Part 37

In 1287, at the marriage of Robert, son of Saint-Louis, with Machault, Countess of Artois, very singular spectacles were given between each course of the banquet. A horseman crossed the hall by making his horse walk on a thick cord, extended above the heads of the guests. At the four corners of the table were musicians seated on oxen; and monkeys, mounted on goats, seemed to play the harp.[XXXIV-27]

A droll custom prevailed at the court of the Frank kings. St. Germier having come to solicit some favour from the King of the Franks, Clovis, that haughty Sicamber received the bishop with kindness, and had an excellent dinner served for him. The holy bishop took leave of the king after the banquet, and the king, who sometimes piqued himself upon his politeness, pulled out a hair, according to the custom of the time, and offered it to his guest. Each of the courtiers hastened, in his turn, to imitate the benevolent monarch, and the virtuous prelate returned to his diocese enchanted with the reception he had met with at the court.[XXXIV-28]

Among other amusements prepared for Queen Elizabeth, during her sojourn at the celebrated castle of Kenilworth, “There was,” says Laneham, “an Italian juggler who performed feats of strength and leaps, and cut such capers with so much suppleness and ease, that I began to ask myself whether it were a man or a sprite. Indeed I know not what to say of that comical fellow,” adds the artless chronicler; “I suppose his back must resemble that of a lamprey--it had no bone.”[XXXIV-29]

In England, during the middle ages, the courts of princes and the castles of the great were crowded with visitors, who were always received with sumptuous hospitality. The pomp displayed by the lords was truly extraordinary, and it is difficult to understand how their fortunes could suffice for it. They had their privy-counsellors, treasurers, secretaries, chaplains, heralds, pursuivants-at-arms, pages, guards, trumpeters--in a word, all the officers, all the servants, with which royalty itself is surrounded. And besides this numerous domestic establishment, there were troops of minstrels, clowns, jugglers, strolling players, rope-dancers, &c., lodged there at the great banqueting times. Each of the apartments open to the guests presented spectacles in harmony with the gross taste of the epoch. It was a marvellous confusion, a prodigious chaos, in which the ear was struck at once with the sound of dishes, of cups clashing one against another, of harmonious music, with the bustle of the dance, the notes of the song, pasquinades, somersaults, and everywhere the most boisterous laughter. The face of decency alone was slightly veiled.[XXXIV-30]

Sometimes the term _entre-mets_ was also applied to decorations, which were paraded through the banqueting hall, and which represented cities, castles, and gardens, with fountains, whence flowed all kinds of liquors. At the dinner which Charles V. of France gave to the Emperor Charles IV. there was a grand spectacle, or _entre-met_. A vessel appeared with its masts, sails, and rigging; it advanced into the middle of the hall, by means of a machine concealed from the view of all. A moment after there appeared the city of Jerusalem; its towers covered with Saracens. The vessel approached it, and the city was taken by the Christian knights who manned the vessel.[XXXIV-31]

Among the Egyptians a funereal idea was made the means of rousing the erewhile buoyant spirits of the guests at the end of a repast. A servant entered carrying a skeleton, or the representation of a mummy, which he took slowly round the dining-room. He then approached the guests, and said: “Eat, drink, amuse yourselves to-day; to-morrow you die.”[XXXIV-32]

Greece, and Rome in particular, adopted this lugubrious emblem of the rapid flight of time and pleasure. This sepulchral image hurried them on in the enjoyment of the present: it never revealed to paganism a “hope full of immortality.”[XXXIV-33]

XXXV.

A ROMAN SUPPER.

Two lustres had passed since the world obeyed Domitius Nero, son of Agrippina. The Romans, a herd of vile slaves, docile adulators of the infamous Cæsar, had already celebrated nine anniversaries of his happy accession to the empire, and the Flamen of Jupiter solemnly thanked the gods at each of these epochs for all the benefits that the well-beloved monarch had unceasingly lavished on the earth.

Few princes, it is true, ever equalled Nero. He and his mother had poisoned Junius Silanus, the pro-consul of Asia; subsequently the young emperor made away with Agrippina, and the senate applauded that horrible crime, which was only the prelude to outrageous enterprises which astonish the historian who narrates them.

The Flamen was, indeed, bound to offer up solemn thanksgivings to Jupiter for having hitherto restrained the crowned monster from the commission of evil which afterwards marked his flagitious career.

