Disappearance of serfdom.
The slow extinction of serfdom in western Europe appears to have begun as early as the twelfth century. A very general emancipation had taken place in France by the end of the thirteenth century (and in England somewhat later), though there were still some serfs in France when the revolution came in 1789. Germany was far more backward in this respect. We find the peasants revolting against their hard lot in Luther's time, and it was not until the beginning of the nineteenth century that the serfs were freed in Prussia.
Importance of town life.
93.It is hardly necessary to point out that the gradual reappearance of town life in western Europe is of the greatest interest to the student of history. The cities had been the centers of Greek and Roman civilization, and in our own time they dominate the life, culture, and business enterprise of the world. Were they to disappear, our whole life, even in the country, would necessarily undergo a profound change and tend to become primitive again like that of the age of Charlemagne.
Origin of the mediæval towns.
Compactness of a mediæval town.
A great part of the mediæval towns, of which we begin to have some scanty records about the year 1000, appear to have originated on the manors of feudal lords or about a monastery or castle. The French name for town,ville, is derived from vill, the name of the manor. The need of protection was probably the usual reason for establishing a town with a wall about it, so that the neighboring country people might find safety init when attacked. The way in which a mediæval town was built seems to justify this conclusion. It was generally crowded and compact compared with its more luxurious Roman predecessors. Aside from the market place there were few or no open spaces. There were no amphitheaters or public baths as in the Roman cities. The streets were often mere alleys over which the jutting stories of the high houses almost met. The high, thick wall that surrounded it prevented its extending easily and rapidly as our cities do nowadays.
Townsmen originally serfs.
All towns outside of Italy were evidently small in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and, like the manors on which they had grown up, they had little commerce as yet with the outside world. They produced almost all that their inhabitants needed except the farm products which came from the neighboring country. There was likely to be little expansion so long as the town remained under the absolute control of the lord or monastery upon whose land it was situated. The townspeople were scarcely more than serfs, in spite of the fact that they lived within a wall and engaged in industry instead of farming. They had to pay irritating dues to their lord, just as if they had still formed a farming community. The emancipation of the townsmen from their lords and the establishment of a suitable form of government for their town were necessary preliminaries to the free development of town life.
Increase of trade promotes the growth of the towns.
With the increase of trade came the longing for this freedom. For when new and attractive commodities began to be brought from the East and the South, the people of the towns were encouraged to produce goods with the idea of exchanging them at some neighboring fair for the products of distant lands. But no sooner did the townsmen begin to engage in manufacturing and to enter into relations with the outside world, than they became conscious that they were greatly hampered by their half-servile condition and were subject to exactions and restrictions which would render progressimpossible. Consequently during the twelfth century there were many insurrections of the towns against their lords and a general demand that the lords should grant the townsmenchartersin which the rights of both parties should be definitely stated.
A Castle on the Rhine with a Village below itA Castle on the Rhine with a Village below it
The communes.
In France the citizens organized themselves into what were calledcommunes, or unions for the purpose of gaining their independence. This wordcommuneappeared a new and detestable one to the lords, for, to their minds, it was merely another name for a company of serfs leagued against their masters. The nobles sometimes put down the insurrections of their townsmen with great cruelty. On the other hand, the lords often realized that they would increase the prosperity oftheir towns by granting them freedom from arbitrary taxation and the right to govern themselves. In England the towns gained their privileges more gradually by purchasing them from the lords.
Town charters.
The town charters were written contracts between the lord and the commune or the guild of merchants of a town. The charter served at once as the certificate of birth of the town and as its constitution. It contained a promise on the part of the lord or king to recognize the existence of the guild of merchants. It limited the rights of the lord in calling the townsmen before his court and fining them, and enumerated the taxes which he might exact from the townspeople. The old dues and services were either abolished or changed into money payments.
