IN-DOOR LIFE AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS.--THE HALL AND
ITS HOSPITALITY.--THE SAXON MEAL.--PROVISIONS AND
COOKERY.--AFTER-DINNER OCCUPATIONS.--DRUNKEN BRAWLS.
The introductory observations in the preceding chapter will be
sufficient to show that the mode of life, the vessels and utensils, and
even the residences of the Anglo-Saxons, were a mixture of those they
derived from their own forefathers with those which they borrowed from
the Romans, whom they found established in Britain. It is interesting
to us to know that we have retained the ordinary forms of pitchers and
basins, and, to a certain degree, of drinking vessels, which existed
so many centuries ago among our ancestors before they established
themselves in this island. The beautiful forms which had been brought
from the classic south were not able to supersede national habit. Our
modern houses derive more of their form and arrangement from those of
our Saxon forefathers than from any other source. We have seen that
the original Saxon arrangement of a house was preserved by that people
to the last; but it does not follow that they did not sometimes adopt
the Roman houses they found standing, although they seem never to have
imitated them. I believe Bulwer’s description of the Saxonised Roman
house inhabited by Hilda, to be founded in truth. Roman villas, when
uncovered at the present day, are sometimes found to have undergone
alterations which can only be explained by supposing that they were
made when later possessors adapted them to Saxon manners. Such
alterations appear to me to be visible in the villa at Hadstock, in
Essex, opened by the late lord Braybrooke; in one place the outer wall
seems to have been broken through to make a new entrance, and a road of
tiles, which was supposed to have been the bottom of a water course,
was more probably the paved pathway made by the Saxon possessor.
Houses in those times were seldom of long duration; we learn from the
domestic anecdotes given in saints’ legends and other writings, that
they were very frequently burnt by accidental fires; thus the main
part of the house, the timber-work, was destroyed; and as ground was
then not valuable, and there was no want of space, it was much easier
to build a new house in another spot, and leave the old foundations
till they were buried in rubbish and earth, than to clear them away in
order to rebuild on the same site. Earth soon accumulated under such
circumstances; and this accounts for our finding, even in towns, so
much of the remains of the houses of an early period undisturbed at a
considerable depth under the present surface of the ground.
It has already been observed that the most important part of the Saxon
house was the hall. It was the place where the household (_hired_)
collected round their lord and protector, and where the visitor or
stranger was first received,--the scene of hospitality. The householder
there held open-house, for the hall was the public apartment, the doors
of which were never shut against those who, whether known or unknown,
appeared worthy of entrance. The reader of Saxon history will remember
the beautiful comparison made by one of king Edwin’s chieftains in the
discussion on the reception to be given to the missionary Paulinus.
“The present life of man, O king, seems to me, in comparison of that
time which is unknown to us, like to the swift flight of a sparrow
through the hall where you sit at your meal in winter, with your chiefs
and attendants, warmed by a fire made in the middle of the hall, whilst
storms of rain or snow prevail without; the sparrow, flying in at one
door and immediately out at another, whilst he is visible is safe
from the wintry storm, but after this short space of fair weather, he
immediately vanishes out of your sight, into the dark winter from which
he had emerged.” Dining in private was always considered disgraceful,
and is mentioned as a blot in a man’s character.
Internally, the walls of the hall were covered with hangings or
tapestry, which were called in Anglo-Saxon _wah-hrægel_, or _wah-rift_,
wall-clothing. These appear sometimes to have been mere plain cloths,
but at other times they were richly ornamented, and not unfrequently
embroidered with historical subjects. So early as the seventh century,
Aldhelm speaks of the hangings or curtains being dyed with purple
and other colours, and ornamented with images, and he adds that “if
finished of one colour uniform they would not seem beautiful to
the eye.” Among the Saxon wills printed by Hickes, we find several
bequests of _heall wah-riftas_, or wall-tapestries for the hall; and it
appears that, in some cases, tapestries of a richer and more precious
character than those in common use were reserved to be hung up only
on extraordinary festivals. There were hooks, or pegs, on the wall,
upon which various objects were hung for convenience. In an anecdote
told in the contemporary life of Dunstan, he is made to hang his harp
against the wall of the room. Arms and armour, more especially, were
hung against the wall of the hall. The author of the “Life of Hereward”
describes the Saxon insurgents who had taken possession of Ely, as
suspending their arms in this manner; and in one of the riddles in the
Exeter Book, a war-vest is introduced speaking of itself thus:--
_hwilum hongige,_ _Sometimes I hang,_
_hyrstum frœtwed,_ _with ornaments adorned,_
_wlitig on wage,_ _splendid on the wall,_
_þær weras drinceð,_ _where men drink,_
_freolic fyrd-sceorp._ _a goodly war-vest._--Exeter Book, p. 395.
