The Wool Trade in England

Wool is different from hair in that it has a natural "crimp" to it that allows the fibers to bind together. This, and the fact that it can be found in abundance on the backs of sheep, made it an excellent source for textiles. Anyone with a plot of grass could have sheep, and anyone with sheep could learn the steps to make it into cloth.

The Low Countries, such as Flanders, did not have as much land to give over to grass instead of other human-based edibles, but they became excellent weavers whose textiles were in demand all over Europe. They needed the raw material, however, and England was an excellent source.

Wool as in such demand that it became the backbone of the English economy from the second half of the 13th century to the second half of the 15th. Everyone kept sheep for this purpose. Abbeys and monasteries often had large tracts of land given to them, and they became major sources of raw wool.

Wool was so popular a commodity that Edward I (1239 - 1307) realized it was a source of revenue for the crown as well. He instituted a tax on every bale and bag of raw wool that went out of the country. The beauty of taxation for the historian is that it means records are kept, so we know a lot about how much wool was exported. From 1281 to 1300, about 26,000 sacks of wool. How much was that, really? The English "sack," used for wool and coal, equalled 224 pounds. That equates to about 2900 tons of wool annually. In the first couple decades of the 1300s, the annual output averaged 35-40,000 sacks.

Edward III (1312 - 1377) needed a lot of revenue to manage expenses during the Hundred Years War, and raised the tax on wool. He promoted the wool trade by establishing the Woolsack, a large cushion of wool on which the presiding officer of the House of Lords sat.

Edward would make decisions that ultimately lessened the value of wool for his economy. He invited weavers from Flanders to relocate to England. Perhaps he though he could bring another source of revenue closer to home. His high taxes, however, started to discourage people from sending wool abroad, and they started making their own woolen cloth. An influx of skilled Flemish weavers meant less raw wool leaving the country to be taxed. The annual export started decreasing in the final years of his reign, and dropped below 20,000 sacks in the decade following. From 1400 to 1430, it didn't exceed 15,000 sacks, and after 1430 it fell below 10,000.

There was another reason: quality. English wool reigned supreme for generations, but experiments in cross-breeding in the Iberian Peninsula produced something else: Merino wool. The best guesses are Spanish ewes being bred with English and North African rams in the 12th and 13th centuries, and then increased stock over the years, produced a much finer wool that became all the rage for cloth. You can learn more about it in this post.

This web article opened with the following:

Wool as a raw material has been widely available since the domestication of sheep. Even before shears were invented, wool would have been harvested using a comb or just plucked out by hand.

I thought the second sentence was pretty superfluous, but then I asked myself: "Well, when did shears come into the picture?" So I did some looking, and now I know, which I will shear...excuse me, share tomorrow.

Advent

We are now in the Christian season of Advent, from the Latin adventus, meaning "coming." It comprises the four Sundays leading to Christmas Day, leading you to think it was started as preparation for the coming off the Nativity. Good guess, but that's not how it began.

First let us talk about the timing. We are not sure when it was first established, but probably in the 4th century Christians in Spain and Gaul began a period of penance and fasting starting on 11 November, the feast day of St. Martin of Tours (c.316/336-397). They were preparing for the baptism of new christians, which would take place on January 6th, the Feast of the Epiphany. The activity spread, and Roman Christians in the 6th century started associating it with the coming of Christ's birth on 25 December.

These days, Advent begins on the Sunday nearest 30 November, the feast of St. Andrew the Apostle, and only lasts four Sundays. It is therefore a "floating holiday" like Easter, and can start any day from 27 November to 3 December. The change seems to have come about by the 9th century: Pope Nicholas I mentions the shortened span in a letter to the Bulgarians. The Eastern Orthodox Church celebrates from 15 November until Christmas.

The Advent wreath, like so many traditions involving evergreens, began in northern Europe. The wheel-shaped greens represented the cycles of the year and the promise of life after winter. The candles represented the warmth of hope in the returning Son/sun. Three purple candles represent hope, peace, and love, and are lit on the 1st, 2nd, and 4th Sundays. The pink candle, representing joy, is lit on the 3rd Sunday. Purple was not a cheap color to produce, and dyeing candles with a royal color indicated the significance of Christ the King's birth.

