WOMEN IN THE AGE OF SAINT LOUIS
WHILE romance has preserved many memories, and history not a few facts,
of Eleanor of Guienne, the records concerning two other notable women,
her contemporaries, are very scanty. Whatever her faults, Eleanor was a
great and commanding personality, one that could not be overlooked
because, whether for good or ill, she was always powerful. The two
unhappy queens of Philippe Auguste, Ingeburge de Danemark and Agnes de
Meranie, though they were the innocent causes of much distress in
France, are yet hardly known to us as personalities.
The first queen of Philippe Auguste was Isabelle de Hainault; after her
death he sought the hand of a Danish princess, Ingeburge, sister of Knut
IV. The marriage was one contracted for political reasons; Philippe was
at the time engaged in his lifelong struggle against the power of the
Plantagenets, and desired an ally against Richard Coeur de Lion. At
Amiens, on Assumption eve, 1193, Ingeburge was married to the King of
France; the next day she was crowned Queen of France by the Archbishop
of Rheims. During the ceremony, says a chronicler of Aix, "the King,
looking on the Princess, began to conceive a horror of her; he trembled,
he grew pale, he was so greatly troubled in spirit that he could hardly
contain himself till the end of the ceremony." For some unknown reason
the fair stranger seems to have awakened in him unconquerable
repugnance; and from that moment he began to devise means of getting rid
of her.
Ingeburge, according to the testimony of those who had no special reason
to favor her but every reason to justify the king, was of a gentle
disposition, sensible, affectionate, and endowed with considerable
beauty of the type usually associated with Danish women. She was a
defenceless stranger, not even acquainted with the French language, and
there were but few in France to champion her cause in the painful
complications that followed. Philippe's aversion could by no means be
accounted for; in the Middle Ages what could not be accounted for, if of
evil nature, was the work of the devil or of his vicegerents on earth,
the witches; so it was promptly reported that the King of France was
bewitched, though it is not exactly apparent that the real force of the
enchantment fell upon him it was Ingeburge who suffered.
Philippe began proceedings to obtain an annulment of the marriage,
which, he asseverated, had never been consummated. This was denied by
Ingeburge, and we are inclined to take her word rather than that of the
unscrupulous king, who, though a successful ruler, was not at all averse
to falsehood where falsehood served his turn. The pair separated almost
at once, and Philippe tried by ill treatment to make Ingeburge consent
to a legal separation. After three months of the utmost unhappiness the
young queen had the shame of hearing her marriage declared null and
void. The council which rendered this decision consisted wholly of
French prelates, presided over by the very Archbishop of Rheims who had
pronounced the nuptial benediction over the pair. Ingeburge was at
Compiegne, where the council met, and was present at the session at
which her marriage was annulled on the frivolous pretext of a kinship,
not between Philippe and Ingeburge for even the ingenuity of mediaeval
genealogy could not trace out that but between the late Queen Isabella
and Ingeburge. The unfortunate Danish lady could not understand what
these priests were saying in the strange tongue of the land to which she
had come to be a queen; when the purport of the proceedings was
explained to her through an interpreter, she exclaimed, in tears: _"Male
France! Male France!_ Rome! Rome!"
[Illustration 3:
DOMESTIC INTERIOR IN FRANCE, TWELFTH CENTURY.
From a water-color by S. Baron, after a description by Viollet-le-Duc.
The decorated fireplace, between two windows, was wide enough to hold
logs eight or ten feet long. Two large benches were at right angles, one
with a movable back, the other being double-seated. The table was fixed
to the floor, the master's chair being elevated, other diners sat on
stools. The tablecloth was used for wiping fingers and lips. The buffet,
with cups and goblets on top, was used as to-day. Generally, the beds
were narrow and displayed great luxury: the wood was carved, incrusted,
or painted; the coverlets had fringes and embroideries; curtains formed
an alcove, and a night lamp was hung at the foot. The room contained an
oratory.
In the rear were the kitchen, etc, and on the upper floors were sleeping
and other chambers.]