It was the 64th year of the Christian era. The emperor had passed some time at Naples, whence it was thought he would go into Greece; but suddenly changing his project, he returned to the capital of the world, to prepare, it was said, a spectacle of unheard-of splendour, and such as Nero alone could conceive.

One of his ancient freed-men, Caius Domitius Seba, resolved to celebrate the return to Rome, and the tenth anniversary of the reign of his master, who was now become his patron and friend. That man possessed immense riches, a formidable credit at court, and an insolence which had struck so much terror into the souls of the proudest families of the empire, that they had long since humbled themselves before him.

So that it was no sooner whispered among the Roman aristocracy that the magnificent Seba intended to give a banquet, than one and all became anxious to be numbered with the guests of Cæsar’s favourite.

However, days past, the time for the nocturnal festival approached, and the Invitor had not made his appearance.

Among the Hebrews, nothing was more simple and unsophisticated than an invitation to dinner;[XXXV-1] but, with the Romans, etiquette required that the amphitryon should send one of his servants to each person who was to participate in his pompous hospitality. This servant, who was generally a freed-man, went from house to house, and indicated, with exquisite politeness, the day and precise hour of the banquet.[XXXV-2]

Seba’s Invitor was at last announced to the two consuls of the year, Lecanius Bassus and Licinius Crassus, who accepted with tender gratitude the distinguished honour which the enfranchised slave deigned to confer upon them.

After them the same favour was received with the same gratitude by the Agrippas, the Ancuses, the Cossuses, the Drususes, and all those who were the most noble, powerful, and proud in Rome.

The next day, about two o’clock in the afternoon (the repast was to begin at six o’clock), an unusual movement reigned in the Palatine baths, and those of Daphnis, near the Sacred Way. The _mediastini_ kept up a steady fire under the coppers; the _capsarii_ folded with care the clothes of the bathers; the _unguentarii_ sold their oils and unguents; and the _fricatores_, armed with the _strigil_--a sort of wooden, iron, or horn spoon--rubbed and scraped the skin before the _tractatores_ came gently to manipulate the joints, and skilfully shampoo the body, which gained by this operation more elasticity and suppleness.[XXXV-3]

The upper classes of the Romans never sat down to table until they had undergone all these preliminaries of minute cleanliness.[XXXV-4]

The future guests return home, after the bath, to employ the skill of the barbers (_tonsores_), who are in waiting to give more grace to the hair, and remove, with the aid of tweezers and pumice, the first silvery indications of the lapse of years, which, though incessantly effaced, still re-appeared.[XXXV-5]

A more serious occupation succeeded. Epicureans should never neglect their teeth--particularly at the approach of a banquet. Nor did the ingenious gastronomy of the first century of our era neglect to invent tooth-powder, which cleaned the enamel without injuring it, and fortified the gums--those fortresses of mastication. Some persons made use of substances which no one would adopt in the present day, because our delicacy revolts against them.[XXXV-6] But preparations less offensive were employed, and men of good taste, as well as fashionable ladies, extolled ox-gall, goats’ milk, the ash of stags’ horns, of pigs’ hoofs, and of egg-shells.[XXXV-7]

Thus were the teeth equipped, as the comic Plautus has it;[XXXV-8] or, rather, thus were they prepared to undergo the labour required of them.

Those who had had the misfortune to lose some of those powerful gastrophagic auxiliaries substituted false ones of ivory, which art found means to render absolutely similar to their neighbours. The eye was deceived: what more could be required?[XXXV-9]

But the clepsydræ[XXXV-10] and the celebrated clock of the field of Mars[XXXV-11] announce that it is time to put on the white, light robe, a little longer than the pallium of the Greeks, and to which the Latins have given the names of _vestis cœnatoria_, _vestis triclinaria_, _vestis convivalis_.[XXXV-12] This last part of their toilet finished, the guests set out for the magnificent abode of their host, preceded by a few slaves, and followed by their shadows--those hungry hangers-on of whom mention has already been made, and who strive to obtain, on the road, a smile or a word by dint of cringing obsequiousness.

