The Mediaeval Stage, Volume 1 (of 2)

by E. K. Chambers

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Deuteronomy, xxii. 5, a commonplace of anti-stage controversy from Tertullian (de Spectaculis, c. 23) to Histrio-Mastix. Tertullian (loc. cit.) asserts, ‘non amat falsum auctor veritatis; adulterium est apud ilium omne quod fingitur.’

[2] J. Denis, La Comédie grecque (1886), i. 50, 106; ii. 535. The so-called mimes of Herodas (third cent. B. C.) are literary pieces, based probably on the popular mime but not intended for representation (Croiset, Hist. de la Litt. grecque, v. 174).

[3] Livy, vii. 2; Valerius Maximus, ii. 4. 4 (364 B. C.).

[4] Juvenal, x. 81; Dion Chrysostom, Or. xxxii. 370, 18 M.; Fronto, Princip. hist. v. 13. A fourth-century inscription (Bull. d. Commis. arch. comun. di Roma, 1891, 342) contains a list of small Roman tabernarii entitled to locum spectaculis et panem.

[5] The holding capacity of the theatre of Pompey is variously given at from 17,580 to 40,000, that of the theatre of Balbus at from 11,510 to 30,085, that of the theatre of Marcellus as 20,000.

[6] Friedländer, ii. 100; Haigh, 457; Krumbacher, 646; Welcker, Die griechischen Tragödien (1841), iii. 1472.

[7] Juvenal, i. 1; Pliny, Epist. vi. 15; vii. 17; Tacitus, de Oratoribus, 9, 11.

[8] The Sententiae of Publilius Syrus were collected from his mimes in the first century A.D., and enlarged from other sources during the Middle Ages (Teuffel-Schwabe, § 212). Cf. the edition by W. Meyer, 1880. The other fragments of the mimographs are included in O. Ribbeck, Comicorum Romanorum Fragmenta (3rd ed. 1898). Philistion of Bithynia, about the time of Tiberius, gave the mime a literary form once more in his κωμῳδίαι βιολογικαί (J. Denis, La Com. grecque, ii. 544; Croiset, Hist. de la Litt. grecque, v. 449).

[9] Incerti (fourth century) ad Terentium (ed. Giles, i. xix) ‘mimos ab diuturna imitatione vilium rerum et levium personarum.’ Diomedes (fifth century), Ars Grammatica, iii. 488 ‘mimus est sermonis cuiuslibet imitatio et motus sine reverentia, vel factorum et dictorum turpium cum lascivia imitatio.’

[10] Ovid, Tristia, ii. 497:

‘quid, si scripsissem mimos obscoena iocantes,

qui semper vetiti crimen amoris habent.’

[11] Hist. Augusta, Vita Heliogabali, 25 ‘in mimicis adulteriis ea quae solent simulato fieri effici ad verum iussit’; cf. the pyrrichae described by Suetonius, Nero, 12. The Roman taste for bloodshed was sometimes gratified by mimes given in the amphitheatre, and designed to introduce the actual execution of a criminal. Martial, de Spectaculis, 7, mentions the worrying and crucifixion of a brigand in the mime Laureolus, by order of Domitian:

‘nuda Caledonio sic pectora praebuit urso

non falsa pendens in cruce Laureolus.’

[12] Martial, i. 1; Ausonius, Ecl. xviii. 25; Lactantius (†300), de Inst. div. i. 20. 10. Probably the influence of a piece of folk-ritual is to be traced here.

[13] The ‘mimus’ type is exactly reproduced by more than one popular performer on the modern ‘variety’ or ‘burlesque’ stage.

[14] Macrobius, Sat. ii. 7; Cicero, ad Atticum, xiv. 3; Suetonius, Augustus, 45, 68; Tiberius, 45; Caligula, 27; Nero, 39; Galba, 13; Vespasian, 19; Domitian, 10; Hist. Augusta, Vita Marc. Aurel. 8. 29; Vita Commodi, 3; Vita Maximini, 9.

[15] Petronius, Satyricon, liii; cf. Taming of the Shrew, i. 1. 258 ‘’Tis a very excellent piece of work, madam lady; would ’twere done!’

[16] Lucian, de Saltatione, 69.

[17] Juvenal, Sat. vi. 63; Zosimus (450-501 A. D.), i. 6 (Corp. Script. Hist. Byz. xx. 12) ἥ τε γὰρ παντόμιμος ὄρχησις ἐν ἐκείνοις εἰσήχθη τοίς χρόνοις ... πολλῶν αἴτια γεγονότα μέχρι τούδε κακῶν.

[18] This is not wholly so, at any rate in Tacitus, who seems to include the players both of mimes and of Atellanes amongst histriones (Ann. i. 73; iv. 14). For the origin of the name, cf. Livy, vii. 2 ‘ister Tusco verbo ludius vocabatur.’ Besides ludius, actor is good Latin. But it is generally used in some such phrase as actor primarum personarum, protagonist, and by itself often means dominus gregis, manager of the grex or company. Mimus signifies both performer and performance, pantomimus the performer only. He is said saltare fabulas.

[19] Dion Cassius, liv. 17.

[20] Tacitus, Annales, i. 77; iv. 14; Dion Cassius, lvii. 21; Suetonius, Tiberius, 37.

[21] Tacitus, Annales, xiii. 25; xiv. 21; Dion Cassius, lix. 2; lxi. 8; lxviii. 10; Suetonius, Nero, 16, 26; Titus, 7; Domitian, 7; Pliny, Paneg. 46; Hist. Augusta, Vita Hadriani, 19; Vita Alex. Severi, 34.

[22] The pyrricha, a Greek concerted dance, probably of folk origin (cf. ch. ix), was often given a mythological argumentum. It was danced in the amphitheatre.

[23] Valerius Maximus, ii. 6. 7 ‘eadem civitas severitatis custos acerrima est: nullum aditum in scenam mimis dando, quorum argumenta maiore in parte stuprorum continent actus; ne talia spectandi consuetudo etiam imitandi licentiam sumat.’

[24] A. H. J. Greenidge, Infamia (passim); Bouché-Leclercq, Manuel des Institutions romaines, 352, 449; Edictum praetoris in C. I. C. Digest, iii. 2. 1 ‘infamia notatur qui ... artis ludicrae pronuntiandive causa in scaenam prodierit.’ The jurists limited the application of the rule to professional actors. Thymelici, or orchestral musicians, were exempt. Diocletian made a further exemption for persons appearing in their minority (C. I. C. Cod. Iust. ii. 11. 21). The censors, on the other hand, spared the Atellani, whose performances had a traditional connexion with religious rites.

[25] C. I. L. i. 122.

[26] C. I. C. Digest, xlviii. 5. 25. A husband may kill an actor with whom his wife is guilty.

[27] Ibid. xxiii. 2. 42, 44; xxxviii. 1. 37; Ulpian, Fragm. xiii.

[28] Tacitus, Annales, i. 77. An attempt to restore the old usage under Tiberius was unsuccessful.

[29] Caesar was tolerably magnanimous, for Laberius had already taken his revenge in a scurrilous prologue. It had its touch of pathos, too:

‘eques Romanus lare egressus meo

domum revertar mimus.’

[30] Cicero, ad Fam. x. 32; Dion Cassius, xlviii. 33; liii. 31; liv. 2; lvi. 47; lvii. 14; lix. 10; lxi. 9; lxv. 6; Tacitus, Ann. xiv. 20; Hist. ii. 62; Suetonius, Augustus, 45; Domitian, 8.

[31] Suetonius, Nero, 21; Tacitus, Ann. xiv. 14; Juvenal, viii. 198; Pseudo-Lucian, Nero, 9.

[32] Dion Cassius, lxxvii. 21; Hist. Augusta, Vita Heliogabali, 12. Yet in the time of Severus a soldier going on the stage was liable to death (C. I. C. Digest, xlviii. 19. 14).

[33] C. I. C. Cod. Iust. xii. 1. 2.

[34] Cf. p. 38.

[35] Tacitus, Ann. xiv. 20; Juvenal, vi. 60; viii. 183; Martial, ix. 28. 9; Ammianus Marcellinus, xiv. 6. 18; xxviii. 4. 32; Macrobius, ii. 1. 5, 9.

[36] M. Aurelius, Comm. xi. 6; Hist. Augusta, Vita M. Aurel. 15. This refers directly to the circus.

[37] Gibbon, ii. 447; Schaff, v. 49; Dill, 34, 100; P. Allard, Julien l’Apostat, i. 272; Alice Gardner, Julian the Apostate, 201; G. H. Rendall, The Emperor Julian (1879), 106. The most interesting passage is a fragmentary ‘pastoral letter’ to a priest (ed. Hertlein, Fragm. Ep. p. 304 B; cf. Ep. 49, p. 430 B); Julian requires the priests to abstain even from reading the Old Comedy (Fragm. Ep. p. 300 D). He also thinks that the moral layman should avoid the theatre (Misopogon, p. 343 c).

[38] On the critical problem offered by such vitae cf. Prof. Bury in Gibbon, i. l. B. von der Lage, Studien zur Genesius-legende (1898), attempts to show that the legends of St. Genesius (Acta SS. Aug. v. 122), St. Gelasius (Acta SS. Feb. iii. 680), St. Ardalio (Acta SS. Apr. ii. 213), St. Porphyrius (Acta SS. Sept. v. 37), and another St. Porphyrius (Acta SS. Nov. ii. 230) are all variants of a Greek story originally told of an anonymous mimus. The Passio of St. Genesius represents him as a magister mimithemelae artis, converted while he was mimicking a baptism before Diocletian and martyred. It professes to give part of the dialogue of the mime. The legends of St. Philemon (Menologium Basilii, ii. 59; cf. Acta SS. Mar. i. 751) and St. Pelagia or Margarita (Acta SS. Oct. iv. 248) appear to be distinct. Palladius, Vita Chrysostomi, 8, records how the stage of Antioch in the fifth century rang with the scandals caused by the patriarch Severus and other Monophysite heretics.

[39] Tertullian, De Spect., especially cc. 4, 26, 30. Schaff, iv. 833, dates the treatise †200. An earlier Greek writing by Tertullian on the same subject is lost; cf. also his Apologeticus, 15 (P. L. i. 357). The information as to the contemporary stage scattered through Tertullian’s works is collected by E. Nöldechen, Tertullian und das Theater (Z. f. Kirchengeschichte (1894), xv. 161). An anonymous De Spectaculis, formerly ascribed to St. Cyprian, follows on Tertullian’s lines (P. L. iv. 779, transl. in Ante-Nicene Christian Libr. xiii. 221).

[40] Tatian, ad Graecos, 22 (P. G. vi. 856); Minucius Felix, Octavius, 27 (P. L. iii. 352); Cyprian, Epist. i. 8 (P. L. iv. 207); Lactantius, de Inst. div. vi. 20 (P. L. vi. 710), ‘quid de mimis loquar, corruptelarum praeferentibus disciplinam, qui docent adulteria, dum fingunt, et simulatis erudiunt ad vera?’; cf. Du Méril, Or. Lat. 6; Schaff, iii. 339. A remarkable collection of all conceivable authorities against the stage is given by Prynne, 566, 685, &c.

[41] Canones Hippolyti, 67 (Duchesne, 509) ‘Quicumque fit θεατρικός vel gladiator et qui currit vel docet voluptates vel [illegible] vel [illegible] vel κυνηγός vel ἱπποδρόμος [?], vel qui cum bestiis pugnat vel idolorum sacerdos, hi omnes non admittuntur ad sermones sacros nisi prius ab illis immundis operibus purgentur.’ This is from an Arabic translation of a lost Greek original. M. Duchesne says ‘ce recueil de prescriptions liturgiques et disciplinaires est sûrement antérieur au iv^e siècle, et rien ne s’oppose à ce qu’il remonte à la date indiquée par le nom d’Hippolyte’ [†198-236].

[42] Conc. Illib. cc. 62, 67 (Mansi, ii. 16); Conc. Arelat. c. 5 (Mansi, ii. 471); 3 Conc. Carth. cc. 11, 35 (Mansi, iii. 882, 885); 4 Conc. Carth. cc. 86, 88 (Mansi, iii. 958).

[43] The strongest pronouncement is that of Augustine and others in 3 Conc. Carth. c. 11 ‘ut filii episcoporum vel clericorum spectacula saecularia non exhibeant, sed non spectent, quandoquidem ab spectaculo et omnes laici prohibeantur. Semper enim Christianis omnibus hoc interdictum est, ut ubi blasphemi sunt, non accedant.’

[44] 4 Conc. Carth. c. 88 ‘Qui die solenni, praetermisso solenni ecclesiae conventu, ad spectacula vadit, excommunicetur.’

[45] D. C. A. s. vv. Actor, Theatre; Bingham, vi. 212, 373, 439; Alt, 310; Prynne, 556. Some, however, of the pronouncements of the fathers came to have equal force with the decrees of councils in canon law. The Code of Gratian (†1139), besides 3 Conc. Carth. c. 35 ‘scenicis atque ystrionibus, ceterisque huiusmodi personis, vel apostaticis conversis, vel reversis ad Deum, gratia vel reconciliatio non negetur’ (C. I. Can. iii. 2. 96) and 7 Conc. Carth. (419) c. 2 (Mansi, iv. 437) ‘omnes etiam infamiae maculis aspersi, id est histriones ... ab accusatione prohibentur’ (C. I. Can. ii. 4. 1. 1), includes two patristic citations. One is Cyprian, Ep. lxi. (P. L. iv. 362), which is ‘de ystrione et mago illo, qui apud vos constitutus adhuc in suae artis dedecore perseverat,’ and forbids ‘sacra communio cum ceteris Christianis dari’ (C. I. Can. iii. 2. 95); the other Augustine, Tract. C. ad c. 16 Iohannis (P. L. xxxv. 1891) ‘donare res suas histrionibus vitium est immane, non virtus’ (C. I. Can. i. 86. 7). Gratian adds Isidorus Hispalensis, de Eccl. Off. ii. 2 (P. L. lxxxiii. 778) ‘his igitur lege Patrum cavetur, ut a vulgari vita seclusi a mundi voluptatibus sese abstineant; non spectaculis, non pompis intersint’ (C. I. Can. i. 23. 3).

[46] Sathas, 7; Krumbacher, 644. Anastasius Sinaita (bp. of Antioch, 564) in his tract, Adversus Monophysitas ac Monothelitas (Mai, Coll. Nov. Script. Vet. vii. 202), speaks of the συγγράμματα of the Arians as θυμελικὰς βίβλους, and calls the Arian Eunomius πρωτοστάτης τῆς Ἀρείου θυμελικῆς ὀρχήστρας. I doubt if these phrases should be taken too literally; possibly they are not more than a criticism of the buffoonery and levity which the fragments of the Θάλεια display. Krumbacher mentions an orthodox Ἀντιθάλεια of which no more seems to be known.

[47] Alt, 310; Bingham, vi. 273; Schaff, v. 106, 125; Haigh, 460; Dill, 56; P. Allard, Julien l’Apostat. i. 230. The Codex Theodosianus, drawn up and accepted for both empires †435, contains imperial edicts from the time of Constantine onwards.

[48] Spectacula are forbidden on Sunday, unless it is the emperor’s birthday, by C. Th. xv. 5. 2 (386), which also forbids judges to rise for them, except on special occasions, and C. Th. ii. 8. 23 (399). The exception is removed by C. Th. ii. 8. 25 (409) and C. Iust. iii. 12. 9 (469). The Christian feasts and fasts, Christmas, Epiphany, the first week in Lent, Passion and Easter weeks are added by C. Th. ii. 8. 23 (400) and C. Th. xv. 5. 5 (425). According to some MSS. this was done by C. Th. ii. 8. 19 (389), but the events of 399 recorded below seem to show that 400 is the right date.

[49] C. Th. xv. 7. 1, 2 (371); xv. 7. 4 (380); xv. 7. 9 (381). Historians have seen in some of these rescripts which are dated from Milan the influence of St. Ambrose. C. Th. xv. 7. 13 (414) seems to withdraw the concessions, in the interest of the public voluptates, but this may have been only a temporary or local measure.

[50] C. Th. xv. 7. 11 (393); xv. 7. 12 (394); xv. 13. 1 (396).

[51] C. Th. iv. 6. 3 (336) ‘scenicae ... quarum venenis inficiuntur animi perditorum’; xv. 7. 8 (381), of the relapsing scenica, ‘permaneat donec anus ridicula, senectute deformis, nec tunc quidem absolutione potiatur, cum aliud quam casta esse non possit.’

[52] C. Th. xv. 7. 12 (394).

[53] C. Th. xv. 6. 2 (399) is explicit, ‘ludicras artes concedimus agitari, ne ex nimia harum restrictione tristitia generetur.’

[54] C. Th. vi. 4. 2 (327); vi. 4. 4 (339); vi. 4. 29 (396); vi. 4. 32 (397). It appears from the decree of 396 that the ‘theatralis dispensio’ of the praetors had been diverted to the building of an aqueduct; they are now to give ‘scenicas voluptates’ again. Symmachus, Ep. vi. 42, describes his difficulties in getting scenici for his son’s praetorship, which cost him £80,000. They were lost at sea; cf. Dill, 151.

[55] See Appendix A.

[56] C. Th. xv. 7. 5 (380); xv. 7. 10 (385); C. Iust. xi. 41. 5 (409).

[57] C. Th. xv. 7. 8 (381); xiv. 7. 3 (412).

[58] C. Th. xvi. 10. 3 (346). But C. Th. xvi. 10. 17 (399) forbids ‘voluptates’ to be connected with sacrifice or superstition.

[59] A. Puech, St. Jean Chrysostome et les Mœurs de son Temps (1891), 266, has an interesting chapter on the spectacula. He refers to Hom. in Matt. 6, 7, 37, 48; Hom. in Ioann. 18; Hom. in Ep. 1 ad Thess. 5; Hom. de Dav. et Saul, 3; Hom. in Prisc. et Aquil. 1, &c. Most of these works belong to the Antioch period; cf. also Allard, i. 229. In de Sacerdotio 1, Chrysostom, like Augustine, records his own delight in the stage as a young man.

[60] P. G. lvi. 263.

[61] C. I. C. Nov. Iust. cv. 1 (536) ‘faciet processum qui ad theatrum ducit, quem pornas vocant, ubi in scena ridiculorum est locus tragoedis et thymelicis choris’; cf. Choricius, Apology for Mimes, ed. Ch. Graux, in R. d. Philologie, i. 209; Krumbacher, 646.

[62] C. Th. iv. 6. 3 (336); C. Iust. v. 5. 7 (454).

[63] C. Iust. v. 4. 23 (520-3) allows the marriage on condition of an imperial rescript and a dotale instrumentum. C. Iust. i. 4. 33 (534) waives the rescript. It also imposes penalties on fideiussores or sureties of actresses who hinder them from conversion and quitting the stage. For similar legislation cf. Nov. li; lxxxix. 15; cxvii. 4. By Nov. cxvii. 8. 6 a man is permitted to turn his wife out of doors and afterwards repudiate her, if she goes to theatre, circus, or amphitheatre without his knowledge or against his will.

[64] Gibbon, iv. 212, 516 (with Prof. Bury’s additions); C. E. Mallet in E. H. Review, ii. 1; A. Debidour, L’Impératrice Théodora, 59. Neither Prof. Bury nor the editor of the C. I. C. accepts M. Debidour’s dating of C. Iust. v. 4. 23 under Justinian in 534.

[65] Mansi, xi. 943. Canon 3 excludes one who has married a σκηνική from orders. C. 24 forbids priests and monks θυμελικῶν παιγνίων ἀνέχεσθαι, and confirms a decree of the council of Laodicea (cf. p. 24, n. 4) obliging them, if present at a wedding, to leave the room before τὰ παίγνια are introduced. C. 51 condemns, both for clergy and laity, τοὺς λεγομένους μίμους καὶ τὰ τούτων θέατρα and τὰς ἐπὶ σκηνῶν ὀρχήσεις. For clergy the penalty is degradation, for laity excommunication. C. 61 provides a six-years’ excommunication for bear-leaders and such. C. 62 deals with pagan religious festivals of a semi-theatrical character; cf. ch. xiv. C. 66 forbids the circus or any δημώδης θέα in Easter week.

[66] Sathas, passim; Krumbacher, 644.

[67] Jerome, in Ezechiel (410-15) ‘a. spectaculis removeamus oculos arenae circi theatri’ (P. L. xxv. 189); Augustine, de Fide et Symbolo (393) ‘in theatris labes morum, discere turpia, audire inhonesta, videre perniciosa’ (P. L. xl. 639); cf. the sermon quoted in Appendix N, N^o. x.

[68] Ausonius, Idyl. iv. 46; Sidonius, Ep. iv. 12 ‘legebamus, pariter laudabamus, iocabamurque.’

[69] Augustine, Conf. iii. 2, 3 (P. L. xxxii. 683). The whim took him once ‘theatrici carminis certamen inire.’

[70] Aug. de Civ. Dei, ii. 8 (P. L. xli. 53) ‘et haec sunt scenicorum tolerabiliora ludorum, comoediae scilicet et tragoediae; hoc est, tabulae poetarum agendae in spectaculis, multa rerum turpitudine sed nulla saltem sicut alia multa verborum obscoenitate compositae; quas etiam inter studia quae honesta ac liberalia vocantur pueri legere et discere coguntur a senibus.’

[71] Jerome, Ep. 21 (alii 146) ad Damasum, written 383 (P. L. xxii. 386) ‘at nunc etiam sacerdotes Dei, omissis evangeliis et prophetis, videmus comoedias legere, amatoria bucolicorum versuum verba canere, tenere Vergilium, et id quod in pueris necessitatis est, crimen in se facere voluptatis’ (C. I. Can. i. 37. 2).

[72] Orosius, Hist. adv. Paganos (417), iv. 21. 5 ‘theatra incusanda, non tempora.’ On the character of the treatise of Orosius cf. Dill, 312; Gibbon, iii. 490. Mr. Dill shows in the third book of his admirable work that bad government and bad finance had much more to do with the breakdown of the Empire than the bad morals of the stage.

[73] Dill, 58, 137; Hodgkin, i. 930. Salvian was a priest of Marseilles, and wrote between 439 and 451.

[74] Salvian, vi. 31 ‘quae est enim in baptismo salutari Christianorum prima confessio? quae scilicet nisi ut renuntiare se diabolo ac pompis eius et spectaculis atque operibus protestentur?’ The natural interpretation of this is that the word ‘spectaculis’ actually occurred in the formula abrenuntiationis. Was this so? It was not when Tertullian wrote (†200). He gives the formula as ‘renunciare diabolo et pompae et angelis eius,’ and goes on to argue that visiting ‘spectacula’ amounts to ‘idolatria,’ or worship of the ‘diabolus’ (de Spectaculis, c. 4). Nor is the word used in any of the numerous versions of the formula given by Schaff, iii. 248; Duchesne, 293; Martene, i. 44; Martin von Bracara, de Caeremoniis (ed. Caspari), c. 15.

[75] Salvian, vi. 69, 87.

[76] Augustine, de Cons. Evang. i. 33 (P. L. xxxiv. 1068) ‘per omnes pene civitates cadunt theatra ... cadunt et fora vel moenia, in quibus demonia colebantur. Unde enim cadunt, nisi inopia rerum, quarum lascivo et sacrilego usu constructa sunt.’

[77] This point was made also by Chrysostom in the Easter-day sermon, already cited on p. 15.

[78] Salvian, vi. 39, 42, 49.

[79] Sidonius, Ep. i. 10. 2 ‘vereor autem ne famem Populi Romani theatralis caveae fragor insonet et infortunio meo publica deputetur esuries’; cf. Ep. i. 5. 10.

[80] Sidonius, Carm. xxiii. 263 (†460); cf. Ep. ix. 13. 5.

[81] Cassiodorus, Variae, iii. 51 ‘quantum histrionibus rara constantia honestumque votum, tanto pretiosior est, cum in eis probabilis monstratur affectus’; this is illustrated by the conduct of one ‘Thomas Auriga’; Var. ii. 8 ‘Sabinus auriga ... quamvis histrio honesta nos supplicatione permovit’; Var. vi. 4 ‘tanta enim est vis gloriosae veritatis, ut etiam in rebus scenicis aequitas desideretur.’

[82] Schaff, v. 122; Dill, 55. The rescript of Constantine is C. Th. xv. 12. 1 ‘cruenta spectacula in otio civili et domestica quiete non placent; quapropter omnino gladiatores esse prohibemus (325).’

[83] Cassiodorus, Var. iv. 51. Of the mime is said ‘mimus etiam, qui nunc modo derisui habetur, tanta Philistionis cautela repertus est ut eius actus poneretur in litteris’ (cf. p. 4, n. 1); of the pantomime, ‘orchestrarum loquacissimae manus, linguosi digiti, silentium clamosum, expositio tacita.’

[84] Cassiodorus, Var. i. 20, 31-3.

[85] Cf. Appendix A.

[86] Cassiodorus, Var. ix. 21 ‘opes nostras scaenicis pro populi oblectatione largimur.’

[87] Du Méril, Or. Lat. 13, quotes from Mariana, Hist. of Spain, vi. 3, the statement that Sisebut, king of the Visigoths, deposed Eusebius, bishop of Barcelona, in 618, ‘quod in theatro quaedam agi concessisset quae ex vana deorum superstitione traducta aures Christianae abhorrere videantur.’ Sisebuthus, Ep. vi (P. L. lxxx. 370), conveys his decision to the bishop. He says, ‘obiectum hoc, quod de ludis theatriis taurorum, scilicet, ministerio sis adeptus nulli videtur incertum; quis non videat quod etiam videre poeniteat.’ But I cannot find in Sisebut or in Mariana, who writes Spanish, the words quoted by Du Méril. For ‘taurorum’ one MS. has ‘phanorum.’ I suspect the former is right. A bull-fight sounds so Spanish, and such festivals of heathen origin as the Kalends (cf. ch. xi) were not held in theatres. A. Gassier, Le Théâtre espagnol (1898), 14, thinks such a festival is intended; if so, ‘theatriis’ probably means not literally, ‘in a theatre,’ but merely ‘theatrical’; cf. the ‘ludi theatrales’ of the Feast of Fools (ch. xiii). In any case there is no question of ‘scenici.’

[88] Isidorus Hispalensis, Etymologiarum (600-636), xviii. 42 (P. L. lxxxii. 658).

[89] Macrobius, Saturnalia, ii. 1. 5, 9.

[90] Chrysostom, Hom. in Ep. ad Col. cap. 1, Hom. i. cc. 5, 6 (P. G. lxii. 306).

[91] Jerome, Ep. 117 (P. L. xxii. 957) ‘difficile inter epulas servatur pudicitia’; cf. Dill, 110.

[92] Conc. of Laodicea (†343-81) can. 54 (Mansi, ii. 574) ὅτι οὐ δεῖ ἱερατικοὺς ἢ κληρικούς τινας θεωρίας θεωρεῖν ἐν γάμοις ἢ δείπνοις, ἀλλὰ πρὸ τοῦ εἰσέρχεσθαι τοὺς θυμελικοὺς ἐγείρεσθαι αὐτοὺς καὶ ἀναχωρεῖν. Conc. of Braga (†572) c. 60 (Mansi, v. 912), Conc. of Aix-la-Chapelle (816) c. 83 (Mansi, vii. 1361); and finally, C. I. Can. iii. 5. 37 ‘non oportet ministros altaris vel quoslibet clericos spectaculis aliquibus, quae aut in nuptiis aut scenis exhibentur, interesse, sed ante, quam thymelici ingrediantur, surgere eos de convivio et abire.’ It is noteworthy that ‘scenis’ here translates δείπνοις.

[93] Muratori Antiq. Ital. Med. Aev. ii. 847, traces the pantomimi in the Italian mattaccini.

[94] Cf. Appendix B.

[95] Ten Brink, i. 11; P. Meyer in Romania (1876), 260; G. Paris, 36; Gautier, ii. 6; Kögel, i. 2. 191.

[96] Tacitus, Ann. i. 65; iv. 47; Hist. ii. 22; iv. 18; v. 15; Germ. 3; Ammianus Marcellinus, xvi. 12. 43; xxxi. 7. 11; Vegetius, de re militari, iii. 18; cf. Kögel, i. 1. 12, 58, 111; Müllenhoff, Germania, ch. 3. The barditus or barritus of the Germans, whatever the name exactly means, seems to have been articulate, and not a mere noise.

[97] Tacitus, Germ. 2 ‘quod unum apud illos memoriae et annalium genus est.’

[98] Jordanis, de orig. Getarum (in M. G. H.), c. 4 ‘in priscis eorum carminibus pene storico ritu in commune recolitur.’

[99] Tacitus, Ann. ii. 88 ‘canitur adhuc barbaras apud gentes.’

[100] Cassiodorus, Var. viii. 9.

[101] Kögel, i. 1. 122, quoting Paulus Diaconus, i. 27.

[102] Kögel, i. 1. 122; i. 2. 220; Gautier, i. 72; G. Paris, Hist. Poét. de Charlemagne, 50; cf. Poeta Saxo (†890) in M. G. H. Scriptores, i. 268 ‘est quoque iam notum; vulgaria carmina magnis laudibus eius avos et proavos celebrant. Pippinos, Karolos, Hludiwicos et Theodricos, et Carlomannos Hlothariosque canunt.’

[103] Gautier, i. 37; Gröber, ii. 1. 447. The shades of opinion on the exact relation of the cantilenae to the chansons de gestes are numerous.

[104] Vita S. Willelmi (Acta SS. Maii, vi. 801) ‘qui chori iuvenum, qui conventus populorum, praecipue militum ac nobilium virorum, quae vigiliae sanctorum dulce non resonant, et modulatis vocibus decantant qualis et quantus fuerit’; cf. Gautier, i. 66. The merest fragments of such folk-song heroic cantilenae are left. A German one, the Ludwigslied, on the battle of Saucourt (881) is in Müllenhoff und Scherer, Denkmäler deutscher Poesie und Prosa (1892), N^o. xi; cf. Kögel, i. 2. 86; Gautier, i. 62. And a few lines of a (probably) French one on an event in the reign of Clotaire (†620) are translated into Latin in Helgarius (†853-76), Vita S. Faronis (Historiens de France, iii. 505; Mabillon, Acta SS. Benedictinorum, ii. 610). Helgarius calls the song a ‘carmen rusticum’ and says ‘ex qua victoria carmen publicum iuxta rusticitatem per omnium pene volitabat ora ita canentium, feminaeque choros inde plaudendo componebant.’ The Vita S. Faronis in Acta SS. lx. 612, which is possibly an abridgement of Helgarius, says ‘carmine rustico ... suavi cantilena decantabatur’; cf. Gautier, i. 47; Gröber, ii. 1. 446.

[105] Ten Brink, i. 148, quotes from Hist. Ely, ii. 27 (†1166), a fragment of a song on Canute, ‘quae usque hodie in choris publice cantantur,’ and mentions another instance from Wm. of Malmesbury. Cf. de Gestis Herewardi Saxonis (Michel, Chron. Anglo-Norm. ii. 6) ‘mulieres et puellae de eo in choris canebant,’ and for Scotland the song on Bannockburn (1314) which, says Fabyan, Chronicle (ed. Ellis), 420, ‘was after many days sungyn in dances, in carolles of ye maydens and mynstrellys of Scotlande’; cf. also Gummere, B. P. 265.

[106] It is important to recognize that the cantilenae of the folk and those of the professional singers existed side by side. Both are, I think, implied in the account of the St. William songs quoted above: the folk sung them in choruses and on wake-days, the professional singers in the assemblies of warriors. At any rate, in the next (twelfth) cent. Ordericus Vitalis, vi. 3 (ed. Soc. de l’Hist. de France, iii. 5), says of the same Willelmus, ‘Vulgo canitur a ioculatoribus de illo cantilena.’ M. Gautier (ii. 6) will not admit the filiation of the ioculatores to the scôpas, and therefore he is led to suppose (i. 78) that the cantilenae and vulgaria carmina were all folk-song up to the end of the tenth cent. and that then the ioculatores got hold of them and lengthened them into chansons de gestes. But, as we shall see (p. 34), the Franks certainly had their professional singers as early as Clovis, and these cannot well have sung anything but heroic lays. Therefore the cantilenae and vulgaria carmina of the Merovingian and Carolingian periods may have been either folk-song, or scôp-song, or, more probably, both (Gröber, ii. 1. 449). Cantilena really means no more than ‘chant’ of any kind; it includes ecclesiastical chant. So Alcuin uses it (e. g. Ep. civ. in Dümmler, ii. 169); and what Gautier, ii. 65, prints as a folk-song cantilena of S. Eulalia is treated by Gröber, ii. 1. 442, as a sequence.

[107] Gummere, G. O. 260.

[108] Grein, i. 1.

[109] Grein, i. 278.

[110] Beowulf, 89, 499, 869, 1064, 1162, 2106, 2259, 2449.

[111] William of Malmesbury, de gestis Pontif. Angl. (R. S.), 336 ‘quasi artem cantitandi professum, ... sensim inter ludicra verbis scripturarum insertis.’

[112] Grein, ii. 294.

[113] Grein, i. 284. A similar poem is The Sea-farer (Grein, i. 290).

[114] Cynewulf, Elene, 1259 (Grein, ii. 135); Riddle lxxxix (Grein, iii. 1. 183). But A. S. Cook, The Christ (1900), lv, lxxxiii, thinks that Cynewulf was a thane, and denies him the Riddle.

[115] Cynewulf, Christ (ed. Gollancz), 668; Gifts of Men (Grein, iii. 1. 140); Fates of Men (Grein, iii. 1. 148).

[116] William of Malmesbury, Gesta Reg. Angl. (R. S.), i. 126, 143.

[117] Asserius, de rebus gestis Alfredi (Petrie-Sharp, Mon. Hist. Brit. i. 473). Alfred was slow to learn as a boy, but loved ‘Saxonica poemata,’ and remembered them. His first book was a ‘Saxonicum poematicae artis librum,’ and ‘Saxonicos libros recitare et maxime carmina Saxonica memoriter discere non desinebat.’

[118] Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 133 ‘Statuimus atque decernimus ut episcopi vel quicunque ecclesiastici ordinis religiosam vitam professi sunt ... nec citharoedas habeant, vel quaecunque symphoniaca, nec quoscunque iocos vel ludos ante se permittant, quia omnia haec disciplina sanctae ecclesiae sacerdotes fideles suos habere non sinit.’

[119] Ibid. iii. 369 (can. 20) ‘ut monasteria ... non sint ludicrarum artium receptacula, hoc est, poetarum, citharistarum, musicorum, scurrorum.’ Can. 12 shows a fear of the influence of the scôp on ritual: ‘ut presbyteri saecularium poetarum modo in ecclesia non garriant, ne tragico sono sacrorum verborum compositionem et distinctionem corrumpant vel confundant.’ Cf. the twelfth-century account of church singers who used ‘histrionicis quibusdam gestis,’ quoted by Jusserand, E. L. 455, from the Speculum Caritatis of Abbot Ælred of Rievaulx.

[120] Bede to Egbert in 734 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 315) ‘de quibusdam episcopis fama vulgatum est ... quod ipsi ... secum habeant ... illos qui risui, iocis, fabulis ... subigantur.’

[121] Gutberchtus to Lullus in 764 (Dümmler, Epist. Mer. et Car. in M. G. H. i. 406).

[122] Alcuin, Ep. 124 (797) ‘melius est pauperes edere de mensa tua quam istriones vel luxuriosos quoslibet ... verba Dei legantur in sacerdotali convivio. ibi decet lectorem audiri, non citharistam; sermones patrum, non carmina gentium. quid Hinieldus cum Christo? angusta est domus; utrosque tenere non poterit ... voces legentium audire in domibus tuis, non ridentium turbam in plateis.’ The allusion to a lost epic cycle of Hinieldus (Ingeld) is highly interesting; on it cf. Haupt in Z. f. d. A. xv. 314.

[123] The Vitae of Dunstan (Stubbs, Memorials of Dunstan, R. S. 11, 20, 80, 257) record that he himself learnt the ‘ars citharizandi.’ One day he hung ‘citharam suam quam lingua paterna hearpam vocamus’ on the wall, and it discoursed an anthem by itself. Anthems, doubtless, were his mature recreation, but as a young clerk he was accused ‘non saluti animae profutura sed avitae gentilitatis vanissima didicisse carmina, et historiarum frivovolas colere incantationum naenias.’

[124] Anglo-Saxon Canons of Edgar (906), can. 58 (Wilkins, i. 228), sic Latine, ‘docemus artem, ut nullus sacerdos sit cerevisarius, nec aliquo modo scurram agat secum ipso, vel aliis’; Oratio Edgari Regis (969) pro monachatu propaganda (Wilkins, i. 246) ‘ut iam domus clericorum putentur ... conciliabulum histrionum ... mimi cantant et saltant.’

[125] Strutt, 172 and passim.

[126] Wright-Wülker, 150, 311, 539. A synonym for scôp is leodwyrhta. On 188 lyricus is glossed scôp. But the distinctive use of scôp is not in all cases maintained, e.g. tragicus vel comicus unwurð scôp (188), comicus scôp (283), comicus id est qui comedia scribit, cantator vel artifex canticorum seculorum, idem satyricus, i. scôp, ioculator, poeta (206). Other western peoples in contact with Latin civilization came to make the same classification of poet and buffoon. Wackernagel, i. 51, says that the German liuderi or poet is opposed to the skirnun or tûmarâ, scurra or mimus. The buffoon is looked askance at by the dignified Scandinavian men of letters (Saxo Grammaticus, Hist. Danica, transl. Elton, vi. 186); and Keltic bardism stands equally aloof from the clerwr (cf. p. 76). Of course Kelts and Teutons might conceivably have developed their buffoons for themselves, independently of Roman influence, but so far as the Germans go, Tacitus, Germ. 24, knows no spectaculum but the sweorda-gelác or sword-dance (ch. ix).

[127] Brooke, i. 12; Merbot, 11. The gleómon, according to Merbot, became mixed with the plegman or mimus. In the glosses pleȝa = ludus in the widest sense, including athletics; and pleȝ-stowe = amphitheatrum (Wright-Wülker, 342). A synonym of pleȝa is the etymological equivalent of ludus, lâc (cf. ch. viii). Spil is not A. S., spilian, a loan-word (Kögel, i. 1. 11).

[128] Scôp, the O. H. G. scopf or scof is the ‘shaper,’ ‘maker,’ from skapan, ‘to make’; it is only a West-German word, and is distinct from scopf, a ‘scoff,’ ‘mock,’ and also from O. N. skald. This is not West-German, but both ‘sing’ and ‘say’ are from the same root seg (Kögel, i. 1. 140). Gleómon is from gleo, gleow, gliw, glig = ‘glee,’ ‘mirth.’ The harp, in Beowulf and elsewhere, is the ‘glee-beam,’ ‘glee-wood.’

[129] Jordanis, de hist. Get. (in M. G. H.), c. 5 ‘ante quos etiam cantu maiorum facta modulationibus citharisque cantabant.’

[130] Cassiodorus, Variae, ii. 40, 41. Kögel, i. 1. 130, thinks that the professional singer, as distinct from the chorus, first became known to the Franks on this occasion. But one may rather infer from Theodoric’s letter to Boethius that the citharoedus was to replace barbaric by civilized music.

[131] Priscus, Hist. Goth. (ed. Bonn) 205 ἐπιγενομένης δὲ ἑσπέρας δ̂ᾷδες ἀνήφθησαν, δύο δὲ ἀντικρὺ τοῦ Ἀττήλα παρελθόντες βάρβαροι ᾄσματα πεποιημένα ἔλεγον, νίκας αὐτοῦ καὶ τὰς κατὰ πόλεμον ᾄδοντες ἀρετάς ἐς οὓς οἱ τῆς εὐωχίας ἀπέβλεπον, καὶ οἱ μὲν ἤδοντο τοῖς ποιήμασιν, οἱ δὲ τῶν πολέμων ἀναμιμνησκόμενοι διηγείροντο τοῖς φρονήμασιν, ἄλλοι δέ ἐχώρουν ἐς δάκρυα, ὧν ὑπὸ τοῦ χρόνου ἠσθένει τὸ σῶμα καὶ ἡσυχάζειν ὁ θυμὸς ἠναγκάζετο. μετὰ δὲ τὰ ἄσματα Σκύθης τις παρελθὼν φρενοβλαβής, ... ἐς γέλωτα πάντας παρεσκεύασε παρελθεῖν. μεθ’ ὃν ... Ζέρκων ὁ Μαυρουσιος ... πάντας ... ἐς ἄσβεστον ὁρμῆσαι γέλωτα παρεσκεύασε, πλὴν Ἀττήλα. Cf. Gibbon, iii. 440; Hodgkin, ii. 86; Kögel, i. 1. 114.

[132] Procopius, de bell. Vandal. ii. 6; Victor Vitensis, de persec. Vandal. i. 15. 47.

[133] Sidonius, Ep. i. 2. 9 ‘sane intromittuntur, quamquam raro, inter coenandum mimici sales, ita ut nullus conviva mordacis linguae felle feriatur.’ There are no musicians, ‘rege solum illis fidibus delenito, quibus non minus mulcet virtus animum quam cantus auditum.’ In Carm. xii Sidonius mentions Gothic songs, without specifying whether they are professional or choric.

[134] Alcuin, Ep. cclxxxi (793-804), to a disciple in Italy, ‘melius est Deo placere quam histrionibus, pauperum habere curam quam mimorum’; Ep. ccl (†801), to the monks of Fulda, ‘non sint [adulescentuli] luxuriosi, non ebrietati servientes, non contemptuosi, non inanes sequentes ludos’; Ep. ccxliv (†801), to Fredegis, master of the palace school, ‘non veniant coronatae columbae ad fenestras tuas, quae volant per cameras palatii, nec equi indomiti inrumpant ostia camerae; nec tibi sit ursorum saltantium cura, sed clericorum psallentium.’ The ‘coronatae columbae’ were Charlemagne’s wanton daughters. Dümmler (Ep. Mer. et Car. ii. 541) prints a responsio of Leidradus, Abp. of Lyons, to Charles. This is interesting, because it contrasts the ‘mobilitas histrionum’ which tempts the eye, with the ‘carmina poetarum et comediarum mimorumque urbanitates et strophae,’ which tempt the ear. This looks as if histriones, in the sense of pantomimi, were still known, but the piece also mentions ‘teatrorum moles’ and ‘circenses,’ and is, I suspect, quite antiquarian.

[135] Ep. clxxv (799), to Adalhart, Bp. of Old Corbey, ‘Vereor, ne Homerus [Angilbert] irascatur contra cartam prohibentem spectacula et diabolica figmenta. quae omnes sanctae scripturae prohibent, in tantum ut legebam sanctum dicere Augustinum, “nescit homo, qui histriones et mimos et saltatores introducit in domum suam, quam magna eos immundorum sequitur turba spirituum.” sed absit ut in domo christiana diabolus habeat potestatem’ (the quotation from Augustine cannot be identified): Ep. ccxxxvii (801), also to Adalhart, ‘quod de emendatis moribus Homeri mei scripsisti, satis placuit oculis meis ... unum fuit de histrionibus, quorum vanitatibus sciebam non parvum animae sui periculum imminere, quod mihi non placuit, ... mirumque mihi visum est, quomodo tam sapiens animus non intellexisset reprehensibilia dignitati suae facere et non laudabilia.’ Angilbert also seems to have had relations unbecoming an abbot with one of the ‘coronatae columbae.’

[136] Capit. of Mantua (Boretius, i. 195), can. 6 ‘neque ulla iocorum genera ante se fieri permittant quae contra canonum auctoritatem eveniunt.’

[137] Capit. Generale (Boretius, i. 64; P. L. xcvii. 188), c. 31 ‘ut episcopi et abbates et abbatissae cupplas canum non habeant, nec falcones, nec accipitres, nec ioculatores.’ If this is the carta of Alcuin’s Ep. clxxv, and I know of no other which it can be, Dümmler’s date for the letter of 799 seems too late. Mabillon’s 791 is nearer the mark.

[138] Capit. Gen. (Boretius, i. 96), can. 23 ‘cleri ... non inanis lusibus vel conviviis secularibus vel canticis vel luxuriosis usum habeant.’

[139] Conc. of Tours (Mansi, xiv. 84), c. 7 ‘histrionum quoque turpium et obscoenorum insolentiis iocorum et ipsi [sacerdotes] animo effugere caeterisque sacerdotibus effugienda praedicare debent.’

[140] Einhard, Vita Caroli Magni, c. 29 ‘barbara et antiquissima carmina, quibus veterum regum actus et bella canebantur, scripsit memoriaeque mandavit.’

[141] Alcuin, Ep. cxlix (798), to Charlemagne, ‘ut puerorum saevitia vestrorum cuiuslibet carminis dulcedine mitigaretur, voluistis’; Alcuin, who doubtless had to ménager Charlemagne a little, is apparently to write the poem himself.

[142] Kögel, i. 2. 222. The Chronicon Novaliciense, iii. 10, describes how after crossing Mt. Cenis in 773, Charlemagne was guided by a Lombard ioculator who sung a ‘cantiunculam a se compositam de eadem re rotando in conspectu suorum.’ As a reward the ioculator had all the land over which his tuba sounded on a hill could be heard. The Monachus S. Galli (Jaffé, Bibl. rer. Germ. iv), i. 13, tells how (†783) a scurra brought about a reconciliation between Charlemagne and his brother-in-law Uodalrich. The same writer (i. 33) mentions an ‘incomparabilis clericus’ of the ‘gloriosissimus Karolus,’ who ‘scientia ... cantilenae ecclesiasticae vel iocularis novaque carminum compositione sive modulatione ... cunctos praecelleret.’

[143] Philippe Mouskes, de Poetis Provincialibus (quoted Ducange, s. v. leccator):

‘Quar quant li buens Rois Karlemaigne

Ot toute mise à son demaine

Provence, qui mult iert plentive

De vins, de bois, d’aigue, de rive,

As lecours, as menestreus,

Qui sont auques luxurieus,

Le donna toute et departi.’

[144] Kögel, i. 2. 220.

[145] Theganus, de gestis Ludovici Pii (M. G. H. Scriptores, ii. 594), c. 19 ‘Poetica carmina gentilia, quae in iuventute didicerat, respuit, nec legere nec audire nec docere voluit,’ and ‘nunquam in risu exaltavit vocem suam, nec quando in festivitatibus ad laetitiam populi procedebant thymelici, scurrae, et mimi cum choraulis et citharistis ad mensam coram eo, tunc ad mensuram ridebat populus coram eo, ille nunquam vel dentes candidos suos in risu ostendit.’ The ‘carmina gentilia,’ so much disliked by Louis, were probably Frankish and not classic poems.

[146] Benedictus Levita, vi. 205 (M. G. H. Leges, ii. 2. 83), ‘ne in illo sancto die vanis fabulis aut locutionibus sive cantationibus vel saltationibus stando in biviis et plateis ut solet inserviant.’ On this collection see Schaff, v. 272.

[147] This capitulary is of doubtful date, but belongs to the reign either of Louis the Pious, or Lothair (Boretius, i. 334; Pertz, i. 324; Ben. Levita, ii. 49) ‘ut in palatiis nostris ad accusandum et iudicandum et testimonium faciendum non se exhibeant viles personae et infames, histriones scilicet, nugatores, manzeres, scurrae, concubinarii, ... aut servi aut criminosi’; cf. R. Sohm, Die fränk. Reichs-und Gerichtsverfassung, 354.

[148] For ninth-century prohibitions see Statutes of Haito, Bp. of Basle (807-23), c. 11 (Boretius, i. 364); Conc. of Maintz (847), c. 13 (Boretius, ii. 179); Conc. of Maintz (852), c. 6 (Boretius, ii. 187); Capit. of Walter of Orleans (858), c. 17 (Mansi, xv. 507), Capit. of Hincmar of Rheims (P. L. cxxv. 776); and cf. Prynne, 556. Stress is often laid on the claims of the poor; e. g. Agobardus (†836), de Dispens. Eccles. Rer. 30 (P. L. civ. 249) ‘satiat praeterea et inebriat histriones, mimos, turpissimosque et vanissimos ioculares, cum pauperes ecclesiae fame discruciati intereant.’

[149] Otto Frisingensis, Chronicon, vi. 32, records of the Emperor Henry III in 1045 that ‘quumque ex more regio nuptias Inglinheim celebraret, omne balatronum et histrionum collegium, quod, ut assolet, eo confluxerat, vacuum abire permisit, pauperibusque ea quae membris diaboli subtraxerat, large distribuit.’ After the death of the Emperor Henry I of Germany his widow Matilda ‘neminem voluit audire carmina saecularia cantantem’ (Vita Machtildis Antiquior in M. G. H. Scriptores, iv. 294).

[150] Honorius Augustodunensis, Elucidarium (†1092), ii. 18 (P. L. clxxii. 1148) ‘Habent spem ioculatores? nullam; tota namque intentione sunt ministri Satanae’; on the vogue of this book cf. Furnivall Miscellany, 88.

[151] The following passages of the Decretum Gratiani, besides those already quoted, bear on the subject: (a) i. 23. 3, ex Isid. de Eccl. Officiis, ii. 2 ‘His igitur lege Patrum cavetur, ut a vulgari vita seclusi a mundi voluptatibus sese abstineant; non spectaculis, non pompis intersint’: (b) i. 44. 7, ex Conc. Nannetensi ‘Nullus presbyterorum ... quando ad collectam presbyteri convenerit ... plausus et risus inconditos, et fabulas inanes ibi referre aut cantare praesumat, aut turpia ioca vel urso vel tornatricibus ante se fieri patiatur’; I cannot identify the Council of Nantes referred to: the canon is not amongst those supposed to belong to the Council of 660, and given by Mansi, xviii. 166: (c) i. 46. 6, ex Conc. Carthag. iv. c. 60 [398. Mansi, iii. 956] ‘Clericum scurrilem et verbis turpibus ioculatorem ab officio retrahendum censemus’: (d) ii. 4. 1. 1, ex Conc. Carthag. vii (419) ‘Omnes etiam infamiae maculis aspersi, id est histriones ... ab accusatione prohibentur.’ The Decretum Gratiani was drawn up †1139. The Decretales of Gregory IX (1234) incorporate can. 16 of the Lateran Council (Mansi, xxii. 1003), held in 1215 (Decr. Greg. IX, iii. 1. 15) ‘[Clerici] mimis, ioculatoribus, et histrionibus non intendant’; and the Liber Sextus of Boniface VIII (1298) adds the following decree of that Pope (Sext. Decr. iii. 1. 1) ‘Clerici qui, clericalis ordinis dignitati non modicum detrahentes, se ioculatores seu goliardos faciunt aut bufones, si per annum artem illam ignominiosam exercuerint, ipso iure, si autem tempore breviori, et tertio moniti non resipuerint, careant omni privilegio clericali.’

[152] Wilkins, i. 585. For can. 16 of the Lateran council see last note. The prohibition is again confirmed by can. 17 of the Synod of Exeter in 1287 (Wilkins, ii. 129).

[153] Constitutiones of Bp. Grosseteste in his Epistolae (R. S.), 159 ‘ne mimis, ioculatoribus, aut histrionibus intendant.’ In 1230, Grosseteste’s predecessor, Hugh of Wells, had bid his archdeacons inquire, ‘an aliqui intendant histrionibus’ (Wilkins, i. 627).

[154] Annales de Burton (Ann. Monast. R. S. i. 485) ‘histrionibus potest dari cibus, quia pauperes sunt, non quia histriones; et eorum ludi non videantur, vel audiantur, vel permittantur fieri coram abbate vel monachis.’

[155] Const. of Roger de Mortival, § 46 (Dayman and Jones, Sarum Statutes, 76) ‘licet robustos corpore, laborem ad quem homo nascitur subire contemnentes, et in delicato otio sibi victum quaerere sub inepta laetitia saeculi eligentes, qui “menestralli” et quandoque “ludorum homines” vulgari eloquio nuncupantur, non quia tales sunt, sed quia opus Dei nostramque naturam conspicimus in eisdem, nostris domibus refectionis gratia aliquotiens toleremus,’ yet no money or goods convertible into money may be given them; ‘nec ad fabulas quas referunt, et quae in detractationibus, turpiloquio, scurrilitate consistunt, ullus voluntarium praebeat auditum, nec ad eas audiendas aures habeat prurientes, sed per obauditionem ab huiusmodi relatibus, quin potius latratibus, in quantum fieri poterit, excludantur, tamen nemo libenter invito referat auditori.’ They may, if they are not women, have their dole of bread, and keep peace from evil words. ‘Nec debet de huiusmodi personarum, quae infames sunt, laude, immo verius fraude, seu obloquio, aut alias vanae laudis praeconio, ecclesiasticus vir curare, cum nihil eo miserius sit praelato, qui luporum laudibus gloriatur.’ The statute is headed ‘De maledicis, adulatoribus, histrionibus, et detractoribus respuendis.’

[156] Thomas Walsingham, Gesta Abbatum S. Albani (ed. Riley, R. S. ii. 469) ‘illicita spectacula prorsus evitent’ (1326-35).

[157] J. T. Fowler, Memorials of Ripon Minster, ii. 68 (Surtees Soc.); the charge was that ‘vicarii, capellani, et caeteri ministri ... spectaculis publicis, ludibriis et coreis, immo teatricalibus ludis inter laicos frequentius se immiscent.’

[158] The Statutes, i. 5. 4, of St. Paul’s, as late as †1450, direct the beadles ‘quod menestrallos coram altaribus Virginis et Crucis indevote strepitantes arceant et eiiciant’ (W. S. Simpson, Register of St. Paul’s, 72).

[159] John of Salisbury, Polycraticus (†1159), i. 8 (P. L. cxcix. 406) ‘satius enim fuerat otiari quam turpiter occupari. Hinc mimi, salii vel saliares, balatrones, aemiliani, gladiatores, palaestritae, gignadii, praestigiatores, malefici quoque multi, et tota ioculatorum scena procedit.’

[160] Cf. Representations, s.v. London.

[161] R. Mannyng de Brunne (†1303), Handlyng Synne (ed. Furnivall), 148. ‘Here doyng ys ful perylous’ he translates William of Wadington’s ‘Qe unt trop perilus mester’; and tells a tale of divine judgement on ‘a mynstralle, a gulardous,’ who disturbed a priest at mass.

[162] Piers the Plowman, C. text, viii. 97:

‘Clerkus and knyȝtes · welcometh kynges mynstrales,

And for loue of here lordes · lithen hem at festes;

Muche more, me thenketh · riche men auhte

Haue beggars by-fore hem · whiche beth godes mynstrales.’

[163] Cant. Tales (ed. Skeat), § 69 ‘Soothly, what thing that he yeveth for veyne glorie, as to minstrals and to folk, for to beren his renoun in the world, he hath sinne ther-of, and noon almesse.’

[164] e. g. Stubbes, Anatomy, i. 169.

[165] Aucassin et Nicolete (†1150-1200), ed. Bourdillon (1897), 22. The term ‘caitif’ has puzzled the editors. Surely the minstrel has in mind the abusive epithets with which the clergy bespattered his profession. See Appendix B.

[166] See especially Le Tombeor de Notre Dame (Romania, ii. 315). Novati (Rom. xxv. 591) refers to a passage quoted by Augustine, de Civ. Dei, vi. 10, from the lost work of Seneca, de Superstitionibus, ‘doctus archimimus, senex iam decrepitus, cotidie in Capitolio mimum agebat, quasi dii libenter spectarent quem illi homines desierant.’ Somewhat similar are Don Cierge qui descendi au Jougleour (Gautier de Coincy), Miracles de Nostre Dame (†1223, ed. Poquet, 1859), and Le Harpeor de Roncestre (Michel, Roms., Contes, Dits, Fabl. ii. 108). Saint Pierre et le Jongleur (Montaiglon Raynaud, v. 117) is a witty tale, in which a minstrel, left in charge of hell, loses so many souls to St. Peter at dice, that no minstrel has been allowed there since. B. Joannes Bonus (Acta SS. Oct. ix. 693) was a minstrel in his youth, but the patron saints of the minstrels were always St. Genesius the mime (cf. p. 10), and St. Julian Hospitator (Acta SS. Jan. iii. 589), who built a hospital and once entertained an angel unawares.

[167] Paris, 113; Bédier, 333.

[168] Brooke, Eng. Lit. 305; Ten Brink, i. 149.

[169] Sophus Bugge, in Bidrag til den aeldste Skaldedigtnings Historie (1894; cf. L. Duvau in Rev. Celt. xvii. 113), holds that Skaldic poetry began in the Viking raids of the eighth and ninth centuries, under the influence of the Irish filid. The tenth-century skald as described in the Raven-Song of Hornklofi at the court of Harold Fair-hair is very like the scôp (C. P. B. i. 254), and here too tumblers and buffoons have found their way. Cf. Kögel, i. 1. 111; E. Mogk, in Paul, Grundriss², iii. 248.

[170] Guy of Amiens, de Bello Hastingensi (†1068), 391, 399:

‘Histrio, cor audax nimium quem nobilitabat ...

... Incisor-ferri mimus cognomine dictus.’

Wace, Roman de Rou (†1170) (ed. Andresen, iii. 8035):

‘Taillefer, ki mult bien chantout,

Sor un cheval ki tost alout,

Devant le duc alout chantant

De Karlemaigne et de Rolant

Et d’Oliver et des vassals

Qui morurent en Rencevals.’

Cf. Freeman, Norman Conquest, iii. 477.

[171] Domesday Book, Gloc. f. 162; Hants, f. 38 (b). Before the Conquest, not to speak of Widsith and Deor, Edmund Ironside had given the hills of Chartham and Walworth ‘cuidam ioculatori suo nomine Hitardo’ (Somner-Battely, Antiq. of Canterbury, app. 39). Hitardus, wishing to visit Rome, gave it to Christ Church, Canterbury.

[172] Bernhard, iii. 378, gives a thirteenth-century regulation for the Petit Pont entry of Paris: ‘Et ausi tot li jougleur sunt quite por i ver de chançon.’

[173] Gautier, ii. 124.

[174] There were 426 at the wedding of Margaret of England with John of Brabant in 1290 (Chappell, i. 15, from Wardrobe Bk. 18 Edw. I).

[175] Rigordus, de gestis Philippi Augusti (1186) ‘vidimus quondam quosdam principes qui vestes diu excogitatas et variis florum picturationibus artificiossisimis elaboratas, pro quibus forsan viginti vel triginta marcas argenti consumpserant, vix revolutis septem diebus, histrionibus, ministris scilicet diaboli, ad primam vocem dedisse.’

[176] The Annales (†1330) of Johannes de Trokelowe (R. S.), 98, tell s. a. 1317, how when Edward II was keeping Pentecost in Westminster ‘quaedam mulier, ornatu histrionali redimita, equum bonum, histrionaliter phaleratum, ascensa, dictam aulam intravit, mensas more histrionum circuivit.’ She rode to the king, placed an insulting letter in his hands, and retired. The ‘ianitores et hostiarii,’ when blamed, declared ‘non esse moris regii, alicui menestrallo, palatium intrare volenti, in tanta solemnitate aditum denegare’; cf. Walsingham, Hist. Angl. (R. S.). i. 149.

[177] Strutt, 189, has a fourteenth-century story of a youth rebuked for coming to a feast in a coat bardy, cut German fashion like a minstrel’s; cf. the complaint against knights in A Poem on the times of Edward II (Percy Soc. lxxxii), 23:

‘Now thei beth disgysed,

So diverselych i-diȝt,

That no man may knowe

A mynstrel from a knyȝt

Wel ny.’

The miniatures show minstrels in short coats to the knees and sometimes short capes with hoods. The Act of Apparel (1463, 3 Edw. IV, c. 5) excepts minstrels and ‘players in their interludes.’ The Franciscan story (p. 57) shows that some of the humbler minstrels went shabby enough.

[178] Klein, iii. 635; Du Méril, Or. Lat. 30; Gautier, ii. 104; Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia Britonum, ix. 1 ‘rasit capillos suos et barbam, cultumque ioculatoris cum cithara cepit.’ Cf. the canon quoted on p. 61 requiring Goliardic clerks to be shorn or shaven, to obliterate the tonsure. The flat shoe had been a mark of the mimi planipedes at Rome.

[179] Gautier, ii. 105. Thus Nicolete (Aucassin et Nicolete, ed. Bourdillon, 120) ‘prist une herbe, si en oinst son cief et son visage, si qu’ele fu tote noire et tainte. Et ele fist faire cote et mantel et cemisse et braies, si s’atorna a guise de jogleor’; cf. King Horn (ed. Hall, 1901), 1471-2:

‘Hi sede, hi weren harpurs,

And sume were gigours.’

[180] Roger de Hoveden, Chronicon (R. S.), iii. 143 ‘De regno Francorum cantores et ioculatores muneribus allexerat, ut de illo canerent in plateis; et iam dicebatur quod non erat talis in orbe.’

[181] Ten Brink, i. 314.

[182] Malory, Morte d’Arthur, x. 27, 31. Even King Mark let the minstrel go quit, because he was a minstrel.

[183] Cf. p. 40.

[184] Ordericus Vitalis, Hist. Eccles. xii. 19 ‘pro derisoriis cantionibus ... quin etiam indecentes de me cantilenas facetus choraula composuit, ad iniuriam mei palam cantavit, malevolosque mihi hostes ad cachinnos ita saepe provocavit.’ Lucas de Barre seems to have been of noble birth, but ‘palam cantavit cantilenas.’

[185] Cf. p. 30.

[186] Speculum Perfectionis (ed. Sabatier), 197. When Francis had finished his Canticle of the Sun, he thought for a moment of summoning ‘frater Pacificus qui in saeculo vocabatur rex versuum et fuit valde curialis doctor cantorum,’ and giving him a band of friars who might sing it to the people at the end of their sermons: ‘finitis autem laudibus volebat quod praedicator diceret populo: “Nos sumus ioculatores Domini, et pro his volumus remunerari a vobis, videlicet ut stetis in vera paenitentia.” Et ait: “Quid enim sunt servi Dei nisi quidam ioculatores eius qui corda hominum erigere debent et movere ad laetitiam spiritualem.”’ Cf. Sabatier, Life of St. Francis, 9, 51, 307. Perhaps Francis may have heard of Joachim of Flora, his contemporary, who wrote in his Commentary on the Apocalypse, f. 183. a. 2 ‘qui vere monachus est nihil reputat esse suum nisi citharam.’

[187] The MS. of the famous thirteenth-century canon Sumer is icumen in has religious words written beneath the profane ones; cf. Wooldridge, Oxford Hist. of Music, i. 326. Several religious adaptations of common motives of profane lyric are amongst the English thirteenth-century poems preserved in Harl. MS. 2253 (Specimens of Lyrical Poetry: Percy Soc., 1842, no. 19, and ed. Böddeker, Berlin, 1878).

[188] Jusserand, E. W. L. 195, 199, 215; Strutt, 194-5, 210, 227; Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 119; Chappell, i. 15; Collier, i. 22; Wardrobe Accounts of Edward I (Soc. Antiq.), 163, 166, 168.

[189] Cf. Appendix C.

[190] Cf. Appendix D.

[191] This cannot be the famous Adan de le Hale (cf. ch. viii), known as ‘le Bossu,’ if Guy, 178, is right in saying that his nephew, Jean Mados, wrote a lament for his death in 1288. He quotes Hist. Litt. xx. 666, as to this.

[192] Gautier, ii. 103; Bédier, 405, quote many similar names; e.g. Quatre Œufs, Malebouche, Ronge-foie, Tourne-en-fuie, Courtebarbe, Porte-Hotte, Mal Quarrel, Songe-Feste a la grant viele, Mal-appareillié, Pelé, Brise-Pot, Simple d’Amour, Chevrete, Passereau.

[193] William of Malmesbury, Gesta Reg. Angl. (R. S.), ii. 494.

[194] Ordericus Vitalis, v. 12, &c. On one occasion ‘ad ecclesiam, quia nudus erat, non pervenit.’

[195] Bédier, 359.

[196] Gautier, chs. xx, xxi, gives an admirable account of the jougleur’s daily life, and its seamy side is brought out by Bédier, 399-418. A typical jougleur figure is that of the poet Rutebeuf, a man of genius, but often near death’s door from starvation. See the editions of his works by Jubinal and Kressner, and the biography by Clédat in the series of Grands Écrivains français.

[197] Morley, Bartholomew Fair, 1-25, from Liber Fundacionis in Cott. Vesp. B. ix; Leland, Collectanea, 1, 61, 99; Dugdale, Monasticon, ii. 166; Stow, Survey, 140; C. Knight, London, ii. 34; Percy, 406. No minstrels, however, appear in the formal list of Henry I’s Norman Household (†1135), which seems to have been the nucleus of the English Royal Household as it existed up to 1782 (Hall, Red Book of Exchequer, R.S., iii. cclxxxvii, 807).

[198] Gautier, ii. 47, 54; G. Paris, § 88; Ambroise, L’Estoire de la Guerre Sainte, ed. G. Paris (Documents inédits sur l’Hist. de France, 1897).

[199] Percy, 358.

[200] Madox, Hist. of Exchequer, 268.

[201] Percy, 365.

[202] Walter Hemmingford, Chronicon, c. 35 (Vet. Hist. Angl. Script. ii. 591).

[203] Chappell, i. 15, from Wardrobe Book, 18 Edw. I.

[204] Wardrobe Accounts of Edw. I (Soc. Antiq.), 323.

[205] Anstis, Register of Order of the Garter, ii. 303, from Pat. de terr. forisfact. 16 Edw. III. Cf. Gesta Edw. de Carnarvon in Chron. of Edw. I and II (R. S.), ii. 91 ‘adhaesit cantoribus, tragoedis, aurigis, navigiis et aliis huiuscemodi artificiis mechanicis.’

[206] Strutt, 194; Issue Roll of Thomas de Brantingham (ed. Devon), 54-57, 296-8.

[207] Household Ordinances, 4, 11.

[208] Rymer, vii. 555.

