King David's Ransom

During the Battle of Neville's Cross, when King David II of Scotland heeded France's request to attack England as part of their Auld Alliance, David realized things were going ill for him. Although the Scots had the greater numbers, and the belief was that the English army was fully engaged on the continent in the Hundred Years War, England had left its northern forces behind, precisely because Edward III didn't trust Scotland.

David had dismounted to fight, and his location on the battlefield had become unclear. He had taken two arrows to his face, and attempted to hide from the enemy. Contemporary accounts state that he hid under a bridge over the River Browney. A group of English soldiers near the bridge saw him reflected in the water of the river and moved to capture him. He fought back and knocked out two teeth of John de Coupland, who took him prisoner.

David was held prisoner from 1346 to 1357. First he was brought to Bamburgh Castle, where surgeons tried to remove the arrows. The tip of one could not be removed and was the cause of headaches for the rest of his life. (John Bradmore would have been useful here, but he was still a child. He was then taken to London and put in the Tower. When Edward III returned from France, David was transferred to Windsor Castle. Finally, David and his household were put in Odiham Castle (its ruins are pictured above). Captivity for a king was generally comfortable, but in 1355 he was forbidden any contact with his family, which may have accelerated negotiations for his ransom (Edward was always looking for more money for his wars).

On 3 October 1357, a treaty was signed that gave 10,000 marks each year for ten years as ransom. He returned to Scotland with an English mistress, Katherine Mortimer. (David had married Edward III's sister, Joan of the Tower, in 1328 when she was seven and he was four. They had no children. She died in 1362.) Mortimer was killed in 1360 by men hired by the Earl of Angus. David had another mistress, Margaret Drummond, whom he married in 1364. (Then he took another mistress, Agnes Dunbar.)

This ransom plan worked for a few years, but the Scottish nobles could not raise 10,000 marks in 1363, and David went to London to try to re-negotiate a settlement. He offered to leave Scotland to Edward or one of his many sons in David's will. In 1364 Scotland's Parliament rejected a proposal for Edward's son Lionel of Antwerp to become the next king. David kept talking to Edward, prolonging the consequences of non-payment (which would mean going back into captivity).

David died on 22 February 1371, aged 46. He was buried quickly in the nearest likely place, in Holyrood Abbey. He wished to be buried near his parents in Dunfermline, but his successor, Robert II, wanted to "conclude" David's reign as quickly as possible to begin his own.

Now, the transition above between paragraphs two and three was hardly a transition at all: it would appear that from his capture to his captivity just "happened" in a flash. It wasn't that easy, and John de Coupland almost got in trouble for it. When the dust settled, however, de Coupland made out extremely well. I'll explain his almost fall but steady rise tomorrow.

Quoits

The idea that quoits—a game in which players toss rings at a stake, hoping to encircle it—originated with the "Greek or Roman discus" does not seem to me to hold up. The discus was flung for distance; quoits is a game of accuracy. The fact that each is circular is not sufficient to link the two historically.

Those who subscribe to the Greco-Roman origin use it as a basis for quoits coming to Britain during the Roman occupation. The game of quoits ("coiting") in England during the reign of Edward III, and again during the reign of his successor, Richard II, was outlawed in favor of pastimes such as archery, which would translate to readiness in battle. This was duplicated in the Statutes of Kilkenny (see here and here) by Edward's son, Lionel of Antwerp, in his rôle as viceroy of Ireland.

(Ironically, quoits was referred to as "manly and healthy amusements" in 1836 in a Washington, DC, advertisement for the available amusements at a nearby coffee house.)

The similarity between quoits and the game of horseshoes suggests that the game might have started with people idling their time by throwing spare horseshoes at a stake or peg. That assumes, however, that "horse shoes" in the past were the ring- or U-shaped pieces of metal they are now.

And that is something worth looking into in more detail.

