‘Gwen Hamilton’, a Medieval Woman Set in Time and Place
RESEARCH INTO SCOTLAND 1380-1430
Paper by Gwen Hamilton, for Ealdormere A&S 2018.
I have
placed my persona, Gwen Hamilton, in
Scotland in the late 14th and early 15th centuries,
living mainly in Edinburgh. My goal in
the following research was to have as detailed a picture as possible of her
circumstances: her expectations,
obligations, and assumptions given her class, gender, and nationality. I also wanted a sense of her physical
surroundings, her belongings, and her daily routine. I was interested in political issues of the
period mainly as they would be likely to affect her.
I see Gwen
as being married to a wealthy burgess of Edinburgh, but of gentler birth than
her husband, descended from a junior, somewhat impoverished branch of an
important family of Anglo-Norman descent.
Renart Le Contrefait, a 14th
century French parody, comments on burghers (burgesses in Scotland): “They live very nobly, they wear a king’s
clothes, have fine palfreys and horses.
When squires go to the east, the burghers remain in their beds; when the
squires go get themselves massacred, the burghers go on swimming parties.” (Gies, Life…City, p. 34)
She was
informed by her parents that she was born in the ninth year of the reign of
King Robert II (1380). She is currently
living in the sixth year (1430) of the reign of King James, the grandson of
King Robert.
Much of what
we know about medieval women of all classes is filtered through the voices of
men, particularly aristocratic men and clerics, and their self interest and
frequent misogyny. In contrast to the
general paucity in the middle ages of feminine voices, in the 14th
and 15th centuries we have a number of women speaking for themselves:
Julian of Norwich, Margery Kempe, Christine de Pizan, and the women of the
Paston letters and the Stonor letters.
For
attitudes, activities, and responsibilities, I have been particularly dependent
upon two sources which are roughly contemporary, although neither is
Scottish. One is Le Ménagier de Paris (The
Goodman of Paris, c.1393) and the other The Paston Letters
(1430 to 1475). Margaret Paston,
married in 1440, probably in her mid to late teens, is an interesting
comparison to the teenage wife of the Ménagier, whose
marriage took place 50 years earlier.
Both ladies had considerable wealth and responsibility without moving in
noble or court circles, although references to political personages and events
suggest that they were aware of what was happening outside of their local area,
in France (Ménagier) and
England (Pastons). Both sources speak of
busy lives spent directing subordinates and taking responsibility for a large
household, but there is also the expectation of enjoying comfort and leisure
activities. Certainly in both there is concern for
appearances and upward mobility and in both, examples of affection and
familiarity between spouses.
Because the Ménagier is describing an ideal or model –
what should be happening according to
contemporary standards – there is sometimes a difference between that and the
real lives of the Paston women. An
example of this is the contrast between the Ménagier’s
description of his young wife’s expected behaviour, telling her beads and
looking neither to the left nor the right at church, and certainly not using strong
words such as “whore” for fear of showing knowledge of the word’s meaning, and
young Margaret Paston’s description in a 1448 letter to her husband of the
following scene: “…And with the noise of
this assault and affray my mother and I came out of the church from the
sacring, and I bade Gloys (their
chaplain, involved in the fight) go into my mother’s place again and so he
did. And then Wymondham called my mother
and me strong whores, and said that the Pastons and all their kin were…(words lost)…[I] said he lied, knave
and churl as he was.”
In the instruction
given by the Ménagier, the
advice about religious devotion is first, followed by and combined with advice
on dress and deportment. He wishes her
to pray upon first waking, whether with the light of day or earlier if woken by
the bells for matins. He suggests five
rather lovely prayers in French, asking for safety and that she not fall into
sin. She is expected to rise in the
morning and to dress respectably, making sure she is attired in appropriate
clothing and that there is no sign of her shift peeking out, or the layers of
her clothing untidily put together, or hair straying from her wimple. When she goes to the church, preferably
hearing mass daily, she is to be accompanied by respectable women and to keep
her eyes and attention strictly upon her book and her prayers. The English 14th Century How the Goode Wife Taught Hyr Doughter
agrees:
When thou arte in the chyrch, my child,
Loke that thou be bothe meke and myld,
And bydde thy bedes aboven alle thinge,
With sybbe ne fremde make no jangelynge.
However, as one assumes with the
repeated passing of sumptuary laws and the writing of books on good behaviour,
presumably all this advice wouldn’t be repeated if consistently correct
demeanour was a given, and Margaret Paston certainly doesn’t seem to expect
criticism for rushing out of the church during service to interfere in a
brawl. Margaret does however make
frequent mentions of prayers said for her husband’s health when he is ill,
special promises made to saints, and much later in her life, when there is a
family problem regarding a marriage, she devoutly, if reluctantly, accepts the
church’s ruling, even though that ruling is against her family’s
interests. Whether or not their
behaviour in church followed the accepted model, the faith of most medieval
women was no doubt very real and very central to their lives.
Besides suitable piety, the Ménagier and others giving advice to women
all take as a law of God and nature that women must be strictly obedient to
their husbands, treating them absolutely as their lords and giving way even
when the men are being frivolous or foolish in their requests. Their husbands are
to be to them as Christ to the church. Medieval concepts of the humours included the
idea that women were “cold and wet” in comparison to men, therefore, due to
their coldness, unable to produce semen, “resulting in soft, weak bodies, and
inferior intellects”. (Gilchrist, pg. 33)
The story of patient Griselda
agreeing placidly to her own humiliation and the apparent murder of her
children turns up as an example in the Ménagier and
also appears in the Décameron by
Boccaccio, in Petrarch’s writing, and in The
Canterbury Tales. Lucretia committing
suicide after being raped is another widely popular exemplar of appropriate
womanly behaviour, rather oddly, given the church’s absolute prohibition of
suicide. It is something of a relief
that the Ménagier follows Griselda’s tale with the
comment, “I…have not set it here to apply to you nor because I would have such
obedience from you…and I am not so foolish, or so overweening nor of such small
sense that I know not well that it is not for me to assault or assay you thus,
nor in like manner.” He adds, “…by good
obedience a wise woman gains her husband’s love and at the end hath what she
would of him.” Chaucer’s fictional Wife
of Bath obviously is not intended as an example of good wifely behaviour –
“Christ Jesus send us husbands meek and young and fresh in bed and grace to
overbid them when we wed” - but it is hard to say how contemporaries viewed her
and to what degree she is a caricature. Chaucer
assigns her the tale of the Loathly Lady, which does provide a story in which
the lady is given “her will” and the hero wins what he wants by kindness and
courtesy.
In the prologue to his book and in
other references throughout, the Ménagier speaks
in an affectionate and approving tone to his young wife. Margaret Paston’s marriage to John Paston was
certainly an arranged one, but a number of the surviving letters, although
formally addressed to her “Right Worshipful Husband”, have very personal and
affectionate touches, with her joking about her pregnancy, showing concern for
his health, and asking him to wear a ring she had sent: “I pray you that you
will wear the ring with the image of St. Margaret that I sent ye for a
remembrance until you come home”. His
letters to her tend to be much more businesslike, although one of his last
letters to her, written after she visited him in London, addresses her much
more fondly: “Mine own dear sovereign
lady.” It is notable that Margaret seems
to feel comfortable making decisions in his absence and sending him lists of
purchases she wishes, without any sense that she has to beg and plead for
anything, even if he is definitely the head of the household. In a letter of 1453, she seems to be
supervising the construction of some additions to the house and although John
had asked for some furniture to be set up in a particular chamber for him to
use as an office and bedroom, she measured, decided there was not enough space
in the room he wanted and switched it to another. In another letter, she speaks of doing
business for him, then requests, “I pray you will vouchsafe to buy for me such
laces as I send you examples of in this letter and one piece of black
lace. As for the caps you sent me for
the children, they are too little for them.
I pray you buy them finer caps and larger than those were.”
Two of the Paston letters, from
Richard Calle to Margery Paston (Margaret’s elder daughter) after their runaway
marriage, and from Margery Brews to John Paston III on Valentine’s Day prior to
their marriage, are definitely love letters, some of the earliest that exist,
and while there is attention to money and status, there is a real sense of the
attachment of the couples. Among the
Stonor Letters and Papers as well, there are some which show real affection
between spouses, such as Thomas Stonor’s letter to his wife in 1468: “Mine own good Jane, as heartily as I can I
recommend me to you…And good sweet leman, be ye very merry and of good comfort
for to comfort me when I come.”
Margery Kempe (approximately
1373-1438), from the wealthy merchant class in England, in her dictated
autobiography, comments on the pleasure she and her husband took in their
sexual relations, “ful many delectabyl thowtys, fleschly lustys, and inordinate
lovys to hys persone” – although she does regard this pleasure and her
enthusiasm for fashionable clothes as sinful.
However, she seems to have had considerable freedom within the
relationship to passionately seek her religious salvation by travelling to
consult with various clerics and mystics, and later to go on pilgrimage and to
negotiate a celibate union. During a
period early in their marriage when she was apparently mentally ill, her
husband kept her at home and cared for her.
He seems to have been consistently kind to her and whether one sees her
as an incipient saint or a religious hysteric, she certainly cannot have been
an easy woman to live with.
Christine de Pizan, a contemporary
living in France, also seems to have had an extremely happy relationship with
her husband, who was not only kind, but respected and valued her intellect and encouraged
her in her studies and writing. In
writing advice to other women, she advises always loving one’s husband and
showing it, although she acknowledges that this may not always be easy if he is
“perverse in his morals, rude…ungracious to his wife, and is involved with
another woman, or even several.” The
wife is obliged both by good judgment and prudence to ignore it all, responding
with charm and gentleness, as “I am obliged to live and die with him, whatever
he may be.” (Pizan, p.
99)
It seems that as is true for
marriages in any age, the personalities and circumstances of the people
involved make each union very individual.
For some people, marriage was fulfilling and brought comfort and
happiness to both. Some 14th
and 15th century funerary monuments show the couple with clasped
hands, possibly as a mark of the closeness of their bond. (Gilchrist pg. 112)
Obviously in those cases where the
husband was unkind or uncaring, the laws of both state and church provided him
with full opportunity to make his wife’s life unhappy and to completely control
her body, her property and her children.
