CHAPTER XXV

HUMANISM AND MEDIAEVALISM

[_Bibliographical Note._—The literary discussions and collections of texts named in the bibliographical note to chap. xxiii and the material on the annals of the stage in that to chap. xxiv remain available. W. Creizenach, _Geschichte des neueren Dramas_, vols. i-iii (1893-1903), is the best general guide on the classical drama and its imitations during the Middle Ages and the Renascence. W. Cloetta, _Beiträge zur Litteraturgeschichte des Mittelalters und der Renaissance_: i. _Komödie und Tragödie im Mittelalter_ (1890); ii. _Die Anfänge der Renaissancetragödie_ (1892), deals very fully with certain points. C. H. Herford, _Studies in the Literary Relations of England and Germany in the Sixteenth Century_ (1886), has an admirable chapter on _The Latin Drama_. G. Saintsbury, _The Earlier Renaissance_ (1901), chap. vi, may also be consulted. Useful books on the beginnings of the Elizabethan forms of drama are R. Fischer, _Zur Kunstentwicklung der englischen Tragödie von ihren ersten Anfängen bis zu Shakespeare_ (1893); J. W. Cunliffe, _The Influence of Seneca on Elizabethan Tragedy_ (1893); L. L. Schücking, _Studien über die stofflichen Beziehungen der englischen Komödie zur italienischen bis Lilly_ (1901); F. E. Schelling, _The English Chronicle Play_ (1902). The best bibliographies are, for the Latin plays, P. Bahlmann, _Die Erneuerer des antiken Dramas und ihre ersten dramatischen Versuche, 1314-1478_ (1896), and _Die lateinischen Dramen von Wimpheling’s Stylpho bis zur Mitte des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts, 1480-1550_ (1893); and for English plays, W. W. Greg, _A List of English Plays written before 1643 and printed before 1700_ (1900). This may be supplemented from W. C. Hazlitt, _A Manual for the Collector and Amateur of Old English Plays_ (1892). A list of early Tudor interludes will be found in Appendix X.]

The dramatic material upon which the interlude was able to draw had naturally its points of relation to and of divergence from that of the popular stage, whose last days it overlapped. It continued to occupy itself largely with the morality. The ‘moral interludes’ of the early Tudor period are in fact distinguished with some difficulty from the popular moralities by their comparative brevity, and by indications of the _mise en scène_ as a ‘room’ or ‘hall’ rather than an open ‘place[591].’ The only clearly popular texts later than those of the fifteenth century, discussed in a previous chapter, are Sir David Lyndsay’s Scottish _Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis_, and the _Magnificence_, which alone survives of several plays from the prolific pen of the ‘laureate’ poet, John Skelton. A somewhat intermediate type is presented by the _Nature_ of Cardinal Morton’s chaplain, Henry Medwall. This was certainly intended for performance as an interlude, but it is on the scale of the popular moralities, needing division into two parts to bring it within the limits of courtly patience; and like them it is sufficiently wide in its scope to embrace the whole moral problem of humanity. The conditions of the interlude, however, enforced themselves, and the later morals have, as a rule, a more restricted theme. They make their selection from amongst the battalions of sins and virtues which were wont to invade the stage together, and set themselves the task of expounding the dangers of a particular temperament or the advantages of a particular form of moral discipline. _Hickscorner_ shows man led into irreligion by imagination and freewill. _Youth_ concerns itself with pride, lechery, and riot, the specific temptations of the young. _The Nature of the Four Elements_ and John Redford’s somewhat later _Wit and Science_ preach the importance of devotion to study. The distinction between the episodic and the more comprehensive moralities was in the consciousness of the writers themselves; and the older fashion did not wholly disappear. William Baldwin describes his play for the Inns of Court in 1556 as ‘comprehending a discourse of the worlde[592]’; and mention is more than once made of an interesting piece called _The Cradle of Security_, which seems to have had a motive of death and the judgement akin to that found in _The Pride of Life_ and in _Everyman_[593].