Irish Apartheid

The Statutes of Kilkenny, established in 1366 by Prince Lionel of Antwerp, were designed to keep Irish and English peoples and cultures so distinct from each other that I think it is fair to compare it to Apartheid.

Not only did they forbid English from adopting any Irish customs, manner of dress, language, or names; not only did they forbid Englishmen from riding horses in the Irish manner, and forbid intermarriage and even friendships, they even...

Forbade playing Irish sports:

VI. Also, whereas a land, which is at war, requires that every person do render himself able to defend himself, it is ordained, and established, that the common [people] ... do not, henceforth, use the plays which men call hurlings*, with great sticks and a ball upon the ground, ..., and other plays which men call coiting**; but that they do apply and accustom themselves to use and draw bows, and throw lances, and other gentlemanlike games, whereby the Irish enemies may be the better checked by the liege people and commons of these parts; and if any do or practise the contrary, and of this be attainted, they shall be taken and imprisoned, and fined at the will of our lord the king.

Forbade allowing Irish to become priests or monks: 

XIV. Also, it is ordained and established that no religious house which is situate amongst the English be it exempt or not, shall henceforth receive any Irishmen to their profession, but may receive Englishmen without taking into consideration whether they be born in England or in Ireland;

Forbade Irish entertainment, lest they be spies in disguise: 

XV. Also, whereas the Irish agents who come amongst the English, spy out the secrets, plans, and policies of the English, whereby great evils have often resulted; it is agreed and forbidden, that any Irish agents, that is to say, pipers, story-tellers, babblers, rimers, mowers, nor any other Irish agent shall come amongst the English, and that no English shall receive or make gift to such;  

These and others created a line between the English and Irish that could not be crossed. Punishments of fines or imprisonment were severe. An Irishman who pastured his livestock on English-owned land could have his livestock seized.

Lionel did not have enough men to enforce these statutes; also, he left Ireland a year later to get married in Italy, and never returned. They did, however, help to keep the English and Irish at odds with each other for centuries.

Next: what about that "coiting"?

*"hurlings" as described clearly refers to the sport of hurling, still played today.
**"coiting" likely refers to quoits; Edward III had banned quoits in England in 1365 and urged the practice of archery instead. Even with the signing of the Treaty of Brétigny which (so far as anyone knew) ended the Hundred Years War, Edward still wanted the country prepared to go to war. In fact, he was planning to make Lionel King of Scotland, and that would require soldiers.

English-Irish Hybrids?

 

When King Edward III sent his son Lionel as viceroy of Ireland, there were issues on the agenda regarding the presence of the English in Ireland. Many English had been living in Ireland for generations, and they were, shall we say, "going native":

Whereas at the conquest of the land of Ireland, and for a long time after, the English of the said land used the English language, mode of riding and apparel, and were governed and ruled, both they and their subjects called Betaghes*, according to the English law, ...; but now many English of the said land, forsaking the English language, manners, mode of riding, laws and usages, live and govern themselves according to the manners, fashion, and language of the Irish enemies; and also have made divers marriages and alliances between themselves and the Irish enemies aforesaid...

This is the opening of the Statutes of Kilkenny, addressing the grave concern that English folk were acting more like the Irish in whose land they were living. Established by Lionel in 1366, the 35 statutes were intended to keep the English true to their heritage. Some samples follow.

II. Also, it is ordained and established, that no alliance by marriage, gossipred**, fostering of children, concubinage or by amour, nor in any other manner, be hencefoth made between the English and Irish of one part, or of the other part; and that no Englishman, nor other person, being at peace, do give or sell to any Irishman, in time of peace or war, horses or armour, nor any manner of victuals in time of war; 

III. Also, it is ordained and established, that every Englishman do use the English language, and be named by an English name, leaving off entirely the manner of naming used by the Irish; and that every Englishman use the English custom, fashion, mode of riding and apparel, according to his estate; and if any English, or Irish living amongst the English, use the Irish language amongst themselves, contrary to the ordinance, and thereof be attainted, his lands and tenements, if he have any, shall be seized into the hands of his immediate lord, until he shall come to one of the places of our lord the king, and find sufficient surety to adopt and use the English language, and then he shall have restitution of his said lands or tenements, his body shall be taken by any of the officers of our lord the king, and committed to the next gaol, there to remain until he, or some other in his name, shall find sufficient surety ... 