She did indeed appeal from "wicked France" to Rome, and the appeal was
not without ultimate good effect. In the meantime she refused to
prejudice her cause by returning to Denmark, and the heartless Philippe
confined her, almost as a criminal, in a convent at Cisoing, in the
Tournois; he did not even have the decency or the humanity to provide
suitably for her actual needs.
The appeal to Rome was pushed by Ingeburge's brother, Knut IV., and the
Pope, Celestine III., at length granted the appeal, on March 13, 1196,
reversing the decree of the council of Compiegne. The papal power was
then in very weak hands, and it was fear of offending the great King of
France that had occasioned the long delay in rendering justice to
Ingeburge. That something more than a mere papal decree would be needed
to subdue Philippe was apparent when, in June, 1196, he married Agnes de
Meranie, the lovely daughter of a German prince who, under the title of
Duke of Meranie, ruled the Tyrol, Istria, and a part of Bohemia. The
papal menaces had not deterred the king from this insolent act of
disobedience; and Pope Celestine made no attempt to coerce him by resort
to more rigorous measures. Ingeburge continued to live in confinement,
while Philippe enjoyed the love of his new wife, against whom no one
could lay the guilt of her husband's licentious conduct.
In January, 1198, Pope Celestine was succeeded by Innocent III., one of
the greatest of the occupants of the chair of St. Peter. He was of an
inflexible character, not to be turned aside by any considerations of
policy or of humanity from what he conceived to be his duty; and his
duty it was, and his right, according to his idea, to dominate the world
and the kings thereof. When the friends of Ingeburge called her case to
his attention, Pope Innocent wrote letter after letter of remonstrance
to Philippe Auguste, "the eldest son of the Church," summoning him to
return to the paths of duty and relinquish his "concubine", Agnes de
Meranie. He urged Philippe's spiritual adviser to bring him to reason by
pious exhortation. All else failing, he sent Cardinal Pierre of Capua as
a special legate, with injunctions to present the Church's ultimatum to
the king: he must either take Ingeburge back at once, with all honor, as
his lawful consort, or the entire kingdom would be put under interdict.
The legate pleaded and threatened in vain; after a year of exasperating
evasion the king was still not obedient. The legate at last summoned a
council and pronounced the interdict, all the prelates receiving
stringent orders to observe it under pain of suspension. From December,
1199, to September, 1200, France was under a general interdict.
In the case of Bertha and Robert, the ecclesiastical censures had
affected only the guilty couple; in the case of Bertrade and Philippe
I., only the places inhabited by them had been smitten. But the Church
had now grown stronger; now the whole kingdom was to suffer because of
the recalcitrant king. Everywhere religious services ceased, for the
clergy were in sympathy with or afraid of the vigorous statesman now in
the papal chair. The churches were closed, the altars dismantled, the
crosses reversed, the bells silent, as during the solemn days in memory
of Christ's Passion. The accustomed religious exercises ceased; but that
was only a small part of the horror, for no more sacraments, save
extreme unction and baptism of infants, could be celebrated. There were
no marriages: when the king wished to marry his son to the young Blanche
de Castille he was obliged to go into Normandy, into English territory,
to have the ceremony performed. There were no more funerals, for the
Pope forbade burials, whether in hallowed or in unhallowed ground: the
air was filled with the pestilential stench from unburied corpses. The
voice of the people rose in wrath against their impious king; it was he
who was bringing all this woe upon the land. Philippe and Agnes lived
on, she happy in the love of her king, and in her children, Philippe and
Marie, he stubbornly resistant. He deprived bishops of their sees and
sequestered their goods; he punished even laymen for daring to take the
side of the Pope. But at last he must yield, for his people would endure
no more.
Ingeburge was taken back as wife and queen, being at last released from
the chateau of Etampes where she had been confined. But the king, deeply
in love with Agnes, declared that this recognition of Ingeburge was only
provisional, since he meant to appeal once more to Rome for an annulment
of the marriage. The fair Agnes, the victim of these unfortunate
circumstances, did not long survive the separation from Philippe, whose
passionate love she returned. A few weeks later she died at Poissi,
giving birth to a short-lived son named Tristan, the pledge of his
mother's sorrows. She had given Philippe two children before this, and,
though her union with the king had been stigmatized as immoral by the
Church, the Pope recognized the legitimacy of the offspring in November,
1201. It was her son Philippe, surnamed Hurepel, who became Count de
Boulogne, and played no pleasing role under Blanche de Castille.