(The Advent calendar? That was concocted in Germany in the 1800s.)

Merino Sheep

The previous post on the Mesta mentioned the kings of Castile giving shepherds rights-of-way that overrode those of other landowners in order to get their sheep to good pasture. There aren't many shepherds or large flocks around these days, and so you might not realize the important stake the kings had in sheep, especially Merino sheep. Those flocks were owned by royalty.

Sheep provided wool, and Merinos were champions at it. Their wool was an incredibly valuable export because of its spinning count, or S value. The S value describes how fine the strands of wool are. The finer the strands, the more yards of fiber you can spin from it. One pound of merino wool, with an S value of 62, could produce 34,720 yards of yarn. (A "hank" is 560 yards.) Merino wool was much finer than other breeds, and produced not only softer wool, but more of it. Finer strands also enabled it to be more easily interwoven with other fibers.

They were bred in southwestern Spain in the 12th century, and there are careful records of attempts to breed them to be even more useful. The original herds might have been brought by Berbers early on, but English breeds were introduced to help develop the Merino, as described in the entry on "Wool" in The New American Cyclopaedia (1858).

Spain held a monopoly on the finest wool in the world through the 16th century. In fact, export of living Merino sheep was a crime in Spain, punishable by death, through the 17th century! The monopoly started to wane when some were sent to Sweden in 1723, and then in 1765 when King Charles III of Spain (1716-1788) sent some to his cousin in Saxony to start a private flock. Merinos started trickling out to other countries, and Spain soon lost its pre-eminence in the world of fine wool.

But the Merino is still king.

The Mesta

Merino Ram, bred in Medieval Spain

Consider the Iberian Peninsula in the early Middle Ages: the Moors controlled the southern part, and Christians held the northern regions bordering France. The border between them was far from firm, and there was a "buffer zone" that was frequently contested. It was therefore too risky for any group to settle there permanently, not knowing whether you might become surrounded by hostile foreigners.

It was suitable, however, for nomadic people, such as shepherds. Hundreds of square kilometers were open to anyone passing through, and if you had hundreds or thousands of sheep, and needed a place for them to graze, well... .

In 1212, Alfonso VIII of Castile, mentioned before because he founded the abbey whence comes the music of Las Huelgas, led a group of Christian leaders to push the Moors south, reclaiming a large part of the peninsula and making it safe for settlement. Folk started moving into what was previously a "no man's land," setting up farms and communities.

This meant clashing with the enormous number of sheep and their herders. Something had to be done, and by the late 1200s, Castile had struck an agreement that produced the most powerful agricultural union in Medieval Europe, the Mesta.

Its full name is Honrado Concejo de la Mesta ["Honorable Council of the Mesta"]. "Mesta" comes from Latin animalia mixta ["mixed animals"] because the enormous herd of sheep which you are guarding might not all belong to the same owner. Driving the sheep from location to location in search of pastureland would result in herds getting mixed together.

The Mesta had rights that persist to this day: the right to drive their sheep along certain pathways regardless of land ownership. These were called cañadas ["road along which livestock is driven"] or cañadas reales ["royal ways"; because they were established by the kings of Castile]. They still exist, and some roads through Madrid are designated as such. Sheep are not usually driven through the streets of Madrid, but nothing prohibits the practice.

Incidentally, mesta is also the root of mestengo ["ownerless beast"], where we get the word "mustang."

The Patron Saint of Comedians

Icon of St. Genesius, commissioned
by the Fraternity of St. Genesius

There are several saints named Genesius in early Christian history: Genesius of Alvernia, Genesius of Béziers, Genesius of Rome, Genesius of Cordoba, Genesius Sciarensis (also known as Ginés de la Jara). They are likely to be made-up names, springing from misunderstandings and the desire to have a local version of the original Genesius, a very early and popular martyr.

The earliest story we have about Genesius is in the Acta Sanctorum ["Acts of the Saints"], attributed to St. Paulinus of Nola:

Genesius, native of Arles, at first a soldier became known for his proficiency in writing, and was made secretary to the magistrate of Arles. While performing the duties of his office the decree of persecution against the Christians was read in his presence. Outraged in his ideas of justice, the young catechumen cast his tablets at the feet of the magistrate and fled. He was captured and executed, and thus received baptism in his own blood.

