LETTER II.
I look upon Chivalry, as on some mighty river, which the fablings of the poets have made immortal. It may have sprung up amidst rude rocks, and blind deserts. But the noise and rapidity of its course, the extent of country it adorns, and the towns and palaces it ennobles, may lead a traveller out of his way, and invite him to take a view of those dark caverns,
unde supernè
Plurimus Eridani per sylvam volvitur amnis.
I enter, without more words, on the subject I began to open to you in my last letter.
The old inhabitants of these North-West parts of Europe were extremely given to the love and exercise of arms. The feats of Charlemagne and our Arthur, in particular, were so famous as in later times, when books of Chivalry were composed, to afford a principal subject to the writers of them[44].
But Chivalry, properly so called, and under the idea of “a distinct military order, conferred in the way of investiture, and accompanied with the solemnity of an oath and other ceremonies, as described in the old historians and romancers,” was of later date, and seems to have sprung immediately out of the Feudal Constitution.
The first and most sensible effect of this constitution, which brought about so mighty a change in the policies of Europe, was the erection of a prodigious number of petty tyrannies. For, though the great barons were closely tied to the service of their Prince by the conditions of their tenure, yet the power which was given them by it over their own numerous vassals was so great, that, in effect, they all set up for themselves; affected an independency; and were, in truth, a sort of absolute Sovereigns, at least with regard to one another. Hence, their mutual aims and interests often interfering, the feudal state was, in a good degree, a state of war: the feudal chiefs were in frequent enmity with each other: the several combinations of feudal tenants were so many separate armies under their head or chief: and their castles were so many fortresses, as well as palaces, of these puny princes.
In this state of things one sees, that all imaginable encouragement was to be given to the use of arms, under every different form of attack and defence, according as the safety of these different communities, or the ambition of their leaders, might require. And this condition of the times, I suppose, gave rise to that military institution, which we know by the name of Chivalry.
Further, there being little or no security to be had amidst so many restless spirits and the clashing views of a neighbouring numerous and independent nobility, the military discipline of their followers, even in the intervals of peace, was not to be relaxed, and their ardour suffered to grow cool, by a total disuse of martial exercises. And hence the proper origin of Justs and Turnaments; those images of war, which were kept up in the castles of the barons, and, by an useful policy, converted into the amusement of the knights, when their arms were employed on no serious occasion.
I call this the proper origin of Justs and Turnaments; for the date of them is carried no higher, as far as I can find, even in France (where unquestionably they made their first appearance) than the year 1066; which was not till after the introduction of the feudal government into that country. Soon after, indeed, we find them in England and in Germany; but not till the feudal policy had spread itself in those parts, and had prepared the way for them.