PLANTAGENET PERIOD (_continued_).--JOHN, TO THE DEATH OF EDWARD II.
A curious anecdote is told of King John in a book of anecdote,[67]
that upon his last visit to Nottingham he called at the house of the
mayor, and at the residence of the priest of St. Mary’s. Finding
neither ale in the cellar of one, nor bread in the cupboard of the
other, his majesty ordered every publican in the town to contribute
sixpennyworth of ale to the mayor yearly, and that every baker should
give a halfpenny loaf weekly to the priest. This custom was continued
in the time of Blackner, the Nottingham historian, who wrote in 1815.
The king, like his brothers, was fond of drink. Sir Walter in his
_Ivanhoe_, while pleading for the general manners of his subjects,
admits that John, and those who courted his pleasure by imitating his
foibles, were apt to indulge to excess in the pleasures of the trencher
and the goblet, and adds, ‘indeed, it is well known that his death was
occasioned by a surfeit upon peaches and new ale.’ D’Aubigné, in his
_History of the Reformation_, referring to this king, says that he
drank copiously of cider, and died of drunkenness and fright. As his
authority for this, he gives in a footnote a Latin extract from Matthew
Paris to the effect that his sickness was increased by his pernicious
gluttony; he surfeited himself with peaches and new cider, which
greatly aggravated the fever in him.
The action of the Church in this reign to suppress intemperance brings
us into contact with one in particular of many kindred species of
sources of excess, namely,
_Scot Ales_.
First of all, what is the derivation of this compound term? ‘Scot’
(Saxon _sceat_, a part) signifies a portion of money assessed or
paid--hence any payment. Thus ‘scot-free’ means no payment. ‘Ale’
signifies a merry gathering, a feast, a merry-making. We find it
variously combined with prefixes which mostly explain themselves,
as bid-ale, bride-ale, church-ale, clerk-ale, Easter-ale, give-ale,
help-ale, lamb-ale, leet-ale, Midsummer-ale, scot-ale, tithe-ale,
weddyn-ale, Whitsun-ale. In each of these a festival is denoted, at
which ale was the predominant drink. In this sense Ben Jonson uses the
term in the lines:--
And all the neighbourhood, from old records
Of antique proverbs, drawn from Whitsun lords,
And their authorities at wakes and ales.
And again:--
And then satten some and songe at the ALE![68]
Scot-ales accordingly denote a gathering at which the company _share_
the drinking expenses. But the first act of legislation on the
subject presents to us the expression with a narrowed, but none the
less definite, sense. In the year 1213 King John in his absence had
appointed Fitzpiers, and Peter (the Bishop of Winchester), regents of
the kingdom. They summoned a council at St. Albans, in which, among
other matters, it was proclaimed to the sheriffs, _foresters_, and
others, as they loved their life and limbs, not to make any violent
extortions, nor dare to injure any one, or to hold _scot-ales_ anywhere
in the kingdom, as they had been wont to do. This legislation was
clearly levelled at the foresters, or officers of the forests, who kept
ale-houses and drew customers by intimidation. Mr. Bridgett has clearly
exposed their oppression. He says, ‘It will be remembered that royal
forests, or uncultivated lands, formed, at that time, no small part
of England, and that they were not subject to common law. The king’s
officers took advantage of this immunity to exercise great tyranny over
the people, and, previous to this period, sought to raise money by
setting up taverns and drinking assemblies, which the country people
were compelled to frequent for fear of incurring the displeasure of
their petty tyrants. Modes of raising money, different in form, though
similar in their nature and consequences, are by no means unknown
to publicans at the present day; and labouring men, in order to get
hired, have sometimes to purchase the good-will of the master of the
beer or gin shop in which workmen assemble and wages are paid. It will
be a happy day when a new Magna Charta shall rescue the nation from
the tyranny of the “liquor interest,” whether it be that of the great
brewers and distillers, or of the petty vendors.’[69]
But scot-ales were by no means confined to the foresters. The evil
spread; the country was infested with them, and of this the language of
councils and synods throughout the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries
is ample evidence.
In these ecclesiastical prohibitions the word ‘scotallum’ is _scot-ale_
dog-latinised, a nut which many a foreign reader has failed to crack.