The morality was not, perhaps, quite such an arid type of drama as might be supposed, especially after the dramatists learnt, instead of leaving humanity as a dry bone of contention between the good and evil powers, to adopt a biographic mode of treatment, and thus to introduce the interest of growth and development[594]. But by the sixteenth century allegory had had its day, and the light-hearted court of Henry VIII and Katharine of Aragon might be excused some weariness at the constant presentation before it of argumentative abstractions which occasionally yielded nothing more entertaining than a personified _débat_[595]. Certainly it is upon record that Medwall’s moral of ‘the fyndyng of Troth,’ played at the Christmas of 1513, appeared to Henry so long, that he got up and ‘departyd to hys chambre[596].’ The offenders on this occasion were English and his company of household players. They seem to have been unwisely wedded to the old methods. They pursued the princess Margaret to Scotland with a ‘Moralite’ in 1503, and in the reign of Edward VI they were still playing the play of _Self-Love_[597]. Perhaps this explains why they make distinctly less show in the accounts of Tudor revels than do their competitors of the Chapel. Unfortunately none of the pieces given by this latter body have been preserved. But, to judge by the descriptions of Hall, many of them could only be called interludes by a somewhat liberal extension of the sense of the term. There was perhaps some slight allegorical or mythological framework of spoken dialogue. But the real amusement lay in an abundance of singing, which of course the Chapel was well qualified to provide, and of dancing, in which the guests often joined, and in an elaborately designed pageant, which was wheeled into the hall and from which the performers descended. They were in fact masques rather than dramas in the strict sense, and in connexion with the origin of the masque they have already been considered[598].

The popular stage, as has been said, had its farcical elements, but did not, in England, arrive at any notable development of the farce. Nor is any marked influence of the overseas habit even now to be traced. The name is not used in England, although it is in Scotland, where at the beginning of the sixteenth century the relations with France were much closer[599]. Whether directly or indirectly through French channels, the farce is perhaps the contribution of minstrelsy to the nascent interlude. That some dramatic tradition was handed down from the _mimi_ of the Empire to the _mimi_ of the Middle Ages, although not susceptible of demonstration, is exceedingly likely[600]. That solitary mediaeval survival, the _Interludium de Clerico et Puella_, hardly declares its origin. But the farce, in its free handling of contemporary life, in the outspokenness, which often becomes indecency, of its language, in its note of satire, especially towards the priest and other institutions deserving of reverence, is the exact counterpart of one of the most characteristic forms of minstrel literature, the _fabliau_. These qualities are reproduced in the interludes of John Heywood, who, though possibly an Oxford man, began life as a singer and player of the virginals at court, and belonged therefore to the minstrel class. He grew quite respectable, married into the family of Sir Thomas More and John Rastell the printer, and had for grandson John Donne. He was put in charge of the singing-school of St. Paul’s, the boys of which probably performed his plays. Of the six extant, _Wit and Folly_ is a mere dialogue, and _Love_ a more elaborate disputation, although both are presented ‘in maner of an enterlude.’ But the others, _The Pardoner and the Friar_, _The Four P’s_, _The Weather_, and _John, Tib and Sir John_ are regular farces. And with them the farce makes good its footing in the English drama.