We have no allusion in Anglo-Saxon writers to chimneys, or fireplaces,
in our modern acceptation of the term. When necessary, the fire seems
to have been made on the floor, in the place most convenient. We find
instances in the early saints’ legends where the hall was burnt by
incautiously lighting the fire too near the wall. Hence it seems to
have been usually placed in the middle, and there can be little doubt
that there was an opening, or, as it was called in later times, a
louver, in the roof above, for the escape of the smoke. The historian
Bede describes a Northumbrian king, in the middle of the seventh
century, as having, on his return from hunting, entered the hall with
his attendants, and all standing round the fire to warm themselves. A
somewhat similar scene, but in more humble life, is represented in the
accompanying cut, taken from a manuscript calendar of the beginning
of the eleventh century (MS. Cotton. Julius, A. iv.). The material
for feeding the fire is wood, which the man to the left is bringing
from a heap, while his companion is administering to the fire with a
pair of Saxon tongs (_tangan_). The vocabularies give _tange_, tongs,
and _bylig_, bellows; and they speak of _col_, coal (explained by the
Latin _carbo_), and _synder_, a cinder (_scorium_). As all these are
Saxon words, and not derived from the Latin, we may suppose that they
represent things known to the Anglo-Saxon race from an early period;
and as charcoal does not produce _scorium_, or cinder, it is perhaps
not going too far to suppose that the Anglo-Saxons were acquainted with
the use of mineral coal. We know nothing of any other fire utensils,
except that the Anglo-Saxons used a _fyr-scofl_, or fire-shovel. The
place in which the fire was made was the _heorth_, or hearth.
[Illustration: _No. 13. A Party at the Fire._]
The furniture of the hall appears to have been very simple, for it
consisted chiefly of benches. These had carpets and cushions; the
former are often mentioned in the Anglo-Saxon wills. The Anglo-Saxon
poems speak of the hall as being “adorned with treasures,” from which
we are perhaps justified in believing that it was customary to display
there in some manner or other the richer and more ornamental of the
household vessels. Perhaps one end of the hall was raised higher than
the rest for the lord of the household, like the _dais_ of later times,
as Anglo-Saxon writers speak of the _heah-setl_, or high seat. The
table can hardly be considered as furniture, in the ordinary sense of
the word: it was literally, according to its Anglo-Saxon name _bord_, a
board that was brought out for the occasion, and placed upon tressels,
and taken away as soon as the meal was ended. Among the inedited
Latin _ænigmata_, or riddles, of the Anglo-Saxon writer Tahtwin, who
flourished at the beginning of the eighth century, is one on a _table_,
which is curious enough to be given here, from the manuscript in the
British Museum (MS. Reg. 12, C. xxiii.). The table, speaking in
its own person, says that it is in the habit of feeding people with
all sorts of viands; that while so doing it is a quadruped, and is
adorned with handsome clothing; that afterwards it is robbed of all it
possesses, and when it has been thus robbed it loses its legs:--
DE MENSA.
_Multiferis omnes dapibus saturare solesco,_
_Quadrupedem hinc felix ditem me sanxerit ætas,_
_Esse tamen pulchris fatim dum vestibus orner,_
_Certatim me prædones spoliare solescunt,_
_Raptis nudata exuviis mox membra relinquunt._
In the illuminated manuscripts, wherever dinner scenes are represented,
the table is always covered with what is evidently intended for a
handsome table-cloth, the _myse-hrægel_ or _bord-clath_. The grand
preparation for dinner was _laying the board_; and it is from this
original character of the table that we derive our ordinary expression
of receiving any one “to _board_ and lodging.”