Responsible parents in arranging a marriage would see to the guarantee
of a dower to provide for her in widowhood, the law gave her a claim on her
husband’s estate even when this hadn’t been arranged, and judging from Agnes
and Margaret Paston, women exerted influence – and to a degree authority – over
adult children. Showing that not all
medieval clerics were antagonistic to women and marriage, 13th
century preacher, St. Bonaventure wrote, “In marriage… there is mutual love and
therefore mutual zeal, and therefore singleness…For there is something
miraculous in a man finding in one woman a pleasingness which he can never find
in another.” (Gies, Women…Ages,
p. 36)
Language
Gwen’s language would be Scots, a
language which arrived in Scotland with Anglo-Saxon speaking retainers of Anglo-Norman
nobility who came to Scotland from England during the reign of the Canmore
family in the 12th century and became the common speech of the
lowlands. She would be unlikely to know
Gaelic. She would quite possibly speak
French, as her heritage was Anglo-Norman.
The ‘Auld Alliance’ provided contacts with the French, as for instance
when in 1385, a French army was in Scotland for some time. The extant
correspondence of Alice de Breyne (1380-1435), an English gentlewoman of the
period, was all in French, although she would have spoken English as well. The
Stonor letters of the 14th century are in Latin and French, with
English gradually replacing French through the 15th century. Gwen might speak English, or at least
understand it since the two languages had a common root and were essentially
different dialects of the same language, although accent and cadence would be
different. Judging from examples of
each, she should have been able to read English if she could read Scots. Contemporary English would be Middle English,
familiar to us from Chaucer’s The
Canterbury Tales.
In 1406, King James I, then aged
eleven, was captured by the English and not released for 17 long years, so the
court and customs he knew best were English and he brought home an English Queen,
Joan Beaufort, when he returned to Scotland.
While in captivity, he fell in love, possibly with Joan, and wrote a
poem that became well-known, The Kingis
Quair. This poem is in Scots, Gwen’s
everyday language and the native language of King James. A few verses follow.
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(Edited by
Linne R. Mooney and Mary-Jo Arn. Originally Published in The Kingis Quair
and Other Prison Poems, Kalamazoo, Michigan: Medieval Institute
Publications, 2005.) |
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1, Heigh in
the hevynnis figure circulere High in heaven’s
circular schema His metir
suete, full of moralitee, His metre sweet, full of morality, Dress In Sacred and Banal: The Discovery of Everyday Medieval Material Culture
(Shiels and
Campbell 2011, published as part of A
History of Everyday Life in Medieval Scotland, 1000 to 1600), the
authors discuss archeological findings throughout Scotland, specifically
jewelry and other costume parts such as buckles, belt mounts, and lace
chapes. Their conclusions
include: “In general, the material
tends to follow the major trends in European dress and consumption…(reference to various items). It is important
to note that these objects are diagnostic of particular forms of clothing and
suggest that in many ways, the population was dressing in a fairly generic
European style. Overall the evidence
suggests that particular trends and forms of dress arrived in Scotland at the
same time as in the rest of Europe, and the material from sites such as
Fortrose tallies well with that recovered from London and Amsterdam.” This would suggest that the ladies of
Edinburgh would wear clothing and jewelry generally similar to that of
English or European contemporaries. Many annular brooches were found in
Scotland, used to fasten garments at the neck. These were connected in the popular mind
with feminine modesty: “My bride shall
wear a brooch – a witness to her modesty. ” (Johannes de Hauville) In this
period, the skirts had become more voluminous and the headdresses elaborate
and very large, perhaps to balance the silhouette of the body. The houppelande was fashionable for both
men and women, often with elaborate and oversized sleeves. Women’s gowns evolved which took the shape
of the houppelande, but with a lower neckline and narrower sleeves. Belts were usually wide and worn high,
coming immediately below the breasts, with no fastening or buckle apparent
from a front view. The frontispiece to
Christine de Pizan’s Cent Ballades,
c. 1402, shows a lady in a blue houppelande apparently playing with the long
end of her red belt, which seems to be buckled at the back with the end
hanging behind her. The Magdalen Reading, by Rogier van
der Weyden, before 1438, shows this more clearly. Elaborate buckles, decorative mounts, and
metal purse hangers increased in popularity from the late 13th
century. (Gilchrist, pg.74) A picture by the Coetivy Master, Philosophy Presenting the Seven Liberal Arts to Boethius, (Paris, mid 15th
century) shows a
variety of feminine garb. The figure
of Philosophy, at the front of the row of women, wears a gown with a
voluminous skirt, which is kilted, either to display the under dress or to facilitate walking. Her headdress is as high and elaborate as
possible. Her belt is, unusually,
narrow. She is followed by Grammar,
wearing what Scott describes as a “low set and rather old-fashioned thick
linen veil” (p.109).
Her gown and cloak are plain, without the belt, if any, showing. Rhetoric, holding a scroll, wears
similar clothing, but in brighter colours, with a high, wide belt. Her skirt is also kilted; most of the
others allow their skirts to trail, Astronomy using her hand to control her
skirt. Logic, with the sieve, wears
the fashionable “steeple” with a transparent veil, as does Astronomy. Music wears a sideless surcote, worn as a
symbol of status at this point in history, trimmed with ermine, and with an
exotic turban for headdress. The
general silhouette of the gowns and houppelandes seems to be fairly
consistent throughout Europe. Scott
describes the simple, heavy veils as “old-fashioned”, which is probably the
case, but as Music is extravagantly and exotically garbed, could the plain,
undecorated costumes of the more mundane Grammar and Rhetoric be, in
contrast, what a practical woman might wear to attend to her household? Women
of every class in the 14th and 15th centuries in
northern Italy were described as wearing only a simple woolen tunic with
sleeves over a long linen chemise while tending to their households and doing
simple shopping. (Duby,
pg. 195) The picture opposite page15 shows
similar dress, simple, unbelted, and practical. There was a
great variety of headdresses at this period, ranging from a fairly simple
linen veil, to layered and frilled veils, and wimple and veil, to “horned”
headdresses, nets and reticulated hair cases, transparent silk veils, turbans
in rich material or fur, butterfly headdresses, truncated hennins and the
“steeple” hennins. Women of the middle
class often wore hoods. Flowers,
jewels, and other decorations were added to headdresses at times and among
the London findings are circlets of silk-covered wire, presumably to support
semi-transparent veils, bits of which are still attached. Hair ornaments are specifically mentioned
in the sumptuary laws. There is a 14th
century reference to an Aberdeen townswoman dressing her hair with an Italian
silk ribbon with picoted edging. In a 15th
century poem of William Dunbar’s, the widow of a rich Scottish burgess
commented that her husband had dressed her in rich clothes and jewels which
“hely raise my renovne amang the rude peple”.
Some wills of English women of the merchant class in this period list
luxury items: Agnes de Frauceys, 1349,
a chandler’s widow, left a “robe of gold work” (presumably embroidered in
gold thread) and Julianna Stokesby, 1384, a vintner’s widow, left a silk hood
and a gown furred with gris (grey
squirrel fur) (Medieval
Clothing & Textiles l, pp142-148). In 1453, Margaret
Paston asked her husband to buy her a necklace, as she had had to borrow her
cousin’s jewels to attend a local visit of the queen, “for I durst not for
shame go with my beads.” The
fabrics involved would mostly be linen for undergarments, wool for outerwear,
and silk for “best” garments. Linen
and wool both came in varying qualities.
Linen could be coarse canvas for work garments, finer linen for shirts,
braes, and shifts, or sheer lawn or baptiste for veils. Hemp was sometimes used for coarser fabric
similar to linen. The amount of time
spent bleaching linen from its natural brown or grey to white would also add
to the value of the cloth. Advice on
hygiene during the middle ages promoted the frequent changing of linen to
maintain cleanliness. Since linen was readily washable, this would also have
protected the more difficult to clean wool and silk garments. Wool ranged from coarse weaves to scarlet, a
fine, soft wool fabric. There was also
variety in weave. Some combinations of
textile material existed, such as linsey-woolsey and fustian. Silk could be interwoven with gold or
silver, and might be damask or brocade.