The death of Agnes de Meranie did not tend to soften Philippe's feelings
toward Ingeburge. She was imprisoned anew, and treated with every
indignity that could be devised, short of calling down again the wrath
of Pope Innocent. For eleven years she was treated in this way, and was
constantly urged, by entreaties and threats, to take the veil, while
Philippe was continuing his efforts to have the marriage annulled. In
1212, however, Philippe had need of the friendship of Rome. Ingeburge
was again taken from her prison at Etampes and received at court: the
victory of the Pope was complete, as far as the letter of the law was
concerned. There was never any love between the royal pair, and could
not be; for between them stood the sad ghost of Agnes de Meranie to
incite Ingeburge to jealousy and Philippe to fresh aversion.
Ingeburge could never have been happy with Philippe, though he treated
her more considerately and fairly during the last years of his life.
When her husband died, in 1223, and his son Louis VIII. came to the
throne, Ingeburge was nearer peace than she had been since she left her
native land. We hear, henceforth, almost nothing of her; there was no
role for a dowager queen, especially one who was a foreigner associated
with most distressing events for France. We do find her name as one of
the notabilities in the solemn procession which, on August 2, 1224, went
from the cathedral of Notre Dame to the Abbey of St. Antoine, to ask of
the Lord of Hosts for a victory for the arms of Louis VIII. at Rochelle.
Now and again her name occurs in the accounts of the royal household
while that careful economist, Blanche de Castille, is governing France.
She is called "la reine d'Orleans," because she lived at Orleans, part
of the domain reserved to her as Queen Dowager. Here she lived quietly,
and let us hope not unhappily, till her death in 1237. She lived in the
midst of great events in which she could take no part; and only her
sorrows have preserved for us this fragment of her story.
Before we begin the history of the greatest queen France had yet seen,
Blanche de Castille, it might be well to note some of the changes in
social conditions since the age of the early Capetians. These changes
were, fortunately, all in the direction of amelioration; for the
civilization of France, of Europe, was taking long strides during the
eleventh and twelfth centuries, and an advance in civilization involves
an improvement in the condition of women. Historians usually look at the
matter from the point of view of man; it must be our endeavor to treat
of social conditions and their causes rather from the point of view of
woman.
Glancing at the history of France for a moment, it is easy enough to
distinguish certain causes or motive forces in the advance in
civilization. Because it is usually quite overlooked, we shall name
first the influence of contact with that very society of Provence which
France was bending her energies to bring to utter ruin. Unquestionably
the _trouveres_ of northern France owed something of their art to the
_troubadours_ of southern France, even if the former were more than mere
imitators. The softening effect of the musical and literary arts
professed by these poets need not be dwelt upon, but we might remark
that it was to the ladies of France, in most cases, that the _trouveres_
sang, and that this conversion of the bard, singing the glories of his
chief, into the minstrel, still singing of battles but also of fair
ladies and for the ears of fair ladies, is a fact not lacking
significance. Woman was no longer the mere toy of the warrior; it is no
longer Aude, barely mentioned in the _Chanson de Roland_, but Nicolette,
that fairest, sweetest of the mediaeval heroines of romance, who is of
more interest than Aucassin in the story. And this little _chantefable_,
as it is aptly called, of _Aucassin et Nicolette_, is so nearly
Provencal that Provence has claimed it; it lies on the borderland
between the manner of the troubadours and that of the _trouveres_. A
woman is here distinctly a heroine, no longer a mere foil to the hero;
and the lovely little tale is manifestly intended to please an audience
of ladies as well as of knights.
We have spoken of this Provencal influence and sought to illustrate what
may be the method of its working, through the minstrel in the lady's
bower, but we do not care to lay too much stress upon it, because it may
not be entirely distinct from a still greater and kindred influence.
