[205] Hist. ed. Dugdale, p. 336.
[206] The Squire of Low Degree.
[207] Ellis’s Metrical Romances, t. iii. p. 167.
For state receptions, our kings used to send out an order that the houses should be “curtained” all along the streets which the procession would have to take through London, “incortinaretur.”[208] How this was done we learn from Chaucer in the “Knight’s Tale,”[209]
By ordinance, thurghout the cite large
Hanged with cloth of gold, and not with sarge;
as well as from the “Life of Alexander:”—
Al theo city was by-hong
Of riche baudekyns and pellis (palls) among.[210]
Hence, when Elizabeth, our Henry VII.’s queen, “proceeded from the Towre throwge the Citie of London (for her coronation) to Westminster, al the strets ther wich she shulde passe by, were clenly dressed and besene with clothes of Tappestreye and Arras. And some strets, as Cheepe, hangged with riche clothes of gold, velvetts, and silks, &c.[211] “As late as A.D. 1555, at Bow chyrche in London was hangyd with cloth of gold and with ryche hares (arras).”[212]