Silk fingerloop braids were part of the London findings from about
this period, apparently used as lacing for garments and for purse
strings. Velvet was available, although
expensive. Garments, particularly cloaks
and houppelandes, were sometimes lined with fur. Collars
and hems were sometimes trimmed with fur when the garment was not lined. In some wills in England, from 1327 to
1487, a number of clothing items were bequeathed, with black, blue, and red
being the most common colours and yellow the least common. Both wool and silk took dye readily. Dyes were all organic, primarily vegetable
dyes, such as woad, madder, and lichen, although kermes, which was
insect-based, was used by the very wealthy to produce a vivid crimson dye. Women’s
hose went to just above the knee and were fastened at the knee with garters,
often with the top part folded down over the garter. Generally in this period the hose were cut
from wool fabric on the bias and the seams stitched. There are a few examples of fragments of knitted
items in England from the 14th century, in an even “stocking
stitch”, but they are believed to be a cap, part of a glove, and possibly
part of a child’s sleeve or vest. They
are not fulled and do not appear to be part of stockings. Men and
women both carried purses at their belt and often a sheath knife or
keys. In the case of both women and
clerics, knives were sometimes beneath the top garment and accessed by a slit
in the seam or in the case of women, the knife was kept in the purse. Shoes were
pointed, sometimes extremely, but were less likely to be extreme in women’s
fashions. Wooden pattens were worn
over shoes in the muddy streets to protect the shoes. Shoes embroidered with “birds, animals,
flowers, and foliage” have been found as early as 12th century
London and pattens were sometimes painted or decorated with stamped
ornaments. (Gilchrist, pg. 74) Although
staying clean was difficult, particularly for the less wealthy, there was
concern for hygiene. Combs, ear
scoops, and tweezers are common findings. Women plucked their eyebrows. Decorated combs were often gifts. Leisure Activities The Ménagier suggests that his wife read
religious books in French, saying that she is welcome to take any of his
books, as she wishes. This certainly
implies that the young wife is able to read in the vernacular, and later, he
expresses the wish that she should read his letters privately (as reading was
generally out loud), but seems not to know whether she is able to write. Margaret Paston is also considered to have probably
been able to read, but not necessarily to write. There are no extant letters which can be
identified as being written by her in her own hand, and many of the writers
of her letters can be identified as various Paston servants. The two skills were not necessarily
combined at this period. It is also
interesting that the Ménagier gives
his wife carte blanche to handle his very valuable books. Caxton was not printing books until the
last part of the 15th century, so any books available at the time
would be manuscript on parchment or vellum, making them very valuable
indeed. Binding was individually
commissioned, with some bindings being more expensive – and of course more
fashionable or impressive. It is
interesting that the custom of the time was for the owner to write in many of
these valuable books, especially psalters and books of hours, putting in
personal prayers and important dates in calendars, personalizing the book as
part of their devotions. Romances as well as works of
devotion would have been available at this period, although also very
expensive. The Ménagier specifically quotes from Le Roman de la Rose. The Scottish Fergus of Galloway, written by Guillaume Le Clerc (possibly
William Malveisin), probably a comedic commentary on earlier Arthurian
romances by Chretien de Troyes, was composed about 1200 in Old French. Sir
Gawain and the Green Knight and The
Pearl are dated mid-14th century and Chaucer’s writings date
to the latter part of the 14th century. There are some references to books in the
Paston letters, including one specific reference to a book owned by Anne
Paston (Margaret’s younger daughter), The
Siege of Thebes. Some contemporary
collections include The Deeds of
Arthur, Tristan and Isolda, Aimeric de Narbonne, Perceval and Gawain, The
Trojan War, Hector of Troy, In Praise of Women, Sir Orfeo, and The Deeds of Fulk Fitzwarin. The
Brus would have been appropriate to a Scottish collection. There are a number of references to
Boethius’ The Consolation of Philosophy,
including, of course, The Kingis
Quair. The Auchinleck manuscript, an
anthology written in English in the 1330’s, includes 44 texts ranging from an
account of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin to the romance of Floris and Blanchefleur, as well as a
list of the Norman knights who fought at Hastings. The Ménagier tells his wife that he is pleased
with her tending roses and violets, making chapelets, and singing and dancing
and that she should do so among their friends, that this is appropriate when
she is young. He feels that her
attending dances and feasts of people of much higher rank is inappropriate,
but is quite content for her to enjoy herself in their own group of friends
and family. Music was important to all
classes. Chaucer’s tales include
characters who play the psaltery (metal-stringed harp plucked with a quill),
the bagpipes, and the flute.
Illustrations in the Luttrell Psalter show bagpipes, nakers (metal
drums), bells, and a portable organ.
In large churches and in monasteries, the Mass was sung, with
three-part polyphony and motets being written by 1400. Chaucer describes the real and very important
Duchess of Lancaster as having been used to “dance so comely, carol and sing
so sweetly…that never has Heaven seen so blissful a creature”. He also describes his fictional and very
bourgeois Wife of Bath declaring, “I could dance to a small harp and sing
like any nightingale when I had downed a draught of mellow wine.” Non-professional dancing tended to be
carols, dancing in a ring, holding hands. The Ménagier promises to talk about games and
amusements in the third section of the book.
This section was sadly never written, possibly because of his
death. His intention was to “tell of
amusing questions, which be…answered in strange fashion by the hazard of dice
and by rooks and kings”, to teach her how to feed and fly a falcon, and to
know certain riddles. It is
interesting that falconry is included, as I would have thought this to have
been an activity of the upper nobility.
Given that the Ménagier is
concerned not to be pushing into too high circles, however, falconry was
presumably wider spread than I had realized among those who could afford it. Indeed, a Lincolnshire merchant of 1383,
William Harecourt, had in his list of household goods, two hawks and a “gentle”
falcon. In his story of Lucretia, the Ménagier refers to women playing “bric”,
“hot cockles”, “blind man’s buff”, and “pinch me”, others playing cards,
singing songs, telling tales, and asking riddles. In 1459, Margaret Paston wrote her husband
to say that she had asked an important neighbour what Christmas activities the
lady had permitted when her family was in mourning, since Margaret needed to
know what was appropriate. She replied that “there were none disguising
nor harping nor luting nor no loud disports, but playing at the tables (similar to backgammon) and chess and cards, and such disports she gave her people
leave to play.” Chess, tables, dice, draughts
(checkers), fox and geese, and merrils (nine men’s morris) were all
common. Scottish women of all classes did
spinning and there are many findings of decorated lead whorls for spindles,
the size depending on whether flax or wool was being spun and the desired
fineness. These were sometimes buried
with women. Of course, spinning and
other handwork would have been simply work for many women, especially those
spinning to earn necessary money, but for others there may well have been an
element of recreation in it. Needlework
of various types has traditionally been a feminine activity and could be done
in very social groups, while listening to someone reading aloud, perhaps to
the romantic adventures of Sir Gawain.
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House
C.L. Kingsford in “A London Merchant’s House
and Its Owners” in Archaeologia
provides a description for the house of Richard Willysdon, a wealthy merchant who
built his home in 1384 in London (cited by Mortimer in The Time Traveler’s Guide).
It is a three-story, timber-framed structure, with the ground floor the
tallest at twelve feet and each succeeding story progressively shorter and
projecting further over the street. At
the front of the ground floor is a row of shops, which are rented to tradesmen. In the centre of the building front is a
gated entry arch leading into a courtyard with storage areas to the left. To
the right a short stairway leads up to an impressive hall, which is forty feet
long by twenty-four feet wide and more than thirty feet high. It boasts painted wall hangings and the
benches along the walls have colourful cushions. The windows are glazed with thick, greenish
glass which is opaque, but allows in light when the shutters are open – and
keeps the cold out. There is a central
hearth with a fire. At the far end is
the merchant’s table, with the aumbry to one side displaying his pewter and
silver. To one side of the hall are
doors leading to the buttery for ale and wine and the pantry for bread, spices,
and linens. Beyond the hall is the
parlour or solar, where the family spends much of its time. The main bedrooms are upstairs and the
kitchen is downstairs, tucked behind the shops.
There is a garden out back.
James I is considered to have brought changes
in architecture to Scotland, but presumably this would be mostly to major
buildings. The English burned Edinburgh
– again – in 1544 and the few surviving buildings of the 15th
century are mostly public buildings.
There is a unique survival from the late 15th century, No. 8
Advocate’s Close, built by a merchant burgess, Thomas Harvey. It is “built of rubble with ashlar dressings. It has vaulted chambers at ground level used
as shops or stores.” (Random rubble is a
style of stone work using local stone of various shapes and sizes held together
by mortar, with dressed stone corners and window borders. This is attractive and safer from fire than
wood, but not as strong as dressed stone and not suitable for very large
buildings.) The principal floor, the first (above the ground floor) was entered
from a timber forestair leading from the close.
There are two mullion and transom windows in the larger room. The upper lights were probably fixed, glazed
panes, with wooden shutters below. Since
it also has two fireplaces, this room may have been two rooms originally, which
would “accord well with what we know to be the typical hall-and-chamber urban
house across Britain at this date.” (Edwards, p.26-27)
There are richly decorated jambs on the fireplaces. There were probably lofts over this room and
thatch on the roof. This is similar in
general layout and use of space to Willysdon’s house.
Housing for
poorer classes was often mixed in with the houses of the wealthy, although some
wealthy families chose to live outside the city. The most popular roofing material in Scotland
was thatch, using a variety of vegetable matter, including heather. The more prestigious buildings would have
timber shingles. Stone may have been
used for the foundations in some cases.
Glass was expensive and used only for windows in important rooms. Horn was used for some windows at this
period, with Barley Hall in Yorkshire having one of the very few surviving
examples.
In the home,
there would be large, comfortable wooden bedsteads with feather beds for the
important adults, probably with curtains for privacy and warmth, and narrow
truckle beds and pallets for children and servants, which would typically be
shared. There would not be a great
amount of furniture, but there would be trestle tables, possibly one or two
chairs, benches, chests for storage, and candleholders. There would be linen for the beds and for the
tables, with a superior quality of linen for the head table. Floors could be wooden or tiled and probably
covered with rushes. Rushes could be
woven into loose mats and could include scented herbs such as lavender. Inside walls would typically be
plastered. Colour would be provided by
bright cushions, bench covers, and wall hangings which would also discourage
drafts.
A marked increase
in the consumption of material goods in private homes began in the 13th
century. For instance, imported pottery
became accessible even for peasant families, although items made of glass were
found only in wealthier homes. (Gilchrist, pg. 112)
There are descriptions
extant, especially from wills of the period, of household goods of well to do
merchants. The following list of
household goods of William Harecourt of Lincolnshire in 1383 is an example: 8 drinking vessels bound with gilt-silver, 3
silver cups with lids, 6 silver plates, 2 beds, 4 more beds of worsted, 8
blankets and 6 quilts, 8 pairs of sheets, 10 more pairs of sheets, 4 pairs of
worsted curtains and 2 half-tester beds, 3 brass pots, 8 more brass pots, 3
great brass pans, 5 small pans, 3 basins and 3 water jugs, 1 great basin, 30
pewter vessels, 4 pewter bottles, 6 quart pots, 2 gallon pots, 4 pint pots of
pewter, 1 backplate for a fireplace, 4 andirons, 2 spits, an iron candlestick,
1 large and 5 small lead pans, 2 great wooden coffers, 5 small coffers, 3
tables and 3 pairs of trestles, 3 dossers (ornamental wall hangings), 6 bankers
(embroidered covering for chairs or benches), 18 cushions, 3 feather beds, a
screen, 2 hawks and a falcon.
There was
also a study of 550 English wills, about a third of them from merchants, from
1327 to 1487, that list and occasionally describe household textiles, such as
tablecloths, napkins, towels, sheets, blankets, feather beds, coverlets, fabric
wall hangings, and bolts of cloth. A
girl named Alice was bequeathed “toward her marriage”, a featherbed, a bolster,
ten pairs of sheets, three down pillows, a red and green coverlet, two “carpet”
cushions, and two flowered cushions. The
type of fabric is usually not mentioned, although sheets, pillow covers,
tablecloths, and napkins were almost certainly made of linen and bed hangings
and coverlets likely made of wool. A few
items were specified to be of “diapered fabric”, linen or occasionally cotton
woven in a small repeating pattern of diamonds.