When the hosts of Peter the Hermit, crazed with religious fanaticism
such as the world sees but once in a great while, straggled back from
their crusade it might have been thought that they brought with them
nothing but the memory of their sufferings, or the precious memory of
those holy places they had journeyed so far and endured so much to see.
But their crusade had been a success; they had won the holy places from
the infidel, and after they had achieved their success they had had time
to look about them upon the new civilization with which they found
themselves in contact. When they come back to their homes they bring
enthusiastic memories of the glories of the East, and soon the spirit of
sheer adventure replaces, almost insensibly, religious feeling, and
crusade follows crusade, till we find one that does not even pretend to
go to Palestine, but devotes itself to the conquest of Constantinople,
full of riches and luxuries undreamed of in France. When Geoffrey
Villehardouin gives a glowing description of the magnificence of
Constantinople we see that already there is appreciation of things that
the first crusaders would have scorned or ruthlessly destroyed. The
influence of the Crusades in introducing higher standards of domestic
comfort, greater luxury, greater refinement, has been too often dwelt
upon to need further notice here.
The cause of woman and of civilization was helped in another way by the
Crusades. While the warlike barons found a vent for their surplus
fighting blood in smiting the infidel and robbing the Greek, there was
peace at home, for private wars and feuds ceased. The barons, moreover,
needed money to continue their sojourn in the army of Christ; and we
hear that in the splendor of the preparations for that Crusade in which
Eleanor took part the nobles of France vied with each other till they
were almost ruined. To get this money they sold freedom to their slaves,
immunity from vexatious feudal rights to their serfs, privileges and
charters to their burgesses. While they themselves were spending their
money and acquiring expensive tastes and refined ideas in contact with
the Greeks and Saracens, their subjects were acquiring a greater degree
of freedom, and their king, if he were a wise one, was consolidating his
kingdom and girding up his loins for more effective resistance to their
turbulence. The strength of the monarchy increased as the power of the
independent baronage decreased, and the strength of the monarchy meant
greater tranquillity, greater respect for law, and the fostering of
conditions favorable to the growth of commerce.
Manners were still rough and cruel, for the Crusades had not tamed the
ferocity of the European heroes. We hear that, when Saladin refused to
pay the enormous ransom demanded for the town of Acre, Richard Coeur de
Lion put to death the two thousand six hundred captives whom he held as
hostages, and the Duke of Burgundy did likewise with his captives. But
in France there was getting to be less and less opportunity for the
display of wanton cruelty toward the lower orders of society. The
seigneur still believed in the truth of the old proverb:
"Oignez vilain, il vous poindra;
Poignez vilain, il vous oindra."
(Stroke a villain, and he will sting you; sting a villain, and he will
stroke you); but the number of serfs was constantly diminishing. The
great communal movement emancipated the bourgeois of the towns; whole
villages bought their freedom; the monarchy favored enfranchisement and
gave the example in freeing serfs here and there, till, in 1315, all the
serfs of the royal domain were set free, and the great doctrine was
proclaimed: _Selon le droit de nature, chacun doit nattre
franc_--"according to the law of nature, everyone should be born free."
The general improvement in conditions affected more visibly the
bourgeois class. We find, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, that
the members of this class are beginning to build large, solid houses of
stone, with ogival windows, and sometimes with lofty towers and
crenelated battlements. As a class they become richer and obtain
recognition. When Philippe Auguste contemplated paving some of the
streets of Paris--they had been mere roads of mud--he sent for the rich
citizens to ask their assistance. One of these, Richard de Poissi, is
said to have contributed eleven thousand marks in silver. Then the
guilds of the tradesmen become wealthy and exercise considerable
political power. It is in the reign of Saint Louis that the trade guilds
of Paris become so numerous that Etienne Boileau compiles a _Livre des
metiers_, containing the statutes of the greater number of them.