He is believed to have been beheaded (the quickest and surest way to execute someone). This would have happened in 303 CE, in Arles in southern France. He is often referred to as Genesius of Arles (which distinguishes him from all the "copycat" saints). Later, a church was built for him in Rome, after which he became also known as Genesius of Rome, on the assumption that he was a Roman martyr.

How did he come to be the patron saint of comedians (and actors and entertainers in general)? Through fiction. A 6th-century legend of Genesius Sciarensis (who likely had no independent existence and is merely a literary duplication of the original Genesius) tells that Genesius was a comedian who, in the middle of performing an anti-Christian satire, became moved by the material and converted to Christianity; he was beheaded for this conversion.

Ginés de la Jara (mentioned above) is the Spanish version of Genesius; scholars analyzing the origins of his cult recognize the likelihood that he is synonymous with the earlier Genesius, partially because the two saints have the same feast day, 25 August.

A Fraternity of St. Genesius works toward the "renewal of culture" and its importance in the modern world.

Crypto-Jews

A secret seder [source]

Yesterday I alluded to a third option available to persecuted Jews in the Middle Ages who were forced into the choice between conversion to Christianity and expulsion from there home country. The un-offered third choice was to publicly choose conversion but privately maintain the practices of Judaism. One modern term for those who chose this way is "Crypto-Jews."

There were a few terms for Jews who remained in Spain after the Alhambra Decree or in Portugal after its decree of expulsion.

• Christianos Nuevos ["New Christians"]
• conversos ["Converted"]
• ...and the derogatory Marranos

Marranos is a racist term: it means "pig" and was used to describe both Jews and Muslims whose dietary practices forbade eating pork. Conversion to Christianity did not remove the social stigma of being an "outsider" or "inferior," and Jewish converts who stayed in their home countries on the Iberian Peninsula were still treated poorly.

This explains why the Lisbon Massacre could happen in 1506: even years after Jews should have been gone from Portugal, evidence could be found of Jewish religious practices—or simple suspicion that conversos were not sincere—that stirred a mob to violence.

Marranos could have a difficult time even if they finally left Portugal and joined Jewish communities:

Even though the rabbis of [those] times had decreed that Marranos be accepted and taken back into the community, Jews outside of Spain had very little sympathy for the Marranos. For many generations, people would not even marry into their families or treat them as Jewish — mostly out of resentment that when the moment of truth came they opted to convert rather than take upon themselves the privation of exile. [source]

In Belmonte, Portugal, a community of Jews survived for centuries, intermarrying to keep families Jewish and hiding every outward sign of their faith. The "Belmonte Jews" returned openly to Judaism in 1970 and opened a synagogue in 1996.

Running to Portugal

The Inquisition in Portigal [source]

When the Alhambra Decree gave Jews the choice of converting to Christianity or leaving the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, tens of thousands—there are no accurate estimates; they vary between 130,000 and 800,000—began the search for a new home. Fortunately, shelter was closer than expected for some.

Portugal had experienced an on-again/off-again anti-Semitism. Many Jews who fled to Portugal wound up being persecuted or imprisoned under King John II (1455 - 1495), but King Alfonso V (1432 - 1481) had appointed a Jew as his treasurer. His successor, King Manuel I, was a very religious man, building religious buildings and trying to round up a Crusade against the Turks, but he was friendly to the Jews and released them from prison. Things seemed to be looking up.

Manuel had ambitions, however, that put his future at odds with his past as a tolerant ruler. Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon had a daughter, the Infanta Isabella. Through her parents, she was the heir to Castile and Aragon. A marriage between Manuel and Isabella would unite most of the Iberian Peninsula, and their children would rule a large part of Europe and be allied to even more of Europe.*

Ferdinand and Isabella, however, would never allow their daughter to marry the monarch of a land that allowed Jews. A contract was written up for the marriage; one of its stipulations was that the Jews of Portugal would no longer be tolerated. Four years after the Edict of Expulsion sent Jews migrating to Portugal, Portugal in 1496 decreed that all Jews had to convert to Christianity or leave Portugal by October of 1497. (This edict applied to Muslims as well.)

