A Short History of Social Life in England/Chapter 5

by Margaret Bertha Synge

CHAPTER V

Circa 1066 — 1204

"SAXON AND NORMAN AND DANE ARE WE"

"I looked: aside the dust-cloud rolled,
 The Waster seemed the Builder too;
 Upspringing from the ruined Old
⁠I saw the New."⁠

Whittier.

WHILE the Danes were settling themselves into their new English homes, plundering parties of Viking pirates were wresting from France her sea-coast territory in the north-east, known to history as the Northman's Land or Normandy.

The same power of assimilation that had enabled the Danes to merge themselves in the English now characterised the Northmen in France. Like their brethren across the English Channel, they became Christian, they learnt to speak in the language of their adopted country, they wore French dress, they absorbed French manners. From sea-faring men they became famous equestrians, and grew to be some of the foremost fighters in Europe.

Years passed by, accentuating on either side the sea this process of absorption, until in 1066 the Northmen of France stood face to face with the Northmen of England on English soil.

Every detail of the Battle of Hastings is known to lovers of history. Shoulder to shoulder, shield to shield, on the heights above Senlac in the grey October dawn stood the English, battle-axes in hand, under their leader Harold, the fair-haired Saxon. Arrayed against them was the Norman force, fully armed, and magnificently disciplined. There were archers and lancers backed by horsemen, and all under the Duke William, a very Viking chieftain himself, with his gigantic height, his fierce brows, his reckless bearing—Norman in his daring, Norman in his very pitilessness.

The conquest practically complete, the newly won land was distributed among the conquerors. Scattered over the country of the vanquished, the Normans kept the same order that had characterised them on the transports at sea as in the battle itself, an order which united all in a great chain of duty. As the simple man-at-arms owed faith and service to his captain, so the knight owed his service to his military superior the baron, while in his turn the baron served his King. Thus, then, the Norman feudal army settled on the land amidst a people already acquainted with the feudal system. But the chances of war had carried men rapidly from the lowest to the highest grade of society. The foot-soldier with black bow and arrow appeared after the Conquest as a fully armed knight mounted on horseback, while many a poor Norman knight now commanded a company, whose rallying cry was his own name. Herdsmen and weavers, butchers and cooks, with obscure names in France, became illustrious barons on this side the water!

The possession of wealth and land now became the basis of society. The Anglo-Saxon freeman vanished under a system by which every landholder was made to depend on another, whom he was bound to serve, not as his chosen patron, not, as of old, by reason of the love he bore him as kinsman or friend, but as owner of the lands he cultivated, the leader he was obliged to follow into battle. Homage to his landlord—the faithful promise on bended knee to be "his man for ever," sealed by a warm grip of the hand—was the rent he paid for the ground.

In the great Domesday Book, compiled by the Conqueror, every field and farm in England are faithfully recorded, every mill and fish-pond, every wood and bit of forest land, every pig and cow are entered—and taxed.

And so the famous day was ushered in when, on the hot plains of Salisbury, William the Conqueror gathered together the whole body of English land-owners, 60,000 men in all—Saxon, Dane and Norman— great and small from every part of the island. There each man knelt and swore to be the King's man, faithful to him above all others. Men have seen in this great Assembly the foreshadowing of our Lords and Commons in the Parliament of to-day. Be this as it may, it was without doubt the foreshadowing of that great national unity after which England had so long struggled in vain. At this Council (1086), England became for ever a kingdom one and indivisible, "which since that day no man has dreamed of parting asunder"—

"Strong with a strength that no fate might dissever.
      One with a oneness no force could divide."

To guard against any attempted rising on the part of the conquered, castles were built in every position of importance, and these were the homes of the Norman barons. Familiar enough are the remains of these old Norman keeps to-day—familiar the thick massive walls, standing four square on rising ground, surrounded by river or moat, and entered by the solid and inhospitable gateway. Familiar are the towers and battlements frowning defiance over the surrounding country, their narrow slits of windows suggestive of draughts and sunlessness within. Inside is the square courtyard, grass growing unheeded on the spot where once clanked hosts of armed men. We see again the long hall, or salle, as the newcomers renamed it, at once dining-room and justice hall, serving as of old for sleeping accommodation for retainers and dogs, when the long day was done and the baronial family had ascended the outside staircase which led to their comfortless bedroom. For one bedroom in those days did duty for the whole family. The lord and his lady had a roof and hangings to their bed, while the rest of the family occupied small beds ranged round the room.