Those congeners of the French farce which took their origin from the Feast of Fools, the _Sottie_ and the _Sermon joyeux_, are only represented in these islands by the Sermon of ‘Folie’ in Sir David Lyndsay’s _Satyre of the Thrie Estaitis_[601]. But the ‘fool’ himself, as a dramatic character, is in Shakespeare’s and other Elizabethan plays, and it must now be pointed out that he is in some of the earliest Tudor interludes. Here he has the not altogether intelligible name of the ‘vice.’ A recent writer, Professor Cushman of the Nevada State University, has endeavoured to show that the vice came into the interludes through the avenue of the moralities. Originally ‘an allegorical representation of human weaknesses and vices, in short the summation of the Deadly Sins,’ he lost in course of time this serious quality, and ‘the term Vice came to be simply a synonym for buffoon[602].’ This theory has no doubt the advantage of explaining the name. Unfortunately it proceeds by disregarding several plays in which the vice does occur, and reading him into many where there is none[603]. ‘Vicious’ had his pageant in the Beverley _Paternoster_ play, and vices in the ordinary sense of the word are of course familiar personages in the morals, which generally moreover have some one character who can be regarded as the representative or the chief representative of human frailty. But the vice is not found under that name in the text, list of _dramatis personae_, or stage directions of any popular morality or of any pre-Elizabethan moral interlude except the Marian _Respublica_. The majority of plays in which he does occur are not morals, even of the modified Elizabethan type; and although in those which are he generally plays a bad part, even this is not an invariable rule. In _The Tide Tarrieth for No Man_, as in the tragedy of _Horestes_, he is Courage. Moreover, as a matter of fact, he comes into the interludes through the avenue of the farce. The earliest vices, by some thirty years, are those of Heywood’s _Love_, in which he is ‘Neither Loving nor Loved,’ who mocks the other disputants, and plays a practical joke with fireworks upon them, and _The Weather_, in which he is ‘Merry Report,’ the jesting official of Jupiter. And in the later plays, even if he has some other dramatic function, he always adds to it that of a riotous buffoon. Frequently enough he has no other. It must be concluded then that, whatever the name may mean—and irresponsible philology has made some amazing attempts at explanation[604]—the character of the vice is derived from that of the domestic fool or jester. Oddly enough he is rarely called a fool, although the description of Medwall’s _Finding of Truth_ mentions ‘the foolys part[605].’ But the Elizabethan writers speak of his long coat and lathen sword, common trappings of the domestic fool[606]. Whether he ever had a cockscomb, a bauble, or an eared hood is not apparent. A vice seems to have been introduced into one or two of the later miracle-plays[607]. At Bungay in 1566 he ‘made pastime’ before and after the play, as Tarleton or Kempe were in time to do with their ‘jigs’ upon the London boards. And probably this was his normal function on such occasions.

From the moral the interlude drew abstractions; from the farce social types. The possibility of vital drama lay in an advance to the portraiture of individualities. The natural way to attain to this was by the introduction of historical, mythical, or romantic personages. The miracle-play had, of course, afforded these; but there is little to show that the miracle-play, during the first half of the sixteenth century, had much influence on the interlude[608]. The local players brought it to court, but, for the present, it was _démodé_. It was, however, to have its brief revival. The quarry of romantic narrative had hardly been opened by the Middle Ages. An old theme of Robert of Sicily, once used at Lincoln, was now remembered at Chester. Robin Hood had yielded dramatic May-games, and his revels were popular at Henry VIII’s court[609]. New motives, however, now begin to assert themselves. Some at least of these were suggested by the study of Chaucer. Ralph Radclif’s school plays at Hitchin included one on _Griselda_ and one on _Meliboeus_[610]. Nicholas Grimald wrote one on _Troilus_, and another had been acted by the Chapel at court in 1516[611]. Radclif was also responsible for a _Titus and Gisippus_, while the king’s players, shaking off their devotion to the moral, prepared in 1552 ‘a play of _Aesop’s Crow_, wherein the most part of the actors were birds[612].’ An extant piece on ‘the beauty and good properties of women’ and ‘their vices and evil conditions’ is really a version through the Italian of the Spanish _Celestina_, one of the first of many English dramatic borrowings from South European sources.

So far I have written only of developments which were at least latent in mediaevalism. But the interlude had its rise in the very midst of the great intellectual and spiritual movement throughout Europe which is known as humanism; and hardly any branch of human activities was destined to be more completely transformed by the new forces than the drama. The history of this transformation is not, however, a simple one. Between humanism and mediaevalism there is no rigid barrier. As at all periods of transition, a constant action and reaction established themselves between the old and new order of ideas. Moreover, humanism itself held elements in solution that were not wholly reconcilable with each other. Many things, and perhaps particularly the drama, presented themselves in very different lights, according as they were viewed from the literary or the religious side of the great movement. Some brief indication of the in-and-out play of the forces of humanism as they affected the history of the interlude during the first half of the sixteenth century is, therefore, desirable.