The tide had turned for Jews in Portugal. Thousands fled to Amsterdam, Constantinople, France and Morocco; even to the New World. Not all left, which led to the Lisbon Massacre in 1506, when up to 2000 Jews (or people perceived to be Jews) were tortured and burned at the stake by a Catholic mob. Thirty years later, the Inquisition came to Portugal, creating more risks for anyone not seen to adhere strictly to Roman Catholicism.

If the Jews were supposed to be expelled, how was it that the Lisbon Massacre seemed like a good idea? That would be because there was a third, unofficial option between expulsion and conversion. We will look at the Marranos tomorrow.

*Her sister was Catherine of Aragon, King Henry VIII's first wife.

The Alhambra Decree

[source]

There is an ethnic subdivision of Jews called Sephardic Jews. "Sephardic" comes from the Hebrew Sepharad, which referred to Hispania. More specifically, Sephardic Jews are those descended from Jews who lived in Spain in the 15th century. They migrated from the Middle East to The Iberian Peninsula/Sepharad/Hispania/Spain/ about 1000 CE.

Several weeks ago, the government of Spain passed a law that allows Sephardic Jews—no matter where they live, no matter in what country they currently have citizenship—to receive dual citizenship for the asking. Wherever they live now, they could receive Spanish citizenship without having to renounce citizenship elsewhere or even move to Spain. The reason, as explained in a recent  article in The Economist, is "righting an historical wrong."

The "historical wrong" was the Alhambra Decree.

The Alhambra Decree was issued on 31 March 1492 by the rulers of the majority of the Iberian Peninsula. (The peninsula comprised Portugal, Castile, Granada, Aragon, Navarre.) Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon ordered the expulsion of all Jews from their two kingdoms. The deadline for departure was 31 July 1492.*

Like England in an earlier century, a choice was offered: you may convert to Christianity and stay, or remain Jewish and leave, taking your possessions with you (except for gold, silver, currency, arms or horses). Refusing these choices meant immediate execution, and a non-Jew who aided a Jew through hiding him would suffer the loss of all property and privileges.

The Alhambra Decree, also known as the Edict of Expulsion, was formally revoked by Spain on 16 December 1968, as a result of reforms that came from the Second Vatican Council.

Where did the Jews go? What were their choices for a new homeland? There were a few options, some close by. But that's a topic for another day.

*Columbus departed on his maiden voyage across the Atlantic on 3 August, a mere four days after the Expulsion deadline.

The Legacy of Liuvigild

Liuvigild on one of his campaigns
detail from an ivory reliquary, 11th c.

Liuvigild was mentioned yesterday as the Visigothic King in the Iberian peninsula who killed his own son, Hermengild, after the son was converted from Arian Christianity to Roman Catholic Christianity. Liuvigild then exiled Bishop Leander of Seville who was responsible for converting Hermengild and preaching against Arianism.

Sounds pretty harsh. There's always at least one other side to a story, however.

Liuvigild ruled Hispania (the Iberian Peninsula) and Septimania (a territory in what is now southern France, on the Mediterranean). He was born about 525. He first came to the throne in 568, when his brother, King Liuva I, named Liuvigild co-king and heir. At his brother's death in 571/2, he became sole ruler, and set about to make sure all the Iberian Peninsula was united, a goal he largely accomplished by 577.

One of his acts as king was to revise the Codex Euricianus ["Code of Euric"], a set of laws designed before 480 by King Euric of the Visigoths. The earlier version stratified society between Goths and non-Goths. Liuvigild's version, called the Codex Revisus ["Revised Code"], gave equal rights to both the Visigoths under his rule and the conquered Hispano-Roman population.

He was married twice. His first wife, Theodosia, bore him two sons, Hermengild and Reccared. After her death, he married the widow of Athanagild, who had been king before Liuva and Liuvigild. Reccared became his father's favorite; Liuvigild even founded a city which he named after Reccared: Recopolis.

Liuvigild also minted a new coin, based on a Roman design. The Visigoths, by virtue of moving into and taking over much of the Roman Empire, considered themselves its heirs. Liuvigild struck a coin with a design that resembled one that had just been produced by the Byzantine Emperor Tiberius II.

Liuvigild died in 586. He was succeeded by Reccared.