Quilts, made of feathers, seem to have taken the place of the modern mattress; then came linen sheets and cloth coverlets made of cat's hair, beaver, badger or martin. On one side of the bedroom stood a perch for the falcons, on the other a similar arrangement for hanging articles of dress. The whole scheme sounds somewhat insanitary to modern ideas. Their day was divided as follows:

"Lever à cinque, diner a neuf,
 Souper à cinque, couctier à neuf.
 Fait vivre d'ans nonante et neuf."

The meals themselves differed little from those under the old régime. Close attention was paid to cooking, and we are told that William the Conqueror brought over his whole kitchen establishment to ensure good dinners on the English shores. As of old, a boar's head was considered among the best of dishes, and it was borne into the hall preceded by musicians sounding trumpets.

Here is one of the new King's menus:—

1. Boar's head with its tusks in its snout, garnished with flowers.
2. Venison, cranes, peacocks, swans, wild geese, kids, pigs and hens.
3. Spiced and seasoned meats, with wine, red and white.
4. Pheasants, woodcock, partridge, larks, plovers, brawn.
5. White powder and large sweetmeats.

The peacock was a favourite dish; so were crane and porpoise. Spiced wines and cordials were drunk freely by the Normans, who were naturally a more temperate people than the Saxons, but with the rapid assimilation of the two races this restraint soon disappeared. So fast indeed did Norman and Saxon blend, that in dress and language they soon became identical. The tunic, cloak and leg bandages were still worn; the women's gown became the "robe," her headgear the couvre-chef or kerchief. The women of the period wore their hair in long plaits, sometimes reaching to the feet, one on either side. So much indeed did the Normans admire the long flowing hair of the Saxons, that they imitated them by allowing their closely cropped hair to grow immoderately long. This fashion was denounced strongly by the clergy as effeminate, and it is recorded that on Easter Day, 1105, the priest, after inveighing against it, coolly drew a huge pair of scissors from his pocket and went from seat to seat mercilessly cropping the whole congregation, from the King downwards!

The clergy, after the Conquest, had much to contend with. The Church was in a deplorable condition. The Saxon clergy had grown illiterate and ignorant; the discipline of the monastic houses was lax; monks had cast aside their habit to enter into the sports and secular life of the people. Inasmuch as the Norman Conquest bore the character of a religious mission, and a banner blessed by the Pope had waved over the victorious Normans at Senlac, it is natural to find great changes taking place in the Church, An age of vigorous growth was now ushered in, an age of "great men, of grand ideals and noble ventures." The substitution of Norman ecclesiastics for Saxon was at once begun, and such names as those of Lanfranc, Anselm, and Becket speak to us of reform within and without. Scholars, statesmen, enthusiasts—each had his message to an age of violence and turbulence. Separate legislation for matters spiritual and temporal, the revival of learning among the clergy, together with a stricter celibacy and the closer connection of the Norman Church in England with the great centre of civilisation in Rome—these were among the important reforms of the thirteenth century.

The Norman prelates brought into England a passion for building. Abbey churches, minsters, and cathedrals began to arise in every diocese. The sees of bishops were transferred from villages to popular towns; thus the Bishop of Thetford migrated to Norwich, and Dorchester to Lincoln. To-day we love and reverence the simplicity and strength of all that remains to us of early Norman architecture. Its chief characteristics are well-known—the low round arch, the stupendous columns, and the stern style of decoration, good examples of which may be seen still at Durham, Canterbury, and Peterborough. Though the secret of mortar-making had not gone with the Romans, yet much early Norman work has perished. The tower of Winchester Cathedral, built in 1093, fell fourteen years later, and though at the time the catastrophe was attributed to Divine displeasure, it was undoubtedly due to bad mortar! Within the great minsters some few organs were now built for Church music. There was a famous one at Winchester with 400 pipes and twenty-six bellows, worked by seventy strong men, "covered with perspiration." Two monks played on two sets of keys simultaneously, with the somewhat natural result that an overwhelming roar was heard all over the city.

