No. 119. King Herod and his Daughter Herodias.
No. 120. Herod and Herodias.
It would appear from various accounts that it was not, unless perhaps at an early period, the custom in France to sit long after dinner at table drinking wine, as it certainly was in England, where, no doubt, the practice was derived from the Anglo-Saxons. Numerous allusions might be pointed out, which show how much our Anglo-Saxon forefathers were addicted to this practice of sitting in their halls and drinking during the latter part of their day; and it was then that they listened to the minstrel’s song, told stories of their own feats and adventures, and made proof of their powers in hard drinking. From some of these allusions, which we have quoted in an earlier chapter, it is equally clear, that these drinking-bouts often ended in sanguinary, and not unfrequently in fatal, brawls. Such scenes of discord in the hall occur also in the early French metrical romances, but they take place usually at the beginning of dinner, when the guests are taking their places, or during the meal. In “Parise la Duchesse,” a scene of this description occurs, in which the great feudal barons and knights fight with the provisions which had been served at the tables: “There,” says the poet, “you might see them throw cheeses, and quartern-loaves, and great pieces of flesh, and great steel knives”— Là veissiez jeter fromages et cartiers,
Et granz pieces de char, et granz cotiauz d’acier
—Roman de Parise, p. 173.
In “Garin le Loherain” (vol. ii. p. 17), at a feast at which the emperor and his empress were present, a fight commences between the two great baronial parties who were their guests, by a chief of one party striking one of the other party with a goblet; the cooks are brought out of the kitchen to take part in it, with their pestles, ladles, and pot-hooks, led by duke Begon, who had seized a spit, full of birds, as the weapon which came first to hand; and the contest is not appeased until many are killed and wounded.
The preceding remarks, of course, apply chiefly to the tables of the prince, the noble, and the wealthy gentleman, where alone this degree of profusion and of ceremony reigned; and to those of the monastic houses and of the higher clergy, where, if possible, the luxury even of princes was overpassed. The examples of clerical and monastic extravagance in feasting are so numerous, that I will not venture on this occasion to enter upon them any further. All recorded facts would lead us to conclude, that the ordinary course of living of the monks was much more luxurious than that of the clerical lords of the land, who, indeed, seem to have lived, on ordinary occasions, with some degree of simplicity, except that the great number of people who dined at their expense, required a very large quantity of provisions. Even men of rank, when dining alone, or hastily, are described as being satisfied with a very limited variety of food. In the romance of “Garin,” when Rigaud, one of the barons of “Garin’s” party, arrives at court with important news, and very hungry, the empress orders him to be served with a large vessel of wine (explained by a various reading to be equivalent to a pot), four loaves (the loaves appear usually to have been small), and a roasted peacock— On li aporte plain un barris de vin,
Et quatre pains, et un paon rosti.
—Garin le Loherain, vol. ii. p. 257.
In a pane of painted glass in the possession of Dr. Henry Johnson, of Shrewsbury, of Flemish workmanship of about the beginning of the sixteenth century, and representing the story of the Prodigal Son, the Prodigal is seated at table with a party of dissolute women, feasting upon a pasty. It is reproduced in our cut [No. 121]. They appear to have only one drinking-cup among them, but the wine is served from a very rich goblet. We cannot, however, always judge the character of a feast by the articles placed on the table by the mediæval illuminators, for they were in the constant habit of drawing things conventionally, and they seem to have found a difficulty—perhaps in consequence of their ignorance of perspective—in representing a crowded table. Our cut [No. 122], on the following page, taken from MS. Reg. 10 E. iv., in which we recognize again our old friend the holy-water clerc, represents a table which is certainly very sparingly furnished, although the persons seated at it seem to belong to a respectable class in society. Some cooked articles, perhaps meat, on a stand, bread, a single knife to cut the provisions, and one pot, probably of ale, from which they seem to have drunk without the intervention of a glass, form the whole service.
No. 121. Feasting on a Pasty.
We find allusions from time to time to the style of living of the class in the country answering to our yeomanry, and of the bourgeoisie in the towns, which appears to have been sufficiently plain. In the romance of “Berte” (p. 78), when Berte finds shelter at the house of the farmer Symon, they give her, for refreshment, a chicken and wine. In the fabliau of the “Vilain mire” (Barbazan, vol. iii. p. 3), the farmer, who had saved money, and become tolerably rich, had no such luxuries as salmon or partridge, but his provisions consisted only of bread and wine, and fried eggs, and cheese in abundance—
N’orent pas saumon ne pertris,
Pain et vin orent, et oés fris,
Et du fromage à grant plenté.