Colours are more often mentioned than fabric types, with red being the
most popular for coverlets and curtains, although white, green, and blue ones
are also listed. Some are described as
“poudred, peinted, and steined”, referring to textiles with images/designs on
them, such as a bed “powdered with butterflies” in a 1381 will. We do not know if these were painted or
embroidered. Another is a “white hanging
bed, stained with branches, roses, and leaves, with all the apparel of stained
cloths for the chamber”, and one cord-maker left a coverlet powdered with
penny-sized dots and a dosser with a dragon on it. (Medieval Clothing & Textiles I,
pp. 143-149)
Christine de Pizan talks about the
importance of linens to the housewife:
“After buying flax at the market at a good price, she will have it spun
by poor women in the town. However, she must never exploit their labor by any
sort of trick or stratagem, since exploitation is damnable and would only
discredit her. The women will make linen, both coarse and fine, tablecloths as
well as towels. Having smoothly-woven, fine linens is a well-earned, honest
pleasure for any woman who is careful and provident. She can take great
pleasure in white, sweet-smelling linens stored in her coffers. These may be
used for any special guests her husband invites to stay with them at the house,
for which she will be highly praised." (Pizan,
p 188)
(Illustration
of table and knives from Luttrell Psalter)
Lighting in the kitchen would be
mostly natural light through unglazed windows or windows covered with oiled
linen. This is, of course, one reason
for the main meal of the day being in the late morning, to utilize the best
light of the day. In the winter, when
there is less light, artificial lighting was sometimes needed in addition to
the firelight. This could be with rushlights,
although these burned rather briefly.
Wax candles would have been prohibitively expensive for most households
(they were generally only used in religious services), and according to Brears
provide insufficient light, although Chiquart recommends candles of suet or
tallow for night work (Henisch,
pg. 144). Brears suggests cressets as a popular and
practical solution, usually consisting of a stone column or slab with hollows approximately
3 by 4 inches cut into the flat stone and filled with oil or animal fat, with a
wick added. Iron fire baskets could also
be used to burn pitched rope, wood, or coal.
Since all heating and lighting was essentially done with open flame, one
needed to be very conscious of safety.
Henisch (The
Medieval Cook, pg. 9)
describes the typical cook in period comedies.
He would be male, as kitchen staff in large homes all were, and
cross. “His kitchen is unbearably hot;
fires burn, tempers flare. An unsavoury
rabble of assistants, jerked to and fro by bellowed commands, is perpetually
engaged in ineffectual crisis control, as pots boil over, fat sizzles, roasts
char. Everyone is shiny with sweat, greasy
with handling food, and grimy from grappling with smoke-blackened
equipment.” While fictional, it provides
a useful vision of the kitchen as a centre of ongoing, rather frantic activity
rather than the static and empty room we see in pictures of surviving medieval
kitchens.
As mentioned elsewhere, houses in
Edinburgh in this period had space behind the house, the ‘backlands”, which
would provide a location for an earth closet latrine and cesspit and probably a
kitchen garden (Edwards,
p.66). Urban pleasure and/or herb gardens were
common in England at this period, but with difficulty in water sources and the
frequent disruptions from war, this cannot be taken for granted in an Edinburgh
setting. Back from the house would be a midden for garbage such as discarded floor
rushes, garden waste, kitchen debris, etc.
Layers of sand were sometimes added to lessen the smell. Some houses had chickens or dovecotes as
well. Gongfermors could be hired in most European cities to empty the
cesspits. Some cities had regulations
obliging them to work at night.
Household Management
The Ménagier writes feelingly about the comforts
that could be provided by a good wife to her husband. He describes how the hard-working husband
would return home, cold, tired, unfed, and shivering: “but naught harmeth him,
because he is upheld by the hope that he hath of the care which his wife will
take of him on his return and of the ease, the joys, and the pleasures which
she will do or have done to him in her presence…to be unshod before a good
fire, to have his feet washed and fresh shoes and hose, to be given good food
and drink, to be well served and well looked after, well bedded in white sheets
and nightcaps, well covered with good furs and assuaged with other joys and
desports…whereof I am silent. And the
next day, fresh shirts and garments.”
Margaret Paston also talks about wanting
to take care of her absent husband, at a time when he was not well: “I would you were at home…liefer than a new
gown, though it were of scarlet; … for I hope ye should be kept as tenderly
here as ye been at London.”
15th century preacher,
Bernadine of Siena described a man without a good wife as “living like a
beast.” “When the woman sees what ought
to be done, she stands in readiness…and tires herself as well in looking to the
comfort of her husband.” Bernadine
describes the womanless man living in discomfort, in a dirty household with an
unmade, lumpy bed with unwashed sheets, a filthy floor with “melons, bones,
refuse, leaves of lettuce left there without being swept up”, moldy tablecloth,
and all his goods rotten and wasted. On
the other hand, a wise and virtuous wife is “the most beautiful and useful
thing in a house.” (Gies, Women in the Middle Ages, p. 34)
The Ménagier is obviously concerned throughout his
book about the cleanliness and comfort of his home. He instructs his bride that she should have
the maids bustling about early every day, first sweeping the entrances and
halls of the house to be ready for any visitors. Then, under her instruction, they should dust
and shake out the cushions and covers on the benches and all rooms be cleaned
and tidied for the day. She and her
companion should personally care for her pet birds and little dogs. The kitchen servants are to carefully clean
all of the kitchen gear. When in the
country, she should summon the steward and check on the welfare of the larger
animals through him and to speak of concerns such as rat-catching. At times, she and the maids should take out
the sheets, coverlets, dresses, and furs, to be checked for problems, and well
aired and cared for. Woolen items and
furs, since they were not readily washable, needed to be brushed or shaken out
frequently, although care should be taken with the brushing. Grease spots could be a serious problem – a
great incentive for good table manners, as grease stains had to be laboriously
worked at with fullers’ earth and urine.
He does not mention making the beds, but this would need to be done and
for the large bedsteads would take a long pole and time and effort to
achieve. He provides her with numerous
suggestions for keeping the place as free as possible of insects, something he
seems particularly concerned about. She
should have the steward check all the wine casks weekly and if any of the wines
are not as they should be, apply various remedies. She is to supervise her servants carefully,
to see that they are well, if plainly, fed and allowed to eat their fill, but
not to laze afterwards at the table, idly chatting. Christine de Pizan also speaks of the
importance of closely supervising the servants and overseeing the accounts
frequently.
The mistress of the house is to plan
appropriate meals for her household and to order the necessary foodstuffs. The servants would probably have two meals a
day, dinner and supper, with breakfast reserved for more privileged people. This distinction is seen in Alice de Breyne’s
food accounts: typically 3-8 people were
fed at breakfast, about 20 at dinner. The difference made by rank to the food
provided is also demonstrated in the plans for three meals for those who
attended the funeral of Thomas Stonor. After the dirges, poor men received bread and
cheese, while the priests and gentlemen had lamb, veal, roasted mutton, and
chickens in a dish. For breakfast, the
“priests and other honest men” had calves’ heads and salt beef, but nothing was
provided for the poor. For dinner, the
poor had “umbles to pottage”, salt beef, roasted veal in a dish, and roasted
pork. The gentry had pottage, “browes of
capons or”, mutton, geese, and custard for the first course, pottage, jussell
(grated bread and eggs in broth), capons, lamb, pig, veal, roast pigeons,
pheasant, baked rabbit, venison, and jelly for the second course. There were pewter vessels for the gentlemen
and silver spoons and silver salt cellars for the most important.
Christine de Pizan also instructs
that the mistress of the house is responsible for appropriate charity. Leftover food and clothing no longer in use
are to be given to the poor, and good meat and wine from her own table sent to
poor women in childbed and to invalids.
She is to give alms wisely, realizing this is the only treasure she can
take from the world, but to be discreet in choosing the recipients of her generosity. (Pizan, p. 188)
In an urban setting, bread could be
readily purchased from bakers, but many recipes of the period are pastries
which would require baking. This could
be done in earthenware under embers, but fairly large quantities would require
an oven. There would need to be secure
storage for fuel, as this was frequently stolen. ‘Great wood’, large logs cut to appropriate
size, would be required for fires in the living area and for roasting and
general cooking. Ovens used ‘faggots’ or
‘bavins’, smaller branches or twigs bound together. Charcoal, which was sold in skeps, was used
in portable fire baskets to warm rooms or for light cooking. ‘Chafers’ or chafing dishes, often ceramic,
also used charcoal for light cooking or reheating. There is documentation for use of sea coal
and peat in some areas in the 15th century. Fireplace hearths were generally flat,
sometimes with a small curb to keep in embers and ashes. Fireplaces and ovens would be of brick or
stone. Fires would be lit with flint and
steel and tinder, often tow.
Dishes and pots needed, of course, to
be cleaned, so the necessities for that had to be provided. Besides water, these could involve soapwort
plants, braken roots, sand, and horsetail plants. Worn out towels and tablecloths were used for
this purpose, although on occasion cloth needed to be purchased. In 1419, Alice de Breyne bought six yards of
linen for washing windows and kitchen ware.
Linen for towels was sometimes woven as “huckaback”, for greater
absorbency.
Water for cooking and washing would
presumably have to be brought from some distance, carried in containers, as the
first piped water in Edinburgh, to a public cistern, would not be built until
1676. In fact, because Edinburgh was not
directly on a body of water, there were water shortages at times. There was a ‘well tower’ for the castle at
the foot of Castle Rock, but Edinburgh was set, although at a distance, among a
number of shallow inland lochs, Burgh Loch to the south, Holyrood Loch to the
east at the foot of Arthur’s Seat, and Duddingston Loch south of Arthur’s Seat,
among them. There were also springs at
the foot of Arthur’s Seat. The amount of
water used by brewers and pollution caused by feeding stock and washing linen
were other issues. Household laundry would often be done by hired washerwomen. It could have been done in washtubs, with
strong liquid soap and a washboard (literally a board, not the textured metal
one which came later). Given the water
situation in Edinburgh and the fact that linen washing in the lochs was standard
enough to be a problem, it was more likely done in the loch, away from the
house, although it is possible that one could hire water carriers. Linen was sometimes wrung out by being twisted
around a pole. The laundry was dried by
being placed on bushes. If sweet
smelling bushes such as rosemary were available, this would lend a pleasant
scent to the cloth.