Arrived at the _atrium_, the crowd of Roman nobles are conducted into the interior of the house by the parasites of Seba. The proud freed-man disturbed himself for nobody; but, like the opulent Greeks, whom he aped, he left to these ignoble familiars the care of replacing him in the honours of his palace.[XXXV-13]

They enter an immense hall, decorated with unheard-of luxury, lighted by lustres,[XXXV-14] and round which are several ranks of seats, not unlike the folding-stools and arm-chairs we meet with in the present day in the most elegant _boudoirs_.[XXXV-15] The guests seat themselves, and anon Egyptian slaves approach with perfumed snow-water, which flows from golden vases of the most graceful forms, and cools the hands of senators and Roman knights,[XXXV-16] whilst other servants disincumber them of their patrician shoes, the end of which represents a crescent.[XXXV-17] The feet then received a similar ablution, and fresh slaves, skilful orthopœdists, accomplish in a twinkling the delicate toilet of these extremities,[XXXV-18] and imprison them again in elegant and commodious sandals, fastened by ribands which cross on the top.[XXXV-19]

Here and there a few persons are remarked who still wear their togas, having doubtless forgotten to substitute the banqueting dress. So soon as the major-domo perceives them he makes a sign to some youths clothed in white tunics, who hasten to present to each of these guests a _synthesis_, or short woollen vestment of different colours,[XXXV-20] which envelopes the whole body, but leaves the shoulders and breast uncovered if the wearer desire it.[XXXV-21]

These indispensable preliminaries being terminated, the seats disappeared, and the guests stood waiting for the freed-man, Seba, who speedily entered accompanied by the two consuls, for whom places of honour had been reserved on couches beside their pompous amphitryon. The latter deigned to address a few words of welcome to his noble company, and each one stretched himself on his couch of gold and purple. The fourth couch was given up to the parasites and shadows.[XXXV-22]

Meanwhile, slaves were burning precious perfumes in golden vases (_acerræ_), and young children were pouring on the hair of the guests odoriferous essences, which filled the banqueting hall with balmy fragrance. Rome had borrowed this custom from the east.[XXXV-23]

The golden panelling of the hall shone with dazzling brightness as it reflected a torrent of light from the crystal candelabra,[XXXV-24] and the melodious sounds of the hydraulic organ[XXXV-25] announced the commencement of the banquet.[XXXV-26]

At this signal, servants, richly dressed, place within the circle formed by the couches lemon-wood tables of inestimable price,[XXXV-27] which they immediately cover with a rich tissue of gold and silk. That done, sylph-like hands spread them over with a profusion of the rarest flowers and rose leaves.[XXXV-28]

Musicians (_symphoniaci_) then occupy a kind of orchestra or platform, raised at one of the extremities of the hall,[XXXV-29] among whom the flute and harp players are to be particularly remarked.[XXXV-30] The former constitute, among the Romans, a special body dubbed with the name of _College_, and they have the exclusive right to attend banquets and enliven the pomp of ceremonies.[XXXV-31]

These musicians execute a slow, dulcet melody while the slaves are placing on the tables the statues of some of the principal gods,[XXXV-32] together with that of the divine Nero, whom a pusillanimous flattery ranks already with the immortals. At this moment they also arrange here and there the salt-cellars,[XXXV-33] while the more meditative of the guests invoke Jupiter, before they give themselves up to the pleasures of the feast.[XXXV-34] Hardly is this short prayer finished when joyous cup-bearers distribute charming little crystal cups,[XXXV-35] which Æthiopian slaves[XXXV-36] fill to the brim with a generous, honeyed wine, drawn, in the first instance, from those large pitchers which the Greeks have named _amphoræ_.

Some drops of the exhilarating liquid are offered to the _Lares_ (household gods), by sprinkling it in their honour on the floor and the table.[XXXV-37] This pious libation precedes the entrance of the first course (_antecœna_),[XXXV-38] composed of the lightest and least succulent kinds of viands, by means of which a generous host stimulates the appetites of his guests, as a preparative for brilliant exploits.[XXXV-39]