[209] Ibid. ix. 255, 260, 336.

[210] Ibid. x. 287; xi. 375.

[211] Household Ordinances, 48.

[212] Rymer, xi. 642; cf. Appendix D.

[213] Ibid. xiii. 705; Collier, i. 45; Campbell, i. 407, 516, 570; ii. 100, 224.

[214] Wardrobe Accounts of Edw. I (Soc. Antiq.), 7, 95; Calendar of Anc. Deeds, ii. A, 2050, 2068, 2076.

[215] Strutt, 189.

[216] Collier, i. 46; Campbell, i. 407, 542, 572; ii. 68, 84, 176.

[217] The entry ‘ad solvendum histrionibus’ occurs in 1364 (Compoti Camerarii Scot. i. 422). The Exchequer Rolls from 1433-50 contain payments to the ‘mimi,’ ‘histriones,’ ‘ioculatores regis’; and in 1507-8 for the ‘histriones in scaccario’ or ‘minstrels of the chekkar’ (Accounts of Treasurer of Scotland, i. xx, cxcix; ii. lxxi).

[218] Cf. Appendix C.

[219] Collier, i. 21, from Lansd. MS. 1. Two of this lord’s menestriers were entertained by Robert of Artois, who also had his own (Guy, 154).

[220] Gautier, ii. 51; cf. the extracts from various computi in Appendix E. There are many entries also in the accounts of King’s Lynn (Hist. MSS. xi. 3. 213); Beverley (Leach, Beverley MSS. 171), &c.

[221] L. T. Smith, Derby Accounts (C. S.), xcvi.

[222] Percy, N. H. B. 42, 344.

[223] Stowe, Survey, 39 (London); Smith, English Guilds, 423, 447 (Bristol, Norwich); Davies, 14 (York); Kelly, 131 (Leicester); Morris, 348 (Chester); Civis, No. xxi (Canterbury); Sharpe, 207 (Coventry); Hist. MSS. xi. 3. 163 (Lynn); Leach, Beverley MSS. 105, &c. (Beverley); for Shrewsbury cf. Appendix E. On Waits’ Badges, cf. Ll. Jewitt, in Reliquary, xii. 145. Gautier, ii. 57, describes the communal cantorini of Perugia, from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century. The usual Latin term for the Beverley waits is speculatores; but they are also called ministralli, histriones and mimi. Apparently waits are intended by the satrapi of the Winchester Accounts (App. E. (iv)). Elsewhere histriones is the most usual term. The signatories to the 1321 statutes of the Paris guild include several guètes (Bernhard, iii. 402).

[224] Household Ordinances, 48 ‘A Wayte, that nyghtly, from Mighelmasse till Shere-Thursday, pipeth the watche within this courte fower tymes, and in the somer nyghtes three tymes.’ He is also to attend the new Knights of the Bath when they keep watch in the chapel the night before they are dubbed.

[225] The Lynn waits had to go through the town from All Saints to Candlemas. Those of Coventry had similar duties, and in 1467 were forbidden ‘to pass this Cite but to Abbotts and Priors within x myles of this Cite.’

[226] The six minstrels of the Earl of Derby in 1391 had a livery of ‘blod ray cloth and tanne facings’ (Wylie, iv. 160).

[227] Household Ordinances, 48: ‘Mynstrelles, xiii, whereof one is verger, that directeth them all in festivall dayes to theyre stations, to bloweings and pipynges, to suche offices as must be warned to prepare for the king and his houshold at metes and soupers, to be the more readie in all servyces; and all these sittinge in the hall togyder; whereof sume use trumpettes, sume shalmuse and small pipes, and sume as strengemen, comyng to this courte at five festes of the yere, and then to take theyre wages of houshold after iiij^d ob. a day, if they be present in courte, and then they to avoyde the next day after the festes be done. Besides eche of them anothyr reward yerely, taking of the king in the resceyte of the chekker, and clothing wynter and somer, or xx^s a piece, and lyverey in courte, at evyn amonges them all, iiij gallons ale; and for wynter season, iij candels wax, vj candells peris’, iiij talwood, and sufficiaunt logging by the herberger, for them and theyre horses, nygh to the courte. Also havyng into courte ij servauntes honest, to beare theyre trumpettes, pipes, and other instrumentes, and a torche for wynter nyghts, whyles they blowe to souper, and other revelles, delyvered at the chaundrey; and allway ij of these persons to continue in courte in wages, beyng present to warne at the kinge’s rydinges, when he goeth to horse-backe, as ofte as it shall require, and by theyre blowinges the houshold meny may follow in the countries. And if any of these two minstrelles be sicke in courte, he taketh ij loves, one messe of grete mete, one gallon ale. They have no part of any rewardes gevyn to the houshold. And if it please the kinge to have ij strenge Minstrelles to contynue in like wise. The kinge wull not for his worshipp that his Minstrelles be too presumptuous, nor too familier to aske any rewardes of the lordes of his londe, remembring De Henrico secundo imperatore [1002-24] qui omnes Ioculatores suos et Armaturos monuerit, ut nullus eorum in eius nomine vel dummodo steterint in servicio suo nihil ab aliquo in regno suo deberent petere donandum; sed quod ipsi domini donatores pro Regis amore citius pauperibus erogarent.’

[228] Percy, N. H. B. (†1512), 339. The king’s shawms, if they came yearly, got 10s., the king’s jugler and the king’s or queen’s bearward, 6s. 8d.; a duke’s or earl’s trumpeters, if they came six together, also got 6s. 8d., an earl’s minstrels only 3s. 4d. If the troupe came only once in two or three years, and belonged to a ‘speciall Lorde, Friende, or Kynsman’ of the earl, the rate was higher.

[229] Gautier, ii. 107, from Bibl. de l’Arsenal MS. 854; e.g. ‘Deprecatio pro dono instrioni impendendo. Salutem et amoris perpetui firmitatem. R. latorem praesentium, egregium instrionem qui nuper meis interfuit nuptiis, ubi suum officium exercuit eleganter, ad vos cum magna confidentia destinamus, rogantes precibus, quibus possumus, quatinus aliquid subsidium gracie specialis eidem impendere debeatis.’ Collier, i. 42, gives a letter of Richard III for his bearward.

[230] Collier, i. 41.

[231] Strutt, 194; Gautier, ii. 173-8; H. Lavoix, ii. 198. They are called Scolae ministrorum, Scolae mimorum. They can be traced to the fourteenth century. Genève and Bourg-en-Bresse also had them. The Paris statutes of 1407 (cf. Appendix F) require a licence from the roi des ménestrels for such an assembly. A Beauvais computus (1402) has ‘Dati sunt de gratia panes ducenti capitulares mimis in hac civitate de diversis partibus pro cantilenis novis addiscendis confluentibus.’

[232] Hearne, Appendix ad Lelandi Collectanea, vi. 36; Percy, 367. The proclamation is dated Aug. 6, 9 Edw. II (i. e. 1315).

[233] No technical term seems, however, intended in Launfal (ed. Ritson), 668:

‘They hadde menstrales of moch honours,

Fydelers, sytolyrs, and trompours.’

[234] C. J. Ribton-Turner, Vagrants and Vagrancy, chs. 3, 4, 5. The proclamation of 1284 against ‘Westours, Bards, and Rhymers and other idlers and vagabonds, who live on the gifts called Cymmortha,’ and the Act of 1402 (4 Hen. IV, c. 27) in the same sense, seem only to refer to the Welsh bards (cf. p. 77).

[235] Ribton-Turner, 107 (14 Eliz. c. 5). Whipping is provided for ‘all Fencers Bearewardes Comon Players in Enterludes & Minstrels, not belonging to any Baron of this Realme or towards any other honourable personage of greater Degree; all Juglers Pedlars Tynkers and Petye Chapmen; whiche said Fencers Bearewardes comon Players in Enterludes Mynstrels Juglers Pedlars Tynkers & Petye Chapmen, shall wander abroade and have not Lycense of two Justices of the Peace at the leaste, whereof one to be of the Quorum, wher and in what Shier they shall happen to wander.’ The terms of 39 Eliz. c. 4 (1597-8) are very similar, but 1 Jac. I, c. 7 (1603-4), took away the exemption for noblemen’s servants.

[236] Appendix F.

[237] Gautier, ii. 156; Ducange, s.v. Ministelli.

[238] Gautier, ii. 158. Strutt, 195, quotes from Cott. MS. Nero, c. viii a payment of Edw. III ‘ministrallo facienti ministralsiam suam coram imagine Beatae Mariae in Veltam, rege praesente.’ Chaucer’s pilgrims had no professional minstrels, but the miller did as well:

‘He was a janglere and a goliardeys, ...

... A baggepype wel koude he blowe and sowne,

And therwithal he broghte us out of towne.’

It was in the absence of regular minstrels that the pilgrims fell to telling one another stories.

[239] Gautier, ii. 160. Richard Swinfield, bishop of Hereford, more than once rewarded minstrels on his episcopal rounds (J. Webb, Household Expenses of Richard de Swinfield, C. S. i. 152, 155). The bishops of Durham in 1355, Norwich in 1362, and Winchester in 1374, 1422, and 1481 had ‘minstrels of honour,’ like any secular noble (see Appendix E, &c.). Even the austere Robert Grosseteste had his private harper, if we may credit Mannyng, 150:

‘He louede moche to here the harpe;

For mannys wyt hyt makyth sharpe.

Next hys chaumbre, besyde hys stody,

Hys harpers chaumbre was fast therby.’

Mannyng represents Grosseteste as excusing his predilection by a reference to King David.

[240] Madox, Hist. of Exchequer, 251.

[241] Norfolk Archaeology, xi. 339 (Norwich); Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 97; Kennet, Parochial Antiq. ii. 259 (Bicester); Decem Scriptores, 2011 (Canterbury); for the rest cf. Appendix E.

[242] Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 97; iii. 118, quotes from the Register of St. Swithin’s amongst the Wolvesey MSS.; in 1338 ‘cantabat ioculator quidam nomine Herebertus canticum Colbrondi, necdum gestum Emmae reginae a iudicio ignis liberatae, in aula prioris’: in 1374 ‘In festo Alwynis episcopi ... in aula conventus sex ministralli, cum quatuor citharisatoribus, faciebant ministralcias suas. Et post cenam, in magna camera arcuata domini Prioris, cantabant idem gestum.... Veniebant autem dicti ioculatores a castello domini regis et ex familia episcopi.’ The ‘canticum Colbrondi’ was doubtless a romance of Guy of Warwick, of which Winchester is the locality. Fragments of early fourteenth-century English versions exist (Ten Brink, i. 246; Jusserand, E. L. i. 224; Zupitza, Guy of Warwick, E. E. T. S.; G. L. Morrill, Speculum Gy de Warewyke, E. E. T. S. lxxxi).

[243] Bartholomaeus (Albizzi) de Pisis (1385-99), Liber Conformitatum (ed. 1590, i. 94^b); Antoninus Episc. Florentiae (1389-1459), Chronicon (ed. 1586, iii. 752) ‘alterius linguae ioculatores eos existimans’; cf. A. Wood, Hist. et Antiq. Univ. Oxon. (1674), i. 69; City of Oxford (O. H. S.), ii. 349.

[244] See Appendix E. At Paris the Statutes of Cornouaille College (1380) required abstinence from ‘ludis mimorum, ioculatorum, histrionum, goliardorum, et consimilium.’ Bulaeus, v. 782, gives another Paris regulation allowing ‘mimi, ad summum duo’ on Twelfth Night (Rashdall, ii. 674).

[245] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae (†1274), ii. 2, quaest. 168, art. 3 ‘Sicut dictum est, ludus est necessarius ad conversationem vitae humanae. ad omnia autem, quae sunt utilia conversationi humanae, deputari possunt aliqua officia licita. et ideo etiam officium histrionum, quod ordinatur ad solatium hominibus exhibendum, non est secundum se illicitum, nec sunt in statu peccati: dummodo moderate ludo utantur, id est, non utendo aliquibus illicitis verbis vel factis ad ludum, et non adhibendo ludum negotiis et temporibus indebitis ... unde illi, qui moderate iis subveniunt, non peccant, sed iusta faciunt, mercedem ministerii eorum iis attribuendo. si qui autem superflue sua in tales consumunt, vel etiam sustentant illos histriones qui illicitis ludis utuntur, peccant, quasi eos in peccatis foventes. unde Augustinus dicit, super Ioan. quod donare res suas histrionibus vitium est immane,’ &c., &c.

[246] Cf. Appendix G.

[247] Another version of this story is given by Petrus Cantor (ob. 1197), Verbum Abbreviatum, c. 84 (P. L. ccv. 254) ‘Ioculatori cuidam papa Alexander (Alex. III) nec concessit vivere de officio suo, nec ei penitus interdixit.’ In c. 49 of the same work Petrus Cantor inveighs learnedly Contra dantes histrionibus. Doubtless the Alexander in question is Alexander III (1159-81), though the (Alex. III) above may be due to the seventeenth-century editor, Galopinus. A hasty glance at the voluminous and practically unindexed decrees and letters of Alexander III in P. L. cc. and Jaffé, Regesta Pontificum Romanorum (ed. 2, 1885-8), ii. 145-418, has not revealed the source of the story; and I doubt whether the Pope’s decision, if it was ever given, is to be found in black and white. The two reports of it by Thomas de Cabham and Petrus Cantor are barely consistent. In any case, it never got into the Gregorian Decretals.

[248] Gautier, ii. 42; Bédier, 389; Ten Brink, i. 186; Ducange, s. vv. Golia, &c.; O. Hubatsch, Lat. Vagantenlieder des Mittelalters (1870).

[249] Le Département des Livres (Méon, N. R. i. 404):

‘A Bouvines delez Dinant

Li perdi-je Ovide le grant ...

Mon Lucan et mon Juvenal

Oubliai-je a Bonival,

Eustace le grant et Virgile

Perdi aus dez a Abeville.’

[250] The chief collections of goliardic verse are Schmeller, Carmina Burana (ed. 3, 1894), and T. Wright, Latin Poems attributed to Walter Mapes (C. S. 1841): for others cf. Hubatsch, 16. Latin was not unknown amongst lay minstrels: cf. Deus Bordeors Ribauz (Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 3):

‘Mais ge sai aussi bien conter,

Et en roumanz et en latin.’

[251] Hubatsch, 15. The origin, precise meaning, and mutual relations of the terms Golias, goliardi are uncertain. Probably the goliardic literature arose in France, rather than in England with Walter Mapes, the attribution to whom of many of the poems is perhaps due to a confusion of G[olias] with G[ualterus] in the MSS. Giraldus Cambrensis (ob. 1217), Speculum Ecclesiae, says ‘Parasitus quidam Golias nomine nostris diebus gulositate pariter et leccacitate famosissimus ... in papam et curiam Romanam carmina famosa ... evomuit’: but the following note points to a much earlier origin for Golias and his pueri, and this is upheld by W. Scherer, Gesch. d. deutsch. Dichtung im 11. und 12. Jahrh. 16.

[252] Early decrees forbidding the clergy to be ioculatores are given on p. 39. More precise is the order of Gautier of Sens (†913) in his Constitutiones, c. 13 (Mansi, xviii. 324) ‘Statuimus quod clerici ribaldi, maxime qui dicuntur de familia Goliae, per episcopos, archidiaconos, officiales, et decanos Christianitatis, tonderi praecipiantur vel etiam radi, ita quod eis non remaneat tonsura clericalis: ita tamen quod sine periculo et scandalo ita fiant.’ If Mansi’s date is right, this precedes by three centuries the almost identical Conc. of Rouen, c. 8 (Mansi, xxiii. 215), and Conc. of Castle Gonther (Tours), c. 21 (Mansi, xxiii. 237), both in 1231. Gautier, Les Tropaires, i. 186, dwells on the influence of the goliardi on the late and ribald development of the tropes, and quotes Conc. of Treves (1227), c. 9 (Mansi, xxiii. 33) ‘praecipimus ut omnes sacerdotes non permittant trutannos et alios vagos scholares aut goliardos cantare versus super Sanctus et Agnus Dei.’ On their probable share in the Feast of Fools cf. ch. xiv. For later legislation cf. Hubatsch, 14, 95, and the passage from the Liber Sextus of Boniface VIII on p. 39. It lasts to the Conc. Frisingense (1440) ‘statuimus ne clerici mimis, ioculatoribus, histrionibus, buffonibus, galliardis, largiantur’ (Labbe, xiii. 1286). By this time ‘goliard’ seems little more than a synonym for ‘minstrel.’ The ‘mynstralle, a gulardous,’ of Mannyng, 148, does not appear to be a clerk, while Chaucer’s ‘goliardeys’ is the Miller (C. T. prol. 560). On the other hand, Langland’s ‘Goliardeys, a glotoun of wordes’ (Piers Plowman, prol. 139), speaks Latin. Another name for the goliardi occurs in an Epistola Guidonis S. Laurentii in Lucina Cardinalis, xx. (1266, Hartzheim, iii. 807) against ‘vagi scolares, qui Eberdini vocantur,’ and who ‘divinum invertunt officium, unde laici scandalizantur.’

[253] Baudouin de Condé in his Contes des Hiraus contrasts the ‘grans menestreus,’ the

‘Maistres de sa menestrandie,

Qui bien viele ou ki bien die

De bouce’

with the ‘felons et honteux,’ who win pence,

‘l’un por faire l’ivre,

L’autre le cat, le tiers le sot,’

while in Les États du Monde his son Jean sets up a high standard of behaviour for the true minstrels:

‘Soies de cuer nes et polis,

Courtois, envoisiés, et jolis,

Pour les boinnes gens solacier’

(Scheler, Dits et Contes de Baudouin de Condé et de son fils Jean de Condé, i. 154; ii. 377). Cf. Watriquet de Couvin, Dis du fol menestrel (ed. Scheler, 367):

‘Menestriex se doit maintenir

Plus simplement c’une pucele, ...

Menestrel qui veut son droit faire

Ne doit le jangleur contrefaire,

Mais en sa bouche avoir tous dis

Douces paroles et biaus dis,

Estre nés, vivre purement.’

These three writers belong to the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth century.

[254] A. Jubinal, Jongleurs et Trouvères, 165. Cf. Gautier, ii. 78; Bédier, 418.

[255] F. Diaz, Poesie der Troubadours (ed. Bartsch), 63; K. Bartsch, Grundriss der provenzalischen Literatur, 25; F. Hueffer, The Troubadours, 63. Diaz, op. cit. 297, prints the documents.

[256] There is nothing to show that Scilling, the companion of Widsith (Widsith, 104), was of an inferior grade.

[257] Hueffer, 52; G. Paris, 182: A. Stimming in Grober’s Grundriss, ii. 2. 15; Gautier, ii. 45, 58. The commonest of phrases in troubadour biography is ‘cantet et trobet.’ The term trobador is properly the accusative case of trobaire.

[258] Petrarch, Epist. Rerum Senil. n. 3 ‘sunt homines non magni ingenii, magnae vero memoriae, magnaeque diligentiae, sed maioris audaciae, qui regum ac potentum aulas frequentant, de proprio nudi, vestiti autem carminibus alienis, dumque quid ab hoc, aut ab illo exquisitius materno praesertim charactere dictum sit, ingenti expressione pronunciant, gratiam sibi nobilium, et pecunias quaerunt, et vestes et munera.’ Fulke of Marseilles, afterwards bishop of Toulouse, wrote songs in his youth. He became an austere Cistercian; but the songs had got abroad, and whenever he heard one of them sung by a joglar, he would eat only bread and water (Sermo of Robert de Sorbonne in Hauréau, Man. Fr. xxiv. 2. 286).

[259] In the first edition of his Reliques (1765), Percy gave the mediaeval minstrel as high a status as the Norse scald or Anglo-Saxon scôp. This led to an acrid criticism by Ritson who, in his essay On the ancient English Minstrels in Ancient Songs and Ballads (1829), easily showed the low repute in which many minstrels were held. See also his elaborate Dissertation on Romance and Minstrelsy in his Ancient English Metrical Romances (1802). The truth really lay between the two, for neither appreciated the wide variety covered by a common name. On the controversy, cf. Minto in Enc. Brit. s. v. Minstrels, Courthope, i. 426-31, and H. B. Wheatley’s Introduction to his edition of Percy’s Reliques, xiii-xv. Percy in his later editions profited largely by Ritson’s criticism; a careful collation of these is given in Schroer’s edition (1889).

[260] Magnin, Journal des Savants (1846), 545.

[261] Lambertus Ardensis, Chronicon, c. 81 (ed. Godefroy Menilglaise, 175) ‘quid plura? tot et tantorum ditatus est copia librorum ut Augustinum in theologia, Areopagitam Dionysium in philosophia, Milesium fabularium in naeniis gentium, in cantilenis gestoriis, sive in eventuris nobilium, sive etiam in fabellis ignobilium, ioculatores quosque nominatissimos aequiparare putaretur.’

[262] Freymond, Jongleurs et Menestrels, 34:

‘Il est de tout bons menesterieux:

Il set peschier, il set chacier,

Il set trop bien genz solacier;

Il set chançons, sonnez et fables,

Il set d’eschez, il set des tables,

Il set d’arbalestre et d’airon.’

[263] Daurel et Beton (ed. Meyer, Soc. des anc. textes fr. 1886), 1206:

‘El va enant, a lor des jocz mostratz,

Dels us e dels altres, qu’el ne sap pro asatz.

Pueis pres l[a] arpa, a .ij. laisses notatz,

Et ab la viola a los gen deportat[z],

Sauta e tomba; tuh s’en son alegratz.’

[264] Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 1:

‘Ge sai contes, ge sai flabeax;

Ge sai conter beax dix noveax,

Rotruenges viez et noveles,

Et sirventois et pastorels.

Ge sai le flabel du Denier,

. . . . . . .

Si sai de Parceval l’estoire,

. . . . . . .

Ge sai joer des baasteax,

Et si sai joer des costeax,

Et de la corde et de la fonde,

Et de toz les beax giex du monde,

. . . . . . .

De totes les chansons de geste.’

[265] Three of these Enseignamens, by Guiraut de Cabreira (†1170), Guiraut de Calanso (†1200), and Bertran de Paris (†1250), are printed by K. Bartsch, Denkmäler der provenzalischen Litteratur, 85-101. Cf. Bartsch, Grundriss der prov. Lit. 25; Hueffer, The Troubadours, 66; Hist. Litt. xvii. 581.

[266] Bernhard, iii. 397, gives some French references, one dated 1395, for ‘menestriers de bouches,’ a term signifying minstrels who sang as well as played instruments.

[267] There are numerous payments to jugglers, tumblers and dancers in the Household Accounts of Henry VII (Bentley, Excerpta Historica, 85-113; Collier, i. 50). A letter to Wolsey of July 6, 1527, from R. Croke, the tutor of Henry VIII’s natural son, the Duke of Richmond, complains of difficulties put in his way by R. Cotton, the Clerk-comptroller of the duke’s household, and adds: ‘At hic tamen in praeceptore arcendo diligens, libenter patitur scurras et mimos (qui digna lupanari in sacro cubiculo coram principe cantillent) admitti’ (Nichols, Memoir of Henry Fitzroy in Camden Miscellany, iii. xxxviii).

[268] For the ioculator regis, cf. Appendix E, and Leach, Beverley MSS. 179. He is called ‘jugler’ in N. H. B. 67. Is he distinct from the royal gestator (gestour, jester)? Both appear in the Shrewsbury accounts (s. ann. 1521, 1549). In 1554 both le jugler and le gester were entertained. The gestator seems to have merged in the stultus or court fool (ch. xvi). The accounts in App. E often mention the royal bearward, who remained an important official under Elizabeth.

[269] 2 Hen. IV, ii. 4. 12.

[270] Cf. Appendix H (i).

[271] Courthope, i. 445; A. Lang, s.v. Ballad in Enc. Brit. and in A Collection of Ballads, xi; Quarterly Review (July, 1898); Henderson, 335; G. Smith, 180. But I think that Gummere, B. P. passim, succeeds in showing that the element of folk-poetry in balladry is stronger than some of the above writers recognize.

[272] Sidney, Apologie for Poetrie (ed. Arber), 46 ‘Certainly I must confess my own barbarousness. I never heard the old song of Percy and Douglas, that I found not my heart moved more than with a trumpet. And yet is it sung but by some blind Crowder, with no rougher voice than rude style.’ For the Puritan view, see Stubbes, i. 169.

[273] Ritson, ccxxiv, quotes the following lines, ascribed to Dr. Bull (†1597), from a Harl. MS., as the epitaph of minstrelsy:

‘When Jesus went to Jairus’ house

(Whose daughter was about to dye),

He turned the minstrels out of doors,

Among the rascal company:

Beggars they are, with one consent,

And rogues, by Act of Parliament.’

[274] Du Vilain au Buffet (Montaiglon-Raynaud, iii. 202):

‘Li quens manda les menestrels,

Et si a fet crier entr’els

Qui la meillor truffe sauroit

Dire ne fere, qu’il auroit

Sa robe d’escarlate nueve.

L’uns menestrels a l’autre rueve

Fere son mestier, tel qu’il sot,

L’uns fet l’ivre, l’autre le sot;

Li uns chante, li autres note,

Et li autres dit la riote,

Et li autres la jenglerie;

Cil qui sevent de jouglerie

Vielent par devant le conte;

Aucuns i a qui fabliaus conte,

Où il ot mainte gaberie,

Et li autres dit l’Erberie,

Là où il ot mainte risée.’

Cf. p. 67; also the similar list in Wace, Brut, 10823, and Piers Plowman, Passus xvi. 205:

‘Ich can nat tabre ne trompe · ne telle faire gestes,

Farten, ne fithelen · at festes, ne harpen,

Iapen ne iogelen · ne gentelliche pipe,

Nother sailen ne sautrien · ne singe with the giterne.’

[275] Gautier, ii. 63; Strutt, 207. L. T. Smith, Derby Accounts (Camden Soc.), 109, records a payment by Henry of Bolingbroke when in Prussia in 1390-1 ‘cuidam tumblere facienti ministralciam suam.’ See miniatures of tumblers (Strutt, 211, 212), stilt-dancing (ibid. 226), hoop-vaulting (ibid. 229), balancing (ibid. 232-4), a contortionist (ibid. 235).

[276] Annales Corbeienses, s. a. 1135 (Leibnitz, Rer. Brunsv. Script. ii. 307) ‘funambulus inter lusus suos in terram deiectus.’

[277] Gautier, ii. 64, quotes Annales Basilienses, s. a. 1276 ‘Basileam quidam corpore debilis venit, qui funem protensum de campanili maioris ecclesiae ad domum cantoris manibus et pedibus descendebat’; for later English examples cf. ch. xxiv.

[278] Strutt, 172, 176, 209; Jusserand, i. 214, and E. W. L. 23.

[279] Strutt, 173, 197; Jusserand, E. W. L. 212; Wright, 33-7.

[280] Gautier, ii. 67, quotes Joufrois, 1146:

‘Ainz veïssiez toz avant traire

Les jogleors et maint jou faire.

Li uns dançoit ...

Li autre ovrent de nigremance.’

[281] Strutt, 194, quotes from Cott. MS. Nero, c. viii, a payment ‘Janins le Cheveretter (bagpiper) called le Tregettour,’ for playing before Edw. II. Collier, i. 30, quotes Lydgate, Daunce de Macabre (Harl. 116):

‘Maister John Rykell, sometyme tregitoure

Of noble Henry kynge of Englonde,

And of Fraunce the myghty conqueroure,

For all the sleightes and turnyngs of thyne honde,

Thou must come nere this daunce to understonde.

. . . . . . . .

Lygarde de mayne now helpeth me right nought.’

[282] Ducange, s. v. bastaxi; Gautier, ii. 11; C. Magnin, Hist. des Marionnettes en Europe (ed. 2, 1862); cf. ch. xxiv. Bastaxus seems to be the origin of the modern bateleur, used in a wide sense of travelling entertainers.

[283] Du Méril, Com. 74; Strutt, 253; Jusserand, E. W. L. vi. 218. Amongst the letters commendatory of minstrels quoted by Gautier, ii. 109, is one ‘De illo qui scit volucrum exprimere cantilenas et voces asininas.’ Baudouin de Condé mentions a minstrel who ‘fait le cat’ (cf. p. 63, n. 1).

[284] See figures of bears (Strutt, 176, 214, 239, 240), apes (ibid. 240, 241; Jusserand, E. W. L. 218), horses (Strutt, 243, 244), dog (ibid. 246, 249), hare (ibid. 248), cock (ibid. 249). For the ursarius and for lion, marmoset, &c., cf. pp. 53, 68, and Appendix E.

[285] Strutt, 256. A horse-baiting is figured in Strutt, 243.

[286] Strutt, 244, figures a combat between man and horse. Gautier, ii. 66, cites Acta SS. Jan. iii. 257 for the intervention of St. Poppo when a naked man smeared with honey was to fight bears before the emperor Henry IV (†1048).

[287] Strutt, 260, 262.

[288] Adam Davie (†1312):

‘Merry it is in halle to here the harpe,

The minstrelles synge, the jogelours carpe.’

[289] John of Salisbury, Polycraticus, i. 8 ‘Quorum adeo error invaluit, ut a praeclaris domibus non arceantur, etiam illi qui obscenis partibus corporis oculis omnium eam ingerunt turpitudinem, quam erubescat videre vel cynicus. Quodque magis mirere, nec tunc eiiciuntur, quando tumultuantes inferius crebro sonitu aerem foedant, et turpiter inclusum turpius produnt’; Adam of Bremen (M. G. H.), iii. 38 ‘Pantomimi, qui obscoenis corporis motibus oblectare vulgus solent.’ Raine, Hist. Papers from Northern Registers (R. S.), 398, prints a letter of Archbishop Zouche of York on the indecent behaviour of some clerks of the bishop of Durham in York Minster on Feb. 6, 1349, ‘subtus imaginem crucifixi ventositates per posteriora dorsi cum foedo strepitu more ribaldorum emittere fecerunt pluries ac turpiter et sonore.’

[290] Gautier, ii. 69; Lavoix, La Musique au Siècle de Saint-Louis, i. 315; cf. Appendix C.

[291] W. Mapes, de Nugis Curialium (Camden Soc.), dist. v. prol., ‘Caesar Lucani, Aeneas Maronis, multis vivunt in laudibus, plurimum suis meritis et non minimum vigilantia poetarum; nobis divinam Karolorum et Pepinorum nobilitatem vulgaribus rithmis sola mimorum concelebrat nugacitas.’

[292] Lavoix, ii. 295.

[293] Ibid. ii. 344. The Paris MS. (B. N. f. fr. 2168) of Aucassin et Nicolete preserves the musical notation of the verse sections. Only three musical phrases, with very slight variations, are used. Two of these were probably repeated, alternately or at the singer’s fancy, throughout the tirade; the third provided a cadence for the closing line (Bourdillon, Aucassin et Nicolette (1897), 157).

[294] Chaucer, House of Fame, 1197:

‘Of alle maner of minstrales,

And gestiours, that tellen tales,

Bothe of weping and of game.’

Cf. Sir Thopas, 134; and Gower, Confessio Amantis, vii. 2424:

‘And every menstral hadde pleid,

And every disour hadde seid.’

The evidence of Erasmus is late, of course, for the hey-day of minstrelsy, but in his time there were certainly English minstrels who merely recited, without musical accompaniment; cf. Ecclesiastes (Opera, v. col. 958) ‘Apud Anglos est simile genus hominum, quales apud Italos sunt circulatores, de quibus modo dictum est; qui irrumpunt in convivia magnatum, aut in cauponas vinarias; et argumentum aliquod, quod edidicerunt, recitant; puta mortem omnibus dominari, aut laudem matrimonii. Sed quoniam ea lingua monosyllabis fere constat, quemadmodum Germanica; atque illi studio vitant cantum, nobis latrare videntur verius quam loqui.’

[295] Ten Brink, i. 193, 225, 235, old gleeman tradition was probably less interfered with in the lowlands of Scotland than in England proper; cf. Henderson, Scottish Vernacular Literature, 16.

[296] Ten Brink, i. 322; Jusserand, i. 360; Courthope, i. 197. Minot’s poems have been edited by J. Hall (Oxford, 1887). See also Wright, Political Songs (C.S.) and Political Poems and Songs (R.S.). Many of these, however, are Latin.

[297] On Welsh bardism see H. d’Arbois de Jubainville, Intr. à l’Étude de la Litt. celtique, 63; Stephens, Literature of the Kymry, 84, 93, 97, 102; Ernest David, Études historiques sur la Poésie et la Musique dans la Cambrie, 13, 62-103, 147-64. In Wales, an isolated corner of Europe, little touched by Latin influences, the bards long retained the social and national position which it is probable they once had held in all the Aryan peoples. Their status is defined in the laws of Howel Dha (†920) and in those of Gruffyd ab Cynan (1100). The latter code distinguishes three orders of bards proper, the Pryddyd or Chair bards, the Teuluwr or Palace bards, and the Arwyddfardd or heralds, also called Storiawr, the cantores historici of Giraldus Cambrensis. The Pryddyd and Teuluwr differ precisely as poets and executants, trouvères and jougleurs. Below all these come the Clerwr, against whom official bardism from the sixth to the thirteenth century showed an inveterate animosity. These are an unattached wandering folk, players on flutes, tambourines, and other instruments meaner than the telyn or harp, and the crwth or viol which alone the bards proper deigned to use. Many of them had also picked up the mime-tricks of the foreigners. It was probably with these Clerwr that the English and French neighbours of the Kelts came mainly into contact. Padelford, 5, puts this contact as early as the Anglo-Saxon period.

[298] Giraldus Cambrensis, Descriptio Cambriae, i. 17 ‘famosus ille fabulator Bledhericus, qui tempora nostra paulo praevenit.’ Thomas, Tristan (†1170, ed. Michel, ii. 847):

‘Mès sulum ço que j’ai oy

N’el dient pas sulum Breri,

Ky solt les gestes e les cuntes

De tuz les reis, de tuz les cuntes

Ki orent esté en Bretaingne.’

[299] G. Paris, in Hist. Litt. xxx. 1-22; Litt. Fr. §§ 53-5; Nutt, Legend of the Holy Grail, 228; Rhys, Arthurian Legend, 370-90. These views have been vigorously criticized by Prof. Zimmer in Göttingische gelehrte Anzeigen (1891), 488, 785, and elsewhere.

[300] David, op. cit. 13, 235; cf. p. 54.

[301] Paris, §§ 118, 122, and Orig. (passim); Jeanroy, 1, 84, 102, 387; Lang. et Litt. i. 345; cf. ch. viii. Texts of chansons à personnages and pastourelles in Bartsch, Altfranzösische Romanzen und Pastourellen; of aubes in Bartsch, Chrestomathie de l’ancien français.

[302] Paris, § 126; Orig. (passim); Jeanroy, 45, and in Lang. et Litt. i. 384; Bartsch, Grundriss der prov. Lit. 34; Hueffer, The Troubadours, 112; Stimming in Gröber’s Grundriss, ii. 2. 24.

[303] In 1386 we hear of ‘des compaingnons, pour de jeux de parture juer et esbattre’ at Douai (Julleville, Rép. Com. 323), which looks as if, by the end of the fourteenth century, the partures were being professionally performed.

[304] Paris, § 109; Bédier, 31. A fabliau is properly a ‘conte à rire en vers’; the term dit is applied more generally to a number of short poems which deal, ‘souvent avec agrément, des sujets empruntés à la vie quotidienne.’ Some dits are satirical, others eulogistic of a class or profession, others descriptive. But the distinction is not very well defined, and the fabliaux are often called dits in the MSS.

[305] Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 1; ii. 257. The dit is also called La Jengle au Ribaut et la Contrejengle.

[306] Rutebeuf (ed. Kressner), 99.

[307] Barbazan-Méon, i. 356. Bédier, 33, considers Courtois d’Arras as the oldest French comedy, a jeu dramatique with intercalated narrative by a meneur de jeu. But the fact that it ends with the words Te Deum leads one to look upon it as an adaptation of a religious play; cf. ch. xix.

[308] On the débats in general, see Hist. Litt. xxiii. 216 sqq.; Paris, Litt. fr. §§ 110, 155; Arthur Piaget, Littérature didactique in Lang. et Litt. ii. 208; Jeanroy, 48; R. Hirzel, Der Dialog, ii. 382; Literaturblatt (1887), 76. A full list is given by Petit, Rép. Com. 405-9. The débats merge into such allegorical poems as Henri d’Andeli’s Bataille des Vins (Barbazon-Méon, i. 152) or Le Mariage des Sept Arts et des Sept Vertus (Jubinal, Œuvres de Rutebeuf, ii. 415); cf. Paris, Litt. fr. 158.

[309] Ten Brink, i. 215; Hubatsch, 24; Gummere, B. P. 200, 306. The Débat de l’Yver et de l’Esté has the nearest folk-lore origin; cf. ch. ix. Paris, Origines, 28, mentions several Greek and Latin versions beginning with Aesop (Halm, 414). The most important is the ninth-century Conflictus Veris et Hiemis (Riese, Anth. Lat. i. 2. 145), variously ascribed to Bede (Wernsdorff, Poetae Latini Minores, ii. 239), Alcuin (Alc. Opera, ed. Froben, ii. 612) and others. French versions are printed in Montaiglon-Rothschild, Anc. Poés. fr. vi. 190, x. 41, and Jubinal, N. R. ii. 40. There are imitations in all tongues: cf. M. Émile Picot’s note in Mont.-Rothsch. op. cit. x. 49; Hist. Litt. xxiii. 231; Douhet, 1441.—La Disputoison du Vin et de l’Iaue is printed in Jubinal, N. R. i. 293; Wright, Lat. Poems of Walter Mapes, 299; Carmina Burana, 232. It is based on the Goliae Dialogus inter Aquam et Vinum (Wright, loc. cit. 87); cf. Hist. Litt. xxiii. 228; Romania, xvi. 366.—On the complicated history of the Débat du Corps et de l’Âme, see T. Batiouchkof in Romania, xx. 1. 513; G. Kleinert, Ueber den Streit von Leib und Seele; Hist. Litt. xxii. 162; P. de Julleville, Répertoire Comique, 5, 300, 347; Wright, Latin Poems, xxiii. 95, 321. Latin, French and other versions are given by Wright, and by Viollet-Leduc, Anc. Thé. fr. iii. 325.—Phillis et Flora, or De Phyllis qui aime un chevalier et de Flora qui aime un prêtre, is also referred by Paris, Orig. 28, to a folk-song beginning; cf. H. L. xxii. 138, 165; Romania, xxii. 536. Latin versions are in Carmina Burana, 155; Wright, Latin Poems of W. Mapes, 258.—A possible influence of the Theocritean and Virgilian eclogues upon these débats, through their neo-Latin forms, must be borne in mind.

[310] Wülker, 384; Brooke, i. 139, ii. 93, 221, 268; Jusserand, i. 75, 443. The passages of dialogue dwelt on by these writers mostly belong to the work of Cynewulf and his school. It has been suggested that some of them, e.g. the A.-S. Descent into Hell (Grein, iii. 175; cf. Anglia, xix. 137), or the dialogue between Mary and Joseph in Cynewulf’s Christ, 163 (ed. Gollancz, p. 16), may have been intended for liturgical use by half-choirs; but of this there is really no proof. Wülker, loc. cit., shows clearly that the notion of a dramatic representation was unfamiliar to the Anglo-Saxons.

[311] Ten Brink, i. 312. Several English versions of the Debate between Body and Soul are given by Wright, loc. cit. 334. An English Debate and Stryfe betwene Somer and Wynter is in W. C. Hazlitt, Early Popular Poetry, iii. 29.

[312] Cf. ch. xx.

[313] Ten Brink, i. 214, 309. The Owl and the Nightingale (c. 1216-72), was printed by J. Stevenson (Roxburghe Club); the Thrush and the Nightingale and the Fox and the Wolf, by W. C. Hazlitt, Early Popular Poetry, i. 50, 58. There are also a Debate of the Carpenter’s Tools (Hazlitt, i. 79) and an English version of a Latin Disputacio inter Mariam et Crucem (R. Morris, Legends of the Holy Rood, 131); cf. Ten Brink, i. 259, 312. An A.-S. version of the Debate between Body and Soul is in the Exeter Book (Grein, ii. 92).

[314] Ælred (†1166), Speculum Charitatis, ii. 23 (P. L. cxcv. 571) ‘Videas aliquando hominem aperto ore quasi intercluso halitu expirare, non cantare, ac ridiculosa quadam vocis interceptione quasi minitari silentium; nunc agones morientium, vel extasim patientium imitari. Interim histrionicis quibusdam gestibus totum corpus agitatur, torquentur labia, rotant, ludunt humeri; et ad singulas quasque notas digitorum flexus respondet. Et haec ridiculosa dissolutio vocatur religio!... Vulgus ... miratur ... sed lascivas cantantium gesticulationes, meretricias vocum alternationes et infractiones, non sine cachinno risuque intuetur, ut eos non ad oratorium sed ad theatrum, non ad orandum, sed ad spectandum aestimes convenisse.’ Cf. op. cit. ii. 17 ‘Cum enim in tragediis vanisve carminibus quisquam iniuriatus fingitur, vel oppressus ... si quis haec, vel cum canuntur audiens, vel cernens si recitentur ... moveatur’; and Johannes de Janua, s.v. persona (cited Creizenach, i. 381) ‘Item persona dicitur histrio, repraesentator comoediarum, qui diversis modis personat diversas repraesentando personas.’ All these passages, like the ninth-century responsio of arch-bishop Leidradus referred to on p. 36, may be suspected of learning rather than actuality. As for the epitaph of the mime Vitalis (Riese, Anth. Lat. i. 2. 143; Baehrens, P. L. M. iii. 245), sometimes quoted in this connexion, it appears to be classical and not mediaeval at all; cf. Teuffel-Schwabe, §§ 8. 11; 32. 6. Probably this is also the case with the lines De Mimo iam Sene in Wright, Anecdota Literaria, 100, where again ‘theatra’ are mentioned.

[315] Cf. p. 71. The mention of a ‘Disare that played the sheppart’ at the English court in 1502 (Nicolas, Privy Purse Expenses of Elizabeth of York) is too late to be of importance here.

[316] Creizenach, i. 383, citing at second-hand from fourteenth-century accounts of a Savoy treasurer ‘rappresentando i costumi delle compagnie inglesi e bretoni.’

[317] Creizenach, i. 380.

[318] Thomas de Cabham mentions the horribiles larvae of some minstrels. A. Lecoy de la Marche, La Chaire française (ed. 2, 1886), 444, quotes a sermon of Étienne de Bourbon in MS. B. N. Lat. 15970, f. 352 ‘ad similitudinem illorum ioculatorum qui ferunt facies depictas quae dicuntur artificia gallicè, cum quibus ludunt et homines deludunt.’ Cf. Liudprand, iii. 15 (Pertz, iii. 310) ‘histrionum mimorumve more incedere, qui, ut ad risum facile turbas illiciant, variis sese depingunt coloribus.’ The monstra larvarum, however, of various ecclesiastical prohibitions I take to refer specifically to the Feast of Fools (cf. ch. xiii).

[319] Schack, Gesch. der dram. Litt. und Kunst in Spanien, i. 30, quotes a Carolingian capitulary, from Heineccius, Capit. lib. v. c. 388 ‘si quis ex scenicis vestem sacerdotalem aut monasticam vel mulieris religiosae vel qualicunque ecclesiastico statu similem indutus fuerit, corporali poena subsistat et exilio tradatur.’ This prohibition is as old as the Codex Theodosianus; cf. p. 14.

[320] Œuvres de Rutebeuf (ed. Kressner), 115; cf. Romania, xvi. 496; Julleville, Les Com. 24; Rép. Com. 407.

[321] Creizenach, i. 386, further points out that a stage was not indispensable to the Latin mimus, who habitually played before the curtain and probably with very little setting; that the favourite situations of fifteenth-century French farce closely resemble those of the mimes; and that the use of marionettes is a proof of some knowledge of dramatic methods amongst the minstrels.

[322] On this treatise, cf. ch. xx.

[323] A ‘japer’ is often an idle talker, like a ‘jangler’ which is clearly sometimes confused with a ‘jongleur’; cf. Chaucer, Parson’s Tale, 89 ‘He is a japere and a gabber and no verray repentant that eft-soone dooth thing for which hym oghte repente.’ Langland uses the term in a more technical sense. Activa Vita in Piers Plowman, xvi. 207, is no minstrel, because ‘Ich can not ... japen ne jogelen.’ No doubt a ‘jape’ would include a fabliau. It is equivalent etymologically to ‘gab,’ and Bédier, 33, points out that the jougleurs use gabet, as well as bourde, trufe, and risée for a fabliau.—The use of ‘pleye’ as ‘jest’ may be illustrated by Chaucer, Pardoner’s Tale (C. T. 12712) ‘My wit is greet, though that I bourde and pleye.’—The ‘japis’ of the Tretise are probably the ‘knakkes’ of the passage on ‘japeris’ in Parson’s Tale, 651 ‘right so conforten the vileyns wordes and knakkes of japeris hem that travaillen in the service of the devel.’

[324] Montaiglon-Raynaud, ii. 243. Cf. Hist. Litt. xxiii. 103; Jusserand, Lit. Hist. i. 442. A shorter prose form of the story is found in La Riote du Monde (ed. Fr. Michel, 1834), a popular facétie of which both French and Anglo-Norman versions exist; cf. Paris, Litt. fr. 153. And a Latin form, De Mimo et Rege Francorum is in Wright, Latin Stories, No. 137. The point consists in the quibbling replies with which the jougleur meets the king’s questions. Thus, in La Riote du Monde: ‘Dont ies tu?—Je suis de no vile.—U est te vile?—Entor le moustier.—U est li moustiers?—En l’atre.—U est li atres?—Sor terre.—U siet cele terre?—Sor l’iaue.—Comment apiel-on l’iaue?—On ne l’apiele nient; ele vient bien sans apieler.’

[325] Cf. Appendix V.

[326] Cf. ch. viii.

[327] Ed. P. Meyer, in Jahrbuch für romanische und englische Literatur, vi. 163. The piece was probably written in Flanders, between 1266 and 1290. Cf. Creizenach, i. 398.

[328] See Appendix U. References for the earlier non-dramatic versions in Latin, French, and English of the story are given by Jusserand, Lit. Hist. i. 447. A Cornish dramatic fragment of the fourteenth century is printed in the Athenæum for Dec. 1, 1877, and Revue celtique, iv. 259; cf. Creizenach, i. 401.

[329] Stephens-Hunt, ii. 301; F. S. Stevenson, Robert Grosseteste, 126. The disciplinary attack seems to have begun with Grosseteste’s predecessor, Hugh de Wells, in 1230 (Wilkins, i. 627), but he, like Roger Weseham, bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, in 1252 (Annales Monastici, R. S. i. 296), merely condemns ludi, a term which may mean folk-festivals or minstrelsy, or both. A similar ambiguity attaches to the obligation of the anchoresses of Tarrant Keyneston not to look on at a ludus (pleouwe) in the church-yard (Ancren Riwle, C. S. 318).

[330] In 1236 Grosseteste wrote to his archdeacons forbidding ‘arietum super ligna et rotas elevationes, caeterosque ludos consimiles, in quo decertatur pro bravio; cum huiusmodi ludorum tam actores quam spectatores, sicut evidenter demonstrat Isidorus, immolant daemonibus, ... et cum etiam huiusmodi ludi frequenter dant occasiones irae, odii, pugnae, et homicidii.’ His Constitutiones of 1238 say ‘Praecipimus etiam ut in singulis ecclesiis denuncietur solenniter ne quisquam levet arietes super rotas, vel alios ludos statuat, in quibus decertatur pro bravio: nec huiusmodi ludis quisquam intersit, &c.’ About 1244 he wrote again to the archdeacons: ‘Faciunt etiam, ut audivimus, clerici ludos quos vocant miracula: et alios ludos quos vocant Inductionem Maii sive Autumni; et laici scotales ... miracula etiam et ludos supra nominatos et scotales, quod est in vestra potestate facili, omnino exterminetis’ (Luard, Letters of Robert Grosseteste (R. S.) Epp. xxii, lii, cvii, pp. 74, 162, 317). For his condemnations of the Feast of Fools cf. ch. xiv.

[331] Const. Walt. de Cantilupo (Wilkins, i. 673) ‘prohibemus clericis ... nec sustineant ludos fieri de Rege et Regina, nec arietas levari, nec palaestras publicas fieri, nec gildales inhonestas.’ The clergy must also abstain and dissuade the laity from ‘compotationibus quae vocantur scottales’ (Wilkins, i. 672). On ‘ram-raisings,’ &c., cf. ch. vii; on ‘gildales’ and ‘scotales’ ch. viii.

[332] Surely the reference is to the mock kings and queens of the village festivals, and not, as Guy, 521; Jusserand, Litt. Hist. i. 444, suggest, to the question-and-answer game of Le Roi qui ne ment described in Jean de Condé’s Sentier Batu (Montaiglon-Raynaud, iii. 248), although this is called playing ‘as rois et as reines’ in Adan de la Hale’s Robin et Marion (ed. Monmerqué-Michel, 121) and elsewhere (cf. Guy, 222), and possibly grew out of the festival custom. Yet another game of King and Queen, of the practical joke order, is described as played at Golspie by Nicholson, 119.

[333] Wilkins, i. 666.

[334] Anstey, Munimenta Academica (R. S.), i. 18 ‘ne quis choreas cum larvis seu strepitu aliquo in ecclesiis vel plateis ducat, vel sertatus, vel coronatus corona ex foliis arborum, vel florum vel aliunde composita alicubi incedat ... prohibemus.’

[335] Inquisitiones ... de vita et conversatione clericorum et laicorum in Annales de Burton (Ann. Monast. R. S. i. 307) ‘an aliqui laici mercata, vel ludos, seu placita peculiaria fieri faciant in locis sacris, et an haec fuerint prohibita ex parte episcopi.... An aliqui laici elevaverint arietes, vel fieri faciant schothales, vel decertaverint de praeeundo cum vexillis in visitatione matricis ecclesiae.’

[336] Wilkins, ii. 129 ‘c. 13 ... Ne quisquam luctas, choreas, vel alios ludos inhonestos in coemeteriis exercere praesumat; praecipue in vigiliis et festis sanctorum, cum huiusmodi ludos theatrales et ludibriorium spectacula introductos per quos ecclesiarum coinquinatur honestas, sacri ordines detestantur.’

[337] Wilkins, iii. 68 ‘c. 2 ... nec in ipsis [locis sacris] fiant luctationes, sagittationes, vel ludi.’ A special caution is given against ludi ‘in sanctorum vigiliis’ and ‘in exequiis defunctorum.’

[338] T. F. Kirby, Wykeham’s Register (Hampshire Record Soc.), ii. 410, forbids ‘ad pilas ludere, iactaciones lapidum facere ... coreas facere dissolutas, et interdum canere cantilenas, ludibriorum spectacula facere, saltaciones et alios ludos inhonestos frequentare, ac multas alias insolencias perpetrare, ex quibus cimeterii huiusmodi execracio seu pollucio frequencius verisimiliter formidetur.’

[339] Handlyng Synne (ed. Furnivall), p. 148, l. 4684:

‘Daunces, karols, somour games,

Of many swych come many shames.’

This poem is a free adaptation (†1303) of the thirteenth-century Anglo-Norman Manuel de Péché, which is probably by William de Wadington, but has been ascribed to Bishop Grosseteste himself. The corresponding lines in this are

‘Muses et tieles musardries,

Trippes, dances, et teles folies.’

Cf. also Handlyng Synne, p. 278, l. 8989:

‘Karolles, wrastlynges, or somour games,

Who so euer haunteþ any swyche shames,

Yy cherche, oþer yn cherche-ȝerde,

Of sacrylage he may be a ferde;

Or entyrludës, or syngynge,

Or tabure bete, or oþer pypynge,

Alle swychë þyng forbodyn es,

Whyle þe prest stondeþ at messe’;

where the Manuel de Péché has

‘Karoles ne lutes nul deit fere,

En seint eglise qe me veut crere;

Car en cymiter neis karoler

Est outrage grant, ou luter:

Souent lur est mes auenu

Qe la fet tel maner de iu;

Qe grant peche est, desturber

Le prestre quant deit celebrer.’

[340] The Puritan Fetherston, in his Dialogue agaynst light, lewde, and lascivious Dancing (1583), sign. D. 7, says that he has ‘hearde of tenne maidens which went to set May, and nine of them came home with childe.’ Stubbes, i. 149, has a very similar observation. Cf. the adventures of Dr. Fitzpiers and Suke Damson on Midsummer Eve in Thomas Hardy’s novel, The Woodlanders, ch. xx.

[341] Grosseteste, in 1236, quotes ‘Isidorus’ as to the pagan origin of ‘ludi, in quo decertatur de bravio.’ The reference is to Isidore of Seville (560-636), Etymologiarum, xviii. 27, De ludis circensibus (P. L. lxxxii. 653). This, of course, refers directly to the religious associations of Roman rather than Celto-Teutonic ludi.

[342] Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 30 ‘idolorum cultus insequere, fanorum aedificia everate.’

[343] Bede, Hist. Eccl. i. 30; Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 37 ‘Dicite [Augustino], quid diu mecum de causa Anglorum cogitans tractavi: videlicet quia fana idolorum destrui in eadem gente minime debeant; sed ipsa quae in illis sunt idola destruantur, aqua benedicta fiat, in eisdem fanis aspergatur, altaria construantur, reliquiae ponantur: quia si fana eadem bene constructa sunt, necesse est ut a cultu daemonum in obsequium veri Dei debeant commutari, ut dum gens ipsa eadem fana sua non videt destrui, de corde errorem deponat, et Deum verum cognoscens ac adorans, ad loca, quae consuevit, familiarius concurrat. Et quia boves solent in sacrificio daemonum multos occidere, debet eis etiam hac de re aliqua solemnitas immutari: ut die dedicationis, vel natalitii sanctorum martyrum quorum illic reliquiae ponuntur, tabernacula sibi circa easdem ecclesias quae ex fanis commutatae sunt, de ramis arborum faciant, et religiosis conviviis sollemnitatem celebrent; nec diabolo iam animalia immolent, sed ad laudem Dei in esum suum animalia occidant, et donatori omnium de satietate sua gratias referant: ut dum eis aliqua exterius gaudia reservantur, ad interiora gaudia consentire facilius valeant. Nam duris mentibus simul omnia abscindere impossibile esse non dubium est, quia et is qui summum locum ascendere nititur gradibus vel passibus non autem saltibus elevatur’....

[344] Stanley, Memorials of Canterbury, 37.

[345] H. B. Wheatley, London, Past and Present, iii. 39; Donne, Poems (Muses’ Library), ii. 23.

[346] Bede, ii. 13 ‘iussit sociis destruere ac succendere fanum cum omnibus septis suis.’ In Essex in a time of plague and famine (664), Sigheri and his people ‘coeperunt fana, quae derelicta sunt, restaurare, et adorare simulacra.’ Bp. Jaruman induced them to reopen the churches, ‘relictis sive destructis fanis arisque’ (Bede, iii. 30).

[347] Bede, ii. 15. So too in eighth-century Germany there were priests who were equally ready to sacrifice to Wuotan and to administer the sacrament of baptism (Gummere, 342). See also Grimm, i. 7, and the letter of Gregory the Great to queen Brunichildis in M. G. H. Epist. ii. 1. 7 ‘pervenit ad nos, quod multi Christianorum et ad ecclesias occurrant, et a culturis daemonum non abscedant.’

[348] Willibald (Gesch.-Schreiber der deutschen Vorzeit, 27) relates that in Germany, when Boniface felled the sacred oak of Thor (robur Iovis) he built the wood into a church.

[349] A Saxon formula abrenuntiationis of the ninth century (Müllenhoff-Scherer, Denkmäler deutscher Poesie und Prosa aus dem 8.-12. Jahrhundert, 1892, No. li) specifically renounces ‘Thuner ende Uuôden ende Saxnôte ende allum thêm unholdum thê hira genôtas sint.’ Anglo-Saxon laws and council decrees contain frequent references to sacrifices and other lingering remnants of heathenism. Cf. Councils of Pincanhale and Cealcythe (787), c. 19 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 458) ‘si quid ex ritu paganorum remansit, avellatur, contemnatur, abiiciatur.’ Council of Gratlea (928), c. 3 (Wilkins, i. 205) ‘diximus ... de sacrificiis barbaris ... si quis aliquem occiderit ... ut vitam suam perdat.’ Council of London (1075) (Wilkins, i. 363) ‘ne offa mortuorum animalium, quasi pro vitanda animalium peste, alicubi suspendantur; nec sortes, vel aruspicia, seu divinationes, vel aliqua huiusmodi opera diaboli ab aliquo exerceantur.’ Also Leges of Wihtred of Kent (696), c. 12 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 235), and other A.-S. laws quoted by Kemble, i. 523.

[350] Penitential of Theodore (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 189), i. 15, de Cultura Idolorum; Penitential of Egbert (H.-S. iii. 424), 8, de Auguriis vel Divinationibus.

[351] Pearson, ii. 1 (Essay on Woman as Witch); cf. A.-S. spells in Kemble, i. 528, and Cockayne, Leechdoms (R. S.), iii. 35, 55. Early and mediaeval Christianity did not deny the existence of the heathen gods, but treated them as evil spirits, demons.

[352] An Essex case of 664 has just been quoted. Kemble, i. 358, gives two later ones from the Chronicle of Lanercost. In 1268 ‘cum hoc anno in Laodonia pestis grassaretur in pecudes armenti, quam vocant usitate Lungessouth, quidam bestiales, habitu claustrales non animo, docebant idiotas patriae ignem confrictione de lignis educere et simulachrum Priapi statuere, et per haec bestiis succurrere.’ In 1282 ‘sacerdos parochialis, nomine Johannes, Priapi prophana parans, congregatis ex villa puellulis, cogebat eis, choreis factis, Libero patri circuire.’ By Priapus-Liber is probably meant Freyr, the only Teutonic god known to have had Priapic characteristics (Adam of Bremen, Gesta Hammaburgensis Eccles. Pontif. iv. 26 in M. G. H. Script. vii. 267).

[353] Grimm, i. 5, 11, 64, 174; iii. xxxiv-xlv; Keary, 90; Pearson, ii. 16, 32, 42, 243, 285, 350. The Virgin Mary succeeds to the place of the old Teutonic goddess of fertility, Freyja, Nerthus. So elsewhere does St. Walpurg. The toasts or minni drunk to Odin and Freyja are transferred to St. John and St. Gertrude. The travels of Odin and Loki become the travels of Christ and St. Peter. Many examples of the adaptation of pre-existing customs to Christianity will be found in the course of this book. A capitulary of Karlmann, drawn up in 742 after the synod of Ratisbon held by Boniface in Germany, speaks of ‘hostias immolatitias, quas stulti homines iuxta ecclesias ritu pagano faciunt sub nomine sanctorum martyrum vel confessorum’ (Boretius, Capitularia Reg. Franc. i. 24 in M. G. H.; Mansi, xii. 367). At Kirkcudbright in the twelfth century bulls were killed ‘as an alms and oblation to St. Cuthbert’ (F. L. x. 353).

[354] In the present state of Gaulish and still more of Irish studies, only a glimmering of possible equations between Teutonic and Keltic gods is apparent.

[355] Recent ethnological research is summed up in G. Vacher de Lapouge, L’Aryen (1899); W. Z. Ripley, The Races of Europe (1900); A. H. Keane, Ethnology (1896); Man, Past and Present (1899); J. Deniker, The Races of Man (1900); G. Sergi, The Mediterranean Race (1901). The three racial types that, in many pure and hybrid forms, mainly compose the population of Europe may be distinguished as (1) Homo Europaeus, the tall blonde long-headed (dolichocephalic) race of north Europe, (including Teutons and red-haired ‘Kelts’), to which the Aryan speech seems primarily to have belonged; (2) Homo alpinus, the medium coloured and sized brachycephalic (round-headed) race of central Europe; (3) Homo meridionalis (Lapouge) or mediterranensis (Keane), the small dark dolichocephalic race of the Mediterranean basin and the western isles (including dark ‘Kelts’). During the formative period of European culture (2) was probably of little importance, and (1) and (3) are possibly of closer racial affinity to each other than either of them is to (2).

[356] Gomme, Ethnology in Folk-lore, 21; Village Community, 69; Report of Brit. Ass. (1896), 626; F. L. Congress, 348; F. L. x. 129, ascribes the fire customs of Europe to Aryans and the water customs to the pre-Aryans. A. Bertrand, Religion des Gaulois, 68, considers human sacrifice characteristically pre-Aryan. There seems to me more hope of arriving at a knowledge of specific Mediterranean cults, before the Aryan intermixture, from a study of the stone amulets and cup-markings of the megaliths (Bertrand, op. cit. 42) or from such investigations into ‘Mycenaean’ antiquity as that of A. J. Evans, Mycenaean Tree and Pillar Cult (1901). The speculations of Nietzsche, in A Genealogy of Morals and elsewhere, as to the altruistic ‘slave’ morality of the pre-Aryan and the self-regarding morality of the conquering Aryan ‘blond beast’ are amusing or pitiful reading, according to one’s mood.

[357] Frazer, G. B. i. 9 ‘The fundamental principles on which it [savage magic] is based would seem to be reducible to two: first, that like produces like, or that an effect resembles its cause; and second, that things which have once been in contact, but have ceased to be so, continue to act upon each other as if the contact still persisted. From the first of these principles, the savage infers that he can produce any desired effect merely by imitating it; from the second he concludes that he can influence at pleasure and at any distance any person of whom, or any thing of which, he possesses a particle. Magic of the latter sort, resting as it does on the belief in a certain secret sympathy which unites indissolubly things that have once been connected with each other may appropriately be termed sympathetic in the strict sense of the term. Magic of the former kind, in which the supposed cause resembles or simulates the supposed effect, may conveniently be described as imitative or mimetic.’ Cf. Jevons, 31 ‘The savage makes the generalization that like produces like; and then he is provided with the means of bringing about anything he wishes, for to produce an effect he has only to imitate it. To cause a wind to blow, he flaps a blanket, as the sailor still whistles to bring a whistling gale.... If the vegetation requires rain, all that is needed is to dip a branch in water, and with it to sprinkle the ground. Or a spray of water squirted from the mouth will produce a mist sufficiently like the mist required to produce the desired effect; or black clouds of smoke will be followed by black clouds of rain.’ I do not feel that magic is altogether a happy term for this sort of savage science. In its ordinary sense (the ‘black art’), it certainly contains a large element of what Dr. Frazer distinguishes from magic as religion, ‘a propitiation or conciliation of powers superior to man which are believed to direct and control the course of nature and of human life.’ True, these powers are not to whom the orthodox religion is directed, but the approach to them is religious in the sense of the above definition. Such magic is in fact an amalgam of charms, which are Dr. Frazer’s ‘magic,’ and spells, which are his ‘religion.’ But so are many more recognized cults.

[358] Some facts of European animal worship are dealt with in two important recent papers, one by S. Reinach in Revue celtique, xxi. 269, the other by N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 227. The relation of such worship to the group of savage social institutions classed as totemism is a difficult and far from solved problem, which cannot be touched upon here.

[359] Gummere, 39; Caesar, de B. G. iv. 1. 7; vi. 22. 2; Tacitus, Germ. 26.

[360] Schräder-Jevons, 281, says that the Indo-Europeans begin their history ‘acquainted with the rudiments of agriculture,’ but ‘still possessed with nomadic tendencies.’ He adds that considerable progress must have been made before the dispersion of the European branches, and points out that agriculture would naturally develop when the migratory hordes from the steppes reached the great forests of central Europe. For this there would be two reasons, the greater fertility of the soil and the narrowed space for pasturage. On the other hand, V. Hehn, Culturpflanzen und Haustiere, and Mommsen, Hist. of Rome, i. 16, find the traces of agriculture amongst the undivided Indo-Europeans very slight; the word yáva-ζέα, which is common to the tongues, need mean nothing more than a wild cereal.

[361] Jevons, 240, 255; Pearson, ii. 42; O. T. Mason, Woman’s Share in Primitive Culture, 14.

[362] Burne-Jackson, 352, 362; Rhys, C. F. i. 312; F. L. v. 339; Dyer, 133; Ditchfield, 70; cf. ch. vi. One of the hills so visited is the artificial one of Silbury, and perhaps the custom points to the object with which this and the similar ‘mound’ at Marlborough were piled up.

[363] Frazer, ii. 261, deals very fully with the theriomorphic corn-spirits of folk belief.

[364] On these triads and others in which three male or three female figures appear, cf. Bertrand, 341; A. Maury, Croyances et Légendes du Moyen Âge (1896), 6; Matronen-Kultus in Zeitschrift d. Vereins f. Volkskultur, ii. 24. I have not yet seen L. L. Paine, The Ethnic Trinities and their Relation to the Christian Trinity (1901).

[365] Mogk, iii. 333; Golther, 298; Grimm, iv. 1709; Kemble, i. 335; Rhys, C. H. 282; H. M. Chadwick, Cult of Othin (1899).

[366] Mogk, iii. 366; Golther, 428.

[367] Mogk, iii. 374; Golther, 488; Tille, Y. and C. 144; Bede, de temp. ratione, c. 15 (Opera, ed. Giles, vi. 179) ‘Eostur-monath qui nunc paschalis mensis interpretatur, quondam a dea illorum, quae Eostre vocabatur, et cui in illo festa celebrabant, nomen habuit; a cuius nomine nunc paschale tempus cognominant, consueto antiquae observationis vocabulo gaudia novae solemnitatis vocantes.’ There seems no reason for thinking with Golther and Tille, that Bede made a mistake. Charlemagne took the name Ôstarmánoth for April, perhaps only out of compliment to the English, such as Alcuin, at his court.