The hall was peculiarly the place for eating--and for drinking. The
Anglo-Saxons had three meals in the day,--the breaking of their fast
(breakfast), at the third hour of the day, which answered to nine
o’clock in the morning, according to our reckoning; the _ge-reordung_
(repast), or _nón-mete_ (noon-meat) or dinner, which is stated to
have been held at the canonical hour of noon, or three o’clock in
the afternoon; and the _æfen-gereord_ (evening repast), _æfen-gyfl_
(evening food), _æfen-mete_ (evening meat), _æfen-thenung_ (evening
refreshment), or supper, the hour of which is uncertain. It is
probable, from many circumstances, that the latter was a meal not
originally in use among our Saxon forefathers: perhaps their only meal
at an earlier period was the dinner, which was always their principal
repast; and we may, perhaps, consider noon as midday, and not as
meaning the canonical hour.
As I have observed before, the table, from the royal hall down to the
most humble of those who could afford it, was not refused to strangers.
When they came to the hall-door, the guests were required to leave
their arms in the care of a porter or attendant, and then, whether
known or not, they took their place at the tables. One of the laws of
king Cnut directs, that if, in the meantime, any one took the weapon
thus deposited, and did hurt with it, the owner should be compelled
to clear himself of suspicion of being cognisant of the use to be
made of his arms when he laid them down. History affords us several
remarkable instances of the facility of approach even to the tables of
kings during the Saxon period. It was this circumstance that led to
the murder of king Edmund in 946. On St. Augustin’s day, the king was
dining at his manor of Pucklechurch, in Gloucestershire; a bandit named
Leofa, whom the king had banished for his crimes, and who had returned
without leave from exile, had the effrontery to place himself at the
royal table, by the side of one of the principal nobles of the court;
the king alone recognised him, rose from his seat to expel him from the
hall, and received his death-wound in the struggle. In the eleventh
century, when Hereward went in disguise as a spy to the court of a
Cornish chieftain, he entered the hall while they were feasting, took
his place among the guests, and was but slightly questioned as to who
he was and whence he came.
[Illustration: _No. 14. An Anglo-Saxon Dinner-Party Pledging._]
In the early illuminated manuscripts, dinner scenes are by no means
uncommon. The cut, No. 14 (taken from Alfric’s version of Genesis, MS.
Cotton. Claudius, B. iv., fol. 36, v^o), represents Abraham’s feast on
the birth of his child. The guests are sitting at an ordinary long hall
table, ladies and gentlemen being mixed together without any apparent
special arrangement. This manuscript is probably of the beginning of
the eleventh century. The cut, No. 15, represents another dinner scene,
from a manuscript probably of the tenth century (Tiberius, C. vi.,
fol. 5, v^o), and presents several peculiarities. The party here is
a very small one, and they sit at a round table. The attendants seem
to be serving them, in a very remarkable manner, with roast meats,
which they bring to table on the spits (_spitu_) as they were roasted.
Another festive scene is represented in the cut, No. 16, taken from
a manuscript of the Psychomachia of the poet Prudentius (MS. Cotton.
Cleopatra, C. viii., fol. 15, r^o). The table is again a round one, at
which Luxury and her companions are seated at supper (_seo Galnes æt
hyre æfen-ge-reordum sitt_).
[Illustration: _No. 15. Anglo-Saxons at Dinner._]
It will be observed that in these pictures, the tables are tolerably
well covered with vessels of different kinds, with the exception
of plates. There are one or two dishes of different sizes in fig.
14, intended, no doubt, for holding bread and other articles; it
was probably an utensil borrowed from the Romans, as the Saxon name
_disc_ was evidently taken from the Latin _discus_. It is not easy to
identify the forms of vessels given in these pictures with the words
which are found in the Anglo-Saxon language, in which the general term
for a vessel is _fæt_, a vat; _crocca_, a pot or pitcher, no doubt of
earthenware, is preserved in the modern English word crockery; and
_bolla_, a bowl, _orc_, a basin, _bledu_ and _mele_, each answering to
the Latin _patera_, _læfel_ and _ceac_, a pitcher or urn, _hnæp_, a
cup (identical in name with the _hanap_ of a later period), _flaxe_, a
flask, are all pure Anglo-Saxon words. Many of the forms represented in
the manuscripts are recognised at once as identical with those which
are found in the earlier Anglo-Saxon graves. In the vocabularies, the
Latin word _amphora_ is translated by _crocca_, a crock; and _lagena_
by _æscen_, which means a vessel made of ash wood, and was, in all
probability, identical with the small wooden buckets so often found in
the early Saxon graves. In a document preserved in Heming’s chartulary
of Canterbury, mention is made of “an _æscen_, which is otherwise
called a back-bucket” (_æscen the is othre namon hrygilebuc gecleopad_,
Heming, p. 393), which strongly confirms the opinion I have adopted as
to the purpose of the bucket found in the graves.