King Henry II of England promised the inhabitants of Wallingford that "wheresoever they shall go on their journeys as merchants through my whole land of England and Normandy, Aquitaine and Anjou, 'by water and by strand, by wood and by land,' they shall be free from toll and passage fees and from all customs and exactions; nor are they to be troubled in this respect by anyone under penalty of ten pounds." In the case of the town of Southampton he concedes "that my men of Hampton shall have and hold their guild and all their liberties and customs, by land and by sea, in as good, peaceable, just, free, quiet, and honorable a manner as they had the same most freely and quietly in the time of King Henry, my grandfather; and let no one upon this do them any injury or insult."
Customs revealed in the charters.
The customs of the times, as revealed in the charters, seem to us very primitive. We find in the charter of the French town of St. Omer, in 1168, provisions like the following: He who shall commit a murder in the town shall not find an asylum anywhere within the walls. If he shall seek to escape punishment by flight, his buildings shall be torn down and his goodsconfiscated; nor may he come back into the town unless he be first reconciled with the relations of his victim and pay ten pounds, of which a half shall go to the lord's representatives and the other half to the commune, to be spent on its fortifications. He who strikes another one in the town shall pay one hundred sous; he who pulls out the hair of another shall pay forty sous, etc.
A Mediæval Town, SiegenA Mediæval Town, Siegen
Many of the towns had, as a visible sign of their freedom, a belfry, a high building with a watchtower, where a guard was kept day and night in order that the bell might be rung in case of approaching danger. It contained an assembly hall, where the commune held its meetings, and a prison. In the fourteenth century the wonderful townhalls began to be erected, which, with the exception of the cathedrals and other churches, are usually the most remarkable buildings which the traveler sees to-day in the old commercial cities of Europe.
Craft guilds.
The tradesmen in the mediæval towns were at once artisans and merchants; they not only made, but offered for sale, the articles which they produced in their shops. In addition to the original guild of merchants which helped the towns to gain and preserve their privileges, many new corporations of tradesmen grew up, the so-calledcraft guilds. The oldest statutes of a guild in Paris are those of the candle makers, which go back to 1061. The number of trades differed greatly indifferent towns, but the guilds all had the same object,—to prevent every one from practicing a trade who had not been duly admitted to the corporation.
LINES OF TRADE AND MEDIAEVAL TOWNSLINES OF TRADE AND MEDIÆVAL TOWNS
The guild system.
A young man had to spend several years in learning his trade. He lived in the house of a master workman, but received no remuneration. He then became a "journeyman" and could earn wages, although he could still work only for master workmen and not directly for the public. A simple trade might be learned in three years, but to become a goldsmith one must be an apprentice for ten years. The number of apprentices that a master workman might employ was strictly limited, in order that the journeymen might not become too numerous. The way in which each trade was to be practiced was carefully regulated, as well as the time that should be spent in work each day. The system of guilds discouraged enterprise but maintained a uniform efficiency everywhere. Had it not been for these unions, the defenseless, isolated workmen, serfs as they had formerly been, would have found it impossible to secure freedom and municipal independence from the feudal lords who had formerly been their masters.
Practical disappearance of commerce in the early Middle Ages.
94.The chief reason for the growth of the towns and their increasing prosperity was a great development of trade throughout western Europe. Commerce had pretty much disappeared with the decline of the Roman roads and the general disorganization produced by the barbarian invasions. There was no one in the Middle Ages to mend the ancient Roman roads. The great network of highways from Persia to Britain fell apart when independent nobles or poor local communities took the place of a world empire. All trade languished, for there was little demand for those articles of luxury which the Roman communities in the North had been accustomed to obtain from the South. There was little money and scarcely any notion of luxury, for the nobility lived a simple life in their dreary and rudely furnished castles.
Italian cities trade with the Orient.
In Italy, however, trade does not seem to have altogether ceased. Venice, Genoa, Amalfi, and other towns appear to have developed a considerable Mediterranean commerce even before the Crusades. Their merchants, as we have seen, supplied the destitute crusaders with the material necessary for the conquest of Jerusalem. The passion for pilgrimages offered inducements to the Italian merchants for expeditions to the Orient, whither they transported the pilgrims and returned with the products of the East. The Italian cities established trading stations in the East and carried on a direct traffic with the caravans which brought to the shores of the Mediterranean the products of Arabia, Persia, India, and the Spice Islands. The southern French towns and Barcelona entered also into commercial relations with the Mohammedans in northern Africa.
