Part 1

Produced by Turgut Dincer, Barry Abrahamsen, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)

THE NEW MEDIEVAL LIBRARY

The engraved title on the reverse of this page was adapted by Miss Blanche C. Hunter from B.M. Add. MS. 31240, f. 4.

THE BABEES’ BOOK:

MEDIEVAL MANNERS FOR THE YOUNG: DONE INTO MODERN ENGLISH FROM DR. FURNIVALL’S TEXTS BY EDITH RICKERT

CHATTO AND WINDUS: LONDON NEW YORK: DUFFIELD & CO. 1908

All rights reserved

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION xi

THE BABEES’ BOOK 1

THE A B C OF ARISTOTLE 9

URBANITATIS 11

THE LITTLE CHILDREN’S LITTLE BOOK 16

THE YOUNG CHILDREN’S BOOK 21

STANS PUER AD MENSAM 26

HOW THE GOOD WIFE TAUGHT HER DAUGHTER 31

HOW THE WISE MAN TAUGHT HIS SON 43

JOHN RUSSELL’S BOOK OF NURTURE 47

THE BOOK OF COURTESY 79

SYMON’S LESSON OF WISDOM FOR ALL MANNER 122 CHILDREN

HUGH RHODES’S BOOK OF NURTURE 126

FRANCIS SEAGER’S SCHOOL OF VIRTUE 141

RICHARD WESTE’S SCHOOL OF VIRTUE, THE SECOND 157 PART, OR THE YOUNG SCHOLAR’S PARADISE

NOTES 179

FOOTNOTES 204

ILLUSTRATIONS

THE SCHOOL OF ARISTOTLE Cotton, MS. Aug. A. Frontispiece 5, fol. 103.

“DE LA DISPUTATION Q’ FIST CATHON A SOY 44 MESMES ET CONTRE SON CORPZ A SA MORT” Royal MS. 16 G. viii., fol. 324.

“CY PARLE DUNE GRANT FESTE QUE LE ROY RICHARD 54 DENGLETERRE FIST A LONDRES” Royal MS. 14 E. iv., fol. 265b.

“IF THOU BE A YOUNG INFANT” Harl. MS. 621, 85 fol. 71.

JOHN OF GAUNT RECEIVES A CIVIC DEPUTATION 112 Royal MS. 14 E. iv., fol. 169b.

“WHO SPARETH THE ROD, THE CHILD HATETH” B.M. 126 Add. MS. 31240, fol. 4.

INTRODUCTION

NEARLY forty years ago, Dr. Furnivall collected for the Early English Text Society “divers treatises touching the Manners and Meals of Englishmen in former days.” Some of these were published in 1868, under the title _The Babees’ Book_,[1] and others, chiefly of later date, in 1869, under the title _Queene Elizabethes Achademy_.

These two volumes, with their introductions and illustrative matter, to my mind present the most vivid picture of home life in medieval England that we have. Aside from their general human interest, they are valuable to the student of social history, and almost essential to an understanding of the literature of their time. The whole fabric of the romances was based upon the intricate system of “courtesy” as here set forth, and John Russell furnishes an interesting comment on Chaucer and his school, as do Rhodes and Seager and Weste on the writers of the sixteenth century. Finally, among these treatises, there is many a plum by the way for the seeker of proverbs, curious lore, superstitions, literary oddities. And as comparatively few people have time or inclination to worry through antiquated English, Dr. Furnivall has long wished that the substance of his collections might be presented in modern form. Therefore this little volume has been undertaken.

Doubtless unwritten codes of behaviour are coeval with society; but the earliest treatises that we possess emphasize morals rather than manners. Even the late Latin author known as Dionysius Cato (fourth century?), whose maxims were constantly quoted, translated, imitated, and finally printed during the late Middle Ages, does not touch upon the niceties of conduct that we call manners; wherefore one John Garland, an Englishman educated at Oxford, who lived much in France during the first half of the thirteenth century, felt bound to supplement Cato on these points. His work, entitled _Liber Faceti: docens mores hominum, precipue iuuenum, in supplementum illorum qui a moralissimo Cathone erant omissi iuuenibus utiles_,[2] is alluded to as _Facet_ in the first piece in this volume, and serves as basis for part of the _Book of Courtesy_.