In spite of the difficulties posed to
creating a hygienic home, other contemporary resources besides the Ménagier see it as a primary concern. Platina, a mid-15th century
Italian gourmet, describes the setting in which one should eat (quoted by Scully, p. 173):
“Napkins should be white and the tablecloths spotless, because, if they
were otherwise, they would arouse squeamishness and take away the desire to
eat. Let a servant scrub the knives and
sharpen their points so that the diners will not be delayed by dullness of
iron. The rest of the dishes should be
scrubbed clean whether they are earthen or silver, for this meticulous care
arouses even a sluggish appetite.”
Because mice and other vermin were a
problem, it was important to have everything properly stored. Mice will eat or damage not just food, but
cloth with traces of food or the salty taste left by sweat. At night, everything is to be locked up, the
storeroom checked for evidence of theft, the hearth fires covered, the servants
given their instructions for the morning, and the candles properly snuffed.
Historian Robert Ekirk theorizes that
given the long winter nights, up to 14 hours, the medieval sleep pattern fell
into two parts with a period of wakefulness between rather than our standard
eight hours sleep. There are references
in period documents to “first sleep” and “second sleep” and a suggestion that
the waking time between was a good time for sexual intimacy and conversation
between spouses. (Worsley, ch. 13)
Responsibilities for Members of the Household/Family
“Family” in medieval
terms often refers to a household, including members of the nuclear biological
family, children being fostered or apprenticed, and servants. Privacy was not typical, expected, nor
generally sought. Beds were commonly
shared, partly because resources and space were limited, partly for warmth, and
partly for company. Even the master and
mistress of the household, who would probably share the largest bed, likely
with curtains for warmth and some privacy, frequently had children or servants
sleeping in the same room.
Medieval women underwent frequent
pregnancies, although 14th century pastoral instructions suggest
that coitus interruptus was known and
sometimes used despite being forbidden (Gilchrist, pg. 39) and recent research suggests some
abortifacients were also known and used (Leyser). Families who could afford it
often sent the resulting children to wet nurses until the children were weaned,
usually between 18 months and two years.
There were plenty of contemporary advocates, particularly religious
ones, for nursing one’s own children, but wet nursing remained common among the
well to do. Maternal death, lack of milk
in the mother, the wish for another pregnancy , and time-consuming
responsibilities are all possible reasons for this. Contemporary critics of wet nursing alleged
it was done because of a desire to remain beautiful and sleep through the
night. Philippe d’Ariès, among some modern writers, has suggested that high infant
and child mortality may have inclined parents to be unwilling to form a close
bond with the infant, although there is certainly contemporary evidence of
parental grief at the death of a child, such as the poem Pearl. Whatever the truth –
which can only be supposition at this point – wealthy medieval women did not
necessarily have the care of infants as part of their household concerns.
They did have the responsibility for
the care and education of the children once they were weaned, as well as for
any older children attached to the household as apprentices or sent by other
families to learn manners and develop a network of useful contacts. Christine de Pizan writes: “She will
supervise the raising of her children and make sure they are neither coddled
nor allowed to be too boisterous while they are young. The children must be kept clean and
mannerly. Nor should their belongings
nor the nurses’ belongings be strewn about the house.” (Pizan, p.187) Leyser refers to depictions of
mothers playing hide-and-seek with their children in The Ancrene Riwle of the 13th century and quotes an example
of conventional maternal concern shown in a play, when Sarah wants to keep
Isaac indoors to keep him out of the wind.
A contemporary poem by Jean Froissart
of Hainaut lists 51 children’s games, including using materials such as mud,
wood, and cloth to construct toy boats, mills, ovens, weapons, and
hobbyhorses. The toys most frequently
depicted in pictures are spinning tops, hobbyhorses, and balls and items
believed to be “buzz-bones” (bones with a cut hole to be threaded and whirred)
have been excavated. There is written
documentation for dolls, but none have survived, so presumably they were
created from perishable materials.
Miniatures made of pewter or lead/tin alloy have survived, including
small knights and equestrian figures and little jugs and tablewear. (Gilchrist, pp.149-151)
In a wealthy home, some of the
physical care would be delegated to servants, but the mistress of the household
would remain responsible for their discipline and seeing that they were fed and
clothed appropriately. Some studies indicate that the children were fed a more
plant-based diet than adults, with significantly less animal-based food (Gilchrist, p.52), which would suggest the necessity for
planning a different menu for them. The
Stonor papers include some impressive invoices for fabric and shoemaking, much
of it for young people in the Stonor household. If the household was large
enough to include a chaplain, he would probably teach basic reading and
religion, although the mother might do so and traditionally would teach them
their first prayers. Leyser argues that
the increase in the 14th century of devotional pictures of St. Anne
teaching the Virgin to read may indicate a rise in domestic literacy,
particularly given the ruling during the clamp down on Lollardy in the 15th
century which stated that women were only to teach other women and
children. The girls would also need to
be taught skills such as spinning, needlework, and household management.
The mistress of the household was
also responsible for the servants. The Ménagier tells his wife that to ensure the staff are properly
inclined to fear and obey her, she will have control over hiring, firing, and
discipline, although because she is young, she might want to ask his advice
privately. He suggests ways to hire the
right servants and directs her to pay good servants well, because they are
important to the comfort and happiness of the house: “he that hath to do with good servants, he
hath peace.” She is to supervise young
female servants closely, having them sleep near her, and correcting gossip, bad
language, and gluttony, and “if she blushes and is shamefast when corrected,
love her as your daughter.” She is to
forbid any quarreling among the servants and see that they are well fed and
given proper times for work and rest, as well as warmth in bad weather. This is obviously a very different
relationship between mistress and servant than the modern employer-employee
dynamic. Essentially, she is acting in a
parental role and the servants, although adults, are dependents.
Servants’ wages sometimes included a
yearly new garment and purchasing the cloth and having it made up would be part
of the mistress’ responsibilities. Clothing
was sometimes handed down from master and mistress, presumably somewhat altered
because of difference in rank.
When any members of the household
were ill, whether husband, child, or servant, she was responsible for their
care. There are recipes extant for
sickroom dishes, such as barley soup and sweet barley water, blankmanger (basically chicken, rice,
almond milk, and sugar – all foods deemed to improve health), and Flemish
Caudle (egg yolks beaten with white wine and drizzled into boiling water). We also have some recipes for “cures” from
the Leechbook, such as this one for a
nosebleed: “Anoint the nose with the
juice of leeks within…also dandelion will stanch blood at the nose, if thou
wilt break it and hold it to the nose that the savour may go into it.” There was thought given to preventative medicine. Elysabeth Stonor wrote her husband in 1476,
“I send you a bladder with powder to drink when you go to bed, for it is
wholesome for you.”
Although medieval medicine was based
upon misconceptions about anatomy and the role of the “humours”, there was some
useful advice. The Health Rule of
Salerno suggests “Use three doctors still, first Dr. Quiet, Next Dr. Merry-man,
and Dr. Diet…” (Gies,
Life…City, p. 118)
Food
Dunbar’s poem, To the Merchants of Edinburgh, mentions some of the foods that
would be for sale in Edinburgh’s market:
curds and milk, cockles and whelks, tripe, and haggis. The basic town diet was grain-based,
supplemented by seafood for the many fish days appointed by the church, berries
and nuts from the local woodlands, and vegetables such as kale, turnips, and
beans. The local elite could add
luxuries such as figs, grapes, and wine.
Wheat often had to be imported, so the poorer locals frequently ate
bread made of oats, barley, or rye. The
wealthier townspeople could buy better bread from the many bakers. Oatcakes,
bannocks, and porridge were simpler and cheaper to cook for the poor. Barley was also consumed as ale, which was
much safer to drink than water. Meat was
easier to obtain in the towns than in rural areas because animals were brought
to the town for slaughter, but meat was mostly consumed by the well to do. Meat was prohibited by the church on Fridays,
Saturdays, and Wednesdays, as well as Lent and Advent.
Pork was the most popular meat,
partly because pigs were easy to raise and because pork kept well when
salted. In England, beef, veal, and lamb
followed pork in order of popularity.
Medieval animals were all “free range” and were leaner than is typical
for modern meat and tended to be slaughtered somewhat younger than they are at
present. Popular poultry included
capons, hens, ducks, and geese. Game
animals and birds were mostly consumed by the nobility, who had the privilege
of hunting. Medieval cooks made use of
virtually the entire animal including head, brain, lungs, kidneys, testicles,
and offal. Sausages were a popular way
of using the less valued parts of the animal and were frequently eaten by the
poor, although sausage did appear on upper class tables, sometimes with slices
dyed different colours. In England,
sausage was most frequently boiled.
Roasts were definitely the prestige meat dish, however, cooked on a
rotisserie, coated in fat to prevent it drying out. (Klemettilä, pp.
63-76)
Because of the many fast days,
enormous amounts of fish were eaten, both from the sea and from fresh
water. They were frequently salted,
fermented, smoked, or dried to preserve them during transport. Herring and cod were the most common fish
products in Europe. Specialties such as
shark, sturgeon, salmon, and Lamprey eels were reserved for the tables of the
wealthy. Wealthy land owners often built
fish ponds and dams to provide fish for their tables. Since fish were seen as being cold and wet
(as to their humours, that is), medical advice
suggested grilling or frying as the best preparation, served with a
sauce rich in spices and herbs. Oysters,
mussels, crayfish, shrimp, and lobster were also served, baked or cooked in
broth, sometimes with eggs, wine, almonds, and spices. (Klemettilä, pp. 77-83)
Fruit and vegetables would have been
available seasonally. Modern excavations
of cesspits indicate that in the middle ages fruit was eaten more frequently
and in larger quantities than previously thought. Dried fruit (imported and expensive) and root
vegetables which lasted well if carefully stored would be the choices in winter. A kitchen garden would be the likeliest
source for fresh vegetables, especially cabbage, kale, onions, garlic, leeks, nettles,
and various herbs, both for the pot and for medicinal purposes. Kale would often grow through much of the
winter in southern England, but I doubt that it would as far north as
Edinburgh.