[Illustration: _No. 16. A Supper Party._]
The food of the Anglo-Saxons appears to have been in general rather
simple in character, although we hear now and then of great feasts,
probably consisting more in the quantity of provisions than in any
great variety or refinement in gastronomy. Bread formed the staple,
which the Anglo-Saxons appear to have eaten in great quantities,
with milk, and butter, and cheese. A domestic was termed a man’s
_hlaf-ætan_, or loaf-eater. There is a curious passage in one of
Alfric’s homilies, that on the life of St. Benedict, where, speaking
of the use of oil in Italy, the Anglo-Saxon writer observes, “they
eat oil in that country with their food as we do butter.” Vegetables
(_wyrtan_) formed a considerable portion of the food of our forefathers
at this period; beans (_beana_) are mentioned as articles of food, but
I remember no mention of the eating of peas (_pisan_) in Anglo-Saxon
writers. A variety of circumstances show that there was a great
consumption of fish, as well as of poultry. Of flesh meat, bacon
(_spic_) was the most abundant, for the extensive oak forests nourished
innumerable droves of swine. Much of their other meat was salted, and
the place in which the salt meat was kept was called, on account of
the great preponderance of the bacon, a _spic-hus_, or bacon-house;
in latter times, for the same reason, named the larder. The practice
of eating so much salt meat explains why boiling seems to have been
the prevailing mode of cooking it. In the manuscript of Alfric’s
translation of Genesis, already mentioned, we have a figure of a
boiling vessel (No. 17), which is placed over the fire on a tripod.
This vessel was called a pan (_panna_--one Saxon writer mentions _isen
panna_, an iron pan) or a kettle (_cytel_). It is very curious to
observe how many of our trivial expressions at the present day are
derived from very ancient customs; thus, for example, we speak of “a
kettle of fish,” though what we now term a kettle would hardly serve
for this branch of cookery. In another picture (No. 18) we have a
similar boiling vessel, placed similarly on a tripod, while the cook
is using a very singular utensil to stir the contents. Bede speaks
of a goose being taken down from a wall to be _boiled_. It seems
probable that in earlier times among the Anglo-Saxons, and perhaps at
a later period, in the case of large feasts, the cooking was done
out of doors. The only words in the Anglo-Saxon language for cook and
kitchen, are _cóc_ and _cycene_, taken from the Latin _coquus_ and
_coquina_, which seems to show that they only improved their rude
manner of living in this respect after they had become acquainted with
the Romans. Besides boiled meats, they certainly had roast, or broiled,
which they called _bræde_, meat which had been spread or displayed to
the fire. The vocabularies explain the Latin _coctus_ by “boiled or
baked” (_gesoden_, _gebacen_). They also fried meat, which was then
called _hyrstyng_, and the vessel in which it was fried was called
_hyrsting-panne_, a frying-pan. Broth, also (_broth_), was much in use.
[Illustration: _No. 17. A Saxon Kettle._]
[Illustration: _No. 18. A Saxon Cook._]
In the curious colloquy of Alfric (a dialogue made to teach the
Anglo-Saxon youth the Latin names for different articles), three
professions are mentioned as requisite to furnish the table:
first, the salter, who stored the store-rooms (_cleafan_) and
cellars (_hedderne_), and without whom they could not have butter
(_butere_)--they always used salt butter--or cheese (_cyse_); next, the
baker, without whose handiwork, we are told, every table would seem
empty; and lastly, the cook. The work of the latter appears not at this
time to have been very elaborate. “If you expel me from your society,”
he says, “you will be obliged to eat your vegetables green, and your
flesh-meat raw, nor can you have any fat broth.” “We care not,” is
the reply, “for we can ourselves cook our provisions, and spread them
on the table.” Instead of grounding his defence on the difficulties
of his profession, the cook represents that in this case, instead of
having anybody to wait upon them, they would be obliged to be their
own servants. It may be observed, as indicating the general prevalence
of boiling food, that in the above account of the cook, the Latin word
_coquere_ is rendered by the Anglo-Saxon _seothan_, to boil.[4] Our
words _cook_ and _kitchen_ are the Anglo-Saxon _cóc_ and _cycene_, and
have no connection with the French _cuisine_.