[368] A Charm for unfruitful or bewitched land (O. Cockayne, Leechdoms of Early England, R. S. i. 399); cf. Grimm, i. 253; Golther, 455; Kögel, i. 1. 39. The ceremony has taken on a Christian colouring, but retains many primitive features. Strips of turf are removed, and masses said over them. They are replaced after oil, honey, barm, milk of every kind of cattle, twigs of every tree, and holy water have been put on the spot. Seed is bought at a double price from almsmen and poured into a hole in the plough with salt and herbs. Various invocations are used, including one which calls on ‘Erce, Erce, Erce, Eorthan modor,’ and implores the Almighty to grant her fertility. Then the plough is driven, and a loaf, made of every kind of corn with milk and holy water, laid under the first furrow. Kögel considers Erce to be derived from ero, ‘earth.’ Brooke, i. 217, states on the authority of Montanus that a version of the prayer preserved in a convent at Corvei begins ‘Eostar, Eostar, Eordhan modor.’ He adds: ‘nothing seems to follow from this clerical error.’ But why an error? The equation Erce-Eostre is consistent with the fundamental identity of the light-goddess and the earth-goddess.

[369] Tacitus, Ann. i. 51; Mogk, iii. 373; Golther, 458; cf. ch. xii.

[370] Gomme, Village Community, 157; B. C. A. Windle, Life in Early Britain, 200; F. W. Maitland, Domesday Book and Beyond, 142, 337, 346.

[371] I have followed in many points the views on Teutonic chronology of Tille, Deutsches Weihnacht (1893) and Yule and Christmas (1899), which are accepted in the main by O. Schräder, Reallexicon der indogermanischen Altertumskunde, s.vv. Jahr, Jahreszeiten, and partly correct those of Weinhold, Ueber die deutsche Jahrtheilung (1862), and Grotefend, Die Zeitrechnung des deutschen Mittelalters (1891).

[372] In Scandinavia the winter naturally began earlier and ended later. Throughout, Scandinavian seasons diverged from those of Germany and the British Isles. In particular the high summer feast and the consequent tripartition of the year do not seem to have established themselves (C. P. B. i. 430). Further south the period of stall-feeding was extended when a better supply of fodder made it possible (Tille, Y. and C. 56, 62; Burne-Jackson, 380).

[373] Cf. ch. xi, where the winter feasts are discussed in more detail.

[374] Grimm, ii. 675, 693, 762, notes the heralds of summer.

[375] Jahn, 34; Mogk, iii. 387; Golther, 572; Schräder-Jevons, 303. The Germans still knew three seasons only when they came into contact with the Romans; cf. Tacitus, Germ. 26 ‘annum quoque ipsum non in totidem digerunt species: hiems et ver et aestas intellectum ac vocabula habent, autumni perinde nomen ac bona ignorantur.’ I do not agree with Tille, Y. and C. 6, that the tripartition of the year, in this pre-calendar form, was ‘of foreign extraction.’ Schräder shows that it is common to the Aryan languages. The Keltic seasons, in particular, seem to be closely parallel to the Teutonic. Of the three great Keltic feasts described by Rhys, C. H. 409, 513, 676; C. F. i. 308, the Lugnassad was probably the harvest feast, the Samhain the old beginning of winter feast, and the Beltain the high summer feast. The meaning of ‘Beltain’ (cf. N. E. D. s.v. Beltane) seems quite uncertain. A connexion is possible but certainly unproved with the Abelio of the Pyrenean inscriptions, the Belenus-Apollo of those of the eastern Alps, and, more rarely, Provence (Röscher, Lexicon, s.v. Belenus; Holder, Alt-celtischer Sprachschatz, s.vv. Belenus, Abelio; Ausonius, Professores, iv. 7), or the Bel of Bohemia mentioned by Allso (ch. xii). The Semitic Baal, although a cult of Belus, found its way into the Roman world (cf. Appendix N, No. xxxii, and Wissowa, 302), is naturally even a less plausible relation. But it is dear to the folk-etymologist; cf. e.g. S. M. Mayhew, Baalism in Trans. of St. Paul’s Ecclesiological Society, i. 83.

[376] Tille, Y. and C. 7, 148, suggests an Egyptian or Babylonian origin, but the equation of the Gothic Jiuleis and the Cypriote ἰλαῖος, ἰουλαῖος, ἰουλίηος, ἰούλιος as names for winter periods makes a Mediterranean connexion seem possible.

[377] Cf. ch. xi.

[378] Grimm, ii. 615, notes that Easter fires are normal in the north, Midsummer fires in the south of Germany. The Beltane fires both of Scotland and Ireland are usually on May 1, but some of the Irish examples collected by J. Jamieson, Etym. Dict. of the Scottish Language, s. v., are at midsummer.

[379] Tille, Y. and C. 71; Rhys, C. H. 419. The primitive year was thermometric, not astronomic, its critical moments, not the solstices, a knowledge of which means science, but the sensible increase and diminution of heat in spring and autumn. The solstices came through Rome. The Sermo Eligii (Grimm, iv. 1737) has ‘nullus in festivitate S. Ioannis vel quibuslibet sanctorum solemnitatibus solstitia ... exerceat,’ but Eligius was a seventh-century bishop, and this Sermo may have been interpolated in the eighth century (O. Reich, Über Audoen’s Lebensbeschreibung des heiligen Eligius (1872), cited in Rev. celtique, ix. 433). It is not clear that the un-Romanized Teuton or Kelt made a god of the sun, as distinct from the heaven-god, who of course has solar attributes and emblems. In the same Sermo Eligius says ‘nullus dominos solem aut lunam vocet, neque per eos iuret.’ But the notion of ‘domini’ may be post-Roman, and the oath is by the permanent, rather than the divine; cf. A. de Jubainville, Intr. à l’Étude de la Litt. celt. 181. It is noticeable that German names for the sun are originally feminine and for the moon masculine.

[380] Mogk, iii. 393; Golther, 584; Jahn, 84; Caspari, 35; Saupe, 7; Hauck, ii. 357; Michels, 93. The ploughing feast is probably the spurcalia of the Indiculus and of Eadhelm, de laudibus virginitatis, c. 25, and the dies spurci of the Hom. de Sacrilegiis. This term appears in the later German name for February, Sporkele. It seems to be founded on Roman analogy from spurcus, ‘unclean.’ Pearson, ii. 159, would, however, trace it to an Aryan root spherag, ‘swell,’ ‘burst,’ ‘shoot.’ Bede, de temp. rat. c. 15, calls February Sol-monath, which he explains as ‘mensis placentarum.’ September, the month of the harvest-festival, is Haleg-monath, or ‘mensis sacrorum.’

[381] Pfannenschmidt, 244; Brand, ii. 1; Ditchfield, 130; Burne-Jackson, 439; Burton, Rushbearing, 147; Schaff, vi. 544; Duchesne, 385. The dedication of churches was solemnly carried out from the fourth century, and the anniversary observed. Gregory the Great ordered ‘solemnitates ecclesiarum dedicationum per singulos annos sunt celebrandae.’ The A.-S. Canons of Edgar (960), c. 28 (Wilkins, i. 227), require them to be kept with sobriety. Originally the anniversary, as well as the actual dedication day, was observed with an all night watch, whence the name vigilia, wakes. Belethus, de rat. offic. (P. L. ccii. 141), c. 137, says that the custom was abolished owing to the immorality to which it led. But the ‘eve’ of these and other feasts continued to share in the sanctity of the ‘day,’ a practice in harmony with the European sense of the precedence of night over day (cf. Schräder-Jevons, 311; Bertrand, 267, 354, 413). An Act of Convocation in 1536 (Wilkins, iii. 823) required all wakes to be held on the first Sunday in October, but it does not appear to have been very effectual.

[382] S. O. Addy, in F. L. xii. 394, has a full account of ‘Garland day’ at Castleton, Derbyshire, on May 29; cf. F. L. xii. 76 (Wishford, Wilts); Burne-Jackson, 365.

[383] The classification of agricultural feasts in U. Jahn, Die deutschen Opfergebräuche, seems throughout to be based less on the facts of primitive communal agriculture, than on those of the more elaborate methods of the later farms with their variety of crops.

[384] Frazer, i. 193; ii. 96; Brand, i. 125; Dyer, 223; Ditchfield, 95; Philpot, 144; Grimm, ii. 762; &c., &c. A single example of the custom is minutely studied by S. O. Addy, Garland Day at Castleton, in F. L. xii. 394.

[385] A. B. Gomme, ii. 507; Hartland, Perseus, ii. 187; Grimm, iv. 1738, 1747; Gaidoz, Un vieux rite médical (1893).

[386] Tacitus, Germania, 40.

[387] Vigfusson and Ungar, Flateyjarbok, i. 337; Grimm, i. 107; Gummere, G. O. 433; Mogk, iii. 321; Golther, 228.

[388] Sozomenes, Hist. Eccles. vi. 37. Cf. also Indiculus (ed. Saupe, 32) ‘de simulacro, quod per campos portant,’ the fifth-century Vita S. Martini, c. 12, by Sulpicius Severus (Opera, ed. Halm, in Corp. Script. Eccl. Hist. i. 122) ‘quia esset haec Gallorum rusticis consuetudo, simulacra daemonum, candido tecta velamine, misera per agros suos circumferre dementia,’ and Alsso’s account of the fifteenth-century calendisationes in Bohemia (ch. xii).

[389] Cf. ch. x.

[390] Cf. Representations (Chester, London, York). There were similar watches at Nottingham (Deering, Hist. of Nott. 123), Worcester (Smith, English Gilds, 408), Lydd and Bristol (Green, Town Life in the Fifteenth Century, i. 148), and on St. Thomas’s day (July 7) at Canterbury (Arch. Cant. xii. 34; Hist. MSS. ix. 1. 148).

[391] Harris, 7; Hartland, Fairy Tales, 71.

[392] Dyer, 205.

[393] Cf. ch. viii.

[394] Dyer, 275; Ditchfield, III; cf. the phrase ‘in and out the windows’ of the singing game Round and Round the Village (A. B. Gomme, s. v.).

[395] M. Deloche, Le Tour de la Lunade, in Rev. celtique, ix. 425; Bérenger-Féraud, i. 423; iii. 167.

[396] Bower, 13.

[397] Duchesne, 276; Usener, i. 293; Tille, Y. and C. 51; W. W. Fowler, 124; Boissier, La Religion romaine, i. 323. The Rogations or litaniae minores represent in Italy the Ambarvalia on May 29. But they are of Gallican origin, were begun by Mamertus, bishop of Vienne (†470), adapted by the Council of Orleans (511), c. 27 (Mansi, viii. 355), and required by the English Council of Clovesho (747), c. 16 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 368), to be held ‘non admixtis vanitatibus, uti mos est plurimis, vel negligentibus, vel imperitis, id est in ludis et equorum cursibus, et epulis maioribus.’ Jahn, 147, quotes the German abbess Marcsuith (940), who describes them as ‘pro gentilicio Ambarvali,’ and adds, ‘confido autem de Patroni huius misericordia, quod sic ab eo gyrade terrae semina uberius provenient, et variae aeris inclementiae cessent.’ Mediaeval Rogation litanies are in Sarum Processional, 103, and York Processional (York Manual, 182). The more strictly Roman litania major on St. Mark’s day (March 25) takes the place of the Robigalia, but is not of great importance in English folk-custom.

[398] Injunctions, ch. xix, of 1559 (Gee-Hardy, Docts. illustrative of English Church History, 426). Thanks are to be given to God ‘for the increase and abundance of his fruits upon the face of the earth.’ The Book of Homilies contains an exhortation to be used on the occasion. The episcopal injunctions and interrogatories in Ritual Commission, 404, 409, 416, &c., endeavour to preserve the Rogations, and to eliminate ‘superstition’ from them; for the development of the notion of ‘beating of bounds,’ cf. the eighteenth-century notices in Dyer, Old English Social Life, 196.

[399] The image is represented by the doll of the May-garland, which has sometimes, according to Ditchfield, 102, become the Virgin Mary, with a child doll in its arms, and at other times (e. g. Castleton, F. L. xii. 469) has disappeared, leaving the name of ‘queen’ to a particular bunch of flowers; also by the ‘giant’ of the midsummer watch. The Salisbury giant, St. Christopher, with his hobby-horse, Hob-nob, is described in Rev. d. T. P. iv. 601.

[400] Grimm, i. 257; Golther, 463; Mogk, iii. 374; Hahn, Demeter und Baubo, 38; Usener, Die Sintfluthsagen, 115. There are parallels in south European custom, both classical and modern, and Usener even derives the term ‘carnival,’ not from carnem levare, but from the currus navalis used by Roman women. A modern survival at Fréjus is described in F. L. xii. 307.

[401] Ditchfield, 103; Transactions of Devonshire Association, xv. 104; cf. the Noah’s ship procession at Hull (Representations, s. v.).

[402] Brand, ii. 223; Grimm, ii. 584; Elton, 284; Gomme, Ethnology, 73; Hartland, Perseus, ii. 175; Haddon, 362; Vaux, 269; Wood-Martin, ii. 46; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 291; R. C. Hope, Holy Wells; M.-L. Quiller-Couch, Ancient and Holy Wells of Cornwall (1894); J. Rhys, C. F. i. 332, 354, and in F. L. iii. 74, iv. 55; A. W. Moore, in F. L. v. 212; H. C. March, in F. L. x. 479 (Dorset).

[403] A. B. Gomme, s. v.; Haddon, 362.

[404] Schaff, iii. 247; Duchesne, 281, 385; Rock, iii. 2. 101, 180; Maskell, i. cccxi; Feasey, 235; Wordsworth, 24; Pfannenschmidt, Das Weihwasser im heidnischen und christlichen Cultus (1869). The Benedictio Fontium took place on Easter Saturday, in preparation for the baptism which in the earliest times was a characteristic Easter rite. The formulae are in York Missal, i. 121; Sarum Missal, 350; Maskell, i. 13.

[405] Frazer, iii. 237; Gomme, in Brit. Ass. Rep. (1896), 626; Simpson, 195; Grenier, 380; Gaidoz, 16; Bertrand, 98; Gummere, G. O. 400; Grimm, ii. 601; Jahn, 25; Brand, i. 127, 166; Dyer, 269, 311, 332; Ditchfield, 141; Cortet, 211.

[406] To this custom may possibly be traced the black-a-vised figures who are persistent in the folk ludi, and also the curious tradition which makes May-day especially the chimney-sweeps’ holiday.

[407] The reasons given are various, ‘to keep off hail’ (whence the term Hagelfeuer mentioned by Pfannenschmidt, 67), ‘vermin,’ ‘caterpillars,’ ‘blight,’ ‘to make the fields fertile.’ In Bavaria torches are carried round the fields ‘to drive away the wicked sower’ (of tares?). In Northumberland raids are made on the ashes of neighbouring villages (Dyer, 332).

[408] Cf. p. 113.

[409] I know of no English Easter folk-fires, but St. Patrick is said to have lit one on the hill of Slane, opposite Tara, on Easter Eve, 433 (Feasey, 180).

[410] Schaff, v. 403; Duchesne, 240; Rock, iii. 2. 71, 94, 98, 107, 244; Feasey, 184; Wordsworth, 204; Frazer, iii. 245; Jahn, 129; Grimm, ii. 616; Simpson, 198. The formulae of the benedictio ignis and benedictio cereorum at Candlemas, and the benedictio ignis, benedictio incensi, and benedictio cerei on Easter Eve, are in Sarum Missal, 334, 697; York Missal, i. 109; ii. 17. One York MS. has ‘Paschae ignis de berillo vel de silice exceptus ... accenditur.’ The correspondence between Pope Zacharias and St. Boniface shows that the lighting of the ignis by a crystal instead of from a lamp kept secretly burning distinguished Gallican from Roman ceremonial in the eighth century (Jaffé, 2291). All the lights in the church are previously put out, and this itself has become a ceremony in the Tenebrae. Ecclesiastical symbolism explained the extinction and rekindling of lights as typifying the Resurrection. Sometimes the ignis provides a light for the folk-fire outside.

[411] Belethus (†1162), de Div. Offic. c. 137 (P. L. ccii. 141), gives three customs of St. John’s Eve. Bones are burnt, because (1) there are dragons in air, earth, and water, and when these ‘in aere ad libidinem concitantur, quod fere fit, saepe ipsum sperma vel in puteos vel in aquas fluviales eiiciunt, ex quo lethalis sequitur annus,’ but the smoke of the bonfires drives them away; and (2) because St. John’s bones were burnt in Sebasta. Torches are carried, because St. John was a shining light. A wheel is rolled, because of the solstice, which is made appropriate to St. John by St. John iii. 30. The account of Belethus is amplified by Durandus, Rationale Div. Offic. (ed. corr. Antwerp, 1614) vii. 14, and taken in turn from Durandus by a fifteenth-century monk of Winchelscombe in a sermon preserved in Harl. MS. 2345, f. 49 (b).

[412] Gaidoz, 24, 109; Bertrand, 122; Dyer, 323; Stubbes, i. 339, from Naogeorgos; Usener, ii. 81; and the mediaeval calendar in Brand, i. 179.

[413] Gomme, in Brit. Ass. Rep. (1896), 636 (Moray, Mull); F. L. ix. 280 (Caithness, with illustration of wood used); Kemble, i. 360 (Perthshire in 1826, Devonshire).

[414] Grimm, ii. 603; Kemble, i. 359; Elton, 293; Frazer, iii. 301; Gaidoz, 22; Jahn, 26; Simpson, 196; Bertrand, 107; Golther, 570. The English term is need-fire, Scotch neidfyre, German Nothfeuer. It is variously derived from nôt ‘need,’ niuwan ‘rub,’ or hniotan ‘press.’ If the last is right, the English form should perhaps be knead-fire (Grimm, ii. 607, 609; Golther, 570). Another German term is Wildfeuer. The Gaelic tin-egin is from tin ‘fire,’ and egin ‘violence’ (Grimm, ii. 609). For ecclesiastical prohibitions cf. Indiculus (Saupe, 20) ‘de igne fricato de ligno, i. e. nodfyr’; Capit. Karlmanni (742), c. 5 (Grimm, ii. 604) ‘illos sacrilegos ignes quos niedfyr vocant.’

[415] Gaidoz, 1; Bertrand, 109, 140; Simpson, 109, 240; Rhys, C. H. 54. The commonest form of the symbol is the swastika, but others appear to be found in the ‘hammer’ of Thor, and on the altars and statues of a Gaulish deity equated in the interpretatio Romana with Jupiter. There is a wheel decoration on the barelle or cars of the Gubbio ceri (Bower, 4).

[416] Brand, i. 97; Dyer, 159; Ditchfield, 78. Eggs are used ceremonially at the Scotch Beltane fires (Frazer, iii. 261; Simpson, 285). Strings of birds’ eggs are hung on the Lynn May garland (F. L. x. 443). In Dauphiné an omelette is made when the sun rises on St. John’s day (Cortet, 217). In Germany children are sent to look for the Easter eggs in the nest of a hare, a very divine animal. Among the miscellaneous Benedictions in the Sarum Manual, with the Ben. Seminis and the Ben. Pomorum in die S^ti Iacobi are a Ben. Carnis Casei Butyri Ovorum sive Pastillarum in Pascha and a Ben. Agni Paschalis, Ovorum et Herbarum in die Paschae. These Benedictions are little more than graces. The Durham Accounts, i. 71-174, contain entries of fifteenth-and sixteenth-century payments ‘fratribus et sororibus de Wytton pro eorum Egsilver erga festum pasche.’

[417] Tw. N. i. 3. 42 ‘He’s a coward and a coystrill, that will not drink to my niece till his brains turn o’ the toe like a parish-top.’ Steevens says ‘a large top was formerly kept in every village, to be whipt in frosty weather, that the peasants might be kept warm by exercise and out of mischief while they could not work.’ This is evidently a ‘fake’ of the ‘Puck of commentators.’ Hone, E. D. B. i. 199, says ‘According to a story (whether true or false), in one of the churches of Paris, a choir boy used to whip a top marked with Alleluia, written in gold letters, from one end of the choir to the other.’ The ‘burial of Alleluia’ is shown later on to be a mediaeval perversion of an agricultural rite. On the whole question of tops, see Haddon, 255; A. B. Gomme, s. v.

[418] Leber, ix. 391; Barthélemy, iv. 447; Du Tilliot, 30; Grenier, 385; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 427; Belethus, c. 120 ‘Sunt nonnullae ecclesiae in quibus usitatum est, ut vel etiam episcopi et archiepiscopi in coenobiis cum suis ludant subditis, ita ut etiam se ad lusum pilae demittant. atque haec quidem libertas ideo dicta est decembrica ... quamquam vero magnae ecclesiae, ut est Remensis, hanc ludendi consuetudinem observent, videtur tamen laudabilius esse non ludere’; Durandus, vi. 86 ‘In quibusdam locis hac die, in aliis in Natali, praelati cum suis clericis ludunt, vel in claustris, vel in domibus episcopalibus; ita ut etiam descendant ad ludum pilae, vel etiam ad choreas et cantus, &c.’ Often the ball play was outside the church, but the canons of Evreux on their return from the procession noire of May 1, played ‘ad quillas super voltas ecclesiae’; and the Easter pilota of Auxerre which lasted to 1538, took place in the nave before vespers. Full accounts of this ceremony have been preserved. The dean and canons danced and tossed the ball, singing the Victimae paschali. For examples of Easter hand-ball or marbles in English folk-custom, cf. Brand, i. 103; Vaux, 240; F. L. xii. 75; Mrs. Gomme, s. v. Handball.

[419] Brand, i. 93; Burne-Jackson, 335. A Norfolk version (F. L. vii. 90) has ‘dances as if in agony.’ On the Mendips (F. L. v. 339) what is expected is ‘a lamb in the sun.’ The moon, and perhaps the sun also, is sometimes ‘wobbly,’ ‘jumping’ or ‘skipping,’ owing to the presence of strata of air differing in humidity or temperature, and so changing the index of refraction (Nicholson, Golspie, 186). At Pontesford Hill in Shropshire (Burne-Jackson, 330) the pilgrimage was on Palm Sunday, actually to pluck a sprig from a haunted yew, traditionally ‘to look for the golden arrow,’ which must be solar. In the Isle of Man hills, on which are sacred wells, are visited on the Lugnassad, to gather ling-berries. Others say that it is because of Jephthah’s daughter, who went up and down on the mountains and bewailed her virginity. And the old folk now stop at home and read Judges xi (Rhys, C. F. i. 312). On the place of hill-tops in agricultural religion cf. p. 106, and for the use of elevated spots for sun-worship at Rome, ch. xi.

[420] Simpson, passim; cf. F. L. vi. 168; xi. 220. Deasil is from Gaelic deas, ‘right,’ ‘south.’ Mediaeval ecclesiastical processions went ‘contra solis cursum et morem ecclesiasticum’ only in seasons of woe or sadness (Rock, iii. 2. 182).

[421] Dr. Murray kindly informs me that the etymology of withershins (A.-S. wiþersynes) is uncertain. It is from wiþer, ‘against,’ and either some lost noun, or one derived from séon, ‘to see,’ or sinþ, ‘course.’ The original sense is simply ‘backwards,’ and the equivalence with deasil not earlier than the seventeenth century. A folk-etymology from shine may account for the aspirate.

[422] Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, 196; Jevons, 130; Frazer, ii. 352; Grant Allen, 318; Hartland, ii. 236; Turnbull, The Blood Covenant. Perhaps, as a third type of sacrifice, should be distinguished the ‘alimentary’ sacrifice of food and other things made to the dead. This rests on the belief in the continuance of the mortal life with its needs and desires after death.

[423] Grimm, i. 47; Golther, 565; Gummere, G. O. 40, 457. Gregory III wrote (†731) to Boniface (P. L. lxxxix. 577) ‘inter cetera agrestem caballum aliquantos comedere adiunxisti plerosque et domesticum. hoc nequaquam fieri deinceps sinas,’ cf. Councils of Cealcythe and Pincanhale (787), c. 19 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 458) ‘equos etiam plerique in vobis comedunt, quod nullus Christianorum in Orientalibus facit.’ The decking of horses is a familiar feature of May-day in London and elsewhere.

[424] C. J. Billson, The Easter Hare, in F. L. iii. 441.

[425] N. W. Thomas in F. L. xi. 227.

[426] Grimm, i. 55; Golther, 559, 575; Gummere, G. O. 456. The universal Teutonic term for sacrificing is blôtan.

[427] Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 20; Jevons, 130, 191. Does the modern huntsman know why he ‘bloods’ a novice?

[428] Grimm, i. 47, 57, 77; Jahn, 24; Gummere, G. O. 459. Hence the theriomorphic ‘image.’

[429] Robertson Smith, 414, 448; Jevons, 102, 285; Frazer, ii. 448; Lang, M. R. R.¹ ii. 73, 80, 106, 214, 226; Grant Allen, 335; Du Méril, Com. i. 75. Hence the theriomorphic larva or mask (Frazer, Pausanias, iv. 239).

[430] Grimm, i. 46, 57; Golther, 576; Frazer, ii. 318, 353; Jevons, 144; Grant Allen, 325. Savages believe that by eating an animal they will acquire its bodily and mental qualities.

[431] Jahn, 14, and for classical parallels Frazer, ii. 315; Pausanias, iii. 288; Jevons, Plutarch, lxix. 143. Grant Allen, 292, was told as a boy in Normandy that at certain lustrations ‘a portion of the Host (stolen or concealed, I imagine) was sometimes buried in each field.’

[432] Frazer, ii. 318; Grant Allen, 337; Jevons, 206.

[433] F. L. vi. 1.

[434] Frazer, ii. 319; Jevons, 214; cf. the πάνσπερμα at the Athenian Pyanepsia.

[435] In the Beltane rite (F. L. vi. 2) a bit of the bannock is reserved for the ‘cuack’ or cuckoo, here doubtless the inheritor of the gods.

[436] Grimm, iii. 1240.

[437] Elton, 428.

[438] Grimm, i. 59; Gummere, G. O. 455.

[439] V. Hehn, Culturpflanzen, 438.

[440] Grimm, i. 44, 48, 53; Golther, 561; Gummere, G. O. 459; Schräder, 422; Mogk, iii. 388; Meyer, 199, and for Keltic evidence Elton, 270. Many of these examples belong rather to the war than to the agricultural cult. The latest in the west are Capit. de partib. Saxon. 9 ‘Si quis hominem diabolo sacrificaverit et in hostiam, more paganorum, daemonibus obtulerit’; Lex Frisionum, additio sup. tit. 42 ‘qui fanum effregerit ... immolatur diis, quorum templa violavit’; Epist. Greg. III, 1 (P. L. lxxxix, 578) ‘hoc quoque inter alia crimina agi in partibus illis dixisti, quod quidam ex fidelibus ad immolandum paganis sua venundent mancipia.’

[441] Frazer, ii. 1; Jevons, 279.

[442] Frazer, ii. 5, 59.

[443] Strabo, iv. 5. 4; Bastian, Oestl. Asien, v. 272. The Mexican evidence given by Frazer, iii. 134, does not necessarily represent a primitive notion of the nature of the rite.

[444] Jevons, 291; Plutarch, lxx. For traces of the blood-guiltiness incurred by sacrifice, cf. the βουφόνια at Athens and the regifugium at Rome (Frazer, ii. 294; Robertson Smith, i. 286).

[445] Frazer, ii. 15, 55, 232; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 242, 296, 329.

[446] In three successive years of famine the Swedes sacrificed first oxen, then men, finally their king Dômaldi himself (Ynglingasaga, c. 18).

[447] Frazer, ii. 24; Jevons, 280; Grant Allen, 296.

[448] The British rule in India forbids human sacrifice, and the Khonds, a Dravidian race of Bengal, have substituted animal for human victims within the memory of man (Frazer, ii. 245).

[449] Hartland, iii. 1; Frazer, Pausanias, iv. 197; v. 44, 143; Bérenger-Féraud, i. 207. Mr. Frazer enumerates forty-one versions of the legend.

[450] Hartland, iii. 81; Grimm, ii. 494; Gummere, G. O. 396. The slaves of Nerthus were drowned in the same lake in which the goddess was dipped.

[451] F. L. vi. i.

[452] Frazer, iii. 319; Gaidoz, 27; Cortet, 213; Simpson, 221; Bertrand, 68; F. L. xii. 315. The work of Posidonius does not exist, but was possibly used by Caesar, B. G. vi. 15; Strabo, iv. 4. 5; Diodorus, v. 32. Wicker ‘giants’ are still burnt in some French festival-fires. But elsewhere, as in the midsummer shows, such ‘giants’ seem to be images of the agricultural divinities, and it is not clear by what process they came to be burnt and so destroyed. Perhaps they were originally only smoked, just as they were dipped.

[453] Gomme, Ethnology, 137; F. L. ii. 300; x. 101; xii. 217; Vaux, 287; Rhys, C. F. i. 306.

[454] F. L. ii. 302; Rhys, C. F. i. 307. In 1656, bulls were sacrificed near Dingwall (F. L. x. 353). A few additional examples, beyond those here given, are mentioned by N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 247.

[455] 1 N. Q. vii. 353; Gomme, Ethnology, 32; Village Community, 113; Grant Allen, 290. The custom was extinct when it was first described in 1853, and some doubt has recently been thrown upon the ‘altar,’ the ‘struggle’ and other details; cf. Trans. of Devonshire Assn. xxviii. 99; F. L. viii. 287.

[456] 1 N. Q. vii. 353; Gomme, Ethnology, 30; Vaux, 285.

[457] Blount, Jocular Tenures (ed. Beckwith), 281; Dyer, 297.

[458] Dunkin, Hist. of Bicester (1816), 268; P. Manning, in F. L. viii. 313.

[459] P. Manning, in F. L. viii. 310; Dyer, 282.

[460] N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 227; Dyer, 285, 438, 470; Ditchfield, 85, 131.

[461] Certain lands were held of the chapter for which a fat buck was paid on the Conversion of St. Paul (January 25), and a fat doe on the Commemoration of St. Paul (June 30). They were offered, according to one writer, alive, at the high altar; the flesh was baked, the head and horns carried in festal procession. The custom dated from at least 1274 (Dyer, 49; W. Sparrow Simpson, St. Paul’s Cath. and Old City Life, 234).

[462] F. L. iv. 9; x. 355. White bulls are said to have been led to the shrine by women desirous of children. F. C. Conybeare, in R. de l’Hist. des Religions, xliv. 108, describes some survivals of sacrificial rites in the Armenian church which existed primitively in other Greek churches also.

[463] F. L. vii. 346. Bull-baiting often took place on festivals, and in several cases, as at Tutbury, the bull was driven into or over a river. Bear-baiting is possibly a later variant of the sport.

[464] Burton, 165; Suffolk F. L. 71; Ditchfield, 227; Dyer, 387; Pfannenschmidt, 279; cf. the Abbots Bromley Horn-dance (ch. viii).

[465] F. L. iv. 5. The custom of sacrifice at the foundation of a new building has also left traces: cf. Grant Allen, 248; F. L. xi. 322, 437; Speth, Builders’ Rites and Ceremonies.

[466] Douce, 598, gives a cut of a hobby-horse, i. e. a man riding a pasteboard or wicker horse with his legs concealed beneath a foot-cloth. According to Du Méril, Com. i. 79, 421, the device is known throughout Europe. In France it is the chevalet, cheval-mallet, cheval-fol, &c.; in Germany the Schimmel.

[467] Dyer, 182, 266, 271; Ditchfield, 97; Burton, 40; F. L. viii. 309, 313, 317; cf. ch. ix on the ‘fool’ or ‘squire’ in the sword and morris dances, and ch. xvi on his court and literary congener. The folk-fool wears a cow’s tail or fox’s brush, or carries a stick with a tail at one end and a bladder and peas at the other. He often wears a mask or has his face blacked. In Lancashire he is sometimes merged with the ‘woman’ grotesque of the folk-festivals, and called ‘owd Bet.’

[468] W. Gregor, F. L. of N. E. Scotland, 181, says that bread and cheese were actually laid in the field, and in the plough when it was ‘strykit.’

[469] Dyer, 20, 207, 447; Ditchfield, 46; F. L. vi. 93. Pirminius v. Reichenau, Dicta (†753), c. 22, forbids ‘effundere super truncum frugem et vinum.’

[470] F. L. Congress, 449, gives a list of about fifty ‘feasten’ cakes. Some are quite local; others, from the Shrove Tuesday pancake to the Good Friday hot cross bun, widespread.

[471] Grimm, i. 57; Frazer, ii. 344; Grant Allen, 339; Jevons, 215; Dyer, 165; Ditchfield, 81.

[472] F. L. vi. 57; viii. 354; ix. 362; x. 111.

[473] F. L. vi. 1.

[474] Ditchfield, 116, 227; Suffolk F. L. 108; Dyer, Old English Social Life, 197. The boys are now said to be whipped in order that they may remember the boundaries; but the custom, which sometimes includes burying them, closely resembles the symbolical sacrifices of the harvest field (p. 158). Grant Allen, 270, suggests that the tears shed are a rain-charm. I hope he is joking.

[475] Brand, ii. 13; Suffolk F. L. 69, 71; Leicester F. L. 121. A ‘harvest-lord’ is probably meant by the ‘Rex Autumnalis’ mentioned in the Accounts of St. Michael’s, Bath (ed. Somerset Arch. Soc. 88), in 1487, 1490, and 1492. A corona was hired by him from the parish. Often the reaper who cuts the last sheaf (i.e. slays the divinity) becomes harvest-lord.

[476] Gomme, Village Community, 107; Dyer, 339; Northall, 202; Gloucester F. L. 33.

[477] Frazer, i. 216; E. Pabst, Die Volksfeste des Maigrafen (1865).

[478] Frazer, i. 219; Cortet, 160; Brand, i. 126; Dyer, 266; Ditchfield, 98.

[479] Tacitus, Germ. c. 43 ‘apud Nahanarvalos antiquae religionis lucus ostenditur. praesidet sacerdos muliebri ornatu.’

[480] Conc. of Trullo (692), c. 62 (Mansi, xi. 671) ‘Nullus vir deinceps muliebri veste induatur, vel mulier veste viro conveniente’; Conc. of Braga (of doubtful date), c. 80 (Mansi, ix. 844) ‘Si quis ballationes ante ecclesias sanctorum fecerit, seu quis faciem suam transformaverit in habitu muliebri et mulier in habitu viri emendatione pollicita tres annos poeniteat.’ The exchange of head-gear between men and women remains a familiar feature of the modern bank-holiday. Some Greek parallels are collected by Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 197. E. Crawley, The Mystic Rose (1902), viii. 371, suggests another explanation, which would connect the custom with the amorous side of the primitive festivals.

[481] Frazer, ii. 93, 109.

[482] Ibid. i. 220; Brand, i. 157; Dyer, 217; Ditchfield, 97; Kelly, 62: cf. ch. viii.

[483] Pearson, ii. 24, 407. Cf. the evidence for a primitive human pairing-season in Westermarck, 25.

[484] Purity of life is sometimes required of those who are to kindle the new fire (Frazer, iii. 260, 302).

[485] H. Spencer, Principles of Psychology, ii. 629; K. Groos, Play of Man, 361; Hirn, 25.

[486] Gummere, G. O. 331.

[487] Frazer, i. 217; iii. 258.

[488] Chaucer says of the Miller (C. T. prol. 548):

‘At wrastlynge he wolde have alwey the ram’;

and of Sir Thopas (C. T. 13670):

‘Of wrastlynge was ther noon his peer,

Ther any ram shal stonde.’

Strutt, 82, figures a wrestling from Royal MS. 2, B. viii, with a cock set on a pole as the prize.

[489] Cf. Appendix I., and Frazer, ii. 316; Jevons, Plutarch, lxix. 143, on the struggle between two wards—the Sacred Way and the Subura—for the head of the October Horse at Rome.

[490] Haddon, 270. The tug-of-war reappears in Korea and Japan as a ceremony intended to secure a good harvest.

[491] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv. Bandyball, Camp, Football, Hockey, Hood, Hurling, Shinty. These games, in which the ball is fought for, are distinct from those already mentioned as having a ceremonial use, in which it is amicably tossed from player to player (cf. p. 128). If Golf belongs to the present category, it is a case in which the endeavour seems to be actually to bury the ball. It is tempting to compare the name Hockey with the Hock-cart of the harvest festival, and with Hock-tide; but it does not really seem to be anything but Hookey. The original of both the hockey-stick and the golf-club was probably the shepherd’s crook. Mr. Pepys tried to cast stones with a shepherd’s crook on those very Epsom downs where the stockbroker now foozles his tee shot.

[492] F. L. vii. 345; M. Shearman, Athletics and Football, 246; Haddon, 271; Gomme, Vill. Comm. 240; Ditchfield, 57, 64; W. Fitzstephen, Vita S. Thomae (†1170-82) in Mat. for Hist. of Becket (R. S.), iii. 9, speaks of the ‘lusum pilae celebrem’ in London ‘die quae dicitur Carnilevaria.’ Riley, 571, has a London proclamation of 1409 forbidding the levy of money for ‘foteballe’ and cok-thresshyng.’ At Chester the annual Shrove Tuesday football on the Roodee was commuted for races in 1540 (Hist. MSS. viii. 1. 362). At Dublin there was, in 1569, a Shrove Tuesday ‘riding’ of the ‘occupacions’ each ‘bearing balles’ (Gilbert, ii. 54).

[493] Haddon, loc. cit.; Gomme, loc. cit.; Gloucester F. L. 38. Cf. the conflictus described in ch. ix, and the classical parallels in Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 267.

[494] F. L. iii. 441; Ditchfield, 85.

[495] F. L. vii. 330 (a very full account); viii. 72, 173; Ditchfield, 50. There is a local aetiological myth about a lady who lost her hood on a windy day, and instituted the contest in memory of the event.

[496] Mrs. Gomme, s. v. Oranges and Lemons.

[497] Mrs. Gomme, s. vv.

[498] Dyer, 6, 481. ‘Stang’ is a word, of Scandinavian origin, for ‘pole’ or ‘stake.’ The Scandinavian nið-stöng (scorn-stake) was a horse’s head on a pole, with a written curse and a likeness of the man to be ill-wished (Vigfusson, Icel. Dict. s. v. níð).

[499] Cf. with Mr. Barrett’s account, Northall, 253; Ditchfield, 178; Northern F. L. 29; Julleville, Les Com. 205; also Thomas Hardy’s Mayor of Casterbridge, and his The Fire at Tranter Sweatley’s (Wessex Poems, 201). The penalty is used by schoolboys (Northern F. L. 29) as well as villagers.

[500] Grenier, 375; Ducange, s. v. Charivarium, which he defines as ‘ludus turpis tinnitibus et clamoribus variis, quibus illudunt iis, qui ad secundas convolant nuptias.’ He refers to the statutes of Melun cathedral (1365) in Instrumenta Hist. Eccl. Melud. ii. 503. Cf. Conc. of Langres (1404) ‘ludo quod dicitur Chareuari, in quo utuntur larvis in figura daemonum, et horrenda ibidem committuntur’; Conc. of Angers (1448), c. 12 (Labbé, xiii. 1358) ‘pulsatione patellarum, pelvium et campanarum, eorum oris et manibus sibilatione, instrumento aeruginariorum, sive fabricantium, et aliarum rerum sonorosarum, vociferationibus tumultuosis et aliis ludibriis et irrisionibus, in illo damnabili actu (qui cariuarium, vulgariter charivari, nuncupatur) circa domos nubentium, et in ipsorum detestationem et opprobrium post eorum secundas nuptias fieri consuetum, &c.’

[501] Cf. ch. xvi, and Leber, ix. 148, 169; Julleville, Les Com. 205, 243. In 1579 a regular jeu was made by the Dijon Mère-Folle of the chevauchée of one M. Du Tillet. The text is preserved in Bibl. Nat. MS. 24039 and analysed by M. Petit de Julleville.

[502] In Berks a draped horse’s head is carried, and the proceeding known as a Hooset Hunt (Ditchfield, 178).

[503] Ducange, s. v. Asini caudam in manu tenens.

[504] Julleville, Les Com. 207.

[505] So on Ilchester Meads, where the proceeding is known as Mommets or Mommicks (Barrett, 65).

[506] On Hock-tide and the Hock-play generally see Brand-Ellis, i. 107; Strutt, 349; Sharpe, 125; Dyer, 188; S. Denne, Memoir on Hokeday in Archaeologia, vii. 244.

[507] Cf. Appendix H. An allusion to the play by Sir R. Morrison (†1542) is quoted in chap. xxv.

[508] Laneham, or his informant, actually said, in error, 1012. On the historical event see Ramsay, i. 353.

[509] There were performers both on horse and on foot. Probably hobby-horses were used, for Jonson brings in Captain Cox ‘in his Hobby-horse,’ which was ‘foaled in Queen Elizabeth’s time’ in the Masque of Owls (ed. Cunningham, iii. 188).

[510] Cf. Representations, s. v. Coventry.

[511] Rossius, Hist. Regum Angliae (ed. Hearne, 1716), 105 ‘in cuius signum usque hodie illa die vulgariter dicta Hox Tuisday ludunt in villis trahendo cordas partialiter cum aliis iocis.’ Rous, who died 1491, is speaking of the death of Hardicanute. On the event see Ramsay, i. 434. Possibly both events were celebrated in the sixteenth century at Coventry. Two of the three plays proposed for municipal performance in 1591 were the ‘Conquest of the Danes’ and the ‘History of Edward the Confessor.’ These were to be upon the ‘pagens,’ and probably they were more regular dramas than the performance witnessed by Elizabeth in 1575 (Representations, s. v. Coventry).

[512] Leland, Collectanea (ed. Hearne), v. 298 ‘uno certo die heu usitato (forsan Hoc vocitato) hoc solempni festo paschatis transacto, mulieres homines, alioque die homines mulieres ligare, ac cetera media utinam non inhonesta vel deteriora facere moliantur et exercere, lucrum ecclesiae fingentes, set dampnum animae sub fucato colore lucrantes, &c.’ Riley, 561, 571, gives London proclamations against ‘hokkyng’ of 1405 and 1409.

[513] Brand-Ellis, i. 113; Lysons, Environs of London, i. 229; C. Kerry, Accts. of St. Lawrence, Reading; Hobhouse, 232; N. E. D. s. vv. Hock, &c.

[514] Owen and Blakeway, Hist. of Shrewsbury, i. 559.

[515] Dyer, 191; Ditchfield, 90.

[516] N. E. D. s. v. Hock-day.

[517] Brand-Ellis, i. 106.

[518] Ibid. i. 109.

[519] Ducange, s. v. Prisio; Barthélemy, iv. 463. On Innocents’ Day, the customs of taking in bed and whipping were united (cf. ch. xii).

[520] Northern F. L. 84; Brand-Ellis, i. 94, 96; Vaux, 242; Ditchfield, 80; Dyer, 133.

[521] Brand-Ellis, i. 106; Owen and Blakeway, i. 559; Dyer, 173; Ditchfield, 90; Burne-Jackson, 336; Northern F. L. 84; Vaux, 242. A dignified H. M. I. is said to have made his first official visit to Warrington on Easter Monday, and to have suffered accordingly. Miss Burne describes sprinkling as an element in Shropshire heaving.

[522] Belethus, c. 120 ‘notandum quoque est in plerisque regionibus secundo die post Pascha mulieres maritos suos verberare ac vicissim viros eas tertio die.’ The spiritually minded Belethus explains the custom as a warning to keep from carnal intercourse.

[523] Dyer, 79; Ditchfield, 83.

[524] Brand-Ellis, i. 114; Ditchfield, 252. Mr. W. Crooke has just studied this and analogous customs in The Lifting of the Bride (F. L. xiii. 226).

[525] Suffolk F. L. 69; F. L. v. 167. The use of largess, a Norman-French word (largitio), is curious. It is also used for the subscriptions to Lancashire gyst-ales (Dyer, 182).

[526] Ditchfield, 155.

[527] Frazer, ii. 233; Pfannenschmidt, 93.

[528] Haddon, 335; Grosse, 167; Herbert Spencer in Contemp. Review (1895), 114; Groos, Play of Man, 88, 354. Evidence for the wide use of the dance at savage festivals is given by Wallaschek, 163, 187.

[529] Grimm, i. 39; Pearson, ii. 133; Müllenhoff, Germania, ch. 24, and de antiq. Germ. poesi chorica, 4; Kögel, i. 1. 8. The primitive word form should have been laikaz, whence Gothic laiks, O. N. leikr, O. H. G. leih, A.-S. lâc. The word has, says Müllenhoff, all the senses ‘Spiel, Tanz, Gesang, Opfer, Aufzug.’ From the same root come probably ludus, and possibly, through the Celtic, the O. F. lai. The A.-S. lâc is glossed ludus, sacrificium, victima, munus. It occurs in the compounds ecga-gelâc and sveorða-gelâc, both meaning ‘sword-dance,’ sige-lâc, ‘victory-dance,’ as-lâc, ‘god-dance,’ wine-lâc, ‘love-dance’ (cf. p. 170), &c. An A.-S. synonym for lâc is plega, ‘play,’ which gives sweord-plega and ecg-plega. Spil is not A.-S. and spilian is a loan-word from O. H. G.

[530] Gummere, B. P. 328; Kögel, i. 1. 6.

[531] S. Ambrose, de Elia et Ieiunio, c. 18 (P. L. xiv. 720), de Poenitentia, ii. 6 (P. L. xvi. 508); S. Augustine, contra Parmenianum, iii. 6 (P. L. xliii. 107); S. Chrysostom, Hom. 47 in Iulian. mart. p. 613; Hom. 23 de Novilun. p. 264; C. of Laodicea (†366), c. 53 (Mansi, ii. 571). Cf. D. C. A. s. v. Dancing, and ch. i. Barthélemy, ii. 438, and other writers have some rather doubtful theories as to liturgical dancing in early Christian worship; cf. Julian. Dict. of Hymn. 206.

[532] Du Méril, Com. 67; Pearson, ii. 17, 281; Gröber, ii. 1. 444; Kögel, i. 1. 25; Indiculus Superstitionum (ed. Saupe), 10 ‘de sacrilegiis per ecclesias.’ Amongst the prohibitions are Caesarius of Arles (†542), Sermo xiii. (P. L. xxxix. 2325) ‘quam multi rustici et quam multae mulieres rusticanae cantica diabolica, amatoria et turpia memoriter retinent et ore decantant’; Const. Childeberti (c. 554) de abol. relig. idololatriae (Mansi, ix. 738) ‘noctes pervigiles cum ebrietate, scurrilitate, vel canticis, etiam in ipsis sacris diebus, pascha, natale Domini, et reliquis festivitatibus, vel adveniente die Dominico dansatrices per villas ambulare ... nullatenus fieri permittimus’; C. of Auxerre (573-603), c. 9 (Maassen, i. 180) ‘non licet in ecclesia choros secularium vel puellarum cantica exercere nec convivia in ecclesia praeparare’; C. of Chalons (639-54), c. 19 (Maassen, i. 212) ‘Valde omnibus noscetur esse decretum, ne per dedicationes basilicarum aut festivitates martyrum ad ipsa solemnia confluentes obscoena et turpia cantica, dum orare debent aut clericos psallentes audire, cum choris foemineis, turpia quidem decantare videantur. unde convenit, ut sacerdotes loci illos a septa basilicarum vel porticus ipsarum basilicarum etiam et ab ipsis atriis vetare debeant et arcere.’ Sermo Eligii (Grimm, iv. 1737) ‘nullus in festivitate S. Ioannis vel quibuslibet sanctorum solemnitatibus solstitia aut vallationes vel saltationes aut caraulas aut cantica diabolica exerceat’; Iudicium Clementis (†693), c. 20 (Haddan-Stubbs, iii. 226) ‘si quis in quacunque festivitate ad ecclesiam veniens pallat foris, aut saltat, aut cantat orationes amatorias ... excommunicetur’ (apparently a fragment of a penitential composed by Clement or Willibrord, an A.-S. missionary to Frisia, on whom see Bede, H. E. v. 9, and the only dance prohibition of possible A.-S. provenance of which I know); Statuta Salisburensia (Salzburg: †800; Boretius, i. 229) ‘Ut omnis populus ... absque inlecebroso canticu et lusu saeculari cum laetaniis procedant’; C. of Mainz (813), c. 48 (Mansi, xiv. 74) ‘canticum turpe atque luxuriosum circa ecclesias agere omnino contradicimus’; C. of Rome (826), c. 35 (Mansi, xiv. 1008) ‘sunt quidam, et maxime mulieres, qui festis ac sacris diebus atque sanctorum natalitiis non pro eorum quibus debent delectantur desideriis advenire, sed ballando, verba turpia decantando, choros tenendo ac ducendo, similitudinem paganorum peragendo, advenire procurant’; cf. Dicta abbatis Pirminii (Caspari, Kirchenhistorische Anecdota, 188); Penitentiale pseudo-Theodorianum (Wasserschleben, 607); Leonis IV Homilia (847, Mansi, xiv. 895); Benedictus Levita, Capitularia (†850), vi. 96 (M. G. H. Script. iv. 2); and for Spain, C. of Toledo (589), c. 23 (Mansi, ix. 999), and the undated C. of Braga, c. 80 (quoted on p. 144). Cf. also the denunciations of the Kalends (ch. xi and Appendix N). Nearly four centuries after the C. of Rome we find the C. of Avignon (1209), c. 17 (Mansi, xxii. 791) ‘statuimus, ut in sanctorum vigiliis in ecclesiis historicae saltationes, obscoeni motus, seu choreae non fiant, nec dicantur amatoria carmina, vel cantilenae ibidem....’ Still later the C. of Bayeux (1300), c. 31 (Mansi, xxv. 66) ‘ut dicit Augustinus, melius est festivis diebus fodere vel arare, quam choreas ducere’; and so on ad infinitum. The pseudo-Augustine Sermo, 265, de Christiano nomine cum operibus non Christianis (P. L. xxxix. 2237), which is possibly by Caesarius of Arles, asserts explicitly the pagan character of the custom: ‘isti enim infelices et miseri homines, qui balationes et saltationes ante ipsas basilicas sanctorum exercere non metuunt nec erubescunt, etsi Christiani ad ecclesiam venerint, pagani de ecclesia revertuntur; quia ista consuetudo balandi de paganorum observatione remansit.’ A mediaeval preacher (quoted by A. Lecoy de la Marche, Chaire française au Moyen Âge, 447, from B. N. Lat. MS. 17509, f. 146) declares, ‘chorea enim circulus est cuius centrum est diabolus, et omnes vergunt ad sinistrum.’

[533] Tille, D. W. 301; G. Raynaud, in Études dédiées à Gaston Paris, 53; E. Schröder, Die Tänzer von Kölbigk, in Z. f. Kirchengeschichte, xvii. 94; G. Paris, in Journal des Savants (1899), 733.

[534] H. E. Reynolds, Wells Cathedral, 85 ‘cum ex choreis ludis et spectaculis et lapidum proiectionibus in praefata ecclesia et eius cemeteriis ac claustro dissentiones sanguinis effusiones et violentiae saepius oriantur et in hiis dicta Wellensis ecclesia multa dispendia patiatur.’

[535] Menestrier, Des Ballets anciens et modernes (1863), 4; on other French church dances, cf. Du Tilliot, 21; Barthélemy, iv. 447; Leber, ix. 420. The most famous are the pilota of Auxerre, which was accompanied with ball-play (cf. ch. vi) and the bergeretta of Besançon. Julian, Dict. of Hymn. 206, gives some English examples.

[536] Grove, 106. A full account of the ceremony at the feast of the Conception in 1901 is given in the Church Times for Jan. 17, 1902.

[537] Grove, 103; Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 430; Mélusine (1879), 39; N. and Q. for May 17, 1890. The dance is headed by the clergy, and proceeds to a traditional tune from the banks of the Sûre to the church, up sixty-two steps, along the north aisle, round the altar deasil, and down the south aisle. It is curious that until the seventeenth century only men took part in it. St. Willibrord is famous for curing nervous diseases, and the pilgrimage is done by way of vow for such cures. The local legend asserts that the ceremony had its origin in an eighth-century cattle-plague, which ceased through an invocation of St. Willibrord: it is a little hard on the saint, whose prohibition of dances at the church-door has just been quoted.

[538] Bérenger-Féraud, iii. 409. A similarly named saint, St. Martial, was formerly honoured in the same way. Every psalm on his day ended, not with the Gloria Patri, but with a dance, and the chant, ‘Saint-Marceau, pregas per nous, et nous epingaren per vous’ (Du Méril, La Com. 68).

[539] Cf. p. 26. There were ‘madinnis that dansit’ before James IV of Scotland at Forres, Elgin and Dernway in 1504, but nothing is said of songs (L. H. T. Accounts, ii. 463).

[540] Carm. Bur. 191:

‘ludunt super gramina virgines decorae

quarum nova carmina dulci sonant ore.’

Ibid. 195:

‘ecce florescunt lilia,

et virginum dant agmina

summo deorum carmina.’

[541] W. Fitzstephen, Descriptio Londin. (Mat. for Hist. of Becket, R. S. iii. 11) ‘puellarum Cytherea ducit choros usque imminente luna, et pede libero pulsatur tellus.’

[542] Jeanroy, 102, 387; Guy, 504; Paris, Journal des Savants (1892), 407. M. Paris points out that dances, other than professional, first appear in the West after the fall of the Empire. The French terms for dancing—baller, danser, treschier, caroler—are not Latin. Caroler, however, he thinks to be the Greek χοραυλεῖν, ‘to accompany a dance with a flute.’ But the French carole was always accompanied, not with a flute, but with a sung chanson.

[543] Paris, loc. cit. 410; Jeanroy, 391. In Wace’s description of Arthur’s wedding, the women carolent and the men behourdent. Cf. Bartsch, Romanzen und Pastourellen, i. 13:

‘Cez damoiseles i vont por caroler,

cil escuier i vont por behorder,

cil chevalier i vont por esgarder.’

[544] On the return of Edward II and Isabella of France in 1308, the mayor and other dignitaries of London went ‘coram rege et regina karolantes’ (Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II, R. S. i. 152). On the birth of Prince Edward in 1312, they ‘menerent la karole’ in church and street (Riley, 107).

[545] Kögel, i. 1. 6.

[546] Mrs. Gomme, ii. 228; Haddon, 345.

[547] Cf. ch. vi on the motion deasil round the sacred object. It is curious that the modern round dances go withershins round a room. Grimm, i. 52, quotes Gregory the Great, Dial. iii. 28 on a Lombard sacrifice, ‘caput caprae, hoc ei, per circuitum currentes, carmine nefando dedicantes.’

[548] At Bradford-on-Avon, Wilts (which preserves its Anglo-Saxon church), and at South Petherton, Somerset, in both cases on Shrove Tuesday (Mrs. Gomme, ii. 230); cf. Vaux, 18. The church at Painswick, Gloucester, is danced round on wake-day (F. L. viii. 392). There is a group of games, in which the players wind and unwind in spirals round a centre. Such are Eller Tree, Wind up the Bush Faggot, and Bulliheisle. These Mrs. Gomme regards as survivals of the ritual dance round a sacred tree. Some obscure references in the rhymes used to ‘dumplings’ and ‘a bundle of rags’ perhaps connect themselves with the cereal cake and the rags hung on the tree for luck. In Cornwall such a game is played under the name of ‘Snail’s Creep’ at certain village feasts in June, and directed by young men with leafy branches.

[549] Du Méril, La Com. 72; Haddon, 346; Grove, 50, 81; Haigh, 14; N. W. Thomas, La Danse totémique en Europe, in Actes d. Cong. intern. d. Trad. pop. (1900).

[550] Plot, Hist. of Staffs. (1686); F. L. iv. 172; vii. 382 (with cuts of properties); Ditchfield, 139.

[551] The O. H. G. hîleih, originally meaning ‘sex-dance,’ comes to be ‘wedding.’ The root hi, like wini (cf. p. 170), has a sexual connotation (Pearson, ii. 132; Kögel, i. 1. 10).

[552] Coussemaker, Chants populaires des Flamands de France, 100:

‘In den hemel is eenen dans:

Alleluia.

Daer dansen all’ de maegdekens:

Benedicamus Domino,

Alleluia, Alleluia.

‘t is voor Amelia:

Alleluia.

Wy dansen naer de maegdekens:

Benedicamus, etc.’

[553] Frazer, i. 35; Dyer, 7; Northall, 233. A Lancashire song is sung ‘to draw you these cold winters away,’ and wishes ‘peace and plenty’ to the household. A favourite French May chanson is

‘Étrennez notre épousée,

Voici le mois,

Le joli mois de Mai,

Étrennez notre épousée

En bonne étrenne.

Voici le mois,

Le joli mois de Mai,

Qu’on vous amène.’

If the quêteurs come on a churl, they have an ill-wishing variant. The following is characteristic of the French peasantry:

‘J’vous souhaitons autant d’enfants,

Qu’y a des pierrettes dans les champs.’

Often more practical tokens of revenge are shown. The Plough Monday ‘bullocks’ in some places consider themselves licensed to plough up the ground before a house where they have been rebuffed.’

[554] Mrs. Gomme, ii. 1, 399; Haddon, 343; Du Méril, La Com. 81. Amongst the jeux of the young Gargantua (Rabelais, i. 22) was one ‘à semer l’avoyne et au laboureur.’ This probably resembled the games of Oats and Beans and Barley, and Would you know how doth the Peasant? which exist in English, French, Catalonian, and Italian versions. On the mimetic character of these games, cf. ch. viii.

[555] Text from Harl. MS. 978 in H. E. Wooldridge, Oxford Hist. of Music, i. 326, with full account. The music, to which religious as well as the secular words are attached, is technically known as a rota or rondel. It is of the nature of polyphonic part-song, and of course more advanced than the typical mediaeval rondet can have been.

[556] On these songs in general, see Northall, 233; Martinengo-Cesaresco, 249; Cortet, 153; Tiersot, 191; Jeanroy, 88; Paris, J. des Savants (1891), 685, (1892), 155, 407.

[557] H. A. Wilson, Hist. of Magd. Coll. (1899), 50. Mr. Wilson discredits the tradition that the performance began as a mass for the obit of Henry VII. The hymn is printed in Dyer, 259; Ditchfield, 96. It has no relation to the summer festival, having been written in the seventeenth century by Thomas Smith and set by Benjamin Rogers as a grace. In other cases hymns have been attached to the village festivals. At Tissington the well-dressing,’ on Ascension Day includes a clerical procession in which ‘Rock of Ages’ and ‘A Living Stream’ are sung (Ditchfield, 187). A special ‘Rushbearers’ Hymn’ was written for the Grasmere Rushbearing in 1835, and a hymn for St. Oswald has been recently added (E. G. Fletcher, The Rushbearing, 13, 74).

[558] Dyer, 240, from Hertfordshire. There are many other versions; cf. Northall, 240.

[559] Kögel, i. 1. 32.

[560] Pertz, Leges, i. 68 ‘nullatenus ibi uuinileodos scribere vel mittere praesumat.’ Kögel, i. 1. 61: Goedeke, i. 11, quote other uses of the term from eighth-century glosses, e.g. ‘uuiniliod, cantilenas saeculares, psalmos vulgares, seculares, plebeios psalmos, cantica rustica et inepta.’ Winiliod is literally ‘love-song,’ from root wini (conn. with Venus). Kögel traces an earlier term O. H. G. winileih, A.-S. winelâc = hîleih. On the erotic motive in savage dances, cf. Grosse, 165, 172; Hirn, 229.

[561] Romania, vii. 61; Trad. Pop. i. 98. Mr. Swinburne has adapted the idea of this poem in A Match (Poems and Ballads, 1st Series, 116).

[562] Romania, ix. 568.

[563] K. Bartsch, Chrest. Prov. 111. A similar chanson is in G. Raynaud, Motets, i. 151, and another is described in the roman of Flamenca (ed. P. Meyer), 3244. It ends

‘E, si parla, qu’il li responda:

Nom sones mot, faitz vos en lai,

Qu’entre mos bracs mos amics j’ai.

Kalenda maia. E vai s’ en.’

[564] Trimousette, from trî mâ câ, an unexplained burden in some of the French maierolles.

[565] Guy, 503.

[566] Tiersot, Robin et Marion; Guy, 506. See the refrain in Bartsch, 197, 295; Raynaud, Rec. de Motets, i. 227.

[567] Langlois, Robin et Marion: Romania, xxiv. 437; H. Guy, Adan de la Hale, 177; J. Tiersot, Sur le Jeu de Robin et Marion (1897); Petit de Julleville, La Comédie, 27; Rep. Com. 21, 324. A jeu of Robin et Marion is recorded also as played at Angers in 1392, but there is no proof that this was Adan de la Hale’s play, or a drama at all. There were folk going ‘desguiziez, à un jeu que l’en dit Robin et Marion, ainsi qu’il est accoutumé de fere, chacun an, en les foiries de Penthecouste’ (Guy, 197). The best editions of Robin et Marion are those by E. Langlois (1896), and by Bartsch in La Langue et la Littérature françaises (1887), col. 523. E. de Coussemaker, Œuvres de Adam de la Halle (1872), 347, gives the music, and A. Rambeau, Die dem Trouvère Adam de la Halle zugeschriebenen Dramen (1886), facsimiles the text. On Adan de la Hale’s earlier sottie of La Feuillée, see ch. xvi.

[568] Thomas Wright, Lyrical Poems of the Reign of Edward I (Percy Soc.).

[569] Cf. ch. xvii.

[570] The May-game is probably intended by the ‘Whitsun pastorals’ of Winter’s Tale, iv. 4. 134, and the ‘pageants of delight’ at Pentecost, where a boy ‘trimmed in Madam Julias gown’ played ‘the woman’s part’ (i. e. Maid Marian) of Two Gentlemen of Verona, iv. 4. 163. Cf. also W. Warner, Albion’s England, v. 25:

‘At Paske began our Morrise, and ere Penticost our May.’

[571] Flores Historiarum (R. S.), iii. 130 ‘aestimo quod rex aestivalis sis; forsitan hyemalis non eris.’

[572] Cf. Appendix E.

[573] ‘King-play’ at Reading (Reading St. Giles Accounts in Brand-Hazlitt, i. 157; Kerry, Hist. of St. Lawrence, Reading, 226).

[574] ‘King’s revel’ at Croscombe, Somerset (Churchwardens’ Accounts in Hobhouse, 3).

[575] ‘King’s game’ at Leicester (Kelly, 68) and ‘King-game’ at Kingston (Lysons, Environs of London, i. 225). On the other hand the King-game in church at Hascombe in 1578 (Representations, s. v. Hascombe), was probably a miracle-play of the Magi or Three Kings of Cologne. This belongs to Twelfth night (cf. ch. xix), but curiously the accounts of St. Lawrence, Reading, contain a payment for the ‘Kyngs of Colen’ on May day, 1498 (Kerry, loc. cit.).

[576] Cf. ch. xvii. Local ‘lords of misrule’ in the summer occur at Montacute in 1447-8 (Hobhouse, 183 ‘in expensis Regis de Montagu apud Tyntenhull existentis tempore aestivali’), at Meriden in 1565 (Sharpe, 209), at Melton Mowbray in 1558 (Kelly, 65), at Tombland, near Norwich (Norfolk Archaeology, iii. 7; xi. 345), at Broseley, near Much Wenlock, as late as 1652 (Burne-Jackson, 480). See the attack on them in Stubbes, i. 146. The term ‘lord of misrule’ seems to have been borrowed from Christmas (ch. xvii). It does not appear whether the lords of misrule of Old Romney in 1525 (Archaeologia Cantiana, xiii. 216) and Braintree in 1531 (Pearson, ii. 413) were in winter or summer.

[577] Owen and Blakeway, i. 331; Jackson and Burne, 480 (cf. Appendix E). Miss Burne suggests several possible derivations of the name; from mar ‘make mischief,’ from Mardoll or Marwell (St. Mary’s Well), streets in Shrewsbury, or from Muryvale or Meryvalle, a local hamlet. But the form ‘Mayvoll’ seems to point to ‘Maypole.’

[578] Representations, s. v. Aberdeen. Here the lord of the summer feast seems to have acted also as presenter of the Corpus Christi plays.

[579] Cf. ch. xvii.

[580] Batman, Golden Books of the Leaden Gods (1577), f. 30. The Pope is said to be carried on the backs of four deacons, ‘after the maner of carying whytepot queenes in Western May games.’ A ‘whitepot’ is a kind of custard.

[581] Such phrases occur as ‘the May-play called Robyn Hod’ (Kerry, Hist. of St. Lawrence, Reading, 226, s. a. 1502), ‘Robin Hood and May game’ and Kynggam and Robyn Hode’ (Kingston Accounts, 1505-36, in Lysons, Environs of London, i. 225). The accounts of St. Helen’s, Abingdon, in 1566, have an entry ‘for setting up Robin Hood’s bower’ (Brand-Hazlitt, i. 144). It is noticeable that from 1553 Robin Hood succeeds the Abbot of Mayvole in the May-game at Shrewsbury (Appendix E). Similarly, in an Aberdeen order of 1508 we find ‘Robert Huyid and Litile Johne, quhilk was callit, in yers bipast, Abbat and Prior of Bonacord’ (Representations, s. v. Aberdeen). Robin Hood seems, therefore, to have come rather late into the May-games, but to have enjoyed a widening popularity.

[582] The material for the study of the Robin Hood legend is gathered together by S. Lee in D. N. B. s. v. Hood; Child, Popular Ballads, v. 39; Ritson, Robin Hood (1832); J. M. Gutch, Robin Hood (1847). Prof. Child gives a critical edition of all the ballads.

[583] Piers Plowman, B-text, passus v. 401.

[584] Fabian, Chronicle, 687, records in 1502 the capture of ‘a felowe whych hadde renewed many of Robin Hode’s pagentes, which named himselfe Greneleef.’

[585] Cf. p. 177.

[586] Kühn, in Haupt’s Zeitschrift, v. 481.

[587] Ramsay, F. E. i. 168.

[588] In the Nottingham Hall-books (Hist. MSS. i. 105), the same locality seems to be described in 1548 as ‘Robyn Wood’s Well,’ and in 1597 as ‘Robyn Hood’s Well.’ Robin Hood is traditionally clad in green. If he is mythological at all, may he not be a form of the ‘wild-man’ or ‘wood-woz’ of certain spring dramatic ceremonies, and the ‘Green Knight’ of romance? Cf. ch. ix.