Lettuces, olives, pomegranates, Damascus plums,[XXXV-40] tastefully arranged on silver dishes,[XXXV-41] serve to encircle dormice, prepared with honey and poppy juice,[XXXV-42] forcemeat balls of crab, lobster, or cray-fish, prepared with pepper, cummin, and benzoin root.[XXXV-43] A little further, champignon and egg sausages, prepared with garum,[XXXV-44] are placed by the side of pheasant sausages, a delicious mixture of the fat of that bird, chopped very small, and mixed with pepper, gravy, and sweet sun-made wine, to which a small quantity of hydrogarum is added.[XXXV-45] Tempting as these delicate viands may be, the practised epicureans seem to have a decided preference for peacocks’ eggs, which they open with spoons. These eggs, a master-piece of the culinary artist, who presides over Seba’s stoves, are composed of a fine perfumed paste, and contain, each one, a fat, roasted, ortolan surrounded with yolk of egg, and seasoned with pepper.[XXXV-46]

We will not go through the list of all the dishes which composed the _antecœna_. The nomenclature was offered, according to custom, to the guests of the rich freed-man, but the reader would doubtless think it a little tiresome. We must, however, inform him, that the true gastronomists--and there were many at that banquet--did no more than give note of preparation to their appetite, by plying it with pickled radishes,[XXXV-47] some few grasshoppers of a particular species, fried with garum,[XXXV-48] grey peas, and olives fresh from their brine.[XXXV-49]

DESCRIPTION OF PLATE No. XXX.

No. 1. A Greek Etruscan vase, or amphora, of terra cotta, for wine and water, commonly placed on the dinner table.--HAMILTON.

No. 2. A Greek terra cotta vase, for a particular wine.--CAYLUS.

No. 3. Etruscan terra cotta vase, to hold wine on the table.--CAYLUS.

No. 4. A glass amphora, or vase, of large dimensions, for Falernian wine.

All found at Herculaneum.--SAINT-NON.

The first course was removed to the sound of music.[XXXV-50] Now came chased silver cups, much larger than those of crystal[XXXV-51]--no doubt because thirst is excited by drinking. Amphoræ of a secular wine were ranged by the major-domo on the mosaic flooring of the hall, at some distance from the triclinium, and they proceeded, by the invitation of the consuls, to the choice of the _symposiarch_ (or master of the banquet), upon whom devolved the duty of regulating how often any person was to drink, and of preventing the guests, in the best manner he could, from yielding too easily to bacchic provocations, which commonly led to unseemly gaiety and the loss of reason.[XXXV-52]

This sort magiric magistracy was obtained by lot, or the unanimous call for a personage worthy of such a distinction.[XXXV-53] That memorable evening every voice named the senator Drusillus, one of the most determined drinkers of the Roman aristocracy. Drusillus smiled, snapped his fingers,[XXXV-54] and, by the order of his master, thus intimated, a slave, who was standing behind him, filled a golden crater[C] with wine, and presented it to the symposiarch.

Thereupon, the latter, slightly raising his head from the downy cushions on which it rested, and supporting it from the left elbow,[XXXV-55] makes a graceful bow to the amphitryon, the consuls, and the rest of the assembly. Then, with a stentorian voice: “Slaves,” he cried, “bring wreaths of flowers.[XXXV-56] Fugitive images of the spring and of pleasure, they shall bind our brows.[XXXV-57] At the same time let garlands adorn our craters, in which the cherished liquor of the son of Semele sparkles;[XXXV-58] and let us bestow no thought, during the fleet joys of the banquet, on the uncertain and fatal hour when Atropos shall pronounce our doom.”

This speech, slightly impregnated with the epicurean philosophy so much in fashion during the reign of Nero, had at least the merit of a praiseworthy conciseness. Nor did it fail to attract applause from the auditors, whose brows and cups were speedily adorned with wreaths of roses, which young boys, clothed in white tunics, arranged with marvellous art.

The slight rustling of the flowers was soon drowned by the shrill noise of the trumpets which announced the second course. A flattering buzz welcomed this profusion of viands, which encumbered the tables, and well-nigh crushed them with their weight. There were the peacock,[XXXV-59] the duck, whose breast and head are so much coveted;[XXXV-60] capons’ livers,[XXXV-60] peppered becaficoes,[XXXV-61] grouse, the turtle-dove, the phenicopter,[XXXV-62] and an infinite number of rare birds, the costly tribute that Europe, Asia, and Africa, exchanged against the gold of the prodigal Seba. Other gold and silver dishes contained these inestimable fishes which Roman luxury brought so much into fashion; the scarus, or parrot fish, sturgeons, turbots, mullets, and those numerous inhabitants of every sea with which the tanks were stocked, to supply the kitchen of the freed-slave.