Vegetables were generally eaten
cooked, after being thoroughly rinsed and often parboiled. They were frequently used in pottages. As they were not regarded as particularly
nutritious, meat or fish broth was added when available. Cauliflowers, lettuce, and peas became known
after being originally cultivated in southern Europe. Root vegetables were sometimes pan fried or
baked in hot ashes. Broad beans,
lentils, and peas – the “dry” vegetables – were widely consumed. They were, of course, the main stay of the
peasant diet, particularly with onions, leeks, or cabbage added, but the
wealthy also enjoyed them, albeit with fancier additions. One English recipe calls for beans to be
boiled in almond milk, with wine, raisins, and honey added. Turnips were common and popular. Carrots, parsnips, beetroots, radishes, and
horseradish were also known. Spinach and
asparagus were relative newcomers, more likely to be found in the kitchens of
the wealthy. Fennel leaves were used in
salads and fennel seeds were used both as a seasoning and as a medicine. (Klemettila, pp 51-59)
It would be necessary to purchase
salt for flavouring and preserving. The
cheapest was sea salt, which often had extraneous content from being dried in
mud flats. It also had valuable trace
elements such as iodine, but of course the medieval consumer was not aware of
this and preferred salt from salt springs or salt mines as purer and better
tasting. This was much more expensive,
however, and sea salt was the most commonly used. Olive oil and almonds were also important
purchases if money was available. Almond
milk substituted frequently for fresh milk, which was very difficult to
keep. Most milk would be processed into
cheese or butter, with salt added to improve preservation.
Alice de Breyne’s household accounts
for 1412-13 show purchases of almonds, raisins, rice, saffron, ginger,
cinnamon, cloves, mace, figs, currants, dates, sugar, pepper, mustard seed,
soda-ash, and honey. Beef and pork were
served throughout the year on flesh days in her household.
Beer or ale was the most common
drink, although wine, cider, mead, and perry were also beverages of the period. Sweet red wine was the most favoured of the
imported wines according to import duties and price controls.
It is possible that chickens might be
kept in the back garden for eggs and the occasional chicken dinner. Chicken was considered particularly
appropriate food for someone who was ill.
The Ménagier provides his wife with a number of
menus, “divers dinners and suppers of great lords and others…whereupon you may
choose, collect, and learn whatsoever dishes it may please you…when you have to
give a dinner or supper.” I infer that
these suggestions are for company dinners, rather than standard fare. One of the menus follows:
“First course: Beef and marrow pasties, hare in
civey, great joints, a white coney brewet, capons and venison with sops, white
porray, turnips, salt ducks, and chines.
Second course: The
best roast, a rosee of larks, a blankmanger, umbles, boar’s tail with hot
sauce, fat capon pasties, fritters, and Norwegian pasties (made with cod’s liver)
Third course: Frumenty,
venison, various sorts of glazed meats, fat geese and capons, cream darioles (small pastries containing custard, possibly with dried fruit or almonds) and leches (slices) fried and sugared, bourreys of hot galantine, capon jelly, coneys, young
chickens, rabbits, and piglings
Fourth course: Hippocras
(spiced and sweetened wine) and wafers for issue.”
Brears cites a middle-class menu from
Furnivall’s Early English Meals and
Manners – A Feast for a Franklin:
First course: Brawne
with mustard, bacon with peas, boiled beef or mutton, boiled chicken or capon,
roast goose and roast suckling pig, baked custard of eggs and cream
Second course: Mortrews and jussell (eggs and broth), roast veal, lamb, kid, cony, or
pigeon, bakemeats and dowcets (small cream-filled pastry), fritters, a leach (pudding, sliced), spiced apples and pears, bread and cheese
Void: Spiced
cakes and wafers, braggot (very strong ale with honey and
spices added) and mead
Some medieval Scottish recipes: (Macdonald, although the author does not cite sources for
these recipes. I thought them
interesting enough to add, especially given the paucity of specifically
Scottish information.)
Blood Pudding
1. Put the blood in a bowl. Stir well.
2. Add salt, milk, chopped fat, chopped
onions, oatmeal, herbs or spices.
3. Pack into cleaned animal intestines.
4. Put in boiling water and boil for
half an hour.
5.
Store
in a cool airy place, and boil again before eating.
Cream Crowdie
(eat with fresh raspberries if possible)
1. Toast some oatmeal on an iron girdle
(griddle) and let it cool.
2. Whip some cream into a froth.
3. Arrange thick layers of cream and
thin layers of oatmeal alternately in a bowl.
4.
Drizzle
heather honey on top.
Black Bun
(traditionally eaten at Hogmanay)
1. Put raisins, currants, candied orange peel,
almonds, spices (cloves, ginger, cinnamon, pepper) and flour in a big
bowl.
2. Add buttermilk or beaten eggs and
stir.
3. Line a baking tin with pastry. Put the fruit mixture inside.
4. Add a lid of pastry and seal the
edges well.
5.
Bake
in a gentle oven for four hours.
Sowans (good
for invalids)
1. Soak oat grain husks in water for
three days or more until they smell sour.
2. Squeeze the husks to press out a
milky liquid, then throw them away.
3. Stand the milky liquid in a jar in a
warm place for 24 hours. You should find
a thick layer at the bottom and a thin liquid on top.
4.
Mix
some of the thick layer with water, then boil it, stirring, for 10
minutes. Serve with milk.
Roast Venison
1. Take a haunch of red deer.
2. Soak it for 6 hours in red wine mixed
with vinegar.
3. Fix it on a spit above a big, hot
fire.
4. Mix the wine and vinegar with melted
butter, then pour over the haunch all the time while it turns.
5.
When
the haunch is nearly cooked, coat with more butter, sprinkle with flour. Cook for another 15 minutes. This will give it a crispy coating.
Oatcake/Havercake (Brears)
1. Melt a tablespoon of lard or dripping
in 3 tablespoons of warm water.
2. Mix in 3 ounces of fine oatmeal and a
pinch of salt to form a dough.
3. Knead and pat out on a thin layer of
oatmeal to form a ten inch disc.
4. Heat a girdle/bakestone until
scattered flour slowly browns, but doesn’t smoulder.
5. Slide cake onto bakestone and bake
until edges begin to curl up, about 4-5 minutes.
6. Turn over and bake on other side.
7. Prop up in front of fire to dry out
and slightly toast.
EDINBURGH
The picture above shows Edinburgh in
the 17th century, about 200 years after the period under discussion,
but still shows the town walls and gives something of a sense of the enclosed,
small, medieval city, surrounded by open fields and hills.
Edinburgh is set on a glacial tail
stretching east from the Castle Rock.
The earliest building still standing is the small chapel of St. Margaret
at the summit of Castle Rock, erected in the 12th century. The castle ramparts were repaired in 1335 and
the castle enlarged and remodelled, with royal apartments built. Hidden within the
wall of the Half Moon Battery are the shattered remains of David's Tower. This
massive rectangular keep, begun as a royal lodging by David II in 1368,
dominated the Castle for nearly two centuries.
David I established about 10 Scottish
burghs in the 12th century, some of which were new and some already existed but
were raised to burghal status. It is not
known which is the case for Edinburgh.
Edinburgh’s plan conforms to the commonest type for medieval towns of
this period throughout Europe: it has a
single main street, the High Street, which widens in the middle to accommodate
markets and the parish church, St. Giles, with plots of uniform width (25 feet)
and length (450 feet), called ‘tofts’, extending to back lanes or town
defenses. It is unusual in that there actually
were two burghs: Edinburgh running part way down the ridge and the lower part
of the ridge the burgh of Canongate, which Holyrood Abbey had been permitted to
establish.
After the founding of the burgh, the
tofts were let to tenants who committed themselves to building a house near the
front of the site within a year and eventually to pay rent (burghage tenure) to
the king. In the burgh of Canongate,
this would have been paid to the Abbot.
Tenure could be inherited and later could be sold. The ‘backlands’ behind the house could be
used for kitchen gardens, but eventually, as other buildings were needed, these
were built up and accessed by paths along the toft boundaries, creating the
characteristic ‘closes’ of Edinburgh. Documents
from 1491 indicate that there were still gardens and yards at this point, as
they are referred to in divisions of property in town. For merchants and tradesmen, the important
aspect of the property was the profitable frontage on the high street. (Edwards)
A rough estimate of the population of
the burgh done in 1929 based on an assessment of burgage plots behind the walls
suggested a population of 2,000 in 1329.
Using the same baseline, the population had risen to 10,000 by 1560,
suggesting rapid growth. Froissart described Edinburgh as the “chief
town” of Scotland, but government of this period was attached to the king, who
moved about in his kingdom, and it would not have been the seat of government
in the modern sense.
The King’s Wall was begun in 1427,
running parallel to an earlier wall. The
church of St. Mary’s in the Fields and the Dominican monastery of Blackfriars
were both established in the 13th century. St. Giles was, however, the parish church
for the burgh, built in the traditional cruciform plan, although this was later
blurred by the addition of multiple chapels.
There are references to town walls
and gates in them dating to 1180, although they seem to have been more intended
to control access to the market and to collect taxes than to fend off
invasions. Edinburgh Castle, overlooking
the town, is the actual defensive structure.
Holyrood Abbey is at the opposite end of the High Street from the
castle, near the mount of Arthur’s Seat, in Canongate. When resident in the area, the royal family
often lived in the comfortable guest quarters of Holyrood Abbey rather than in
their apartments at the castle.
In 1329, King Robert gave Edinburgh a
new charter to encourage it to rebuild after the devastation of the English
occupation and the war with England.
Among other things, it made over to them a port at the mouth of the
Water of Leith. Edinburgh was liable for
a flat fee of 52 merks a year, far less than the cities of Berwick and
Aberdeen.
During much of the 14th
century there was considerable building in Edinburgh. In the High Street, the church of St. Giles
was rebuilt, particularly after the English sacked the town again in 1385. Chapels and transepts were added and the
choir was complete by 1419. The spire
was raised in height to be more impressive.
Although there was no seating for the congregation in early medieval
churches, by this period there is documentation for some seating against the
walls and sometimes pews, with records from some 15th century churches
of pews being reserved for women or sold for the use of particular families (Gilchrist, p.175).