We may form some idea of the proportions in the consumption of
different kinds of provisions among our Saxon forefathers, by the
quantities given on certain occasions to the monasteries. Thus,
according to the Saxon Chronicle, the occupier of an estate belonging
to the abbey of Medeshamstede (Peterborough) in 852, was to furnish
yearly sixty loads of wood for firing, twelve of coal (_græfa_), six of
fagots, two tuns of pure ale, two beasts fit for slaughter, six hundred
loaves, and ten measures of Welsh ale.
[Illustration: _No. 19. Anglo-Saxons at Table._]
It will be observed in the dinner scenes given above, that the guests
are helping themselves with their hands. Forks were totally unknown to
the Anglo-Saxons for the purpose of carrying the food to the mouth, and
it does not appear that every one at table was furnished with a knife.
In the cut, No. 19 (taken from MS. Harl. No. 603, fol. 12, r^o.), a
party at table are eating without forks or knives. It will be observed
here, as in the other pictures of this kind, that the Anglo-Saxon bread
(_hlaf_) is in the form of round cakes, much like the Roman loaves
in the pictures at Pompeii, and not unlike our cross-buns at Easter,
which are no doubt derived from our Saxon forefathers. Another party at
dinner without knives or forks is represented in the cut No. 20, taken
from the same manuscript (fol. 51, v^o.). The tables here are without
table-cloths. The use of the fingers in eating explains to us why it
was considered necessary to wash the hands before and after the meal.
[Illustration: _No. 20. Anglo-Saxons at Table._]
The knife (_cnif_), as represented in the Saxon illuminations, has a
peculiar form, quite different from that of the earlier knife found in
the graves, but resembling rather closely the form of the modern razor.
Several of these Saxon knives have been found, and one of them, dug up
in London, and now in the interesting museum collected by Mr. Roach
Smith, is represented in the accompanying cut, No. 21.[5] The blade,
of steel (_style_), which is the only part preserved, has been inlaid
with bronze.
When the repast was concluded, and the hands of the guests washed,
the tables appear to have been withdrawn from the hall, and the party
commenced drinking. From the earliest times, this was the occupation
of the after part of the day, when no warlike expedition or pressing
business hindered it. The lord and his chief guests sat at the high
seat, while the others sat round on benches. An old chronicler,
speaking of a Saxon dinner party, says, “after dinner they went to
their cups, to which the English were very much accustomed.”[6] This
was the case even with the clergy, as we learn from many of the
ecclesiastical laws. In the Ramsey History printed by Gale, we are told
of a Saxon bishop who invited a Dane to his house in order to obtain
some land from him, and to drive a better bargain, he determined to
make him drunk. He therefore pressed him to stay to dinner, and “when
they had all eaten enough, the tables were taken away, and they passed
the rest of the day, till evening, drinking. He who held the office of
cup-bearer, managed that the Dane’s turn at the cup came round oftener
than the others, as the bishop had directed him.” We know by the story
of Dunstan and king Eadwy, that it was considered a great mark of
disrespect to the guests, even in a king, to leave the drinking early
after dinner.
[Illustration: _No. 21. An Anglo-Saxon Knife._]
Our cut, No. 22, taken from the Anglo-Saxon calendar already mentioned
(MS. Cotton. Julius, A. vi.), represents a party sitting at the
_heah-setl_, the high seat, or dais, drinking after dinner. It is the
lord of the household and his chief friends, as is shown by their
attendant guard of honour. The cup-bearer, who is serving them, has a
napkin in his hand. The seat is furnished with cushions, and the three
persons seated on it appear to have large napkins or cloths spread over
their knees. Similar cloths are evidently represented in our cut No.
16. Whether these are the _setl-hrœgel_, or seat-cloths, mentioned in
some of the Anglo-Saxon wills, is uncertain.
