Message-Id: <001801be1330$901696b0$1122030a@wvincenti.bergen.cc.nj.us>
From: "William Vincenti" <wgv@email.njin.net>
To: "EKlistserv" <sca-east@indra.com>
Subject: EK: Courtesy and Etiquette - sources
Date: Wed, 18 Nov 1998 15:18:10 -0500
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-Poster: "William Vincenti" <wgv@email.njin.net>

Chairiste wrote ...
<snip>
> 1) Medieval Chivalry really only applied to knights, right?  Like, as a
>battle thing -- not supposed to take cheap shots, once you've kick his
>butt praise his valor, that sort of stuff.
> 2) The politeness between nobles, well, what politeness?!?  Wary
>circling of constantly fighting dogs!  Sure, allies got along and
>enemies did just about anything to one-up each other.
> 3) We must accept that thought a goal of the SCA is historical
>accuracy, we're still acting out a code of behavior idealised and
>romantisized even in period. Many behaviors or customs of the nobles of
>the period we would never emulate.  Like an earnest monk or nun, we're
>trying to achieve the perhaps unachieveable ideal of perfect chivalric
>behavior at all times.  Yet we're curiously blind to the simpler
>aspects.
> 4) "Noblesse Oblige"--wasn't this originally more about the rights a
>nobleperson has over his/her territory/serfs?  Then later got twisted by
>high-minded (ei: idealistic) folks to mean the obligations of protection
>of his/her serfs?
> 5)Is there a Knight on this list, or a Laurel who can quote some source
>material, or anyone who can point at a manuscript and say "this is what
>we're basing SCA chivalry on.  This is how they/people/knights/nobles
>acted then"?
<snip>

Hi,
        There was a deep gulf between the ideals of chivalry and how one
went about the business of living from day to day and I think that we really
have a few discussions going on here that overlap.
1.  What were the ideals of chivalry?
2.  How did these ideals reflect upon everyday life in Medieval Europe?
3.  How may they be and are they applied within the SCA?

        I'm going to stick to the first question here, and even limit it to
the professed ideals of the knightly class.  By this I mean I'm going to
ignore the romances for the moment.

        There is a small body of literature from Western Europe that was
either written by knights or widely owned by knights that tends to be
referred to as either chivalric handbooks, or manuals.  The good news is
that most of them have been translated into English and are pretty easy to
come by.  I've put a bibliography of them online at:
http://www.users.nac.net/wgv/reviews/chivalry/chivalry.htm


        The books that seem to have been most in circulation off this list
are:
1.  Anonymous.  "Ordene De Chevalerie".  ca. 1220-1230?

2.  Llull, Ramon (1223-1315). The Book of the Ordre of Chyvalry or
Knyghthode.
3.  Geoffroi De Charny d.1355.  (He wrote 3 books.)
    a. The Book of Chivalry of Geoffroi De Charny: Text, Context, and
Translation.
    b. Livre Charny  (not yet in English)
    c. 'Demands pour la joute, les tournois, et la guerre'  (not yet in
English)
4.  La Tour-Landry, Geoffroy de, 14th cent.
    ca. 1372.  The Book of the Knight of La Tour-Landry, compiled for the
instruction of his
    daughters.
5.  Bonet, Honore. ca. 1387.  The Tree of Battles of Honore Bonet.
6.  Henry, duke of Lancaster, 1299?-1361.
    Le livre de seyntz medicines; the unpublished devotional treatise of
Henry of Lancaster.
    text edited by E.J. Arnould. Oxford, Pub. for the Anglo-Norman text
society by B.
    Blackwell, 1940.  (not yet in English ... sigh!  This one never got
published in period, but if
    you dig up some of the things written about it it does sound pretty
interesting.)

        I think that if you read any of these you won't find anything too
alien when it comes to what we think of as ideals of chivalry.
        They say nothing of chivalry being reserved for treatment of fellow
knights, and regularly go on at length about the responsibilities of power
and being a knight and how one should not abuse that power by taking
advantage of peasants, women or widows.
        They also say very little on the subject of courtly love that
something that comes from the troubadours.  These guys didn't want someone
else pining away thinking of their wives.  Also, if you grab a copy of La
Tour-Landry's work you'll get an earful of him warning his daughters (he was
a widower), about how his peers would tell them just about anything to get
what they wanted.  (You fathers out there know that speech.)  La Tour-Landry
didn't have a high opinion of the moral character of his fellow knights.
        The translation of De Charny's work gives one both an idealized
version of what it is to be a knight, while at the same time describing in
fair detail the difficulties of surviving the profession.  He spends a good
bit of ink on the difficulties of resolving an incredibly violent lifestyle
with ideals that professed peace, love and charity.
        Ramon Lull explains that Noblesse of Courage "chooses a knight,"
though it cannot do this without the virtues of Faith, Hope, Charity,
Justice, Prudence, Strength, and Temperance.

        Again, you will find a big difference between the chivalric ideals
that these men espoused, and everyday life.  I think the joy of our
situation is that we don't regularly have to deal with the need to actually
kill someone to defend ourselves, and we all get to go out to dinner
together after the day is over.

Yours in Service,
William MacCrimmon

----------
William Vincenti - Reference Librarian
Bergen Community College
400 Paramus Road
Paramus, NJ  07652
Email:     wgv@email.njin.net

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