too outrageously they may cry out to the suzerain for
justice, and sometimes the overlord will delight in an excuse to humble
an arrogant feudatory. But the limits of interference are well marked.
No seigneur should undermine a faithful vassal's hold on his own
subjects. Every noble will feel his own rights threatened if a suzerain
begins to meddle with a dependent, even if the reason for doing so is
manifest. Many a baron can therefore play the outrageous tyrant if so
the devil inspires him. He has (as we have seen) to observe the vested
rights of his subordinates on the fief; otherwise he may provoke
a dangerous mutiny within his own castle.[41] Baron Garnier of St.
Aliquis, however, has been typical of many of his class. Prisoners,
travelers, peasants are subject to unspeakably brutal treatment. As
has been written concerning one such seigneur: "He was a very Pluto,
Megæra, Cerberus, or anything you can conceive still more horrible. He
preferred the slaughter of his captives to their ransom. He tore out
the eyes of his own children, when in sport they hid their faces under
his cloak. He impaled persons of both sexes on stakes. To butcher men
in the most horrible manner was to him an agreeable feast." Of another
such baron, the trembling monks record: "When anyone by force or
fraud fell into his hands, the captive might truly say, 'The pains of
hell have compassed me about.' Homicide was his passion and glory. He
treated his wife in an unspeakably brutal manner. Men feared him, bowed
down to him and worshiped him!"[42]
[Sidenote: Types of Evil and Good Barons]
Evidently, such outrageous seigneurs hold their lieges in a kind of
fascinated obedience, just as do the emirs and atabegs among the
Infidels. Of course, they treat merchants as merely so many objects
for plunder. If they do not watch the roads themselves, they make
bargains with professional robbers, allowing the latter to infest their
seigneuries in return for an agreed share of their booty. Even noble
folk are liable to be seized, imprisoned, and perhaps tortured to get a
ransom. If you cannot find the deniers, you may leave your bones in a
foul dungeon.
Nevertheless, St. Michael and all angels be praised! this evil is
abating. In the direct royal dominions such "men of sin" have been
rooted out since old Louis VI's time. The Church is using its great
influence against evil sires. The communal towns are waxing strong and
sending civic armies to besiege their towers and protect the roads.
The better class of seigneurs also unite against these disgraces to
nobility. As for Baron Garnier, he died betimes, for his suzerain the
duke (weary of complaints) was about to call out the levy of the duchy
and attack St. Aliquis. In other words, law and order are gradually
asserting themselves after the heyday of petty tyrannies, yet there
are still queersome happenings on every seigneury, and the amount of
arbitrary power possessed by the average baron is not good even for a
conscientious and high-minded man.
It is not the theoretical powers of a seigneur, but his actual mental
and ofttimes physical ability, which determines the real extent of
his power. Fiefs are anything but static. They are always growing or
diminishing. A capable seigneur is always attracting new lands to
himself. He ejects unfaithful vassals and adds their estates to his own
personal domain land. He induces his vassal's vassals to transfer their
allegiance directly to him. He wins land from his neighbors by direct
conquest. He induces his neighbor's vassals to desert to the better
protection of his suzerainty. He negotiates advantageous marriage
treaties for his relatives which bring new baronies into his dynasty.
When his own suzerain needs his military aid beyond the orthodox "forty
days," he sells his assistance for cash, lands, or valuable privileges.
Then, often when such an aggressive seigneur dies, his whole
pretentious fief crumbles rapidly. His eldest son is entitled to the
central castle, and the lion's share of the barony, but not to the
whole. The younger lads each detach something, and the daughters cannot
be denied a portion.[43] The suzerain presses all kinds of demands upon
the weakened heir. So do neighboring seigneurs who are the new baron's
feudal equals. One little quarrel after another has to be compounded
after ruinous concessions. Worst of all, the direct vassals of the
incoming baron refuse him homage, hunt up more congenial suzerains, or,
if swearing fealty, nevertheless commit perjury by the treacherous way
they execute their oaths. In a few years what has appeared a powerful
fief, under a young or incapable baron seems on the very edge of
ruin--its lord reduced to a single castle, with perhaps some question
whether he can defend even that.