[589] The earliest mention of her is (†1500) in A. Barclay, Eclogue, 5, ‘some may fit of Maide Marian or else of Robin Hood.’

[590] Hist. MSS. i. 107, from Convocation Book, ‘pecuniae ecclesiae ac communitatis Welliae ... videlicet, provenientes ante hoc tempus de Robynhode, puellis tripudiantibus, communi cervisia ecclesiae, et huiusmodi.’

[591] The accounts of Croscombe, Somerset, contain yearly entries of receipts from ‘Roben Hod’s recones’ from 1476 to 1510, and again in 1525 (Hobhouse, 1 sqq.). At Melton Mowbray the amount raised by the ‘lord’ was set aside for mending the highways (Kelly, 65).

[592] Lysons, Environs, i. 225. Mention is made of ‘Robin Hood,’ ‘the Lady,’ ‘Maid Marion,’ ‘Little John,’ ‘the Frere,’ ‘the Fool,’ ‘the Dysard,’ ‘the Morris-dance.’

[593] Archaeologia Cantiana, xiii. 216.

[594] C. Kerry, History of St. Lawrence, Reading, 226. ‘Made Maryon,’ ‘the tree’ and ‘the morris-dance,’ are mentioned.

[595] L. H. T. Accounts, ii. 377.

[596] Stowe, Survey (1598), 38. He is speaking mainly of the period before 1517, when there was a riot on ‘Black’ May-day, and afterwards the May-games were not ‘so freely used as before.’

[597] Appendix E (vi).

[598] Cf. Representations.

[599] Bower (†1437), Scotichronicon (ed. Hearne), iii. 774 ‘ille famosissimus sicarius Robertus Hode et Litill-Iohanne cum eorum complicibus, de quibus stolidum vulgus hianter in comoediis et tragoediis prurienter festum faciunt, et, prae ceteris romanciis, mimos et bardanos cantitare delectantur.’ On the ambiguity of ‘comoediae’ and ‘tragoediae’ in the fifteenth century, cf. ch. xxv.

[600] Gairdner, Paston Letters, iii. 89; Child, v. 90; ‘W. Woode, whyche promysed ... he wold never goo ffro me, and ther uppon I have kepyd hym thys iij yer to pleye Seynt Jorge and Robyn Hod and the Shryff off Nottyngham, and now, when I wolde have good horse, he is goon into Bernysdale, and I withowt a keeper.’ The Northumberland Household Book, 60, makes provision for ‘liveries for Robin Hood’ in the Earl’s household.

[601] Printed by Child, v. 90; Manly, i. 279. The MS. of the fragment probably dates before 1475.

[602] Printed by Child, v. 114, 127; Manly, i. 281, 285. They were originally printed as one play by Copland (†1550).

[603] Printed in Dodsley-Hazlitt, vol. viii. These plays were written for Henslowe about February 1598. In November Chettle ‘mended Roben hood for the corte’ (Henslowe’s Diary, 118-20, 139). At Christmas 1600, Henslowe had another play of ‘Roben hoodes penerths’ by William Haughton (Diary, 174-5). An earlier ‘pastoral pleasant comedie of Robin Hood and Little John’ was entered on the Stationers’ Registers on May 18, 1594. These two are lost, as is The May Lord which Jonson wrote (Conversations with Drummond, 27). Robin Hood also appears in Peele’s Edward I (†1590), and the anonymous Look About You (1600), and is the hero of Greene’s George a Greene the Pinner of Wakefield (†1593). Anthony Munday introduced him again into his pageant of Metropolis Coronata (1615), and a comedy of Robin Hood and his Crew of Soldiers, acted at Nottingham on the day of the coronation of Charles II, was published in 1661. On all these plays, cf. F. E. Schelling, The English Chronicle Play, 156.

[604] Furnivall, Robert Laneham’s Letter, clxiii. Chaucer, Rom. of Rose, 7455, has ‘the daunce Joly Robin,’ but this is from his French original ‘li biaus Robins.’

[605] Cf. p. 176.

[606] Dyer, 278; Drake, 86; Brand-Ellis, i. 157; Cutts, Parish Priests, 317; Archaeologia, xii. 11; Stubbes, i. 150; F. L. x. 350. At an ‘ale’ a cask of home-brewed was broached for sale in the church or church-house, and the profits went to some public object; at a church-ale to the parish, at a clerk-ale to the clerk, at a bride-ale or bridal to the bride, at a bid-ale to some poor man in trouble. A love-ale was probably merely social.

[607] At Reading in 1557 (C. Kerry, Hist. of St. Lawrence, Reading, 226).

[608] At Tintinhull in 1513 (Hobhouse, 200, ‘Robine Hood’s All’).

[609] Brand-Ellis, i. 157; Dyer, 278. A carving on the church of St. John’s, Chichester, represents a Whitsun-ale, with a ‘lord’ and ‘lady.’

[610] Cf. p. 141.

[611] At Ashton-under-Lyne, from 1422 to a recent date (Dyer, 181). ‘Gyst’ appears to be either ‘gist’ (gîte) ‘right of pasturage’ or a corruption of ‘guising’; cf. ch. xvii.

[612] Cf. p. 91. On Scot-ale, cf. Ducange, s. v. Scotallum; Archaeologia, xii. 11; H. T. Riley, Munimenta Gildhallae Londin. (R. S.), ii. 760. The term first appears as the name of a tax, as in a Northampton charter of 1189 (Markham-Cox, Northampton Borough Records, i. 26) ‘concessimus quod sint quieti de ... Brudtol et de Childwite et de hieresgiue et de Scottale, ita quod Prepositus Northamptonie ut aliquis alius Ballivus scottale non faciat’; cf. the thirteenth-century examples quoted by Ducange. The Council of Lambeth (1206), c. 2, clearly defines the term as ‘communes potationes,’ and the primary sense is therefore probably that of an ale at which a scot or tax is raised.

[613] Malory, Morte d’ Arthur, xix. 1. 2.

[614] Hall, 515, 520, 582; Brewer, Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, ii. 1504. In 1510, Henry and his courtiers visited the queen’s chamber in the guise of Robin Hood and his men on the inappropriate date of January 18. In Scotland, about the same time, Dunbar wrote a ‘cry’ for a maying with Robin Hood; cf. Texts, s. v. Dunbar.

[615] Latimer, Sermon vi before Edw. VI (1549, ed. Arber, 173). Perhaps the town was Melton Mowbray, where Robin Hood was very popular, and where Latimer is shown by the churchwardens’ accounts to have preached several years later in 1553 (Kelly, 67).

[616] Machyn, 20.

[617] Ibid. 89, 137, 196, 201, 283, 373. In 1559, e. g. ‘the xxiiij of June ther was a May-game ... and Sant John Sacerys, with a gyant, and drumes and gunes [and the] ix wordes (worthies), with spechys, and a goodly pagant with a quen ... and dyvers odur, with spechys; and then Sant Gorge and the dragon, the mores dansse, and after Robyn Hode and lytyll John, and M[aid Marian] and frere Tuke, and they had spechys round a-bout London.’

[618] ‘Mr. Tomkys publicke prechar’ in Shrewsbury induced the bailiffs to ‘reform’ May-poles in 1588, and in 1591 some apprentices were committed for disobeying the order. A judicial decision was, however, given in favour of the ‘tree’ (Burne-Jackson, 358; Hibbert, English Craft-Gilds, 121). In London the Cornhill May-pole, which gave its name to St. Andrew Undershaft, was destroyed by persuasion of a preacher as early as 1549 (Dyer, 248); cf. also Stubbes, i. 306, and Morrison’s advice to Henry VIII quoted in ch. xxv.

[619] Archbishop Grindal’s Visitation Articles of 1576 (Remains, Parker Soc. 175), ‘whether the minister and churchwardens have suffered any lords of misrule or summer lords or ladies, or any disguised persons, or others, in Christmas or at May-games, or any morris-dancers, or at any other times, to come unreverently into the church or churchyard, and there to dance, or play any unseemly parts, with scoffs, jests, wanton gestures, or ribald talk, namely in the time of Common Prayer.’ Similarly worded Injunctions for Norwich (1569), York (1571), Lichfield (1584), London (1601) and Oxford (1619) are quoted in the Second Report of the Ritual Commission; cf. the eighty-eighth Canon of 1604. It is true that the Visitation Articles for St. Mary’s, Shrewsbury, in 1584 inquire more generally ‘whether there have been any lords of mysrule, or somer lords or ladies, or any disguised persons, as morice dancers, maskers, or mum’ers, or such lyke, within the parishe, ether in the nativititide or in som’er, or at any other tyme, and what be their names’; but this church was a ‘peculiar’ and its ‘official’ the Puritan Tomkys mentioned in the last note (Owen and Blakeway, i. 333; Burne-Jackson, 481).

[620] Stafford, 16.

[621] Stubbes, i. 146; cf. the further quotations and references there given in the notes.

[622] 6 Mary, cap. 61.

[623] Child, v. 45; cf. Representations, s.v. Aberdeen, on the breaches of the statute there in 1562 and 1565.

[624] Dyer, 228; Drake, 85. At Cerne Abbas, Dorset, the May-pole was cut down in 1635 and made into a town ladder (F. L. x. 481).

[625] Grimm, ii. 784; Kleinere Schriften, v. 281; Pearson, ii. 281.

[626] Frazer, ii. 82; Grant Allen, 293, 315; Grimm, ii. 764; Pearson, ii. 283.

[627] Frazer, ii. 86; Martinengo-Cesaresco, 267. Cf. the use of the bladder of blood in the St. Thomas procession at Canterbury (Representations, s. v.).

[628] Frazer, iii. 70. Amongst such customs are the expulsion of Satan on New Year’s day by the Finns, the expulsion of Kore at Easter in Albania, the expulsion of witches on March 1 in Calabria, and on May 1 in the Tyrol, the frightening of the wood-sprites Strudeli and Strätteli on Twelfth night at Brunnen in Switzerland. Such ceremonies are often accompanied with a horrible noise of horns, cleavers and the like. Horns are also used at Oxford (Dyer, 261) and elsewhere on May 1, and I have heard it said that the object of the Oxford custom is to drive away evil spirits. Similar discords are de rigueur at Skimmington Ridings. I very much doubt whether they are anything but a degenerate survival of a barbaric type of music.

[629] Frazer, iii. 121.

[630] Tylor, Anthropology, 382.

[631] Caspari, 10 ‘qui in mense februario hibernum credit expellere ... non christianus, sed gentilis est.’

[632] Frazer, ii. 91.

[633] Frazer, ii. 60.

[634] Sometimes the Pfingstl is called a ‘wild man.’ Two ‘myghty woordwossys [cf. p. 392] or wyld men’ appeared in a revel at the court of Henry VIII in 1513 (Revels Account in Brewer, ii. 1499), and similar figures are not uncommon in the sixteenth-century masques and entertainments.

[635] Frazer, ii. 62.

[636] Ibid. ii. 61, 82; E. Meier, Deutsche Sagen, Sitten und Gebräuche aus Schwaben, 374, 409.

[637] Syr Gawayne and the Grene Knyghte (ed. Madden, Bannatyne Club, 1839); cf. J. L. Weston, The Legend of Sir Gawain, 85. Arthur was keeping New Year’s Day, when a knight dressed in green, with a green beard, riding a green horse, and bearing a holly bough, and an axe of green steel, entered the hall. He challenged any man of the Round Table to deal him a buffet with the axe on condition of receiving one in return after the lapse of a year. Sir Gawain accepts. The stranger’s head is cut off, but he picks it up and rides away with it. This is a close parallel to the resurrection of the slain ‘wild man.’

[638] Frazer, ii. 105, 115, 163, 219; Pausanias, iii. 53; v. 259; Gardner, New Chapters in Greek History, 395, give Russian, Greek, and Asiatic parallels.

[639] Frazer, ii. 71; Pfannenschmidt, 302. The victim is sometimes known as the Carnival or Shrovetide ‘Fool’ or ‘Bear.’

[640] Dyer, 93. The Jack o’ Lent apparently stood as a cock-shy from Ash Wednesday to Good Friday, and was then burnt. Portuguese sailors in English docks thrash and duck an effigy of Judas Iscariot on Good Friday (Dyer, 155).

[641] Alleluia was not sung during Lent. Fosbrooke, British Monachism, 56, describes the Funeral of Alleluia by the choristers of an English cathedral on the Saturday before Septuagesima. A turf was carried in procession with howling to the cloisters. Probably this cathedral was Lincoln, whence Wordsworth, 105, quotes payments ‘pro excludend’ Alleluya’ from 1452 to 1617. Leber, ix. 338; Barthélemy, iii. 481, give French examples of the custom; cf. the Alleluia top, p. 128.

[642] Dyer, 158. Reeds were woven on Good Friday into the shape of a crucifix and left in some hidden part of a field or garden.

[643] Dyer, 333. The village feast was on St. Peter’s day, June 29. On the Saturday before an effigy was dug up from under a sycamore on May-pole hill; a week later it was buried again. In this case the order of events seems to have been inverted.

[644] Frazer, i. 221. The French May-queen is often called la mariée or l’épouse.

[645] Frazer, i. 225; Jevons, Plutarch R. Q. lxxxiii. 56.

[646] Waldron, Hist. of Isle of Man, 95; Dyer, 246.

[647] Olaus Magnus, History of Swedes and Goths, xv. 4, 8, 9; Grimm, ii. 774.

[648] Grimm, ii. 765; Paul, Grundriss (ed. 1), i. 836.

[649] Frazer, Pausanias, iii. 267.

[650] Cf. ch. iv.

[651] Grimm, ii. 675, 763; Swainson, Folk-lore of British Birds (F. L. S.), 109; Hardy, Popular History of the Cuckoo, in F. L. Record, ii; Mannhardt, in Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie, iii. 209. Cf. ch. v.

[652] Aristotle, Poetics, i. 5 αὐτῷ δέ τῷ ῥυθμῷ [ποιεῖται τὴν μίμησιν] χωρὶς ἁρμονίας ἡ [τέχνη] τῶν ὀρχηστῶν, καὶ γὰρ οὗτοι διά τῶν σχηματιζομένων ῥυθμῶν μιμοῦνται καὶ ἤθη καὶ πάθη καὶ πράξεις. Cf. Lucian, de Saltatione, xv. 277. Du Méril, 65, puts the thing well: ‘La danse n’a été l’invention de personne: elle s’est produite d’elle-même le jour que le corps a subi et dû refléter un état de l’âme.... On ne tarda pas cependant à la séparer de sa cause première et à la reproduire pour elle-même ... en simulant la gaieté on parvenait réellement à la sentir.’

[653] Wallaschek, 216; Grosse, 165, 201; Hirn, 157, 182, 229, 259, 261; Du Méril, Com. 72; Haddon, 346; Grove, 52, 81; Mrs. Gomme, ii. 518; G. Catlin, On Manners ... of N. Amer. Indians (1841), i. 128, 244. Lang, M. R. R. i. 272, dwells on the representation of myths in savage mystery-dances, and points out that Lucian (loc. cit.) says that the Greeks used to ‘dance out’ (ἐξορχεῖσθαι) their mysteries.

[654] The chanson of Transformations (cf. p. 170) is sung by peasant-girls as a semi-dramatic duet (Romania, vii. 62); and that of Marion was performed ‘à deux personnages’ on Shrove Tuesday in Lorraine (Romania, ix. 568).

[655] Giraldus Cambrensis, Itinerarium Cambriae, i. 2 (Opera, R.S. vi. 32) ‘Videas enim hic homines seu puellas, nunc in ecclesia, nunc in coemiterio, nunc in chorea, quae circa coemiterium cum cantilena circumfertur, subito in terram corruere, et primo tanquam in extasim ductos et quietos; deinde statim tanquam in phrenesim raptos exsilientes, opera quaecunque festis diebus illicite perpetrare consueverant, tam manibus quam pedibus, coram populo repraesentantes. videas hunc aratro manus aptare, illum quasi stimulo boves excitare; et utrumque quasi laborem mitigando solitas barbarae modulationis voces efferre. videas hunc artem sutoriam, illum pellipariam imitari. item videas hanc quasi colum baiulando, nunc filum manibus et brachiis in longum extrahere, nunc extractum occandum tanquam in fusum revocare; istam deambulando productis filis quasi telam ordiri: illam sedendo quasi iam orditam oppositis lanceolae iactibus et alternis calamistrae cominus ictibus texere mireris. Demum vero intra ecclesiam cum oblationibus ad altare perductos tanquam experrectos et ad se redeuntes obstupescas.’

[656] Cf. p. 151 with Mrs. Gomme’s Memoir (ii. 458) passim, and Haddon, 328. Parallel savage examples are in Wallaschek, 216; Hirn, 157, 259.

[657] Mrs. Gomme, ii. 399, 494 and s. vv.; Haddon, 340. Similar games are widespread on the continent; cf. the Rabelais quotation on p. 167. Haddon quotes a French formula, ending

‘Aveine, aveine, aveine,

Que le Bon Dieu t’amène.’

[658] Wallaschek, 273; Hirn, 285.

[659] The German data here used are chiefly collected by Müllenhoff and F. A. Mayer; cf. also Creizenach, i. 408; Michels, 84; J. J. Ammann, Nachträge zum Schwerttanz, in Z. f. d. Alterthum xxxiv (1890), 178; A. Hartmann, Volksschauspiele (1880), 130; F. M. Böhme, Geschichte des Tanzes in Deutschland (1886); Sepp, Die Religion der alten Deutschen, und ihr Fortbestand in Volkssagen, Aufzügen und Festbräuchen bis zur Gegenwart (1890), 91; O. Wittstock, Ueber den Schwerttanz der Siebenbürger Sachsen, in Philologische Studien: Festgabe für Eduard Sievers (1896), 349.

[660] Tacitus, Germania, 24 ‘genus spectaculorum unum atque in omni coetu idem. nudi iuvenes, quibus id ludicrum est, inter gladios se atque infestas frameas saltu iaciunt. exercitatio artem paravit, ars decorem, non in quaestum tamen aut mercedem; quamvis audacis lasciviae pretium est voluptas spectantium.’

[661] Beowulf, 1042. It is in the hall of Hrothgar at Heorot,

‘þæt wæs hilde-setl: heah-cyninges,

þonne sweorda-gelác: sunu Healfdenes

efnan wolde: nǽfre on óre lǽg

wíd-cúþes wíg: þonne walu féollon.’

[662] Appendix N, no. xxxix; ‘arma in campo ostendit.’

[663] Strutt, 215. The tenth-century τὸ γοτθικόν at Byzantium seems to have been a kind of sword-dance (cf. ch. xii ad fin.).

[664] Strutt, 260; Du Méril, La Com. 84.

[665] Mayer, 259.

[666] Müllenhoff, 145, quoting Don Quixote, ii. 20; Z. f. d. A. xviii. 11; Du Méril, La Com. 86.

[667] Webster, The White Devil, v. 6, ‘a matachin, it seems by your drawn swords’; the ‘buffons’ is included in the list of dances in the Complaynt of Scotland (†1548); cf. Furnivall, Laneham’s Letter, clxii.

[668] Tabourot, Orchésographie, 97, Les Bouffons ou Mattachins. The dancers held bucklers and swords which they clashed together. They also wore bells on their legs.

[669] Cf. Appendix J.

[670] Henderson, 67. The sword-dance is also mentioned by W. Hutchinson, A View of Northumberland (1778), ii ad fin. 18; by J. Wallis, Hist. of Northumberland (1779), ii. 28, who describes the leader as having ‘a fox’s skin, generally serving him for a covering and ornament to his head, the tail hanging down his back’; and as practised in the north Riding of Yorks, by a writer in the Gentleman’s Magazine (1811), lxxxi. 1. 423. Here it took place from St. Stephen’s to New Year’s Day. There were six lads, a fiddler, Bessy and a Doctor. At Whitby, six dancers went with the ‘Plough Stots’ on Plough Monday. The figures included the placing of a hexagon or rose of swords on the head of one of the performers. The dance was accompanied with ‘Toms or clowns’ masked or painted, and ‘Madgies or Madgy-Pegs’ in women’s clothes. Sometimes a farce, with a king, miller, clown and doctor was added (G. Young, Hist. of Whitby (1817), ii. 880).

[671] Cf. Appendix J.

[672] R. Bell, Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England, 175.

[673] Cf. Appendix J.

[674] Mayer, 230, 417.

[675] Henderson, 67. The clown introduces each dancer in turn; then there is a dance with raised swords which are tied in a ‘knot.’ Henderson speaks of a later set of verses also in use, which he does not print.

[676] R. Bell, Ancient Poems, Ballads and Songs of the Peasantry of England, 175 (from Sir C. Sharpe’s Bishoprick Garland). A Christmas dance. The captain began the performance by drawing a circle with his sword. Then the Bessy introduced the captain, who called on the rest in turn, each walking round the circle to music. Then came an elaborate dance with careful formations, which degenerated into a fight. Bell mentions a similar set of verses from Devonshire.

[677] Bell, 172. A Christmas dance. The clown makes the preliminary circle with his sword, and calls on the other dancers.

[678] Bell, 181. The clown calls for ‘a room,’ after which one of the party introduces the rest. This also is a Christmas dance, but as the words ‘we’ve come a pace-egging’ occur, it must have been transferred from Easter. Bell says that a somewhat similar performance is given at Easter in Coniston, and Halliwell, Popular Rhymes and Nursery Tales, 244, describes a similar set of rhymes as used near York for pace-egging.

[679] Described by Müllenhoff, 138, from Ausland (1857), No. 4, f. 81. The clown gives the prologue, and introduces the rest.

[680] Cf. p. 221.

[681] Mayer prints and compares all three texts.

[682] Cf. p. 185. The original names seem to be best preserved in the Styrian verses: they are Obersteiner (the Vortänzer) or Hans Kanix, Fasching (the Narr), Obermayer, Jungesgsell, Grünwald, Edlesblut, Springesklee, Schellerfriedl, Wilder Waldmann, Handssupp, Rubendunst, Leberdarm, Rotwein, Höfenstreit.

[683] H. Pröhle, Weltliche und geistliche Volkslieder und Volksschauspiele (1855), 245.

[684] Müllenhoff, Z. f. d. A. xx. 10.

[685] Brand-Ellis, i. 142; Douce, 576; Burton, 95; Gutch, Robin Hood, i. 301; Drake, 76.

[686] Burton, 117; Warner, Albion’s England, v. 25 ‘At Paske begun our Morrise, and ere Penticost our May.’ The morris was familiar in the revels of Christmas. Laneham, 23, describes at the Bride-ale shown before Elizabeth at Kenilworth ‘a lively morrisdauns, according too the auncient manner: six daunserz, Mawdmarion, and the fool.’

[687] A good engraving of the window is in Variorum Shakespeare, xvi. 419, and small reproductions in Brand, i. 145; Burton, 103; Gutch, i. 349; Mr. Tollet’s own account of the window, printed in the Variorum, loc. cit., is interesting, but too ingenious. He dates the window in the reign of Henry VIII; Douce, 585, a better authority, ascribes it to that of Edward IV.

[688] Ben Jonson, The Gipsies Metamorphosed (ed. Cunningham, iii. 151):

‘Clod. They should be morris-dancers by their gingle, but they have no napkins.

‘Cockrel. No, nor a hobby-horse.

‘Clod. Oh, he’s often forgotten, that’s no rule; but there is no Maid Marian nor Friar amongst them, which is the surer mark.

‘Cockrel. Nor a fool that I see.’

[689] The lady, the fool, the hobby-horse are all in Tollet’s window, and in a seventeenth-century printing by Vinkenboom from Richmond palace, engraved by Douce, 598; Burton, 105. Cf. the last note and other passages quoted by Douce, Brand, and Burton. In Two Noble Kinsmen, iii. 5, 125, a morris of six men and six women is thus presented by Gerrold, the schoolmaster:

‘I first appear ...

The next, the Lord of May and Lady bright,

The Chambermaid and Serving-man, by night

That seek out silent hanging: then mine Host

And his fat Spouse, that welcomes to their cost

The galled traveller, and with a beck’ning

Informs the tapster to inflame the reck’ning:

Then the beast-eating Clown, and next the Fool,

The Bavian, with long tail and eke long tool;

Cum multis aliis, that make a dance.’

Evidently some of these dramatis personae are not traditional; the ingenuity of the presenter has been at work on them. ‘Bavian’ as a name for the fool, is the Dutch baviaan, ‘baboon.’ His ‘tail’ is to be noted; for the phallic shape sometimes given to the bladder which he carries, cf. Rigollot, 164. In the Betley window the fool has a bauble; in the Vinkenboom picture a staff with a bladder at one end, and a ladle (to gather money in) at the other. In the window the ladle is carried by the hobby-horse. ‘The hobby-horse is forgot’ is a phrase occurring in L. L. L. iii. 1. 30; Hamlet, iii. 2. 144, and alluded to by Beaumont and Fletcher, Women Pleased, iv. 1, and Ben Jonson, in the masque quoted above, and in The Satyr (Cunningham, ii. 577). Apparently it is a line from a lost ballad.

[690] Stubbes, i. 147, of the ‘devil’s daunce’ in the train of the lord of misrule, evidently a morris, ‘then haue they their Hobby-horses, dragons & other Antiques.’ In W. Sampson’s Vow-breaker (1636), one morris-dancer says ‘I’ll be a fiery dragon’; another, ‘I’ll be a thund’ring Saint George as ever rode on horseback.’

[691] Burton, 40, 43, 48, 49, 56, 59, 61, 65, 69, 75, 115, 117, 121, 123, cites many notices throughout the century, and gives several figures. The morris is in request at wakes and rushbearings. Both men and women dance, sometimes to the number of twenty or thirty. Gay dresses are worn, with white skirts, knee-breeches and ribbons. Handkerchiefs are carried or hung on the arm or wrist, or replaced by dangling streamers, cords, or skeins of cotton. Bells are not worn on the legs, but jingling horse-collars are sometimes carried on the body. There is generally a fool, described in one account as wearing ‘a horrid mask.’ He is, however, generally black, and is known as ‘King Coffee’ (Gorton), ‘owd sooty-face,’ ‘dirty Bet,’ and ‘owd molly-coddle.’ This last name, like the ‘molly-dancers’ of Gorton, seems to be due to a linguistic corruption. In 1829 a writer describes the fool as ‘a nondescript, made up of the ancient fool and Maid Marian.’ At Heaton, in 1830, were two figures, said to represent Adam and Eve, as well as the fool. The masked fool, mentioned above, had as companion a shepherdess with lamb and crook.

[692] Burton, 115, from Journal of Archaeol. Assoc. vii. 201. The dancers went on Twelfth-night, without bells, but with a fool, a ‘fool’s wife’ and sometimes a hobby-horse.

[693] Jackson and Burne, 402, 410, 477. The morris-dance proper is mainly in south Shropshire and at Christmas. At Shrewsbury, in 1885, were ten dancers, with a fool. Five carried trowels and five short staves which they clashed. The fool had a black face, and a bell on his coat. No other bells are mentioned. Staves or wooden swords are used at other places in Shropshire, and at Brosely all the faces are black. The traditional music is a tabor and pipe. A 1652 account of the Brosely dance with six sword-bearers, a ‘leader or lord of misrule’ and a ‘vice’ (cf. ch. xxv) called the ‘lord’s son’ is quoted. In north-east Shropshire, the Christmas ‘guisers’ are often called ‘morris-dancers,’ ‘murry-dancers,’ or ‘merry-dancers.’ In Shetland the name ‘merry dancers’ is given to the aurora borealis (J. Spence, Shetland Folk-Lore, 116).

[694] Leicester F. L. 93. The dance was on Plough Monday with paper masks, a plough, the bullocks, men in women’s dresses, one called Maid Marian, Curly the fool, and Beelzebub. This is, I think, the only survival of the name Maid Marian, and it may be doubted if even this is really popular and not literary.

[695] P. Manning, Oxfordshire Seasonal Festivals, in F. L. viii. 317, summarizes accounts from fourteen villages, and gives illustrations. There are always six dancers. A broad garter of bells is worn below the knee. There are two sets of figures: in one handkerchiefs are carried, in the other short staves are swung and clashed. Sometimes the dancers sing to the air, which is that of an old country-dance. There is always a fool, who carries a stick with a bladder and cow’s tail, and is called in two places ‘Rodney,’ elsewhere the ‘squire.’ The music is that of a pipe and tabor (‘whittle’ and ‘dub’) played by one man; a fiddle is now often used. At Bampton there was a solo dance between crossed tobacco-pipes. At Spelsbury and at Chipping Warden the dance used to be on the church-tower. At the Bampton Whit-feast and the Ducklington Whit-hunt, the dancers were accompanied by a sword-bearer, who impaled a cake. A sword-bearer also appears in a list of Finstock dancers, given me by Mr. T. J. Carter, of Oxford. He also told me that the dance on Spelsbury church-tower, seventy years ago, was by women.

[696] Norfolk, Monmouthshire, Berkshire (Douce, 606); Worcestershire, Northamptonshire, Gloucestershire, Somersetshire, Wiltshire, Warwickshire, and around London (Burton, 114).

[697] L. H. T. Accounts, ii. 414; iii. 359, 381.

[698] Pfannenschmidt, 582; Michels, 84; Creizenach, i. 411. Burton, 102, reproduces, from Art Journal (1885), 121, cuts of ten morris-dancers carved in wood at Munich by Erasmus Schnitzer in 1480.

[699] Douce, 585, and Burton, 97, reproduce Israel von Mecheln’s engraving (†1470) of a morris with a fool and a lady.

[700] Coquillart, Œuvres (†1470), 127.

[701] Mémoires de Pétrarque, ii. app. 3, 9; Petrarch danced ‘en pourpoint une belle et vigoureuse moresque’ to please the Roman ladies on the night of his coronation.

[702] Somers Tracts, ii. 81, 87. The Earl of Nottingham, when on an embassy from James I, saw morrice-dancers in a Corpus Christi procession.

[703] Douce, 480; Favine, Theater of Honor, 345: at a feast given by Gaston de Foix at Vendôme, in 1458, ‘foure young laddes and a damosell, attired like savages, daunced (by good direction) an excellent Morisco, before the assembly.’

[704] Tabourot, Orchésographie, 94: in his youth a lad used to come after supper, with his face blackened, his forehead bound with white or yellow taffeta, and bells on his legs, and dance the morris up and down the hall.

[705] Douce, 577; Burton, 95.

[706] A dance certainly of Moorish origin is the fandango, in which castanets were used; cf. the comedy of Variety (1649) ‘like a Bacchanalian, dancing the Spanish Morisco, with knackers at his fingers’ (Strutt, 223). This, however, seems to show that the fandango was considered a variety of morisco. Douce, 602; Burton, 124, figure an African woman from Fez dancing with bells on her ankles. This is taken from Hans Weigel’s book of national costumes published at Nuremberg in 1577.

[707] Tabourot’s morris-dancing boy had his face blackened, and Junius (F. Du Jon), Etymologicum Anglicanum (1743), says of England ‘faciem plerumque inficiunt fuligine, et peregrinum vestium cultum assumunt, qui ludicris talibus indulgent, ut Mauri esse videantur, aut e longius remota patria credantur advolasse, atque insolens recreationis genus ad vexisse.’ In Spousalls of Princess Mary (1508) ‘morisks’ is rendered ‘ludi Maurei quas morescas dicunt.’ In the modern morris the black element is represented, except at Brosely, chiefly by ‘owd sooty face,’ the fool: in Leicestershire it gives rise to a distinct figure, Beelzebub.

[708] Du Méril, La Com. 89, quotes a sixteenth-century French sword-dance of ‘Mores, Sauvages, et Satyres.’ In parts of Yorkshire the sword-dancers had black faces or masks (Henderson, 70).

[709] Cotgrave, ‘Dancer les Buffons, To daunce a morris.’ The term ‘the madman’s morris’ appears as the name of the dance in The Figure of Nine (temp. Charles II); cf. Furnivall, Laneham’s Letter, clxii. The buffon is presumably the ‘fool’; cf. Cotgrave, ‘Buffon: m. A buffoon, jeaster, sycophant, merrie fool, sportfull companion: one that lives by making others merrie.’

[710] Henderson, 70. In Yorkshire the sword-dancers carried the image of a white horse; in Cheshire a horse’s head and skin.

[711] Cf. ch. x; also Wise, Enquiries concerning the Inhabitants, ... of Europe, 51 ‘the common people in many parts of England still practise what they call a Morisco dance, in a wild manner, and as it were in armour, at proper intervals striking upon one another’s staves,’ &c. Johnson’s Dictionary (1755) calls the morris ‘a dance in which bells are gingled, or staves or swords clashed.’

[712] Müllenhoff, 124; cf. Mayer, 236.

[713] Douce, 602; Burton, 123. The bells were usually fastened upon broad garters, as they are still worn in Oxfordshire. But they also appear as anklets or are hung on various parts of the dress. In a cut from Randle Holme’s Academie of Armorie, iii. 109 (Douce, 603; Burton, 127), a morris-dancer holds a pair of bells in his hands. Sometimes the bells were harmonized. In Pasquil and Marforius (1589) Penry is described as ‘the fore gallant of the Morrice with the treble bells’; cf. Rowley, Witch of Edmonton, i. 2.

[714] Müllenhoff, 123; Mayer, 235.

[715] Tabourot, Orchésographie, 97.

[716] Cf. Appendix J. A figure with a bow and arrow occurs in the Abbots Bromley horn-dance (p. 166).

[717] W. Kempe’s Nine Days Wonder (ed. Dyce, Camden Soc.) describes his dancing of the morris in bell-shangles from London to Norwich in 1599.

[718] Müllenhoff, 114.

[719] The ‘Squire’s Son’ of the Durham dances is probably the clown’s son of the Wharfdale version; for the term ‘squire’ is not an uncommon one for the rustic fool. Cf. also the Revesby play described in the next chapter. Why the fool should have a son, I do not know.

[720] The ‘Nine Worthies’ of Love’s Labour’s Lost, v. 2, are a pageant not a dance, and the two sets of speeches quoted from Bodl. Tanner MS. 407, by Ritson, Remarks on Shakespeare, 38, one of which is called by Ashton, 127, the earliest mummers’ play that he can find, also probably belong to pageants. The following, also quoted by Ritson loc. cit. from Harl. MS. 1197, f. 101* (sixteenth century), looks more like a dance or play:

‘I ame a knighte

And menes to fight

And armet well ame I

Lo here I stand

With swerd ine hand

My manhoud for to try.

Thou marciall wite

That menes to fight

And sete vppon me so

Lo heare J stand

With swrd in hand

To dubbelle eurey blow.’

[721] Mayer, 230, 425, finds in the dance a symbolical drama of the death of winter; but he does not seem to see the actual relic of a sacrificial rite.

[722] Müllenhoff, 114; Du Méril, La Com. 82; Plato, Leges, 815; Dion Cassius, lx. 23; Suetonius, Julius, 39, Nero, 12; Servius ad Aen. v. 602; cf. p. 7. A Thracian sword-dance, ending in a mimic death, and therefore closely parallel to the west European examples mentioned in the next chapter, is described by Xenophon, Anabasis, v. 9.

[723] Müllenhoff, 115; Frazer, iii. 122; W. W. Fowler, The Roman Festivals, 38, 44. The song of the Salii mentioned Saeturnus, god of sowing. It appears also to have been their function to expel the Mamurius Veturius in spring. Servius ad Aen. viii. 285, says that the Salii were founded by Morrius, king of Veii. According to Frazer, Morrius is etymologically equivalent to Mamurius—Mars. He even suggests that Morris may possibly belong to the same group of words.

[724] Cf. Appendix J. In other dances a performer stands on a similar ‘knot’ or Stern of swords. Mayer, 230, suggests that this may represent the triumph of summer, which seems a little far-fetched.

[725] Mayer, 243; O. Wittstock, in Sievers-Festgabe, 349.

[726] Grimm, i. 304, gives the following as communicated to him by J. M. Kemble, from the mouth of an old Yorkshireman: ‘In some parts of northern England, in Yorkshire, especially Hallamshire, popular customs show remnants of the worship of Fricg. In the neighbourhood of Dent, at certain seasons of the year, especially autumn, the country folk hold a procession and perform old dances, one called the giant’s dance: the leading giant they name Woden, and his wife Frigga, the principal action of the play consisting in two swords being swung and clashed together about the neck of a boy without hurting him.’ There is nothing about this in the account of Teutonic mythology in J. M. Kemble’s own Saxons in England. I do not believe that the names of Woden and Frigga were preserved in connexion with this custom continuously from heathen times. Probably some antiquary had introduced them; and in error, for there is no reason to suppose that the ‘clown’ and ‘woman’ of the sword-dance were ever thought to represent gods. But the description of the business with the swords is interesting.

[727] Müllenhoff, Z. f. d. A. xviii. 11, quoting Covarubias, Tesoro della lengua castellana (1611), s.v. Danza de Espadas: ‘una mudanza que llaman la degollada, porque cercan el cuello del que los guia con las espadas.’ With these sword manœuvres should be compared the use of scythes and flails in the mock sacrifices of the harvest-field and threshing-floor (p. 158), the ‘Chop off his head’ of the ‘Oranges and Lemons’ game (p. 151), and the ancient tale of Wodan and the Mowers.

[728] Mayer, 229.

[729] Gentleman’s Magazine, lxxxi (1811), 1. 423. The dance was given in the north Riding from St. Stephen’s day to the New Year. Besides the Bessy and the Doctor there were six lads, one of whom acted king ‘in a kind of farce which consists of singing and dancing.’

[730] Bell, 178; cf. p. 193. I do not feel sure whether the actual parish clergyman took part, or whether a mere personage in the play is intended; but see what Olaus Magnus (App. J (i)) says about the propriety of the sword-dances for clerici. It will be curious if the Christian priest has succeeded to the part of the heathen priest slain, first literally, and then in mimicry, at the festivals.

[731] Printed by Mr. T. F. Ordish in F. L. J. vii. 338, and again by Manly, i. 296. The MS. used appears to be headed ‘October Ye 20, 1779’; but the performers are called ‘The Plow Boys or Morris Dancers’ and the prologue says that they ‘takes delight in Christmas toys.’ I do not doubt that the play belonged to Plough Monday, which only falls just outside the Christmas season.

[732] On the name Pickle Herring, see W. Creizenach, Die Schauspiele der englischen Komödianten, xciii. It does not occur in old English comedy, but was introduced into Anglo-German and German farce as a name for the ‘fool’ or ‘clown’ by Robert Reynolds, the ‘comic lead’ of a company of English actors who crossed to Germany in 1618. Probably it was Reynolds’ invention, and suggested by the sobriquet ‘Stockfish’ taken by an earlier Anglo-German actor, John Spencer. The ‘spicy’ names of the other Revesby clowns are probably imitations of Pickle Herring.

[733] The lines (197-8)

‘Our old Fool’s bracelet is not made of gold

But it is made of iron and good steel’

suggest the vaunt of the champions in the St. George plays.

[734] Is ‘Anthony’ a reminiscence of the Seven Champions? The Fool says (ll. 247-9), like Beelzebub in the St. George plays,

‘Here comes I that never come yet, ...

I have a great head but little wit.’

He also jests (l. 229) on his ‘tool’; cf. p. 196 n.

[735] Brand, i. 278; Dyer, 37; Ditchfield, 47; Drake, 65; Mrs. Chaworth Musters, A Cavalier Stronghold, 387. Plough Monday is the Monday after Twelfth night, when the field work begins. A plough is dragged round the village and a quête made. The survivals of the custom are mainly in the north, east and east midlands. In the city, a banquet marks the day. A Norfolk name is ‘Plowlick Monday,’ and a Hunts one ‘Plough-Witching.’ The plough is called the ‘Fool Plough,’ ‘Fond Plough,’ ‘Stot Plough’ or ‘White Plough’; the latter name probably from the white shirts worn (cf. p. 200). At Cropwell, Notts, horses cut out in black or red adorn these. In Lincolnshire, bunches of corn were worn in the hats. Those who draw the plough are called ‘Plough Bullocks,’ ‘Boggons’ or ‘Stots.’ They sometimes dance a morris-or sword-dance, or act a play. At Haxey, they take a leading part in the Twelfth day ‘Hood-game’ (p. 150). In Northants their faces are blackened or reddled. The plough is generally accompanied by the now familiar grotesques, ‘Bessy’ and the Fool or ‘Captain Cauf-Tail.’ In Northants there are two of each; the Fools have humps, and are known as ‘Red Jacks’; there is also a ‘Master.’ In Lincolnshire, reapers, threshers, and carters joined the procession. A contribution to the quête is greeted with the cry of ‘Largess!’ and a churl is liable to have the ground before his door ploughed up. Of old the profits of the quête or ‘plow-gadrin’ went into the parish chest, or as in Norfolk kept a ‘plow-light’ burning in the church. A sixteenth century pamphlet speaks of the ‘sensing the Ploughess’ on Plough Monday. Jevons, 247, calls the rite a ‘worship of the plough’; probably it rather represents an early spring perambulation of the fields in which the divinity rode upon a plough, as elsewhere upon a ship. A ploughing custom of putting a loaf in the furrow has been noted. Plough Monday has also its water rite. The returning ploughman was liable to be soused by the women, like the bearer of the ‘neck’ at harvest. Elsewhere, the women must get the kettle on before the ploughman can reach the hearth, or pay forfeit.

[736] Printed by Mrs. Chaworth Musters in A Cavalier Stronghold (1890), 388, and in a French translation by Mrs. H. G. M. Murray-Aynsley, in R. d. T. P. iv. 605.

[737] ‘Hopper Joe’ also calls himself ‘old Sanky-Benny,’ which invites interpretation. Is it ‘Saint Bennet’ or ‘Benedict’?

[738]

‘In comes I, Beelzebub,

On my shoulder I carry my club,

In my hand a wet leather frying-pan;

Don’t you think I’m a funny old man?’

Cf. the St. George play (p. 214).

[739] ‘Dame Jane’ says,

‘My head is made of iron,

My body made of steel,

My hands and feet of knuckle-bone,

I think nobody can make me feel.’

In the Lincolnshire play Beelzebub has this vaunt. Cf. the St. George play (p. 220).

[740] The Doctor can cure ‘the hipsy-pipsy, palsy, and the gout’; cf. the St. George play (p. 213).

[741] Printed in French by Mrs. Murray Aynsley in R. d. T. P. iv. 609.

[742] The farce recorded as occasionally introduced at Whitby (cf. p. 192, n. 1) but not described, probably belonged to the ‘popular’ type.

[743] Chambers, Popular Rhymes of Scotland, 169, prints a Peebles version. Instead of George, a hero called Galatian fights the Black Knight. Judas, with his bag, replaces Beelzebub. But it is the same play. Versions or fragments of it are found all over the Lowlands. The performers are invariably called ‘guizards.’ In a Falkirk version the hero is Prince George of Ville. Hone, E. D. B., says that the hero is sometimes Galacheus or St. Lawrence. But in another Falkirk version, part of which he prints, the name is Galgacus, and of this both Galacheus and Galatian are probably corruptions, for Galgacus or Calgacus was the leader of the Picts in their battle with Agricola at the Mons Graupius (A. D. 84; Tacitus, Agricola, 29).

[744] Appendix K. Other versions may be conveniently compared in Manly, i. 289; Ditchfield, 310. The best discussions of the St. George plays in general, besides Mr. Ordish’s, are J. S. Udall, Christmas Mummers in Dorsetshire (F. L. R. iii. 1. 87); Jackson and Burne, 482; G. L. Gomme, Christmas Mummers (Nature, Dec. 23, 1897). The notes and introductions to the versions tabulated above give many useful data.

[745] In F. L. x. 351, Miss Florence Grove describes some Christmas mummers seen at Mullion, Cornwall, in 1890-1. ‘Every one naturally knows who the actors are, since there are not more than a few hundred persons within several miles; but no one is supposed to know who they are or where they come from, nor must any one speak to them, nor they to those in the houses they visit. As far as I can remember the performance is silent and dramatic; I have no recollection of reciting.’ The dumb show is rare and probably a sign of decadence, but the bit of rural etiquette is archaic and recurs in savage drama.

[746] In Berkshire and at Eccleshall, Slasher is ‘come from Turkish land.’ On the other hand, the two often appear in the same version, and even, as at Leigh, fight together.

[747] Burne-Jackson, 483.

[748] Ibid. 483. He appears in the MSS. written by the actors as ‘Singuy’ or ‘Singhiles.’ Professor Skeat points out that, as he ‘sprang from English ground,’ St. Guy (of Warwick) was probably the original form, and St. Giles a corruption.

[749] Here may be traced the influence of the Napoleonic wars. In Berkshire, Slasher is a ‘French officer.’

[750] F. L. v. 88.

[751] Ditchfield, 12.

[752] Sandys, 153.

[753] P. Tennant, Village Notes, 179.

[754] Beelzebub appears also in the Cropwell Plough Monday play; cf. p. 209. Doubtless he once wore a calf-skin, like other rural ‘Fools,’ but, as far as I know, this feature has dropped out. Sandys, 154, however, quotes ‘Captain Calf-tail’ as the name of the ‘Fool’ in an eighteenth-century Scotch version, and Mr. Gomme (Nature, Dec. 23, 1897), says ‘some of the mummers, or maskers as the name implies, formerly disguised themselves as animals—goats, oxen, deer, foxes and horses being represented at different places where details of the mumming play have been recorded.’ Nowadays, Beelzebub generally carries a club and a ladle or frying-pan, with which he makes the quête. At Newport and Eccleshall he has a bell fastened on his back; at Newbold he has a black face. The ‘Fool’ figured in the Manchester chap-book resembles Punch.

[755] See notes to Steyning play in F. L. J. ii. 1.

[756] Mr. Gomme, in Nature for Dec. 23, 1897, finds in this broom ‘the magic weapon of the witch’ discussed by Pearson, ii. 29. Probably, however, it was introduced into the plays for the purposes of the quête; cf. p. 217. It is used also to make a circle for the players, but here it may have merely taken the place of a sword.

[757] Parish, Dict. of Sussex Dialect, 136. The mummers are called ‘John Jacks.’

[758] Cf. p. 268, n. 4.

[759] Sandys, 301.

[760] Cf. Capulet, in Romeo and Juliet, i. 5. 28 ‘A hall, a hall! give room! and foot it, girls’; and Puck who precedes the dance of fairies in Midsummer Night’s Dream, v. 1. 396

‘I am sent with broom before,

To sweep the dust behind the door.’

[761] Ditchfield, 315. ‘The play in this village is performed in most approved fashion, as the Rector has taken the matter in hand, coached the actors in their parts, and taught them some elocution.’ This sort of thing, of course, is soon fatal to folk-drama.

[762] Burne-Jackson, 484; Manly, i. 289.

[763] Burne-Jackson, 402, 410; F. L. iv. 162; Dyer, 504. The broom is used in Christmas and New Year quêtes in Scotland and Yorkshire, even when there is no drama. Northall 205, gives a Lancashire Christmas song, sung by ‘Little David Doubt’ with black face, skin coat and broom. At Bradford they ‘sweep out the Old Year’; at Wakefield they sweep up dirty hearths. In these cases the notion of threatening to do the unlucky thing has gone.

[764] Ditchfield, 12. An ‘Old Bet’ is mentioned in 5 N. Q. iv. 511, as belonging to a Belper version. The woman is worked in with various ingenuity, but several versions have lost her. The prologue to the Newcastle chap-book promises a ‘Dives’ who never appears. Was this the woman? In the Linton in Craven sword-dance, she has the similar name of ‘Miser.’

[765] I hardly like to trace a reminiscence of the connexion with the renouveau in the ‘General Valentine’ and ‘Colonel Spring’ who fight and are slain in the Dorset (A) version; but there the names are. Mr. Gomme (Nature for Dec. 23, 1897) finds in certain mumming costumes preserved in the Anthropological Museum at Cambridge and made of paper scales, a representation of leaves of trees. Mr. Ordish, I believe, finds in them the scales of the dragon (F. L. iv. 163). Some scepticism may be permitted as to these conjectures. In most places the dress represents little but rustic notions of the ornamental. Cf. Thomas Hardy, The Return of the Native, bk. ii. ch. 3: ‘The girls could never be brought to respect tradition in designing and decorating the armour: they insisted on attaching loops and bows of silk and velvet in any situation pleasing to their taste. Gorget, gusset, bassinet, cuirass, gauntlet, sleeve, all alike in the view of these feminine eyes were practicable spaces whereon to sew scraps of fluttering colour.’ The usual costume of the sword-dancers, as we have seen (p. 200), was a clean white smock, and probably that of the mummers is based upon this.

[766] T. F. Ordish, in F. L. iv. 158.

[767] Printed in The Old English Drama (1830), vol. iii. Burne-Jackson, 490, think that ‘the masque owes something to the play,’ but the resemblances they trace are infinitesimal. A play of St. George for England, by William or Wentworth Smith, was amongst the manuscripts destroyed by Warburton’s cook, and a Bartholomew Fair ‘droll’ of St. George and the Dragon is alluded to in the Theatre of Compliments, 1688 (Fleay, C. H. ii. 251; Hazlitt, Manual, 201).

[768] In the Dorset (A) version, the king of Egypt is ‘Anthony’ and the doctor ‘Mr. Martin Dennis.’ Conceivably these are reminiscences of St. Anthony of Padua and St. Denys of France. The Revesby Plough Monday play (cf. p. 208) has also an ‘Anthony.’ The ‘Seven Champions’ do not appear in the English sword-dances described in ch. ix, but the morris-dancers at Edgemond wake used to take that name (Burne-Jackson, 491). Mrs. Nina Sharp writes in F. L. R. iii. 1. 113: ‘I was staying at Minety, near Malmesbury, in Wilts (my cousin is the vicar), when the mummers came round (1876). They went through a dancing fight in two lines opposed to each other—performed by the Seven Champions of Christendom. There was no St. George, and they did not appear to have heard of the Dragon. When I inquired for him, they went through the performance of drawing a tooth—the tooth produced, after great agony, being a horse’s. The mummers then carried into the hall a bush gaily decorated with coloured ribbons.... [They] were all in white smock frocks and masks. At Acomb, near York, I saw very similar mummers a few years ago, but they distinguished St. George, and the Dragon was a prominent person. There was the same tooth-drawing, and I think the Dragon was the patient, and was brought back to life by the operation.’ I wonder whether the ‘Seven Champions’ were named or whether Mrs. Sharp inferred them. Anyhow, there could not have been seven at Minety, without St. George. The ‘bush’ is an interesting feature. According to C. R. Smith, Isle of Wight Words (Eng. Dial. Soc. xxxii. 63) the mummers are known in Kent as the ‘Seven Champions.’

[769] Entered on the Stationers’ Registers in 1596. The first extant edition is dated 1597. Johnson first introduced Sabra, princess of Egypt, into the story; in the mediaeval versions, the heroine is an unnamed princess of Silena in Libya. The mummers’ play follows Johnson, and makes it Egypt. On Johnson was based Heylin’s History of St. George (1631 and 1633), and on one or both of these Kirke’s play.

[770] Jackson and Burne, 489: ‘Miss L. Toulmin Smith ... considers that the diction and composition of the [Shropshire] piece, as we now have it, date mainly from the seventeenth century.’

[771] Dyer, 193; Anstis, Register of the Garter (1724), ii. 38; E. Ashmole, Hist. of the Garter (ed. 1672), 188, 467; (ed. 1715), 130, 410.

[772] F. Blomefield, Hist. of Norfolk (1805), iv. 6, 347; Mackerell, MS. Hist. of Norfolk (1737), quoted in Norfolk Archaeology, iii. 315; Notices Illustrative of Municipal Pageants and Processions (with plates, publ. C. Muskett, Norwich, 1850); Toulmin Smith, English Gilds (E. E. T. S.), 17, 443; Kelly, 48. Hudson and Tingey, Cal. of Records of Norwich (1898), calendar many documents of the guild.

[773] Hartland, iii. 58, citing Jacobus à Voragine, Legenda Aurea, xciii, gives the story of St. Margaret, and the appearance of the devil to her in the shape of a dragon. She was in his mouth, but made the sign of the cross, and he burst asunder.

[774] Cf. p. 177.

[775] Kelly, 37. The ‘dressyng of the dragon’ appears in the town accounts for 1536. The guild had dropped the riding, even before the Reformation.

[776] Harris, 97, 190, 277; Kelly, 41. The guild was formed by journeymen in 1424. Probably there was a riding. In any case, at the visit of Prince Edward in 1474, there was a pageant or mystère mimé ‘upon the Conddite in the Crosse Chepyng’ of ‘seint George armed and Kynges dought^r knelyng afore hym w^t a lambe and the fader and the moder beyng in a toure a boven beholdyng seint George savyng their dought^r from the dragon.’ There was a similar pageant at the visit of Prince Arthur in 1498.

[777] Kelly, 42.

[778] Morris, 139, 168; Fenwick, Hist. of Chester, 372; Dyer, 195. The Fraternity of St. George was founded for the encouragement of shooting in 1537. They had a chapel with a George in the choir of St. Peter’s. St. George’s was the great day for races on the Rooddee. In 1610 was a famous show, wherein St. George was attended by Fame, Mercury, and various allegorical figures.

[779] Cf. Representations, s. v. York, Dublin.

[780] Dyer, 194, gives from Coates, Hist. of Reading, 221, the account for setting-up a ‘George’ in 1536. Dugdale, Hist. of Warwickshire, 928, has a notice of a legacy in 1526 by John Arden to Aston church of his ‘white harneis ... for a George to were it, and to stand on his pewe, a place made for it.’

[781] R. W. Goulding, Louth Records, quotes from the churchwardens’ accounts for 1538 payments for taking down the image of St. George and his horse.

[782] Representations, s. v. Windsor, Lydd, New Romney, Bassingbourne.

[783] For the legend, see Acta Sanctorum, April, iii. 101; Jacobus à Voragine, Legenda Aurea (1280), lviii; E. A. W. Budge, The Martyrdom and Miracles of St. George of Cappadocia: the Coptic Texts (Oriental Text Series, 1888). In Rudder, Hist. of Gloucestershire, 461, and Gloucester F. L. 47, is printed an English version of the legend, apparently used for reading in church on the Sunday preceding St. George’s day, April 23. Cf. also Gibbon (ed. Bury), ii. 472, 568; Hartland, Perseus, iii. 38; Baring-Gould, Curious Myths of the Middle Ages, 266; Zöckler, s. v. St. Georg, in Herzog and Plitt’s Encyclopedia; F. Görres, Ritter St. Georg in Geschichte, Legende und Kunst, in Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie, xxx (1887), 54; F. Vetter, Introduction to Reimbot von Durne’s Der heilige Georg (1896). Gibbon identified St. George with the Arian bishop George of Cappadocia, and the dragon with Athanasius. This view has been recently revived with much learning by J. Friedrich in Sitzb. Akad. Wiss. München (phil.-hist. Kl.), 1899, ii. 2. Pope Gelasius (†495) condemned the Passio as apocryphal and heretical, but he admits the historical existence of the saint, whose cult indeed was well established both in East and West in the fifth century. Budge tries to find an historical basis for him in a young man at Nicomedia who tore down an edict during the persecution of Diocletian (†303), and identifies his torturer Dadianus with the co-emperor Galerius.

[784] Du Méril, La Com. 98. He quotes Novidius, Sacri Fasti (ed. 1559), bk. vi. f. 48^vo:

‘perque annos duci monet [rex] in spectacula casum

unde datur multis annua scena locis.’

A fifteenth-century Augsburg miracle-play of St. George is printed by Keller, Fastnachtsspiele, No. 125; for other Continental data cf. Creizenach, i. 231, 246; Julleville, Les Myst. ii. 10, 644; D’Ancona, i. 104.

[785] Rabelais, Gargantua, iv. 59. The dragon was called Graoully, and snapped its jaws, like the Norwich ‘snap-dragons’ and the English hobby-horse.

[786] Cf. p. 138. The myth has attached itself to other undoubtedly historical persons besides St. George (Bury, Gibbon, ii. 569). In his case it is possibly due to a misunderstood bit of rhetoric. In the Coptic version of the legend edited by Budge (p. 223), Dadianus is called ‘the dragon of the abyss.’ There is no literal dragon in this version: the princess is perhaps represented by Alexandra, the wife of Dadianus, whom George converts. Cf. Hartland, Perseus, iii. 44.

[787] Cf. ch. xxiv, as to these plays.

[788] I ought perhaps to say that in one of the Coptic versions of the legend St. George is periodically slain and brought back to life by a miracle during the space of seven years. But I do not think that this episode occurs in any of the European versions of the legend.

[789] ‘Sant George and the dragon’ are introduced into a London May-game in 1559 (ch. viii).

[790] See the Manchester Peace Egg chap-book. At Manchester, Langdale, and, I believe, Coniston, the play is performed at Easter: cf. Halliwell, Popular Rhymes, 231. The Steyning play is believed to have been given at May-day as well as Christmas. Of course, so far as this goes, the transference might have been from Christmas, not to Christmas, but the German analogies point the other way. The Cheshire performance on All Souls’ Day (Nov. 2), mentioned by Child, v. 291, is, so far as I know, exceptional.

[791] Cf. ch. xvii: In the Isle of Wight the performers are called the ‘Christmas Boys’ (C. R. Smith, Isle of Wight Words, in E. D. S. xxxii. 63). The terms ‘Seven Champions’ (Kent) and ‘John Jacks’ (Salisbury) have already been explained. The Steyning ‘Tipteers’ or ‘Tipteerers’ may be named from the ‘tips’ collected in the quête. The ‘Guisers’ of Staffordshire become on the Shropshire border ‘Morris-dancers,’ ‘Murry-dancers,’ or ‘Merry-dancers’—a further proof of the essential identity of the morris-or sword-dance with the play.

[792] Tille, Y. and C. 78, 107; Rhys, C. H. 519; cf. ch. v.

[793] Tille, Y. and C. 18; D. W. 6. Bede, D. T. R. 15, gives Blot-monath as the Anglo-Saxon name for November, and explains it as ‘mensis immolationum, quia in ea pecora quae occisuri erant, Diis suis voverent.’

[794] Burton, 15, notes a tradition at Disley, in Cheshire, that the local wake was formerly held after the first fall of snow.

[795] Tille, Y. and C. 18.

[796] Mogk, iii. 391; Tille, Y. and C. 24, find the winter feast in the festival of Tanfana which the Marsi were celebrating when Germanicus attacked them in A. D. 14 (Tacitus, Ann. i. 51). Winter, though imminent, had not yet actually set in, but this might be the case in any year after the festival had come to be determined by a fixed calendar.

[797] Tille, Y. and C. 57.

[798] Rhys, C. H. 513, says that the Samhain fell on Nov. 1. The preceding night was known as Nos Galan-geaf, the ‘night of winter calends,’ and that following as Dy’ gwyl y Meirw, ‘the feast of the Dead.’ In F. L. ii. 308 he gives the date of the Manx Samhain as Nov. 12, and explains this as being Nov. 1, O. S. But is it not really the original date of the feast which has been shifted elsewhere to the beginning of the month?

[799] Tille, Y. and C. 12, citing M. Heyne, Ulfilas, 226: ‘In a Gothic calendarium of the sixth century November, or Naubaímbaír, is called fruma Iiuleis, which presupposes that December was called *aftuma Iiuleis.’

[800] Bede, de temp. rat. c. 15. Tille, Y. and C. 20, points out that the application of the old tide-name to fit November and December by the Goths and December and January by the Anglo-Saxons is fair evidence for the belief that the tide itself corresponded to a period from mid-November to mid-January.

[801] Tille, Y. and C. 147. The terms gehhol, geóhel, geól, giúl, iûl, &c. signify the Christmas festival season from the ninth century onwards, and from the eleventh also Christmas Day itself. The fifteenth-century forms are Yule, Ywle, Yole, Yowle. In the A.-S. Chronicle the terms used for Christmas are ‘midewinter,’ ‘Cristes mæssa,’ ‘Cristes tyde,’ ‘Natiuitedh.’ As a single word ‘Cristesmesse’ appears first in 1131 (Tille, Y. and C. 159). The German ‘Weihnacht’ (M.H.G. wich, ‘holy’) appears †1000 (Tille, D. W. 22).

[802] Pfannenschmidt, 238, 512.

[803] The notion is of a circular course of the sun, passing through the four turning-or wheeling-points of the solstices and equinoxes. Cf. ch. vi for the use of the wheel as a solar symbol.

[804] Mogk, iii. 391, quoting Kluge, Englische Studien, ix. 311, and Bugge, Ark. f. nord. Filolog. iv. 135. Tille, Y. and C. 8, 148, desirous to establish an Oriental origin for the Three Score Day tides, doubts the equation *jehwela = ioculus, and suggests a connexion between the Teutonic terms and the old Cypriote names ἰλαῖος, ἰουλαῖος, ἰουλίηος, ἰούλιος for the period Dec. 22 to Jan. 23 (K. F. Hermann, Über griech. Monatskunde, 64), and, more hesitatingly, with the Greek Ἴουλος or hymn to Ceres. Weinhold, Deutsche Monatsnamen, 4; Deutsche Jahrteilung, 15, thinks that both the Teutonic and Cypriote names are the Roman Julius transferred from mid-summer to mid-winter. Northall, 208, makes yule = ol, oel, a feast or ‘ale,’ for which I suppose there is nothing to be said. Skeat, Etym. Dict. s. v., makes it ‘a time of revelry,’ and connects with M.E. youlen, yollen, to ‘yawl’ or ‘yell,’ and with A.-S. gýlan, Dutch joelen, to make merry, G. jolen, jodeln, to sing out. He thus gets in a different way much the sense given in the text.

[805] At a Cotswold Whitsun ale a lord and lady ‘of yule’ were chosen (Gloucester F. L. 56). Rhys, C. H. 412, 421, 515, and in F. L. ii. 305, gives Gwyl as a Welsh term for ‘feast’ in general, and in particular mentions, besides the Gwyl y Meirw at the Samhain, the Gwyl Aust (Aug. 1, Lammas or Lugnassad Day). This also appears in Latin as the Gula Augusti (Ducange, s. v. temp. Edw. III), and in English as ‘the Gule of August’ (Hearne, Robert of Gloucester’s Chron. 679). Tille, Y. and C. 56, declares that Gula here is only a mutilation of Vincula, Aug. 1 being in the ecclesiastical calendar the feast of St. Peter ad Vincula.

[806] Kluge and Lutz, English Etymology, s. v. Yule.

[807] Bede, D. T. R. c. 15 ‘ipsam noctem nobis sacrosanctam, tunc gentili vocabulo Modranicht [v.l. Modraneht], id est, matrum noctem appellabant; ob causam ut suspicamur ceremoniarum, quas in ea pervigiles agebant.’

[808] Mogk, iii. 391. Tille, Y. and C. 152, gives some earlier explanations, criticizes that of Mogk, and offers as his own a reference to a custom of baking a cake (placenta) to represent the physical motherhood of the Virgin. The practice doubtless existed and was condemned by Pope Hormisdas (514-23), by the Lateran Council of 649, the Council of Hatfield (680), and the Trullan Council (692). But Bede must have known this as a Christian abuse, and he is quite plainly speaking of a pre-Christian custom. J. M. Neale, Essays in Liturgiology (1867), 511, says, ‘In most Celtic languages Christmas eve is called the night of Mary,’ the Virgin, here as elsewhere, taking over the cult of the mother-goddesses.

[809] Tille, Y. and C. 65. In his earlier book D. W. 7, 29, Dr. Tille held the view that there had always been a second winter feast about three weeks after the first, when the males held over for breeding were slain.

[810] According to Bede, D. T. R. c. 15, the Anglo-Saxons had adopted the system of intercalary months which belongs to the pre-Julian and not the Julian Roman calendar. But Bede’s chapter is full of confusions: cf. Tille, Y. and C. 145.

[811] All Saints’ day or Hallowmas (November 1) and All Souls’ day (November 2) have largely, though not wholly, absorbed the November feast of the Dead.

[812] Pfannenschmidt, 203; Jahn, 229; Tille, Y. and C. 21, 28, 36, 42, 57; D. W. 23.

[813] Tille, D. W. 29; Müller, 239, 248. According to Tille, D. W. 63, Christmas only replaced the days of St. Martin and St. Nicholas as a German children’s festival in the sixteenth century.

[814] Tille, Y. and C. 34, 65; Pfannenschmidt, 206; Dyer, 418; N. Drake, Shakespeare and his Times (1838), 93. Martinmas was a favourite Anglo-Saxon and mediaeval legal term. It survived also as a traditional ‘tyme of slauchter’ for cattle. ‘Martlemas beef’ was a common term for salt beef. In Scotland a Mart is a fat cow or bullock, but the derivation of this appears to be from a Celtic word Mart = cow.

[815] Rhys, in F. L. ii. 308.

[816] Mommsen, C. I. L. i². 287; Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Encycl. s. v. Bruma; Tomaschek, in Sitzb. Akad. Wiss. Wien, lx (1869), 358.

[817] Ovid, Fasti, i. 163 ‘bruma novi prima est veterisque novissima solis.’

[818] Cf. p. 112.

[819] Preller, ii. 408; P. Allard, Julien l’Apostat, i. 16; J. Réville, La Religion à Rome sous les Sévères (1885); Wissowa, 306. An earlier cult of the same type introduced by Elagabalus did not survive its founder.

[820] The earliest reference is probably that in the calendar of the Greek astronomer, of uncertain date, Antiochus, Ἡλίου γενέθλιον· αὔξει φῶς (Cumont, i. 342, from Cod. Monac. gr. 287, f. 132). The Fasti of Furius Dionysius Philocalus (A.D. 354) have ‘VIII. KAL. IAN. N[atalis] INVICTI C[ircenses] M[issus] XXX’ (C. I. L. i². 278, 338). Cf. Julian, Orat. 4 (p. 156 ed. Spanheim) εὐθέως μετὰ τὸν τελευταῖον τοῦ Κρόνου μῆνα ποιοῦμεν ἡλίῳ τὸν περιφανέστατον ἀγῶνα, τὴν ἑορτὴν Ἡλίῳ καταφημίσαντες Ἀνικήτῳ; Corippus, de laud. Iust. min. i. 314 ‘Solis honore novi grati spectacula circi’; cf. the Christian references on p. 242. Mommsen’s Scriptor Syrus quoted C. I. L. i². 338 tells us that lights were used; ‘accenderunt lumina festivitatis causa.’