Leander of Seville

Commentary on Job being given from
Pope Gregory to Bishop Leander of Seville

St. Isidore of Seville (c. 560 – 4 April 636) has been mentioned here before as the author of a popular encyclopedia of information and etymologies. He was not the only saint in the family, however. His brother, Leander (c. 534 – 13 March 600/601), was also made a saint.*

Leander was Bishop of Seville (a position later held by Isidore), using his authority in political ways: he tried to convert Hermengild, the son of the Arian Christian King of the Visigoths in Spain, to Roman Catholic Christianity. Hermengild converted, his father King Liuvigild got angry, and suddenly Leander was exiled.

He traveled to the other end of the Mediterranean, where he continued to oppose Arianism by writing treatises against it. Here he met and became friends with the man who would later become Pope Gregory the Great, (mentioned here). The two remained in contact, and letters that passed between them still exist.

Hermengild, the rebellious son, was put to death by his father (and therefore became a martyr in the Catholic Church). Luvigild died in 589, and sometime after that Leander returned to Spain, convoking the Third Council of Toledo that renounced Arianism. Bishop Leander spent the rest of his life fighting heresy in Spain. When he died, in 600/601, Isidore became bishop in his place.

*As were their siblings, Florentina and Fulgentius.

Donating America

Christopher Columbus is about as late as a "medieval" blog should deal with, but to me it seems appropriate. The world that Columbus sailed from was still very much entrenched in the culture and technology of the Middle Ages (even though its artworks are considered part of the Renaissance). But the discovery of a new continent—and the new era of exploration of which it was a part—made radical changes to any remaining "parochial" attitudes of the Old World.

But what was the plan for the land he was to find? Was there a plan? Didn't he intend simply to find a new route to India for trade purposes?

Maybe not. On 4 May 1493, Pope Alexander VI (1431-1503) issued a papal bull, Inter caetera [Latin: "Among other (works)"], which granted to the kingdoms of Spain (Castile and Aragon) all lands west and south of a line 100 leagues west of the Azores or Cape Verde islands. If you look at the map below, the line on the right shows the boundary, west of which the lands belonged to Spain. Everyone involved realized very quickly that Columbus had discovered new lands, not the expected ones.

Portugal objected to this authority granted to Spain. It felt it had some precedent for authority over these new lands.

Inter caetera was not the first papal bull regarding the disposition of the New World. Pope Nicholas V (1397-1455) had presented a bull on 18 June 1452 called Dum diversas [Latin: "Until different"], allowing Alfonso V of Portugal (1432-1481) to seek out and capture pagans and seize their kingdoms. Portugal believed that Spain's rights granted by Inter caetera conflicted with Portugal's rights granted by Dum diversas. Spain and Portugal tried a diplomatic solution, to no avail. Spain urged the Pope (who was Spanish) to help. The result was a new bull, Dudum siquidem [Latin: "A short while ago"] that gave Spain:

all islands and mainlands whatsoever, found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered, that are or may be or may seem to be in the route of navigation or travel towards the west or south, whether they be in western parts, or in the regions of the south and east and of India. [Dudum siquidem, 26 September 1493]

 The intent was clear, and Spain started sending conquistadors.

In truth, there were several bulls over the years that granted authority to different countries to take over other lands. A specific subset of these dealing with the New World is known collectively as the "Bulls of Donation." Spain and Portugal finally came to an agreement with the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, dividing up the New World between them.

Finding the Ten Lost Tribes

Later depiction of Benjamin of Tudela

One of the greatest historical puzzles is the disappearance of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. After the death of King Solomon, the northern kingdom of Israel broke away from the kingdom of Judah, ruled over by the House of David. The destruction of the kingdom by the Assyrians in about 720 BCE supposedly sent the tribes of Reuben, Simon, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Ephraim, and half the tribe of Manasseh to other locations, where presumably they were assimilated into the native populations. Suggesting that they merely dissolved into indigenous groups is not satisfying to anyone, however. A combination of rabbinical writings and sheer speculation, however, has attempted to answer this unanswerable question.

Is it possible, however, that a partial answer was provided by a 12th century traveler from Spain, a sort of Jewish Marco Polo who went seeking settlements of Jews all over the known world and recording details about their lifestyle?