Worshippers knelt upon the stone floor, although the wealthy might bring
a cushion to kneel on or women bunch their skirts to pad their knees a bit. During
the pre-Reformation period, the church would have been decorated with coloured
statues, with vivid wall paintings of the lives of the saints, elaborate stone
tombs of local noble families, stained glass windows, and embroidered
hangings. Carvings in wood and stone abounded, sometimes
just for beauty, sometimes humorous, and sometimes – as in depictions of the
Last Judgement – terrifying. Beeswax
candles were used in ceremonies, their scent and flickering light adding drama
to the scene. The priests would have
been in brightly coloured and elaborate vestments and the church filled with
music and the aroma of incense. The
service and its surroundings would have been a feast for the senses.
The church was very central to the
community, both religiously and socially, as all members of the community were
a part of it. For instance, at the
celebration of Candlemas, 40 days after Christmas, each parishioner would bring
a candle to be blessed by the priest, paying him a penny for this service. The candles were consecrated at the high
altar and perfumed with incense. “They
were then lit and carried … in procession around the church, evoking the
symbolism of divine light and the renewal of life” (Gilchrist, p. 171) Some candles would be given to the church afterwards, but
others would be taken home to “be lit during thunderstorms or in times of
sickness or put in the hands of the dying.” (Gilchrist, p. 171, quoting Eamon Duffy)
This was a rite performed by the community as a group rather than simply
a performance by the clergy witnessed by the congregation and for many carried
over into rituals in the home which comforted them when they were afraid.
Next to St. Giles, in the middle of
the long marketplace which had originally been laid out in the 1120’s, the
Tolbooth, where taxes were paid and other government business dealt with, was
built. There had been a tolbooth or pretorium as early as 1368 and the one built after the English
destruction of the city is first mentioned in 1403, when it was used by
parliament. In Aberdeen, each burgess had to contribute 4 d. or one day’s work to the
building of their Tolbooth and presumably a similar arrangement would have
happened in Edinburgh. The Tron, or official weight, and the Market Cross were
nearby. The Market Cross was the central
place of trade and where announcements and public punishments took place. Some times a reconciliation ritual was
imposed, or the stocks, pillory, or an iron collar were used. In an apparently unique Scottish practice,
those convicted of speaking false words had to admonish their tongue
publicly: “false tongue, you lied!”
(Cowan) Friars might
also preach from here. Prices were set
for staple goods such as bread and ale and hours were set for selling.
The High
Street would have had temporary booths and stalls set up on market days or for
fairs, as well as chapmen carrying their wares on horses or on their
backs. In the booths and shops, there
could also be candle sellers, basket makers, soap (some fine, made from olive oil and even
scented), brooms, combs, glassware, wooden hoops, rush matting, knives, and
pater nosters, as well as all the foods. In the typical medieval city, there would be
brightly coloured signboards over the many taverns and tradesmen’s symbols over
the shops, a bush for a vintner, three gilded pills for the apothecary, a
unicorn for the goldsmith, and so on. In
the permanent shop stalls the front when opened would fold down to form a
counter to display the wares and often an upper part would fold up to create a
small canopy to protect them.
Religious processions would take place. Some towns had official, hired musicians. We know from Dunbar that Edinburgh had
official minstrels by the latter part of the 15th century, although
he did not think highly of their skills.
Some towns had plays similar to the mystery or morality plays in
England, although the evidence for this is very scattered, with no
documentation prior to 1440, and I have found nothing specific to Edinburgh.
The open area outside the city walls was used for archery
practice, for sports, for grazing animals, for washing and bleaching linen, and
also for festivities needing a larger space.
Thanks to middens belonging to homes, to casual disposal of
sewage and garbage, and the stench produced by animal dung, the remains of
slaughtered animals, and industries such as dyeing and tanning, the city would
have been strongly and unpleasantly scented, probably overwhelming pleasanter
aromas from the cookhouses and bakeries.
Dunbar complained of the “reek of haddock”. The most unpleasant industries such as
tanning were usually confined to a specific area, so the degree of odour may
have varied with wind direction. There
are detailed descriptions from 150 years later of disputes in urban England
over privies and cesspits (Locating
Privacy in Tudor London, L.C. Orlin).
The disagreements ranged over odour, overuse, trespass, and cost. This is, of course, considerably later in
time and in more crowded conditions, but one of the things stressed was the
expense involved in having the privies emptied and the resulting tendency to
use public or other nearby privies. In
Edinburgh, much closer to 1430, there are references to people fouling ditches,
walls, and public benches and stools (Cowan, p.129). Much less irksome and probably rarely
noticed, in wet weather, there would have been the scent of wet wool from
everyone’s clothing.
Feral cats and dogs wandered and so did pigs, which had
owners, but had been turned loose to forage.
Officials made an effort to keep the market area as clean as possible
and various laws were passed to improve hygiene. More effort was made in times of plague –
which was pretty much every decade or so from 1350 to the end of this period -
as bad air or miasma was believed to carry illness. Shop keepers might try to keep the area in
front of their shop fairly clear, in order not to discourage trade, although
offal from the butcher and poultry shops would be often just be dumped in the
street. In the most important streets
and before the wealthier houses, servants would clear the area before the
door.
In the better homes, fragrant herbs were strewn with rushes
on the floor and the rushes changed in order to improve the smells in the
house. Herbs were sometimes burned as
well. Experiences with camping would
suggest to me that the smoke from the hearths and the scent of burning wood
would have masked some of the odours.
The noises of the city would have mostly been natural ones,
from people talking or negotiating prices or arguing, from friars preaching, and
street sellers crying their wares. Scully
cites street cries from Piers Plowman,
1377: “Cooks and their kitchen-boys kept
crying, ‘Hot pies, hot! Good pork and
geese! Go dine, go! Tavern-keepers told
them the same, ‘White wine of Alsace and red wine of Gascony, Of the Rhine and
LaRochelle, to wash down the roast!’”
Other cries from Europe quoted by Scully include the following: “Mussels,
lily-white mussels! I have ripe strawberries, ripe strawberries! Buy my dish of
great smelts! Fine oranges, fine lemons!
Fresh eels! Rabbits for
sale! Rats or mice to kill! Old shoes, old shoes!” Beggars would be importuning passersby, often quite noisily and
aggressively. Some of the
sounds would be from animals, the clop of horse hoofs, the barking of dogs, the
snorting of pigs rooting through garbage, and the squawking of the geese and
other poultry awaiting purchase. There
would also have been the church bells, which marked the passing of the
canonical hours, from matins to the curfew bell at night, as well as marking
rites of passage such as burials. In a
period without easy means of telling time, the bells did more than call you to
prayers and remind you of God’s watchful presence. At night there would have been dark and
quiet, fires banked, windows shuttered, respectable citizens all abed.
William Dunbar’s famous poem, To the Merchants of Edinburgh, provides an interesting picture of
Edinburgh in the throes of rapid growth and urban problems. The poem is from the end of the 15th
century, so many of the problems would have possibly been less onerous in
1430. Given the Scottish tradition of flyting, basically contests of insults
in poetry, the charges may also be exaggerated.
Holyrood Abbey (description
and picture from internet)
The ruined Augustinian abbey that is sited in the grounds was founded in 1128 at the order of King David I
of Scotland. The name derives
either from a legendary vision of the cross witnessed by David I, or from a
relic of the True Cross known as the Holy Rood or Black Rood, and
which had belonged to Queen
Margaret, David's mother. As a
royal foundation, and sited close to Edinburgh Castle, it became an important administrative centre. In 1370, David II became the first of several Kings of Scots
to be buried at Holyrood. Not only was James II born at Holyrood in 1430, it was at
Holyrood that he was crowned, married and laid to rest. The early royal
residence was in the abbey guesthouse, which most likely stood on the site of
the present north range of the palace, west of the abbey cloister, and by the
later 15th century already had dedicated royal apartments. 9
According to Gemmill and Mayhew in Changing Values in Medieval Scotland, in the 13th and
early 14th centuries, English coin was the dominant coinage in
Scotland. In 1367, however, Scotland ‘clearly moved away from sterling’,
although it took until the end of the century to eclipse the predominance of
English currency. English coins were
still in use to some extent in the 15th and 16th
centuries. The basic unit was the
penny. In accounts, shillings and pounds
were used, as well as the mark (merk in Scotland), which was two thirds of a
pound. Comparison is complicated, but Private Life in the Fifteenth Century
gives some interesting figures on English incomes and prices:
The wealthiest lords, such
as the Duke of York, had annual incomes between £4,000 and £6,000. Alice de Breyne’s annual income was £400. John
Paston’s 1451 tax assessment was £66 per annum from land, while wages for an
agricultural labourer were about 4d. a day, 5-6 d. a day for a building worker,
and 6 d. a day for an archer.
wheat – 5s. 8d. a quarter
salt – 5 d. a bushel
eggs – 5 d. a hundred
pepper – 2 s. a pound
sugar – 1 s. 6 d. a pound,
raisins – 3 d. a pound
candles – 1 d. a pound
milk – 1 d. a gallon
beer – 1 d. a gallon
red wine – 10 d. a gallon
cattle – 9-11 s. each
sheep – 1-2 s. each
pigs – 2-3s. each
CALENDAR – dates would be usually
written with reference to year of reign and religious festivals:
Annunciation of the Virgin – 25 March
Ash Wednesday, followed by 40 days of
Lent
Palm Sunday
Maundy Thursday
Good Friday
Easter Day
Rogation Sunday – 5th Sunday
after Easter
Ascension Day – Thursday following
Rogation Sunday
Pentecost, Whitsunday – 7th
Sunday after Easter
Trinity Sunday – 8th Sunday
after Easter
Corpus Christi – Thursday after Trinity
Sunday
Midsummer/Birth of John the Baptist –
24 June
Lammas/St. Peter’s Day - 1 August
Michaelmas – 29 September
Hallowmas – 1 November
Martinmas – 11 November
Christmas – 25 December
Epiphany – 6 January
Hilary – 13 January
Candlemas/Purification of the Virgin –
2 February
Timeline (Edinburgh,
Scotland, England, France)
The climate
worsened in the 14th century in Scotland, with floods, animal
diseases, and poor harvests. In 1344,
John of Fordun writes, “There was so great a pestilence among the fowls that
men utterly shrank from eating, or even looking upon, a cock or a hen, as
though unclean and smitten with leprosy; and thus, as well as from the
aforesaid cause, nearly the whole of that species was destroyed…”
1350: The
Black Death (source is John of Fordun):
“There was in the kingdom of Scotland so great a pestilence and plague
among men (which also prevailed for a great many years before and after in
divers parts of the world – nay, all over the whole earth) as…had never been
heard of by man nor is found in books…For to such a pitch did that plague wreak
its cruel spite that nearly a third of mankind were thereby made to pay the
debt of nature. Moreover, by God’s will,
this evil led to a strange and unwonted kind of death, insomuch that the flesh
of the sick was somehow puffed out and swollen and they dragged out their
earthly life for barely two days. Now
this everywhere attacked especially the meaner sort and common people, seldom
the magnates. Men shrank from it so much
that, through fear of contagion, sons, fleeing as from the face of leprosy or
from an adder, durst not go and see their parents in the throes of death.” This recurred, though less violently, every
decade or so for many years.