The desire to create an Irish-English Apartheid was so remarkable, it is worth looking at more examples tomorrow.

*A note on "Betaghes": the word come from Old Irish bíattach "providing food," and refers to those workers who provided food for the ruling class.
**A note on gossiprede: the noun gossip referred to a close friend or confidant; rede means advice or counsel. The English and Irish were not allowed to be partners in any manner.

Lionel of Antwerp

Lionel of Antwerp, like many royal children, was obligated to be a political tool as well as a person. Born 29 November, 1338 in Antwerp (his parents were there temporarily because of the start of the Hundred Years War), he was the second son of Edward III and Philippa of Hainault to survive infancy. 

On 9 September, 1342, he was married to Elizabeth de Burgh, who as a ten-year-old was six years his senior. The year after Elizabeth was born, her father died. He had been the Earl of Ulster, and marrying Elizabeth allowed Edward III to grant Lionel that title as early as 1347; Lionel also gained possession of vast estates in Ireland. In 1352 the couple lived together as husband and wife, aged 14 and 20 respectively. They had one daughter, Philippa, born 16 August 1355.

While Edward was heading to the continent as part of the Hundred Years War, he appointed Lionel as his representative in England in 1345 and 1346. Lionel was old enough to join his father and brothers on military campaigns to France in 1355. He grew to be about 6'10" tall, and would have been an imposing figure on the battlefield.

Lionel was present in 1360 for the signing of the Treaty of Brétigny, during which time he sent his page, Geoffrey Chaucer (then in his late teens) back to England with letters (discussed here). With the war with France "settled" (little did they know), Lionel went to Dublin in 1361 to be governor of Ireland. The following year, Edward created a dukedom and named Lionel Duke of Clarence. Edward also hoped to make Lionel King of Scotland, but that was less successful even than trying to control Ireland. In 1366, the Statutes of Kilkenny made an attempt to control some of the issues in Ireland that were disturbing to England.

Prior to this, however, tragedy struck with the death of Elizabeth in 1363. This left Lionel open to another advantageous marriage. This time, ties with Italy were sought through marriage to Violante Visconti. Arrangements had been made earlier by, among others, Geoffrey Chaucer, who traveled to Italy (mentioned previously here); the marriage itself was mentioned here.

Lionel and Violante were married in June 1368, kicking off months of festivities. Lionel took ill and died 17 October of the same year. His father-in-law, the ruthless Galeazzo II Visconti, was suspected of poisoning him, but it could not be proven. Visconti wanted the alliance with England, and Violante was not going to inherit anything of value with the death of Lionel, so there is no rational reason for Lionel's father-in-law to have him killed.

His body was buried in Pavia, but later returned to be laid to rest beside his first wife at Clare Priory in Suffolk. His daughter, Princess Philippa of Clarence, inherited the earldom of Ulster.

What was the perceived need for the Statutes of Kilkenny? It addressed the concern about English residents of Ireland becoming "too Irish." I'll tell you about that next.

Mailing a Letter

Large empires such as the Roman Empire needed ways to communicate quickly and efficiently with their far-flung domains. For the Romans, it was the cursus publicus, a series of stations along the main Roman roads where messages were passed along to fresh couriers. After the decline of the empire, the value of the  cursus publicus caused it to be maintained. Theodoric maintained the Roman postal system in his own domain, as did the Carolingian Empire in theirs.

When the Carolingian Empire ended (888 CE), however, there was no longer any organized attempt for a postal system throughout any part of Europe. Kings and popes, of course, had the large staff available and could appoint someone to deliver a message, but outside of those official types of correspondence, what were the options?