[821] Preller, ii. 410; Gibbon, ii. 446.

[822] On Mithraicism, cf. F. Cumont, Textes et Monuments relatifs aux Mystères de Mithra (1896-9); also the art. by the same writer in Roscher’s Lexicon, ii. 3028, and A. Gasquet, Le Culte de Mithra (Revue des Deux Mondes for April 1, 1899); J. Réville, La Religion à Rome sous les Sévères, 77; Wissowa, 307; Preller, ii. 410; A. Gardner, Julian the Apostate, 175; P. Allard, Julien l’Apostat, i. 18; ii. 232; G. Zippel, Le Taurobolium, in Festschrift f. L. Friedländer (1895), 498. Mithra was originally a form of the Aryan Sun-god, who though subordinated in the Mazdean system to Ahoura Mazda continued to be worshipped by the Persian folk. His cult made its appearance in Rome about 70 B.C., and was developed during the third and fourth centuries A.D. under philosophic influences. Mithra was regarded as the fount of all life, and the yearly obscuration of the sun’s forces in winter became a hint and promise of immortality to his worshippers: cf. Carm. adv. paganos, 47 ‘qui hibernum docuit sub terra quaerere solem.’ Mithraic votive stones have been found in all parts of the empire, Britain included. They are inscribed ‘Soli Invicto,’ ‘Deo Soli Invicto Mithrae,’ ‘Numini Invicto Soli Mithrae,’ and the like.

[823] Cumont, Textes et Mon. i. 325; ii. 66, and in Roscher’s Lexicon, ii. 3065; Lichtenberger, Encycl. des Sciences religieuses, s. v. Mithra.

[824] Preller, R. M. ii. 15; Mommsen, in C. I. L. i². 337; Marquardt and Mommsen, Handbuch der römischen Alterthümer, vi. 562; Dict. of Cl. A. s. v. Saturnalia; Tille, Y. and C. 85; Frazer, iii. 138; W. W. Fowler, 268; C. Dezobry, Rome au Siècle d’Auguste (ed. 4, 1875), iii. 140.

[825] Horace, Satires, ii. 7. 4:

‘age, libertate Decembri,

quando ita maiores voluerunt, utere; narra.’

[826] The democratic character of the feast is brought out in the νόμοι put by Lucian (Luc. Opp. ed. Jacobitz, iii. 307; Saturnalia, p. 393) in the mouth of the divinely instructed νομοθέτης, Chronosolon, and in the ‘Letters of Saturn’ that follow.

[827] According to Tacitus, Ann. xiii. 15, Nero was king of the Saturnalia at the time of the murder of Britannicus. On the nature of this sovereignty, cf. Arrian, Epictetus, i. 25; Martial, xi. 6:

‘unctis falciferi senis diebus,

regnator quibus imperat fritillus.’

Lucian, Saturnalia, p. 385, introduces a dialogue between Saturn and his priests. Saturn says ἑπτὰ μὲν ἡμερῶν ἡ πᾶσα βασιλεία, καὶ ἢν ἐκπρόθεσμος τούτων γένωμαι, ἰδιώτης εὐθύς εἰμι, καὶ τοῦ πολλοῦ δήμου εἷσ· ἐν αὐταῖς δέ ταῖς ἑπτὰ σπουδαῖον μὲν οὐδὲν οὐδὲ ἀγοραῖον διοικήσασθαί μοι συγκεχώρηται, πίνειν δὲ καὶ μεθύειν καὶ βοᾶν καὶ παίζειν καὶ κυβεύειν καὶ ἄρχοντας καθίσταναι καὶ τοὺς οἰκέτας εὐωχεῖν καὶ γυμνὸν ἄδειν καὶ κροτεῖν ὑποτρέμοντα, ἐνίοτε δὲ καὶ ἐς ὕδωρ ψυχρὸν ἐπὶ κεφαλὴν ὠθεῖσθαι ἀσβόλῳ κεχρισμένον τὸ πρόσωπον, ταῦτα ἐφεῖταί μοι ποιεῖν; and again: εὐωχώμεθα δὲ ἤδη καὶ κροτῶμεν καὶ ἐπὶ τῆ ἑορτῆ ἐλευθεριάζωμεν, εἲτα πεττεύωμεν ἐς τὸ ἀρχαῖον ἐπὶ καρύων καὶ βασιλέας χειροτονῶμεν καὶ πειθαρχῶμεν αὐτοῖσ· οὕτω γὰρ ἂν τὴν παροιμίαν ἐπαληθεύσαιμι, ἥ φησι, παλίμπαιδας τοὺς γέροντας γίγνεσθαι. The ducking is curiously suggestive of western festival customs, but I do not feel sure whether it was the image of Saturn that was ducked or the rex with whom he appears to half, and only half, identify himself. Frazer, iii. 140, lays stress on the primitive sacrificial character of the ‘rex,’ who is said still to have been annually slain in Lower Moesia at the beginning of the fourth century A.D.; cf. Acta S. Dasii, in Acta Bollandiana, xvi. (1897), 5; Parmentier et Cumont, Le Roi des Saturnales, in R. de Philologie, xxi (1897), 143.

[828] Frazer, iii. 144, suggests that the Saturnalia may once have been in February, and have left a trace of themselves in the similar festival of the female slaves, the Matronalia, on March 1, which, like the winter feasts, came in for Christian censure; cf. Appendix N. No. (i).

[829] Preller, R. M. i. 64, 178; ii. 13; C. Dezobry, Rome au Siècle d’Auguste (ed. 4, 1875), ii. 169; Mommsen and Marquardt, vi. 545; vii. 245; Roscher, Lexicon, ii. 37; W. W. Fowler, 278; Tille, Y. and C. 84; M. Lipenius, Strenarum Historia in J. G. Graevius, Thesaurus Antiq. Rom. (1699), xii. 409. The last-named treatise contains a quantity of information set out with some obsolete learning. The most important contemporary account is that of Libanius (314-†95) in his είς τὰς καλάνδας and his καλανδῶν ἔκφρασις (ed. Reiske, i. 256; iv. 1053; cf. Sievers, Das Leben der Libanius, 170, 204). In the former speech he says ταύτην τὴν ἑορτὴν εὔροι τ’ ἂν τεταμένην ἐφ’ ἅπαν, ὅσον ἡ Ῥωμαίων ἀρχὴ τέταται, in the latter, μίαν δὲ οἶδα κοινὴν ἁπάντων ὁπόσοι ζῶσιν ὑπὸ τὴν Ῥωμαίων ἀρχήν. Under the emperors, who made much of the strenae and vota, the importance of the Kalends grew, probably at the expense of the Saturnalia; cf. Macrobius, Saturnalia, i. 2. 1 ‘adsunt feriae quas indulget magna pars mensis Iano dicati.’

[830] Preller, i. 180; Mommsen and Marquardt, vi. 14; vii. 245; W. W. Fowler, 278; Tille, Y. and C. 84, 104. Strenia was interpreted in the sense of ‘strenuous’; cf. Symmachus, Epist. x. 15 ‘ab exortu paene urbis Martiae strenarum usus adolevit auctore Tatio rege, qui verbenas felicis arboris ex luco Streniae anni novi auspices primus accepit.... Nomen indicio est viris strenuis haec convenire virtute.’ Preller calls Strenia a Sabine Segensgöttin.

[831] Mommsen and Marquardt, vii. 245; Lipenius, 489. The gifts were often inscribed ‘anno novo faustum felix tibi.’ It is probable that the sweet cakes and the lamps like the verbenae had originally a closer connexion with the rites of the feast than that of mere omens. The emperors expected liberal strenae, and from them the custom passed into mediaeval and Renaissance courts. Queen Elizabeth received sumptuous new year gifts from her subjects. For a money payment the later empire used the term καλανδικόν or kalendaticum. Strenae survives in the French étrennes (Müller, 150, 504).

[832] Appendix N, Nos. (i), (ii).

[833] The most recent authorities are Tille, Y. and C. 119; H. Usener, Religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen, i, Das Weihnachtsfest (1889); L. Duchesne, Origines du Culte chrétien (ed. 2, 1898), 247, and in Bulletin critique (1890), 41; F. C. Conybeare, The History of Christmas, in American Journal of Theology (1899), iii. 1, and Introduction to The Key of Truth (1898); F. Cumont, Textes et Monuments mithraïques, i (1899), 342, 355. I have not been able to see an article praised by Mr. Conybeare, in P. de Lagarde, Mittheilungen (1890), iv. 241.

[834] Conybeare, Am. J. Th. iii. 7, cites, without giving exact references, two ‘north Italian homilies’ of the fourth century, which seem to show this.

[835] Sermo ccii (P. L. xxxviii. 1033).

[836] The depositio martyrum, attached to the Fasti of Philocalus drawn up in 354, opens with the entry ‘viii kl. ianu. natus Christus in Bethleem Iudeae.’ December 25 was therefore kept as the birthday at least as early as 353. Usener, i. 267, argued that the change must have taken place in this very year, because Liberius, while veiling Marcellina, the sister of St. Ambrose, on the Epiphany, spoke of the day as ‘natalem Sponsi tui’ (de Virginibus, iii. 1, in P. L. xvi. 219). But it is not proved either that this event took place in 363, or that it was on Epiphany rather than Christmas day. Liberius refers to the Marriage at Cana and the Feeding of the Five Thousand. But the first allusion is directly led up to by the sponsalia of Marcellina, and both events, although at a later date commemorated at Epiphany, may have belonged to Christmas at Rome, before Epiphany made its appearance (Duchesne, Bulletin critique (1890), 41). Usener adds that Liberius built the Basilica Liberii, also known as Sta. Maria ad Praesepe or Sta. Maria Maggiore, which is still a great station for the Christmas ceremonies, in honour of the new feast. But Duchesne shows that the dedication to St. Mary only dates from a rebuilding in the fifth century, that the praesepe cannot be traced there before the seventh, and that the original Christmas statio was at St. Peter’s.

[837] Duchesne, Bulletin critique (1890), 44. This document also belongs to the collection of Philocalus.

[838] Conybeare, Key of Truth, clii-clvii, quoting an Armenian bishop Hippolytus in Bodl. Armen. Marsh 467, f. 338^a, ‘as many as were disobedient have divided the two feasts.’ According to the Catechism of the Syrian Doctors in the same MS., Sahak asked Afrem why the churches feast Dec. 25: the teacher replied, ‘The Roman world does so from idolatry, because of the worship of the Sun. And on the 25th of Dec., which is the first of Qanûn; when the day made a beginning out of the darkness they feasted the Sun with great joy, and declared that day to be the nuptials [? ‘natals,’ but cf. p. 241, n. 1] of the Sun. However, when the Son of God was born of the Virgin, they celebrated the same feast, although they had turned from their idols to God. And when their bishops (or primates) saw this, they proceeded to take the Feast of the Birth of Christ, which was on the sixth of January, and placed it there (viz. on Dec. 25). And they abrogated the feast of the Sun, because it (the Sun) was nothing, as we said before.’ Mommsen, C. I. L. i². 338, quotes to the same effect another Scriptor Syrus (in Assemanus, Bibl. Orient. ii. 164): cf. p. 235. The early apologists (Tertullian, Apol. 16; ad Nationes, i. 13; Origen, contra Celsum, viii. 67) defend Christianity against pagan charges of Sun-worship.

[839] Conybeare, J. Am. Th. iii. 8.

[840] Most of these dates were in the spring (Duchesne, 247). As late as †243 the Pseudo-Cyprianic de Pascha computus gives March 28. On the other hand, December 25 is given early in the third century by Hippolytus, Comm. super Danielem, iv. 23 (p. 243, ed. Bonwetsch, 1897), although the text has been suspected of interpolation (Hilgenfeld, in Berlin. phil. Wochenschrift, 1897, p. 1324, s.). Ananias of Shirak (†600-50), Hom. de Nat. (transl. in Expositor, Nov. 1890), says that the followers of Cerinthus first separated the birth and baptism: cf. Conybeare, Key of Truth, cliv. This is further explained by Paul of Taron (ob. 1123), adv. Theopistum, 222 (quoted Conybeare, clvi), who says that Artemon calculated the dates of the Annunciation as March 25 and the Birth as December 25, ‘the birth, not however of the Divine Being, but only of the mere man.’ Both Cerinthus (end of 1st cent.) and Artemon (†202-17) appear to have held Adoptionist tenets: cf. Schaff, iv. 465, 574. Paul adds that Artemon calculated the dates from those for the conception and nativity of John the Baptist. This implies that St. John Baptist’s day was already June 24 by †200. It was traditional on that day by St. Augustine’s time, ‘Hoc maiorum traditione suscepimus’ (Sermo ccxcii. 1, in Migne, P. L. xxxviii. 1320). The six months’ interval between the two nativities may be inferred from St. Luke i. 26. St. Augustine refers to the symbolism of their relation to each other, and quotes with regard to their position on the solstices the words ascribed to the Baptist in St. John iii. 30 ‘illum oportet crescere, me autem minui’ (Sermo cxciv. 2; cclxxxvii. 3; cclxxxviii. 5; Migne, P. L. xxxviii. 1016, 1302, 1306). Duchesne, 250, conjectures that the varying dates of West (Dec. 25) and East (Jan. 6) depended on a similar variation in the date assigned to the Passion, it being assumed in each case that the life of Christ must have been a complete circle, and that therefore he must have died on the anniversary of his conception in the womb. Thus St. Augustine (in Heptat. ii. 90) upbraids the Jews, ‘non coques agnum in lacte matris suae.’ March 25 was widely accepted for the Passion from Tertullian onwards, and certain Montanists held to the date of April 6. Astronomy makes it impossible that March 25 can be historically correct, and therefore the whole calculation, if Duchesne is right, probably started from an arbitrary identification of a Christian date with the spring equinox, just as, if Ananias of Shirak is right, it started from a similar identification of another such date with the summer solstice. But it seems just as likely that the birth was fixed first, and the Annunciation and St. John Baptist’s day calculated back from that. If the Passion had been the starting-point, would not the feast of Christmas, as distinct from the traditional date for the event, have become a movable one?

[841] The Armenian criticism just quoted only re-echoes that put by St. Augustine in the mouth of the Manichaeans in Contra Faustum, xx. 4 (Corp. Script. Eccl. xxv) ‘Faustus dixit ... solemnes gentium dies cum ipsis celebratis ut Kalendas et solstitia.’ Augustine answers other criticisms of the same order in the course of the book, but he does not take up this one.

[842] Augustine, in his sermons, uses a solar symbolism in two ways, besides drawing the parallel with St. John already quoted. Christ is lux e tenebris: ‘quoniam ipsa infidelitas quae totum mundum vice noctis obtexerat, minuenda fuerat fide crescente; ideo die Natalis Domini nostri Iesu Christi, et nox incipit perpeti detrimenta, et dies sumere augmenta’ (Sermo cxc. 1 in P. L. xxxviii. 1007). He is also sponsus procedens de thalamo suo (Sermo cxcii. 3; cxcv. 3, in P. L. xxxviii. 1013, 1018). Following this Caesarius or another calls Christmas the dies nuptialis Christi, on which ‘sponsae suae Ecclesiae adiunctus est’ (Serm. Pseudo-Aug. cxvi. 2, in P. L. xxxix. 1975). Cumont, i. 355, gives other examples of Le Soleil Symbole du Christ from an early date, and especially of the use of the phrase Sol Iustitiae from Malachi, iv. 2.

[843] Pseudo-Chrysostom (Italian, 4th cent.), de solstitiis et aequinoctiis (Op. Chrys. ed. 1588, ii. 118) ‘Sed et dominus nascitur mense Decembri, hiemis tempore, viii kal. Ianuarias.... Sed et invicti natalem appellant. Quis utique tam invictus nisi dominus noster qui Mortem subactam devicit? vel quod dicant Solis esse natalem, ipse est Sol iustitiae de quo Malachias propheta dixit’; St. Augustine, Sermo cxc. 1 (P. L. xxxviii. 1007) ‘habeamus, igitur, fratres, solemnem istum diem; non sicut infideles propter hunc solem, sed propter eum qui fecit hunc solem’; Tract. in Iohann. xxxiv. 2 (P. L. xxxv. 1652) ‘numquid forte Dominus Christus est Sol iste qui ortu et occasu peragit diem? Non enim defuerunt heretici qui ita senserunt ... (c. 4) ne quis carnaliter sapiens solem istum intelligendum putaret’; Pseudo-Ambrose (perhaps Maximus of Turin, †412-65), Sermo vi. (P. L. xvii. 614) ‘bene quodammodo sanctum hunc diem natalis Domini solem novum vulgus appellat ... quod libenter nobis amplectendum est; quia oriente Salvatore non solum humani generis salus, sed etiam solis ipsius claritas innovatur’; Leo Magnus, Sermo xxii, in Nativ. Dom. (P. L. liv. 198) ‘Ne idem ille tentator, cuius iam a vobis dominationem Christus exclusit, aliquibus vos iterum seducat insidiis, et haec ipsa praesentis diei gaudia suae fallaciae arte corrumpat, illudens simplicioribus animis de quorumdam persuasione pestifera, quibus haec dies solemnitatis nostrae non tam de nativitate Christi quam de novi, ut dicunt, solis ortu honorabilis videatur’; Sermo xxvii, in Nat. Dom. (P. L. liv. 218) ‘De talibus institutis etiam illa generatur impietas ut sol in inchoatione diurnae lucis exsurgens a quibusdam insipientioribus de locis eminentioribus adoretur; quod nonnulli etiam Christiani adeo se religiose facere putant, ut priusquam ad B. Petri apostoli basilicam, quae uni Deo vivo et vero est dedicata, perveniant, superatis gradibus quibus ad suggestum areae superioris ascenditur, converso corpore ad nascentem se solem reflectant, et curvatis cervicibus, in honorem se splendidi orbis inclinent. Quod fieri partim ignorantiae vitio, partim paganitatis spiritu, multum tabescimus et dolemus.’ Eusebius, Sermo xxii. περὶ ἀστρονόμων (P. G. lxxxvi. 453), also refers to the adoration of the sun by professing Christians. The ‘tentator’ of Leo and the ‘heretici’ of Augustine are probably Manichaeus and his followers, against whose sun-worship Augustine argues at length in Contra Faustum, xx (Corp. Script. Eccl. xxv).

[844] Duchesne, 248.

[845] Cf. p. 14.

[846] C. Agathense, c. 21 (Mansi, viii. 328) ‘Pascha vero, natale domini, epiphania, ascensionem domini, pentecostem, et natalem S. Ioannis Baptistae, vel si qui maximi dies in festivitatibus habentur, non nisi in civitatibus aut in parochiis teneant.’

[847] Conc. Bracarense (†560), Prop. 4 (Mansi, ix. 775) ‘Si quis natalem Christi secundum carnem non bene honorat, sed honorare se simulat, ieiunans in eodem die, et in dominico; quia Christum in vera hominis natura natum esse non credit, sicut Cerdon, Marcion, Manichaeus, et Priscillianus, anathema sit.’ A similar prohibition is given by Gregory II (†725), Capitulare, c. 10 (P. L. lxxxix. 534). To failings in the opposite direction the Church was more tender: cf. Penitentiale Theodori (Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 177), de Crapula et Ebrietate ‘Si vero pro infirmitate aut quia longo tempore se abstinuerit, et in consuetudine non erit ei multum bibere vel manducare, aut pro gaudio in Natale Domini aut in Pascha aut pro alicuius Sanctorum commemoratione faciebat, et tunc plus non accipit quam decretum est a senioribus, nihil nocet. Si episcopus iuberit, non nocet illi, nisi ipse similiter faciat.’

[848] Tille, Y. and C. 122.

[849] Cf. Appendix N, No. xxii.

[850] Epist. Gregorii ad Eulogium (Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 12).

[851] Epist. Bedae ad Egbertum (Haddan and Stubbs, iii. 323).

[852] Leges Ethelredi (Thorpe, Ancient Laws, i. 309) ‘Ordâl and âdhar sindon tocweden ... fram Adventum Domini odh octavas Epiphanie.... And beo tham hâlgum tîdan eal swa hit riht is, eallum cristenum mannum sib and sôm gemæne, and ælc sacu getwæmed.’ Cf. Leges Edwardi (Thorpe, i. 443).

[853] C. Moguntiacum, c. 36 (Mansi, xiv. 73) ‘In natali Domini dies quatuor, octavas Domini, epiphaniam Domini.’

[854] Tille, Y. and C. 203.

[855] Cf. the collection of prohibitions in Appendix N.

[856] C. of Tours, c. 18 (Appendix N, No. xxii).

[857] R. Sinker, in D. C. A. s. v. Circumcision.

[858] On this difficult subject see Tille, Y. and C. 134; H. Grotefend, Taschenbuch der Zeitrechnung (1898), 11; F. Ruhl, Chronologie des Mittelalters und der Neuzeit (1897), 23; C. Plummer, Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, ii. cxxix; R. L. Poole, in Eng. Hist. Review (1901), 719.

[859] The position of Christmas would have made it natural that it should attract observances from the spring festivals also, and, in fact, it did attract the Mummers’ play: cf. p. 226. It cannot of course be positively said whether the Epiphany fires and some of the other agricultural rites to be presently mentioned (ch. xii) came from the November or the ploughing festival.

[860] C. of Auxerre (573-603), c. 11 (Appendix N. No. xxv).

[861] In the south of France Christmas is Chalendes, in Provence Calendas or Calenos. The log is calignau, chalendau, chalendal, calignaon, or culenos, and the peasants sang round it ‘Calène vient’ (Tille, D. W. 286; Müller, 475, 478). Thiers, i. 264, speaks of ‘le pain de Calende.’ Christmas songs used to be known in Silesia as Kolendelieder (Tille, D. W. 287). The Lithuanian term for Christmas is Kalledos and the Czechic Koleda (Polish Kolenda, Russian Koljada). A verb colendisare appears as a Bohemian law term (Tille, Y. and C. 84); while in the fourteenth century the Christmas quête at Prague was known as the Koledasammeln (Tille, D. W. 112). The Bohemian Christmas procession described by Alsso (cf. ch. xii) was called Calendizatio, and according to tradition St. Adalbert (tenth century) transferred it from the Kalends to Christmas, and called it colendizatio ‘a colendo.’

[862] C. of Auxerre (573-603), c. 5 (Appendix N, No. xxv). Pfannenschmidt, 498, has collected a number of notices of Martinalia from the tenth century onwards.

[863] Pfannenschmidt, 279; Dyer, 386, describe the ‘Horn Fair’ at Charlton, Kent, on St. Luke’s Day, Oct. 18. A king and queen were chosen, who went in procession to the church, wearing horns. The visitors wore masks or women’s clothes, and played practical jokes with water. Rams’ horns were sold at the fair, which lasted three days, and the gilt on the gingerbread took the same shape. It will be remembered that the symbol of St. Luke in Christian art is a horned ox.

[864] Cf. p. 114. According to Spence, 196, the Shetland Christmas begins on St. Thomas’s Day and ends on Jan. 18, known as ‘Four and Twenty Day.’ Candlemas (Feb. 2) is also often regarded as the end of the Christmas season. The Anglo-Saxon Christmas feast lasted to the Octave of Epiphany (Tille, Y. and C. 165).

[865] Dyer, 451; Ashton, 118, where the custom is said to have been ‘started by the Rev. J. Kenworthy, Rector of Ackworth, in Yorkshire, ... for the special benefit of the birds.’

[866] Frazer, i. 177, ii. 172, 286; Grimm, iv. 1783; Tille, D. W. 50, 178; Alsso, in Usener, ii. 61, 65.

[867] Lipenius, 423; cf. Appendix N, Nos. i, vi, xiii, xxiv.

[868] Tille, Y. and C. 103, 174; Philpot, 164; Jackson and Burne, 397; Dyer, 457; Stow, Survey of London (ed. 1618), 149 ‘Against the feast of Christmas, euery mans house, as also their parish Churches, were decked with Holm, Iuy, Bayes, and whatsoever the season of the yeere aforded to be greene. The Conduits and Standards in the streetes were, likewise, garnished.’ He gives an example from 1444.

[869] Burne-Jackson, 245, 397, 411; Ashton, 95. Customs vary: here the evergreens must be burnt; there given to the cattle. They should not touch the ground (Grimm, iii. 1207). With this taboo compare that described by ancient writers, probably on the authority of Posidonius, as existing in a cult of a god identified with Dionysus amongst the Namnites on the west coast of Gaul. A temple on an island was unroofed and reroofed by the priestesses annually. Did one of them drop her materials on the ground, she was torn to pieces by her companions (Rhys, C. H. 196). They are replaced on Candlemas by snowdrops, or, according to Herrick, ‘the greener box.’ In Shropshire a garland made of blackthorn is left hanging from New Year to New Year, and then burnt in a festival fire (F. L. x. 489; xii. 349).

[870] The Christmas, rivalry between holly and ivy is the subject of carols, some dating from the fifteenth century; cf. Ashton, 92; Burne-Jackson, 245.

[871] Grimm, iii. 1205.

[872] Pliny, Nat. Hist. xxi. 95.

[873] Ashton, 81, 92; Ditchfield, 18; Brand, i. 285; Dyer, 458; Philpot, 164. Mistletoe is the chief ingredient of the ‘kissing-bunch,’ sometimes a very elaborate affair, with apples and dolls hung in it. The ecclesiastical taboo is not universal; in York Minster, e.g., mistletoe was laid on the altar.

[874] Tille, Y. and C. 174; D. W. 256, and in F. L. iii. 166; Philpot, 164; Ashton, 189; Kempe, Loseley MSS. 75. The earliest English mention is in 1789.

[875] Tille, Y. and C. 170.

[876] Ibid. 172; Ashton, 105, quoting Aubrey, Natural Hist. of Wilts, ‘Mr. Anthony Hinton, one of the officers of the Earle of Pembroke, did inoculate, not long before the late civill warres (ten yeares or more), a bud of Glastonbury Thorne, on a thorne, at his farm house, at Wilton, which blossoms at Christmas, as the other did. My mother has had branches of them for a flower-pott, several Christmasses, which I have seen. Elias Ashmole, Esq., in his notes upon Theatrum Chymicum, saies that in the churchyard at Glastonbury grew a walnutt tree, that did putt out young leaves at Christmas, as doth the King’s Oake in the New Forest. In Parham Park, in Suffolk (Mr. Boutele’s), is a pretty ancient thorne, that blossomes like that at Glastonbury; the people flock hither to see it on Christmas day. But in the rode that leades from Worcester to Droitwiche is a black thorne hedge at Clayes, half a mile long or more, that blossoms about Christmas-day for a week or more together. Dr. Ezerel Tong sayd that about Rumly-Marsh in Kent, are thornes naturally like that near Glastonbury. The Soldiers did cutt downe that near Glastonbury: the stump remaines.’ Specimens are still found about Glastonbury of Crataegus oxyacantha praecox, a winter-flowering variety of hawthorn: some of the alleged slips from the Glastonbury thorn appear, however, to be Prunus communis, or blackthorn. A writer in the Gentleman’s Magazine for 1753 reports that the opponents of the ‘New Style’ introduced in 1752 were encouraged by the refusal of the thorns at Glastonbury and Quainton in Buckinghamshire to flower before Old Christmas day. A Somerset woman told a writer in 3 N. Q. ix. 33 that the buds of the thorns burst into flower at midnight on Christmas Eve, ‘As they comed out, you could hear ‘um haffer.’

[877] Tille, Y. and C. 175.

[878] Usener, ii. 61. Alsso says that St. Adalbert substituted a crucifix for the idol, and the cry of ‘Vele, Vele,’ for that of ‘Bely, Bely.’

[879] Ashton, 244; Dyer, 483; Ditchfield, 15. The dolls sometimes represent the Virgin and Child. ‘Wesley-bob’ and the alternative ‘vessel-cup’ appear to be corruptions of ‘wassail.’

[880] Cf., however, the Burghead ceremony (p. 256).

[881] Brand, i. 217; Burne-Jackson, 381; Dyer, 405; Ditchfield, 25, 161; Northall, 216; Henderson, 66; Haddon, 476; Pfannenschmidt, 206. The N. E. D. plausibly explains ‘gooding,’ which seems to be used of any of these quêtes as ‘wishing good,’ and ‘hooding’ may be a corruption of this.

[882] Brand, i. 1; Dyer, 501; Ditchfield, 42; Northall, 183. Skeat derives wassail, M.E. wasseyl, ‘a health-drinking,’ from N.E. wæs hǽl, A.-S. wes hál, ‘be whole.’

[883] Ducange, Gloss, s. v. Kalendae Ianuarii, quoting Cerem. Rom. ad calcem Cod. MS. eccl. Camerac. ‘Hii sunt ludi Romani communes in Kalendis Ianuarii. In vigilia Kalendarum in sero surgunt pueri, et portant scutum. Quidam eorum est larvatus cum maza in collo; sibilando sonant timpanum, eunt per domos, circumdant scutum, timpanum sonat, larva sibilat. Quo ludo finito, accipiunt munus a domino domus, secundum quod placet ei. Sic faciunt per unamquamque domum. Eo die de omnibus leguminibus comedunt. Mane autem surgunt duo pueri ex illis, accipiunt ramos olivae et sal, et intrant per domos, salutant domum: Gaudium et laetitia sit in hac domo; tot filii, tot porcelli, tot agni, et de omnibus bonis optant, et antequam sol oriatur, comedunt vel favum mellis, vel aliquid dulce, ut totus annus procedat eis dulcis, sine lite et labore magno.’

[884] Du Tilliot, 67, quoting J. B. Thiers, Traité des jeux et des divertissemens, 452; Müller, 103. There are some Guillaneu songs in Bujeaud, ii. 153. The quête was prohibited by two synods of Angers in 1595 and 1668.

[885] Brand, i. 247; Dyer, 505; Ditchfield, 44; Ashton, 217; Northall, 181; Henderson, 76; Tille, Y. and C. 204; Nicholson, Golspie, 100; Rhys, in F. L. ii. 308. Properly speaking, ‘Hogmanay’ is the gift of an oaten farl asked for in the quête. It is also applied to the day on which the quête takes place, which is in Scotland generally New Year’s Eve. Besides the quête, Hogmanay night, like Halloween elsewhere, is the night for horse-play and practical joking. The name appears in many forms, ‘Hogmana,’ ‘Hogomanay,’ ‘Nog-money’ (Scotland), ‘Hogmina’ (Cumberland), ‘Hagmena’ (Northumberland), ‘Hagman heigh!’ ‘Hagman ha!’ (Yorkshire), ‘Agganow’ (Lancashire), ‘Hob dy naa,’ ‘Hob ju naa’ (Isle of Man). It is generally accepted as equivalent to the French aguilanneuf, aguilanleu, guillaneu, hagui men lo, hoquinano, &c., ad infin., the earliest form being auguilanleu (1353). With the Scotch

‘Hogmanay,

Trollolay,

Give us of your white bread and none of your grey’!

may be compared the French,

‘Tire lire,

Maint de blanc, et point du bis.’

On no word has amateur philology been more riotous. It has been derived from ‘au gui menez,’ ‘à gui l’an neuf,’ ‘au gueux menez,’ ‘Hálig monath,’ ἁγία μήνη, ‘Homme est né,’ and the like. Tille thinks that the whole of December was formerly Hogmanay, and derives from monâth and either *hoggva, ‘hew,’ hag, ‘witch,’ or hog, ‘pig.’ Nicholson tries the other end, and traces auguilanleu to the Spanish aguinaldo or aguilando, ‘a New Year’s gift.’ This in turn he makes the gerund of *aguilar, an assumed corruption of alquilar, ‘to hire oneself out.’ Hogmanay will thus mean properly ‘handsel’ or hiring-money,’ and the first Monday in the New Year is actually called in Scotland ‘Handsel Monday.’ This is plausible, but, although no philologist, I think a case might be made out for regarding the terms as corruptions of the Celtic Nos Galan-gaeaf, ‘the night of the winter Calends’ (Rhys, 514). This is All Saints’ eve, while the Manx ‘Hob dy naa’ quête is on Hollantide (November 12; cf. p. 230).

[886] A Gloucestershire wassail song in Dixon, Ancient Poems, 199, ends,

‘Come, butler, come bring us a bowl of the best:

I hope your soul in heaven will rest;

But if you do bring us a bowl of the small,

Then down fall butler, bowl and all.’

[887] In Herefordshire and the south of Scotland it is lucky to draw ‘the cream of the well’ or ‘the flower of the well,’ i. e. the first pail of water after midnight on New Year’s eve (Dyer, 7, 17). In Germany Heilwag similarly drawn at Christmas is medicinal (Grimm, iv. 1810). Pembroke folk sprinkle each other on New Year’s Day (F. L. iii. 263). St. Martin of Braga condemns amongst Kalends customs ‘panem in fontem mittere (Appendix N, No. xxiii), and this form of well-cult survives at Christmas in the Tyrol (Jahn, 283) and in France (Müller, 500). Tertullian chaffs the custom of early bathing at the Saturnalia (Appendix N, No. ii). Gervase of Tilbury (ed. Liebrecht, ii. 12) mentions an English belief (†1200) in a wonder-working Christmas dew. This Tille (Y. and C. 168) thinks an outgrowth from the Advent chant Rorate coeli, but it seems closely parallel to the folk belief in May-dew.

[888] Burne-Jackson, 388; Simpson, 202; F. L. v. 38; Dyer, 410. The festival in its present form can only date from the reign of James I, but the Pope used to be burned in bonfires as early as 1570 upon the accession day of Elizabeth, Nov. 17 (Dyer, 422).

[889] Dyer, 389 (Sussex).

[890] Brand, i. 210, 215 (Buchan, Perthshire, Aberdeenshire, North Wales).

[891] Pfannenschmidt, 207; Jahn, 240.

[892] Ashton, 47 (Isle of Man, where the day is called ‘Fingan’s Eve’).

[893] Jahn, 253.

[894] F. L. xii. 349; W. Gregor, Brit. Ass. Rept. (1896), 620 (Minnigaff, Galloway; bones being saved up for this fire); Gomme, Brit. Ass. Rept. (1896), 633 (Biggar, Lanarkshire).

[895] Brand, i. 14; Dyer, 22 (Gloucestershire, Herefordshire). Twelve small fires and one large one are made out in the wheat-fields.

[896] Dyer, 507; Ashton, 218; Simpson, 205; Gomme, Brit. Ass. Rept. (1896), 631; F. L. J. vii. 12; Trans. Soc. Antiq. Scot. x. 649.

[897] Simpson, 205, quoting Gordon Cumming, From the Hebrides to the Himalayas, i. 245.

[898] Bede, D. T. R. c. 17: cf. the A.-S. passage quoted by Pfannenschmidt, 495; Jahn, 252. Other Germanic names for the winter months are ‘Schlachtmonat,’ ‘Gormânaða’: cf. Weinhold, Die deutschen Monatsnamen, 54.

[899] Jahn, 229; Tille, Y. and C. 28, 65; Pfannenschmidt, 206, 217, 228.

[900] Dyer, 456, 470, 474, 477; Ashton, 171; Karl Blind, The Boar’s Head Dinner at Oxford and an Old Teutonic Sun-God, in Saga Book of Viking Club for 1895.

[901] Dyer, 473.

[902] Hampson, i. 82.

[903] Gummere, G. O. 433.

[904] Tacitus, Germ. 45, of the Aestii, ‘matrem deum venerantur. insigne superstitionis formas aprorum gestant: id pro armis omnique tutela securum deae cultorem etiam inter hostis praestat.’

[905] Dyer, 439.

[906] Dyer, 492; Ashton, 204; Grimm, iv. 1816.

[907] Dyer, 481; N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 250. Cf. ch. xvii for the hunt of a cat and a fox at the ‘grand Christmas’ of the Inner Temple.

[908] Dyer, 494, 497; Frazer, ii. 442; Northall, 229.

[909] Ashton, 114 (Reculver); Dyer, 472 (Ramsgate); Ditchfield, 27 (Walmer), 28 (Cheshire: All Souls’ day).

[910] Dyer, 486.

[911] Ditchfield, 28.

[912] Bertrand, 314; Arbois de Jubainville, Cycl. myth. 385; Rhys, C. H. 77.

[913] Tille, D. W. 109.

[914] C. de Berger (1723), Commentatio de personis vulgo larvis seu mascharis, 218 ‘Vecolo aut cervolo facere; hoc est sub forma vitulae aut cervuli per plateas discurrere, ut apud nos in festis Bacchanalibus vulgo dicitur correr la tora’; J. Ihre (†1769), Gloss. Suio-Gothicum, s. v. Jul. ‘Julbock est ludicrum, quo tempore hoc pellem et formam arietis induunt adolescentuli et ita adstantibus incursant. Credo idem hoc esse quod exteri scriptores cervulum appellant.’ In the Life of Bishop Arni (nat. 1237) it is recorded how in his youth he once joined in a scinnleic or ‘hide-play’ (C. P. B. ii. 385). Frazer, ii. 447, describes the New Year custom of colluinn in Scotland and St. Kilda. A man clad in a cowhide is driven deasil round each house to bless it. Bits of hide are also burnt for amulets. Probably the favourite Christmas game of Blind Man’s Buff was originally a scinnleic (N. W. Thomas, in F. L. xi. 262).

[915] Brand, i. 210, 217; Jackson and Burne, 381, 392, 407; Ashton, 178; Jahn, 487, 500; Müller, 487, 500. Scandinavian countries bake the Christmas ‘Yule-boar.’ Often this is made from the last sheaf and the crumbs mixed with the seed-corn (Frazer, ii. 29). Germany has its Martinshörner (Jahn, 250; Pfannenschmidt, 215).

[916] Dyer, 501; Ashton, 214.

[917] Brand, i. 19; Dyer, 21, 447; Ashton, 86, 233. Brand, i. 210, describes a Hallow-e’en custom in the Isle of Lewis of pouring a cup of ale in the sea to ‘Shony,’ a sea god.

[918] Brand, i. 14; Dyer, 22, 448; Northall, 187. A cake with a hole in the middle is hung on the horn of the leading ox.

[919] Grimm, iv. 1808. Hens are fed on New Year’s day with mixed corn to make them lay well.

[920] Gregory, Posthuma, 113 ‘It hath been a Custom, and yet is elsewhere, to whip up the Children upon Innocents-Day morning, that the memory of this Murther might stick the closer, and in a moderate proportion to act over the cruelty again in kind.’ In Germany, adults are beaten (Grimm, iv. 1820). In mediaeval France ‘innocenter,’ ‘donner les innocents,’ was a custom exactly parallel to the Easter prisio (Rigollot, 138, 173).

[921] Dyer, 24; Cortet, 32; Frazer, iii. 143; Deslyons, Traités contre le Paganisme du Roi boit (2nd ed. 1670). The accounts of Edward II record a gift to the rex fabae on January 1, 1316 (Archaeologia, xxvi. 342). Payments to the ‘King of Bene’ and ‘for furnissing his graith’ were made by James IV of Scotland between 1490 and 1503 (L. H. T. Accounts, 1. ccxliii; 11. xxiv, xxxi, &c.). The familiar mode of choosing the king is thus described at Mont St. Michel ‘In vigilia Epyphaniae ad prandium habeant fratres gastellos et ponatur faba in uno; et frater qui inveniet fabam, vocabitur rex et sedebit ad magnam mensam, et scilicet sedebit ad vesperas ad matutinam et ad magnam missam in cathedra parata’ (Gasté, 53). The pre-eminence of the bean, largest of cereals, in the mixed cereal cake (cf. ch. vi) presents no great difficulty; on the religious significance attached to it in South Europe, cf. W. W. Fowler, 94, 110, 130. Lady Jane Grey was scornfully dubbed a Twelfth-day queen by Noailles (Froude, v. 206), just as the Bruce’s wife held her lord a summer king (ch. viii).

[922] Accts. of St. Michael’s, Bath, s. ann. 1487, 1490, 1492 (Somerset Arch. Soc. Trans. 1878, 1879, 1883). One entry is ‘pro corona conducta Regi Attumnali.’ The learned editor explains this as ‘a quest conducted by the King’s Attorney’!

[923] Ashton, 119; Dyer, 388, 423, 427.

[924] Brand, i. 261, prints from Leland, Itinerary (ed. 1769), iv. 182, a description of the proclamation of Youle by the sheriffs at the ‘Youle-Girth’ and throughout the city. In Davies, 270, is a letter from Archbp. Grindal and other ecclesiastical commissioners to the Lord Mayor, dated November 13, 1572, blaming ‘a very rude and barbarouse custome maynteyned in this citie and in no other citie or towne of this realme to our knowledge, that yerely upon St. Thomas day before Christmas twoo disguysed persons, called Yule and Yule’s wife, shoulde ryde throughe the citie very undecently and uncomely....’ Hereupon the council suppressed the riding. Drake, Eboracum (1736), 217, says that originally a friar rode backwards and ‘painted like a Jew.’ He gives an historical legend to account for the origin of the custom. Religious interludes were played on the same day: cf. Representations. The ‘Yule’ of York was perhaps less a ‘king’ than a symbolical personage like the modern ‘Old Father Christmas.’

[925] Ramsay, Y. and L. ii. 52; Blomefield, Hist. of Norfolk, iii. 149. The riot was against the Abbot of St. Benet’s Holm, and the monks declared that one John Gladman was set up as a king, an act of treason against Henry VI. The city was fined 1,000 marks. In 1448 they set forth their wrongs in a ‘Bill’ and explained that Gladman ‘who was ever, and at thys our is, a man of sad disposition, and trewe and feythfull to God and to the Kyng, of disporte as hath ben acustomed in ony cite or burgh thorowe alle this realme, on Tuesday in the last ende of Cristemesse, viz. Fastyngonge Tuesday, made a disport with hys neyghbours, havyng his hors trappyd with tynnsoyle and other nyse disgisy things, coronned as kyng of Crestemesse, in tokyn that seson should end with the twelve monethes of the yere, aforn hym yche moneth disguysed after the seson requiryd, and Lenton clad in whyte and red heryngs skinns, and his hors trapped with oystyr-shells after him, in token that sadnesse shuld folowe, and an holy tyme, and so rode in diverse stretis of the cite, with other people, with hym disguysed makyng myrth, disportes and plays.’

[926] Jevons, Plutarch’s Romane Questions, 86. The Ides (Jan. 9) must have practically been included in the Kalends festival. The Agonium, probably a sacrifice to Janus, was on that day (W. W. Fowler, 282).

[927] Appendix N, Nos. ix, xi, xiv, xvii, xviii, xxviii, xxxvi.

[928] G. L. Gomme, in Brit. Ass. Rep. (1896), 616 sqq.; Tille, D. W. 11, Y. and C. 90; Jahn, 253; Dyer, 446, 466; Ashton, 76, 219; Grimm, iv. 1793, 1798, 1812, 1826, 1839, 1841; Bertrand, 111, 404; Müller, 478.

[929] Tille, Y. and C. 95.

[930] Dyer, 456; Ashton, 125, 188. A Lombard Capitulary (App. N, No. xxxviii) forbids a Christmas candle to be burnt beneath the kneading-trough.

[931] Müller, 236; Dyer, 430; Ashton, 54; Rigollot, 173; Records of Aberdeen (Spalding Club), ii. 39, 45, 66. In Belgium the household keys are entrusted to the youngest child on Innocents’ day (Durr, 73).

[932] Saupe, 9; Tille, Y. and C. 118; Duchesne, 267. A custom of feasting on the tombs of the dead on the day of St. Peter de Cathedra (Feb. 22) is condemned by the Council of Tours (567), c. 23 (Maassen, i. 133) ‘sunt etiam qui in festivitate cathedrae domui Petri apostoli cibos mortuis offerunt, et post missas redeuntes ad domos proprias, ad gentilium revertuntur errores, et post corpus Domini, sacratas daemoni escas accipiunt.’ I do not doubt that the Germano-Keltic tribes had their spring Todtenfest, but the date Feb. 22 seems determined by the Roman Parentalia extending from Feb. 13 to either Feb. 21 (Feralia) or Feb. 22 (Cara Cognatio): cf. Fowler, 306. The ‘cibi’ mentioned by the council of Tours seem to have been offered in the house, like the winter offerings described below; but there is also evidence for similar Germano-Keltic offerings on the tomb or howe itself; and these were often accompanied by dadsisas or dirges; cf. Saupe, Indiculus, 5-9. Saupe considers the spurcalia in Februario, explained above (p. 114) as a ploughing rite, to be funereal.

[933] Pfannenschmidt, 123, 165, 435; Saupe, 9; Golther, 586; C. P. B. i. 43; Jahn, 251. The chronicler Widukind, Res gestae Sax. (Pertz, Mon. SS. iii. 423), describes a Saxon three-days’ feast in honour of a victory over the Thuringi in 534. He adds ‘acta sunt autem haec omnia, ut maiorum memoria prodit, die Kal. Octobris, qui dies erroris, religiosorum sanctione virorum mutati sunt in ieiunia et orationes, oblationes quoque omnium nos praecedentium christianorum.’ This is probably a myth to account for the harvest Todtenfest, which may more naturally be thought of as transferred with the agricultural rites from November. For the mediaeval Gemeinwoche, beginning on the Sunday after Michaelmas, was common to Germany, and not confined to Saxony. Michaelmas, the feast of angels, known at Rome in the sixth century, and in Germany by the ninth, also adapts itself to the notion of a Todtenfest.

[934] Pfannenschmidt, 168, 443.

[935] Mogk, in Paul, iii. 260; Tille, Y. and C. 107.

[936] Cf. p. 231.

[937] Appendix N, Nos. xii, xvii, xxvii, xxxiii, xxxv, xxxix.

[938] Appendix N, No. xlii.

[939] Martin of Amberg, Gewissensspiegel (thirteenth century, quoted Jahn, 282), the food and drink are left for ‘Percht mit der eisnen nasen.’

[940] Thes. Paup. s. v. Superstitio (fifteenth century, quoted Jahn, 282) ‘multi credunt sacris noctibus inter natalem diem Christi et noctem Epiphaniae evenire ad domos suas quasdam mulieres, quibus praeest domina Perchta ... multi in domibus in noctibus praedictis post coenam dimittunt panem et caseum, lac, carnes, ova, vinum, et aquam et huiusmodi super mensas et coclearea, discos, ciphos, cultellos et similia propter visitationem Perhtae cum cohorte sua, ut eis complaceant ... ut inde sint eis propitii ad prosperitatem domus et negotiorum rerum temporalium.’

[941] Usener, ii. 84 ‘Qui preparant mensam dominae Perthae’ (fifteenth century). Schmeller, Bairisch. Wörterb. i. 270, gives other references for Perchte in this connexion.

[942] Usener, ii. 58.

[943] Dives and Pauper (Pynson, 1493) ‘Alle that ... use nyce observances in the ... new yere, as setting of mete or drynke, by nighte on the benche, to fede Atholde or Gobelyn.’ In English folk-custom, food is left for the house-spirit or ‘brownie’ on ordinary as well as festal days; cf. my ‘Warwick’ edition of Midsummer Night’s Dream, 145.

[944] Jahn, 283; Brand, i. 18; Bertrand, 405; Cortet, 33, 45.

[945] Appendix N, No. xxiii. If the words ‘in foco’ are not part of the text, ‘youling’ (cf. pp. 142, 260) may be intended.

[946] Bertrand, 111, 404.

[947] Jahn, 120, 244, 269: the Gertruden-minnes on St. Gertrude’s day (March 17) perhaps preserve another fragment of the spring Todtenfest, St. Gertrude here replacing the mother-goddess; cf. Grimm, iii. xxxviii.

[948] Grimm, i. 268, 273, 281; Mogk, in Paul, iii. 279. The especial day of Frau Perchte is Epiphany.

[949] Mogk, in Paul, iii. 260; Tille, D. W. 173.

[950] Grimm, iv. 1798.

[951] Ibid. iv. 1814.

[952] Tille, D. W. 163; Grimm, iv. 1782.

[953] Ashton, 104.

[954] Müller, 496.

[955] Hamlet, i. 1. 158. I do not know where Shakespeare got the idea, of which I find no confirmation; but its origin is probably an ecclesiastical attempt to parry folk-belief. Other Kalends notions have taken on a Christian colouring. The miraculous events of Christmas night are rooted in the conception that the Kalends must abound in all good things, in order that the coming year may do so. But allusions to Christian legend have been worked into and have transformed them. On Christmas night bees sing (Brand, i. 3), and water is turned into wine (Grimm, iv. 1779, 1809). While the genealogy is sung at the midnight mass, hidden treasures are revealed (Grimm, iv. 1840). Similarly, the cattle of heathen masters naturally shared in the Kalends good cheer; whence a Christian notion that they, and in particular the ox and the ass, witnesses of the Nativity, can speak on that night, and bear testimony to the good or ill-treatment of the farmers (Grimm, iv. 1809, 1840); cf. the Speculum Perfectionis, c. 114, ed. Sabatier, 225 ‘quod volebat [S. Franciscus] suadere imperatori ut faceret specialem legem quod in Nativitate Domini homines bene providerent avibus et bovi et asino et pauperibus’: also p. 250, n. 1.—Ten minutes after writing the above note, I have come on the following passage in Tolstoi, Résurrection (trad. franç.), i. 297 ‘Un proverbe dit que les coqs chantent de bonne heure dans les nuits joyeuses.’

[956] Müller, 272.

[957] Pfannenschmidt, 207.

[958] Müller, 235, 239, 248.

[959] Tille, D. W. 107; Y. and C. 116; Saupe, 28; Io. Iac. Reiske, Comm. ad Const. Porph., de Caeremoniis, ii. 357 (Corp. Script. Byz. 1830) ‘Vidi puerulus et horrui robustos iuvenes pelliceis indutos, cornutos in fronte, vultus fuligine atratos, intra dentes carbones vivos tenentes, quos reciprocato spiritu animabant, et scintillis quaquaversum sparsis ignem quasi vomebant, cum saccis cursitantes, in quos abdere puerulos occursantes minitabantur, appensis cymbalis et insano clamore frementes.’ He calls them ‘die Knecht Ruperte,’ and says that they performed in the Twelve nights. The sacci are interesting, for English nurses frighten children with a threat that the chimney-sweep (here as in the May-game inheriting the tradition on account of his black face) will put them in his sack. The beneficent Christmas wanderers use the sack to bring presents in; cf. the development of the sack in the Mummers’ play (p. 215).

[960] Müller, 235, 248.

[961] A mince-pie eaten in a different house on each night of the Twelves (not twelve mince-pies eaten before Christmas) ensures twelve lucky months. The weather of each day in the Twelves determines that of a month (Harland, 99; Jackson and Burne, 408). I have heard of a custom of leaping over twelve lighted candles on New Year’s eve. Each that goes out means ill-luck in a corresponding month.

[962] Caesarius; Boniface (App. N, Nos. xvii, xviii, xxxiii); Alsso, in Usener, ii. 65; F. L. iii. 253; Jackson and Burne, 400; Ashton, 111; Brit. Ass. Report (1896), 620. In some of the cases quoted under the last reference and elsewhere, nothing may be taken out of the house on New Year’s Day. Ashes and other refuse which would naturally be taken out in the morning were removed the night before. Ashes, of course, share the sanctity of the fire. Cf. the maskers’ threat (p. 217).

[963] Boniface (App. N, No. xxxiii); cf. the Kloster Scheyern (Usener, ii. 84) condemnation of those ‘qui vomerem ponunt sub mensa tempore nativitatis Christi.’ For other uses of iron as a potent agricultural charm, cf. Grimm, iv. 1795, 1798, 1807, 1816; Burne-Jackson, 164.

[964] Cf. Burchardus (App. N, No. xlii); Grimm, iv. 1793, with many other superstitions in the same appendix to Grimm; Brand, i. 9; Ashton, 222; Jackson and Burne, 403. The practical outcome is to begin jobs for form’s sake and then stop. The same is done on Saint Distaff’s day, January 7; cf. Brand, i. 15.

[965] Harland, 117; Jackson and Burne, 314; Brit. Ass. Rep. (1896), 620; Dyer, 483; Ashton, 112, 119, 224. There is a long discussion in F. L. iii. 78, 253. I am tempted to find a very early notice of the ‘first foot’ in the prohibition ‘pedem observare’ of Martin of Braga (App. N, No. xxiii).

[966] F. L. iii. 253.

[967] Kloster Scheyern MS. (fifteenth century) in Usener, ii. 84 ‘Qui credunt, quando masculi primi intrant domum in die nativitatis, quod omnes vaccae generent masculos et e converso.’

[968] Müller, 269 (Italy). Grimm, iv. 1784, notes ‘If the first person you meet in the morning be a virgin or a priest, ’tis a sign of bad luck; if a harlot, of good’: cf. Caspari, Hom. de Sacrilegiis, § 11 ‘qui clericum vel monachum de mane aut quacumque hora videns aut ovians, abominosum sibi esse credet, iste non solum paganus, sed demoniacus est, qui christi militem abominatur.’ These German examples have no special relation to the New Year, and the ‘first foot’ superstition is indeed only the ordinary belief in the ominous character of the first thing seen on leaving the house, intensified by the critical season.

[969] Tille, D. W. 189; Y. and C. 84, 95, 104.

[970] Cf. p. 238.

[971] Brand, i. 3, 209, 226, 257; Spence, Shetland Folk-Lore, 189; Grimm, iv. 1777-1848 passim; Jackson and Burne, 176, 380, &c., &c. Burchardus (App. N, No. xlii) mentions that the Germans took New Year omens sitting girt with a sword on the housetop or upon a [sacrificial] skin at the crossways. This was called liodorsâza, a term which a glossator also uses for the kindred custom of cervulus (Tille, Y. and C. 96). Is the man in Hom. de Sacr. (App. N, No. xxxix) ‘qui arma in campo ostendit’ taking omens like the man on the housetop, or is he conducting a sword-dance?

[972] Burchardus (App. N, No. xlii).

[973] Brand, i. 209.

[974] Grimm, iv. 1781, 1797, 1818.

[975] Quoted Pfannenschmidt, 489 ‘quod autem obscoena carmina finguntur a daemonibus et perditorum mentibus immittuntur, quidam daemon nequissimus, qui in Nivella urbe Brabantiae puellam nobilem anno domini 1216 prosequebatur, manifeste populis audientibus dixit: cantum hunc celebrem de Martino ego cum collega meo composui et per diversas terras Galliae et Theutoniae promulgavi. Erat autem cantus ille turpissimus et plenus luxuriosis plausibus.’ On Martinslieder in general cf. Pfannenschmidt, 468, 613.

[976] T. Gascoigne, Loci e Libro Veritatum (1403-58), ed. Rogers, 144.

[977] Aubrey, Gentilisme and Judaisme (F. L. S.), 1.

[978] Tille, D. W. 55; K. Simrock, Deutsche Weihnachtslieder (1854); Cortet, 246; Grove, Dict. of Music, s. v. Noël; Julian, Dict. of Hymn. s. v. Carol; A. H. Bullen, Carols and Poems, 1885; Helmore, Carols for Christmastide. The cry ‘Noël’ appears in the fifteenth century both in France and England as one of general rejoicing without relation to Christmas. It greeted Henry V in London in 1415 and the Marquis of Suffolk in Rouen in 1446 (Ramsay, Lancaster and York, i. 226; ii. 60).

[979] Constantinus Porphyrogenitus, de Caeremoniis Aulae Byzantinae, Bk. i. c. 83 (ed. Reiske, in Corp. Script. Hist. Byz. i. 381); cf. Bury-Gibbon, vi. 516; Kögel, i. 34; D. Bieliaiev, Byzantina, vol. ii: Haupt’s Zeitschrift, i., 368; C. Kraus, Gotisches Weihnachtsspiel, in Beitr. z. Gesch. d. deutschen Sprache und Litteratur, xx (1895), 223.

[980] Fouquier-Cholet, Hist. des Comtes de Vermandois, 159, says that Heribert IV (ob. †1081) persuaded the clergy of the Vermandois to suppress the fête de l’âne. This would have been a century before Belethus wrote. But he does not give his probatum, and I suspect he misread it.

[981] Belethus, c. 72 ‘Festum hypodiaconorum, quod vocamus stultorum, a quibusdam perficitur in Circumcisione, a quibusdam vero in Epiphania, vel in eius octavis. Fiunt autem quatuor tripudia post Nativitatem Domini in Ecclesia, levitarum scilicet, sacerdotum, puerorum, id est minorum aetate et ordine, et hypodiaconorum, qui ordo incertus est. Unde fit ut ille quandoque annumeretur inter sacros ordines, quandoque non, quod expresse ex eo intelligitur quod certum tempus non habeat, et officio celebretur confuso.’ Cf. ch. xv on the three other tripudia.

[982] Lebeuf, Hist. de Paris (1741), ii. 277; Grenier, 365:

Ad amicum venturum ad festum Baculi.

Festa dies aliis Baculus venit et novus annus,

Qua venies, veniet haec mihi festa dies.

Leonius is named as canon of N.-D. in the Obituary of the church Guérard, Cartulaire de N.-D. in (Doc. inédits sur l’Hist. de France, iv. 34), but unfortunately the year of his death is not given.

[983] During the fifteenth century the Chantre of N.-D. ‘porta le baston’ at the chief feasts as ruler of the choir (F. L. Chartier, L’ancien Chapitre de N.-D. de Paris (1897), 176). This baculus must be distinguished from the baculus pastoralis or episcopi.

[984] Guérard, Cartulaire de N.-D. (Doc. inéd. sur l’Hist. de France), i. 73; also printed by Ducange, s. v. Kalendae; P. L. ccxii. 70. The charta, dated 1198, runs in the names of ‘Odo [de Soliaco] episcopus, H. decanus, R. cantor, Mauricius, Heimericus et Odo archidiaconi, Galo, succentor, magister Petrus cancellarius, et magister Petrus de Corbolio, canonicus Parisiensis.’ Possibly the real moving spirit in the reform was the dean H[ugo Clemens], to whom the Paris Obituary (Guérard, loc. cit. iv. 61) assigns a similar reform of the feast of St. John the Evangelist. Petrus de Corbolio we shall meet again. Eudes de Sully was bishop 1196-1208. His Constitutions (P. L. ccxii. 66) contain a prohibition of ‘choreae ... in ecclesiis, in coemeteriis et in processionibus.’ In a second decree of 1199 (P. L. ccxii. 72) he provided a solatium for the loss of the Feast of Fools in a payment of three deniers to each clerk below the degree of canon, and two deniers to each boy present at Matins on the Circumcision. Should the abuses recur, the payment was to lapse. This donation was confirmed in 1208 by his successor Petrus de Nemore (P. L. ccxii. 92).

[985] A ‘hearse’ was a framework of wood or iron bearing spikes for tapers (Wordsworth, Mediaeval Services, 156). The penna was also a stand for candles (Ducange, s.v.).

[986] A prosa is a term given in French liturgies to an additional chant inserted on festal occasions as a gloss upon or interpolation in the text of the office or mass. It covers nearly, though not quite, the same ground as Sequentia, and comes under the general head of Tropus (ch. xviii). For a more exact differentiation cf. Frere, Winchester Troper, ix. Laetemur gaudiis is a prose ascribed to Notker Balbulus of St. Gall.

[987] cum farsia: a farsia, farsa, or farsura (Lat. farcire, ‘to stuff’), is a Tropus interpolated into the text of certain portions of the office or mass, especially the Kyrie, the Lectiones and the Epistola. Such farces were generally in Latin, but occasionally, especially in the Epistle, in the vernacular (Frere, Winchester Troper, ix, xvi).

[988] Laetabundus: i. e. St. Bernard’s prose beginning Laetabundus exultet fidelis chorus; Alleluia (Daniel, Thesaurus Hymnologicus, ii. 61), which was widely used in the feasts of the Christmas season.

[989] The document is too long to quote in full. These are the essential passages. The legate says: The Church of Paris is famous, therefore diligence must be used ‘ad exstirpandum penitus quod ibidem sub praetextu pravae consuetudinis inolevit ... Didicimus quod in festo Circumcisionis Dominicae ... tot consueverunt enormitates et opera flagitiosa committi, quod locum sanctum ... non solum foeditate verborum, verum etiam sanguinis effusione plerumque contingit inquinari, et ... ut sacratissima dies ... festum fatuorum nec immerito generaliter consueverit appellari.’ Odo and the rest order: ‘In vigilia festivitatis ad Vesperas campanae ordinate sicut in duplo simplici pulsabuntur. Cantor faciet matriculam (the roll of clergy for the day’s services) in omnibus ordinate; rimos, personas, luminaria herciarum nisi tantum in rotis ferreis, et in penna, si tamen voluerit ille qui capam redditurus est, fieri prohibemus; statuimus etiam ne dominus festi cum processione vel cantu ad ecclesiam adducatur, vel ad domum suam ab ecclesia reducatur. In choro autem induet capam suam, assistentibus ei duobus canonicis subdiaconis, et tenens baculum cantoris, antequam incipiantur Vesperae, incipiet prosam Laetemur gaudiis: qua finita episcopus, si praesens fuerit ... incipiet Vesperas ordinate et solemniter celebrandas; ... a quatuor subdiaconis indutis capis sericis Responsorium cantabitur.... Missa similiter cum horis ordinate celebrabitur ab aliquo praedictorum, hoc addito quod Epistola cum farsia dicetur a duobus in capis sericis, et postmodum a subdiacono ... Vesperae sequentes sicut priores a Laetemur gaudiis habebunt initium: et cantabitur Laetabundus, loco hymni. Deposuit quinquies ad plus dicetur loco suo; et si captus fuerit baculus, finito Te Deum laudamus, consummabuntur Vesperae ab eo quo fuerint inchoatae.... Per totum festum in omnibus horis canonici et clerici in stallis suis ordinate et regulariter se habebunt.’

[990] The feast lasted from Vespers on the vigil to Vespers on the day of the Circumcision. The Hauptmoment was evidently the Magnificat in the second Vespers. But what exactly took place then? Did the cathedral precentor hand over the baculus to the dominus festi, or was it last year’s dominus festi, who now handed it over to his newly-chosen successor? Probably the latter. The dominus festi is called at first Vespers ‘capam redditurus’: doubtless the cope and baculus went together. The dominus festi may have, as elsewhere, exercised disciplinary and representative functions amongst the inferior clergy during the year. His title I take to have been, as at Sens, precentor stultorum. The order says, ‘si captus fuerit baculus’; probably it was left to the chapter to decide whether the formal installation of the precentor in church should take place in any particular year.

[991] P. L. ccxv. 1070 ‘Interdum ludi fiunt in eisdem ecclesiis theatrales, et non solum ad ludibriorum spectacula introducuntur in eas monstra larvarum, verum etiam in tribus anni festivitatibus, quae continue Natalem Christi sequuntur, diaconi, presbiteri ac subdiaconi vicissim insaniae suae ludibria exercentes, per gesticulationum suarum debacchationes obscoenas in conspectu populi decus faciunt clericale vilescere.... Fraternitati vestrae ... mandamus, quatenus ... praelibatam vero ludibriorum consuetudinem vel potius corruptelam curetis e vestris ecclesiis ... exstirpare.’ As to the scope of this decretal and the glosses of the canonists upon it, cf. the account of miracle plays (ch. xx).

[992] Decretales Greg. IX, lib. iii. tit. i. cap. 12 (C. I. Can. ed. Friedberg, ii. 452). I cannot verify an alleged confirmation of the decretal by Innocent IV in 1246.

[993] C. of Paris (1212), pars iv. c. 16 (Mansi, xxii. 842) ‘A festis vero follorum, ubi baculus accipitur, omnino abstineatur. Idem fortius monachis et monialibus prohibemus.’ Can. 18 is a prohibition against ‘choreae,’ similar to that of Eudes de Sully already referred to. Such general prohibitions are as common during the mediaeval period as during that of the conversion (cf. ch. viii), and probably covered the Feast of Fools. See e.g. C. of Avignon (1209), c. 17 (Mansi, xxii. 791), C. of Rouen (1231), c. 14 (Mansi, xxiii. 216), C. of Bayeux (1300), c. 31 (Mansi, xxv. 66).

[994] Codex Senonen. 46 A. There are two copies in the Bibl. Nat., (i) Cod. Parisin. 10520 B, containing the text only, dated 1667; (ii) Cod. Parisin. 1351 C, containing text and music, made for Baluze (1630-1718). The Officium has been printed by F. Bourquelot in Bulletin de la Soc. arch. de Sens (1858), vi. 79, and by Clément, 125 sqq. The metrical portions are also in Dreves, Analecta Hymnica Medii Aevi, xx. 217, who cites other Quellen for many of them. See further on the MS., Dreves, Stimmen aus Maria-Laach, xlvii. 575; Desjardins, 126; Chérest, 14; A. L. Millin, Monuments antiques inédits (1802-6), ii. 336; Du Tilliot, 13; J. A. Dulaure, Environs de Paris (1825), vii. 576; Nisard, in Archives des Missions scientifiques et littéraires (1851), 187; Leber, ix. 344 (l’Abbé Lebeuf). Before the Officium proper, on f. 1^vo of the MS. a fifteenth-century hand (Chérest, 18) has written the following quatrain:

‘Festum stultorum de consuetudine morum

omnibus urbs Senonis festivat nobilis annis,

quo gaudet precentor, sed tamen omnis honor

sit Christo circumciso nunc semper et almo’:

and the following couplet:

‘Tartara Bacchorum non pocula sunt fatuorum,

tartara vincentes sic fiunt ut sapientes.’

Millin, loc. cit. 344, cites a MS. dissertation of one Père Laire, which ascribes these lines to one Lubin, an official at Chartres. The last eight pages of the MS. contain epistles for the feasts of St. Stephen, St. John the Evangelist, and the Innocents.

