On the eve of the tournament the youthful esquires practised among themselves in the lists with less weighty and less dangerous weapons than those wielded by the knights. These preludes, which were often graced by the presence of the ladies, were termed éprouves (trials), vêpres du tournoi (tournament vespers), or escremie (fencing bouts). The esquires who distinguished themselves the most in these trials were frequently immediately admitted to the rank of knighthood, and allowed to take part in the ensuing feats. Like the Olympic games of Greece, tournaments, which were real popular solemnities, excited the ambition and quickened the pulses of all. Stands, usually roofed and closed in, were erected at the ends of the lists to afford shelter to persons of distinction in the event of bad weather. These stands, sometimes built tower-shape, were divided into boxes, and more or less magnificently decorated with tapestry, hangings, pennants, shields of arms, and banners. Kings, queens, princes, dames, damoiselles, and the older knights, the natural judges of the combats in which they could no longer take a personal share, stationed themselves there. The camp marshals and the seconds or counsellors of the knights, whose duty it was to enforce the laws of Christian chivalry, and to give their advice and assistance to all who might require it, had also their respective posts. The kings-at-arms, the heralds, and pursuivants-at-arms, stood within the arena or just without it, and were expected to narrowly observe the combatants, and to draw up a faithful and minute report of the different incidents of the combat, without forgetting a single blow. Every now and then they lifted up their voices to encourage the younger knights who were making their first appearance in the lists: “Recollect whose son you are! be worthy of your ancestry!” they cried, in loud tones. Besides these, varlets and sergeants, who were specially entrusted with the duty of keeping order, of picking up and replacing broken weapons, and of raising unhorsed knights, were posted everywhere in and about the lists; while musicians on separate stands held themselves ready to celebrate with noisy flourishes every great feat of arms and every fortunate and brilliant stroke. The sound of their clarions announced the entry of the knights into the lists, stepping with slow and solemn cadence, magnificently armed and equipped, and followed by their esquires on horseback. Sometimes the ladies were the first to enter the lists, leading in by golden or silver chains the knights, their slaves, whom they only set at liberty when the signal was given for the combat to commence. The ladies almost always bestowed a favour on their favourite knight or servitor, generally a scarf, a veil, a head-dress, a mantle, a bracelet, or even a plain bow of ribbon, which had formed part of their own dress. This was termed an enseigne or nobloy (distinguishing mark), and was placed on a knight’s shield, lance, or helmet, so that his lady might be able to recognise him in the mêlée, particularly when his weapons were broken, or when he had lost some essential portion of his armour. While the combat lasted the heralds uttered loud cries of encouragement, and the musicians sounded loud flourishes, at each decisive blow of lance or sword; and between each tilt the nobles and the ladies distributed a quantity of small coins amongst the crowd, who received it with loud and joyous cries of largesse! and noël!
Fig. 134.—The Prize of the Tournament.—From a Looking-glass Lid in Carved Ivory. End of the Thirteenth Century.
Fig. 135.—King Henri II. wounded by Montgomery in a Tournament (1559).—From an Engraving of the Sixteenth Century in the possession of M. Ambr. Firmin-Didot.
The combat being over, and the victor being declared according to the reports of the heralds and pursuivants, the prize was given away with all proper solemnity by the elder knights and sometimes by the ladies (Fig. 134). The latter conducted the conqueror with great pomp and triumph to the splendid banquet which followed the tournament. The place of honour occupied by the successful knight, the resplendent clothes in which he was dressed, the kiss that he had the privilege of giving to the most beautiful ladies, the poems and the songs in which his prowess was celebrated, were the last items in this knightly pageant, which was generally accompanied by bloodshed, and frequently by the death of some of its actors. As we have already stated, the usages of the tournament often varied; nothing, for example, could be more unlike the warlike sports of Germany in the thirteenth century, as related in the “Niebelungen,” nothing could be more unlike those sanguinary and ferocious struggles, than the Provençal and Sicilian tournaments of the fifteenth century, described in such glowing language by good King René in the magnificent manuscript which he spent his leisure in illuminating with miniatures. This poet-king, refined in manners, generous in disposition, and cultivated in his tastes, attempted, under the influence of the romantic and religious charm which, still pervaded the chivalric sports of this epoch, to perpetuate with pen and pencil, in prose and in verse, the memory of a magnificent festival over which he presided, and which may be considered an unsurpassed example of the ceremonies of the time. All who take an interest in the subject should read this curious manuscript, which describes among other things the famous struggle between the Duke of Brittany and the Duke of Bourbon. In this may be found related to its smallest details the whole ceremony of a grand tournament, its forms, its progress, and its incidents; in it appear careful comments upon every trifle that increased the brilliancy or added to the effect of this courtly festival, as well as everything that threw a light upon the spirit in which it was carried out, or the usages that regulated every detail, from the armour of the knights to the smallest incidents of the ceremonial. In its pages illustrations reproduce with exact truthfulness the helmets of the knights with barred vizors and leathern shields, their maces, their swords, and their hourts, intended to protect the croup and the hind legs of their chargers (Fig. 136). Its text, written with great care and in an elegant hand, records the rules to be observed, in accordance with knighthood’s truest spirit, at the different stages of the combat and the tournament, and minutely describes all their preliminaries and accessories, the giving and the accepting of a challenge, the mutual exchange of gages, the presentation of warrants of nobility by the kings-at-arms, the distribution of the coats-of-arms or insignia of the two parties to the strife, the entry of the nobles, and the bestowal of the prizes upon the conquerors by the queen of the tournament.
Fig. 136.—“Designs of armour for the head, the body, and the arms, helmets and streamers (called in Flanders and Brabant hacheures or hachements), coats-of-arms, and swords for tournaments.”—From Miniatures in the “Tournaments of King René” (Fifteenth Century).
King René’s book is a document all the more valuable to an historian of the customs of chivalry, in that it was written at an epoch when they still existed in all their splendour; although signs of their decadence had already showed themselves. That punctilious sovereign, Philippe le Bel, with his court of lawyers and usurers, had already dealt chivalry a crushing blow by the regulations be drew up for the better government of single combats and gages of battle. Between his reign and that of Charles VII. this decadence became more marked. Commerce had made much progress, the wealth of the middle classes had much increased, and the monarchy had acquired a preponderating influence, to the detriment both of feudalism and chivalry, which began simultaneously to decline; the reign of Louis XI., a reign of espionage and of cunning, was fatal to them—thenceforward their little remaining prestige rapidly waned and soon entirely expired. François I. made several fruitless attempts to rekindle the dying embers of chivalry, and, at a later period, Henri IV. and Louis XIV. vainly essayed, with many brilliant pageantries and passages of arms, to quicken once more the phantom of the noble institution which came into existence with the Middle Ages, and with them passed away.