Benjamin of Tudela (1130-1173) was born in the little town of Tudela, in Navarre in northern Spain. That sums up what we know of his early life. Around 1165 he undertook a journey east—whether his purpose was to visit the Holy Land, to truly map out Jewish settlements, or to make business connections, we don't know—and spent the next 8 years traveling and writing down the details of his travel and of the communities he met. As a 12th century snapshot of life in the Middle Ages—particularly Jewish life across Europe and the Middle East—his Masa'ot Binyamin (Travels of Benjamin) is invaluable to historians, especially Jewish historians, despite its occasional inaccuracies.

If he heard of any community of Jews, he visited them and asked about their traditions and numbers. And then there is this:

There are men of Israel in the land of Persia who say that in the mountains dwell four of the tribes of Israel, namely, the tribe of Dan, the tribe of Zevulun, the tribe of Asher, and the tribe of Naphtali. "They are governed by their own prince, Joseph the Levite. Among them are learned scholars. They sow and reap and go forth to war as far as the land of Cush, by way of the desert. They are in league with the Kofar-al-Turak, pagan tribesmen who worship the wind and live in the wilderness.

And also, in Arabia, he found a very large Jewish settlement:

These tribesmen are of the tribes Reuven and Gad, and the half-tribe of Menasseh. Their seat of government is a great city surrounded by the mountains of the North. The Jews of Kheibar have built many large fortified cities. The yoke of the gentiles is not upon them. They go forth to pillage and to capture booty in conjunction with the Arabs their neighbors.

If you are interested in more, you can read a translation of his work at Project Gutenberg.

The Birth of Tick-Tock

A city without bells is like a blind man without a stick. —Rabelais

Rabelais (c.1494-1553) was a little late for this blog, but his statement in Chapter XIX of Gargantua indicates a reliance on time-keeping that the modern world can understand. It was not always thus, however, for the Middle Ages.

I discussed yesterday how early concepts of time by their nature might have made it difficult to think of time as something measurable. I mentioned a mid-1200s definition of time that came from Franco of Cologne, the mathematically-minded music theorist who created what is the basis for modern musical notation. Franco's most diligent biographer places him as chapelmaster at Notre Dame in Paris.

Johannes de Sacrobosco (c.1195-c.1256) taught at the University of Paris, probably contemporaneously with Franco. Johannes was an astronomer who, among other things, declared that there was a flaw in the Julian calendar: it was 10 days off. (That error wouldn't be corrected until long after.) He also wrote of an attempt he knew to construct a wheel that would make a complete rotation in one day. Robertus Anglicus wrote a commentary in 1270 on Sacrobosco's treatise, mentioning the device and further spreading the idea. In that same decade, a clock is described by someone writing in Spain that runs by the flow of mercury from chamber to chamber in a wheel.

It only took a generation for this idea to catch on. By 1300, clocks were becoming widely known (if not widely owned), but the early ones only measured hours—they rang bells, but had no faces with markings around a dial, no minutes or seconds were counted, that we know of.

The device described by Sacrobosco and Anglicus used a weight hanging from a line around a wheel or cylinder. The Middle Ages understood wheels, gears, levers and pulleys, but how could these be used to guarantee a steady revolution of the weighted wheel? Sometime around 1300, or not long after, some early mechanical "Eureka" moment took place. Someone designed what we call the "escapement," which rocked back and forth on a toothed gear, allowing the wheel to turn at a steady, measurable, predictable speed. It also had a side-effect: a steady sound that we have been listening to ever since.

The escapement.

Within a generation after 1300, Dante Alighieri (c.1265-1321) considers his audience familiar enough with clocks and their mechanism to use gears as a metaphor:

As the wheels within a clockwork synchronize
       So that the innermost, when looked at closely
       Seems to be standing, while the outermost flies. (Canto xxiv, Paradiso)

Humans could now mark time in sequences of ticks and tocks. Minutes and seconds could be distinguished. Hours could be regulated. Six hours before noon became the same, whether it were dark in winter or already light in summer. (That's right: the 12 hours from sunrise until sunset used to be extended or shortened depending upon the season.) This was a change from the canonical hours described by the Rule of St. Benedict, for whom prayers at Matins were supposed to end as the sun rose, and therefore had to be started at different times depending on the season. In 1370, Charles V of France installed a clock in his palace, and decreed that all clocks in Paris be set according to his. Punctuality, crucial feature of our modern world, was born.