[995] Chérest, 14; Millin, op. cit. ii. 336 (plates), and Voyage dans le Midi, i. 60 (plates); Clément, 122, 162; Bourquelot, op. cit. vi. 79 (plates); A. de Montaiglon, in Gazette des Beaux-arts (1880), i. 24 (plates); E. Molinier, Hist. générale des Arts appliqués, i; Les Ivoires (1896), 47 (plate); A. M. Cust, Ivory Workers of the Middle Ages (1902), 34. This last writer says that the diptych is now in the Bibl. Nationale. The leaves of the diptych represent a Triumph of Bacchus, and a Triumph of Artemis or Aphrodite. It has nothing to do with the Feast of Fools, and is of sixth-century workmanship.

[996] Dreves, 575, thinks the MS. was ‘für eine Geckenbruderschaft,’ as the chants are not in the contemporary Missals, Breviaries, Graduais, and Antiphonals of the church. But if they were, a separate Officium book would be superfluous. Such special festorum libri were in use elsewhere, e.g. at Amiens. Nisard, op. cit., thinks the Officium was an imitation one written by ‘notaires’ to amuse the choir-boys, and cites a paper of M. Carlier, canon of Sens, before the Historic Congress held at Sens in 1850 in support of this view. Doubtless the goliardi wrote such imitations (cf. the missa lusorum in Schmeller, Carmina Burana, 248; the missa de potatoribus in Wright-Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae, ii. 208; and the missa potatorum in F. Novati, La Parodia sacra nelle Letterature moderne (Studi critici e letterari, 289)); but this is too long to be one, and is not a burlesque at all.

[997] Cf. the chapter decree of 1524 ‘festum Circumcisionis a defuncto Corbolio institutum,’ which is doubtless the authority for the statements of Taveau, Hist. archiep. Senonen. (1608), 94; Saint-Marthe, Gallia Christiana (1770), xii. 60; Baluze, note in B. N. Cod. Parisin. 1351 C. (quoted Nisard, op. cit.).

[998] Dreves, 575; Chérest, 15, who quotes an elaborate opinion of M. Quantin, ‘archiviste de l’Yonne.’ M. Quantin believes that the hand is that of a charter of Pierre de Corbeil, dated 1201, in the Yonne archives. On the other hand Nisard, op. cit., and Danjou, Revue de musique religieuse (1847), 287, think that the MS. is of the fourteenth century.

[999] Chérest, 35; Dreves, 576.

[1000] Liturgically a conductus is a form of Cantio, that is, an interpolation in the mass or office, which stands as an independent unit, and not, like the Tropes, Proses and Sequences, as an extension of the proper liturgical texts. The Cantiones are, however, only a further step in the process which began with Tropes (Nisard, op. cit. 191; Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 6). From the point of view of musical science H. E. Wooldridge, Oxford Hist. of Music, i. 308, defines a conductus as ‘a composition of equally free and flowing melodies in all the parts, in which the words are metrical and given to the lower voice only.’ The term is several times used in the Officium. Clément, 163, falls foul of Dulaure for taking it as an adjective throughout, with asinus understood.

[1001] Wordsworth, Mediaeval Services, 289; Clément, 126, 163. Dulaure seems to have taken the tabula for the altar. The English name for the tabula was wax-brede. An example (†1500) is printed by H. E. Reynolds, Use of Exeter Cathedral, 73.

[1002] Appendix L; where the various versions of the ‘Prose’ are collated.

[1003] There are many hymns beginning Salve, festa dies. The model is a couplet of Venantius Fortunatus, Carmina, iii. 9, Ad Felicem episcopum de Pascha, 39 (M. G. H. Auct. Antiquiss. iv. 1. 60):

‘Salve, festa dies, toto venerabilis aevo,

qua Deus infernum vicit et astra tenet.’

[1004] Clément, 127, correcting an error of Lebeuf. A still more curious slip is that of M. Bourquelot, who found in the word euouae, which occurs frequently in the Officium, an echo of the Bacchic cry évohé. Now euouae represents the vowels of the words Seculorum amen, and is noted at the ends of antiphons in most choir-books to give the tone for the following psalm (Clément, 164).

[1005] Clément, 138, reads Conductus ad Ludos, and inserts before In Laudibus the word Ludarius. Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 221, reads Conductus ad Laudes. The section In Laudibus, not being metrical, is not printed by him, so I do not know what he makes of Ludarius. If Clément is right, I suppose a secular revel divided Matins and Lauds, which seems unlikely.

[1006] I follow Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 228. Clément, 151, has again Ludarium.

[1007] Prudentius, Cathemerinon, iii.

[1008] Egerton MS. 2615 (Catalogue of Additions to MSS. in B. M. 1882-87, p. 336). On the last page is written ‘Iste liber est beati petri beluacensis.’ On ff. 78, 110^v are book-plates of the chapter of Beauvais, the former signed ‘Vollet f[ecit].’ The MS. was bought by the British Museum in 1883, and formerly belonged to Signor Pachiarotti of Padua. It was described and a facsimile of the harmonized Prose of the Ass given in Annales archéologiques (1856), xvi. 259, 300. Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 230 (1895), speaks of it as ‘vielleicht noch in Italien in Privatbesitz.’ This, and not the MS. used by Ducange’s editors, is the MS. whose description Desjardins, 127, 168, gives from a 1464 Beauvais inventory: ‘N^o. 76. Item ung petit volume entre deux ais sans cuir l’ung d’icelx ais rompu à demy contenant plusieurs proses antiennes et commencemens des messes avec oraisons commençant au ii^e feuillet Belle bouche et au pénultième coopertum stolla candida.’ The broken board was mended, after 420 years, by the British Museum in 1884.

[1009] B. M. Catalogue, loc. cit., ‘Written in the xiii^th cent., probably during the pontificate of Gregory IX (1227-41) and before the marriage of Louis IX to Marguerite of Provence in 1234.’ There are prayers for Gregorius Papa and Ludovicus Rex on ff. 42, 42^v, but none for any queen of France.

[1010] Between ff. 40^vo and 41.

[1011] So B. M. Catalogue, loc. cit. To me it reads like ‘Conductus asi ... adducitur.’

[1012] F. 43.

[1013] Cf. ch. xix.

[1014] Louis VII married Adèle de Champagne in 1160 and died in 1180.

[1015] Pierre Louvet, Hist. du Dioc. de Beauvais (1635), ii. 299, quoted by Desjardins, 124. I am sorry not to have been able to get hold of the original. Nor can I find E. Charvet, Rech. sur les anciens théâtres de Beauvais (1881).

[1016] Grenier, 362. He says the ‘cérémonial’ is ‘tiré d’un ms. de la cathédrale de Beauvais,’ and gives the footnote ‘Preuv. part 1, n^o. .’ On the prose Kalendas Ianuarias and the censing his footnotes refer to Ducange, s. v. Kalendae. The ‘Preuves’ for his history are scattered through the MSS. Picardie in the Bibl. Nat. No doubt the reference here is to MSS. 14 and 158 which are copies of the Beauvais office (Dreves, in Stimmen aus Maria-Laach, xlvii. 575). These, or parts of them, are printed by F. Bourquelot, in Bulletin de la Soc. arch. de Sens (1854), vi. 171 (which also, unfortunately, I have not seen), and chants from them are in Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 229. But here Dreves seems to speak of them as copies of Pacchiarotti’s MS. (Egerton MS. 2615). And Desjardins, 124, says that Grenier and Bourquelot used extracts from eighteenth-century copies of Pacchiarotti’s MS. in the library of M. Borel de Brétizel. Are these writers mistaken, or did Grenier only see the copies, and take his description from Louvet? And what has become of the twelfth-century MS.?

[1017] Ducange, s. v. Kalendae, ‘MS. codice Bellovac. ann. circiter 500, ubi 1^a haec occurrit rubrica Dominus ... ianuae. Et alibi Hac ... saucita.’

[1018] Ducange, s. v. Festum Asinorum. Desjardins and other writers give the date of the ‘codex’ as twelfth century. But 500 years from 1733-6 only bring it to the thirteenth century. The mistake is due to the fact that the first edition of Ducange, in which the ‘codex’ is not mentioned, is of 1678. Clément, 158, appears to have no knowledge of the MS. but what he read in Ducange; and it is not quite clear what he means when he says that it ‘d’après nos renseignements, ne renferme pas un office, mais une sorte de mystère postérieur d’un siècle au moins à l’office de Sens, et n’ayant aucune autorité historique et encore bien moins religieuse.’ The MS. was contemporary with the Sens Officium, and although certainly influenced by the religious drama was still liturgic (cf. ch. xx).

[1019] Cf. Appendix L, on an Officium (1553) for Jan. 1 without stulti or asinus, from Puy.

[1020] Leber, ix. 238. This is a note by J. B. Salques to the reprint of D’Artigny’s memoir on the Fête des Fous. The writer calls the ceremony the ‘fête des apôtres,’ and says that it was held at the same time as the ‘fête de l’âne.’ He describes a Rabelaisian contretemps, which is said to have put an end to the procession in 1634. No authority is given for this account, which I believe to be the source of all later notices. I may add that Ducange gives the name Festum Apostolorum to the feast of St. Philip and St. James on May 1.

[1021] Cod. Senonens. G. 133, printed by Chérest, 47; Quantin, Recueil de pièces pour faire suite au Cartulaire général de l’Yonne (1873), 235 (N^o. 504) ‘mandamus, quatenus illa festorum antiqua ludibria, quae in contemptum Dei, opprobrium cleri, et derisum populi non est dubium exerceri, videlicet, in festis Sancti Ioannis Evangelistae, Innocentium, et Circumcisionis Domini, iuxta pristinum modum nullatenus faciatis aut fieri permittatis, sed iuxta formam et cultum aliarum festivitatum quae per anni circulum celebrantur, ita volumus et praecipimus celebrari. Ita quod ipso facto sententiam suspensionis incurrat quicumque in mutatione habitus aut in sertis de floribus seu aliis dissolutionibus iuxta praedictum ritum reprobatum adeo in praedictis festivitatibus seu aliis a modo praesumpserit se habere.’

[1022] L. Deschamps de Pas, Les Cérémonies religieuses dans la Collégiale de Saint-Omer au xiii^e Siècle (Mém. de la Soc. de la Morinie, xx. 147). The directions for Jan. 1 are fragmentary: ‘In quo vicarii ceterique clerici chorum frequentantes et eorum episcopus se habeant in cantando et officiando sicut superius dictum est in festo Sanctorum Innocentium (cf. p. 370), hoc tamen excepto quod omnia quae ista die fiunt officiando quando est festum fatuorum pro posse fiunt et etiam ullulando ... domino decano fatuorum ferunt incensum sed prepostere ut dictum est.’ Ululatus is, however, sometimes a technical term in church music; cf. vol. ii. p. 7.

[1023] R. de Renard, xii. 469 (ed. Martin, vol. ii. 14):

‘Dan prestre, il est la feste as fox.

Si fera len demein des chox

Et grant departie a Baieus:

Ales i, si verres les jeus.’

Branch xii of the Roman is the composition of Richart de Lison, who, according to Martin, suppl. 72, wrote in Normandy †1200. The phrase ‘faire les choux’ = ‘get drunk,’ cabbages being regarded as prophylactic of the ill effects of liquor.

[1024] Hist. de l’Église d’Autun (1774), 469, 631 ‘Item innovamus, quod ille qui de caetero capiet baculum anni novi nihil penitus habebit de bursa Capituli’ (Registr. Capit. s. a. 1230).

[1025] Martene and Durand, Thesaurus Anecdotorum, iv. 1070 ‘in festo stultorum, scilicet Innocentium et anni novi ... multa fiunt inhonesta ... ne talia festa irrisoria de cetero facere praesumant.’

[1026] Ducange, s. v. abbas esclaffardorum, quoting Hist. Delphin. i. 132; J. J. A. Pilot de Thorey, Usages, Fêtes et Coutumes en Dauphiné, i. 182. The latter writer says that there was also an episcopus, who was not suppressed, that the canons did reverence to him, and that the singing of the Magnificat was part of the feast.

[1027] C. Hidé, Bull. de la Soc. acad. de Laon (1863), xiii. 115.

[1028] Grenier, 361 ‘Si hoc dicitur festum stultorum a subdiaconis fiat, et dominica eveniat, ab ipsis fiat festum in cappis sericis, sicut in libris festorum continetur.’ These libri possibly resembled those of Sens and Beauvais.

[1029] Summa Gulielmi Autissiodorensis de Off. Eccles. (quoted by Chérest, 44, from Bibl. Nat. MS. 1411) ‘Quaeritur quare in hac die fit festum stultorum.... Ante adventum Domini celebrabant festa quae vocabant Parentalia; et in illa die spem ponebant credentes quod si in illa die bene eis accideret, quod similiter in toto anno. Hoc festum voluit removere Ecclesia quod contra fidem est. Et quia extirpare omnino non potuit, festum illud permittit et celebrat illud festum celeberrimum ut aliud demittatur: et ideo in matutinali officio leguntur lectiones quae dehortantur ab huiusmodi quae sunt contra fidem (cf. p. 245). Et si ista die ab ecclesia quaedam fiunt praeter fidem, nulla tamen contra fidem. Et ideo ludos qui sunt contra fidem permutavit in ludos qui non sunt contra fidem.’ There is clearly a confusion here between the Roman Parentalia (Feb. 13-22) and Kalendae (Jan. 1). On William of Auxerre, whose work remains in MS., cf. Lebeuf, in P. Desmolets, Mémoires, iii. 339; Nouvelle Biographie universelle, s. n. He was bishop of Auxerre, translated to Paris in 1220, ob. 1223. He must be distinguished from another William of Auxerre, who was archdeacon of Beauvais (†1230), and wrote a comment on Petrus Lombardus, printed at Paris in 1500 (Gröber, Grundriss der röm. Philologie, ii. 1. 239).

[1030] Gulielmus Durandus, Rationale Div. Off. (Antwerp, 1614), vi. 15, de Circumcisione, ‘In quibusdam ecclesiis subdiaconi fortes et iuvenes faciunt hodie festum ad significandum quod in octava resurgentium, quae significatur per octavam diem, qua circumcisio fiebat, nulla erit debilis aetas, non senectus, non senium, non impotens pueritia ... &c.’ A reference to the heathen Kalends follows; cf. also vii. 42, de festis SS. Stephani, Ioannis Evang. et Innocentium, ‘... subdiaconi vero faciunt festum in quibusdam ecclesiis in festo circumcisionis, ut ibi dictum est: in aliis in Epiphania et etiam in aliis in octava Epiphaniae, quod vocant festum stultorum. Quia enim ordo ille antiquitus incertus erat, nam in canonibus antiquis (extra de aetate et qualitate) multis quandoque vocatur sacer et quandoque non, ideo subdiaconi certum ad festandum non habent diem, et eorum festum officio celebratur confuso.’ On Durandus cf. the translation of his work by C. Barthélemy (1854). He was born at Puymisson in the diocese of Béziers (1230), finished the Rationale (1284), became bishop of Mende (1285), and ob. (1296).

[1031] A. Lecoy de la Marche, La Chaire française au M. A. 368, citing Bibl. Nat. MSS. fr. 13314, f. 18; 16481, N^o. 93. The latter MS., which is analysed by Echard, Script. Ord. Predicatorum, i. 269, contains Dominican sermons delivered in Paris, 1272-3.

[1032] Chérest, 49 sqq., from Sens Chapter Accounts in Archives de l’Yonne, at Auxerre. The Compotus Camerarii begins in 1295-6. The Chapter Register is missing before 1662: some of Baluze’s extracts from it are in Bibl. Nat. Cod. Parisin. 1351.

[1033] Chérest, 55 ‘pro servitio faciendo die dicti festi quatenus tangit canonicos subdiaconos in ecclesia.’

[1034] Towards the end of this period the accounts are in French: ‘le précentre de la feste aux fols.’

[1035] Epistola de Reformatione Theologiae (Gerson, Opera Omnia, i. 121), from Bruges, 1st Jan. 1400 ‘ex sacrilegis paganorum idololatrarumque ritibus reliquiae,’ &c.; Solemnis oratio ex parte Universitatis Paris. in praesentia Regis Caroli Sexti (1405, Opera iv. 620; cf. French version in Bibl. Nat. anc. f. fr. 7275, described P. Paris, Manus. franç. de la Bibl. du Roi, vii. 266) ‘hic commendari potest bona Regis fides et vestrum omnium Dominorum variis modis religiosorum, ... in hoc quod iam dudum litteras dedistis contra abominabiles maledictiones et quasi idolatrias, quae in Francorum fiunt ecclesiis sub umbra Festi fatuorum. Fatui sunt ipsi, et perniciosi fatui, nec sustinendi, opus est executione’; Rememoratio quorumdam quae per Praelatum quemlibet pro parte sua nunc agenda viderentur (1407-8, Opera, ii. 109) ‘sciatur quomodo ritus ille impiissimus et insanus qui regnat per totam Franciam poterit evelli aut saltem temperari. De hoc scilicet quod ecclesiastici faciunt, vel in die Innocentium, vel in die Circumcisionis, vel in Epiphania Domini, vel in Carnisprivio per Ecclesias suas, ubi fit irrisio detestabilis Servitii Domini et Sacramentorum: ubi plura fiunt impudenter et execrabiliter quam fieri deberent, in tabernis vel prostibulis, vel apud Saracenos et Iudaeos; sciunt qui viderunt, quod non sufficit censura Ecclesiastica; quaeratur auxilium potestatis Regiae per edicta sua vehementer urgentia’; Quinque conclusiones super ludo stultorum communiter fieri solito (Opera iii. 309) ‘qui per Regnum Franciae in diversis fiunt Ecclesiis et Abbatiis monachorum et monialium ... hae enim insolentiae non dicerentur cocis in eorum culina absque dedecore aut reprehensione, quae ibi fiunt in Ecclesiis Sacrosanctis, in loco orationis, in praesentia Sancti Sacramenti Altaris, dum divinum cantatur servitium, toto populo Christiano spectante et interdum Iudaeis ... adhuc peius est dicere, festum hoc adeo approbatum esse sicut festum Conceptionis Virginis Mariae, quod paulo ante asseruit quidam in urbe Altissiodorensi secundum quod dicitur et narrari solet, &c.’

[1036] Council of Langres (1404) ‘prohibemus clericis ... ne intersint ... in ludis illis inhonestis quae solent fieri in aliquibus Ecclesiis in festo Fatuorum quod faciunt in festivitatibus Natalis Domini.’

[1037] Council of Nantes (1431), c. 13 (J. Maan, Sancta et Metrop. Eccl. Turonensis, ii. 101) ‘quia in talibus Ecclesiis Provinciae Turonensis inolevit et servatur usus, ... quod festis Nativitatis Domini, Sanctorum Stephani, Ioannis et Innocentium, nonnulli Papam, nonnulli Episcopum, alii Ducem vel Comitem aut Principem in suis Ecclesiis ex novitiis praecipuis faciunt et ordinant ... Et talia ... vulgari eloquio festum stultorum nuncupatur, quod de residuis Kalendis Ianuariis a multo tempore ortum fuisse credatur.’

[1038] Council of Basle, sessio xxi (June 9, 1435), can. xi (Mansi, xxix. 108) ‘Turpem etiam illum abusum in quibusdam frequentatum Ecclesiis, quo certis anni celebritatibus nonnullis cum mitra, baculo ac vestibus pontificalibus more episcoporum benedicunt, alii ut reges ac duces induti quod festum Fatuorum, vel Innocentum seu Puerorum in quibusdam regionibus nuncupatur, alii larvales et theatrales iocos, alii choreas et tripudia marium et mulierum facientes homines ad spectacula et cachinnationes movent, alii comessationes et convivia ibidem praeparant.’

[1039] Council of Bourges, July 7, 1438 (Ordonnances des Rois de France de la Troisième Race, xiii. 287) ‘Item. Acceptat Decretum de spectaculis in Ecclesia non faciendis, quod incipit: Turpem, &c.’

[1040] F. Aubert, Le Parlement de Paris, sa Compétence, ses Attributions, 1314-1422 (1890), 182; Hist. du Parlement de Paris, 1250-1515 (1894), i. 163.

[1041] Epistola et xiv. conclusiones facultatis theologiae Parisiensis ad ecclesiarum praelatos contra festum fatuorum in Octavis Nativitatis Domini vel prima Ianuarii in quibusdam Ecclesiis celebratum (H. Denifle, Chartularium Univ. Paris. iv. 652; P. L. ccvii. 1169). The document is too long and too scholastic to quote in full. The date is March 12, 144⁴⁄₅.

[1042] ‘Quis, quaeso, Christianorum sensatus non diceret malos illos sacerdotes et clericos, quos divini officii tempore videret larvatos, monstruosis vultibus, aut in vestibus mulierum, aut lenonum, vel histrionum choreas ducere in choro, cantilenas inhonestas cantare, offas pingues supra cornu altaris iuxta celebrantem missam comedere, ludum taxillorum ibidem exercere, thurificare de fumo fetido ex corio veterum sotularium, et per totam ecclesiam currere, saltare, turpitudinem suam non erubescere, ac deinde per villam et theatra in curribus et vehiculis sordidis duci ad infamia spectacula, pro risu astantium et concurrentium turpes gesticulationes sui corporis faciendo, et verba impudicissima ac scurrilia proferendo?’

[1043] ‘Concludimus, quod a vobis praelatis pendet continuatio vel abolitio huius pestiferi ritus; nam ipsos ecclesiasticos ita dementes esse et obstinatos in hac furia non est verisimile, quod si faciem praelati reperirent rigidam et nullatenus flexibilem a punitione cum assistentia inquisitorum fidei, et auxilio brachii saecularis, quam illico cederent aut frangerentur. Timerent namque carceres, timerent perdere beneficia, perdere famam et ab altaribus sacris repelli.’

[1044] T. Boutiot, Hist. de la Ville de Troyes (1870-80), ii. 264; iii. 19. A chapter decree of 1437 lays down that a vicar who has served as ‘archbishop’ and has subsequently left the cathedral and returned again, need not serve a second time. It was doubtless an expensive dignity.

[1045] Boutiot, op. cit. iii. 20; A. de Jubainville, Inventaire sommaire des Archives départementales de l’Aube, i. 244 (G. 1275); P. de Julleville, Les Com. 35, Rép. Com. 330; A. Vallet de Viriville, in Bibl. de l’École des Chartes, iii. 448. The letter of Jean Leguisé to Louis de Melun is printed in Annales archéologiques, iv. 209; Revue des Soc. Savantes (2nd series), vi. 94; Journal de Verdun, Oct. 1751, and partly by Rigollot, 153. It is dated only Jan. 23, but clearly refers to the events of 1444-5. The Ordonnance of Charles VII is in Martene and Durand, Thesaurus Novus Anecdotorum, i. 1804; H. Denifle, Chartularium Univ. Paris, iv. 657. Extracts are given by Ducange, s. v. Kalendae. The king speaks of the Troyes affair as leading to the Theological Faculty’s letter. It is permissible to conjecture that he was moved, no doubt by the abstract rights and wrongs of the case, but also by a rumour spread at Troyes that he had revoked the Pragmatic Sanction. For, as a matter of fact, Peter of Brescia, the papal legate, was trying hard to get him to revoke it.

[1046] Boutiot, op. cit. i. 494, iii. 20. The chapters of St. Stephen’s and St. Urban’s and the abbey of St. Loup all continued to make payments for their feasts after 1445. They may have been pruned of abuses. In the sixteenth century the Comte of Champagne pays five sous to the ‘archevesque des Saulx’ at St. Stephen’s, and this appears to be the droit charged upon the royal demesne up to 1789.

[1047] Chérest, 66, from Acta Capitularia (Dec. 4, 1444) in Bibl. Nat. Cod. Paris. 1014 and 1351 ‘De servitio dominicae circumcisionis, viso super hoc statuto per quemdam legatum edito, et consideratis aliis circa hoc considerandis, et ad evitandum scandala, quae super hoc possent exoriri, ordinatum fuit unanimiter et concorditer, nemine discrepante, quod de caetero dictum servitium fiet, prout iacet in libro ipsius servitii, devote et cum reverentia; absque aliqua derisione, tumultu aut turpitudine, prout fiunt alia servitia in aliis festis, in habitibus per dictum statutum ordinatis, et non alias, et voce modulosa, absque dissonantia, et assistant in huiusmodi servitio omnes qui tenentur in eo interesse, et faciant debitum suum absque discursu aut turbatione servitii, potissime in ecclesia; nec proiiciatur aqua in vesperis super praecentorem stultorum ultra quantitatem trium sitularum ad plus; nec adducantur nudi in crastino festi dominicae nativitatis, sine brachis verenda tegentibus, nec etiam adducantur in ecclesia, sed ducantur ad puteum claustri, non hora servitii sed alia, et ibi rigentur sola situla aquae sine lesione. Qui contrarium fecerit occurrit ipso facto suspensionis censuram per dictum statutum latam; attamen extra ecclesiam permissum est quod stulti faciant alias ceremonias sine damno aut iniuria cuiusquam.’ The proceedings on the day after the Nativity are probably explained by the election of the precentor on that day (after Vespers). The victims ducked may have failed to be present at the election; but cf. the Easter prisio (ch. vii).

[1048] Saint-Marthe, Gallia Christiana, xii. 96, partly quoted by Ducange, s. v. Kalendae. The bishop describes the feast almost in the ipsissima verba of the Paris Theologians, but in one passage (‘nudos homines sine verendorum tegmine inverecunde ducendo per villam et theatra in curribus et vehiculis sordidis, &c.’) he adds a trait from the Sens chapter act just quoted.

[1049] Chérest, 68. The councils of Sens in 1460 and 1485 (p. 300) are for the province. That of 1528 (sometimes called of Sens, but properly of Paris) is national. They are not evidence for the feast at Sens itself.

[1050] Ibid. 72 ‘Insolentias, tam de die quam de nocte, faciendo tondere barbam parte, ut fieri consuevit, in theatro ... ac ludere personagia, die scilicet circumcisionis Domini.’ The shaven face was characteristic of the mediaeval fool, minstrel, or actor (cf. ch. ii). Dreves, 586, adds that Tallinus Bissart, the precentor of this year, was threatened with excommunication.

[1051] Ibid. 75.

[1052] Ibid. 76 ‘prohibitum vicariis ne attentent, ultima die anni, in theatro tabulato ante valvas ecclesiae aut alibi in civitate Senonensi, publice barbam illius qui se praecentorem fatuorum nominat, aut alterius, radere, radifacere, permittere, aut procurare; et ne ad electionem dicti praecentoris die festo Sancti Iohannis Evangelistae sub poenis excommunicationis.’

[1053] Ibid. 77 ‘honeste, ac devote, sine laternis, sine precentore, sine delatione baculi domini precentoris, nec poterunt facere rasuram in theatro ante ecclesiam.’

[1054] Ibid. 78.

[1055] Dreves, 586.

[1056] Prov. C. of Rouen (1445), c. 11 (Labbé, xiii. 1304) ‘prohibet haec sancta synodus ludos qui fatuorum vulgariter nuncupantur cum larvatis faciebus et alias inhoneste fieri in ecclesiis aut cemeteriis’; Prov. C. of Sens (1485, repeats decrees of earlier council of 1460), c. 3 (Labbé, xiii. 1728), quoting and adopting Basle decree, with careful exception for consuetudines of Nativity and Resurrection; cf. ch. xx; Dioc. C. of Chartres (1526, apparently repeated 1550, tit. 16; cf. Du Tilliot, 62) quoted Bochellus, iv. 7. 46 ‘denique ab Ecclesia eiiciantur vestes fatuorum personas scenicas agentium’; Nat. C. of Paris (1528, held by Abp. of Sens as primate), Decr. Morum, c. 16 (Labbé, xiv. 471) ‘prohibemus ne fiat deinceps festum fatuorum aut innocentium, neque erigatur decanatus patellae.’ The Prov. C. of Rheims (1456, held at Soissons) in Labbé, xiii. 1397, mentions only ‘larvales et theatrales ioci,’ ‘choreae,’ ‘tripudia,’ but refers explicitly to the Pragmatic Sanction. This, it may be observed, was suspended for a while in 1461 and finally annulled in 1516. Still more general are the terms of the C. of Orleans (1525, repeated 1587; Du Tilliot, 61); C. of Narbonne (1551), c. 46 (Labbé, xv. 26); C. of Beauvais (1554; E. Fleury, Cinquante Ans de Laon, 53); C. of Cambrai (1565), vi. 11 (Labbé, xv. 160); C. of Rheims (1583), c. 5 (Labbé, xv. 889); C. of Tours (1583, quoted Bochellus, iv. 7. 40). See also the councils quoted as to the Boy Bishop, in ch. xv. Finally, the C. of Trent, although in its 22nd session (1562) it renewed the decrees of popes and councils ‘de choreis, aleis, lusibus’ (Decr. de Reformatione, c. 1), made no specific mention of ‘fatui’ (Can. et Decr. Sacros. Oec. Conc. Tridentini, (Romae, 1845), 127). Probably the range of the feast was by this time insignificant.

[1057] Cf. ch. xvi.

[1058] But there was another revel on Aug. 28. F. L. Chartier, L’ancien Chapitre de N.-D. de Paris, 175, quotes Archives Nationales, LL. 288, p. 219 ‘iniunctum est clericis matutinalibus, ne in festo S. Augustini faciant dissolutiones quas facere assueverant annis praeteritis.’

[1059] Dulaure, Hist. de Paris, iii. 81; Grenier, 370. A ‘cardinal’ was chosen on Jan. 13, and took part in the office.

[1060] Grenier, 362. A model account form has the heading ‘in die Circumcisionis, si fiat festum stultorum.’ The ‘rubriques du luminaire’ provide for a distribution of wax to the sub-deacons and choir-clerks.

[1061] Martonne, 49, giving no authority.

[1062] Grenier, 361; Dreves, 583; Rigollot, 15, quoting Actum Capit. Leave was given to John Cornet, of St. Michael’s, John de Nœux of St. Maurice’s, rectors, and Everard Duirech, capellanus of the cathedral, ‘pridem electi, instituti et assumpti in papatum stultorum villae Ambianensis ... quod dictus Cornet ... et sui praedecessores in ipso papatu ordinati superstites die circumcisionis Domini ... facerent prandium in quo beneficiati ipsius villae convocarentur ... ut inibi eligere instituere et ordinare valerent papam ac papatum relevarent absque tamen praeiudicio in aliquo tangendo servitium divinum ... faciendum.’ Apparently the parochial clergy of Amiens joined with the cathedral vicars and chaplains in the feast.

[1063] Grenier, 362; Rigollot, 15 ‘Servitium divinum facient honeste in choro ecclesiae solemne, absque faciendo insolentias aut aliquas irrisiones, nec deferendo aliquas campanas in dicta ecclesia, aut alibi, et si dicti vicarii facere voluerint aliqua convivia, erit eorum sumptibus et non sumptibus Dominorum canonicorum.’

[1064] Rigollot, 16 ‘inhibuerunt capellanis et vicariis ... facere recreationes solitas in pascha annotino, etiam facere electionem de Papa Stultorum.’ Later in the year the ‘iocalia Papae, videlicet annulus aureus, tassara (sic) argentea et sigillum’ were put in charge of the ‘canonicus vicarialis.’

[1065] Rigollot, 17 ‘licentiam dederunt ... ludere die dominica proxima brioris.’ Rigollot and Leber think that ‘brioris’ may be for ‘burarum,’ the feast of ‘buras’ or ‘brandons’ on the first Sunday in Lent. Can it be the same as the ‘fête des Braies’ of Laon?

[1066] Grenier, 414; Rigollot, 17.

[1067] L. Maziére, Noyon Religieux in Comptes-Rendus et Mémoires of the Comité arch. et hist. de Noyon (1895), xi. 92; Grenier, 370, 413; Rigollot, 28, quoting Actum Capit. of 1497 ‘cavere a cantu carminum infamium et scandalosorum, nec non similiter carminibus indecoris et impudicis verbis in ultimo festo Innocentium per eos fetide decantatis; et si vicarii cum rege vadant ad equitatum solito, nequaquam fiet chorea et tripudia ante magnum portale, saltem ita impudice ut fieri solet.’

[1068] Grenier, 365; Rigollot, 29, quoting, I think, a ceremonial (1350) of the collegiate church of Saint-Pierre-au-Parvis. The masquers obtained permission from some canons seated on a theatre near the house called Grosse-Tête.

[1069] Grenier, 365; Rigollot, 26; Dreves, 584, quoting cathedral Actum Capit. of 19 Dec. 1403, from Grenier’s MS. Picardie, 158. Five canons said ‘quod papa fieret in ecclesia, sed nulla elevatio, et quod, qui vellet venire, in habitu saeculari honesto veniret, et quod nulla dansio ibi fieret’; but the casting-vote of the dean was against them, ‘sed extra possent facere capellani et alii quidquid vellent.’

[1070] Grenier, 370; Rigollot, 22; E. Fleury, Cinquante Ans de Laon, 16; C. Hidé, in Bull. de la Soc. académique de Laon (1863), xiii. 111.

[1071] Hidé, op. cit. 116, thinks that the Patriarch used jetons de présence, similar to those used by the Boy Bishop at Amiens and elsewhere (ch. xv). He figures some, but they may belong to the period of the confrérie.

[1072] MS. Hist. of Dom. Bugniatre (eighteenth century) quoted Fleury, op. cit. 16. I do not feel sure that the term ‘fête des ânes’ was really used at Laon.

[1073] Julleville, Les Com. 36; Rép. Com. 348; L. Paris, Remensiana, 32, Le Théâtre à Reims, 30; Coquillart, Œuvres (Bibl. Elzév.), i. cxxxv. Coquillart is said to have written verses for the Basoche on this occasion.

[1074] Rigollot, 211, from A. Hugo, La France pittoresque, ii. 226, on the authority of a register of 1570 in the cathedral archives.

[1075] It begins ‘Cantemus ad honorem, gloriam et laudem Sancti Stephani.’

[1076] L. Deschamps de Pas, in Mém. de la Soc. des Antiq. de la Morinie, xx. 104, 107, 133; O. Bled, in Bull. Hist., de la même Soc. (1887), 62.

[1077] Deschamps de Pas, op. cit. 133 ‘solitum est fieri gaude in cena ob reverentiam ipsius sancti.’

[1078] Ibid. op. cit. 107. Grenier, 414, citing Sammarthanus, Gallia Christiana, x. 1510, calls Francis de Melun ‘bishop of Terouanne.’ An earlier reform of the feast seems implied by the undated Chapter Statute in Ducange, s. v. Episcopus Fatuorum ‘quia temporibus retroactis multi defectus et plura scandala, deordinationes et mala, occasione Episcopi Fatuorum et suorum evenerint, statuimus et ordinamus quod de caetero in festo Circumcisionis Domini Vicarii caeterique chorum frequentantes et eorum Episcopus se habeant honeste, cantando et officiando sicut continetur plenius in Ordinario Ecclesiae.’

[1079] De la Fons-Melicocq, Cérémonies dramatiques et Anciens Usages dans les Eglises du Nord de la France (1850), 4. In 1445 is a payment to the ‘évêque des fous de Saint-Aldegonde’ for a ‘jeu’; in 1474, one for the chapter’s share of ‘le feste du vesque des asnes, par dessus tout ce que ly cœurz paya.’

[1080] E. Hautcœur, Hist. de l’Église collégiale de Saint-Pierre de Lille (1896-9), ii. 30; Id. Cartulaire de l’Église, &c. ii. 630, 651 (Stat. Capit. of July 7, 1323, confirmed June 23, 1328); ‘item volumus festum folorum penitus anullari.’

[1081] Hautcœur, Hist. ii. 215; De la Fons-Melicocq, Archives hist. et litt. du Nord de France (3rd series), v. 374; Flammermont, Album paléographique du Nord de la France (1896), No. 45.

[1082] Ducange, s. v. Deposuit (Stat. Capit. S. Petri Insul. July 13, 1531, ex Reg. k.) ‘Scandala et ludibria quae sub Fatuitatis praetextu per beneficiatos et habituatos dictae nostrae ecclesiae a vigilia usque ad completas octavas Epiphaniae fieri et exerceri consueverunt ... deinceps nullus nominetur, assumatur et creetur praelatus follorum, nec ludus, quem Deposuit vocant, in dicta vigilia, aut alio quocumque tempore, ludatur, exerceatur, aut fiat.’ Probably to this date belongs the very similarly worded but undated memorandum in Delobel, Collectanea, f. 76, which Hautcœur, Hist. ii. 220, 224, assigns to 1490. This adds ‘de non ... faciendo officio ... per vicarios in octava Epiphaniae.’ The municipal duties of the praelatus fell to the confrérie of the Prince des Foux, afterwards Prince d’Amour, which held revels in 1547 (Du Tilliot, 87), and still later to the ‘fou de la ville’ who led the procession of the Holy Sacrament, and flung water at the people in the eighteenth century (Leber, ix. 265).

[1083] Rigollot, 14.

[1084] Two documents are preserved, each giving a full account of the event: (a) summons of the delinquents before the Parlement, dated March 16, 149⁸⁄₉ (J. F. Foppens, Supplément (1748), to A. Miraeus, Opera Diplomatica, iv. 295). This is endorsed with some notes of further proceedings; (b) official notes of the hearing on Nov. 18, 1499 (Bibl. de l’École des Chartes, iii. 568); cf. Julleville, Rép. com. 355; Cousin, Hist. de Tournay, Bk. iv. 261. The Synod of Tournai in 1520 still found it necessary to forbid students to appear in church ‘en habits de fous, en représentant des personnages de comédie’ on St. Nicholas’ day, Innocents’ day, or ‘la fête de l’évêque’ (E. Fleury, Cinquante Ans de Laon, 54).

[1085] Rigollot, 19, 157.

[1086] Cf. ch. xix.

[1087] Martene, iii. 41 ‘[at second Vespers] Cantor ... dicit ter Deposuit baculum tenens, et si baculus capitur, Te Deum Laudamus incipietur ... [at Compline] ascendunt duo clerici super formam thesaurarii et cantant Haec est sancta dies, &c. et post Conserva Deus, et dum canitur verberant eum clerici baculis, et ante eos cantores festi et erupitores.... Post incipit cantor novus Verbum caro factum est, et hoc cantando ducunt eum in domum suam per parietes cum baculis feriendo. Si autem baculus non accipitur, nihil de iis dicitur, sed vadunt, et extinguitur luminare.’

[1088] Cf. Appendix L.

[1089] Chérest, 9, 55, quoting Acta Capit. (1453) ‘item circa festum Innocentium ordinatum est quod in ecclesia nullae fient insolenciae seu derisiones potissime tempore divini servitii et quod pulsentur matutinae non ante quartam horam. Permittimus tamen quod reverenter et in habitu ecclesiastico per Innocentes et alios iuvenes de sedibus inferioribus dictum fiat officium, saltem circa ea quae sine sacris ordinibus possunt exerceri’; (1510) ‘item turpem illum abusum festi fatuorum in nostra hactenus ecclesia, proh dolor, frequentatum quo in celebritate sanctorum Innocentium quidam sub nomine patriarchali divinum celebrant officium, penitus detestamus, abolemus et interdicimus.’

[1090] Lebeuf, Mém. concernant l’Histoire ... d’Auxerre (ed. Challe et Quantin, 1848-55), ii. 30; iv. 232 (quoting Acta Capit. partly extracted by Ducange, s.v. Kalendae); and in Leber, ix. 358, 375, 385.

[1091] ‘Cum domini nostri rex et alii regales Franciae sint valde dolorosi, propter nova armaturae factae in partibus Ungariae contra Saracenos et inimicos fidei’; cf. Bury-Gibbon, vii. 35.

[1092] ‘Ordinavit quod de caetero omnes, qui de festo fatuorum fuerint, non pulsent campanam capituli sui post prandium, dempta prima die in qua suum episcopum eligent, et etiam quod in suis sermonibus fatuis non ponant seu dicant aliqua opprobria in vituperium alicuius personae.’

[1093] Lebeuf, Hist. d’Auxerre, ii. 30.

[1094] I suppose the intended action took shape in the Quinque Conclusiones of Gerson (p. 292), in which he quotes the dictum of an Auxerre preacher that the feast of Fools was as approbatum as that of the Conception. To this there seems to be a reference in the account of the Abbot of Pontigny’s sermon in the Acta Capit. ‘praedicavit ... quod dictum festum non erat, nec unquam fuerat a Deo nec Ecclesia approbandum seu approbatum.’ Lebeuf, in Leber, ix. 385, points out that Gerson was intimate with one member of the Auxerre chapter. This was Nicolas de Clamengis, whose Opera, 151 (ed. Lydius, 1613), include a treatise De novis celebritatibus non instituendis, in which the suppression of feasts in his diocese by Michael of Auxerre is alluded to.

[1095] These were canons of inferior rank at Auxerre (Ducange, s. v. tortarius).

[1096] Canons J. Boileaue, Devisco, Pavionis, Viandi and H. Desnoes. Was Viandi the canon John Vivien who, according to Lebeuf, Hist. d’Auxerre, iv. 234, noted on his Breviary (now Bibl. Nat. Cod. Colbert. 4227) that at first Vespers on the Circumcision, Hodie Christus was sung after each Psalm, ‘quia Festum Circumcisionis vocatur in diversis ecclesiis festum Fatuorum’?

[1097] Chérest, 76; Julleville, Les Com. 234; Lebeuf, in Leber, ix. 358, 373, quoting a Cry pour l’abbé de l’église d’Ausserre et ses supposts, from the Œuvres of Roger de Collerye (1536). This resembles the productions of the confréries des fous (cf. ch. xvi) and begins,

‘Sortez, saillez, venez de toutes parts,

Sottes et sots plus prompts que liépars.’

[1098] Dunot de Charnage, Hist. de Besançon, i. 227; Rigollot, 47; Leber, ix. 434; x. 40.

[1099] The anonymous author of the Histoire de l’Église d’Autun (1774), 462, 628, gives probata from the Acta Capitularia for some, but not all of his statements. Du Tilliot, 24 and possibly Ducange, s. v. Festum Asinorum appear also to have seen at least one register kept by the rotarius which covered the period 1411 to 1416.

[1100] ‘Deliberaverunt super festo folorum quod fieri consuevit anno quolibet in festo Circumcisionis Domini, ad resecandum superfluitates et derisiones quae fieri consueverunt ... item quod amodo non adducatur asinus ad processionem dictae diei, ut fuit solitum fieri, nec dicatur cantilena quae dici solebat super dictum asinum, et supra officio quod fieri consuetum est dicta die in Ecclesia dicti Domini postea providebunt.’ Ducange says that the ass had a golden foot-cloth of which four of the principal canons held the corners. On the cantilena cf. Appendix L.

[1101] ‘Ordinaverunt quod festum folorum penitus cesset.’

[1102] ‘Concluserunt ad requestum stultorum quod hoc anno fiat festum folorum ... cum solemnitatibus in dicto festo requisitis in libris dicti festi descriptis ... qui defecerit in matutinis et aliis horis statutis comburatur in fonte.’

[1103] ‘In fine Matutinarum nonnulli larvati alii inordinate vestiti choreas, tripudia et saltus in eadem ecclesia faciunt ... [aliquos] ad fontem deferunt et ibi aqua intinguntur.’

[1104] Cf. ch. xix. A representation of the ‘Flight into Egypt’ might well come into a play of Herod. The Hist. d’Autun, 462, says that, before the reform of 1411, the ass appeared as Balaam’s ass in connexion with a Prophetae on a stage at the church door. There was a procession to church, and the Prose. The rex received a cheese from the chapter.

[1105] Cf. ch. xv.

[1106] ‘Regna Herodis et Episcopatus Innocentium, seu fatuorum festa hactenus ... fieri solita ... abolentes.’

[1107] ‘Quod vulgo dicitur Les Gaigizons ... amplius neminem balneare aut ... pignus aufferre.’ It is here only the choice of ‘bishop’ and ‘dean’ of Innocents, ‘quod festum fatuorum a nonnullis nuncupatur’ that is forbidden. Apparently ‘Herod’ had died out.

[1108] Du Tilliot, 100; Petit de Julleville, Les Com. 194. Amongst Du Tilliot’s woodcuts is one of a bâton (No. 4) bearing this date 1482. It represents a nest of fools.

[1109] Ibid. 21.

[1110] Ibid. 74 ‘Icelle cour a ordonné et ordonne, que defenses seront faites aux Choriaux et habitués de ladite Église Saint-Vincent et de toutes autres Églises de son Ressort, et dorésnavant le jour de la Fête des Innocens, et autres jours faire aucunes insolences et tumultes esdites Églises, vacquer en icelles, et courir parmi les villes avec danses et habits indécens à leur état ecclésiastique.’

[1111] Pilot de Thorey, i. 177.

[1112] Pilot de Thorey, i. 178 (Statuta, c. 40) ‘Item statuimus et ordinamus, quod ex nunc cessent abusus qui fieri consueverunt per abbatem vulgariter vocatum stultorum seu sociorum ... Item statuimus et ordinamus, cum in ecclesia Dei non deceat fieri ludibria vel inhonesta committi, quod, in festis Sanctorum Stephani, Iohannis evangelistae, Innocentium et Epiphaniae, domino de cetero officiatur et desserviatur in divinis, prout in aliis diebus infra fieri statuetur, et quod nullus, de cetero, ut quandoque factum fuisse audivimus, portetur in Rost, et quod, de nulla persona ecclesiastica vel seculari cuiuscumque status existat, inhonesti vel diffamatorii rithmi recitentur, et quod nullus pignoret aut aliena rapiat quovisimodo.’ A Vienne writer, in Leber, ix. 259, adds that the performance of the office on the three post-Nativity feasts by deacons, priests, and choir in the high stalls was continued by these Statutes, but suppressed about 1670.

[1113] Lancelot, in Hist. de l’Académie des Inscriptions (ed. 4to), vii. 255, (ed. 12mo), iv. 397; Ducange, s. v. Kalendae; Du Tilliot, 46.

[1114] ‘... Te Deum, et tunc per consocios subtollitur, et elevatur, ac super humeros ad domum, ubi caeteri pro potu sunt congregati, laetanter deportatur, atque in loco ad hoc specialiter ornato et praeparato ponitur, statuitur et collocatur. Ad eius introitum omnes debent assurgere, etiam dominus Episcopus, si fuerit praesens, ac impensa reverentia consueta per consodales et consocios electo, fructus species et vinum cum credentia ei dentur, &c. Sumpto autem potu idem Abbas vel maior succentor ex eius officio absente Abbate incipit cantando ea quae secuntur; ab ista enim parte sclafardi, clericuli ceterique de suptus chorum debent esse simulque canere, ceteri vero desuper chorum ab alia parte simul debent respondere.... Sed dum eorum cantus saepius et frequentius per partes continuando cantatu tanto amplius ascendendo elevatur in tantum quod una pars cantando, clamando, è fort cridar, vincit aliam. Tunc enim inter se ad invicem clamando, sibilando, ululando, cachinnando, deridendo ac cum manibus demonstrando, pars victrix quantum potest partem adversam deridere conatur ac superare, iocosasque trufas sine taedio breviter inferre.

A parte Abbatis. Heros.

Alter chorus. Et nolic. nolierno.

A parte Abbatis. Ad fons sancti bacon.

Alii. Kyrie Eleison.

Quo finito illico gachia ex eius officio facit praeconizationem sic dicendo: De par Mossenhor Labat è sos Cosselliers vos fam assaber que tot homs lo sequa, lay on voura anar, ea quo sus la pena de talhar lo braye. Tunc Abbas aliique domum exeunt impetum facientes. Iuniores canonici chorarii scutiferique domini Episcopi et canonicorum Abbatem comitantur per urbem, cui transeunti salutem omnes impertiunt. In istis vero visitationibus (quae usque ad vigiliam Natalis Domini quotidie vespere fiunt) Abbas debet semper deportare habitum, sive fuerit manta, sive tabardum, sive cappa una cum capputio de variis folrato.’ It is curious how the characteristic meridional love of sheer noise and of gesture comes out.

[1115] De indulgentiis dandis:

[St. Stephen’s Day]

De par Mossenhor l’Evesque,

Que Dieus vos donne gran mal al bescle,

Avec una plena balasta de pardos

E dos das de raycha de sot lo mento.

[St. John’s Day]

Mossenhor ques ayssi presenz

Vos dona xx balastas de mal de dens,

Et à vos autras donas atressi

Dona 1^a coa de rossi.

[1116] ‘Deinde electus per sclafardos subtollitur et campanilla precedente portatur ad domum episcopalem, ad cuius adventum ianuae domus, absente vel praesente ipso domino Episcopo, debent totaliter aperiri, ac in una de fenestris magni tinelli debet deponi, et stans dat ibi iterum benedictionem versus villam.’

[1117] Ducange, s. v. Kalendae; Bérenger-Féraud, iv. 14.

[1118] Papon, Hist. de Provence (1784), iv. 212.

[1119] Rigollot, 125.

[1120] Bérenger-Féraud, iv. 131, quoting Mireur, Bull. hist. et philos. du Comité des Travaux hist. (1885), N^os. 3, 4.

[1121] Rigollot, 171; Fauris de Saint-Vincent, in Magasin encyclopédique (1814), i. 24. A chapter inventory mentions a ‘mitra episcopi fatuorum.’ The Council of Aix in 1585 (Labbé, xv. 1146) ordered the suppression of ‘ludibria omnia et puériles ac theatrales lusus’ on Innocent’s day.

[1122] Thiers, Traité des Jeux et des Divertissements, 449; Du Tilliot, 33, 39, quoting [Mathurin de Neuré] Querela ad Gassendum, de parum Christianis Provincialium suorum ritibus ... &c. (1645) ‘Choro cedunt omnes Therapeutae Sacerdotes, et ipse Archimandrita; in quorum omnium locos sufficiuntur Coenobii mediastini viles, quorum aliis manticae explendae cura est, aliis culina, aliis hortus colendus: Fratres Laicos vocant, qui tunc occupatis hinc et inde Initiatorum ac Mystarum sedibus, ... Sacerdotalibus nempe induuntur vestibus, sed laceris, si quae suppetant, ac praepostere aptatis, inversisque; inversos etiam tenent libros in quibus se fingunt legere, appensis ad nasum perspicillis, quibus detractum vitrum, eiusque loco mali aurati putamen insertum.... Thuricremi Sanniones in cuiusque faciem cineres exsufflarunt, et favillas ex acerris, quas per ludibrium temere iactantes, stolidis quandoque capitibus affundunt; sic autem instructi non hymnos, non Psalmos, non liturgias de more concinunt, sed confusa ac inarticula verba demurmurant, insanasque prorsus vociferationes derudunt.’ The same M. de Neuré (whose real name was Laurent Mesme) says more generally that in many towns of the province on Innocents’ day, ‘Stolidorum se Divorum celebrare festa putant, quibus stolide litandum sit, nec aliis quam stolidis illius diei sacra ceremoniis peragenda.’ He quotes (p. 72) from a Rituale a direction for the singing of the Magnificat to the tune ‘Que ne vous requinquez-vous, vielle? Que ne vous requinquez-vous donc?’

[1123] Bérenger-Féraud, iv. 17.

[1124] C. of Toledo, N^o. 38, in 1582 (Aguirre, Coll. Conc. Hisp. vi. 12); C. of Oriolana, in 1600 (Aguirre, vi. 452): cf. pp. 162, 350.

[1125] Pearson, ii. 285; C. M. Engelhardt, H. von Landsberg (1818), 104; C. Schmidt, H. von Landsberg, 40. Herrad was abbess of Hohenburg, near Strasburg, 1167-95. The MS. of her Hortus Deliciarum was destroyed at Strasburg in 1870, but Engelhardt, and from him Pearson, translated the bit about the Epiphany feasts: cf. ch. xx.

[1126] Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xx. 22 (from the Gradual, Cod. Monacens. 157, f. 231^vo); after quoting a decree against cantiones of the C. of Lyons in 1274; ‘ne igitur propter scholarium episcopum, cum quo in multis ecclesiis a iuniore clero ad specialem laudem et devotionem natalis Domini solet tripudiari, saecularia parliamenta nec non strepitus clamorque et cachitus mundanarum cantionum in nostro choro invalescant ... ego Iohannes, cognomine de Perchausen, Decanus ecclesiae Mosburgensis, antequam in decanum essem assumptus ... infra scriptas cantiones, olim ab antiquis etiam in maioribus ecclesiis cum scholarium episcopo decantatas, paucis modernis, etiam aliquibus propriis, quas olim, cum rector fuissem scholarium, pro laude nativitatis Domini et beatae Virginis composui, adiunctis, coepi in unum colligere et praesenti libro adnectere pro speciali reverentia infantiae Salvatoris, ut sibi tempore suae nativitatis his cantionibus a novellis clericulis quasi ex ore infantium et lactentium laus et hymnizans devotio postposita vulgarium lascivia possit tam decenter quam reverenter exhiberi.’

[1127] The following may all be for Jan. 1, and I do not think that there was a scholarium episcopus on any other day at Mosburg: Gregis pastor Tityrus (Dreves, op. cit. 110), Ecce novus annus est (Dreves, 131, headed in MS. ‘ad novum annum’), Nostri festi gaudium (Dreves, 131, ‘in circumcisione Domini’), Castis psallamus mentibus (Dreves, 135, 251, ‘cum episcopus eligitur’), Mos florentis venustatis (Dreves, 135 ‘dum itur extra ecclesiam ad choream’), Anni novi novitas (Dreves, 136 ‘cum infulatus et vestitus praesul inthronizatur’). Some other New Year cantiones found elsewhere by Dreves (pp. 130, 131) have no special reference to the feast.

[1128] Dreves, op. cit. 136 (beginning anni novi novitas), 250, with musical notation.

[1129] Dreves, op. cit. 110, 254, with notation.

[1130] Wetzer und Welte, Kirchenlexicon, s. v. Epiphany, quoting Crombach, Hist. Trium Regum (1654), 752; Galenius, de admir. Coloniae (1645), 661. The date of the Ritual is not given, but the ceremony had disappeared by 1645.

[1131] ‘Admiscent autem natalitias cantiones, non sine gestientis animi voluptate.’

[1132] Tractatus de precatione Dei, i. 302 (†1406-15), in F. Palacký, Documenta Mag. Ioannis Hus vitam illustrantia (1869), 722: ‘Quantam autem quamque manifestam licentiam in ecclesia committant, larvas induentes—sicut ipse quoque adolescens proh dolor larva fui—quis Pragae describat? Namque clericum monstrosis vestibus indutum facientes episcopum, imponunt asinae, facie ad caudam conversa, in ecclesiam eum ad missam ducunt, praeferentes lancem iusculi et cantharum vel amphoram cerevisiae; atque dum haec praetendunt, ille cibum potionemque in ecclesia capit. Vidi quoque eum aras suffientem et pedem sursum tollentem audivique magna voce clamantem: bú! Clerici autem magnas faces cereorum loco ei praeferebant, singulas aras obeunti et suffienti. Deinde vidi clericos cucullos pellicios aversa parte induentes et in ecclesia tripudiantes. Spectatores autem rident atque haec omnia religiosa et iusta esse putant; opinantur enim, hos esse in eorum rubricis, id est institutis. Praeclarum vero institutum: pravitas, foeditas!—Atque quum tenera aetate et mente essem, ipse quoque talium nugarum socius eram; sed ut primum dei auxilio adiutus sacras literas intelligere coepi, statim hanc rubricam, id est institutum huius insaniae, ex stultitia mea delevi. Ac sanctae memoriae dominus Ioannes archiepiscopus, is quidem excommunicationis poena proposita hanc licentiam ludosque fieri vetuit, idque summo iure, &c.’

[1133] The quotation given above is a translation by J. Kvíčala from the Bohemian of Huss. There seems to be a confusion between the ‘bishop’ and his steed. It was probably the latter who lifted up his leg and cried bú.

[1134] Grosseteste, Epistolae (ed. Luard, R. S.), 118 ‘vobis mandamus in virtute obedientiae firmiter iniungentes, quatenus festum stultorum cum sit vanitate plenum et voluptatibus spurcum, Deo odibile et daemonibus amabile, ne de caetero in ecclesia Lincolniensi die venerandae circumcisionis Domini nullatenus permittatis fieri.’

[1135] Ibid. op. cit. 161 ‘execrabilem etiam consuetudinem, quae consuevit in quibusdam ecclesiis observari de faciendo festo stultorum, speciali authoritate rescripti apostolici penitus inhibemus; ne de domo orationis fiat domus ludibrii, et acerbitas circumcisionis Domini Iesu Christi iocis et voluptatibus subsannetur.’ The ‘rescript’ will be Innocent III’s decretal of 1207, just republished in Gregory IX’s Decretales of 1234; cf. p. 279.

[1136] Lincoln Statutes, ii. 247 ‘quia in eadem visitacione nostra coram nobis a nonnullis fide dignis delatum extitit quod vicarii et clerici ipsius ecclesiae in die Circumcisionis Domini induti veste laicali per eorum strepitus truffas garulaciones et ludos, quos festa stultorum communiter et convenienter appellant, divinum officium multipliciter et consuete impediunt, tenore presencium. Inhibemus ne ipsi vicarii qui nunc sunt, vel erunt pro tempore, talibus uti de caetero non praesumant nec idem vicarii seu quivis alii ecclesiae ministri publicas potaciones aut insolencias alias in ecclesia, quae domus oracionis existit, contra honestatem eiusdem faciant quouismodo.’ Mr. Leach, in Furnivall Miscellany, 222, notes ‘a sarcastic vicar has written in the margin, “Harrow barrow. Here goes the Feast of Fools (hic subducitur festum stultorum).”’

[1137] What was ly ffolcfeste of which Canon John Marchall complained in Bishop Alnwick’s visitation of 1437 that he was called upon to bear the expense? Cf. Lincoln Statutes, ii. 388 ‘item dicit quod subtrahuntur ab ipso expensae per eum factae pascendo ly ffolcfeste in ultimo Natali, quod non erat in propria, nec in cursu, sed tamen rogatus fecit cum promisso sibi facto de effusione expensarum et non est sibi satisfactum.’

[1138] Statutes of Thos. abp. of York (1391) in Monasticon, vi. 1310 ‘in die etiam Circumcisionis Domini subdiaconis et clericis de secunda forma de victualibus annis singulis, secundum morem et consuetudinem ecclesiae ab antiquo usitatos, debite ministrabit [praepositus], antiqua consuetudine immo verius corruptela regis stultorum infra ecclesiam et extra hactenus usitata sublata penitus et extirpata.’

[1139] Inventory of St. Paul’s (1245) in Archaeologia, l. 472, 480 ‘Baculus stultorum est de ebore et sine cambuca, cum pomello de ebore subtus indentatus ebore et cornu: ... capa et mantella puerorum ad festum Innocentum et Stultorum sunt xxviij debiles et contritae.’

[1140] Sarum Inventory of 1222 in W. H. R. Jones, Vetus Registr. Sarisb. (R. S.), ii. 135 ‘Item baculi ii ad “Festum Folorum.”’

[1141] N^o. 27 in the list given for ch. x. Father Christmas says ‘Here comes in “The Feast of Fools.”’

[1142] Cf. the further account of these post-Nativity feasts in ch. xv.

[1143] The C. of Paris in 1212 (p. 279) forbids the Feast of Fools in religious houses. But that in the Franciscan convent at Antibes is the only actual instance I have come across.

[1144] There were canonici presbiteri, diaconi, subdiaconi and even pueri at Salisbury (W. H. Frere, Use of Sarum, i. 51).

[1145] On the nature and growth of vicars choral, cf. Cutts, 341; W. H. Frere, Use of Sarum, i. xvii; Lincoln Statutes, passim; A. R. Maddison, Vicars Choral of Lincoln (1878); H. E. Reynolds, Wells Cathedral, xxix, cvii, clxx. Vicars choral make their appearance in the eleventh century as choir substitutes for non-resident canons. At Lincoln they got benefactions from about 1190, and in the thirteenth century formed a regularly organized communitas. The vicarii were often at the same time capellani or chantry-priests. On chantries see Cutts, 438.

[1146] The Lincoln vicars chose two Provosts yearly (Maddison, op. cit.); the Wells vicars two Principals (Reynolds, op. cit. clxxi).

[1147] Reynolds, op. cit., gives numerous and interesting notices of chapter discipline from the Wells Liber Ruber.

[1148] In Leber, ix. 379, 407, is described a curious way of raising funds for choir suppers, known at Auxerre and in Auvergne, and not quite extinct in the eighteenth century. It has a certain analogy to the Deposuit. From Christmas to Epiphany the Psalm Memento was sung at Vespers, and the anthem De fructu ventris inserted in it. When this began the ruler of the choir advanced and presented a bouquet to some canon or bourgeois as a sign that the choir would sup with him. This was called ‘annonce en forme d’antienne,’ and the suppers defructus. The C. of Narbonne (1551), c. 47, forbade ‘parochis ... ne ... ad commessationes quas defructus appellant, ullo modo parochianos suos admittant, nec permittant quempiam canere ut dicunt: Memento, Domine, David sans truffe, &c. Nec alia huiusmodi ridenda, quae in contemptum divini officii ac in dedecus et probrum totius cleri et fiunt et cantantur.’

[1149] When, however, Ducange says that the feast was not called Subdiaconorum, because the sub-deacons held it, but rather as being ‘ebriorum Clericorum seu Diaconorum: id enim evincit vox Soudiacres, id est, ad litteram, Saturi Diaconi, quasi Diacres Saouls,’ we must take it for a ‘sole joke of Thucydides.’ I believe there is also a joke somewhere in Liddell and Scott.

[1150] Cf. p. 60; Gautier, Les Tropaires, i. 186; and C. of Treves in 1227 (J. F. Schannat, Conc. Germ. iii. 532) ‘praecipimus ut omnes Sacerdotes non permittant trutannos et alios vagos scolares aut goliardos cantare versus super Sanctus et Agnus Dei.’

[1151] The ‘abbot’ appears to have been sometimes charged with choir discipline throughout the year, and at Vienne and Viviers exists side by side with another dominus festi. Similarly at St. Omer there was a ‘dean’ as well as a ‘bishop.’ The vicars of Lincoln and Wells also chose two officers.

[1152] I suppose that ‘portetur in rost’ at Vienne means that the victims were roasted like the fags in Tom Brown.

[1153] Ducange, s. v. Kalendae.

[1154] Gibbon-Bury, v. 201. The Byzantine authorities are Genesius, iv. p. 49 B (Corp. Hist. Byz. xi. 2. 102); Paphlagon (Migne, P. G. cv. 527); Theophanes Continuatus, iv. 38 (Corp. Hist. Byz. xxii. 200); Symeon Magister, p. 437 D (Corp. Hist. Byz. xxii. 661), on all of whom see Bury, App. I to tom. cit.

[1155] C. of Constantinople (869-70), c. 16 (Mansi, xvi. 169, ex versione Latina, abest in Graeca) ‘fuisse quosdam laicos, qui secundum diversam imperatoriam dignitatem videbantur capillorum comam circumplexam involvere atque reponere, et gradum quasi sacerdotalem per quaedam inducia et vestimenta sacerdotalia sumere, et, ut putabatur, episcopos constituere, superhumeralibus, id est, palliis, circumamictos, et omnem aliam Pontificalem indutos stolam, qui etiam proprium patriarcham adscribentes eum qui in adinventionibus risum moventibus praelatus et princeps erat, et insultabant et illudebant quibusque divinis, modo quidem electiones, promotiones et consecrationes, modo autem acute calumnias, damnationes et depositiones episcoporum quasi ab invicem et per invicem miserabiliter et praevaricatorie agentes et patientes. Talis autem actio nec apud gentes a saeculo unquam audita est.’

[1156] Cedrenus, Historiarum Compendium, p. 639 B (ed. Bekker, in Corp. Hist. Byz. xxiv. 2. 333), follows verbatim the still unprinted eleventh-century John Scylitzes (Gibbon-Bury, v. 508). Theophylactus was Patriarch from 933 to 956.

[1157] Theodorus Balsamon, In Can. lxii Conc. in Trullo (P. G. cxxxvii. 727) Σημείωσαι τὸν παρόντα κανόνα, καὶ ζήτησον διόρθωσιν ἐπὶ τοῖς γινομένοις παρὰ τῶν κληρικῶν εἰς τήν ἑορτὴν ἐπὶ τῆς γεννήσεως τοῦ Χριστοῦ, καὶ τὴν ἑορτὴν τῶν Φώτων [Luminarium, Candlemas] ὑπεναντίως τούτῳ· καὶ μᾶλλον εἰς τὴν ἁγιωτάτην Μεγάλην ἐκκλησίαν ... ἀλλὰ καί τινες κληρικοὶ κατά τινας ἑορτὰς πρὸς διάφορα μετασχηματίζονται προσωπεῖα. καὶ ποτὲ μὲν ξιφήρεις ἐν τῷ μεσονάω τῆς ἐκκλησίας μετὰ στρατιωτικῶν ἀμφίων εἰσέρχονται, ποτὲ δὲ καὶ ὡς μοναχοὶ προοδεύουσιν, ἢ καὶ ὡς ζῶα τετράποδα. ἐρωτήσας οὖν ὅπως ταῦτα παρεχωρήθησαν γίνεσθαι, οὐδέν τε ἕτερον ἤκουσα ἀλλ’ ἢ ἐκ μακρᾶς συνθείας ταῦτα τελεῖσθαι. τοιαῦτά εἰσιν, ὡς ἐμοὶ δοκεῖ, καὶ τὰ παρά τινων δομεστικευόντων ἐν κλήρῳ γινόμενα, τὸν ἀέρα τοῖς δακτύλοις κατὰ ἡνιόχους τυπτόντων, καὶ φύκη ταῖς γνάθοις δῆθεν περιτιθεμένων καὶ ὑπορρινομένων ἔργα τινὰ γυναικεῖα, καὶ ἕτερα ἀπρεπῆ, ἵνα πρὸς γελωτα τοὺς βλέποντας μετακινήσωσι. τὸ δὲ γελᾶν τοὺς ἀγρότας ἐγχεομένους τοῦ οἴνου τοῖς πίθοις, ὡσεί τι παρεπόμενον ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἐστὶ τοῖς ληνοβατοισιν· εἰ μήτις εἴπη τὴν σατανικὴν ταύτην ἐργασίαν καταργεῖσθαι διὰ τοῦ λέγειν τοὺς ἀγρότας συχνότερον ἐφ’ ἑκάστῳ μέτρῳ σχεδὸν τό, Κύριε ἐλέησον. τὰ μέντοι ποτὲ γινόμενα ἀπρεπῆ παρὰ τῶν νοταρίων παιδοδιδασκάλων κατὰ τὴν ἑορτὴν τῶν ἁγίων νοταρίων, μετὰ προσωπείων σκηνικῶν διερχομένων τὴν ἀγοράν, πρὸ χρόνων τινῶν κατηργήθησαν, καθ’ ὁρισμὸν τοῦ ἁγιωτάτου ἐκείνου πατριάρχου κυρίου Λουκᾶ.