In the year 1220, Richard de Marisco, Bishop of Durham, decreed: ‘We
forbid announcements of scot-ales to be made by a priest or any one
else in the church. If priest or cleric do this, or take part in a
scot-ale, he will be punished canonically.’
In 1223, Richard, Bishop of Sarum, orders, ‘that no announcement of
scot-ales be made by laymen in the church, and neither in the churches
nor out of the churches by priests or by clergymen.’
In 1230, Robert Grosseteste, Bishop of Lincoln, writes to his
archdeacons: ‘We strictly command that you prohibit in your synods
and chapters those drinking assemblies which are commonly called
scot-ales; and every year, in every church of your archdeaconries,
this prohibition must be several times made known; and if any presume
to violate this prohibition, canonically made, you must admonish them
canonically, and proceed against them by ecclesiastical censures.’
In 1237, Alexander Stavenby, Bishop of Coventry, forbids under penalty
any priest to go to a tavern, or to keep a tavern or scot-ale.
In 1240, Walter of Cantilupe, Bishop of Worcester, decreed: ‘We forbid
the clergy to take part in those drinking parties called scot-ales,
or to keep taverns. They must also deter their flocks from them,
forbidding by God’s authority and ours the aforesaid scot-ales, and
other meetings for drinking.’
In 1255, Walter de Kirkham, Bishop of Durham, wrote: ‘We adjure all
priests, by Him who lives for ever, and all the ministers of the
Church, especially those in holy orders, that they be not drunkards,
nor keep taverns, lest they die an eternal death; moreover, we forbid
scot-ales and games in sacred places.’
In 1256, Giles of Bridport, Bishop of Salisbury, decreed: ‘We confirm
the prohibition of scot-ales, which has been made for the good both of
souls and bodies; and we command rectors, vicars, and other parochial
priests that, by frequent exhortations, they earnestly induce their
parishioners not rashly to violate the prohibition.’
For another century occasional decrees are issued upon the same
subject. One of the last admonitions respecting scot-ales is to be
found proceeding from the Synod of Ely in 1364.
It will have been observed how vigorous was the action of the Church in
the reign of Henry III. But all is not yet told. Archbishop Langton, in
his Constitutions, 1222, decrees (canon 30) that archdeacons, deans,
rural deans, and priests abstain from immoderate eating and drinking.
Again (canon 47), that neither monks nor canons regular spend time in
eating or drinking, save at the stated hours. They may by leave quench
their thirst in the refectory, but not indulge.
In the Constitutions of Archbishop Edmund, 1236, the sixth canon
forbids clergymen ‘the ill practice by which all that drink together
are obliged to equal draughts, and he carries away the credit who hath
made most drunk, and taken off the largest cups; therefore, we forbid
all forcing to drink.’
Bishop Grosseteste, to whom reference has lately been made, turned his
attention to the indirect as well as the direct occasions of excess.
He suppressed the May games in his diocese of Lincoln, from which date
the practices of the day have gradually changed. The nature of the
festivities may be guessed from the fact that the Maypole used to be
called _ale-stake_.[70]
The action of the civil power was still limited in its scope.
Regulation of tariff was among the most prominent of its efforts. Thus
in the fifty-first year of Henry III. (1266), it was enacted that when
a quarter of wheat is sold for 3_s._ or 3_s._ 4_d._, and a quarter of
barley for 1_s._ 8_d._, and a quarter of oats for 1_s._ 4_d._, then
brewers in cities ought and may well afford to sell two gallons of beer
or ale for a penny; and out of cities to sell three or four gallons for
a penny. These regulations are indicative that the manufacture of ale
had become of much consequence.
The quality of this drink was questionable. Matthew Paris describes it
as very weak.
Henry of Avranches, a Norman poet of the period, has some coarse banter
upon it. The lines as translated begin thus:--
Of this strange drink, so like the Stygian lake,
Men call it _ale_, I know not what to make.
The criticism of the barons of Snowdon on London ale counts for what it
is worth, for nothing satisfied them. Quartered at Islington, when they
accompanied Llewellyn to England, they could neither drink the wine
nor ale of London; neither mead nor Welsh ale could be obtained; the
English bread they refused to eat, and all London could not afford milk
enough for their daily requirement. Hard to please they clearly were;
nevertheless, their complaint of the ale was justifiable. It was made
indiscriminately of barley, wheat, and oats, sometimes of all combined.