In connection with the cathedral was the monastery. As in the old days, those who wished to live the highest Christian life took refuge in monastic discipline and rule. The paths of life were few and sharply defined. All men were warriors; the warriors of God must be monks. As heretofore, monasteries were the centres of learning: here Norman and Saxon children alike learnt to read and to write and to sing; here books were copied and illuminated and chronicles kept—imperfect and untrustworthy, but beyond all words precious. Here, too, were the hospitals, where the sick poor were provided with food and clothing; here were the wooden houses for those stricken with that scourge of the Middle Ages, leprosy.

It is this spirit or consciousness of sacrifice made ungrudgingly for the sick and suffering that gave rise to the spirit of Chivalry, which was such a characteristic of this age. For it is to the new life breathed into Christianity by direct contact with Europe after the Conquest that we owe the spirit of knighthood, suggestive of a new ideal and more generous impulses than any hitherto known in this country. Knighthood in the Middle Ages was no lightly earned title, as it is to-day. The ceremonies then were entirely of a religious character. After bathing, typical of baptism, the candidate for knighthood was clothed in a white tunic, symbol of purity; then a red robe, symbolical of the blood he might be called upon to shed in the defence of the oppressed; over which garments was placed a black tight gown, representing the mystery of death to be solved here after. Left alone for twenty-four hours to fast and pray, the young man then made his confession, received the sacrament, attended Mass, and listened to an address on his new life and duties. This over, a sword was hung round his neck; he was dressed in new garments, spurs, armour, a coat of mail, cuirass, gauntlets were presented, and he kneeled before his lord, who pronounced over him: "In the name of God, of St. Michael and St. George, I make thee knight Be valiant, fearless, and loyal."

These words were accompanied by three taps on the shoulder with a sword, and the young man rose a knight, member of the great Christian brotherhood of chivalry, one of

 
"A glorious company, the flower of men,
 To serve as model for the mighty world."

The whole spirit of knighthood lifts us into another atmosphere, and it seems strange to mark the co-existing condition of brutality, murder, highway robbery and cruelty that characterises the same age. The Crusading fever is but the result of the new-born desire to minister to those in need and to relieve the oppressed.

By the year 1204, Saxon, Dane, and Norman were practically one people. "Sons of one mother," they soon learnt to speak the same language, to obey the same King, and to worship the same God. The Norman Conquerors were gradually lost in the great mass of the English people, but in the process they left their indelible mark, and England is the richer for their coming. The brighter, loftier, and more enthusiastic Norman temper mingled happily with the stolid, resolute nature of the Anglo-Saxon. Norman severity was necessary to strengthen Anglo-Saxon patriotism; the Norman genius for order and organisation was able to define and concentrate existing Anglo-Saxon institutions. The Normans did not sweep and destroy, they strengthened and added. Perhaps our language illustrates this rich addition best. Such words as sceptre, royalty, homage, duke, palace, castle, were used for the first time. Synonyms exist, the one homely Anglo-Saxon, the other ornate Norman, as "heavy" and "ponderous," "earthly" and "terrestial," " shining" and "radiant," while even to-day our language bears traces of the Conquest, and the very words separate master from servant. Thus, in the fields animals were called sheep, oxen, and calves, fed by poor Englishmen; at table they became mutton, beef, and veal, eaten by the Normans. Both peoples had to pass through a fiery ordeal, but there rose as from a furnace a new product—the English national character; and to its fusion of Norman fire with Saxon earnestness we owe the noblest scenes in our "rough island story." It is the "Norman graft upon the sturdy Saxon tree" that has made the English people great, and produced the scholars, soldiers and sailors that are the pride of her history. It is likewise this blend of Norman, Saxon, and Dane, this single race of Englishmen, that has built up the young nation across the restless Atlantic. Our kin are their kin, our forefathers are their forefathers, while we are bound together not only in blood and in speech, but by a rich inheritance of noble achievement and glorious association.