One of the more efficient systems was created by Italian merchants centuries later. A lot of travel and trade used the Mediterranean, and the Mediterranean was dominated by Genoa, Florence, and Venice. Italian businesses became so large that branches were created, and the owners could not be everywhere that needed them. Orders and messages needed to be sent to subordinates, customers, deliverymen, etc.

The large businesses set up posting stations with fast horses and riders at several points along their trade routes, but eventually they realized they were duplicating each others' work. In 1357, seventeen companies in Florence collaborated on a single message delivery system. Florence to Paris was 700 miles, and ideally a message was delivered in three weeks. Weather could be a mitigating factor, but their system was the best option.

Couriers were not worthy of being named historically, but we do know one. Geoffrey Chaucer was paid nine shillings by his master, Lionel of Antwerp, to deliver letters from France to London while Lionel and his father (Edward III) took part in the Treaty of Brétigny. (Footnote: Chaucer was in London for two weeks before Lionel returned. What can an unattached page do in a fortnight? That is the frame for my mystery novel A Death in Catte Street, available via the links in the upper-right of this blog's main page.)

Lionel, a younger son of Edward III, does not get the attention given to Edward's other progeny like the Black Prince or John of Gaunt. He will get a little more of what is due him next time.

Chaucer & the Viscontis

On the 28th of May in 1378, a small expedition of 16 men set out from the City of London. In the financial records that manage their pay, only two of the men are named. One was the chamber knight Sir Edward de Berkley; the other was Geoffrey Chaucer. Berkeley was paid 20 shillings per day and had nine attendants; Chaucer, only an esquire, had five attendants and made 13 shillings and four pence per day. The royal accounts list their purpose as meeting with Bernabò the Lord of Milan and with John Hawkwood.

Why was Chaucer chosen for an embassy of some sort to Italy? He had been there already in 1368, when he was in the household of Prince Lionel, younger son of King Edward III, and was arranging the marriage of Lionel to Violante Visconti, daughter of Galeazzo II Visconti.

Royal marriages between countries were always valuable for alliances, and England was glad to have an ally on the Italian peninsula in its on-again/off-again hostilities with France. Chaucer would already be familiar with the roads traveled, and probably the language. He might also have asked to go, having likely had a taste for himself of the magnificent library started by Galeazzo.

Bernabò's reputation for his willingness to fight anyone was well-known, and so allying with him was a wise move. (Although his endless antagonism of Pope Urban VI was not to England's liking.)

As for John Hawkwood, an English mercenary, he was in command of part of Milan's forces. Not only did he have an excellent reputation as a fighter and leader, commanding high prices for his service, but he had the year before married Donnina Visconti, daughter of Bernabò. That Donnina was illegitimate did not make the familial bond between Hawkwood and his father-in-law any less firm.

We do not know the exact purpose of the trip, although securing potential military support on the continent seems likely. It lasted 115 days, with Chaucer and Berkeley returning to London on September 19th. London to Milan is about 800 miles, and the routes were well established by then, but it would still be over a month of travel one way. Do you suppose they told stories to each other to pass the time?

I have written about Hawkwood before but, as with anyone, there is a lot more to his story that I'd like to tell you. So I will.

Chaucer's First Boss

A page at work

Lionel, the son of King Edward III of England and Queen Philippa, was born in Antwerp in Flanders in 1338 during the start of the Hundred Years War. He was betrothed at the age of three to the nine-year-old Elizabeth de Burgh, sole heiress to the Earl of Ulster. They were married in 1355, and Lionel became the Earl of Ulster.

An earl's household is a grand one, especially if he's also a son of the king. His wife, if she is the Countess of Ulster, also has a great household with many servants. Into Elizabeth's household, from 1356 to 1359, came a young boy named Geoffrey. His father, vintner John Chaucer, had actually accompanied Lionel's parents on the Flanders trip on which Lionel was born, and had been put in charge of the king's wine imports in Southampton. These connections gave him the chance to place his son in service to the aristocracy, which could open doors for future careers, including that of a knight.