The chief of these forces is, of course, the influence of classical comedy and tragedy. These, as vital forms of literature, did not long survive the fall of the theatres, with which, indeed, their connexion had long been of the slightest. In the East, a certain tradition of Christian book dramas begins with the anti-Gnostic dialogues of St. Methodius in the fourth century and ends with the much disputed Χριστὸς Πάσχων in the eleventh or twelfth[613]. It is the merest conjecture that some of these may have been given some kind of representation in the churches[614]. In the West the _Aulularia_ of Plautus was rehandled under the title of _Querolus_ at the end of the fourth century, and possibly also the _Amphitruo_ under that of _Geta_[615]. In the fifth, Magnus, the father of Consentius, is said by Sidonius, as Shakespeare is said by Ben Jonson, to have ‘outdone insolent Greece, or haughty Rome[616].’ Further the production of plays cannot be traced. Soon afterwards most of the classical dramatists pass into oblivion. A knowledge of Seneca or of Plautus, not to speak of the Greeks, is the rarest of things from the tenth century to the fourteenth. The marked exception is Terence who, as Dr. Ward puts it, led ‘a charmed life in the darkest ages of learning.’ This he owed, doubtless, to his unrivalled gift of packing up the most impeccable sentiments in the neatest of phrases. His vogue as a school author was early and enduring, and the whole of mediaevalism, a few of the stricter moralists alone dissenting, hailed him as a master of the wisdom of life[617]. At the beginning of the eleventh century, Notker Labeo, a monk of St. Gall, writes that he has been invited to turn the _Andria_ into German[618]. Not long before, Hrotsvitha, a Benedictine nun of Gandersheim in Saxony, had taken Terence as her model for half a dozen plays in Latin prose, designed to glorify chastity and to celebrate the constancy of the martyrs. The dramaturgy of Hrotsvitha appears to have been an isolated experiment and the merest literary exercise. Her plays abound in delicate situations, and are not likely to have been intended even for cloister representation[619]. Nor is there much evidence for any representation of the Terentian comedies themselves. A curious fragment known as _Terentius et Delusor_ contains a dialogue between the _vetus poeta_ and a _persona delusoris_ or mime. The nature of this is somewhat enigmatic, but it certainly reads as if it might be a prologue or _parade_ written for a Terentian representation. In any case, it is wholly unparalleled[620]. In fact, although the Middle Ages continued to read Terence, the most extraordinary ideas prevailed as to how his dramas were originally produced. Vague reminiscences of the pantomimic art of later Rome led to the mistaken supposition that the poet himself, or a _recitator_, declaimed the text from a _pulpitum_ above the stage, while the actors gesticulated voicelessly below[621]. By a further confusion the name of Calliopius, a third- or fourth-century grammarian through whose hands the text of Terence has passed, was taken for that of a _recitator_ contemporary with the poet, and the _Vita Oxoniensis_ goes so far as to describe him as a powerful and learned man, who read the comedies aloud in the senate[622]. The same complete ignorance of things scenic declares itself in the notions attached to the terms _tragoedia_ and _comoedia_, not only vulgarly, but in the formal definitions of lexicographers and encyclopaedists[623].