23 February 1371: David II dies at Edinburgh
Castle. He is succeeded by his nephew, Robert
Stewart who becomes King Robert II, and the founder of the Stewart dynasty that is to rule Scotland for most of the next three
hundred years. Robert II is the grandson of Robert the Bruce by his daughter Marjory. The usual hostilities with
England are more or less ongoing.
1377:
Death of Edward III of England and the accession of his grandson, Richard II,
as a minor, with John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, his uncle, as chief man in
the realm.
1380: Charles V of France dies and is succeeded by
his son, Charles VI.
1381: Peasants’ Rising in England.
November 1384: An ailing Robert II is sidelined in favour of his own eldest son and
heir, John, Earl
of Carrick, who becomes
Guardian of the Kingdom.
1384:
Duke of Lancaster extorts ransom from
burgesses following end of truce
1385: Archibald Douglas, 3rd Earl of
Douglas captures Lochmaben Castle from the
English, held by them since 1333.
June 1385: The Scots
under the Earl of Carrick, supported
by a French army, invade northern England but are pushed back as far as Edinburgh, which is
destroyed in retaliation by the English. Jean Froissart complains of the treatment of
the French army by the Scots, who in turn have many complaints about the
French. Froissart comments upon the
poverty of the country and lack of availability of many items and the “savage”
manners of the Scots.
1385: English
burn Edinburgh
1386: Robert II grants ground for building of the Tolbooth
1387: Donald of Islay becomes
the 2nd Lord of the Isles following
the death of John of Islay.
1387: Five new chapels
are added to the Church of St Giles following English damage in 1385
August
1388: The Earl of Carrick
leads the Scots into Cumberland and Northumberland. This culminates with the
Battle of Otterburn, a victory for the Scots but with the loss of their
battlefield commander James, Earl of Douglas, the Earl of Carrick's most
powerful ally in southern Scotland.
December 1388: John, Earl
of Carrick, who has been
injured while riding, is replaced as Guardian of the Kingdom by his younger
brother Robert,
Earl of Fife.
1394: Death of Queen Anne, wife of Richard II of
England
April 1390: Robert II dies, and is succeeded by his eldest son John, Earl
of Carrick. He becomes,
confusingly, King
Robert III because the Scots
feel John is an unlucky name for a King and because for him to become John II
would acknowledge John
Balliol as John I, and so revive a
claim to the throne that had been sold to Edward III of England in 1356.
17 June 1390: Alexander
Stewart, youngest son of Robert II and younger brother Robert III, and Robert,
Earl of Fife, destroy Elgin
Cathedral.
1393: Le Ménagier writes his book
around this time.
24 July 1394: Alexander
Stewart, 1st Earl of Buchan, the Wolf of
Badenoch, dies, according to legend after playing chess with the devil at Ruthven
Castle.
September 1396: In an effort to
halt one of the many clan feuds dividing the Highlands, Robert III arranged a fight to the death between 30 warriors
from each of the Clans Kay and Chattan on the edge of Perth in front of spectators. 11 Clan Chattan emerge
alive and one man of Clan Kay escapes by swimming the River Tay. This is later
called the Battle of the Inch.
1396:
Richard II of England marries Isabella of France and begins a 28 year
truce with France.
1398: Robert
III's eldest son, David, is created 1st Duke
of Rothesay and Robert
III's younger brother, Robert,
Earl of Fife, is created Duke of
Albany.
1398: Henry
Sinclair, 1st Earl of Orkney, is believed to have made his voyage of discovery
to North America.
In those
days there was no law in Scotland, but the strong oppressed the weak, and the
whole kingdom was one den of thieves. Homicides, robberies, fire-raisings, and
other misdeeds remained unpunished, and justice seemed banished beyond the
kingdom's bounds.
The Chartularium Episcopatus Moraviensis
written at Elgin Cathedral for the year 1398
1399: The General Council takes power from Robert
III, now in poor health, and gives
it instead to David
Stewart, 1st Duke of Rothesay, whom they make the King's Lieutenant.
1399: Richard II of England is forced
to abdicate. Henry IV ascends to the
throne.
1400: Death of Geoffrey Chaucer
1400: The Duke
of Rothesay bigamously marries Mary Douglas. The father of his spurned first
wife gains support from Henry IV of England and an English army easily takes Edinburgh, except for
the castle, before
withdrawing.
1400: Henry IV attempts to storm castle
1401: David Stewart, 1st Duke of
Rothesay is captured by his uncle Robert, Duke of Albany and
imprisoned in St Andrews Castle. He is
subsequently moved to the Duke of Albany's home at Falkland Palace in Fife.
March 1402: David Stewart, 1st Duke of
Rothesay, dies at Falkland Palace as a
result, the General Council decides, of "Divine Providence". Others
say the cause is starvation. This leaves David's 7 year-old brother James as heir to
the throne still held by Robert III. There are
fears that James in turn
will not be safe from the ambitions of his uncle Robert.
1403:
English warring with Welsh.
1403: The earliest burgh record mentions the
"Pretorio burgi" - the Old
Tolbooth
February 1406: An army of
James' supporters
is defeated by the Duke of Albany at Edinburgh. James is taken
for safety to Bass Rock, off North Berwick.
22 March 1406: James is
captured by pirates off Flamborough Head in Yorkshire while en route to
sanctuary in France. They then hand him over to Henry IV of England.
4 April 1406: King Robert III dies in Rothesay Castle after
hearing the news of James' capture.
James therefore succeeds to the throne as James I at the age
of 11 and as a prisoner of the English. He is first lodged in the Tower, moved
to Nottingham Castle in 1407 and Evesham in 1409, then sent back to the Tower
by Henry V, but afterwards joined the court at Windsor.
1406: Robert, Duke of Albany becomes
Governor of Scotland in his nephew's absence and moves his base to Doune Castle.
1407: The Duke of Albany negotiates
a renewal of the long standing treaty of mutual support against England with
France.
24 July 1411: At the Battle of Harlaw, 20 miles
north of Aberdeen, the
highland army of Donald of Islay, Lord of the Isles meets the
lowland army of Alexander, Earl of Mar, son of the Wolf of Badenoch. At stake
is the Earldom of Ross and control of northern Scotland. After an inconclusive
day of heavy fighting and heavy casualties, Donald retires to
Inverness and
Alexander to Aberdeen.
1413: The University of St Andrews is founded
as a center for learning and the arts.
1413:
Henry IV dies, Henry V becomes King of England.
1415:
English invasion of France, Battle of Agincourt.
1418:
In France, which has already had serious losses to the English, John the
Fearless, Duke of Burgundy, captures Paris.
The Dauphin flees.
1419:
John the Fearless is assassinated by friends of the Dauphin. He is succeeded by his son, Philip the Good,
who allies himself with the English.
1420: Robert, Duke of Albany dies and
is succeeded as Governor of Scotland by his son, Murdoch.
1420:
Charles VI signs the Treaty of Troyes, under which the French throne
will pass on his death to Henry V of England, who has married the French
princess, Katherine.
August 1422:
Death of Henry V of England, succeeded by his very young son, Henry
VI.
October 1422:
Charles VI of France dies, succeeded by his son, Charles VII. From the English point of view, by the Treaty
of Troyes, he should have been succeeded by Henry VI of England. The Hundred Years War continues.
1422: Margaret Mauteby, later
Paston, is born in England around this time.
1423 : Alexander of Islay becomes
the 3rd Lord of the Isles following
the death of Donald of Islay.
December 1423: The Treaty
of London provides for the release of King James I by Henry
VI of England in return for a King's ransom of £40,000, plus £4,000 for the
expenses incurred during James' 18 years of captivity.
February 1424: James I marries Lady Joan Beaufort, a relative
of Henry VI, in London. (Joan is
the daughter of John Beaufort, Earl of Somerset, who is the legitimated eldest
son of John of Gaunt and his third wife, Katherine Swynford – Henry VI is the
great-grandson of John of Gaunt through his first marriage.)
21 May 1424: James I is crowned
at Scone.
1424: After Linlithgow, which is 15 miles from
Edinburgh, burns in 1424, James starts rebuilding Linlithgow Palace as a
splendid – and expensive - residence for the kings of Scotland.
April 1425: James I arrests
many members of the Albany family, descendents of his uncle, Robert. James Albany evades capture long enough to
attack Dumbarton and
destroy the castle, so justifying a charge of treason against the family.
May 1425: The Scottish
Parliament meets in Stirling to try the
Albany family for treason. Murdoch and three others are executed and the family
is virtually extinguished.
1427: Act of Parliament sets a bounty on wolf
whelps and orders all men to assist their barons in hunting wolves when asked,
upon pain of fine.
1427: Act of Parliament forbids lepers to enter any
burgh other than on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from ten in the morning to
two in the afternoon or to beg in kirks or kirkyards.
1428: James I summons Alexander, Lord of the Isles and other
highland clan chiefs to a meeting in Inverness, and has
them arrested. Three are executed as an example, but others including Alexander
are later released.
1429:
Jeanne d’Arc leads French army to the relief of Orleans, turning the
tide of the war in France.
1429: Alexander, Lord of the Isles, attacks
and destroys Inverness. James I retaliates
and captures Alexander, releasing
him again two years later.
16
October 1430: Twin sons, James and Alexander, are born
to James I
and Joan.
Alexander dies as a baby, but James survives
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