A boy could become a page at the age of seven. Pages would learn to serve at table, carry messages or perform small daily tasks. They might care for the household's clothing. They were also likely to engage in military training against the day when they might become a knight or soldier.

In 1359, Geoffrey Chaucer was taken from the Countess of Ulster and put under Lionel in order to add to the troops that Lionel would command during that phase of the Hundred Years War. There was, however, one link to the Countess of Ulster later in his life: Chaucer married Philippa Roet, who started as a lady-in-waiting in the household of the Countess of Ulster.

An English Mercenary

Funerary monument to Hawkwood

This is the story of how an English soldier of no particular background rose to such prominence that a monument to him sits in Florence, Italy.

John Hawkwood was born about 1320, perhaps in Essex; anecdotes that he apprenticed in London as a tailor before becoming a soldier cannot be substantiated. He served in the Hundred Years War under Edward III. He may have fought at Crécy and Poitiers—again, we cannot be sure of his exact whereabouts during the war—but it is certain that he was no longer employed as a soldier once the Treaty of Brétigny was concluded in 1360.

The life of a soldier suited him, apparently—or he simply had no desire to find passage back to England. He joined one of the mercenary companies that sprang up on the continent. These groups, with no particular allegiance to any nationality and willing to fight for pay against anyone, were called Free Companies. He soon became a member of one called the "Great Company of English and Germans," also known as the White Company. By 1362 he was leading the White Company in battles all over Italy.

Hawkwood was shrewd—some would say "dishonest" or "unethical." Knowing that the White Company was a military force to be reckoned with, he would manipulate the Italian city-states that wanted help. If one offered a contract for the Company's services, he would go to their potential employer's enemy and ask for more money to refuse the initial contract. Sometimes he would be paid simply not to fight for the other side. Florence did this for three months in 1375, when the White Company was employed by Pope Gregory XI to fight Florence.

Despite this behavior, the White Company under Hawkwood gained a reputation for sticking to a contract and not deserting the battle or acting like lawless marauders once a battle was done. Military discipline was one of the commodities you gained when employing the White Company.

Besides being a mercenary, his life dovetailed with other historical events. In 1368, Edward III's son Lionel of Antwerp married Violante Visconti, daughter of then-ruler of Milan, Galeazzo II Visconti. Hawkwood was in attendance and might have met some of the other wedding guests: Geoffrey Chaucer, Petrarch, and the French chronicler Jean Froissart.

John Hawkwood died on 17 March 1394 in Florence. He had lived at that point for several years in peaceful retirement, enjoying the citizenship and pension and villa Florence had given him. Praised for his part in maintaining Florentine independence, he was buried with state honors. Plans for a bronze statue were abandoned due to cost, but 40 years later a monument was created for him by Paolo Uccello, a fresco designed to resemble bronze.

When Poets Collide?

Did the greatest English poet of the 14th century and the greatest French poet of the 14th century meet, thanks to the Hundred Years War?

Guillaume de Machaut (c.1300-1377) was a classical composer and poet—in fact, one of the last poets who also composed music—and a part of the ars nova ["new technique"] movement which embraced polyphony. His name suggests that he was born in Machault, east of Rheims in France, but it is clear that he spent most of his life in Rheims. Unlike many non-royal figures of his age, his popularity has ensured that we possess a remarkable amount of biographical information about him.

As a young man, he was a secretary to the ing of Bohemia, John I. He was named a canon of Verdun, then Arras, then Rheims; by 1340 he had given up the other positions and was a canon of Rheims only. As a canon, attached to the cathedral in Rheims and living without private wealth, he could devote himself to composing poetry and music. In all, we have about 400 pieces in various forms.