[Illustration: _No. 22. An Anglo-Saxon Drinking Party._]
It will be observed that the greater part of the drinking-cups bear
a resemblance in form to those of the more ancient period which we
find in Anglo-Saxon graves, and of which some examples have been
given in the preceding chapter. We cannot tell whether those seen
in the pictures be intended for glass or other material; but it is
certain that the Anglo-Saxons were ostentatious of drinking-cups
and other vessels made of the precious metals. Sharon Turner, in
his History of the Anglo-Saxons, has collected together a number of
instances of such valuable vessels. In one will, three silver cups
are bequeathed; in another, four cups, two of which were of the value
of four pounds; in another, four silver cups, a cup with a fringed
edge, a wooden cup variegated with gold, a wooden knobbed cup, and
two very handsome drinking-cups (_smicere scencing-cuppan_). Other
similar documents mention a golden cup, with a golden dish; a gold cup
of immense weight; a dish adorned with gold, and another with Grecian
workmanship (probably brought from Byzantium). A lady bequeathed a
golden cup weighing four marks and a half. Mention of silver cups,
silver basins, &c., is of frequent occurrence. In 833, a king gave
his gilt cup, engraved outside with vine-dressers fighting dragons,
which he called his cross-bowl, because it had a cross marked within
it, and it had four angles projecting, also like a cross. These cups
were given frequently as marks of affection and remembrance. The lady
Ethelgiva presented to the abbey of Ramsey, among other things, “two
silver cups, for the use of the brethren in the refectory, in order
that, while drink is served in them to the brethren at their repast,
my memory may be more firmly imprinted on their hearts.”[7] It is a
curious proof of the value of such vessels, that in the pictures of
warlike expeditions, where two or three articles are heaped together
as a kind of symbolical representation of the value of the spoils,
vessels of the table and drinking-cups and drinking-horns are generally
included. Our cut, No. 23, represents one of these groups (taken from
the Cottonian Manuscript, Claudius, C. viii.); it contains a crown, a
bracelet or ring, two drinking-horns, a jug, and two other vessels.
The drinking-horn was in common use among the Anglo-Saxons. It is seen
on the table or in the hands of the drinkers in more than one of our
cuts. In the will of one Saxon lady, two buffalo-horns are mentioned;
three horns worked with gold and silver are mentioned in one inventory;
and we find four horns enumerated among the effects of a monastic
house. The Mercian king Witlaf, with somewhat of the sentiment of the
lady Ethelgiva, gave to the abbey of Croyland the horn of his table,
“that the elder monks may drink from it on festivals, and in their
benedictions remember sometimes the soul of the donor.”
[Illustration: _No. 23. Articles of Value._]
The liquors drunk by the Saxons were chiefly ale and mead; the immense
quantity of honey that was then produced in this country, as we learn
from Domesday-book and other records, shows us how great must have
been the consumption of the latter article. Welsh ale is especially
spoken of. Wine was also in use, though it was an expensive article,
and was in a great measure restricted to persons above the common rank.
According to Alfric’s Colloquy, the merchant brought from foreign
countries wine and oil; and when the scholar is asked why he does not
drink wine, he says he is not rich enough to buy it, “and wine is not
the drink of children or fools, but of elders and wise men.” There
were, however, vineyards in England in the times of the Saxons, and
wine was made from them; but they were probably rare, and chiefly
attached to the monastic establishments. William of Malmesbury speaks
of a vineyard attached to his monastery, which was first planted at the
beginning of the eleventh century by a Greek monk who settled there,
and who spent all his time in cultivating it.
In their drinking, the Anglo-Saxons had various festive ceremonies,
one of which is made known to us by the popular story of the lady
Rowena and the British king. When the ale or wine was first served, the
drinkers pledged each other, with certain phrases of wishing health,
not much unlike the mode in which we still take wine with each other
at table, or as people of the less refined classes continue to drink
the first glass to the health of the company; but among the Saxons the
ceremony was accompanied with a kiss. In our cut, No. 14, the party
appear to be pledging each other.
[Illustration: _No. 24. Drinking and Minstrelsy._]
[Illustration: _No. 25. An Anglo-Saxon Fithelere._]
The Anglo-Saxon potations were accompanied with various kinds of
amusements. One of these was telling stories, and recounting the
exploits of themselves or of their friends. Another was singing their
national poetry, to which the Saxons were much attached. In the less
elevated class, where professed minstrels were not retained, each
guest was minstrel in his turn. Cædmon, as his story is related by
Bede, became a poet through the emulation thus excited. One of the
ecclesiastical canons enacted under king Edgar enjoins “that no priest
be a minstrel at the ale (_ealu-scóp_), nor in any wise act the
gleeman (_gliwige_), with himself or with other men.” In the account
of the murder of king Ethelbert in Herefordshire, by the treachery
of Offa’s wicked queen (A.D. 792), we are told that the royal party,
after dinner, “spent the whole day with music and dancing in great
glee.” The cut, No. 24 (taken from the Harl. MS., No. 603), is a
perfect illustration of this incident of Saxon story. The cup-bearer is
serving the guest with wine from a vessel which is evidently a Saxon
imitation of the Roman amphora; it is perhaps the Anglo-Saxon _sester_
or _sæster_; a word, no doubt, taken from the Latin sextarius, and
carrying with it, in general, the notion of a certain measure. In Saxon
translations from the Latin, _amphora_ is often rendered by _sester_.