Street in Frankfort-on-the-MainStreet in Frankfort-on-the-Main
Commerce stimulates industry.
This progress in the South could not but stir the lethargy of the rest of Europe. The new commerce encouraged a revolution in industry. So long as the manor system prevailed and each man was occupied in producing only what he andthe other members of his group needed, there was nothing to send abroad and nothing to exchange for luxuries. But when merchants began to come with tempting articles, the members of a community were encouraged to produce a surplus of goods above what they themselves needed, and to sell or exchange this surplus for commodities coming from a distance. Merchants and artisans gradually directed their energies toward the production of what others wished as well as what was needed by the little group to which they belonged.
The luxuries of the East introduced into Europe.
The romances of the twelfth century indicate that the West was astonished and delighted by the luxuries of the East,—the rich fabrics, Oriental carpets, precious stones, perfumes, drugs (like camphor and laudanum), silks and porcelains from China, spices from India, and cotton from Egypt. Venice introduced the silk industry from the East and the manufacture of those glass articles which the traveler may still buy in the Venetian shops. The West learned how to make silk and velvet as well as light and gauzy cotton and linen fabrics. The eastern dyes were introduced, and Paris was soon imitating the tapestries of the Saracens. In exchange for those luxuries which they were unable to produce, the Flemish towns sent their woolen cloths to the East, and Italy its wines. But there was apparently always a considerable cash balance to be paid to the Oriental merchants, since the West could not produce enough to pay by exchange for all that it demanded from the Orient.
Some of the important commercial centers.
The northern merchants dealt mainly with Venice and brought their wares across the Brenner Pass and down the Rhine, or sent them by sea to be exchanged in Flanders. By the thirteenth century important centers of trade had come into being, some of which are still among the great commercial towns of the world. Hamburg, Lübeck, and Bremen carried on active trade with the countries on the Baltic and with England. Augsburg and Nuremberg, in the south of Germany, became important on account of their situation onthe line of trade between Italy and the North. Bruges and Ghent sent their manufactures everywhere. English commerce was relatively unimportant as yet compared with that of the great ports of the Mediterranean.
Restrictions on trade.
Idea of a 'just' price.
95.A word must be said of the numerous and almost incredible obstacles in the way of commerce in the Middle Ages. There was very little of that freedom which we now regard as essential to successful business. Our wholesale dealers would have been considered an abomination in the Middle Ages. Those who bought up a quantity of a commodity in order to sell it at a high rate were called by the ugly name offorestallers. It was universally believed that everything had a "just" price, which was merely enough to cover the cost of the materials used in its manufacture and remunerate the maker for the work he had put upon it. It was considered outrageous to sell a thing for more than the just price, no matter how anxious the purchaser might be to obtain it. Every manufacturer was required to keep a shop in which he offered at retail all that he made. Those who lived near a town were permitted to sell their products in the market place within the walls on condition that they sold directly to the consumers. They might not dispose of their whole stock to one dealer, for fear that if he had all there was of a commodity he might raise the price above a just one.
Payment of interest on money forbidden.
Akin to these prejudices against wholesale trade was that against interest. Money was believed to be a dead and sterile thing, and no one had a right to demand any return for lending it. Interest was wicked, since it was exacted by those who took advantage of the embarrassments of others. Usury, as the taking of even the most moderate and reasonable rate of interest was then called, was strenuously forbidden by the laws of the Church. We find church councils ordering that impenitent usurers should be refused Christian burial and have their wills annulled. So money-lending, necessary to all greatcommercial and industrial undertakings, was left to the Jews, from whom Christian conduct was not expected.
The Jews as money-lenders.