In the dress of all classes above the abjectly poor there was a tendency
toward greater show, vainly repressed during part of the thirteenth
century, but continuing to increase even under repression. The standard
costume during the whole period of the Crusades was indeed plain, and
very similar for men and for women. On their heads ordinary women wore
only a sort of coif, or the cowl attached to the long robe or gown,
though there were a few ladies of fashion who scandalized the community
by wearing tall, pointed bonnets, sometimes cone-shaped, sometimes with
two horns, and with a veil hanging from the tip to form a sort of
wimple. The chief article in the dress of both sexes was the garment
called a cotte-hardie, consisting of a long robe reaching to the feet
and confined at the waist by a girdle. The sleeves of the cotte-hardie
were, among sober-minded dames, rather close fitting and plain; fashion
had them made absurdly large, flaring at the wrist to many times the
dimensions of the upper part, and sometimes so long as not only to cover
the whole hand, but to trail upon the ground. Over the _cotte-hardie_
was worn the _surcot_, a sort of tunic, shorter than the undergarment,
and either without sleeves or with elbow sleeves. On grand occasions a
handsome mantle was worn, but the use of this was generally restricted
to noble ladies. The shoes were usually simple, lacing higher on the leg
than what we now call shoes; sometimes, however, they were made of gaily
colored leathers, richly embroidered, or even of cloth of gold, damask,
or the like. The days of high heels had not yet come, and women's shoes
seem never to have been quite so outrageous as those long pointed shoes
worn by the dandies of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
It was at the other end of the costume, the headgear, that women
displayed their extravagance. Fearfully and wonderfully were the
headdresses made, judging from the pictures in manuscripts and from the
indignation of the satirists. The modest bonnet sprouted horns of
alarming shape and proportions. "When ladies come to festivals," says a
thirteenth century satirist, "they look at each other's heads, and carry
_bosses_ like horned beasts; if any one is without horns, she becomes an
object of derision." Not content with having betrayed man by her
flirtation with Lucifer in Eden, Eve must now wear on her head the very
mark of the beast. No text served as the basis for sermons with more
frequency or more delight than one attacking the horns of the ladies.
One preacher advised his hearers to cry out: _Hurte, belier!_--"Beware
the ram!" when one of these horned monsters approached, and promised ten
days' absolution to those who would do so. "By the faith I owe Saint
Mathurin," exclaims the monkish satirist, "they make themselves horned
with platted hemp or linen, and so counterfeit dumb beasts; they carry
great masses of other people's hair on their heads." The author of the
_Romance of the Rose_ describes with great unction the gorget, or
neckcloth, hanging from the horns and twisted two or three times around
the neck. These horns, he says, are evidently designed to wound the men.
"I know not whether they call those things that sustain their horns
gibbets or corbels,... but I venture to say Saint Elizabeth did not get
to heaven by wearing such things. Moreover, they are a great encumbrance
(owing to the hair piled up, etc.), for between the gorget and the
temple and horns there is quite enough room for a rat to pass, or the
biggest weasel 'twixt here and Arras."
Neither ridicule nor threats of eternal damnation, however, made any
impression on the daughters of Eve, and the horns continued to adorn
their fair heads. The other parts of the costume, as we have said, were
usually simple. The robe, or _cotte-hardie_, and the _surcot_ were
generally of plain cloth of solid color; but as wealth increased, the
use of expensive materials became more and more common, and silk, cloth
of gold, and velvet appeared on various parts of the dress, as well as a
profusion of jewels. A short passage from the description of the costume
of the queen in Philippe de Beaumanoir's _La Manekine_ may serve to show
the utmost that imagination could devise in the way of dress, for, of
course, the costume of the heroines of romance is always some degrees
more elegant than that to which the fair readers are accustomed.
"The queen arose early in the morning, well dressed and richly jewelled.
(Her costume) was laced with a thick gold thread, with two big rubies to
every finger's breadth: no matter how dark the skies, one could see
clearly by the light of these jewels. She clothed her beautiful body in
a robe of cloth of gold, with fur sewn all about it. So fine was the
cloth of her girdle that I can scarcely describe it. There were upon it
many little platines of gold linked together with emeralds beautiful and
costly, and one sapphire there was in the clasp, worth full a hundred
marks in silver. Upon her breast she wore a brooch of gold set with many
precious stones. Over her shoulders and about her neck she had fastened
a mantle of cloth of gold, no man ever saw more beautiful. Her furs were
no common, moth-eaten things, but sable, which makes people look
beautiful. At her girdle she wore a purse, in all the world there is
none more elegant. Upon her head rested a crown whose like was not to be
found; for one gazed at it in wonder and admiration of the beautiful
stones in it, stones of many virtues: emeralds, sapphires, rubies,
jacinths,... never was a more beautiful one seen."