The characteristics which really differentiate the drama from other forms of literature, dialogue and scenic representation, drop out of account, the latter entirely, the former very nearly so. Both tragedy and comedy are regarded as forms of narrative. Tragedy is narrative which concerns persons of high degree, is written in a lofty style, and beginning happily comes to a sad conclusion. Comedy, on the other hand, concerns itself with ordinary persons, uses humble and everyday language, and resolves its complications in a fortunate ending[624]. Even these distinctions are not all consistently maintained, and the sad or happy event becomes the only fixed and invariable criterion[625]. The origin of such conceptions is to be found partly in the common derived classical use of _tragoedia_ and _comoedia_ to describe tragic and comic events as well as the species of drama in which these are respectively represented; partly in a misunderstanding of grammarians who, assuming the dialogue and the representation, gave definitions of tragedy and comedy in relation to each other[626]; and partly in the solecism of the fifth-century epic writer Dracontius, who seems to have called his _Orestes_ a tragedy, merely because it was from tragedies that the material he used was drawn[627]. The _comoedia_ and _tragoedia_ of the Latin writers, thus defined, was extended to all the varieties of narrative, in the widest sense of the word. The epics of Lucan and Statius, the elegies of Ovid, are _tragoediae_; the epistles of Ovid, the pastoral dialogues of Virgil, are _comoediae_; the satires of Horace, Persius, Juvenal, are one or the other, according to the point of view[628]. It is curious that, with all this wide extension of the terms, they were not applied to the one form of mediaeval Latin composition which really had some analogy to the ancient drama; namely to the liturgical plays out of which the vernacular mysteries grew. These must have been written by learned writers: some of them were probably acted by schoolboys trained in Terence; and yet, if Hrosvitha, as she should be, is put out of the reckoning, no inward or outward trace of the influence of classical tragedy or comedy can be found in any one of them. In the manuscripts, they are called _officium_, _ordo_, _ludus_, _miraculum_, _repraesentatio_ and the like, but very rarely _comoedia_ or _tragoedia_, and never before 1204[629]. From the Latin the mediaeval notions of tragedy and comedy were transferred to similar compositions in the vernaculars. Dante’s _Divina Commedia_ is just a story which begins in Hell and ends in Paradise[630]. Boccaccio[631], Chaucer[632], and Lydgate[633] use precisely similar language. And, right up to the end of the sixteenth century, ‘tragedy’ continues to stand for ‘tragical legend’ with the authors of the _Mirror for Magistrates_ and their numerous successors[634]. Long before this, of course, humanistic research, without destroying their mediaeval sense, had restored to the wronged terms their proper connotation. There is a period during which it is a little difficult to say what, in certain instances, they do mean. When Robert Bower, in 1447, speaks of _comoediae_ and _tragoediae_ on the theme of Robin Hood and Little John, it is a matter for conjecture whether he is referring to dramatized May-games or merely to ballads[635]. Bale, in writing of his contemporaries, certainly applies the words to plays; but when he ascribes _tragoedias vulgares_ to Robert Baston, a Carmelite friar of the time of Edward II, it is probable that he is using, or quoting a record which used, an obsolescent terminology[636]. What the _comoediae_ of John Scogan, under Edward IV, may have been, must remain quite doubtful[637].

It is in the early fourteenth century and in Italy that a renewed interest in the Latin dramatists, other than Terence, can first be traced. Seneca became the subject of a commentary by the English Dominican Nicholas Treveth, and also attracted the attention of Lovato de’ Lovati and the scholarly circle which gathered round him at Padua. The chief of these was Albertino Mussato, who about 1314 was moved by indignation at the intrigues of Can Grande of Verona to write his _Ecerinis_ on the fate of that Ezzelino who, some eighty years before, had tyrannized over Padua. This first of the Senecan tragedies of the Renascence stirred enthusiasm amongst the growing number of the _literati_. It was read aloud and Mussato was laureated before the assembled university. Two learned professors paid it the tribute of a commentary. The example of Mussato was followed in the _Achilleis_ (1390) of Antonio de’ Loschi of Vicenza and the _Progne_ (†1428) of Gregorio Corraro of Mantua. Petrarch was familiar not only with Terence, but also with Seneca and Plautus, and his _Philologia_, written before 1331 and then suppressed, may claim to take rank with the _Ecerinis_ as the first Renascence comedy. It was modelled, says Boccaccio, upon Terence. A fresh impulse was given to the study and imitation of Latin comedy in 1427 by the discovery of twelve hitherto unknown Plautine plays, including the _Menaechmi_ and the _Miles Gloriosus_, and various attempts were made to complete the imperfect plays. In 1441 Leonardo Dati of Florence introduced a motive from the _Trinummus_ into his, not comedy, but tragedy of _Hiempsal_[638].