Moreover, there were wild boars _à la Troyenne_,[XXXV-63] ranged in the centre of the table, in silver basins of a prodigious value; stuffed pigs, quarters of stag and roebuck, loins of beef, kidneys surrounded with African figs,[XXXV-64] sows’ paps prepared with milk,[XXXV-65] sows’ flank,[XXXV-66] and some pieces of Gallic bacon,[XXXV-67] which certain gluttons loved to associate with a piece of succulent venison.

While the carvers were cutting up the meats with incredible address, to the sound of a light but animated music, Numidian slaves filled the cups from small leathern bottles with old Greek wine,[XXXV-68] a servant carried bread round the tables in a silver basket,[XXXV-69] and others ventilated the apartment,[XXXV-70] or offered the guests warm and iced water.[XXXV-71]

In every direction trays circulated, covered with divers kinds of meats,[XXXV-72] which they took care to humect with peppered garum,[XXXV-73] that strange condiment, which the freed-slave procured from Spain at a price equal to its weight in gold.

Suddenly the symposiarch commands silence: the musicians obey--the slaves are motionless.

“Let us drain our cups,” said he, “in honour of Cæsar. Let us celebrate the tenth anniversary of his glorious reign, and his happy return to the metropolis of the world. Let us drink, senators and knights, as many craters as there are letters in the cherished name of the emperor.”[XXXV-74]

Sense and reason must have succumbed, had the patrician assembly toasted Caius Lucius Domitius Nero: it would have been constructive treason not to empty twenty-three cups; but they limited themselves to four, which represented the last of these names.

Joy unrestrained floated with the fumy wine, furnished from large

DESCRIPTION OF PLATE No. XXXI.

No. 1. Curious silver dish, with Etruscan letters engraved around the head of Medusa. Petronius speaks of two silver dishes, upon which were engraved the name of Trimalcion, and the weight of each dish.--ATHEN.; STUART.

Nos. 2 and 3. Silver dishes.--GORRIE, “_Etruscan Mus_.”

glass amphoræ, on which were these words: “Falernian wine of a hundred leaves, made under the consulship of Opimius.”[XXXV-75][D] The consuls and the Roman nobles almost forgot, in the voluptuousness of the splendid repast, that the executioner of Britannicus and Burrhus, the crowned tiger, was doubtless thinking at that very moment of taking some of the heads then present. A funereal spectacle soon aroused their dormant fears.

An officer of the palace presented himself at the door of the banqueting hall. He advanced slowly, followed by two slaves, who laid on the table an object covered with a winding-sheet. “Pressing occupations,” said the imperial messenger, “prevent Cæsar from sharing with you the hospitality of Seba; but he thinks of you, and sends you a testimony of his remembrance.”

“Long live Cæsar!” cry the consuls, the freed-slave, and some few trembling voices. The officer retires. The veil which shrouds Nero’s present from every eye is removed, and all perceive a silver skeleton, of terrifying truthfulness, and which, by its admirable mechanism, proclaims artist to be one of those Greeks who have come to Rome to seek fortune and celebrity.[XXXV-76]

This episode engrossed the thoughts of the greater part of the guests, and the old senator, Lucius Vafra, could not help saying, with a sigh, to his neighbour, Virginius Rufus, one of the consuls of the preceding year: “Fear the Greeks: fear this disastrous present!”[XXXV-77]

But the hot wine which was being served,[XXXV-78] and the healths which succeeded without interruption, drove the sinistrous presage from their minds; and, moreover, the present of the emperor was nowise contrary to the manners of the epoch, and the thought of death would only have enlivened the repast, if it had been presented by any other than Nero.

At first healths were drunk in the Greek fashion,--that is, beginning by the most distinguished personages, he who drank bowed and said: “I wish you every kind of prosperity;” or simply: “I salute you.” In pronouncing these words, he who drank the health took only a part of the wine contained in the cup, and sent the remainder to the guest he had just designated.[XXXV-79]

Many craters were then emptied in honour of the mistress of the house (_dominæ_); neither were the illustrious dead nor absent friends forgotten. The formula was nearly the same for all: “To your healths,” said the symposiarch, “to our own, to that also of the friend whom we cherish.”[XXXV-80]