This ill-starred people played a most important part in the economic development of Europe, but they were terribly maltreated by the Christians, who held them guilty of the supreme crime of putting Christ to death. The active persecution of the Jews did not, however, become common before the thirteenth century, when they first began to be required to wear a peculiar cap, or badge, which made them easily recognized and exposed them to constant insult. Later they were sometimes shut up in a particular quarter of the city, called the Jewry. Since they were excluded from the guilds, they not unnaturally turned to the business of money-lending, which no Christian might practice. Undoubtedly their occupation had much to do in causing their unpopularity. The kings permitted them to make loans, often at a most exorbitant rate; Philip Augustus allowed them to exact forty-six per cent, but reserved the right to extort their gains from them when the royal treasury was empty. In England the usual rate was a penny a pound for each week.
The 'Lombards' as bankers.
In the thirteenth century the Italians—"Lombards"—began to go into a sort of banking business and greatly extended the employment of bills of exchange. They lent for nothing, but exacted damages for all delay in repayment. This appeared reasonable and right even to those who condemned ordinary interest. Capitalists, moreover, could contribute money towards an enterprise and share the profits as long as no interest was exacted. In these and other ways the obstacles offered by the prejudice against interest were much reduced, and large commercial companies came into existence, especially in Italy.
Tolls, duties, and other annoyances to which merchants were subjected on land.
96.Another serious disadvantage which the mediæval merchant had to face was the payment of an infinite number of tolls and duties which were exacted by the lords through whose domains his way passed. Not only were duties exacted on the highways, bridges, and at the fords, but those barons who wereso fortunate as to have castles on a navigable river blocked the stream in such a way that the merchant could not bring his vessel through without a payment for the privilege. The charges were usually small, but the way in which they were exacted and the repeated delays must have been a serious source of irritation and loss to the merchants. For example, a certain monastery lying between Paris and the sea required that those hastening to town with fresh fish should stop and let the monks pick out what they thought worth three pence, with little regard to the condition in which they left the goods. When a boat laden with wine passed up the Seine to Paris, the agent of the lord of Poissy could have three casks broached, and, after trying them all, he could take a measure from the one he liked best. At the markets all sorts of dues had to be paid, such, for example, as payments for using the lord's scales or his measuring rod. Besides this, the great variety of coinage which existed in feudal Europe caused infinite perplexity and delay.
Dangers by sea.
Pirates.
Strand laws.
Commerce by sea had its own particular trials, by no means confined to the hazards of wind and wave, rock and shoal. Pirates were numerous in the North Sea. They were often organized and sometimes led by men of high rank, who appear to have regarded the business as no disgrace. Then there were the so-calledstrand laws, according to which a ship with its cargo became the property of the owner of the coast upon which it might be wrecked or driven ashore. Lighthouses and beacons were few and the coasts dangerous. Moreover, natural dangers were increased by false signals which wreckers used to lure ships to shore in order to plunder them.
The Hanseatic League.
With a view to mitigating these manifold perils, the towns early began to form unions for mutual defense. The most famous of these was that of the German cities, called theHanseatic League. Lübeck was always the leader, but amongthe seventy towns which at one time and another were included in the confederation, we find Cologne, Brunswick, Dantzig, and other centers of great importance. The union purchased and controlled settlements in London,—the so-calledSteelyardnear London Bridge,—at Wisby, Bergen, and the far-off Novgorod in Russia. They managed to monopolize nearly the whole trade on the Baltic and North Sea, either through treaties or the influence that they were able to bring to bear.
The League made war on the pirates and did much to reduce the dangers of traffic. Instead of dispatching separate and defenseless merchantmen, their ships sailed out in fleets under the protection of a man-of-war. On one occasion the League undertook a successful war against the king of Denmark, who had interfered with their interests. At another time it declared war on England and brought her to terms. For two hundred years before the discovery of America, the League played a great part in the commercial affairs of western Europe; but it had begun to decline even before the discovery of new routes to the East and West Indies revolutionized trade.
Trade regulated by the towns (thirteenth to fifteenth century), not by nations or individuals.