We have here a choice party of minstrels and gleemen. Two are occupied
with the harp, which appears, from a comparison of Beowulf with the
later writers, to have been the national instrument. It is not clear
from the picture whether the two men are playing both on the same
harp, or whether one is merely holding the instrument for the other.
Another is perhaps intended to represent the Anglo-Saxon _fithelere_,
playing on the _fithele_ (the modern English words _fiddler_ and
_fiddle_); but his instrument appears rather to be the cittern, which
was played with the fingers, not with the bow. Another representation
of this performer, from the same manuscript, is given in the cut No.
25, where the instrument is better defined. The other two minstrels,
in No. 24, are playing on the horn, or on the Saxon _pip_, or pipe.
The two dancers are evidently a man and a woman, and another lady to
the extreme right seems preparing to join in the same exercise. We
know little of the Anglo-Saxon mode of dancing, but to judge by the
words used to express this amusement, _hoppan_ (to hop), _saltian_
and _stellan_ (to leap), and _tumbian_ (to tumble), it must have been
accompanied with violent movements. Our cut No. 26 (from the Cottonian
MS., Cleopatra, C. viii. fol. 16, v^o), represents another party of
minstrels, one of whom, a female, is dancing, while the other two
are playing on a kind of cithara and on the Roman double flute. The
Anglo-Saxon names for the different kinds of musicians most frequently
spoken of were _hearpere_, the harper; _bymere_, the trumpeter;
_pipere_, the player on the pipe or flute; _fithelere_, the fiddler;
and _horn-blawere_, the horn-blower. The _gligman_, or _gleeman_, was
the same who, at a later period, was called, in Latin, _joculator_,
and, in French, a _jougleur_; and another performer, called _truth_, is
interpreted as a stage player, but was probably some performer akin to
the gleeman. The harp seems to have stood in the highest rank, or, at
least, in the highest popularity, of musical instruments; it was termed
poetically the _gleó-beam_, or the glee-wood.
[Illustration: _No. 26. Anglo-Saxon Minstrels._]
Although it was considered a very fashionable accomplishment among
the Anglo-Saxons to be a good singer of verses and a good player on
the harp, yet the professed minstrel, who went about to every sort of
joyous assemblage, from the festive hall to the village wake, was a
person not esteemed respectable. He was beneath consideration in any
other light than as affording amusement, and as such he was admitted
everywhere, without examination. It was for this reason that Alfred,
and subsequently Athelstan, found such easy access in this garb to
the camps of their enemies; and it appears to have been a common
disguise for such purposes. The group given in the last cut (No. 26)
are intended to represent the persons characterised in the text (of
Prudentius) by the Latin word _ganeones_ (vagabonds, ribalds), which is
there glossed by the Saxon term gleemen (_ganeonum_, _gliwig-manna_).
Besides music and dancing, they seem to have performed a variety of
tricks and jokes, to while away the tediousness of a Saxon afternoon,
or excite the coarse mirth of the peasant. That such performers,
resembling in many respects the Norman jougleur, were usually employed
by Anglo-Saxons of wealth and rank, is evident from various allusions
to them. Gaimar has preserved a curious Saxon story of the murder
of king Edward by his stepmother (A.D. 978), in which the queen
is represented as having in her service a dwarf minstrel, who is
employed to draw the young king alone to her house. According to the
Anglo-Norman relator of this story, the dwarf was skilled in various
modes of dancing and tumbling, characterised by words of which we can
hardly now point out the exact distinction, “and could play many other
games.”