Without the hop, the ale must have been insipid. To remove its mawkish
flatness, they flavoured it with spices and other ingredients,
especially long pepper.
Home-made cider was evidently in repute, since we find in this reign
of Henry III. a gentleman holding his manor in Norfolk on condition of
supplying the king, annually, at his exchequer, with two _mites_ of
wine, made of pearmains (a species of apple).
Again, before the close of this thirteenth century, Edward I. orders
the Sheriff of Southamptonshire to provide 400 quarters of wheat, and
to convey the same in good ships from Portsmouth to Winchelsea. Also to
put on board the said ships 200 tuns of cider.
Still, whatever were the merits of the home vineyards and breweries,
historians began to observe the growing fondness for foreign wines.
They accounted for it in various ways: the listlessness of the people,
home and foreign wars, crusades, and that ever-recurring cause of
new phenomena, ‘change of circumstances.’ So argues Twyne, a man,
according to history, of extraordinary knowledge in the antiquities of
England.[71]
A new custom of one penny for every tun, called _guage_, was levied on
all wines imported. From the duty collected between a given date in
1272 and 1273, at the ports of London, Portsmouth, Southampton, and
Sandwich, we find that there were imported 8,846 tuns, in addition to
the _prisa_ not liable to the new impost.
Vinous preparations of a fancy character were much in use. We read of
an order for the delivery of two tuns of white and one of red wine to
make garhiofilac and clarry for the king’s table at York. The names of
some of these preparations are painfully significant. Recipes are found
for making _Bishop_, _Cardinal_, _Pope_.
Whether in consequence of the royal statute upon ale, or for some
other reason, the first mention I can find of the _Crown_ as an inn
sign occurs in this reign. The tavern was in that part of Cheapside
called, after the inn, Crown Field. The king was evidently a moderate,
plain-living man; the only festivities that he seemed to care for being
those at Christmastide.
Inns, even at this time, were uncommon. In the time of Edward I. Lord
Berkeley’s farmhouses were used instead. Travellers would not only
inquire for hospitable persons, but even go to the king’s palaces for
refreshment. Knights were known to lodge in barns. But, though few
in number, they had already proved a nuisance. In the statutes for
the regulation of the city of London in the time of Edward I., it is
stated that ‘divers persons do resort unto the city:’ some who had
been banished, or who had fled from their own country, also foreigners
and others, many of them suspicious characters; and ‘of these, some do
become brokers, hostlers, and innkeepers, within the city, as freely
as though they were good and lawful men of the franchise of the city;
and some do nothing but run up and down through the streets, more by
night than by day, and are well attired in clothing and array, and
have their food of delicate meats and costly; neither do they use any
craft or merchandise; nor have they any lands or tenements whereof to
live, nor any friend to find them; and through such persons many perils
do often happen in the city.’ In addition to this, it was complained
that ‘offenders, going about by night, do commonly resort and have
their meetings, and evil talk in taverns more than elsewhere, and
there do seek for shelter, lying in wait and watching their time to do
mischief.’ To do away with this grievance, taverns were not allowed to
be opened for the sale of wine and ale after the tolling of the curfew.
In the first year of Edward I.’s reign was abolished the old impost
called _Prisage_, and in its place a duty imposed of 2_s._ on every tun
of wine imported. This tax afterwards obtained the name of _Butlerage_,
because it was paid to the king’s butler. It was abolished in 1311, in
consequence of a petition urged upon Edward II. for the redress of this
and many other grievances.
It was stated above that ale was made of various cereals. In 1302,
barley-malt was rated at 3_s._ 4_d._ per quarter, and from the
cheapness of wheat the brewers malted that grain also. The beer made
from barley was 3_d._ or 4_d._ a gallon, while that from wheat was
only 1½_d._, wheat being then only about 2_s._ the quarter.[72] This
caused a proclamation prohibiting the malting of wheat, lest it should
prevent the encouragement of its growth for bread, and give the
advantage to corn and other grain.