It should be observed that, during the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries, trade was not carried on between nations, but by the various towns, like Venice, Lübeck, Ghent, Bruges, Cologne. A merchant did not act or trade as an independent individual but as a member of a particular merchant guild, and he enjoyed the protection of his town and of the treaties it arranged. If a merchant from a certain town failed to pay a debt, a fellow-townsman might be seized where the debt was due. At the period of which we have been speaking, an inhabitant of London was considered a foreigner or an alien in Bristol, just as was the merchant from Cologne or Antwerp. Only gradually did the towns merge into the nations to which their people belonged.[158]
The burghers, or commons, become an influential class.
The increasing wealth of the merchants could not fail to raise them to a position of importance in society which they had not hitherto enjoyed. Their prosperity enabled them to vie with the clergy in education and with the nobility in the luxury of their dwellings and surroundings. They began to give some attention to reading, and as early as the fourteenth century many of the books appear to have been written with a view of meeting their tastes and needs. Representatives of the towns were called into the councils of the king, who was obliged to take their advice along with their contributions to the support of the government. The rise of the burgher class alongside the older orders of the clergy and nobility, which had so long dominated the life of western Europe, is one of the most momentous changes of the thirteenth century.
General Reading.—Gibbins,History of Commerce in Europe(The Macmillan Company, 90 cents), the best short account of the subject, with good maps of trade routes.Ingram,History of Slavery and Serfdom(Black, London, $2.00), especially Chapters IV and V.Cunningham,Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects, Vol. II, Mediæval and Modern Times (The Macmillan Company, $1.25), is very suggestive. There are several excellent accounts of the economic situation in England in the Middle Ages, which, in many respects, was similar to the conditions on the continent.Cheyney,Industrial and Social History of England(The Macmillan Company, $1.40);Gibbins,The Industrial History of England(Methuen, $1.00), and a more elaborate treatise by the same writer,Industry in England(Methuen, $3.00);Cunningham,Outlines of English Industrial History(The Macmillan Company, $1.50), and much fuller by the same writer,Growth of English Industry and Commerce during the Middle Ages(The Macmillan Company, $4.00). All these give excellent accounts of the manor, the guilds, the fairs, etc. See alsoJessopp,Coming of the Friars, second essay, "Village Life Six Hundred Years Ago."
General Reading.—Gibbins,History of Commerce in Europe(The Macmillan Company, 90 cents), the best short account of the subject, with good maps of trade routes.Ingram,History of Slavery and Serfdom(Black, London, $2.00), especially Chapters IV and V.Cunningham,Western Civilization in its Economic Aspects, Vol. II, Mediæval and Modern Times (The Macmillan Company, $1.25), is very suggestive. There are several excellent accounts of the economic situation in England in the Middle Ages, which, in many respects, was similar to the conditions on the continent.Cheyney,Industrial and Social History of England(The Macmillan Company, $1.40);Gibbins,The Industrial History of England(Methuen, $1.00), and a more elaborate treatise by the same writer,Industry in England(Methuen, $3.00);Cunningham,Outlines of English Industrial History(The Macmillan Company, $1.50), and much fuller by the same writer,Growth of English Industry and Commerce during the Middle Ages(The Macmillan Company, $4.00). All these give excellent accounts of the manor, the guilds, the fairs, etc. See alsoJessopp,Coming of the Friars, second essay, "Village Life Six Hundred Years Ago."
97.The interest of the Middle Ages lies by no means exclusively in the statesmanship of kings and emperors, their victories and defeats; in the policy of popes and bishops; or even in feudalism and Europe's escape from it. Important as all these are, we should have but a very imperfect idea of the period which we have been studying if we left it without considering the intellectual life and the art of the time, the books that were written, the universities that were founded, and the cathedrals that were built.
General use of Latin in the Middle Ages.