He lost his first patron, King John of Bohemia, when John died at the Battle of Crécy in 1346 during the Hundred Years War. Machaut found support from John's daughter. When she died during the Black  Death, he found support from her sons, Jean de Berry and CharlesV, Duke of Normandy.

In the next phase of the Hundred Years War, Geoffrey Chaucer (likely still a teenager at the time) was in the retinue of Prince Lionel as a valet. During the siege of Rheims in early 1360, Rheims rallied and captured the besiegers. Chaucer was taken prisoner. This would not have involved being thrown in dungeons and experiencing deprivation. The practice at the time was to capture as many high-ranking opponents as possible in order to gain money from ransoms. (Chaucer was ransomed for £16 in March.) The English would have likely experienced a mild form of "house arrest" which would have allowed them a certain amount of freedom. Chaucer would have had ample opportunity to visit Machaut.

Did he? We cannot be sure. Chaucer's poetry rarely offers attribution for his influences, but he was certainly intimately familiar with Machaut's work. Scholars have found numerous influences in Chaucer's writing. Chaucer scholar James I. Wimsatt has referred to "Guillaume de Machaut, who among fourteenth-century French poets exerted by far the most important influence on Chaucer."[link] Even long before he himself began writing, he was in a court that valued and supported the arts and poetry. Machaut was enormously popular in his own lifetime, and it seems inconceivable that Machaut would not have been sought out by several of the English who would have appreciated his reputation.

For a sample of his musical composition:

John of Gaddesden

With us there was a doctor of physic;
In all this world was none like him to pick
For talk of medicine and surgery;
For he was grounded in astronomy. —Prologue to the Canterbury Tales

Doctor, from the Ellesmere MS.

John of Gaddesden (c.1280-1361) was a "Doctor of Physik" who was quite well-known in his day, so much so that modern scholars looking to find analogs for the characters in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales have suggested he is the likeliest candidate for Chaucer's "doctor of physic." As a fan of both Chaucer and historical detail, I'm going to weigh in and say . . . maybe.

Who was Gaddesden, and why was he considered the model for Chaucer's pilgrim? For one thing, he had written Rosa medicinæ (The rose of medicine; sometimes called the Rosa Anglicæ), a compendium of medical information called so because it was in five parts, like the five sepals of a rose. In it, he quotes numerous authorities from the past; Chaucer's list of authorities with whom his doctor is familiar lines up nicely with Gaddesden's sources. Also, Gaddesden had a reputation for charging high fees, and Chaucer makes it clear that his doctor loved gold.

To be honest, however, Gaddesden's book was quoting the same authorities that anyone would quote when compiling a book on medicine. It was completely unoriginal. Even his title seems derivative, probably based on Lilium medicinæ (the Lily of medicine) by Bernard Gordon, produced at Montpellier in 1303. Gordon, a Scotsman, was one of the teachers of Guy de Chauliac. Chauliac, in turn, taught Gaddesden. What did Chauliac think of his student's work? Not much; he said of it:

Last of all arose the scentless rose of England, in which, on its being sent to me, I hoped to find the odor of sweet originality, but instead of that I encountered only the fictions of Hispanus, of Gilbert, and of Theodoric.

Those who write about Gaddesden being Chaucer's doctor usually justify it also be calling them "contemporaries." Let's look at the timeline: the Canterbury Tales probably wasn't started until 1387. Even if the Prologue were the first thing he wrote—highly unlikely—this was a quarter century after Gaddesden's death; a death that would have taken place when Chaucer was about 20 years old and had been connected to the household of Prince Lionel, the second son of King Edward III, only for a few years. Gaddesden seems to have been attached to the household of Edward, the Black Prince, who would have spent much of Gaddesden's later years on the continent while Chaucer was in England.

They could have crossed paths, but probably not significantly, and Gaddesden would have been long out of the public eye and consciousness when Chaucer came into his own as a poet. For Chaucer to write up a physician who quoted historical authorities, knew astrology, and loved gold probably just meant that he had met typical physicians.