But, earlier than this, Thomasin of Zerklaere, about 1215, wrote in German a detailed treatise on manners called _Der Wälsche Gast_.[3] And in 1265, Dante’s teacher, Brunetto Latini, published his _Tesoretto_,[3] which was soon followed by a number of similar treatises in Italian.

While we need not hold with the writer of the _Little Children’s Little Book_, that courtesy came down from heaven when Gabriel greeted the Virgin, and Mary and Elizabeth met, we must look for its origin somewhere; and inasmuch as, in its medieval form at least, it is closely associated with the practices of chivalry, we may not unreasonably suppose it to have appeared first in France. And although most of the extant French treatises belong to the fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, a lost book of courtesy, translated by Thomasin of Zerklaere, is sometimes held, on good grounds, to have been derived from French, rather than from Italian.

In any case, such of the English books as were not taken immediately from Latin, came from French sources. To be sure, there is a Saxon poem, based it would seem on Cato, though by no means a translation, called _A Father’s Instructions to his Son_; but this, although it is greatly exercised about the child’s soul, takes no thought for his finger-nails or his nose.

It is not, therefore, surprising to find that nearly all English words denoting manners are of French origin—_courtesy_, _villainy_, _nurture_, _dignity_, _etiquette_, _debonaire_, _gracious_, _polite_, _gentilesse_, &c., while to balance them I can, at this moment, recall only three of Saxon origin—_thew_ (which belongs rather to the list of moral words in which Old English abounds), _churlish_ and _wanton_ (without breeding), both of which, significantly enough, are negative of good manners.

The reason for the predominance of the French terms is simply that “French use these gentlemen,” as one old writer puts it; that is, from the Conquest until the latter part of the fourteenth century the language of the invaders prevailed almost entirely among the upper classes, who, accordingly, learned their politeness out of French or Latin books; and it was only with the growth of citizenship and English together, that these matters came to be discussed in this latter tongue for the profit of middle-class children, as well as of the “bele babees” at Court.

We must suppose, from numerous hints and descriptions, that an elaborate system of manners and customs prevailed long before it was codified. The Bayeux tapestry (eleventh century) shows a feast, with a server kneeling to serve, his napkin about his neck, as John Russell prescribes some four hundred years later.

The romances again, alike in French and in English, describe elaborate ceremonies, and allude constantly to definite laws of courtesy. Now and again we find a passage that sets forth the ideal gentleman. Young Horn, for example, was taught “skill of wood and river” (hunting and hawking), carving, cup-bearing, and harping “with his nails sharp.” Child Florent showed his high birth by his love of horse, hawk, and armour, and by his contempt of gold; but he was not thought ill-mannered to laugh when his foster-father and mother fell down in their attempt to draw a rusty sword from its scabbard! Chaucer’s _Squire_ might well have been brought up on a treatise similar to those included in this volume:

“Well could he sit on horse and fairly ride; He could songs make and fair could he indite, Joust and eke dance, and well portray and write.

────────────────

Courteous he was, lowly, and serviceáble, And carved before his father at the table.”

But the _Prioress_ outmatched him, having possibly learned her manners in the French of “Stratford-atte-Bowe,” in _Les Contenances de la Table_, or some such thing:

“At meatë well y-taught was she withal, She let no morsel from her lippës fall, Nor wet her fingers in her saucë deep: Well could she carry a morsel, and well keep, That no dropë did fall upon her breast; In courtesy was set full much her lest.[4] Her over-lippë wipéd she so clean, That in her cup there was no farthing seen Of grease, when she drunken had her draught. Full seemëly after her meat she raught,[5] And certainly she was of great desport,[6] And full pleasant, and amiable of port; And painéd her to counterfeitë cheer Of court, and to be stately in mannér, And to be holden digne of reverence.”