To begin with, the Middle Ages differed from our own time in the very general use then made of Latin, both in writing and speaking. In the thirteenth century, and long after, all books that made any claim to learning were written in Latin;[159]the professors in the universities lectured in Latin, friends wrote to one another in Latin, and state papers, treaties, and legal documents were drawn up in the same language. The ability of every educated person to make use of Latin, as well as of his native tongue, was a great advantage at a time when there were many obstacles to intercourse among the various nations. It helps to explain, for example, the remarkable way in which the pope kept in touch with all the clergymen of western Christendom, and the ease with which students, friars, and merchants could wander from one country to another. There is no more interesting or important revolution than thatby which the language of the people in the various European countries gradually pushed aside the ancient tongue and took its place, so that even scholars scarcely ever think now of writing books in Latin.
In order to understand how it came about that two languages, the Latin and the native speech, were both commonly used in all the countries of western Europe all through the Middle Ages, we must glance at the origin of the modern languages. These all fall into two quite distinct groups, the Germanic and the Romance.
The Germanic languages derived from the dialects of the German barbarians.
Those German peoples who had continued to live outside of the Roman Empire, or who, during the invasions, had not settled far enough within its bounds to be led, like the Franks in Gaul, to adopt the tongue of those they had conquered, naturally adhered to the language they had always used, namely, the particular Germanic dialect which their forefathers had spoken for untold generations. From the various languages spoken by the German barbarians, modern German, English, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, and Icelandic are derived.
The Romance languages derived from the spoken Latin.
The second group of languages developed within the territory which had formed a part of the Roman Empire, and includes modern French, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese. It has now been clearly proved, by a very minute study of the old forms of words, that these Romance languages were one and all derived from thespokenLatin, employed by the soldiers, merchants, and people at large. This differed considerably from the elaborate and elegant written Latin which was used, for example, by Cicero and Cæsar. It was undoubtedly much simpler in its grammar and doubtless varied a good deal in different regions;—a Gaul, for instance, could not pronounce the words like an Italian. Moreover, in conversation people did not always use the same words as those in the books. For example, a horse was commonly spoken of ascaballus, whereas a writer would use the wordequus; it is fromcaballusthat the word for horse is derived in Spanish, Italian, and French (caballo,cavallo,cheval).
As time went on the spoken language diverged farther and farther from the written. Latin is a troublesome speech on account of its complicated inflections and grammatical rules, which can be mastered only after a great deal of study. The people of the Roman provinces and the incoming barbarians naturally paid very little attention to the niceties of syntax and found easy ways of saying what they wished.[160]Yet several centuries elapsed after the German invasions before there was anything written in the language of conversation. So long as the uneducated could understand the correct Latin of the books when they heard it read or spoken, there was no necessity of writing anything in their familiar daily speech. But the gulf between the spoken and the written language had become so great by the time Charlemagne came to the throne, that he advised that sermons should be given thereafter in the language of the people, who, apparently, could no longer follow the Latin. The Strasburg oaths[161]are, however, about the first example which has come down to us of the speech which was growing into French.
Earliest examples of the Germanic languages.
Gothic.
98.As for the Germanic languages, one at least was reduced to writing even before the break-up of the Empire. An eastern bishop, Ulfilas (d. 381), had undertaken to convert the Goths while they were still living north of the Danube before the battle of Adrianople. In order to carry on his work, Ulfilas translated a great part of the Bible into Gothic, using the Greek letters to represent the sounds. With the single exception of the Gothic, there is no example of writingin any German language before Charlemagne's time. There is no doubt, however, that the Germans possessed an unwritten literature, which was passed down by word of mouth for several centuries before any of it was written out. Charlemagne caused certain ancient poems to be collected, which presumably celebrated the great deeds of the German heroes during the invasions. These invaluable specimens of ancient German are said to have been destroyed by the order of Louis the Pious, who was shocked by their paganism. The great German epic, theSong of the Niebelungs, was not reduced to writing until the end of the twelfth century, after it had been transmitted orally for many generations.
Ancient English, or Anglo-Saxon.