[1158] Belethus, c. 120, compares the ecclesiastical ball-play at Easter to the libertas Decembrica. He is not speaking here of the Feast of Fools.

[1159] e.g. Du Tilliot, 2.

[1160] S. R. Maitland, The Dark Ages, 141, tilts at the Protestant historian Robertson’s History of Charles V, as do F. Clément, 159, and A. Walter, Das Eselsfest in Caecilien-Kalender (1885), 75, at Dulaure, Hist. des Environs de Paris, iii. 509, and other ‘Voltairiens.’

[1161] Chérest, 81.

[1162] J. Bujeaud, Chants et Chansons populaires des Provinces de l’Ouest, i. 63. The ronde is known in Poitou, Aunis, Angoumois. P. Tarbé, Romancero de Champagne (2^e partie), 257, gives a variant. Bujeaud, i. 61, gives another ronde, the Testament de l’Âne, in which the ass has fallen into a ditch, and amongst other legacies leaves his tail to the curé for an aspersoir. This is known in Poitou, Angoumois, Franche-Comté. He also says that he has heard children of Poitou and Angoumois go through a mock catechism, giving an ecclesiastical significance to each part of the ass. The tail is the goupillon, and so forth. Fournier-Verneuil, Paris, Tableau moral et philosophique (1826), 522, with the Beauvais Officium in his mind, says ‘Voulez-vous qu’au lieu de dire, Ite, missa est, le prêtre se mette à braire trois fois de toute sa force, et que le peuple réponde en chœur, comme je l’ai vu faire en 1788, dans l’église de Bellaigues, en Périgord?’

[1163] Cf. ch. xx. Gasté, 20, considers the Rouen Festum Asinorum ‘l’origine de toutes les Fêtes de l’Âne qui se célébraient dans d’autres diocèses’: but the Rouen MS. in which it occurs is only of the fourteenth century, and the Balaam episode does not occur at all in the more primitive forms of the Prophetae, while the Sens Feast of Fools is called the festa asinaria in the Officium of the early thirteenth century.

[1164] Tille, D. W. 31. In Madrid an ass was led in procession on Jan. 17, with anthems on the Balaam legend (Clément, 181).

[1165] Clément, 182; Didron, Annales archéologiques, xv. 384.

[1166] Dulaure, Hist. des Environs de Paris, iii. 509, quotes a legend to the effect that the very ass ridden by Christ came ultimately to Verona, died there, was buried in a wooden effigy at S^ta-Maria in Organo, and honoured by a yearly procession. He guesses at this as the origin of the Beauvais and other fêtes. Didron, Annales arch. xv. 377, xvi. 33, found that nothing was known of this legend at Verona, though such a statue group as is described above apparently existed in the church named. Dulaure gives as his authorities F. M. Misson, Nouveau Voyage d’ Italie (1731), i. 164; Dict. de l’ Italie, i. 56. Misson’s visit to Verona was in 1687, although the passage was not printed in the first edition (1691) of his book. It is in the English translation of 1714 (i. 198). His authority was a French merchant (M. Montel) living in Verona, who had often seen the procession. In Cenni intorno all’ origine e descrizione della Festa che annualmente si celebra in Verona l’ ultimo Venerdì del Carnovale, comunamente denominata Gnoccolare (1818), 75, is a mention of the ‘asinello del vecchio padre Sileno’ which served as a mount for the ‘Capo de’ Maccheroni.’ This is probably Misson’s procession, but there is no mention of the legend in any of the eighteenth-century accounts quoted in the pamphlet. Rienzi was likened to an ‘Abbate Asinino’ (Gibbon, vii. 269).

[1167] Ducange, s. v. Festum Asinorum; cf. Leber, ix. 270; Molanus, de Hist. SS. Imaginum et Picturarum (1594), iv. 18.

[1168] T. Naogeorgus (Kirchmeyer), The Popish Kingdom, iv. 443 (1553, transl. Barnabe Googe, 1570, in New Shakspere Society edition of Stubbes, Anatomy of Abuses, i. 332); cf. Beehive of the Roman Church, 199. The earliest notice is in Gerardus, Leben St. Ulrichs von Augsburg (ob. 973), c. 4. E. Bishop, in Dublin Review, cxxiii. 405, traces the custom in a Prague fourteenth-century Missal and sixteenth-century Breviary; also in the modern Greek Church at Moscow where until recently the Czar held the bridle. But there is no ass, as he says, in the Palm Sunday ceremony described in the Peregrinatio Silviae (Duchesne, 486).

[1169] A peeress of the realm lately stated that this custom had been introduced in recent years into the Anglican church. Denials were to hand, and an amazing conflict of evidence resulted. Is there any proof that the Palmesel was ever an English ceremony at all? The Hereford riding of 1706 (cf. Representations) was not in the church. Brand, i. 73, quotes A Dialogue: the Pilgremage of Pure Devotyon (1551?), ‘Upon Palme Sondaye they play the foles sadely, drawynge after them an Asse in a rope, when they be not moche distante from the Woden Asse that they drawe.’ Clearly this, like Googe’s translation of Naogeorgus, is a description of contemporary continental Papistry. W. Fulke, The Text of the New Testament (ed. 1633), 76 (ad Marc. xi. 8) quotes a note of the Rheims translation to the effect that in memory of the entry into Jerusalem is a procession on Palm Sunday ‘with the blessed Sacrament reverently carried as it were Christ upon the Asse,’ and comments, ‘But it is pretty sport, that you make the Priest that carrieth the idoll, to supply the roome of the Asse on which Christ did ride.... Thus you turn the holy mysterie of Christ’s riding to Jerusalem to a May-game and Pageant-play.’ Fulke, who lived 1538-89, is evidently unaware that there was an ass, as well as the priest, in the procession, from which I infer that the custom was not known in England. Not that this consideration would weigh with the mediaevally-minded curate, who is as a rule only too ready to make up by the ceremonial inaccuracy of his mummeries for the offence which they cause to his congregation.

[1170] Marquardt-Mommsen, vi. 191; Jevons, Plutarch’s Romane Questions, 134; Fowler, 304, 322; Ovid, Fasti, ii. 531:

‘stultaque pars populi, quae sit sua curia, nescit;

sed facit extrema sacra relata die.’

[1171] Fowler, 306.

[1172] Schaff, iii. 131.

[1173] Belethus, c. 70 ‘Debent ergo vesperae Natalis primo integre celebrari, ac postea conveniunt diaconi quasi in tripudio, cantantque Magnificat cum antiphona de S. Stephano, sed sacerdos recitat collectam. Nocturnos et universum officium crastinum celebrant diaconi, quod Stephanus fuerit diaconus, et ad lectiones concedunt benedictiones, ita tamen, ut eius diei missam celebret hebdomarius, hoc est ille cuius tum vices fuerint eam exsequi. Sic eodem modo omne officium perficient sacerdotes ipso die B. Ioannis, quod hic sacerdos fuerit, et pueri in ipso festo Innocentium, quia innocentes pro Christo occisi sunt, ... in festo itaque Innocentium penitus subticentur cantica laetitiae, quoniam ii ad inferos descenderunt.’ Cf. also c. 72, quoted on p. 275. Durandus, Rat. Div. Off. (1284), vii. 42, De festis SS. Stephani, Ioannis Evang. et Innocentium, gives a similar account. At Vespers on Christmas Day, he says, the deacons ‘in tripudio convenientes cantant antiphonam de sancto Stephano, et sacerdos collectam. Nocturnos autem et officium in crastinum celebrant et benedictiones super lectiones dant: quod tamen facere non debent.’ So too for the priests and boys on the following days.

[1174] Honorius Augustodunensis, Gemma Animae, iii. 12 (P. L. clxxii. 646).

[1175] Ioannes Abrincensis (bishop of Rouen †1070), de Eccl. Offic. (P. L. cxlvii. 41), with fairly full account of the ‘officia.’

[1176] Ekkehardus IV, de Casibus S. Galli, c. 14 (ed. G. Meyer von Knonau, in Mittheilungen zur vaterländischen Gesch. of the Hist. Verein in St. Gallen, N. F., v.; M. G. H. Scriptores, ii. 84) ‘longum est dicere, quibus iocunditatibus dies exegerit et noctes, maxime in processione infantum; quibus poma in medio ecclesiae pavimento antesterni iubens, cum nec unum parvissimorum moveri nec ad ea adtendere vidisset, miratus est disciplinam.’ Ekkehart was master of the song-school, and von Knonau mentions some cantiones written by him and others for the feast, e. g. one beginning ‘Salve lacteolo decoratum sanguine festum.’ He has another story (c. 26) of how Solomon who was abbot of the monastery, as well as bishop of Constance, looking into the song-school on the ‘dies scolarium,’ when the boys had a ‘ius ... ut hospites intrantes capiant, captos, usque dum se redimant, teneant,’ was duly made prisoner, and set on the master’s seat. ‘Si in magistri solio sedeo,’ cried the witty bishop, ‘iure eius uti habeo. Omnes exuimini.’ After his jest, he paid his footing like a man. The ‘Schulabt’ of St. Gall is said to have survived until the council of Trent.

[1177] Frere, Winch. Troper, 6, 8, 10. The deacons sang ‘Eia, conlevitae in protomartyris Stephani natalicio ex persona ipsius cum psalmista ouantes concinnamus’; the priests, ‘Hodie candidati sacerdotum chori centeni et milleni coniubilent Christo dilectoque suo Iohanni’; the boys, ‘Psallite nunc Christo pueri, dicente propheta.’

[1178] Rock, iii. 2. 214; Clément, 118; Grenier, 353; Martene, iii. 38. These writers add several references for the triduum or one or other of its feasts to those here given: e. g. Martene quotes on St. Stephen’s feast Ordinarium of Langres, ‘finitis vesperis fiunt tripudia’; Ordinarium of Limoges, ‘vadunt omnes ad capitulum, ubi Episcopus, sive praesens, sive absens fuerit, dat eis potum ex tribus vinis’; Ordinarium of Strasburg (†1364), ‘propinatur in refectorio, sicut in vigilia nativitatis.’

[1179] Martene, iii. 38 ‘tria festa, quae sequuntur, fiunt cum magna solemnitate et tripudio. Primum faciunt diaconi, secundum presbiteri, tertium pueri.’

[1180] Grenier, 353 ‘si festa [S. Stephani] fiant, ut consuetum est, a diaconis in cappis sericis ... fit statio in medio choro, et ab ipsis regitur chorus ... et fiant festa sicut docent libri’; and so for the two other feasts.

[1181] Martene, iii. 38 ‘cum in primis vesperis [in festo S. Stephani] ad illum cantici Magnificat versiculum Deposuit potentes perventum erat, cantor baculum locumque suum diacono, qui pro eo chorum regeret, cedebat’; and so on the other feasts.

[1182] Cf. p. 315.

[1183] Durr, 77. Here the sub-deacons shared in the deacons’ feast.

[1184] The Consuetudinarium of †1210 (Frere, Use of Sarum, i. 124, 223) mentions the procession of deacons after Vespers on Christmas day, but says nothing of the share of the priests and boys in those of the following days. The Sarum Breviary gives all three (Fasc. i. cols. cxcv, ccxiii, ccxxix), and has a note (col. clxxvi) ‘nunquam enim dicitur Prosa ad Matutinas per totum annum, sed ad Vesperas, et ad Processionem, excepto die sancti Stephani, cuius servitium committitur voluntati Diaconorum; et excepto die sancti Iohannis, cuius servitium committitur voluntati Sacerdotum; et excepto die sanctorum Innocentium, cuius servitium committitur voluntati Puerorum.’

[1185] York Missal, i. 20, 22, 23 (from fifteenth-century MS. D used in the Minster) ‘In die S. Steph. ... finita processione, si Dominica fuerit, ut in Processionali continetur, Diaconis et Subdiaconis in choro ordinatim astantibus, unus Diaconus, cui Praecentor imposuerit, incipiat Officium.... In die S. Ioann. ... omnibus Personis et Presbyteris civitatis ex antiqua consuetudine ad Ecclesiam Cathedralem convenientibus, et omnibus ordinate ex utraque parte Chori in Capis sericis astantibus, Praecentor incipiat Officium.... In die SS. Innoc. ... omnibus pueris in Capis, Praecentor illorum incipiat.’ There are responds for the ‘turba diaconorum,’ ‘presbyterorum’ or ‘puerorum.’

[1186] Lincoln Statutes, i. 290; ii. ccxxx, 552.

[1187] Gasquet, Old English Bible, 250.

[1188] Martene, iii. 40.

[1189] Ibid. iii. 39.

[1190] In his second decree of 1199 as to the feast of the Circumcision at Paris (cf. p. 276), Bishop Eudes de Sully says (P. L. ccxii. 73) ‘quoniam festivitas beati protomartyris Stephani eiusdem fere subiacebat dissolutionis et temeritatis incommodo, nec ita solemniter, sicut decebat et martyris merita requirebant, in Ecclesia Parisiensi consueverat celebrari, nos, qui eidem martyri sumus specialiter debitores, quoniam in Ecclesia Bituricensi patronum habuerimus, in cuius gremio ab ineunte aetate fuimus nutriti; de voluntate et assensu dilectorum nostrorum Hugonis decani et capituli Parisiensis, festivitatem ipsam ad statum reducere regularem, eumque magnis Ecclesiae solemnitatibus adnumerare decrevimus; statuentes ut in ipso festo tantum celebritatis agatur, quantum in ceteris festis annualibus fieri consuevit.’ Eudes de Sully made a donative to the canons and clerks present at Matins on the feast, which his successor Petrus de Nemore confirmed in 1208 (P. L. ccxii. 91). Dean Hugo Clemens instigated a similar reform of St. John’s day (see p. 276).

[1191] Martene, iii. 40; Grenier, 353, 412. The Ritual of Bishop Nivelon, at the end of the twelfth century, orders St. Stephen’s to be kept as a triple feast, ‘exclusa antiqua consuetudine diaconorum et ludorum.’

[1192] Schannat, iv. 258 (1316) ‘illud, quod ... causa devotionis ordinatum fuerat ... ut Sacerdotes singulis annis in festivitate Beati Iohannis Evangelistae unum ex se eligant, qui more episcopi illa die Missam gloriose celebret et festive, nunc in ludibrium vertitur, et in ecclesia ludi fiunt theatrales, et non solum in ecclesia introducuntur monstra larvarum, verum etiam Presbyteri, Diaconi et Subdiaconi insaniae suae ludibria exercere praesumunt, facientes prandia sumptuosa, et cum tympanis et cymbalis ducentes choreas per domos et plateas civitatis.’

[1193] At Rouen in 1445 the feast of St. John, held by the capellani, was alone in question. The chapter ordered (Gasté, 46) ‘ut faciant die festi sancti euangelistae Iohannis servicium divinum bene et honeste, sine derisionibus et fatuitatibus; et inhibitum fuit eisdem ne habeant vestes difformes, insuper quod fiat mensa et ponantur boni cantores, qui bene sciant cantare, omnibus derisionibus cessantibus.’ But in 1446 the feast of St. Stephen needed reforming, as well as that of St. John (A. Chéruel, Hist. de Rouen sous la Domination anglaise, 206); and in 1451 all three (Gasté, 47) ‘praefati Domini capitulantes ordinaverunt quod in festis solemnitatis Nativitatis Domini nostri Ihesu Christi proxime futuris, omnes indecencie et inhonestates consuete fieri in dedecus ecclesie, tam per presbyteros dyaconos quam pueros chori et basse forme, cessent omnino, nec sit aliquis puer in habitu episcopi, sed fiat servicium devote et honorifice prout in aliis festis similis gradus.’

[1194] C. of Toledo (1473), c. 19 (Labbé, xiii. 1460) ‘Quia vero quaedam tam in Metropolitains quam in Cathedralibus et aliis Ecclesiis nostrae provinciae consuetudo inolevit ut videlicet in festis Nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et sanctorum Stephani, Ioannis et Innocentium aliisque certis diebus festivis, etiam in solemnitatibus Missarum novarum dum divina aguntur, ludi theatrales, larvae, monstra, spectacula, necnon quamplurima inhonesta et diversa figmenta in Ecclesiis introducuntur ... huiusmodi larvas, ludos, monstra, spectacula, figmenta et tumultuationes fieri ... prohibemus.... Per hoc tam honestas repraesentationes et devotas, quae populum ad devotionem movent, tam in praefatis diebus quam in aliis non intendimus prohibere’; C. of Lyons (1566 and 1577), c. 15 (Du Tilliot, 63) ‘Es jours de Fête des Innocens et autres, l’on ne doit souffrir ès Églises jouer jeux, tragédies, farces, &c.’; cf. the Cologne statutes (1662) quoted on p. 352.

[1195] H. E. Reynolds, Wells Cathedral, 75 ‘Quod non sint ludi contra honestatem Ecclesiae Wellensis. Item a festo Nativitatis Domini usque ad octavas Innocentium quod Clerici Subdiaconi Diaconi Presbiteri etiam huius ecclesiae vicarii ludos faciant theatrales in ecclesia Wellensi et monstra larvarum introducentes, in ea insaniae suae ludibria exercere praesumunt contra honestatem clericalem et sacrorum prohibitionem canonum divinum officium multipliciter impediendo; quod de cetero in ecclesia Wellensi et sub pena canonica fieri prohibentes volumus quod divinum officium in festo dictorum sanctorum Innocentium sicuti in festis sanctorum consimilibus quiete ac pacifice absque quocunque tumultu et ludibrio cum devotione debita celebretur.’

[1196] Reynolds, op. cit. 87 ‘Prohibitio ludorum theatralium et spectaculorum et ostentationum larvarum in Ecclesia. Item, cum infra septimanam Pentecostes et etiam in aliis festivitatibus fiant a laicis ludi theatrales in ecclesia praedicta et non solum ad ludibriorum spectacula introducantur in ea monstra larvarum, verum etiam in sanctorum Innocentium et aliorum sanctorum festivitatibus quae Natale Christi secuntur, Presbyteri Diaconi et Subdiaconi dictae Wellensis ecclesiae vicissim insaniae suae ludibria exercentes per gesticulationem debacchationes obscenas divinum officium impediant in conspectu populi, decus faciant clericale vilescere quem potius illo tempore deberent praedicatione mulcere....’ The statute goes on to threaten offenders with excommunication.

[1197] F. C. Hingeston Randolph, Bishop Grandison’s Register, Part iii, p. 1213; Inhibicio Episcopi de ludis inhonestis. The bishop writes to all four bodies in identical terms. He wishes them ‘Salutem, et morum clericalium honestatem,’ and adds ‘Ad nostram, non sine gravi cordis displicencia et stupore, pervenit noticiam quod, annis praeteritis et quibusdam praecedentibus, in Sanctissimis Dominice Nativitatis, ac Sanctorum Stephani, Iohannis, Apostoli et Evangelistae, ac Innocencium Solempniis, quando omnes Christi Fideles Divinis laudibus et Officiis Ecclesiasticis devocius ac quiescius insistere tenentur, aliqui praedicte Ecclesie nostre Ministri, cum pueris, nedum Matutinis et Vesperis ac Horis aliis, set, quod magis detestandum est, inter Missarum Sollempnia, ludos ineptos et noxios, honestatique clericali indecentes, quia verius Cultus Divini ludibria detestanda, infra Ecclesiam ipsam inmiscendo committere, Divino timore postposito, pernicioso quarundam Ecclesiarum exemplo, temere praesumpserunt; Vestimenta et alia Ornamenta Ecclesie, in non modicum eiusdem Ecclesie nostre et nostrum dampnum et dedecus, vilium scilicet scenulentorumque (or scev.) sparsione multipliciter deturpando. Ex quorum gestis, seu risibus et cachinnis derisoriis, nedum populus, more Catholico illis potissime temporibus ad Ecclesiam conveniens, a debita devocione abstrahitur, set et in risum incompositum ac oblectamenta illicita dissolvitur; Cultusque Divinus irridetur et Officium perperam impeditur....’

[1198] On the Pastores cf. ch. xix. Gasté, 33, gives several Rouen chapter acts from 1449 to 1457 requiring them to officiate ‘cessantibus stultitiis et insolenciis.’ These orders and those quoted on p. 341 above were prompted by the Letter of the Paris theologians against the Feast of Fools and similar revels. In 1445 (or 1449) a committee was chosen ‘ad videndum et visitandum ordinationem ecclesiae pro festis Nativitatis Domini et deliberationes Facultatis Theologiae super hoc habitas et quod tollantur derisiones in ipsis fieri solitas.’

[1199] At Sarum a Constitutio of Roger de Mortival in 1324 (Dayman and Jones, Sarum Statutes, 52) forbade drinking when the antiphon ‘O Sapientia’ was sung after Compline on Dec. 16. John of Avranches (†1070) allowed for the feast of his ‘O’ at Rouen ‘unum galonem vini de cellario archiepiscopi,’ and the ‘vin de l’O’ was still given in 1377 (Gasté, 47). On these ‘Oes,’ sung by the great functionaries of cathedrals and monasteries, see E. Green, On the words ‘O Sapientia’ in the Kalendar (Archaeologia, xlix. 219); Cynewulf, Christ (ed. A. S. Cook), xxxv. Payments ‘cantoribus ad ludum suum’ or ‘ad’ or ‘ante natale’ appear in Durham accounts; cf. Finchale Priory ccccxxviii (Surtees Soc.,) and Durham Accounts, passim (Surtees Soc.). I do not feel sure what feast is here referred to.

[1200] Chérest, 49 sqq.

[1201] Ioannes Abrincensis, de Eccl. Offic. (P. L. cxlvii. 42) ‘Licet, ut in morte Domini, Te Deum et Gloria in excelsis et Alleluia in aliquot ecclesiis, ex more antiquo, omittantur; quia ut Christus occideretur tot parvuli occidi iubentur; et illis occisis fit mors Christi secundum aestimationem Herodis; tamen quia placuit modernis, placet et nobis ut cantentur’; cf. the passage from Belethus quoted on p. 336; also Honorius Augustodunensis, Gemma Animae, iii. 14 (P. L. clxxii. 646), and Martene, iii. 40.

[1202] Ordinarium of Rouen (fourteenth century) in Ducange, s.v. Kalendae; P. L. cxlvii. 155; Gasté, 35. On the Rouen feast cf. also Gasté, 48.

[1203] These chants are taken from Revelation, xiv. 3 ‘nemo poterat dicere canticum, nisi illa centum quadraginta quatuor millia, qui empti sunt de terra. Hi sunt, qui cum mulieribus non sunt coinquinati, virgines enim sunt. Hi sequuntur Agnum quocumque ierit.’ This passage is still read in the ‘Epistle’ at Mass on Holy Innocents’ day. Cf. the use of the same chants at Salisbury (Appendix M).

[1204] ‘Et tamdiu cantetur Deposuit potentes quod baculus accipiatur ab eo qui accipere voluerit.’

[1205] Ordinarium of Bayeux (undated) in Gasté, 37. On the Bayeux feast and its parvus episcopus or petit évêque cf. F. Pluquet, Essai sur Bayeux, 274.

[1206] ‘Dum perventum fuerit ad illum: Deposuit potentes, vadunt omnes ad medium ecclesiae et ibi qui in processione stant ordinate eumdem versum, episcopo inchoante, plures replicantes. Qui dum sic cantatur, offert ipse episcopus sociis suis de choro baculum pastoralem. Post multas itaque resumptiones dicti versus, revertuntur in chorum, Te Deum laudamus, si habent novum episcopum, decantantes, et ita canendo deducunt eum ad altare, et mitra sibi imposita et baculo cum capa serica, revertuntur in chorum, illo qui fuerat episcopus explente officium capellani, creato nihilominus novo cantore. Tunc chorus, si non fuerit ibi novus episcopus, vel novus episcopus qui baculum duxerit capiendum, cum suis sociis resumit a capite psalmum Magnificat, et sic cantant vesperas usque ad finem.’

[1207] Novus Ordinarius of Coutances (undated) in Gasté, 39.

[1208] ‘Post Matutinas conveniant omnes pueri ad suam tabulam faciendam, quibus licitum est maiores personas Ecclesiae minoribus officiis deputare. Diaconis et subdiaconis ordinatis, thuribula imponantur et candelabra maiora videlicet et minora. Episcopo vero, cantori et aliis canonicis aquam, manutergium, missale, ignem et campanam possunt imponere pro suae libito voluntatis. Nihil tamen inhonestum aut impertinens apponatur; antiquiores primi ponantur in tabula et ultimi iuniores.’

[1209] ‘Quo facto dicat [Episcopus] Deposuit. Statimque electus Episcopus, tradito sibi baculo pastorali a pueris ad altare praesentetur, et osculato altari in domum suam a dictis pueris deferatur. Et interim, finito tumultu, eat processio ad altare S. Thomae martyris.’

[1210] Rituale (fourteenth century) of Tours in Martene, iii. 39. There was a cantor puerorum as well as the episcopus. At second Vespers ‘quando Magnificat canitur, veniunt clericuli in choro cum episcopo habentes candelas accensas de proprio et quando Deposuit canitur, accipit cantor puerorum baculum, et tunc in stallo ascendunt pueri, et alii descendunt.’

[1211] Ducange, s. v. Kalendae.

[1212] ‘Omnes pueri et subdiaconi feriati, qui in numero dictorum Innocentium computantur.’

[1213] ‘Ipsa autem die de mane equitare habet idem episcopus Innocentium ad monasteria SS. Mansueti et Apri per civitatem transeundo in comitiva suorum aequalium, quibus etiam maiores et digniores personae dignitatum comitantur per se vel suos servitores et equos, et descendentes ad fores ecclesiarum praedictarum intonat unam antiphonam et dicit episcopus orationem, sibique debentur a quolibet monasteriorum eorundem xviij den. Tullenses, qui si illico non solvantur, possunt accipere libros vel vadia.’

[1214] ‘Cantatis eiusdem diei vesperis, episcopus ipse cum mimis et tubis procedit per civitatem cum sua comitiva, via qua fiunt generales processiones.’

[1215] ‘In crastino Innocentium, quo omnes vadunt per civitatem post prandium, faciebus opertis, in diversis habitibus, et si quae farsae practicari valeant, tempore tamen sicco, fiunt in aliquibus locis civitatis, omnia cum honestate.’ Another passage, referring more generally to the feast, has ‘Fiunt ibi moralitates vel simulacra miraculorum cum farsis et similibus ioculis, semper tamen honestis.’

[1216] ‘In octavis Innocentium rursus vadit episcopus cum omni comitiva sua in habitibus suis ad ecclesiam B. Genovefae, ubi cantata antiphona de ipsa virgine cum collecta, itur ad domum parochialem eius ecclesiae vel alibi, ubi magister et fratres domus Dei, quibus ipsa ecclesia est unita, paraverint focapam unam, poma, nuces, &c. ad merendam oportuna; et ibi instituuntur officiarii ad marencias super defectibus aut excessibus in officio divino per totum annum commissis.’

[1217] ‘Fit ... assignatio post coenam diei Innocentium; ita quod is qui illa die festum peregit, gratias refert episcopo et toti comitivae, ac excusari petit, si in aliquo defecit; et finaliter pileum romarini vel alterius confectionis floreum exhibet ipsi episcopo, ut tradat canonico in receptione sequenti constituto ad futurum annum ipsum festum agendum.’ Cf. the bouquets at the ‘defructus’ (p. 324).

[1218] ‘Si autem facere contemneret adveniente festo, suspenderetur cappa nigra in raustro medio chori, et tamdiu ibi maneret in illius vituperium, quamdiu placeret subdiaconis feriatis et pueris chori; et in ea re non tenerentur nobis capitulo obedire.’

[1219] Amiens: Rigollot, 13 and passim; cf. p. 339.

[1220] St. Quentin: Rigollot, 32; Grenier, 360.

[1221] Senlis: Rigollot, 26; Grenier, 360.

[1222] Soissons: Matton, Archives de Soissons, 75.

[1223] Roye: Rigollot, 33; Grenier, 359.

[1224] Peronne: Rigollot, 34; Grenier, 359, 413.

[1225] Rheims: Rigollot, 50; Petit de Julleville, Rép. Com. 348; Marlot, Hist. de Rheims, ii. 266. In 1479 the chapter undertook the expense, ‘modo fiat sine larvis et strepitu tubicinis, ac sine equitatione per villam.’ Martene, iii. 40, says that there is no trace of any of the triduum ceremonies in the early thirteenth-century Rheims Ordinarium.

[1226] Brussels: Laborde, Ducs de Bourgogne, ii. 2. 286 ‘[1378] Item xxi decembris episcopo scholarium sanctae Gudilae profecto Sancti Nycolay quod scholares annuatim faciunt 1¹⁄₂ mut[ones].’

[1227] Lille: E. Hautcœur, Hist. de Saint-Pierre de Lille, ii. 217, 223. On June 29, 1501, Guillemot de Lespine ‘trépassa évêque des Innocens.’ His epitaph is in the cloister gallery (Hautcœur, Doc. liturg. de S. P. de Lille, 342).

[1228] Liège: Rigollot, 42; Dürr, 82. A statute of 1330 laid the expense on the last admitted canon ‘nisi canonicus scholaris sub virga existens ipsum exemerit.’

[1229] Laon: Rigollot, 21; Grenier, 356, 413; C. Hidé, Bull. de la Soc. acad. de Laon, xiii. 122; E. Fleury, Cinquante Ans de Laon, 52. A chapter act of 1546 states that the custom of playing a comedy at the election of the Boy Bishop on St. Eloi’s day (Dec. 1) has ceased. The Mass is not to be disturbed, but ‘si les escoliers veulent faire un petit discours, il seroit entendu avec plaisir.’

[1230] Troyes: T. Boutiot, Hist. de Troyes, iii. 20.

[1231] Mans: Gasté, 43; Julleville, Les Com. 38.

[1232] Bourges: Martene, iii. 40.

[1233] Châlons-sur-Saône: Du Tilliot, 20; C. Perry, Hist. de Châlons (1659), 435.

[1234] Grenoble: Pilot de Thorey, Usages, Fêtes et Coutumes en Dauphiné, i. 181.

[1235] C. of Cognac (1260), c. 2 (Mansi, xxiii. 1033) ‘cum in balleatione quae in festo SS. Innocentium in quibusdam Ecclesiis fieri inolevit, multae rixae, contentiones et turbationes, tam in divinis officiis quam aliis consueverint provenire, praedictas balleationes ulterius sub intimatione anathematis fieri prohibemus; nec non et Episcopos in praedicto festo creari; cum hoc in ecclesia Dei ridiculum existat, et hoc dignitatis episcopalis ludibrio fiat.’ C. of Salzburg (1274), c. 17 (Labbé, xi. 1004) ‘ludi noxii quos vulgaris elocutio Eptus puor. appellat’; CC. of Chartres (1526 and 1575; Bochellus, Decr. Eccl. Gall. iv. 7. 46; Du Tilliot, 66) ‘stultum aut ridiculum in ecclesia’ on days of SS. Nicholas and Catharine, and the Innocents; C. of Toledo (1565), ii. 21 (Labbé, xv. 764) ‘ficta illa et puerilis episcopatus electio’; C. of Rouen (1581; Hardouin, Concilia, x. 1217) ‘in festivitate SS. Innocentium theatralia.’

[1236] There are traces of it in the eighteenth century at Lyons (Martene, iii. 40) and Rheims (Barthélemy, v. 334); at Sens, in the nineteenth, the choir-boys still play at being bishops on Innocents’ day, and name the ‘archbishop’ âne (Chérest, 81).

[1237] Grenier, 358, quoting Le Vasseur, Epistolae, Cent. ii. Epist. 68; cf. on the Noyon feast, Leach, 135; Du Tilliot, 17; Rigollot, 27; L. Mazière, Noyon religieux, in Comptes-Rendus et Mémoires, xi. 91, of The Comité arch. et hist. de Noyon. Le Vasseur, an ex-Rector of the University of Paris, writes to François Geuffrin ‘ecce ludunt etiam ante ipsas aras; internecionem detestamur, execramur carnificem. Ludunt et placet iste ludus ecclesiae.... Tam grandis est natu ritus iste, quem viguisse deprehendo iam ante quadringentos annos in hac aede, magno totius orbis ordinum et aetatum plausu fructuque.... O miserum saeculum! ... solo gestu externoque habitu spectabiles, sola barba et pallio philosophi, caetera pecudes!’

[1238] Chronicon Montis Sereni in Pertz, Scriptores, xxiii. 144.

[1239] Monum. Boic. xiii. 214, quoted by Specht, 228 ‘in festo nativitatis Dominicae annuatim sibi ludendo constituentes episcopum.’

[1240] Vitus Arnpekius, Chron. Baioariorum, v. 53, cited by Martene, iii. 40.

[1241] Specht, 228.

[1242] Ibid. 225; Creizenach, i. 391; both quoting E. Meyer, Gesch. des hamburgischen Schul-und Unterrichtswesens im Mittelalter, 197 ‘praeterea scholares nunquam, sive in electione sive extra, aliquos rhythmos faciant, tam in latino, quam in teutonico, qui famam alicuius valeant maculare.’ In the thirteenth century a child-abbot was chosen in Hamburg on St. Andrew’s day (Nov. 30). On St. Nicholas’ day (Dec. 6) he gave way to a child-bishop, who remained in office until Dec. 28 (Tille, D. W. 31, citing Beneke, Hamburgische Geschichte und Sagen, 90).

[1243] Specht, 229.

[1244] Ibid. 228.

[1245] Cf. p. 319.

[1246] Tille, D. W. 31.

[1247] Ibid. 299.

[1248] Dürr, 67, quoting a Ritual of the cathedral (‘tempore Alberti’).

[1249] It began:

‘Iam tuum festum Nicolae dives

more solemni recolit iuventus,

nec tibi dignus, sacerdotum Caesar,

promere laudes.’

[1250] Tille, D. W. 31, citing Nork, Festkalender, 783. Dürr’s tract was published at Mainz in 1755.

[1251] Wetzer und Welte, s. v. Feste ‘consuetudo seu potius detestabilis corruptela, qua pueri a die S. Nicolai usque ad festum SS. Innocentium personatum Episcopum colunt ... ea puerilibus levitatibus et ineptiis plena coeperit esse multumque gravitatis et decoris divinis detrahat officiis ... ne clerus se pueris die SS. Inn. submittat ac eorum locum occupet, aut illis functiones aliquas in divinis officiis permittat, neque praesentes aliquis Episcopus benedictiones faciat, aliique pueri in cantandis horariis precibus lectionibus et collectis Sacerdotum, Diaconorum aut Subdiaconorum officia quaedam usurpent; multo minus convenit ut Canonici aut Vicarii ex collegarum suorum numero aliquem designent Episcopum qui reliquos omnes magnis impendiis liberali convivio excipiat.’

[1252] W. H. R. Jones, Vetus Registr. Sarisb. (R. S.), ii. 128; Wordsworth, Proc. 170 ‘Item, annulus unus aureus ad Festum Puerorum.’

[1253] Constitutiones, § 45 (Jones and Dayman, Sarum Statutes, 75; cf. Jones, Fasti, 295) ‘Electus puer chorista in episcopum modo solito puerili officium in ecclesia, prout fieri consuevit, licenter exequatur, convivium aliquod de caetero, vel visitationem exterius seu interius nullatenus faciendo, sed in domo communi cum sociis conversetur, nisi cum ut choristam ad domum canonici causa solatii ad mensam contigerit evocari, ecclesiam et scholas cum caeteris choristis statim post festum Innocentium frequentando. Et quia in processione quam ad altare Sanctae Trinitatis faciunt annuatim pueri supradicti per concurrentium pressuras et alias dissolutiones multiplices nonnulla damna personis et ecclesiae gravia intelleximus priscis temporibus pervenisse, ex parte Dei omnipotentis et sub poena maioris excommunicationis, quam contravenientes utpote libertates dictae ecclesiae nostrae infringentes et illius pacem et quietem temerarie perturbantes declaramus incurrere ipso facto, inhibemus ne quis pueros illos in praefata processione vel alias in suo ministerio premat vel impediat quoquomodo, quominus pacifice valeant facere et exequi quod illis imminet faciendum; sed qui eidem processioni devotionis causa voluerint interesse, ita modo maturo se habeant et honeste sicut et in aliis processionibus dictae ecclesiae se habent qui ad honorem Dei frequentant quando que ecclesiam supradictam.’

[1254] Appendix M.

[1255] Jones, Fasti, 299.

[1256] Wordsworth, Proc. 259. The oblationes vary from lvis. viiid. in 1448 to as much as lxxxixs. xid. in 1456.

[1257] Jones, Fasti, 300; Rimbault, xxviii; Planché, in Journal of Brit. Archaeol. Assoc. xv. 123. Gregory, 93, gives a cut of the statue.

[1258] Ordinale secundum Usum Exon. (ed. H. E. Reynolds), f. 30.

[1259] Archaeologia, l. 446, 472 sqq. (Invent. of 1245) ‘mitra alia alba addubbata aurifrigio, plana est; quam dedit J. Belemains episcopo innocentum.... Mitra episcopi innocentum, nullius precii.... Capa et mantella puerorum ad festum Innocentum et Stultorum [cf. p. 323] sunt xxviij debiles et contritae.’ In 1402 there were two little staves for the Boy Bishop (Simpson, St. Paul’s Cathedral and Old City Life, 40).

[1260] Statutes, bk. i, pars vi. c. 9, De officio puerorum in festo Sanctorum Innocencium (W. S. Simpson, Registrum Statutorum et Consuetudinum Ecclesiae Cathedralis Sancti Pauli Londinensis, 91).

[1261] ‘Memorandum, quod Anno Domini Millesimo cc lxiij. tempore G. de fferring, Decani, ordinatum fuit de officio Puerorum die Sanctorum Innocencium, prout sequitur. Provida fuit ab antiquis patribus predecessoribus nostris deliberacione statutum, ut in sollennitate Sanctorum Innocencium, qui pro Innocente Christo sanguinem suum fuderunt, innocens puer Presulatus officio fungeretur, ut sic puer pueris preesset, et innocens innocentibus imperaret, illius tipum tenens in Ecclesia, quem sequuntur iuvenes, quocumque ierit. Cum igitur quod ad laudem lactencium fuit adinventum, conversum sit in dedecus, et in derisum decoris Domus Dei, propter insolenciam effrenatae multitudinis subsequentis eundem, et affluentis improborum turbae pacem Praesulis exturbantis, statuendum duximus ut praedicti pueri, tam in eligendo suo Pontifice et personis dignitatum Decani, Archidiaconorum, et aliorum, necnon et Stacionariorum, antiquum suum ritum observent, tabulam suam faciant, et legant in Capitulo. Hoc tamen adhibito moderamine, ut nullum decetero de Canonicis Maioribus vel Minoribus ad candelabra, vel turribulum, vel ad aliqua obsequia eiusdem Ecclesiae, vel ipsius Pontificis deputent in futurum, set suos eligant ministeriales de illis qui sunt in secunda forma vel in tercia. Processionem suam habeant honestam, tam in incessu, quam habitu et cantu, competenti; ita vero se gerant in omnibus in Ecclesia, quod clerus et populus illos habeant recommendatos.’

[1262] ‘Die vero solemnitatis post prandium ad mandatum personae Decani convenient omnes in atrio Ecclesiae, ibidem equos ascendant ituri ad populum benedicendum. Tenetur autem Decanus Presuli presentare equum, et quilibet Stacionarius sua personae in equo providere.’

[1263] Statutes, bk. i, pars vii. c. 6 (Simpson, op. cit. 129), a statute made in the time of Dean Ralph de Diceto (1181-†1204) ‘Debet eciam novus Residenciarius post cenam die Sanctorum Innocencium ducere puerum suum cum daunsa et chorea et torchiis ad Elemosinariam, et ibi cum torticiis potum et species singulis ministrare, et liberatam vini cervisiae et specierum et candellarum facere, et ibidem ministri sui expectare, quousque alius puer Canonici senioris veniat. Et secundam cenam in octavis Innocencium tenebit, Episcopum cum pueris et eorum comitiva pascendo, et in recessu dona dando, et, si diu expectat adventum illorum nocte illa, ad matutinos non teneatur venire.’

[1264] Rimbault, xxxii.

[1265] Printed in Rimbault, 1. Duff, Handlists, ii. 5, notes also a Sermo pro episcopo puerorum by J. Alcock, printed in the fifteenth century by R. Pynson.

[1266] Concio de puero Iesu pronunciata a puero in nova schola Iohannis Coleti per eum instituta Londini in qua praesidet imago Pueri Iesu docentis specie (Erasmi Opera (1704), v. 599). The English version was printed by W. Redman (Lupton, Life of Colet, 176). It is not clear that this Concio was preached by a boy bishop, for Colet’s school (cf. next note) attended the ‘bishop’ of St. Paul’s song-school.

[1267] Lupton, op. cit. 175 ‘Alle these Chyldren shall every Chyldremasse day come to paulis Church and here the Chylde Bisshoppis sermon, and after be at the hye masse, and eche of them offre a 1^d. to the Childe Bisshopp; and with theme the Maisters and surveyours of the scole.’

[1268] Lincoln Statutes, ii. 98 ‘Inveniet [thesaurarius] Stellas cum omnibus ad illas pertinentibus, preter cirpos, quos inveniet Episcopus Puerorum futurorum [?fatuorum], vnam in nocte Natalis Domini pro pastoribus et ·ij^as in nocte Epiphanie, si debeat fieri presentacio ·iij^um regum.’

[1269] Warton, iv. 224 ‘Ioannes de Quixly confirmatur Episcopus Puerorum, et Capitulum ordinavit, quod electio Episcopi Puerorum in ecclesia Eboracensi de cetero fieret de eo, qui diutius et magis in dicta ecclesia laboraverit, et magis idoneus repertus fuerit, dum tamen competenter sit corpore formosus, et quod aliter facta electio non valebit.’

[1270] Warton, iv. 237 ‘nisi habuerit claram vocem puerilem.’

[1271] Warton, iv. 224.

[1272] Appendix M. Cf. Rimbault, xi, for further elucidations of the Computus.

[1273] Percy, North. H. B. 340.

[1274] York Missal, i. 23. The rubric at the beginning of Mass is ‘Omnibus pueris in Capis, Praecentor illorum incipiat.’ There are some responds for the ‘Praecentor’ and the ‘turba puerorum.’ After the Kyrie, ‘omnibus pueris in medio Chori stantibus et ibi omnia cantantibus, Episcopo eorum interim in cathedra sedente; et si Dominica fuerit, dicitur ab Episcopo stante in cathedra Gloria in excelsis Deo: aliter non.’ The Sequentia for the day is

‘Celsa pueri concrepent melodia,

eia, Innocentum colentes tripudia, &c.’

[1275] Rimbault, xvi. The dates are between 1416 and 1537.

[1276] Raine, Fabric Rolls of York Minster (Surtees Soc.), 213 sqq. (†1500, the additions in brackets being †1510) ‘una mitra parva cum petris pro episcopo puerorum ... [unus annulus pro episcopo puerorum et duo owchys, unus in medio ad modum crucis cum lapidibus in circumferenciis cum alio parvo cum uno lapide in medio vocato turchas].... Capae Rubiae.... Una capa de tyssue pro Episcopo puerili ... [duae capae veteres olim pro Episcopo puerorum].’ Leach, 132, says ‘At York, in 1321, the Master of the Works gave “a gold ring with a great stone for the Bishop of the Innocents.” In 1491 the Boy Bishop’s pontifical was mended with silver-gilt.’

[1277] Lincoln Statutes, i. 290 (Black Book, †1300); ii. ccxxxi.

[1278] Archaeologia, liii. 25, 50; Monasticon, viii. 1282 ‘Item, a coope of Rede velvett w^t Rolles & clowdes ordenyd for the barne busshop w^t this scriptur “the hye wey ys best”.’ The entry is repeated in a later inventory of 1548.

[1279] Hereford, Consuetudines of thirteenth century (Lincoln Statutes, ii. 67) ‘Thesaurarius debet invenire ... in festo Innocencium pueris candelas et ·ij^os cereos coram parvo Episcopo.’

[1280] Lichfield—J. C. Cox, Sports in Churches, in W. Andrews, Curious Church Customs, 3, quoting inventories of 1345 and of the fifteenth century. The latter uses the term ‘Nicholas Bishop.’

[1281] Gloucester—Rimbault, 14, prints from Cotton MSS. Vesp. A. xxv, f. 173, a Sermon of the Child Bishop, Pronownysed by John Stubs, Querester, on Childermas Day, at Gloceter, 1558.

[1282] Norwich—a fourteenth-century antiphonal of Sarum Use, probably of Norwich provenance (Lansd. MS. 463, f. 16^v), provides for the giving of the baculus to the Episcopus Puerorum at Vespers on St. John’s Day.

[1283] Beverley—the fifth earl of Northumberland about 1522 gave xxs. at Christmas to the ‘Barne Bishop’ of Beverley, as well as to him of York (Percy, North. H. B. 340); cf. p. 357.

[1284] Wordsworth, Proc. 52; cf. Appendix M (1).

[1285] Ottery—Statutes of Bishop Grandisson (1337), quoted by Warton, ii. 229 ‘Item statuimus, quod nullus canonicus, vicarius, vel secundarius, pueros choristas in festo sanctorum Innocentium extra parochiam de Otery trahant, aut eis licentiam vagandi concedant.’

[1286] Magdalen—see Appendix E.

[1287] All Souls—An inventory has ‘j chem. j cap et mitra pro Episcopo Nicholao’ (Rock, iii. 2. 217).

[1288] In 1299 Edward I heard vespers said ‘de Sancto Nicholao ... in Capella sua apud Heton iuxta Novum Castrum super Tynam’ (Wardrobe Account, ed. Soc. of Antiq., 25). In 1306 a Boy Bishop officiated before Edward II on St. Nicholas’ Day in the king’s chapel at Scroby (Wardrobe Account in Archaeologia, xxvi. 342). In 1339 Edward III gave a gift ‘Episcopo puerorum ecclesiae de Andeworp cantanti coram domino rege in camera sua in festo sanctorum Innocentium’ (Warton, ii. 229). There was a yearly payment of £1 to the Boy Bishop at St. Stephen’s, Westminster, in 1382 (Devon, Issues of Exchequer, 222), and about 1528-32 (Brewer, iv. 1939).

[1289] The fifth earl of Northumberland (†1512) was wont to ‘gyfe yerly upon Saynt Nicolas-Even if he kepe Chapell for Saynt Nicolas to the Master of his Childeren of his Chapell for one of the Childeren of his Chapell yerely vj^s. viij^d. And if Saynt Nicolas com owt of the Towne wher my Lord lyeth and my Lord kepe no Chapell than to have yerely iij^s. iiij^d.’ (Percy, North. H. B. 343). An elaborate Contenta de Ornamentis Ep., puer., of uncertain provenance, is printed by Percy, op. cit. 439.

[1290] St. Mary at Hill (Brand, i. 233); St. Mary de Prees (Monasticon, iii. 360); St. Peter Cheap (Journal of Brit. Arch. Ass. xxiv. 156); Hospital of St. Katharine by the Tower (Reliquary, iv. 153); Lambeth (Lysons, Environs of London, i. 310); cf. p. 367.

[1291] Louth (E. Hewlett, Boy Bishops, in W. Andrews, Curious Church Gleanings, 241)—the payments for the Chyld Bishop include some for ‘making his See’ (sedes); Nottingham (Archaeologia, xxvi. 342); Sandwich (Boys, Hist. of S. 376); New Romney (Hist. MSS. v. 517-28), Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Somersetshire (J. C. Cox, Sports in Churches, in W. Andrews, Curious Church Customs); Bristol—L. T. Smith, Ricart’s Kalendar, 80 (1479-1506, Camden Soc.). On Nov. 24, the Mayor, Sheriff, and ‘worshipfull men’ are to ‘receyue at theire dores Seynt Kateryn’s pleyers, making them to drynk at their dores and rewardyng theym for theire playes.’ On Dec. 5 they are ‘to walke to Seynt Nicholas churche, there to hire theire even-song: and on the morowe to hire theire masse, and offre, and hire the bishop’s sermon, and have his blissyng.’ After dinner they are to play dice at the mayor’s counter, ‘and when the Bishope is come thedir, his chapell there to synge, and the bishope to geve them his blissyng, and then he and all his chapell to be serued there with brede and wyne.’ And so to even-song in St. Nicholas’ church.

[1292] L. T. Accounts, i. ccxlvi record annual payments by James IV (†1473-98) to Boy Bishops from Holyrood Abbey and St. Giles’s, Edinburgh.

[1293] Wilkins, ii. 38 ‘Puerilia autem solemnia, quae in festo solent fieri Innocentum post vesperas S. Iohannis, tantum inchoari permittimus, et in crastino in ipsa die Innocentum totaliter terminentur.’

[1294] Archaeologia, lii. 221 sqq.

[1295] Transactions of London and Middlesex Arch. Soc. vols. iv, v.

[1296] Athenæum (1900), ii. 655, 692 ‘data Pueris de Elemosinaria ludentibus coram Domino apud Westmonasterium, iij^s. iiij^d.’ Dr. E. J. L. Scott and Dr. Rutherford found in this entry a proof of the existence of the Westminster Latin play at ‘a period anterior to the foundation of Eton’!

[1297] Rimbault, xviii; Finchale Priory (Surtees Soc.), ccccxxviii; Durham Accounts (Surtees Soc.), iii. xliii, and passim.

[1298] Hist. MSS. xiv. 8. 124, 157.

[1299] Computi of Cellarer (Warton, ii. 232, iii. 300) ‘1397, pro epulis Pueri celebrantis in festo S. Nicholai ... 1490, in larvis et aliis indumentis Puerorum visentium Dominum apud Wulsey, et Constabularium Castri Winton, in apparatu suo, necnon subintrantium omnia monasteria civitatis Winton, in festo sancti Nicholai.’

[1300] G. W. Kitchin, Computus Rolls of St. Swithin’s (Hampshire Rec. Soc.), passim; G. W. Kitchin and F. T. Madge, Winchester Chapter Documents (H. R. Soc.), 24.

[1301] Warton, ii. 231 ‘1441, pro pueris Eleemosynariae una cum pueris Capellae sanctae Elizabethae, ornatis more puellarum, et saltantibus, cantantibus, et ludentibus, coram domina Abbatissa et monialibus Abbathiae beatae Mariae virginis, in aula ibidem in die sanctorum Innocentium.’

[1302] Harpsfield, Hist. Eccl. Angl. (1622), 441, citing Peckham’s Register. He says the mandate was in French.

[1303] Visitations of Diocese of Norwich (Camden Soc.), 209 ‘Domina Iohanna Botulphe dicit ... quod ... habent in festo Natalis Domini iuniorem monialem in abbatissam assumptam, vocandi [? iocandi] gratia; cuius occasione ipsa consumere et dissipare cogitur quae vel elemosina vel aliorum amicorum largitione acquisierit ... Iniunctum est ... quod de cetero non observetur assumptio abbatissae vocandi causa.’

[1304] Gregory of Tours, x. 16 (M. G. H. Script. Rerum Meroving. i. 427), mentions among the complaints laid before the visitors of the convent of St. Radegund in Poitou, that the abbess ‘vittam de auro exornatam idem neptae suae superflue fecerit, barbaturias intus eo quod celebraverit.’ Ducange, s. v. Barbatoriae, finds here a reference to some kind of masquing, and Peter of Blois, Epist. 14, certainly uses barbatores as a synonym for mimi. The M. G. H. editors of Gregory, however, explain ‘barbatoria’ as ‘primam barbam ponere’ the sense borne by the term in Petronius, Sat. lxxiii. 6. The abbess’s niece had probably no beard, but may not the reference be to the cutting of the hair of a novice when she takes the vows?

[1305] Ducange, s. v. Kalendae (‘de monialibus Villae-Arcelli’), ‘Item inhibemus ne de caetero in festis Innocentum et B. M. Magdalenae ludibria exerceatis consueta, induendo vos scilicet vestibus saecularium aut inter vos seu cum secularibus choreas ducendo’; and again ‘in festo S. Iohannis et Innocentium mimia iocositate et scurrilibus cantibus utebantur, ut pote farsis, conductis, motulis; praecepimus quod honestius et cum maiori devotione alias se haberent’; Gasté, 36 (on Caen) ‘iuniores in festo Innocentium cantant lectiones suas cum farsis. Hoc inhibuimus.’ In 1423, the real abbess gave place to the little abbess at the Deposuit. Gasté, 44, describes a survival of the election of an ‘abbess’ from amongst the pensionnaires on the days of St. Catherine and the Innocents in the Abbaye aux Bois, Faubourg St. Germain, from the Mémoires of Hélène Massalska. This was about 1773.

[1306] Howlett, Monumenta Franciscana (R. S.), ii. 93 ‘Caveant fratres in festo Sancti Nicolai seu Innocentium, vel quibuscunque aliis festis vestes extraneas religiosas seu seculares aut clericales vel muliebres sub specie devotionis induere; nec habitus fratrum secularibus pro ludis faciendis accommodentur sub poena amotionis confusibilis de conventu.’

[1307] Denifle, i. 532. It was forbidden ‘in eisdem festis vel aliis paramenta nec coreas duci in vico de die nec de nocte cum torticiis vel sine.’ But it was on Innocents’ Day that the béjaunes or ‘freshmen’ of the Sorbonne were subjected to rites bearing a close analogy to the feast of fools; cf. Rigollot, 172 ‘1476 ... condemnatus fuit in crastino Innocentium capellanus abbas beiannorum ad octo solidos parisienses, eo quod non explevisset officium suum die Innocentium post prandium, in mundationem beiannorum per aspersionem aquae ut moris est, quanquam solemniter incoepisset exercere suum officium ante prandium inducendo beiannos per vicum super asinum.’

[1308] Denifle, iii. 166.

[1309] ‘Verbis nedum gallicis sed eciam latinis, ut ipsi qui de partibus alienis oriundi linguam gallicam nequaquam intelligebant plenarie.’

[1310] S. F. Hulton, Rixae Oxonienses, 68. There had been many earlier brawls.

[1311] Statute xxix (T. F. Kirby, Annals of Winchester College, 503) ‘Permittimus tamen quod in festo Innocencium pueri vesperas matutinas et alia divina officia legenda et cantanda dicere et exsequi valeant secundum usum et consuetudinem ecclesiae Sarum.’ The same formula is used in New College Statute xlii (Statutes of the Colleges of Oxford, vol. i).

[1312] Cf. Appendix E. Kirby, op. cit. 90, quotes an inventory of 1406 ‘Baculus pastoralis de cupro deaurato pro Epõ puerorum in die Innocencium ... Mitra de panno aureo ex dono Dñi. Fundatoris hernesiat (mounted) cum argento deaurato ex dono unius socii coll. [Robert Heete] pro Epõ puerorum.’

[1313] The Charter of King’s College (1443), c. 42 (Documents relating to the Univ. of Camb. ii. 569; Heywood and Wright, Ancient Laws of the Fifteenth Century for King’s Coll. Camb. and Eton Coll. 112), closely follows Wykeham’s formula: ‘excepto festo S^ti Nicholai praedicto, in quo festo et nullatenus in festo Innocentium, permittimus quod pueri ... secundum usum in dicto Regali Collegio hactenus usitatum.’ The Eton formula (c. 31) in 1444 is slightly different (Heywood and Wright op. cit. 560) ‘excepto in festo Sancti Nicholai, in quo, et nullatenus in festo Sanctorum Innocentium, divina officia praeter missae secreta exequi et dici permittimus per episcopum puerorum scholarium, ad hoc de eisdem annis singulis eligendum.’

[1314] Warton, ii. 228; Leach, 133. The passage from the Consuetudinarium is given from Harl. MS. 7044 f. 167 (apparently a transcript from a C. C. C. C. MS.) by Heywood and Wright, op. cit. 632; E. S. Creasy, Eminent Etonians, 91 ‘in die S^ti Hugonis pontificis solebat Aetonae fieri electio Episcopi Nihilensis, sed consuetudo obsolevit. Olim episcopus ille puerorum habebatur nobilis, in cuius electione et literata et laudatissima exercitatio, ad ingeniorum vires et motus excitandos, Aetonae celebris erat.’

[1315] Eton Audit Book, 1507-8, quoted by H. C. Maxwell-Lyte, Hist. of Eton (ed. 1899), 149 ‘Pro reparatione le rochet pro episcopo puerorum, xj^d.’ An inventory of Henry VIII’s reign says that this rochet was given by James Denton (K. S. 1486) for use at St. Nicholas’ time.

[1316] Maxwell-Lyte, op. cit. 450.

[1317] Hearne, Liber Niger Scaccarii, 674 ‘Item, unam Mitram de Cloth of goold habentem 2 knoppes arḡ. enameld, dat. ad occupand. per Barnebishop.’

[1318] John Stone, a monk of Canterbury, records in his De Obitibus et aliis Memorabilibus sui Coenobii (MS. C. C. C. C., Q. 8, quoted Warton, ii. 230) ‘Hoc anno, 1464, in festo Sancti Nicolai non erat episcopus puerorum in schola grammatica in civitate Cantuariae ex defectu Magistrorum, viz. I. Sidney et T. Hikson.’

[1319] J. Stuart, Extracts from Council Registers of Aberdeen (Spalding Club), i. 186. The council ordered on Nov. 27, 1542, ‘that the maister of thair grammar scuyll sell haf iiij^s Scottis, of the sobirest persoun that resauis him and the bischop at Sanct Nicolace day.’ This is to be held a legal fee, ‘he hes na uder fee to leif on.’

[1320] Wilkins, Concilia, iii. 860 ‘And whereas heretofore dyverse and many superstitious and childysshe observations have been usid, and yet to this day are observed and kept in many and sondry parties of this realm, as upon sainte Nicolas, sainte Catheryne, sainte Clement, the holye Innocentes, and such like; children be strangelye decked and apparelid to counterfaite priestes, bysshopps, and women; and so ledde with songes and daunces from house to house, bleasing the people, and gatherynge of monye; and boyes doo singe masse, and preache in the pulpitt, with suche other unfittinge and inconvenyent usages, rather to the derision than to any true glory of God, or honour of his saints; the kyng’s majestie therefore mynding nothing so moche, as to avaunce the true glorye of God without vayne superstition, willith and commaundeth, that from henceforth all suche superstitions be loste and clyerlye extinguisshed throughowte all this his realmes and dominions, forasmoche as the same doo resemble rather the unlawfull superstition of gentilitie, than the pure and sincere religion of Christe.’ Brand, i. 236, suggests that there was an earlier proclamation of July 22, 1540, to the same effect. Johan Bale in his Yet a Course at the Romyshe Foxe (1542), says that if Bonner’s censure of those who lay aside certain ‘auncyent rytes’ is justified, ‘then ought my Lorde also to suffer the same selfe ponnyshment, for not goynge abought with Saynt Nycolas clarkes.’ Thomas Becon, Catechism, 320 (ed. Parker Soc.), compares a bishop who does not preach, a ‘dumb dog,’ to a ‘Nicholas bishop.’ The Articles put to bishop Gardiner in 1550 required him to declare ‘that the counterfeiting St. Nicholas, St. Clement, St. Catherine and St. Edmund, by children, heretofore brought into the church, was a mockery and foolishness’ (Froude, iv. 550).

[1321] Machyn’s Diary, 75 ‘The xij day of November [1554] was commondyd by the bysshope of London to all clarkes in the dyoses of London for to have Sant Necolas and to go a-brod, as mony as wold have ytt ... [the v day of December, the which was Saint Nicholas’ eve, at even-song time, came a commandment that St. Nicholas should not go abroad, nor about. But, notwithstanding, there went about these Saint Nicholases in divers parishes, as St. Andrew’s, Holborn, and St.] Nicolas Olyffe in Bredstret.’ Warton, iv. 237, says that during Mary’s reign Hugh Rhodes, a gentleman or musician of the Chapel royal, printed in black letter quarto a poem of thirty-six octave stanzas, entitled The Song of the Chyldbysshop, as it was songe before the queenes maiestie in her privie chamber at her manour of saynt James in the Feeldes on Saynt Nicholas day and Innocents day this yeare nowe present, by the chylde bysshope of Poules churche with his company.’ Warton apparently saw the poem, for he describes it as ‘a fulsome panegyric on the queen’s devotion, in which she is compared to Judith, Esther, the Queen of Sheba, and the Virgin Mary,’ but no copy of it is now known; cf. F. J. Furnivall, The Babees Book (E. E. T. S.), lxxxv.

[1322] Machyn’s Diary, 121 ‘The v day of Desember [1556] was Sant Necolas evyn, and Sant Necolas whentt a-brod in most partt in London syngyng after the old fassyon, and was reseyvyd with mony good pepulle in-to ther howses, and had myche good chere as ever they had, in mony plasses.’ Foxe, Acts and Monuments, viii. 726, celebrates the wit of a ‘godly matron,’ Mrs. Gertrude Crockhay, who shut ‘the foolish popish Saint Nicholas’ out of her house in this year, and told her brother-in-law, Dr. Mallet, when he remonstrated, that she had heard of men robbed by ‘Saint Nicholas’s clerks.’ This was a slang term for thieves, of whom, as of children, St. Nicholas was the patron; for the reason of which cf. Golden Legend, ii. 119. Another procession forbidden by the proclamation of 1541 was also revived in 1556; cf. Machyn’s Diary, 119 ‘[The xxiv day of November, being the eve of Saint Katharine, at six of the clock at night] sant Katheryn(’s) lyght [went about the battlements of Saint Paul’s with singing,] and Sant Katheryn gohying a prossessyon.’

[1323] At Exton in Rutlandshire, children were allowed at the beginning of the nineteenth century to play in the church on Innocents’ Day (Leicester and Rutland Folk-Lore, 96). Probably a few other examples could be collected.

[1324] At Mainz, not only the pueri, but also the diaconi and the sacerdotes, had their episcopus (Dürr, 71). On the other hand at Vienne the term used at all the feasts, of the triduum and on January 1 and 6, was rex (Pilot de Thorey, Usages, Fêtes et Coutumes en Dauphiné, i. 179). The Boy Bishops received, for their brief day, all the external marks of honour paid to real bishops. They are alleged to have occasionally enjoyed more solid privileges. Louvet (Hist. et Ant. de Beauvais, cited Rigollot, 142), says that at Beauvais the right of presentation to chapter benefices falling vacant on Innocents’ Day fell to the pueri. Jean Van der Muelen or Molanus (De Canonicis (1587), ii. 43) makes a similar statement as to Cambrai: ‘Immo personatus hic episcopus in quibusdam locis reditus, census et capones, annue percipit: alibi mitram habet, multis episcoporum mitris sumptuosiorem. In Cameracensi ecclesia visus est vacantem, in mense episcopi, praebendam, quasi iure ad se devoluto, conferre; quam collationem beneficii vere magnifici, reverendissimus praesul, cum puer grato animo, magistrum suum, bene de ecclesia meritum, nominasset, gratam et raram habuit.’ At Mainz lost tradition had it that if an Elector died during the tenure of office by a Boy Bishop, the revenues sede vacante would fall to him. Unfortunately the chapter and verse of history disprove this (Dürr, 67, 79). On the other hand it is certain that the Boy Bishops assumed the episcopal privilege of coinage. Rigollot, 52 sqq., describes and figures a long series of fifteenth-and sixteenth-century coins or medals mostly struck by ‘bishops’ of the various churches and monastic houses of Amiens. They are the more interesting, because some of them bear ‘fools’ as devices, and thus afford another proof of the relations between the feasts of Boys and Fools. Lille monetae of the sixteenth century are figured by Vanhende, Numismatique Lilloise, 256, and others from Laon by C. Hidé, in Bull. de la Soc. acad. de Laon, xiii. 126. Some of Rigollot’s specimens seem to have belonged, not to Boy Bishops, but to confréries, who struck them as ‘jetons de présence’ (Chartier, L’ancien Chapitre de N.-D. de Paris, 178); and probably this is also the origin of the pieces found at Bury St. Edmunds, which have nothing in their devices to connect them with a Boy Bishop (Rimbault, xxvi).

[1325] Ivo Carnotensis, Epist. 67, ad papam Urbanum (P. L. clxii. 87)

‘eligimus puerum, puerorum festa colentes,

non nostrum morem, sed regis iussa sequentes.’

Cf. Rigollot, 143.

[1326] Lucas Cusentinus (†1203-24) Ordinarium (Martene, iii. 39): ‘Puero episcopello pontificalia conceduntur insignia, et ipse dicit orationes.’

[1327] The Ritual (†1264) of St. Omer (Mém. de la Soc. des Antiq. de la Morinie, xx. 186) has the following rubric for St. Nicholas’ Day ‘in secundis vesperis ... a choristis incipitur prosa Sospitati dedit egros, in qua altercando cantatur iste versus Ergo laudes novies tantum, ne immoderatum tedium generet vel derisum.’ The same rubric recurs on St. Catherine’s Day. At St. Omer, as at Paris (cf. p. 363), these were the two winter holidays for scholars. Cf. also p. 289, and A. Legrand, Réjouissances des écoliers de N.-D. de St. Omer, le jour de St.-Nicholas, leur glorieux patron (Mémoires, ut cit. vii. 160). The St. Omer Episcopus puerorum also officiated on Innocents’ Eve and the octave. Dreves, Anal. Hymn. xxi. 82, gives various cantiones for St. Nicholas’ Day; e.g.