Though the number of jewels is probably magnified, the essential
features of the costume correspond to what a lady of fashion would have
liked to wear in the year 1250. The mantle, being regarded as suitable
for full dress occasions, was much ornamented. In the _Roman de la
Violette_ (about 1225) we find this description of a lady's mantle: "She
wore a mantle greener than the leaves and trimmed with ermine. Upon it
were embroidered little golden flowerets, cunningly worked; each one had
attached to it, so hidden as to be invisible, a little bell. When the
wind blew against the mantle, sweetly sounded the bells. I give you my
word that nor harp nor rote nor vielle ever gave forth so sweet a sound
as these silver chimes."
Not all ladies, of course, were so gorgeously attired, and even among
the noble ladies of the land the delicacy of manners did not always
match the elegance of the attire. To get some idea of what a fine lady
did, we may look at some of the things she is warned against doing in a
sort of book on deportment, of the thirteenth century,--Robert de
Blois's _Chastiement des dames._
"Cest livre petit priseront
dames, s'amendees n'en sont;
por ce vueil je cortoisement
enseignier les dames comment
eles se doivent contenir,
en lor aler, en lor venir,
en lor tesir, en lor parler."
(Ladies will think but little of this book if they are not improved by
it; therefore will I politely teach the ladies how they should conduct
themselves, in their goings, in their comings, in silence, and when
talking.) This last item, he remarks, requires much care. "Do not talk
too much," he continues, "especially do not boast of your love affairs;
and do not be too free in your conduct with men when playing games, lest
they be encouraged to take liberties with you. When you go to church,
take good care not to trot or run, but walk straight, and do not go too
far in advance of the company you are with. Do not let your glances rove
here and there, but look straight ahead of you; and salute courteously
everyone you meet, for courtesy costs little. Let no man put his hand
upon your breast, or touch you at all, or kiss you; for such
familiarities are dangerous and unbecoming, save with the one man whom
you love. Of this lover, too, you must not talk too much, nor must you
glance often at men, or accept presents from them. Beware of exposing
your body out of vanity, and do not undress in the presence of men. You
must not dispute and get in the habit of scolding, nor must you swear.
Above all, eschew eating greedily at the table, and getting drunk, for
this latter practice is fraught with danger to you. Unless your face is
ugly or deformed, do not cover it in the presence of gentlemen, who like
to look at the beautiful." One can guess that this rule was rigidly
obeyed; those succeeding touch upon matters still more delicate. "If
your breath is bad, take care not to breathe in people's faces, and eat
aniseed, fennel, and cummin for breakfast. Keep your hands clean, cut
your nails so that they be not permitted to grow beyond the tip of the
finger and harbor dirt. It is not polite to gaze into a house when you
are passing, for people may do many things in their houses that they
would not have seen; it would be well, therefore, when you go into
another person's house, to pause a moment on the sill and cough or speak
loud, so that they may know you are coming."
Before we give Robert de Blois's directions for table manners it may be
well to say a few words about the table. Among the common people the
table itself was little more than a rude board on trestles, with benches
or stools along the side and with places scooped out to hold the portion
of food allotted to each person. Among the more well-to-do classes,
however, the table was a more ornamental piece of furniture. The benches
or stools still remained, but the rest was more civilized. The food,
consisting of vegetables, roast fowls, boiled meats, and fish was served
in large earthenware platters. There were no forks, but spoons and
fingers were freely used as well as knives, each guest frequently using
his own knife or dagger. As the guests had to help themselves, often
with their fingers, out of the common serving platters, there was some
reason in the ceremony which preceded each meal; this was the washing of
hands, for which the trumpeter sounded a call. Every gentleman had the
right to _faire corner l'eau_, as it was called, that is, to have his
trumpeter sound the call for washing hands. When this call sounded the
pages of the establishment bore the ewer to the ladies, and servants of
less pretension did likewise for the gentlemen. Napkins were provided
for drying one's hands after this, but the time had not yet come when
there were regular table napkins; instead, each wiped his hands or mouth
upon the tablecloth, and his knife upon a piece of bread. The company
sat at the table in couples, a gentleman and a lady together. This means
more than may be apparent at first sight, for one must remember that
there was usually but one drinking cup for each couple and that they ate
from a common plate. The plate, as we ventured to call it, was regularly
a large piece of bread, flat and round, which served to hold the food
and absorb the gravy. At the end of the meal this bread, called _pain
tranchoir_, was given to the poor, with the other scraps from the table.