The oldest form of English is commonly called Anglo-Saxon and is so different from the language that we use that, in order to read it, it must be learned like a foreign language. We hear of an English poet, Cædmon, as early as Bede's time, a century before Charlemagne. A manuscript of an Anglo-Saxon epic, calledBeowulf, has been preserved which belongs perhaps to the close of the eighth century. The interest which King Alfred displayed in the mother tongue has already been mentioned. This old form of our language prevailed until after the Norman Conquest; theAnglo-Saxon Chronicle, which does not close until 1154, is written in pure Anglo-Saxon. Then changes may be noticed in the language as it appears in the books of the time, and decade by decade it approaches more nearly to that which we speak. Although the first public document in English (1256), which belongs to the reign of Henry III, is scarcely to be understood without study, a poem written in his son's time is tolerably intelligible.[162]
English literature was destined one day to arouse the admiration of the peoples across the Channel and exercise an importantinfluence upon other literatures. In the Middle Ages, however, French, not English, was the most important of the vernacular languages of western Europe. In France a vast literature was produced in the language of the people during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries which profoundly affected the books written in Italy, Spain, Germany, and England.
French and Provençal.
99.Two quite different languages had gradually developed in France from the spoken Latin of the Roman Empire. If a line were drawn on the map from La Rochelle, on the Atlantic, eastward to the Alps, crossing the Rhone a little below Lyons, it would give a general idea of the limits of the two tongues. To the north, French was spoken; to the south, in a region bounded by the Pyrenees and the Alps, Provençal.[163]
Mediæval French romances.
Very little in the ancient French language written before the year 1100 has been preserved. The West Franks undoubtedly began much earlier to sing of their heroes, of the great deeds of Clovis, Dagobert, and Charles Martel. These famous rulers were, however, completely overshadowed later by Charlemagne, who became the unrivaled hero of mediæval poetry and romance. It was believed that he had reigned for a hundred and twenty-five years, and the most marvelous exploits were attributed to him and his knights. He was supposed, for instance, to have led a crusade to Jerusalem. Such themes as these—more legend than history—were woven into long epics, which were the first written literature of the Frankish people. These poems, combined with the stories of adventure, developed a spirit of patriotic enthusiasm among the French which made them regard "fair France" as the especial care of Providence.
TheSong of Roland.
It is little wonder that the best of these long poems came to be looked upon as the national epic of the French. Thisis theSong of Roland, probably written just before the First Crusade. It tells the story of Charlemagne's retreat from Spain, during which Roland, one of his commanders, lost his life in a romantic encounter in the defiles of the Pyrenees.
That death was on him he knew full well;Down from his head to his heart it fell.On the grass beneath a pine tree's shade,With face to earth, his form he laid,Beneath him placed he his horn and sword,And turned his face to the heathen horde.Thus hath he done the sooth to show,That Karl and his warriors all may know,That the gentle count a conqueror died.[164]
Romances of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.
In the latter part of the twelfth century the romances of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table begin to appear. These enjoyed great popularity in all western Europe for centuries, and they are by no means forgotten yet. Arthur, of whose historical existence no one can be quite sure, was supposed to have been king of Britain shortly after the Saxons gained a foothold in the island. In other long poems of the time, Alexander the Great, Cæsar, and other ancient worthies appear as heroes. The absolute disregard of historical facts and the tendency to represent the warriors of Troy and Rome as mediæval knights, show the inability of the mediæval mind to understand that the past could have been different from the present. All these romances are full of picturesque adventures and present a vivid picture of the valor and loyalty of the true knight, as well as of his ruthlessness and contempt for human life.[165]
Thefabliauxand the fables.
Besides the long and elaborate epics, likeRoland, and the romances in verse and prose, there were numberless short stories in verse (thefabliaux), which usually dealt with the incidents of everyday life, especially with the comical ones. Then there were the fables, the most famous of which are the stories of Reynard the Fox, which were satires upon the customs of the time, particularly the weaknesses of the priests and monks.
The troubadours.