_Wolstanet un naim aveit,_
_Ki baler e trescher saveit;_
_Si saveit sailler e tumber,_
_E altres gius plusurs juer._
In a Saxon manuscript in the British Museum (MS. Cotton. Tiberius, C.
vi.), among the minstrels attendant on king David (represented in our
cut, No. 27), we see a gleeman, who is throwing up and catching knives
and balls, a common performance of the later Norman jougleurs, as well
as of our modern mountebanks. Some of the tricks and gestures of these
performers were of the coarsest description, such as could be only
tolerated in a rude state of society. An example will be found in a
story told by William of Malmesbury of wandering minstrels, whom he had
seen performing at a festival at that monastery when he was a child,
and which we can hardly venture to give even under the veil of the
original Latin. A poem in the Exeter manuscript describes the wandering
character of the Saxon minstrels. He tells us:--
_swa scriþende_ _Thus roving_
_gesceapum hweorfað_ _with their lays go_
_gleo-men gumena_ _the gleemen of men_
_geond grunda fela,_ _over many lands,_
_þearfe secgað,_ _state their wants,_
_þonc-word sprecaþ,_ _utter words of thank,_
_simle suð oþþe norð_ _always south or north,_
_sumne gemetað_ _they find one_
_gydda gleawne,_ _knowing in songs,_
_geofum unhneawne._ _who is liberal of gifts._--Exeter Book, p. 326.
[Illustration: _No. 27. Anglo-Saxon Minstrels and Gleeman._]
We are not to suppose that our Anglo-Saxon forefathers remained at
table, merely drinking and listening. On the contrary, the performance
of the minstrels appears to have been only introduced at intervals,
between which the guests talked, joked, propounded and answered
riddles, boasted of their own exploits, disparaged those of others,
and, as the liquor took effect, became noisy and quarrelsome. The moral
poems often allude to the quarrels and slaughters in which feasts
ended. One of these poems, enumerating the various endowments of men,
says:--
_sum bið wrœd tæfle;_ _one is expert at dice;_
_sum bið gewittig_ _one is witty_
_æt win-þege,_ _at wine-bibbing,_
_beor-hyrde god._ _a good beer-drinker._--Exeter Book, p. 297.
A “Monitory Poem,” in the same collection, thus describes the manners
of the guests in hall:--
_þonne monige beoð_ _but many are_
_mæþel-hergendra,_ _lovers of social converse,_
_wlonce wig-smiþas,_ _haughty warriors,_
_win-burgum in,_ _in pleasant cities,_
_sittaþ æt symble_ _they sit at the feast,_
_soð-gied wrecað,_ _tales recount,_
_wordum wrixlað,_ _in words converse,_
_witan fundiað_ _strive to know_
_hwylc æsc-stede_ _who the battle place,_
_inne in ræcede_ _within the house,_
_mid werum wunige;_ _will with men abide;_
_þonne win hweteð_ _then wine wets_
_beornes breost-sefan,_ _the man’s breast-passions,_
_breahtme stigeð_ _suddenly rises_
_cirm on corþre,_ _clamour in the company,_
_cwide-scral letaþ_ _an outcry they send forth_
_missenlice._ _various._--Exeter Book, p. 314.
In a poem on the various fortunes of men, and the different ways in
which they come by death, we are told:--
_sumum meces ecg_ _from one the sword’s edge_
_on meodu-bence,_ _on the mead-bench,_
_yrrum ealo-wosan,_ _angry with ale,_
_ealdor oþþringeð,_ _life shall expel,_
_were win-sadum._ _a wine-sated man._--Exeter Book, p. 330.
And in the metrical legend of St. Juliana, the evil one boasts:--
_sume ic larum geteah,_ _some I by wiles have drawn,_
_te geflite fremede,_ _to strife prepared,_
_þæt hy færinga_ _that they suddenly_
_eald-afþoncan_ _old grudges_
_edniwedan,_ _have renewed,_
_beore druncne;_ _drunken with beer;_
_ic him byrlade_ _I to them poured_
_wreht of wege,_ _discord from the cup,_
_þæt hi in win-sale_ _so that they in the social hall_
_þurh sweord-gripe_ _through gripe of sword_
_sawle forletan_ _the soul let forth_
_of flæsc-homan._ _from the body._--Exeter Book, p. 271.
There were other amusements for the long evenings besides those which
belonged especially to the hall, for every day was not a feast-day. The
hall was then left to the household retainers and their occupations.
But we must now leave this part of the domestic establishment. The
ladies appear not to have remained at table long after dinner--it was
somewhat as in modern times--they proceeded to their own special part
of the house--the chamber--and thither it will be my duty to accompany
them in the next chapter. I have described all the ordinary scenes that
took place in the Anglo-Saxon hall.