The Church made herself heard during the long reign of Edward I. in the
Constitutions of Archbishop Peckham, 1281, and in a synod at Exeter,
1287. In the former, immoderate love of the pleasures of the table,
both in eating and drinking, was condemned. In the latter, instructions
were issued against the keeping or frequenting of taverns by the
priesthood; and such instructions were doubtless needed. Nor did the
satirists spare the clergy. One of these, writing at the close of the
thirteenth century, thus exposes a new order to which is attached the
name of ‘Fair-Ease.’ Speaking of the particulars in which this new
order imitated other orders, he adds: ‘Of Beverly they have taken a
point, which shall be kept well and accurately; to drink well at their
meat, and then afterwards until supper; and afterwards at the collation
each must have a piece of candle as long as the arm below the elbow,
and as long as there shall remain a morsel of the candle to burn, the
brethren must continue their drinking.’ And again: ‘A point they have
taken from the Black Monks, that they love drinking, forsooth, and are
drunk every day, for they do not know any other way of living.... Also
it is provided that each brother drink before dinner and after;’ and
much more to the same effect.
At a visitation at St. Swithin’s Priory at Winchester, it appears that
the monks claimed to have, among other articles of luxury, ‘vinum
tam album quam rubeum, claretum, medonem, burgurastrum.’ This was in
the year 1285. In the following year a benefactor grants to the said
convent ‘unam pipam vini’ for their refection.[73]
Another satire on the corruptions in the Church, entitled ‘The Land of
Cockaigne,’ is assigned to the latter part of the thirteenth century.
The name signifies ‘kitchen-land.’ In this popular poem the land of
animal delights is painted as the happy land of monks who had turned
their backs upon the higher life to which they were devoted. A line or
two will give an idea.
In Cokaygne is met and drink
Without care, how, and swink.
The met is trie, the drink is clere,
To none, russin, and sopper.
Which Professor Morley interprets:--
In Cockaigne is meat and drink
Without care, trouble, and toil.
The meat is choice, the drink is clear,
At dinner, draught, and supper,
and explains _russin_ to be wine between meals, often condemned of old;
and connects with it the terms _rouse_ and _carouse_, which, says he,
denote emptying of the wine-cup, quoting, ‘The queen _carouses_ to thy
fortune, Hamlet.’ But the words are generally referred to _gar aus_,
all out. ‘Russin,’ in the eastern counties, still denotes drink at odd
hours.
The household roll of the Countess of Leicester, widow of Simon de
Montfort, reveals some secrets of the private life of the English
towards the end of this thirteenth century. Among the wines in use in
that family, _Gascon_ and _Bastard_ are prominent. Bastard was a sweet
Spanish wine, of which there were two sorts, white and brown. Little is
told in the roll of the price of wine. Nine shillings and twopence was
paid for twenty-two gallons.
We are able to get a comparative view of the prices of food at
this time from a list of articles supplied by his tenants when the
Archbishop of Canterbury visited his lands at Tarrings in Sussex,
about 1277. The prices seem very low.
_s._ _d._
A bushel of wheat 0 2¼
Carcass of beef 1 4
Yearling hog 0 8
4 gallons of beer 0 1
2 good hens 0 1
5 score eggs 0 1
The quantity of beer consumed in the household of the countess was
immense. On April 18, they brewed five quarters of barley and four
of oats; on the 25th of the same month they bought 188 gallons of
beer, and on the 29th brewed again. Cider is mentioned once, but was
not especially relished. One tun was distributed among 800 paupers.
Cordials were in demand.[74]
In the ‘Squire of Low Degree,’ probably of early fourteenth century
date, the King of Hungary offers to provide for his daughter wines from
all manners of countries--
Ye shall have Rumney and Malmesyne,
Both Hippocras and Vernage wine,
Mount Rose and wine of Greke,
Both Algrade and despice eke,
Antioche and Bastarde,
Pyment also and garnarde;
Wine of Greek and Muscadell,
Both claré, pyment, and Rochell,
The reed your stomake to defye,
And pottes of Osey sett you bye.[75]
The constant mention about this time of Hippocras (Ipocras, Ypocrasse)
demands some notice. It was a most favourite drink of the middle ages,
a compound of wine and aromatics. A curious recipe for it is given in
Pegge’s _Form of Cury_--‘Ypocrasse for lords with gynger, synamon, and
graynes, sugour, and turesoll; and for comyn pepull, gynger, canell,
longe peper, and claryffyed hony.’ Another recipe is found, much in
vogue at wedding festivals, ‘introduced at the commencement of the
banquet, served hot; of so comforting and generous a nature that the
stomach would be at once put into good temper.’ It was constantly
served with comfits; thus we find Elizabeth Woodville ordering up
‘green ginger, comfits, and ipocras.’ Katharine of Arragon gave ipocras
and comfits for the _voide_. In a satire upon Wolsey, entitled, ‘Why
come ye not to the Court?’ we find it in the company of sweetmeat--
Welcome, dame Simonia,
With dame Castimergia,
To drynke and for to eate,
Swete ipocras, and swete meate.