It took a careful hostess properly to pair off the couples, for it must
have been very embarrassing for either lady or gentleman to have to
_manger a la meme ecuelle_ (eat out of the same porringer) and drink out
of the same cup with one personally distasteful. In the romance of
_Perceforest_ we find the description of a banquet where there were
eight hundred knights, "and there was not a one who did not have lady or
maiden to eat from his porringer." There was great profusion if not
great delicacy upon the table; we shall content ourselves with echoing
what Philippe de Beaumanoir says: "If I undertook to describe the dishes
they had I should stop here forever.... Each had as much as he wished
and whatever he wished: meats, fowls, venison, or fish cooked in many
styles."
[Illustration 4: LADIES HUNTING.
After the painting by Henri Genois.
Sometimes brawls followed the too free use of wine, as one romance tells
us "you might see them throw at each other cheeses, and big
quartern-loaves, and hunks of meat, and sharp steel knives." But
sometimes the ladies strolled off into the gardens and played
games--blindman's-buff, or frog-in-the-middle, or the like--or sang to
the harp, or sewed. A great deal of time, indeed, was spent out of
doors, not only in the gentler field sports, such as hawking, in which
ladies participated, but also in the mere routine of daily life. In the
romances many a scene of revelry as well as of love making takes place
under the trees; and the ladies are not always idling away their time,
either; for we find them spinning, embroidering, or at least making
garlands of flowers.]
Upon a table so appointed and served we can understand that some of the
cautions of Robert de Blois to the ladies would be most useful. "In
eating you must avoid much laughing or talking. If you eat with another
(out of the same _ecuelle_), turn the nicest bits to him, and do not
pick out the finest and largest for yourself, which is not good manners.
Moreover, no one should try to devour a choice bit which is too large or
too hot, for fear of choking or burning herself.... Each time you drink,
wipe your mouth well, that no grease may go into the wine, which is very
unpleasant to the person who drinks after you. But when you wipe your
mouth after drinking, do not wipe your eyes or nose with the tablecloth,
and take care not to get your hands too greasy or let your mouth spill
too much." The really well-bred lady, then, must be like Chaucer's
Prioress:
"At mete was she wel ytaughte withalle;
She lette no morsel from hire lippes falle,
Ne wette hire fingres in hire sauce depe.
Wel coude she carie a morsel, and wel kepe,
Thatte no drope ne fell upon hire brest.
In curtesie was sette ful moche hire lest.
Hire over lippe wiped she so clene,
That in hire cuppe was no ferthing sene
Of grese, when she dronken hadde hire draught.
Ful semely after hire mete she raught."
One might almost fancy that old Dan Chaucer, the first humorist of
modern times, was copying from and slyly poking fun at our friend Robert
de Blois and his fine lady.
"Quant mengie eurent, si laverent.
Li menestrel dont en alerent
Cascuns a son mestier servir."
(When they had eaten, they washed their hands; then the minstrels began,
each doing that which he could do best.) The tables cleared, the guests,
the ladies not excepted, watched the tricks of the jugglers and
tumblers, listened to the minstrels, or told tales, nearly all of which
were horribly coarse. Sometimes brawls followed the too free use of
wine, as one romance tells us "you might see them throw at each other
cheeses, and big quartern-loaves, and hunks of meat, and sharp steel
knives." But sometimes the ladies strolled off into the gardens and
played games--blindman's-buff, or frog-in-the-middle, or the like--or
sang to the harp, or sewed. A great deal of time, indeed, was spent out
of doors, not only in the gentler field sports, such as hawking, in
which ladies participated, but also in the mere routine of daily life.