These maxims were versified that they might be the more easily remembered, as we know from various expressions, notably “Learn or be Lewd” (ignorant), which occurs at the end of several pieces. In 1612 the principle was stated explicitly, “because children will learn that book with most readiness and delight through the running of the metre, as it is found by experience.” And the fact that versified treatises on manners formed part of the schooling of that day, brings up the subject of medieval education.

In the first place, this cannot be understood until we have set aside our modern ideas of master and servant. The old point of view is picturesquely summed up in a pamphlet of 1598, quoted by Dr. Furnivall.

“Amongst what sort of people should then this serving-man be sought for? Even the duke’s son preferred page to the prince, the earl’s second son attendant upon the duke, the knight’s second son the earl’s servant, the esquire’s son to wear the knight’s livery, and the gentleman’s son the esquire’s serving-man. Yea, I know at this day gentlemen, younger brothers that wear their elder brother’s blue coat and badge, attending him with as reverent regard and dutiful obedience as if he were their prince or sovereign. Where was then in the prime of this profession Goodman Tomson’s Jack, or Robin Rush, my Gaffer Russet-coat’s second son? The one holding the plough, the other whipping the cart-horse, labouring like honest men in their vocation. Trick Tom the tailer was then a tiler for this trade; as strange to find a blue coat on his back, with a badge on his sleeve, as to take Kent Street without a scold, or Newmarket Heath without a highwayman. But now, being lapped in his livery, he thinketh himself as good a man, with the shears at his back, as the Poet Laureate with a pen in his ear.”

From this passage it is clear that at a time not very much earlier, serving was a profession in which every rank, except royalty itself (if indeed this is to be omitted, see pp. 1, 179 below), might honourably wear the livery of a man of higher rank. Indeed, under the system of entail, this was, in time of peace, the only possible livelihood for a gentleman’s younger son, unless he had a special aptitude for law or the Church. Debarred from all trade, he could only offer his services to some great man who was compelled by his estate to keep up a large household, and so earn his patronage to provide for the future. It was fully expected that boys so placed would be helped to opportunities at Court or abroad, and girls to good marriages. That these patrons really took an interest in their young servitors, and felt responsible for their welfare, appears in many accounts of help bestowed upon men who afterwards became famous in literature, or scholarship, or state-craft. And as for the girls, Dr. Furnivall quotes an amusing instance of a mistress who, when reproached with dismissing a gentlewoman without due cause, thereby injuring her chances for the future, immediately allowed her forty shillings a year towards her maintenance while she herself lived.

Among rich men it was the custom to receive a number of boys for training in this way. In the household of Lord Percy there were nine young “henchmen” who served him as cup-bearers and in various other capacities. To these he allowed servants, one for each two, unless they were “at their friends’ finding,” in which case they might have one apiece. Likewise, in his household, his second son was carver, his third, sewer.

But while in a rich man’s household, younger sons might receive as good a training as if they had been sent elsewhere for the purpose, the case of the younger sons of a poor gentleman might be sufficiently wretched. Orlando, in _As You Like It_, speaks feelingly on this point. Although his father had left 1000 crowns for his upbringing, he was so neglected that he says: “His (his brother’s) horses are bred better, for, besides that they are fair with their feeding, they are taught their manage, and to that end riders dearly hired;[7] but I, his brother, gain nothing under him but growth ... he lets me feed with his hinds, bars me the place of a brother, and as much as in him lies, mines my gentility with my education.”

The alternative to such a life of hardship was either to enter the Church or depend upon its charity, or to serve in the household of a man of rank. While only a few were fitted for the religious life or cared to undertake it, “many poor gentlemen ... left beggars in consequence of the inheritance devolving to the eldest son,” were supported by the charity of the Church, as we are told by an Italian visitor to England in 1496-7.

