[V2] [Is not the only instance, &c.] The constant admission granted to minstrels was so established a privilege, that it became a ready expedient to writers of fiction. Thus, in the old romance of Horn-Child, the Princess Rymenyld being confined in an inaccessible castle, the prince, her lover, and some assistant knights with concealed arms assume the minstrel character, and approaching the castle with their "gleyinge" or minstrelsy, are heard by the lord of it, who being informed they were "harpeirs, jogelers, and fythelers,"[1127] has them admitted, when
"Horn sette him abenche (i.e. on a bench).
Is (i.e. his) harpe he gan clenche
He made Rymenild a lay."
This sets the princess a weeping and leads to the catastrophe, for he immediately advances to "the Borde" or table, kills the ravisher, and releases the lady.
[V3] [... Assumed the dress and character of a harper, &c.] We have this curious historiette in the records of Lacock Nunnery in Wiltshire, which had been founded by this Countess of Salisbury. See Vincent's Discovery of Errors in Brookes Catalogue of Nobility, &c. folio, pp. 445-6, &c. Take the following extract, and see Dugdale's Baron, i. p. 175.
"Ela uxor Gullielmi Longespee primi, nata fuit apud Ambresbiriam, patre et matre Normannis.
"Pater itaque ejus defectus senio migravit ad Christum, A.D. 1196. Mater ejus ante biennium obiit.... Interea Domina charissima clam per cognatos adducta fuit in Normanniam, & ibidem sub tutâ et arctâ custodiâ nutrita. Eodem tempore in Anglia fuit quidam miles nomine Gulielmus Talbot, qui induit se habitum Peregrini (Anglicè, a Pilgrim) in Normanniam transfretavit & moratus per duos annos, huc atque illuc vagans, ad explorandam dominam Elam Sarum. Et illâ inventâ, exuit habitum Peregrini, & induit se quasi Cytharisator & curiam ubi morabatur intravit. Et ut erat homo Jocosus, in Gestis Antiquorum valde peritus, ibidem gratanter fuit acceptus quasi familiaris. Et quando tempus aptum invenit, in Angliam repatriavit, habens secum istam venerabilem dominam Elam & hæredem Comitatus Sarum; & eam Regi Richardo præsentavit. Ac ille lætissime eam suscepit, & Fratri suo Guillelmo Longespee maritavit....
A.D. 1226 Dominus Guill. Longespee primus nonas Martii obiit. Ela vero uxor ejus et 7 annis supervixit.... Una die Duo monasteria fundavit primo mane xvi Kal. Maii. A.D. 1232. apud Lacock, in quo sanctæ degunt Canonissæ.... Et Henton post nonam, anno vero ætatis suæ, xlv. &c."
[W] For the preceding account Dugdale refers to Monast. Angl. i. (r. ii.) p. 185, but gives it as enlarged by D. Powel, in his Hist. of Cambria, p. 196, who is known to have followed ancient Welsh MSS. The words in the Monasticon are: "Qui accersitis Sutoribus Cestriæ et Histrionibus, festinanter cum exercitu suo venit domino suo facere succursum. Walenses vero videntes multitudinem magnam venientem, relictâ obsidione fugerunt.... Et propter hoc dedit comes antedictus.... Constabulario dominationem Sutorum et Histrionum. Constabularius vero retinuit sibi et hæredibus suis dominationem Sutorum: et Histrionum dedit vero Seneschallo." So the passage should apparently be pointed; but either et or vero seems redundant.
We shall see below in note [Z] the proper import of the word histriones; but it is very remarkable that this is not the word used in the grant of the constable De Lacy to Dutton, but "magisterium omnium leccatorum et meretricium totius Cestreshire, sicut liberius illum (sic) magisterium teneo de comite" (vid. Blount's Ancient Tenures, p. 156). Now, as under this grant the heirs of Dutton confessedly held for many ages a magisterial jurisdiction over all the minstrels and musicians of that county, and as it could not be conveyed by the word meretrices, the natural inference is, that the minstrels were expressed by the term leccatores. It is true, Du Cange compiling his Glossary could only find in the writers he consulted this word used in the abusive sense, often applied to every synonyme of the sportive and dissolute minstrel, viz. Scurra, vaniloquus, parasitus, epulo, &c. (This I conceive to be the proper arrangement of these explanations, which only express the character given to the minstrel elsewhere: see Du Cange, passim, and notes, [C], [E], [F], [I], iii. 2, &c.) But he quotes an ancient MS. in French metre, wherein the leccour (Lat. leccator) and the minstrel are joined together, as receiving from Charlemagne a grant of the territory of Provence, and from whom the Provençal troubadours were derived, &c. See the passage above in note [C] p. 387.
The exception in favour of the family of Dutton is thus expressed in the statute, Anno 39, Eliz. chap. iv. entitled, "An Act for punishment of Rogues, Vagabonds, and Sturdy Beggars."