[Sidenote: Accession to a Barony]
Through such a peril Conon passed inevitably when, as a very youthful
knight, he took over the estates of his unblessed uncle. Only the
saints' favor, his mother's wise counsels, and his own high looks and
strong arm kept the fief together. But after the vassal petty nobles
had been duly impressed with the fact that, even if the new baron were
less of a bloody tyrant than his predecessor, he could storm a defiant
fortalice and behead its rebellious master, the barony settled down to
relative peace. There was a meeting at St. Aliquis of all the vassals.
Conon, clothed in full armor, then presented himself in the great hall.
"Will you have Sire Conon, the nephew of your late lord, as your
present undoubted baron and suzerain?" demanded Sire Eustace, the
seneschal.
"_Fiat! Fiat!_--So be it!" shouted all the knights. Whereat each in
turn did homage; and Conon was now their liege lord by every Christian
and feudal law. Next Conon himself visited the Duke of Quelqueparte,
paid his relief, in turn did his own homage; and henceforth had his
position completely recognized.
From that time Conon had been obeyed by his vassals with reasonable
fidelity. They had never refused military service; they had fought
round his standard very faithfully at the great battle of Bouvines;
they had given him no reason to doubt that if he were hard bestead they
would discharge the other feudal duties of defending his person at the
hazard of their lives, of resigning a horse to him that he might save
himself in a battle, or even of going prisoner for him to secure his
release, if he were captive. On the other hand, Conon had earned their
love by proving himself a very honorable seigneur. When his vassal,
Sire Leonard, had died, leaving only a minor son, he administered the
lad's fief very wisely and gave it back a little richer, if anything,
when the heir came of age. When another vassal had fallen into a feud
with a neighboring sire, Conon had afforded military help, although it
was not his direct quarrel. He had respected the wives and daughters of
his petty nobles as though they had been his sisters. In short, on St.
Aliquis had been almost realized that happy relation mentioned in the
law books, "The seigneur owes faith and loyalty to his 'man' as much as
the man to his seigneur."
Nevertheless, Conon ("wise as a serpent, but _not_ harmless as a dove,"
as Father Grégoire says, pithily) takes nothing for granted. Twice he
has somewhat formally made the circuit of his seigneury, stopping at
each castle, allowing each little sire to show hospitality, and then
receiving again his pledges. Homage can be done many times. The more
often it is repeated the more likely it will be effective.[44] Your
vassal who swore fealty last Christmas is much more likely to obey the
_ban_ (the call to arms) than he who took his oath ten years ago. The
St. Aliquis vassals have all performed this devoir quite recently, save
one, Sire André of the sizable castle of Le Chenevert, whose father
died last Lent, and who has waited for the present fêtes to take his
vows and receive due investiture.
This ceremony, therefore, takes place some day after the wedding feast.
There is nothing humiliating therein for Sire André; on the contrary,
he is glad to have many of the noble guests be witnesses--they will
serve to confirm his title to his father's fief.
[Sidenote: Ceremony of Homage]
The great hall has been cleared. Messire Conon sits in his high chair
under the canopy. He wears his ermine and his velvet cap of presence.
Adela sits at his side, with many cavaliers on either hand. The other
St. Aliquis vassals and the noble leaders of the castle men at arms,
all in best armor, stand before the dais in a semicircle. Sire Eustace
holds a lance with a small red pennon. Sire André, in silvered mail and
helmet and his sword girded, comes forward, steps up to the dais, and
kneels. Conon rises, extends both hands, and André takes one in each of
his, then repeats clearly the formula dictated by Father Grégoire,
now, as so often, acting as baronial chancellor:
"Sire baron, _I enter into your homage and faith and become your man_,
by mouth and hands, and I swear and promise to keep faith and loyalty
to you against all others, saving only the just rights of the Baron of
Braisne, from whom I hold two farms and certain hunting rights, and I
swear to guard your rights with all my strength."