The case of an unmarried daughter living at home, though less desperate, was even in well-to-do families sufficiently uncomfortable, as is plainly hinted in a letter written by Margaret Paston to her husband in 1469. She implores him to find his sister “some worshipful place,” and concludes: “I will help to her finding, for we be either of us weary of other.”

The practice of sending children seven or eight years old away from their parents was ostensibly that they “might learn better manners”; but the Italian visitor mentioned above concluded uncharitably that the real reason was, the English had but small affection for their children, and liked to keep all their comforts to themselves, and moreover knew that they would be “better served by strangers than by their own children.” However absurd this may seem at first glance, I incline to think that the foreigner may have touched upon truth here, as is borne out by many instances of Spartan, even brutal, treatment of children by parents in those days. Still, the fact remains that the loss of home life and parental tenderness was balanced by gain in discipline, education, social opportunity, and the opening up of careers.

The education of the various children addressed in these treatises varied according to their social status. As early as the twelfth century certainly, and perhaps earlier, it was customary for “bele babees,” with boys and girls, to have a tutor either at home, or in the household of the great man with whom they were placed. If they went to school, there were at first the monastic and conventual institutions; then later, the universities and grammar-schools. But, in the case of girls like the _Good Wife’s_ daughter, who sold homespun in the market-place, and had to be admonished not to get drunk often, I doubt whether there would be any education beyond her mother’s teaching.

The universities, at first, were frequented chiefly by poor men’s sons, and scarcely attended by the upper classes. In Chaucer’s time, the _Clerk of Oxenford_ was lean and threadbare, and had but little gold, and his two Cambridge scholars were in no better case. Nearly two centuries later, Sir Thomas More says: “Then may we yet like poor scholars of Oxford, go a-begging with our bags and wallets, and sing ‘_Salve, Regina_’” (a carol) “at rich men’s doors.” However, gradually during the sixteenth century, a university education became so fashionable that rich men’s sons crowded in, and “scrooged” (I quote Dr. Furnivall) poor students out of the proceeds of endowments left expressly for them. Still, in 1517, the old ideal of a gentleman as yet held its own, as is amusingly related by Pace in his _De Fructu_. He tells how “one of those whom we call gentlemen, who always carry some horn hanging at their backs, as though they would hunt during dinner, said: ‘I swear by God’s body I would rather that my son should hang than study letters. For it becomes the sons of gentlemen to blow the horn nicely, and to hunt skilfully, and elegantly carry and train a hawk. But the study of letters should be left to the sons of rustics....’”

But Pace was equal to him. “You do not seem to me to think aright, good man,” said I, “for if any foreigner were to come to the king, such as are ambassadors of princes, and an answer had to be given to him, your son if he were educated as you wish, could only blow his horn, and the learned sons of rustics would be called to answer, and they would be far preferred to your hunter or fowler son,” &c.

The fashion among noblemen of sending their sons abroad to study, either at a university or with a tutor, did not prevail widely until later. In the twelfth century, indeed, the “English nation” was famous at the University of Paris, but was composed largely of poor but earnest students, some of whom became famous men; and even these had ceased to study there before the fifteenth century.

Younger sons of good birth, in the service of a man of rank, were usually taught by a “maistyr” or tutor in the household in which they were placed. It is only in later books like Seager’s that these rules of demeanour were applied extensively to schoolboys. Doubtless gentlemen’s sons went to Winchester (after 1373) and to Eton (after 1440); but of the thirty grammar-schools endowed before 1500, all the others were attended chiefly by the middle classes. The early monastic schools doubtless entertained young noblemen; but the cathedral schools founded by Henry VIII. seem to have been for citizens’ children, such as the boy in Symon’s _Lesson of Wisdom_, who is urged to learn fast so that when the old bishop dies he may be ready to take his place. However, even earlier we find complaints of the monastic schools which helped each shoemaker to educate his son, and each beggar’s brat to be a writer and finally a bishop, so that lords’ sons must kneel to him.