It is strange that Pepys should have thought it unintoxicating. Thus
October 9, 1663, he went to Guildhall, met there some friends; wine
was offered, ‘and they drunk, I only drinking some hypocras, which
do not break my vowe, it being, to the best of my present judgment,
only a mixed compound drink, and not any wine. If I am mistaken, God
forgive me! But I hope and do think I am not.’ It differed from clarry
(claré), wine mixed with _honey_ and spice. Hence Fournier mistakes in
thinking that hippocras was wine spiced ‘ou édulcoré avec le miel’ (_Le
Vieux-Neuf_, vol. ii.).
We hear very little of home vineyards at this time, and, but for
incidental allusions, it might be imagined that the foreign trade was a
monopoly. At the same time, such allusions as we have are convincing
that native wine was a rarity. Lambarde states that the Bishop of
Rochester sent to King Edward II. when he was at Bockingfield ‘a
present of his drinks, and withal both wines and grapes, _of his own
growth_, in his vineyard at Hallings.’
The days when bishops were identified with the contents of the cellar
are buried in the sepulchre of the long past, but we are now speaking
of a time when a bishop’s induction to his see was often a disgrace to
civilisation. It is incredible, remarks Godwin, in his notice of the
installation of Bishop Stapleton to the See of Exeter (1308), how many
oxen, tuns of ale and wine, are said to have been usually spent at this
kind of solemnity.
We have already mentioned that the duty on wine was taken off in the
year 1311. Four years later, a proclamation was issued prohibiting the
malting of wheat.[76] In 1317, merchants who were not of the freedom
of the city were forbidden to retail wines or other wares within its
precincts or suburbs. Thus much for the legislation of the reign.
The hospitality of the time must have been unbounded. Stowe gives a
curious instance, taken from the accounts of the Earl of Lancaster’s
steward for the year 1313. The items, which included 369 pipes of red
wine, amounted to 7,309_l._, which is more than 20,000_l._ of our
money, and, making the due allowance for the relative prices of food,
would represent something like 100,000_l._ sterling.
The terrible fate of Edward II. almost forbids harsh criticism of his
life. He was certainly fond of the pleasures of the table, and is said
to have given way to intemperance. Had not the banqueting-room been
oftener employed than the council-chamber, opportunities might not have
occurred for the rebellion of favourites, for which the festal board
was answerable.
FOOTNOTES:
[67] Briscoe: _Book of Nottinghamshire Anecdote_.
[68] _Piers Plowman_, fol. xxxii. _b_.
[69] _Discipline of Drink_, p. 181. For the overwhelming proof of his
allegations, see Dunlop’s _Artificial and Compulsory Drinking Usage_.
[70] Cf. Brady: _Clavis Calendaria_, vol. i. p. 320.
[71] _De Reb. Alb._, p. 116.
[72] Fleetwood, _Chronicon Preciosum_, p. 75.
[73] The details of the recluse life will be found in Bishop Poore’s
_Ancren Riewle_, or more readily in Fosbroke’s _Monachism_. See
also Cutt’s _Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages_; Tomline
and Rokewood, _Monastic and Social Life_; and S. P. Bay, _Monastic
Institutions_.
[74] More information can be derived from the roll of ‘Household
expenses of the Bishop of Hereford,’ 1289-1290.
[75] See Ritson, _Metrical Romances_, vol. iii.
[76] Fleetwood (_Chronicon Preciosum_, 1707) states that ‘by the rains
in harvest the dearth was such that wheat came to 30_s._ and 40_s._ the
quarter. And good ale was at the gallon (per _lagenam_, from whence
our _flagon_) 2_d._, the better sort 3_d._, the best 4_d._ So that a
proclamation was fain to be issued out that a lagena of ale should be
sold at 1_d._, and that no wheat should be malted (_imbrasiatum_).’