[Illustration: HOMAGE IN THE TWELFTH CENTURY
The future vassal has put his hands in those of his lord and pays him
homage; a soldier holds the lance which the lord will give to his
subject as a mark of investiture in the domain.]
Whereupon Conon makes reply, "We do promise to you, vassal André, that
we and our heirs will guarantee to you the lands held of us, to you and
your heirs against every creature with all our power, to hold these
lands in peace and quiet."
Conon then bends, kisses André upon the mouth, and the latter rises to
his feet. Father Grégoire holds out a small golden box flashing with
jewels, a saint's reliquary. The vassal puts his right hand upon it and
declares:
"In the name of the Holy Trinity, and in reverence of these sacred
relics, I, André, swear that I will truly keep the promise which I have
taken, and will always remain faithful to Sire Conon, my seigneur."
The first formula has technically been the "homage." The second is
the "oath of fealty"; now comes the "investiture." Sire Eustace steps
forward and gives to the vassal the lance, the symbolic token of the
lawful transfer to him of the fief. In other places, local custom would
make the article a glove, a baton, or even a bit of straw, but some
symbol is always required. This act completes the ceremony.
Sire André is now in possession of Le Chenevert and its lands, and
cannot be ousted thence so long as he performs his feudal duties. Of
course, if the fief had been granted out for the first time, or had
been transferred to some one not a direct heir, there would be a deed
of conveyance drafted in detail, and sealed by many ponderous lumps of
wax attached to the parchment with strips of leather. In many cases
however, no new document is needful, and, indeed, all through the
Feudal Ages even important bargains are likely often to be determined
merely by word of mouth--a reason for requiring many witnesses.
There is little danger, however, of a quarrel between such congenial
spirits as Baron Conon and Sire André. At its best, vassalship is not
a state of unworthy dependence; it is a state of junior comradeship
which, "without effacing distances, created a close relation of mutual
devotion"; and if vassals are often rebellious, vassals again and again
in history and in story have proved willing to lay down their lives
for their lord. There are few sentiments the jongleurs can repeat in
the average castle with surer hope of applause than when they recite
once more from the "Epic of Garin," concerning the Duke of Belin, who
declared that there was something more precious than all his riches and
power; for "wealth consists neither in rich clothes, nor in money, nor
in buildings, nor in horses, but is made from kinsmen and _friends_;
the heart of one man is worth all the gold in a country!"
FOOTNOTES:
[37] The right to profit from certain beehives could constitute a fief,
or to a fraction, say, of the tolls collected at a certain bridge.
[38] The emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (Germany and Italy) was
usually acknowledged as the social and titular superior of the king of
France, but he was never conceded any practical power over Frenchmen.
[39] Sometimes the relief was also payable when a new suzerain came in,
not merely when the fief changed vassals.
[40] In a South Country castle a certain seigneur was obligated, if his
suzerain, the Duke of Aquitaine, visited him, to wait on the duke's
table, wearing himself scarlet leggings with spurs of gold. He had to
serve the duke and ten knights with a meal of pork, beef, cabbage,
roast chickens, and mustard. Many other obligations for payments or
rendering of hospitality which were equally curious could be recorded.
[41] One might describe the situation by saying that many a baron who
would order a stranger or captive to be executed in cold blood without
form of trial, would hesitate to have him hanged or beheaded save by
the hereditary executioner of the seigneury, who had a vested right to
perform such nice matters.
[42] What could go on in feudal families earlier, in the eleventh
century, is illustrated by the tale of three brothers, noblemen of
Angouleme, who quarreled. Two of them treacherously invited the third
to their joint Easter festivities. They seized him in bed, put out
his eyes, and cut out his tongue that he might not denounce them. The
facts, however, leaked out. Their suzerain, the Duke of Aquitaine,
ravaged their lands with fire and sword (thus ruining their innocent
peasants), took the two criminals and cut out their own tongues and put
out their eyes in retaliation.
[43] The absence of a strict rule of primogeniture in France and other
continental countries added much to the complexities of the whole
feudal regime.
[44] Homage may be likened somewhat to _vaccination_ in a later
day--the more recently performed the greater its effectiveness.