In general, the system of education implied in the _Babees’ Book_ is that described in the household ordinances of Edward IV. for the young henchmen in charge of a “maistyr,” who should teach them to ride cleanly and surely, to draw them also to jousts, to ... “wear their harness, to have all courtesy in words, deeds, and degrees, diligently to keep them in rules of goings and sittings, after they be of honour.” They learned also “sundry languages,” and harping, piping, singing and dancing. Likewise, their master sat always with them at table in the hall, to see “how mannerly they eat and drink, and to their communication and other forms of court, after the book of _Urbanitie_[8].” Clearly it would seem that one of the very treatises in this collection was studied by these young pages of Edward IV.

What languages they learned and what else studied we are not told in detail; but in Henry VIII.’s time, young Gregory Cromwell, son of the Earl of Essex, studied French, writing, fencing, “casting accounts,” instrumental music, &c. He was also made to read English aloud for the pronunciation, and was taught the etymology of Latin and French words. His day was as follows: After Mass, he read first the Colloquium on _Pietas Puerilis_ (_De Civilitate Morum Puerilium_) by Erasmus (written 1530), of which he had to practice the precepts. Now this is nothing more than a collection of maxims similar to the _Facet_ mentioned in the _Babees’ Book_, together with learned _Scholia_ in Latin and Greek; hence, he had the same kind of thing to learn—only more elaborate—as the boys mentioned a hundred years earlier studied in _Urbanitie_. Doubtless his master approved the beginning of Erasmus: “Est autem uel prima uirtutis ac honestatis pars, tenere præcepta de moribus.” The specific nature of these directions appears in the following:

“Cleanliness of teeth must be cared for, but to whiten them with powder does for girls. To rub the gum with salt or alum is injurious.... If anything sticks to the teeth, you must get it out, not with a knife, or with your nails after the manner of dogs and cats, or with your napkin, but with a toothpick, or quill or small bone taken from the tibias of cocks or hens. To wash the mouth in the morning with pure water is both mannerly and healthful; to do it often is foolish.” Indeed, Erasmus’s treatise is only a superior book of courtesy.

His manners attended to, young Gregory wrote for one or two hours, read Fabyan’s _Chronicle_, and gave the rest of the day to his lute and virginals. When he rode, his master used to tell him stories of the Greeks and Romans, which he had to repeat; and his recreations were hunting, hawking and shooting with the long bow.

A harsher system prevailed with Queen Elizabeth’s wards, according to Sir Nicholas Bacon. They went to church at 6 o’clock, studied Latin until 11, dined from 11 to 12, had music from 12 to 2, French from 2 to 3, Latin and Greek from 3 to 5, then prayers, supper, and “honest pastimes” until 8, then music until 9, and so to bed.

The curricula in these various schools doubtless emphasized the usual Latin subjects (Greek was not taught in England before 1500) of the Middle Ages. Thus we find an account of the “disputations” in a London grammar-school, dating from 1174. But that athletic sports were popular even at that early time, appears from the same narrative, in which we read of football, sham fights, water-quintain, archery, running, leaping, wrestling, stone-casting, flinging bucklers, sliding and skating (on bones), besides the brutal sports of hog-, boar- and cock-fighting, bull- and bear-baiting.

At the other extreme we find the account of a school-day in 1612. Work begins at 6, and those who come first have the best places. At 9 o’clock, there is given 15 minutes for breakfast and recreation; then work continues until 11 or past (to balance the 15 minutes off). Dinner follows, and then work until 3 or 3.30, then 15 minutes off, and work until 5.30, when school closes with a piece of a chapter, two staves of a psalm and prayer by the master.

It is probable, however, that these two descriptions are but two sides of the same medal; that Fitzstephen’s holidays were balanced by work days as tedious as those described by Brinsley.[9]