In the romances many a scene of revelry as well as of love making takes
place under the trees; and the ladies are not always idling away their
time, either; for we find them spinning, embroidering, or at least
making garlands of flowers. We have a pretty picture in the _Roman de la
Violette_ of a burgher's daughter "who sat in her father's chamber,
working a stole and amice in silk, with care and skill, and embroidering
upon her work many a little cross and star, singing the while this
spinning song (_chanson a toile_)."
With all this romance and poetry there went a freedom of intercourse
between the sexes that not infrequently led to serious immorality. Not
only did the ladies play rather rough games and listen to very vulgar
stories with the men, but they received visits from men in their
bed-chambers, _tete-a-tete_. More surprising still, ladies sometimes
visited men in this way, without its being considered a serious breach
of etiquette, as one can see in the fashionable romance of _Jean de
Dammartin et Blonde d'Oxford_. The ladies, when they really fell in
love, did not attempt to conceal the passion from any feeling of shame
or delicacy; nay, they were commonly very forward, and became ardent
suitors sometimes, with less of restraint in word and deed than was
shown by the chivalrous knight under similar circumstances. Indeed, the
knight had need to be a veritable Joseph to withstand temptation, if
there were many scenes in real life like that described, for example, in
the romance of _Amis et Amiles_, where the good knight is pursued by a
demoiselle who positively insists on loving him.
The hours of the lady's day were regulated, we may suppose, by the
proverb which says:
"Lever a cinq, diner a neuf,
Souper a cinq, coucher a neuf,
Fait vivre d'ans nonante et neuf."
(Rising at five, dining at nine, supping at five, sleeping at nine,
makes one live to ninety-and-nine.) Sometimes, instead of rising at five
and dining at nine, it is rising at six and dining at ten, supping at
six and to bed by ten; but we are not, in this case, promised the
ninety-and-nine years of life. Dinner between nine and ten, and other
meals at suitable hours, seems to have been the rule in France even
until the sixteenth century. Breakfast was a very uncertain meal (think
of breakfast before a nine o'clock dinner!), but supper was almost as
elaborate as dinner. As candles and lamps were very expensive, being
regarded as almost a luxury, there was some reason in the early hours
for meals. For the same reason, in summer, when there were no fires to
supply light, most people went to bed as soon as it grew dark. The lady
of the house is told, in a French housekeeper's book of the fourteenth
century, to see that the candles are not wasted. She must go around to
see that all fires are out and the house properly closed and that the
servants are in bed. These latter are to place the candle allowed them
on the floor, at a safe distance from the bed, and the lady must take
care "to teach them to put out their candle with the mouth, or with the
hand before getting in bed, and not by throwing their chemises over
it"--servants, mistress, and all, be it remembered, slept naked.
The kind of life we have been describing, the washing of hands, the
plentiful food, the wine, the amusements, the rich costumes--all these
are things belonging to the lady. The woman of the poorer classes, the
laboring woman, had no such comforts; lucky was she, indeed, if she had
enough of coarse food and coarse clothing for herself and children. The
mediaeval moralists noted the inequality of the classes, and one of them
compares the fare of the rich, which we have mentioned, with that of the
poor: "There was not one among them, great or small, who did not have a
fine appetite for dry (black) bread, and garlic, and salt; nor did they
eat anything else with these, neither mutton, nor beef, nor a bit of
goose or young spring chicken. And after the meal they took up the basin
with both hands, and drank water." Having attempted to give some idea of
the life of a lady of the time, we may now turn to the life of Blanche
de Castille, the first lady of France in the second quarter of the
thirteenth century. For the first time we shall find a woman whose
history will include a large part of the history of France during her
period. As a late biographer, Elie Berger, _Histoire de Blanche de
Castille_, says: "Her life, during a great part of the thirteenth
century, is the life of France itself, the France to which she gave
peace; her history is the history of the power of the throne, of the
monarchy, outside of which there was then no France, no _patrie_."