‘Nicolai praesulis

Festum celebremus,

. . . . .

In tanto natalitio

Patrum docet traditio

Ut consonet in gaudio

Fidelium devotio,

Est ergo superstitio

Vacare a tripudio.’

In England it is probable that the Beverley Boy Bishop also officiated on St. Nicholas’ Day. A chapter order of Jan. 7, 1313, directs the transfer of the ‘servitium sancti Nicholai in festo eiusdem per Magistrum Scholarum Beverlacensium celebrandum’ to the altar of St. Blaize during the building of a new nave (A. F. Leach, Memorials of Beverley Minster, Surtees Soc. i. 307).

[1328] Tille, D. W. 32; Leach, 130. The connexion of St. Nicholas with children may be explained by, if it did not rather give rise to, either the legend of his early piety, ‘The first day that he was washed and bained, he addressed him right up in the bason, and he wold not take the breast nor the pap but once on the Wednesday and once on the Friday, and in his young age he eschewed the plays and japes of other young children’ (Golden Legend, ii. 110); or the various other legends which represent him as bringing children out of peril. Cf. Golden Legend, ii. 119 sqq., and especially the history of the resurrection of three boys from a pickle-tub narrated by Mr. Leach from Wace. A. Maury, (Croyances et Légendes du Moyen Âge (ed. 1896), 149) tries to find the origin of this in misunderstood iconographic representations of the missionary saint at the baptismal font.

[1329] Leach, 130; Golden Legend, ii. 111.

[1330] Cf. ch. xi. The position of St. Nicholas’ Day in the ceremonies discussed in this chapter is sometimes shared by other feasts of the winter cycle: St. Edmund’s (Nov. 20), St. Clement’s (Nov. 23), St. Catherine’s (Nov. 25), St. Andrew’s (Nov. 30), St. Eloi’s (Dec. 1), St. Lucy’s (Dec. 13). Cf. pp. 349-51, 359, 366-8. The feast of St. Mary Magdalen, kept in a Norman convent (p. 362), was, however, in the summer (July 22).

[1331] Specht, 229; Tille, D. W. 300; Wetze and Welte, iv. 1411. Roman schoolmasters expected a present at the Minervalia (March 18-23); cf. the passage from Tertullian in Appendix N (1).

[1332] Martin Franc, Champion des dames (Bibl. de l’École des Chartes, v. 58).

[1333] Du Tilliot, 87.

[1334] Julleville, Les Com. 241.

[1335] Julleville, Les Com. 193, 256; Du Tilliot, 97. The chief officers of the chapel fous were the ‘bâtonnier’ and the ‘protonotaire et procureur des fous.’ In the Infanterie these are replaced by the emblematical Mère Folle and the ‘Procureur fiscal’ known as ‘Fiscal vert’ or ‘Griffon vert.’ Du Tilliot and others have collected a number of documents concerning the Infanterie, together with representations of seals, badges, &c., used by them. These may be compared in Du Tilliot with the bâton belonging to the Chapel period (1482), which he also gives. The motto of the Infanterie is worth noticing. It was Numerus stultorum infinitus est, and was taken from Ecclesiastes, i. 15. It was used also at Amiens (Julleville, Les Com. 234).

[1336] At Amiens the ‘feste du Prince des Sots’ existed in 1450 (Julleville, Les Com. 233), but the ‘Pope of Fools’ was not finally suppressed in the cathedral for another century. But at Amiens there was an immense multiplication of ‘fool’-organizations. Each church and convent had its ‘episcopus puerorum,’ and several of these show fous on their coins. Rigollot, 77, 105, figures a coin with fous, which he assigns to a confrérie in the parish of St. Remigius; also a coin, dated 1543, of an ‘Evesque des Griffons.’

[1337] Julleville, Les Com. 144.

[1338] The term cornard seems to be derived from the ‘cornes’ of the traditional fool headdress. Leber, ix. 353, reprints from the Mercure de France for April, 1725, an account of a procession made by the abbas cornardorum at Evreux mounted upon an ass, which directly recalls the Feast of Fools. A macaronic chanson used on the occasion of one of these processions is preserved:

‘De asino bono nostro,

Meliori et optimo,

Debemus faire fête.

En revenant de Gravignariâ,

Un gros chardon reperit in viâ;

Il lui coupa la tête.

Vir monachus, in mense Iulio,

Egressus est e monasterio,

C’est dom de la Bucaille.

Egressus est sine licentiâ,

Pour aller voir donna Venissia,

Et faire la ripaille.’

Research has identified Dom de la Bucaille and Donna Venissia as respectively a prior of St. Taurin, and a prioress of St. Saviour’s, in Evreux.

[1339] A coquille is a misprint, and this société was composed of the printers of Lyon.

[1340] Conc. of Avignon (1326), c. 37, de societatibus colligationibus et coniurationibus quas confratrias appellant radicitus extirpandis (Labbé, xi. 1738), forbids both clerks and laymen ‘ne se confratres priores abbatas praedictae societatis appellent.’ The charges brought against the confréries are of perverting justice, not of wanton revelry, and therefore it is probably not ‘sociétés joyeuses’ that are in question; cf. Ducange, s. v. Abbas Confratriae, quoting a Paris example. Grenier, 362, however, mentions a ‘confrérie’ in the Hôpital de Rue at Amiens (†1210) which was under an ‘évêque’; cf. the following note.

[1341] I find an ‘évesque des folz’ at Béthune, a ‘M. le Cardinal’ as head of the ‘Joyeux’ at Rheims (Julleville, Les Com. 242; Rép. Com. 340), and an ‘évesque des Griffons’ at Amiens (Rigollot, 105). Exceptional is, I believe, the Société des Foux founded on the lines of a chivalric order by Adolphe, Comte de Clèves, in 1380 (Du Tilliot, 84).

[1342] Julleville, 236; Guy, 471.

[1343] Julleville, 88, 136. The Paris Basoche was a ‘royaume’; those of Chambéry and Geneva were ‘abbayes.’

[1344] Cf. p. 304.

[1345] Julleville, Les Com. 152.

[1346] Bulaeus, Hist. Univ. Paris, v. 690; Julleville, Les Com. 297; Rashdall, Universities of Europe, ii. 611. It was probably to this student custom that the Tournai rioters of 1499 appealed (cf. p. 301). In 1470 the Faculty of Arts ordered the suppression of it. Cf. C. Jourdain, Index Chartarum Paris. 294 (No. 1369). On Jan. 5 they met ‘ad providendum remedium de electione regis fatuorum,’ and decreed ‘quod nullus scolaris assumeret habitum fatui pro illo anno, nec in collegio, nec extra collegium, nisi forsan duntaxat ludendo farsam vel moralitatem.’ Several scholars ‘portantes arma et assumentes habitus fatuorum’ were corrected on Jan. 24, and it was laid down that ‘reges vero fatuorum priventur penitus a gradu quocumque.’

[1347] Grenier, 365; Ducange, s. v. Deposuit, quoting Stat. Hosp. S. Iacobi Paris. (sixteenth century), ‘après le diner, on porte le baton au cueur, et là est le trésorier, qui chante et fait le Deposuit.’ Stat. Syn. Petri de Broc. episc. Autiss. (1642) ‘pendant que les bâtons de confrérie seront exposez, pour être enchéris, l’on ne chantera Magnificat, et n’appliquera-t-on point ces versets Deposuit et Suscepit à la délivrance d’iceux; ains on chantera quelque antienne et répons avec l’oraison propre en l’honneur du Saint, duquel on célèbre la feste.’

[1348] Cf. ch. iii and Appendix F; and on the general character of the puys, Julleville, Les Com. 42; Guy, xxxiv; Paris, 185. Some documents with regard to a fourteenth-century puy in London are in Riley, Liber Custumarum, xlviii. 216, 479 (Munim. Gildh. Lond. in R. S.); Memorials of London, 42.

[1349] Julleville, Les Com. 92, 233, 236, 241.

[1350] Clément-Hémery, Fêtes du Dép. du Nord, 184, states on the authority of a MS. without title or signature that this fête originated in a prose with a bray in it, sung by the canons of St. Peter’s. The lay form of the feast can be traced from †1476 to 1668. Leber, x. 135, puts the (clerical) origin before 1282.

[1351] Julleville, Les Com. 92, 204, 247.

[1352] F. Guérard, Les Fous de Saint-Germain, in Mélanges d’Hist. et d’Arch. (Amiens, 1861), 17. On the Saturday before the first Sunday in May children in the rue St. Germain carry boughs, singing

‘Saint Germain, coucou,

Ch’est l’fette d’chés fous, &c.’

In the church they used to place a bottle crowned with yellow primroses, called ‘coucous.’ The dwellers in the parish are locally known as ‘fous,’ and an historical myth is told to account for this. Probably May-day has here merged with St. Germain’s Day (May 2) in a ‘fête des fous.’ Payments for decking the church appear in old accounts.

[1353] Guérard, op. cit. 46.

[1354] Leber, x. 125, from Mercure de France for April, 1726; Gasté, 46.

[1355] ‘ludunt ad quillas super voltas ecclesiae ... faciunt podia, choreas et choros ... et reliqua sicut in natalibus.’

[1356] Leber, ix. 261.

[1357] Julleville, Les Com. 233, quotes a decree of the municipality of Amiens in 1450, ‘Il a esté dit et declairié qu’il semble que ce sera tres grande recreacion, considéré les bonnes nouvelles que de jour en jour en disoit du Roy nostre sire, et que le ducée de Normendie est du tout reunye en sa main, de fere la feste du Prince des Sots.’

[1358] Ibid. 214.

[1359] Cf. ch. vii.

[1360] Julleville, Les Com. 209.

[1361] Leber, ix. 150, reprints the Recueil de la Chevauchée faicte en la Ville de Lyon le dix septiesme de novembre, 1578. Another Lyon Recueil dates from 1566. Cf. Julleville, Les Com. 234 (Amiens), 243 (Lyon), 248 (Rouen).

[1362] Cf. chs. xiii, xiv. The theatrales ludi of Pope Innocent III’s decree in 1207 probably refers only to the burlesque ‘offices’ of the feasts condemned; and even the terms used by the Theological Faculty in 1445—spectacula, ludi theatrales, personagiorum ludi—might mean no more, for at Troyes in the previous year the ‘jeu du sacre de leur arcevesque’ was called a ‘jeu de personnages,’ and this might have been a mere burlesque consecration. However, ‘jeu de personnages’ generally implies something distinctly dramatic (cf. ch. xxiv). It recurs in the Sens order of 1511. The Beauvais Daniel was possibly played at a Feast of Fools: at Tours a Prophetae and a miraculum appear under similar conditions; at Autun a Herod gave a name to the dominus festi. At Laon there were ‘mysteries’ in 1464 and 1465; by 1531 these had given way to ‘comedies.’ Farces were played at Tournai in 1498 and comedies at Lille in 1526.

[1363] Cf. ch. xv. The Toul Statutes of 1497 mention the playing of miracles, morals, and farces. At Laon the playing of a comedy had been dropped before 1546.

[1364] Julleville, Rép. Com. 321 (Catalogue des representations), and elsewhere, gives many examples. The following decree (†1327) of Dominique Grima, bishop of Pamiers, is quoted by L. Delisle, in Romania, xxii. 274: ‘Dampnamus autem et anathematizamus ludum cenicum vocatum Centum Drudorum, vulgariter Cent Drutz, actenus observatum in nostra dyocesi, et specialiter in nostra civitate Appamiensi et villa de Fuxo, per clericos et laycos interdum magni status; in quo ludo effigiabantur prelati et religiosi graduum et ordinum diversorum, facientes processionem cum candelis de cepo, et vexilis in quibus depicta erant membra pudibunda hominis et mulieris. Induebant etiam confratres illius ludi masculos iuvenes habitu muliebri et deducebant eos processionaliter ad quendam quem vocabant priorem dicti ludi, cum carminibus inhonestissima verba continentes....’ The confrates and the prior here look like a société joyeuse, but the ‘ludus cenicus’ was probably less a regular play than a dramatized bit of folk-ritual, like the Troyes Sacre de l’arcevesque and the Charivaris. The change of sex-costume is to be noted.

[1365] Cf. ch. xx.

[1366] Julleville, Les Com. 33; La Com. 73 ‘Le premier qui s’avisa, pendant l’ivresse bruyante de la fête, de monter dans la chaire chrétienne et d’y parodier le prédicateur dans une improvisation burlesque, débita le premier sermon joyeux. C’est à l’origine, comme nous avons dit, “une indécente plaisanterie de sacristain en goguette.”’ A list of extant sermons joyeux is given by Julleville, Rép. Com. 259.

[1367] Julleville, Les Com. 32, 145; La Com. 68; E. Picot, La Sottie en France (Romania, vii. 236). Jean Bouchet, Épîtres morales et familières du Traverseur (1545), i. 32, thus defines the Sottie:

‘En France elle a de sotie le nom,

Parce que sotz des gens de grand renom

Et des petits jouent les grands follies

Sur eschaffaux en parolles polies.’

[1368] Cf. ch. viii.

[1369] Creizenach, i. 395; Julleville, Les Com. 46; La Com. 19; Rép. Com. 20; E. Langlois, Robin et Marion, 13; Guy, 337; M. Sepet, Le Jeu de la Feuillée, in Études romaines dédiées à G. Paris, 69. The play is sometimes called Le Jeu d’Adam. The text is printed in Monmerque et Michel, Théâtre français au Moyen Âge, 55, and E. de Coussemaker, Œuvres de Adam de la Halle, 297.

[1370] The extant sotties are catalogued by Julleville, Rép. Com. 104, and E. Picot, in Romania, vii. 249.

[1371] Creizenach, i. 406; G. Gregory Smith, Transition Period, 317; Goedeke, Deutsche Dichtung, i. 325; V. Michels, Studien über die ältesten deutschen Fastnachtspiele, 101. The latter writer inclines to consider the Narr of these plays as substituted by fifteenth century for a more primitive Teufel. The plays themselves are collected by A. von Keller, Fastnachtspiele aus dem 15. Jahrhundert (1853-8).

[1372] C. H. Herford, Literary Relations of England and Germany, 323 sqq.; cf. G. Gregory Smith, op. cit. 176. On an actual pseudo-chivalric Order of Fools cf. p. 375.

[1373] F. C. Hingeston-Randolph, Register of Bishop Grandisson, ii. 1055, Litera pro iniqua fraternitate de Brothelyngham. ‘Ad nostrum, siquidem, non sine inquietudine gravi, pervenit auditum, quod in Civitate nostra Exonie secta quedam abhominabilis quorundam hominum malignorum, sub nomine Ordinis, quin pocius erroris, de Brothelyngham, procurante satore malorum operum, noviter insurrexit; qui, non Conventum sed conventiculam facientes evidenter illicitam et suspectam, quemdam lunaticum et delirum, ipsorum utique operibus aptissime congruentem, sibi, sub Abbatis nomine, prefecerunt, ipsumque Monachali habitu induentes ac in Theatro constitutum velut ipsorum idolum adorantes, ad flatum cornu, quod sibi statuerunt pro campana, per Civitatis eiusdem vicos et plateas, aliquibus iam elapsis diebus, cum maxima equitum et peditum multitudine commitarunt [sic]; clericos eciam laicos ceperunt eis obviam tunc prestantes, ac aliquos de ipsorum domibus extraxerunt, et invitos tam diu ausu temerario et interdum sacrilego tenuerunt, donec certas pecuniarum summas loco sacrificii, quin verius sacrilegii, extorserunt ab eisdem. Et quamvis hec videantur sub colore et velamine ludi, immo ludibrii, attemptari, furtum est, tamen, proculdubio, in eo quod ab invitis capitur et rapina.’ There is no such place as Brothelyngham, but ‘brethelyng,’ ‘brethel,’ ‘brothel,’ mean ‘good-for-nothing’ (N. E. D., s. vv.).

[1374] Du Tilliot, pl. 4.

[1375] Ibid. pll. 1-12 passim.

[1376] Julleville, Les Com. 234.

[1377] Ibid. 246; Rigollot, lxxxiv.

[1378] Marot, Epistre du Coq en l’Asne (ed. Jannet, i. 224; ed. Guiffrey, iii. 352):

‘Attachez moy une sonnette

Sur le front d’un moyne crotté,

Une aureille à chaque costé

Du capuchon de sa caboche;

Voyla un sot de la Basoche,

Aussi bien painct qu’il est possible.’

For other Paris evidence cf. Julleville, Les Com. 144, 147; E. Picot, in Romania, vii. 242.

[1379] Picot, in Romania, vii. 245; Keller, Fastnachtspiele, 258.

[1380] Rigollot, 73, 166, and passim; Strutt, 222; Douce, 516; Julleville, Les Com. 147. There are many examples in the literature referred to on p. 382.

[1381] Rigollot, lxxix.

[1382] F. de Ficoroni, Le Maschere sceniche e le Figure comiche d’antichi Romani, 186, pl. 72.

[1383] Dieterich, 237, traces the coxcomb to Italian comedy of the Atellane type; cf. ch. xxiii, on ‘Punch.’

[1384] Douce, pl. 3; cf. Leber, in Rigollot, lxi. 164, quoting the proverb ‘pisa in utre perstrepentia’ and a statement of Savaron, Traité contre les Masques (1611), that at Clermont in Auvergne men disguised ‘en Fols’ ran through the streets at Christmas ‘tenant des masses à la main, farcies de paille ou de bourre, en forme de braiette, frappant hommes et femmes.’ I suppose the bauble, like the hood, was originally part of the sacrificial exuviae and the marotte a sophistication of it.

[1385] Julleville, Les Com. 147, quoting Réponse d’Angoulevent à l’archipoète des pois pillez (1603):

‘Qu’après, dedans le char de la troupe idiotte

Ayant pour sceptre en main une peinte marotte,

Tu sois parmi Paris pourmené doucement,

Vestu de jaune et vert en ton accoustrement.’

[1386] Leber, in Rigollot, lxviii.

[1387] Julleville, Les Com. 195, 203.

[1388] Du Tilliot, 84.

[1389] See e. g. the plate (p. 9) and description (p. xii) of Touchstone in Miss E. Fogerty’s ‘costume edition’ of As You Like It.

[1390] Twelfth Night, i. 5. 95, 101; Lear, i. 4. 220.

[1391] To the English data given by the historians of court fools may be added Wardrobe Account 28 Edw. I, 1299-1300 (Soc. Antiq.), 166 ‘Martinetto de Vasconia fatuo ludenti coram dicto domino Edwardo,’ and Lib. de Comp. Garderobae, temp. Edw. II (MS. Cotton, Nero, C. viii. ff. 83, 85), quoted by Strutt, 194 ‘twenty shillings paid to Robert le Foll to buy a boclarium ad ludendum before the king.’ Robert le Foll had also a garcio. For fools at the Scottish court of James IV cf. L. H. T. i. cxcix, &c.; iii. xcii, &c.; and on Thomas, the fool of Durham Priory in the fourteenth century, Appendix E (1).

[1392] Rigollot, 74; Moreau, 180, quoting a (clearly misdated) letter of Charles V to the municipality of Troyes, which requires the provision of a new ‘fol de cour’ by that city as a royal droit. The king’s eulogy of his fool is rather touching: ‘savoir faisons à leurs dessus dictes seigneuries que Thévenin nostre fol de cour vient de trespasser de celluy monde dedans l’aultre. Le Seigneur Dieu veuille avoir en gré l’âme de luy qui oneques ne faillit en sa charge et fonction emprès nostre royale Seigneurie et mesmement ne voult si trespasser sans faire quelque joyeuseté et gentille farce de son métier.’

[1393] Moreau, 177, 197.

[1394] Quoted by Julleville, Les Com. 148:

‘L’un [le poète] a la teste verte; et l’autre va couvert

D’un joli chapperon, fait de jaune et de vert;

L’un s’amuse aux grelots, et l’autre à des sornettes.’

[1395] Requestes présentées au Roy ... par le S. de Vertau (1605), quoted by Leber, in Rigollot, lxvi; Julleville, Les Com. 147 ‘un habit ... qui estoit faict par bandes de serge, moitié de couleur verte et l’autre de jaune; et là où il y avoit des bandes jaunes, il y avoit des passemens verts, et sur les vertes des passemens jaunes ... et un bonnet aussi moitié de jaune et vert, avec des oreilles, &c.’

[1396] Kempe, Loseley MSS, 35, 47, 85.

[1397] Douce, 512; Doran, 293. Lodge, Wits Miserie (1599), describes a fool as ‘in person comely, in apparell courtly.’ The Durham accounts (Appendix E (1)) contain several entries of cloth and shoes purchased for the fool Thomas, but there is no mention of a hood.

[1398] Douce, 510.

[1399] Ibid. 510, 511. Hence the common derived sense of ‘coxcomb’ for a foolish, vain fellow.

[1400] Douce, 509, quoting ‘the second tale of the priests of Peblis,’ which, for all I know, may be a translation, ‘a man who counterfeits a fool is described “with club and bel and partie cote with eiris”; but it afterwards appears that he had both a club and a bauble.’

[1401] Douce, 510.

[1402] Douce, 512, quoting Gesta Grayorum, ‘the scribe claims the manor of Noverinte, by providing sheepskins and calves-skins to wrappe his highness wards and idiotts in’; cf. King John, iii. 1. 129 ‘And hang a calf’s-skin on those recreant limbs.’

[1403] Douce, 511.

[1404] Twelfth Night, i. 5. 63; As You Like It, ii. 7. 13, 43; King Lear, i. 4. 160; Midsummer Night’s Dream, iv. 1. 215. But the ‘long motley coat guarded with yellow’ of Hen. VIII, prol. 16, does not quite correspond to anything in the ‘habit de fou.’

[1405] King Lear, i. 4. 106. Cf. Taming of the Shrew, ii. 1. 226 ‘What is your crest? a coxcomb?’

[1406] All’s Well that Ends Well, iv. 5. 32. There are double entendre’s here and in the allusion to the ‘bauble’ of a ‘natural’ in Romeo and Juliet, ii. 4. 97, which suggest less a ‘marotte’ than a bauble of the bladder type; cf. p. 197.

[1407] As You Like It, ii. 4. 47.

[1408] Cf. ch. xxv.

[1409] Twelfth Night, ii. 3. 22.

[1410] Fools appear in As You Like It (†1599), All’s Well that Ends Well (†1601), Twelfth Night (†1601), King Lear (†1605); cf. the allusion to Yorick, the king’s jester in Hamlet, v. 1. 198 (†1603). Kempe seems to have left the Shakespearian company in 1598 or 1599.

[1411] According to Fleay, Biog. Chron. i. 25, Armin’s Nest of Ninnies, of 1608 (ed. Shakes. Soc.), is a revision of his Fool upon Fool of 1605.

[1412] As You Like It, v. 4. 111. Cf. Lionel Johnson, The Fools of Shakespeare, in Noctes Shakespearianae (Winchester Sh. Soc.); J. Thümmel, Ueber Sh.’s Narren (Sh.-Jahrbuch, ix. 87).

[1413] Tille, Y. and C. 162; Sandys, 20. At Christmas, 1065, Edward the Confessor ‘curiam tenuit’ at London, and dedicated Westminster Abbey on Innocents’ day (Florence of Worcester, Chronicle, ed. Thorpe, i. 224).

[1414] Tille, Y. and C. 160; Ramsay, F. of E. ii. 43.

[1415] Sandys, 23; Ashton, 9.

[1416] Sandys, 53; Ashton, 14; Drake, 94.

[1417] Ashton, 26; Stubbes, i. 173. Cf. Vaughan’s Poems (Muses Library, i. 107):

‘Alas, my God! Thy birth now here

Must not be number’d in the year.’

[1418] Cf. ch. xiii. There is much learning on the use of masks in seasonal festivals in C. Noirot, Traité de l’origine des masques (1609, reprinted in Leber, ix. 5); Savaron, Traité contre les masques (1611); J. G. Drechssler, de larvis natalitiis (1683); C. H. de Berger, Commentatio de personis vulgo larvis seu mascheratis (1723); Pfannenschmidt, 617; Fr. Back, de Graecorum caeremoniis in quibus homines deorum vice fungebantur (1883); W. H. Dall, On masks, labrets and certain aboriginal customs (Third Annual Report of American Bureau of Ethnology, 1884, p. 73); Frazer, Pausanias, iv. 239.

[1419] Archaeologia, xxxi, 37, 43, 44, 120, 122.

[1420] ‘Et ad faciendum ludos domini Regis ad festum Natalis domini celebratum apud Guldefordum anno Regis xxj^o, in quo expendebantur xx
iiij. iiij. tunicae de bokeram diversorum colorum, xlij viseres diversorum similitudinum (specified as xiiij similitudines facierum mulierum, xiiij similitudines facierum hominum cum barbis, xiiij similitudines capitum angelorum de argento) xxviij crestes (specified as xiiij crestes cum tibiis reversatis et calciatis, xiiij crestes cum montibus et cuniculis), xiiij clocae depictae, xiiij capita draconum, xiiij tunicae albae, xiiij capita pavonum cum alis, xiiij tunicae depictae cum oculis pavonum, xiiij capita cygnorum cum suis alis, xiiij tunicae de tela linea depictae, xiiij tunicae depictae cum stellis de auro et argento vapulatis.’ The performers seem to have made six groups of fourteen each, representing respectively men, women, angels, dragons, peacocks, and swans. A notion of their appearance is given by the cuts from miniatures (†1343) in Strutt, 160.

[1421] ‘Et ad faciendum ludos Regis ad festum Natalis domini anno Regis xxij^do celebratum apud Ottefordum ubi expendebantur viseres videlicet xij capita hominum et desuper tot capita leonum, xij capita hominum et tot capita elephantum, xij capita hominum cum alis vespertilionum, xij capita de wodewose [cf. p. 185], xvij capita virginum, xiiij supertunicae de worsted rubro guttatae cum auro et lineatae et reversatae et totidem tunicae de worsted viridi.... Et ad faciendum ludos Regis in festo Epiphaniae domini celebrato apud Mertonum ubi expendebantur xiij visers cum capitibus draconum et xiij visers cum capitibus hominum habentibus diademata, x c^r tepies de bokeram nigro et tela linea Anglica.’

[1422] Archaeologia, xxxi. 29, 30, 118. The element of semi-dramatic spectacle was already getting into the fourteenth-century tournament. In 1331 Edward III and his court rode to the lists in Cheap, ‘omnes splendido apparatu vestiti et ad similitudinem Tartarorum larvati’ (Annales Paulini in Chron. Edw. I and II, R. S. i. 354). In 1375 ‘rood dame Alice Perrers, as lady of the sune, fro the tour of London thorugh Chepe; and alwey a lady ledynge a lordys brydell. And thanne begun the grete justes in Smythefeld’ (London Chronicle, 70). These ridings closely resemble the ‘mummings’ proper. But they were a prelude to hastiludia, which from the fourteenth to the sixteenth century constantly grew less actual and more mimetic. In 1343 ‘fuerunt pulchra hastiludia in Smethfield, ubi papa et duodecim cardinales per tres dies contra quoscumque tirocinium habuerunt’ (Murimuth, Continuatio Chronicarum, R. S. 146). And so on, through the jousts of Pallas and Diana at the coronation of Henry VIII (Hall, 511) to the regular Elizabethan ‘Barriers,’ such as the siege of the ‘Fortress of Perfect Beauty’ by the ‘Four Foster Children of Desire,’ in which Sidney took part in 1581.

[1423] This seems to be clearly the sense of the ludi Domini Prioris in the accounts of Durham Priory (cf. Appendix E). The Scottish Exchequer Rolls between 1446 and 1478 contain such entries as ‘iocis et ludis,’ ‘ludis et interludiis,’ ‘ioculancium et ludencium,’ ‘ludos et disportus suos,’ where all the terms used, except ‘interludiis’ (cf. ch. xxiv), appear to be more or less equivalent (Accounts of the Treasurer of Scotland, i. ccxxxix). The Liber Niger of Edward IV declares that in the Domus of Henry I were allowed ‘ludi honesti,’ such as military sports ‘cum ceterorum iocorum diversitate’ (Household Ordinances, 18). ‘Ioca’ is here exactly the French ‘jeux.’ Polydore Vergil, Hist. Anglica (ed. Thysius), 772, says of the weddings of the children of Henry VII ‘utriusque puellae nuptiae omnium generum ludis factae.’ For ‘disports’ cf. Hall, 774, ‘enterludes ... maskes and disportes,’ and Paston Letters, iii. 314, where Lady Morley is said to have ordered in 1476 that on account of her husband’s death there should be at Christmas ‘non dysgysyngs, ner harpyng, ner lutyng, ner syngyn, ner non lowde dysports, but pleyng at the tabyllys, and schesse, and cards. Sweche dysports sche gave her folkys leve to play, and non odyr.’ I find the first use of ‘revels’ in the Household Books of Henry VII for 1493 (Collier, i. 50). In 1496 the same source gives the Latin ‘revelliones’ (Collier, i. 46). Sir Thomas Cawarden (1545) was patented ‘magister iocorum, revellorum et mascorum’ (Rymer, xv. 62). Another synonym is ‘triumph,’ used in 1511 (Arnold, Chronicle, xlv). The latter means properly a royal entry or reception; cf. ch. xxiii.

[1424] Warton, ii. 220, from Compotus Magn. Garderobae, 14 Ric. II, f. 198^b ‘pro xxi coifs de tela linea pro hominibus de lege contrafactis pro ludo regis tempore natalis domini anno xii.’

[1425] Froissart (ed. Buchon, iii. 176), Bk. iv, ch. 32, describes the dance of 1393, in which Charles VI dressed in flax as a wild man was nearly burnt to death.

[1426] The English William of Palerne, 1620 (†1350, ed. Skeat, E. E. T. S.), has ‘daunces disgisi.’

[1427] H. T. Riley, Liber Albus (R. S. xii), i. 644, 645, 647, 673, 676; Memorials of London, 193, 534, 561. For similar orders elsewhere cf. L. T. Smith, Ricart’s Calendar, 85 (Bristol), and Harl. MS. 2015, f. 64 (Chester).

[1428] Riley, Memorials, 658.

[1429] Ibid. 669. It was proclaimed ‘that no manere persone, of what astate, degre, or condicioun that euere he be, duryng this holy tyme of Cristemes be so hardy in eny wyse to walk by nyght in any manere mommyng, pleyes, enterludes, or eny other disgisynges with eny feynyd berdis, peyntid visers, diffourmyd or colourid visages in eny wyse ... outake that hit be leful to eche persone for to be honestly mery as he can, with in his owne hous dwellyng.’

[1430] Stowe, Survey (ed. Thoms), 37, from a fragment of an English chronicle, in a sixteenth-century hand, in Harl. MS. 247, f. 172^v (cf. Archaeologia, xxii. 208). I print the original text, which Stowe paraphrases, introducing, e.g., the term ‘maskers’: ‘At y^e same tyme y^e Comons of London made great sporte and solemnity to y^e yong prince: for upon y^e monday next before y^e purification of our lady at night and in y^e night were 130 men disguizedly aparailed and well mounted on horsebacke to goe on mumming to y^e said prince, riding from Newgate through Cheape whear many people saw them with great noyse of minstralsye, trumpets, cornets and shawmes and great plenty of waxe torches lighted and in the beginning they rid 48 after y^e maner of esquiers two and two together clothed in cotes and clokes of red say or sendall and their faces covered with vizards well and handsomely made: after these esquiers came 48 like knightes well arayed after y^e same maner: after y^e knightes came one excellent arrayed and well mounted as he had bene an emperor: after him some 100 yards came one nobly arayed as a pope and after him came 24 arayed like cardinals and after y^e cardinals came 8 or 10 arayed and with black vizardes like deuils appearing nothing amiable seeming like legates, riding through London and ouer London bridge towards Kenyton wher y^e yong prince made his aboad with his mother and the D. of Lancaster and y^e Earles of Cambridge, Hertford Warrick and Suffolk and many other lordes which were with him to hould the solemnity, and when they were come before y^e mansion they alighted on foot and entered into y^e haule and sone after y^e prince and his mother and y^e other lordes came out of y^e chamber into y^e haule, and y^e said mummers saluted them, shewing a pair of dice upon a table to play with y^e prince, which dice were subtilly made that when y^e prince shold cast he shold winne and y^e said players and mummers set before y^e prince three jewels each after other: and first a balle of gould, then a cupp of gould, then a gould ring, y^e which y^e said prince wonne at thre castes as before it was appointed, and after that they set before the prince’s mother, the D. of Lancaster, and y^e other earles euery one a gould ringe and y^e mother and y^e lordes wonne them. And then y^e prince caused to bring y^e wyne and they dronk with great joye, commanding y^e minstrels to play and y^e trompets began to sound and other instruments to pipe &c. And y^e prince and y^e lordes dansed on y^e one syde, and y^e mummers on y^e other a great while and then they drank and tooke their leaue and so departed toward London.’ Collier, i. 26, speaks of earlier mummings recorded by Stowe in 1236 and 1298; but Stowe only names ‘pageants’ (cf. ch. xxiii). M. Paris, Chronica Maiora (R. S. lvii), v. 269, mentions ‘vestium transformatarum varietatem’ at the wedding of Alexander III of Scotland and Margaret of England in 1251, but this probably means ‘a succession of rapidly changed robes.’

[1431] A Chronicle of London (†1442, ed. N. H. Nicolas or E. Tyrrell, 1827), 85 ‘to have sclayn the kyng ... be a mommynge’; Incerti Scriptoris Chronicon (before 1455, ed. J. A. Giles), 7 ‘conduxerunt lusores Londoniam, ad inducendum regi praetextum gaudii et laetitiae iuxta temporis dispositionem, ludum nuncupatum Anglice Mummynge’; Capgrave, Chronicle of England (†1464, R. S.), 275 ‘undir the coloure of mummeris in Cristmasse tyme’; An English Chronicle (†1461-71, C. S.), 20 ‘to make a mommyng to the king ... and in that mommyng they purposid to sle him’; Fabian, Chronicle, 567 ‘a dysguysynge or a mummynge.’ But other chroniclers say that the outbreak was to be at a tournament, e. g. Continuatio Eulogii (R. S. ix), iii. 385; Annales Henrici (R. S. xxviii), 323 ‘Sub simulatione natalitiorum vel hastiludiorum.’ I suppose ‘natalitia’ is ‘Christmas games’ and might cover a mumming. Hall, Chronicle (ed. 1809), 16, makes it ‘justes.’ So does Holinshed (ed. 1586), iii. 514, 516, but he knew both versions; ‘them that write how the king should have beene made awaie at a justs; and other that testifie, how it should have been at a maske or mummerie’; cf. Wylie, Henry the Fourth, i. 93; Ramsay, L. and Y. i. 20.

[1432] Stowe, Survey (ed. Thoms), 37, doubtless from A Chronicle of London (†1442, ut supra), 87. I do not find the mumming named in other accounts of the visit.

[1433] Gregory’s Chronicle (before 1467, in Hist. Collections of a Citizen of London, C. S.), 108 ‘the whyche Lollers hadde caste to have made a mommynge at Eltham, and undyr coloure of the mommynge to have destryte the Kynge and Hooly Chyrche.’

[1434] Acte against disguysed persons and Wearing of Visours (3 Hen. VIII, c. 9). The preamble states that ‘lately wythin this realme dyvers persons have disgysed and appareld theym, and covert theyr fayces with Vysours and other thynge in such manner that they sholde nott be knowen and divers of theym in a Companye togeder namyng them selfe Mummers have commyn to the dwellyng place of divers men of honor and other substanciall persones; and so departed unknowen.’ Offenders are to be treated as ‘Suspectes or Vacabundes.’

[1435] The Promptorium Parvulorum (†1440 C. S.), ii. 348, translates ‘Mummynge’ by ‘mussacio vel mussatus’ (‘murmuring’ or ‘keeping silence,’ conn. mutus), and gives a cognate word ‘Mummȳn, as they that noȝt speke Mutio.’ This is of course the ordinary sense of mum. But Skeat (Etym. Dict. s.v.) derives ‘mummer’ from the Dutch through Old French, and explains it by the Low German Mumme, a ‘mask.’ He adds ‘The word is imitative, from the sound mum or mom, used by nurses to frighten or amuse children, at the same time pretending to cover their faces.’ Whether the fourteenth-century mumming was silent or not, there is no reason to suppose that the primitive folk-procession out of which it arose was unaccompanied by dance and song; and silence is rarely, if ever (cf. p. 211) de rigueur in modern ‘guisings.’

[1436] They are in Trin. Coll. Camb. MS. R. iii. 20 (Shirley’s; cf. E. P. Hammond, Lydgate’s Mumming at Hertford in Anglia, xxii. 364), and copied by or for Stowe ‘out of þe boke of John Sherley’ in B. M. Add. MS. 29729, f. 132 (cf. E. Sieper, Lydgate’s Reson and Sensuallyte, E. E. T. S. i. xvi). The Hertford verses have been printed by Miss Hammond (loc. cit.) and the others by Brotanek, 306. I do not find any notice of disguisings when Henry VI spent the Christmas of 1433 at Lydgate’s own monastery of Bury St. Edmunds (F. A. Gasquet. A Royal Christmas in The Old English Bible, 226). Devon, Issues of the Exchequer, 473, notes a payment for the king’s ‘plays and recreations’ at Christmas, 1449.

[1437] ‘A lettre made in wyse of balade by daun Johan, brought by a poursuyant in wyse of Mommers desguysed to fore þe Mayre of London, Eestfeld, vpon þe twelffeþe night of Cristmasse, ordeyned Ryallych by þe worthy Merciers, Citeseyns of london’ and ‘A lettre made in wyse of balade by ledegate daun Johan, of a mommynge, whiche þe Goldesmythes of þe Cite of London mommed in Right fresshe and costele welych desguysing to þeyre Mayre Eestfeld, vpon Candelmasse day at nyght, affter souper; brought and presented vn to þe Mayre by an heraude, cleped ffortune.’ The Mercer’s pursuivant is sent from Jupiter; the Goldsmiths’ mummers are David and the twelve tribes. The Levites were to sing. William Eastfield was mayor 1429-30 and 1437-8. Brotanek, 306, argues that, as a second term is not alluded to, this was probably the first. Fairholt, Lord Mayors’ Pageants, ii. 240, prints a similar letter of Lydgate’s sent to the Sheriffs at a May-day dinner.

[1438] ‘A balade made by daun John Lidegate at Eltham in Cristmasse for a momyng tofore þe kyng and þe Qwene.’ Bacchus, Juno and Ceres send gifts ‘by marchandes þat here be.’ The same collections contain a balade, ‘gyven vnto þe Kyng Henry and to his moder the quene Kateryne sittyng at þe mete vpon the yeares day in the castell of Hertford.’ Some historical allusions make 1427 a likely date (Brotanek, 305).

[1439] ‘Þe devyse of a momyng to fore þe kyng henry þe sixte, beinge in his Castell of wyndesore, þe fest of his crystmasse holdyng þer, made by lidegate daun John, þe munk of Bury, howe þampull and þe floure delys came first to þe Kynges of ffraunce by myrakle at Reynes.’ An allusion to Henry’s coming coronation in Paris fixes the date to 1429-30.

[1440] ‘Þe deuyse of a desguysing to fore þe gret estates of þis lande, þane being at London, made by Lidegate daun Johan, þe Munk of Bury, of dame fortune, dame prudence, dame Rightwysnesse and dame ffortitudo. beholdeþe, for it is moral, plesaunt and notable.’ A fifth dame is ‘Attemperaunce.’ The time is ‘Cristmasse.’ An elaborate pageant in which Fortune dwelt is described. A song is directed at the close. Henry V is spoken of as dead.

[1441] ‘Nowe foloweth here the maner of a bille by weye of supplycation put to the kynge holdinge his noble fest of crystmasse in the castell of hartford as in dysguysinge of þe rude vpplandishe people complayninge on their wyues with the boystrus answere of ther wyues deuysed by lidgate at þe requeste of the countrowlore Brys slain at louiers.’ Louviers was taken by the French in 1430 and besieged next year (Brotanek, 306). The text has marginal notes, ‘demonstrando vj rusticos,’ &c.

[1442] Cf. p. 393. There is a disguising of 1483 in the Howard Accounts (Appendix E, vii).

[1443] L. H. T. Accounts, i. ccxl ‘Iohanni Rate, pictori, pro le mumre regis’ (1465-6); ad le mumre grath’ (1466-7).

[1444] Ibid. i. lxxix, cxliv, ccxxxix; ii. lxxi, cx; iii. xlvi, lv, and passim, have many payments for dances at court, of which some were morris dances, with ‘leg-harnis,’ and also to ‘madinnis,’ ‘gysaris,’ or ‘dansaris’ who ‘dansit’ or ‘playit’ to the king in various parts of the country.

[1445] Campbell, Materials for a Hist. of Henry VII (R. S.), passim; Collier, i. 38-64; Bentley, Excerpta Historica, 85-133; Leland, Collectanea, iii. 256.

[1446] Collier, i. 58, from Harl. MS. 69. A word which Collier prints ‘Maskers’ is clearly a misprint for ‘Masters,’ and misleading.

[1447] Ibid. i. 53. The ‘morris’ provided a grotesque element, analogous to the ‘antimasque’ of Jonson’s day.

[1448] Ibid. i. 24, from Fairfax MSS. Of this Booke of all manner of Orders concerning an Earle’s house ‘some part is dated 16 Henry VII, although the handwriting appears to be that of the latter end of the reign of Henry VIII.’

[1449] Hall, 513; Brewer, ii. 1490.

[1450] Hen. VIII, i. 4; Hall, 719; Stowe, Chronicle, 845; Cavendish, Life of Wolsey, 112; Boswell-Stone, Shakespeare’s Holinshed, 441; R. Brown, Venetian Papers, iv. 3, 4.

[1451] Brewer, iii. 1552.

[1452] Ibid. iv. 1390-3; Hall, 722.

[1453] Ibid. ii. 1495, 1497, 1499, 1501, 1509; iii. 1558.

[1454] Hall, 597, speaks of a disguising in 1519, which apparently included ‘a goodly commedy of Plautus’ and a mask. Away from court in 1543 four players were committed to the Counter for ‘unlawful disguising’ (P. C. Acts, i. 109, 110, 122). They surely played interludes. It may be further noted (i) the elaborate disguisings of Henry VII and Henry VIII, with much action and speechifying besides the dancing, are difficult to distinguish when merely described from interludes. What Hall, 518, calls in 1511 an interlude, seems from the Revels Accounts (Brewer, ii. 1495) to have been really a disguising. Hall, 641, speaks of a ‘disguisyng or play’ in 1522, and Cavendish, Life of Wolsey, i. 136, of a ‘disguising or interlude’ in 1527; (ii) a disguising or dance might be introduced, as entr’acte or otherwise, into an interlude. In 1514 an interlude ‘conteyned a moresk of vj persons and ij ladys’ (Collier, i. 68). In 1526 a moral play was ‘set forth with straunge deuises of Maskes and Morrishes’ (Hall, 719). The interlude of The Nature of the Four Elements (early Hen. VIII) has after the dramatis personae the direction, ‘Also yf ye lyst ye may brynge in a dysgysynge’; cf. Soergel, 21.

[1455] Hall, 526.

[1456] Evans, xxi. Other not very plausible suggestions are made by Ward, i. 150; Soergel, 13. There is a good account of the Italian mascherata from about 1474 in Symonds, Shakespeare’s Predecessors, 321.

[1457] Brewer, ii. 1497. There is a further entry in an account of 1519 (Brewer, iii. 35) of a revel, called a ‘masklyne,’ after the manner of Italy.

[1458] ‘Maske’ first appears in 1514 (Collier, i. 79 ‘iocorum larvatorum, vocat. Maskes, Revelles, and Disguysings’); ‘masque’ is not English until the seventeenth century (Evans, xiii). Skeat derives through the French masque, masquer, masquerer, and the Spanish mascara, mascarada (Ital. mascherata) from the Arabic maskharat, a buffoon or droll (root sakhira, ‘he ridiculed’). The original sense would thus be ‘entertainment’ and that of ‘face-mask’ (larva, ‘vizard,’ ‘viser’) only derivative. But late Latin has already masca, talamasca in this sense; e.g. Burchardus of Worms, Coll. Decretorum (before 1024), bk. ii. c. 161 ‘nec larvas daemonum quas vulgo Talamascas dicunt, ibi ante se ferri consentiat’; cf. Ducange, s.v. Talamasca; Pfannenschmidt, 617, with some incorrect etymology. And the French masque is always the face-mask and never the performance; while se masquier, masquillier, maschurer, are twelfth-to thirteenth-century words for ‘blacken,’ ‘dirty.’ I therefore prefer the derivation of Brotanek, 120, from a Germanic root represented by the M. E. maskel ‘stain’; and this has the further advantage of explaining ‘maskeler,’ ‘maskeling,’ which appear, variously spelt, in documents of †1519-26. Both terms signify the performance, and ‘maskeler’ the performer also (Brotanek, 122). Face-masks were de rigueur in the Mask to a late date. In 1618 John Chamberlain writes ‘the gentlemen of Gray’s Inn came to court with their show, for I cannot call it a masque, seeing they were not disguised, nor had vizards’ (Nichols, James I, iii. 468).

[1459] Ben Jonson, iii. 162. Masque of Augurs (1623) ‘Disguise was the old English word for a masque, sir, before you were an implement belonging to the Revels’; ii. 476, A Tale of a Tub (1634), v. 2:

‘Pan. A masque! what’s that?

Scriben. A mumming or a shew,

With vizards and fine clothes.

Clench. A disguise, neighbour,

Is the true word.’

[1460] Cf. ch. x. Less dramatic performances are described for the ‘guizards’ of the Scottish Lowlands by R. Chambers, Popular Rhymes of Scotland, 169, for the ‘mummers’ of Ireland in N. and Q. 3rd series, viii. 495, for the ‘mummers’ of Yorkshire in F. L. iv. 162. The latter sweep the hearth, humming ‘mumm-m-m.’

[1461] L. H. T. Accounts, i. ccxl, 270, 327; ii. cx, 111, 320, 374, 430, 431; iii. 127. In 1504 is a payment ‘to the barbour helit Paules hed quhen he wes hurt with the Abbot of Unresoun.’ Besides the court Abbot, there was an ‘Abbot of Unresone of Linlithgow’ in 1501, who ‘dansit to the king,’ and an ‘Abbot of Unresoun of the pynouris of Leith’ in 1504. Such entries cease after the Scottish Act of Parliament of 1555 (cf. p. 181).

[1462] Stowe, Survey, 37 ‘There was in the feast of Christmas in the King’s house, wheresoever he was lodged, a Lord of Misrule or Master of Merry Disports; and the like had ye in the house of every nobleman of honour or good worship, were he spiritual or temporal. Among the which, the Mayor of London and either of the Sheriffs had their several Lords of Misrule, ever contending, without quarrel or offence, who should make the rarest pastimes to delight the beholders. These Lords beginning their rule on Allhollons eve, continued the same til the morrow after the feast of the Purification, commonly called Candlemas-day. In all which space there were fine and subtle disguisings, masks and mummeries’; Holinshed (ed. 1587), iii. 1067 ‘What time [at Christmas], of old ordinarie course, there is alwaies one appointed to make sport in the court, called commonlie lord of misrule: whose office is not unknowne to such as haue beene brought up in noble mens houses, & among great house keepers which use liberall feasting in that season.’ The sense of ‘misrule’ in this phrase is ‘disorder’; cf. the ‘uncivil rule’ of Twelfth Night, ii. 3. 132.

[1463] Collier, i. 48-55; Bentley, Excerpt. Historica, 90, 92; Leland, Collectanea (ed. Hearne), iv. 255. The ‘Lords’ named are one Ringley in 1491, 1492, and 1495, and William Wynnesbury in 1508. In this year the terms ‘Lordship’ and ‘Abbot’ are both used. The ‘Lord’ got a fee each year of £6 13s. 4d. Also the queen (1503) gave him £1.

[1464] Collier, i. 74, 76; Brewer, i. cxi. Wynnesbury was Lord in 1509, 1511 to 1515, and 1519, Richard Pole in 1516, Edmund Trevor in 1518, William Tolly in 1520. The fees gradually rise to £13 6s. 8d. and a ‘rewarde’ of £2. Madden, Expenses of Princess Mary, xxvi, enters a gift in 1520 ‘domino mali gubernatoris [? gubernationis] hospicii domini Regis.’

[1465] Brewer, vii. 589.

[1466] Madden, op. cit. xxviii. He was John Thurgood.

[1467] Ellis, Original Letters (1st series), i. 270.

[1468] Campbell, Materials for Hist. of Hen. VII (R. S.), i. 337; ii. 60, 83; Collier, i. 50; Yorke, Hardwicke Papers, 19. Payments are made for ‘revels’ or ‘disguisings’ to Richard Pudsey ‘serjeant of the cellar,’ Walter Alwyn, Peche, Jaques Haulte, ‘my Lord Suff, my Lord Essex, my Lord Will^m, and other,’ John Atkinson, Lewes Adam, ‘master Wentworth.’ In 1501 Jaques Hault and William Pawne are appointed to devise disguisings and morisques for a wedding. The term ‘Master of the Revels’ is in none of these cases used. But in an ‘Order for sitting in the King’s great Chamber,’ dated Dec. 31, 1494 (Ordinances and Regulations, Soc. Antiq. 113), it is laid down that ‘if the master of revells be there, he may sit with the chaplains or with the squires or gentlemen ushers.’

[1469] Revels Accounts (Brewer, ii. 1490; iii. 1548), s. ann. 1510, 1511, 1512, 1513, 1515, 1517, 1522; Brewer, i. 718; ii. 1441; xiv. 2. 284; Kempe, 69; Collier, i. 68. Guildford is several times called ‘master of the revels’; so is Harry Wentworth in 1510. In 1522 Guildford is ‘the hy kountrolleler.’ It was the ‘countrowlore’ at whose request Lydgate prepared one of his disguisings (p. 398).

[1470] Rymer, xv. 62 ‘dedimus et concessimus eidem Thomae officium Magistri Iocorum Revelorum & Mascorum omnium & singularium nostrorum vulgariter nuncupatorum Revells & Masks.’ The tenure of office was to date from March 16, 1544, and the annual fee was £10.

[1471] Collier, i. 79, 131, 139, 153; Kempe, 69, 73, 93, 101; Molyneux Papers (Hist. MS. Comm., seventh Rep.), 603, 614; Brewer, ii. 2. 1517; xiii. 2. 100; xiv. 2. 159, 284; xvi. 603; Halliwell, A Collection of Ancient Documents respecting the Office of Master of the Revels (1870); P. Cunningham, Extracts from the Accounts of Revels at Court (Sh. Soc. 1842).

[1472] Kempe, 19; Collier, i. 147; Holinshed (ut cit. supra, p. 403); W. F. Trench, A Mirror for Magistrates, its Origin and Influence, 66, 76.

[1473] Kempe, 23. One of Ferrers’ letters to Cawarden is endorsed ‘Ferryrs, the Lorde Myserable, by the Cunsell’s aucketorryte.’ Ferrers solemnly heads his communications ‘Qui est et fuit,’ and alludes to the king as ‘our Founder.’

[1474] Kempe, 85.

[1475] Ibid. 28.

[1476] Machyn, 13.

[1477] Kempe, 32; Collier, i. 148; W. F. Trench, op. cit. 21; D. N. B. s. v. William Baldwin; G[ulielmus] B[aldwin] Beware the Cat (1570, reprinted by Halliwell, 1864). In this pamphlet Baldwin tells a story heard by him at court ‘the last Christmas,’ where he was with ‘Maister Ferrers, then maister of the King’s Majesties pastimes.’ The date seems fixed to 1552 by a mention of ‘Maister Willott and Maister Stremer, the one his [Ferrers’] Astronomer, the other his Divine’ (cf. Kempe, 34). The pamphlet was probably printed in 1553 and suppressed.

[1478] Machyn, 28; Stowe, Annals, 608. Abraham Fleming in Holinshed (ed. 1587), copying Stowe, transfers the events of this Christmas by mistake to 1551-2.

[1479] Kempe, 53; cf. p. 369.

[1480] Ibid. 47.

[1481] The letter from Ferrers dated in Kempe, 37 ‘Saynt John’s Daye, ano 1553,’ clearly belongs to the Christmas of 1552. The additional garments asked for therein are in the accounts for that year (Kempe, 52).

[1482] A. Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (ed. Bliss), iii. 480 ‘The custom was not only observed in that [St. John’s] college, but in several other houses, particularly in Merton College, where, from the first foundation, the fellows annually elected, about St. Edmund’s day, in November, a Christmas lord, or lord of misrule, styled in their registers Rex Fabarum and Rex Regni Fabarum; which custom continued until the reformation of religion, and then, that producing puritanism, and puritanism presbytery, the profession of it looked upon such laudable and ingenious customs as popish, diabolical and antichristian’; Hist. and Antiq. of the Univ. of Oxford, ii. 136, ‘s. a. 1557’ mentions an oration ‘de ligno et foeno’ made by David de la Hyde, in praise of ‘Mr. Jasper Heywood, about this time King, or Christmas Lord, of the said Coll. [Merton] being it seems the last that bore that commendable office. That custom hath been as ancient for ought that I know as the College itself, and the election of them after this manner. On the 19th of November, being the vigil of S. Edmund, king and martyr, letters under seal were pretended to have been brought from some place beyond sea, for the election of a king of Christmas, or Misrule, sometimes called with us of the aforesaid college, Rex Fabarum. The said letters being put into the hands of the Bachelaur Fellows, they brought them into the Hall that night, and standing, sometimes walking, round the fire, there reading the contents of them, would choose the senior Fellow that had not yet borne that office, whether he was a Doctor of Divinity, Law, or Physic, and being so elected, had power put into his hands of punishing all misdemeanours done in the time of Christmas, either by imposing exercises on the juniors, or putting into the stocks at the end of the Hall any of the servants, with other punishments that were sometimes very ridiculous. He had always a chair provided for him, and would sit in great state when any speeches were spoken, or justice to be executed, and so this his authority would continue till Candlemas, or much about the time that the Ignis Regentium was celebrated in that college’; Life and Times (O. H. S.), i. 423 ‘Fresh nights, carolling in public halls, Christmas sports, vanished, 1661.’

[1483] The title is borrowed from the Twelfth-Night King; cf. p. 260. Perhaps ‘Rex de Faba’ was an early name for the Lord of Misrule at the English court. In 1334 Edward III made a gift to the minstrels ‘in nomine Regis Fabae’ (Strutt, 344).

[1484] G. C. Brodrick, Memorials of Merton College, 46 and passim; B. W. Henderson, Merton College, 267.

[1485] The Christmas Prince in 1607, printed in Miscellanea Antiqua Anglicana (1816); M. L. Lee, Narcissus: A Twelfth Night Merriment, xvii.

[1486] The Prince’s designation was ‘The most magnificent and renowned Thomas by the fauour of Fortune, Prince of Alba Fortunata, Lord S^t. Iohn’s, high Regent of y^e Hall, Duke of S^t. Giles, Marquesse of Magdalens, Landgraue of y^e Groue, County Palatine of y^e Cloisters, Cheife Bailiffe of y^e Beaumonts, high Ruler of Rome, Maister of the Man̄or of Waltham, Gouernour of Gloster-greene, Sole Com̄aunder of all Titles, Turneaments and Triumphes, Superintendent in all Solemnities whatsoeuer.’ His seal, a crowned and spotted dog, with the motto Pro aris et focis, bears the date 1469. Amongst his officers was a ‘M^r of y^e Reuells.’ His Cofferer was Christopher Wren.

[1487] Wood, Hist. of Oxford (ut supra, p. 408), ii. 136, has the following note ‘New Coll. in Cat. MSS., p. 371 ... Magd. Coll. v. Heylin’s Diary, an. 1617, 1619 et 1620.’

[1488] Warton, iii. 304 ‘pro prandio Principis Natalicii eodem tempore xiii^s. ix^d.’

[1489] H. H. Henson, Letters relating to Oxford in the fourteenth century in the Oxford Hist. Soc.’s Collectanea, i. 39. The learned editor does not give the MS. from which he takes the letters, but the rest of his collection is from the fourteenth-century Brit. Mus. Royal MS. 12 D, xi.

[1490] ‘Quocirca festi praesentis imminenti vigilia, vos ut accepimus in loco potatorio, hora extraordinaria prout moris est, unanimiter congregati, dominum Robertum Grosteste militem in armis scolasticis scitis [Ed. satis] providum et expertum, electione concordi sustulistis ad apicem regiae dignitatis.’

[1491] Cf. p. 279.

[1492] Grosseteste probably became a student at Oxford before 1196. About 1214 he became Chancellor, and it seems hardly likely, as Mr. Stevenson thinks, that he would have been rex natalicius as late as †1233 (F. S. Stevenson, Robert Grosseteste, 8, 25, 110). There were of course no colleges †1200; if rex, he was rex at a hall. But 1200 is an early date even in the history of the Feast of Fools.

[1493] Cooper, Annals of Cambridge, ii. 32; Stat. Acad. Cantab. 161.

[1494] Fuller, Good Thoughts in Worse Times (1646), 193 ‘Some sixty years since, in the University of Cambridge it was solemnly debated betwixt the Heads to debarre young schollers of that liberty allowed them in Christmas, as inconsistent with the Discipline of Students. But some grave Governors mentioned the good use thereof, because thereby, in twelve days, they more discover the dispositions of Scholars than in twelve moneths before’; Hist. of Cambridge (ed. M. Prickett and J. Wright), 301 (s. a. 1610-11), describing a University Sermon by Wm. Ames, Fellow of Christ’s, who ‘had (to use his own expression) the place of a watchman for an hour in the tower of the University; and took occasion to inveigh against the liberty taken at that time, especially in such colleges who had lords of misrule, a pagan relic which (he said) as Polidore Vergil showeth, remaineth only in England.’ W. Ames had, in consequence, to ‘forsake his college.’ Polydore Vergil, de Inventoribus Rerum, v. 2 (transl. Langley, f. 102^v), speaks of ‘the Christemass Lordes’ of England.

[1495] Cooper, op. cit. ii. 112; Baker, St. John’s, ii. 573. Lords in 1545 and 1556.

[1496] Ibid. ii. 111. A lord in 1566. Peile, Christ’s College, 54, quotes payments of the time of Edward VI ‘for sedge when the Christenmasse lords came at Candlemas to the Colledge with shewes’; ‘for the lordes of S. Andrewes and his company resorting to the Colledge.’ These were perhaps from the city; cf. p. 419.

[1497] Dee, Compendious Rehearsal (Chronicle of John of Glastonbury, ed. T. Hearne, 502), ‘in that College also (by my advice and by my endeavors, divers ways used with all the other colleges) was their Christmas Magistrate first named and confirmed an Emperor. The first was one Mr. Thomas Dun, a very goodly man of person, stature and complexion, and well learned also.’ Warton, iii. 302, describes a draught of the college statutes in Rawl. MS. 233, in which cap. xxiv is headed ‘de Praefecto Ludorum qui Imperator dicitur,’ and provides for the superintendence by the Imperator of the Spectacula at Christmas and Candlemas. But the references to the Imperator have been struck out with a pen, and the title altered to ‘de Comoediis Ludisque in natali Christi exhibendis.’ This is the title of cap. xxiv as actually issued in 1560 (Mullinger, University of Cambridge, 579). The earlier statutes of 1552 have no such chapter.

[1498] H. King, Funeral Sermon of Bishop Duppa (1662), 34 ‘Here he had the greatest dignity which the School could afford put upon him, to be the Paedonomus at Christmas, Lord of his fellow scholars: which title was a pledge and presage that, from a Lord in jeast, he should, in his riper age, become one in earnest’; cf. J. Sargeaunt, Annals of Westminster School, 64.

[1499] Records of Lincoln’s Inn: Black Books, i. 1.

[1500] Paston Letters, i. 186. The names of two gentlemen chosen stewards this year at the Middle and Inner Temples are mentioned.

[1501] Fortescue, de Laudibus, cap. xlix.

[1502] N. E. D. s. v. Cockney, supposes the word to be here used in the sense of ‘cockered child,’ ‘mother’s darling.’

[1503] Records of Lincoln’s Inn: Black Books, i. xxx, 181, 190; ii. xxvii, 191; iii. xxxii, 440; W. Dugdale, 246; W. Herbert, 314; J. A. Manning, Memoirs of Rudyerd, 16; J. Evelyn, Diary (s. ann. 1661-2). As an appendix to vol. iii of the Black Book is reprinted ’Εγκυκλοχορεία, or Universal Motion, Being part of that Magnificent Entertainment by the noble Prince de la Grange, Lord Lieutenant of Lincoln’s Inn. Presented to the High and Mighty Charles II’ (1662). Evelyn mentions the ‘solemne foolerie’ of the Prince de la Grange.

[1504] Cf. p. 257.

[1505] ‘Supper ended, the Constable-Marshall presenteth himself with Drums afore him, mounted upon a Scaffold, born by four men; and goeth three times round about the Harthe, crying out aloud “A Lorde, a Lorde, &c.”—Then he descendeth and goeth to dance, &c., & after he calleth his Court, every one by name, in this manner: “Sir Francis Flatterer, of Fowleshurst, in the county of Buckingham. Sir Randle Rackabite, of Rascall Hall, in the County of Rakehell. Sir Morgan Mumchance, of Much Monkery, in the County of Mad Mopery. Sir Bartholmew Baldbreech, of Buttocke-bury, in the County of Brekeneck”.... About Seaven of the Clocke in the Morning the Lord of Misrule is abroad, and if he lack any Officer or attendant, he repaireth to their Chambers, and compelleth them to attend in person upon him after Service in the Church, to breakfast, with Brawn, Mustard, and Malmsey. After Breakfast ended, his Lordship’s power is in suspence, until his personal presence at night; and then his power is most potent.’

[1506] W. Dugdale, 153; Herbert, 205, 254; F. A. Inderwick, Calendar of the I. T. Records, i. xxxiv, 3, 75, 171, 183.

[1507] G. Legh, Accedens of Armory (1562), describes the proceedings; cf. Dugdale, 151; Herbert, 248; Inderwick, op. cit. lxiv, 219. Machyn, 273, mentions the riding through London of this ‘lord of mysrull’ on Dec. 27.

[1508] Cf. references for Gesta Grayorum in p. 417.

[1509] Ashton, 155, quoting The Reign of King Charles (1655) ‘A Lieutenant, which we country folk call a Lord of Misrule.’ In the sixteenth century the lieutenant was only an officer of the constable-marshal.

[1510] Dugdale, 149; Herbert, 201.

[1511] Dugdale, 202, 205; Herbert, 215, 231, 235.

[1512] J. A. Manning, Memoirs of Rudyerd, 9. Carleton wrote to Chamberlain on Dec. 29, 1601, that ‘Mrs. Nevill, who played her prizes, and bore the belle away in the Prince de Amour’s revels, is sworn maid of honour’ (Cal. S. P. Dom. Eliz. 1601-3, 136).

[1513] Dugdale, 191.

[1514] G. Garrard to Strafford (Strafford Letters, i. 507); Warton, iii. 321; Ward, iii. 173.

[1515] Dugdale, 285; Herbert, 333; R. J. Fletcher, Pension Book of Gray’s Inn (1901), xxviii, xxxix, xlix, 68 and passim.

[1516] His full title was ‘The High and Mighty Prince Henry, Prince of Purpoole, Arch-duke of Stapulia and Bernardia, Duke of High and Nether Holborn, Marquis of St. Giles and Tottenham, Count Palatine of Bloomsbury and Clerkenwell, Great Lord of the Cantons of Islington, Kentish Town, Paddington and Knightsbridge, Knight of the most heroical Order of the Helmet, and Sovereign of the same.’

[1517] Halliwell-Phillipps, i. 122; Ward, ii. 27, 628; Sandys, 93; Spedding, Works of Bacon, viii. 235; S. Lee, Life of Shakespeare, 70; W. R. Douthwaite, Gray’s Inn, 227; Fletcher, 107. A full description of the proceedings is in the Gesta Grayorum (1688), reprinted in Nichols, Progresses of Elizabeth, iii. 262.

[1518] Douthwaite, op. cit. 234; Fletcher, 72, 299; Nichols, Progresses of James I, iii. 466. To this year belong the proceedings of ‘Henry the Second,’ Prince of Purpoole, printed by Nichols, Eliz. iii. 320, as the ‘Second Part’ of the Gesta Grayorum; cf. Hazlitt, Manual, 95, 161. ‘Henry the Second, Prince of Graya and Purpulia,’ was a subscriber to Minsheu’s Dictionary (1617). An earlier Prince of Purpoole is recorded in 1587 (Fletcher, 78).

[1519] Dugdale, 281, 286; Herbert, 334, 336.

[1520] Douthwaite, op. cit. 243, 245.

[1521] Percy, N. H. B. 344, 346.

[1522] Machyn, 125.

[1523] Archaeologia, xviii. 333; Ashton, 144. Other passages showing that lords of misrule were appointed in private houses are given by Hazlitt-Brand, i. 272.

[1524] Ashton, 144; cf. p. 407.

[1525] Hist. of Cov. in Fordun, Scotichronicon, ed. Hearne, v. 1450; Morris, 353.

[1526] Cf. p. 261.

[1527] Machyn, 162, 274. The Westminster lord seems to have been treated with scant courtesy, for ‘he was browth in-to the contur in the Pultre; and dyver of ys men lay all nyght ther.’

[1528] Cf. p. 173.

[1529] Brewer, ix. 364. The lord of misrule was chosen in the church ‘to solace the parish’ at Christmas.

[1530] Cf. p. 181.