At last the great day for which Aimery has waited is at hand. To-morrow Conon will dub him a knight.
FOOTNOTES:
[56] As late as about 1250 there was a "grand chamberlain of France" who seems to have been absolutely illiterate.
[57] It is risky to generalize as to the extent of learning among the average nobles. Some modern students would probably represent them as being sometimes better lettered than were Conon and Aimery.
[58] The sharp distinction between the young attendants known as "pages," and the older "squires," had hardly been worked out by A.D. 1220. Such young persons could also be called "varlets," but that name might be given as well to non-noble servitors. When chivalry was at its height the theory developed that a nobleman's son should spend his first to his seventh year at home with his mother, his eighth to his fifteenth in suitable training as a "page," and from that time till he was one-and-twenty serving as a squire. This precise demarcation of time was probably seldom adhered to. Many ambitious young nobles would serve much less than seven years as a squire. On the other hand, many petty nobles might remain squires all their lives, for lack of means to maintain themselves as self-respecting knights.
[59] The words quoted are those of the Archdeacon Peter of Blois, haranguing about A.D. 1180.
Chapter XII: Feudal Weapons and Horses. Dubbing a Knight.