100.Turning now to southern France, the beautiful songs of the troubadours, which were the glory of the Provençal tongue, reveal a gay and polished society at the courts of the numerous feudal princes. The rulers not merely protected and encouraged the poets; they aspired to be poets themselves and to enter the ranks of the troubadours, as the composers of these elegant verses were called. These songs were always sung to an accompaniment on some instrument, usually the lute. Those who merely sang them, without being themselves poets, were calledjongleurs. The troubadours and jongleurs traveled from court to court, not only in France, but north into Germany and south into Italy, carrying with them the southern French poetry and customs. We have few examples of Provençal before the year 1100, but from that time on, for two centuries, countless songs were written, and many of the troubadours enjoyed an international reputation. The terrible Albigensian crusade brought misery and death into the sprightly circles which had gathered about the count of Toulouse and others who had treated the heretics too leniently. But the literary critic traces signs of decline in the Provençal verse even before this disaster.[166]
Chivalry.
For the student of history, the chief interest of the epics of northern France and the songs of the South lies in the insight that they give into the life and aspirations of this feudalperiod. These are usually summed up in the termchivalry, orknighthood, of which a word may properly be said here, since we should know little of it were it not for the literature of which we have been speaking. The knights play the chief rôle in all the mediæval romances; and, as many of the troubadours belonged to the knightly class, they naturally have much to say of it in their songs.
Chivalry was not a formal institution established at any particular moment. Like feudalism, with which it was closely connected, it had no founder, but appeared spontaneously throughout western Europe to meet the needs and desires of the period. We learn from Tacitus that even in his time the Germans considered the moment a solemn one when the young warrior was first invested with the arms of a soldier. "This was the sign that the youth had reached manhood; this was his first honor." It is probably a survival of this feeling which we find in the idea of knighthood. When the youth of good family had been carefully trained to ride his horse, use his sword, and manage his hawk in the hunt, he was made aknightby a ceremony in which the Church took part, although the knighthood was actually conferred by an older knight.
Nature of the knightly order.
The knight was a Christian soldier, and he and his fellows were supposed to form, in a way, a separate order with high ideals of the conduct befitting their class. Knighthood was not, however, membership in an association with officers and a written constitution. It was an ideal, half-imaginary society,—a society to which even those who enjoyed the title of king or duke were proud to belong. One was not born a knight as he might be born a duke or count, and could become one only through the ceremony mentioned above. One might be a noble and still not belong to the knightly order, and, on the other hand, one baseborn might be raised to knighthood on account of some valorous deed.
The ideals of the knight.
The knight must, in the first place, be a Christian and must obey and defend the Church on all occasions. He must respect all forms of weakness and defend the helpless wherever he might find them. He must fight the infidel ceaselessly, pitilessly, and never give way before the enemy. He must perform all his feudal duties, be faithful in all things to his lord, never lie or violate his plighted word. He must be generous and give freely and ungrudgingly to the needy. He must be faithful to his lady and be ready to defend her person and her honor at all costs. Everywhere he must be the champion of the right against injustice and oppression. In short, chivalry was the Christianized profession of arms.
In the stories of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table there is a beautiful picture of the ideal knight. The dead Lancelot is addressed by one of his sorrowing companions as follows: "Thou wert the courtliest knight that ever bare shield, and thou wert the truest friend to thy lover that ever bestrode horse, and thou wert the truest lover of a sinful man [i.e., among sinful men] that ever loved woman, and thou wert the kindest man that ever struck with sword, and thou wert the goodliest person that ever came among the press of knights, and thou wert the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies, and thou wert the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever put spear in breast."
The German minnesingers.
Walther von der Vogelweide.
Parsifal.
The Germans also made their contribution to the literature of chivalry. The German poets of the thirteenth century are calledminnesingers. Like the troubadours, whom they greatly admired, they usually sang of love (German,Minne). The most famous of the minnesingers was Walther von der Vogelweide (d. about 1228), whose songs are full of charm and of enthusiasm for his German fatherland. Wolfram von Eschenbach (d. about 1225) in his story ofParsifalgives the long and sad adventures of a knight in search of the Holy Grail,—the sacred vessel which had held the blood of Christ. Onlythose perfectly pure in thought, word, and deed could hope to behold it. Parsifal failed to speak a word of sympathy to a suffering man and was forced to undergo a long atonement. At last he learned that only through pity and humility and faith in God could he hope to find the Grail.