It must be borne in mind that during these early stages of humanism classical models and neo-Latin imitations alike were merely read and not acted. There is no sign whatever that as yet the mediaeval misconception as to the nature of Roman scenic representation had come to an end. It was certainly shared by Nicolas Treveth and probably by both Petrarch and Boccaccio[639]. It was not indeed in these regular dramas that the habit of acting Latin first re-established itself, but in a mixed and far less classical type of play. It is probable that in schools the exercise of reciting verse, and amongst other verse dialogue, had never died out since the time of the Empire. In the fourth century the _Ludus Septem Sapientum_ of the Bordeaux schoolmaster Ausonius, which consists of no more than a set of verses and a ‘_Plaudite!_’ for each sage, was doubtless written for some such purpose[640]. Such also may have been the destiny of the ‘elegiac’ and ‘epic’ comedies and tragedies of which a fair number were produced, from the eleventh century to the thirteenth. These are comedies and tragedies, primarily, in the mediaeval sense. They are narrative poems in form. But in all of them a good deal of dialogue is introduced, and in some there is hardly anything else. Their subject-matter is derived partly from Terence and partly from the stock of motives common to all forms of mediaeval light literature. Their most careful student, Dr. Cloetta, suggests that they were intended for a half-dramatic declamation by minstrels. This may sometimes have been the case, but the capacity and the audience of the minstrels for Latin were alike limited, and I do not see why at any rate the more edifying of them may not have been school pieces[641]. By the fifteenth century it will be remembered, students, who had long been in the habit of performing miracle-plays, had also taken to producing farces, morals, and those miscellaneous comic and satiric pieces which had their origin in the folk-festivals. Many of these were in the vernaculars; but it is difficult to avoid classing with them a group of Latin dialogues and loosely constructed comedies, written in Terentian metres and presenting a curious amalgam of classical and mediaeval themes. Of hardly any of these can it be said positively that they were intended to be acted. This is, however, not unlikely in the case of the anonymous _Columpnarium_, which goes back to the fourteenth century. Pavia probably saw a performance of Ugolini Pisani’s _Confabulatio coquinaria_ (1435), which has all the characteristics of a carnival drollery, and certainly of Ranzio Mercurino’s _De Falso Hypocrita_, which is stated in the manuscript to have been ‘_acta_’ there on April 15, 1437. The _Admiranda_ of Alberto Carrara was similarly ‘_acta_’ at Padua about 1456. The exact way in which these pieces and others like them were performed must remain doubtful. Acting in the strict sense can only be distinctly asserted of Francesco Ariosto’s dialogue of _Isis_ which was given ‘_per personatos_’ at the Ferrara carnival of 1444[642].

All this pseudo-classic comedy was looked upon with scorn by the purists of humanism. But it made its way over the Alps and had a considerable vogue in Germany. In France it found an exponent in Jean Tissier de Ravisy (Ravisius Textor), professor of rhetoric in the College of Navarre at Paris, and afterwards rector of the Paris University, who wrote, in good enough Latin, but wholly in the mediaeval manner, a large number of morals, farces, and dialogues for representation by his pupils[643]. Two at least of these were turned into English interludes. The classical element predominates in the pseudo-Homeric _Thersites_, the production of which can be fixed to between October 12 and 24, 1537; the mediaeval in Thomas Ingelend’s _The Disobedient Child_, which belongs to the very beginning of the reign of Elizabeth.

It was doubtless the study of Vitruvius which awakened the humanists to the fact that their beloved comedies had after all been acted after very much the fashion so long familiar in farces and miracle-plays. Exactly when the knowledge came is not clear. Polydore Vergil is still ignorant, and even Erasmus, at the date of the _Adagia_, uncertain. Alberti put a _theatrum_ in the palace built on the Vatican for Nicholas V about 1452, but there is no record of its use for dramatic performances at that time, and the immediate successors of Nicholas did not love humanism. Such performances seem to have been first undertaken by the pupils of a Roman professor, Pomponius Laetus. Amongst these was Inghirami, who was protagonist in revivals of the _Asinaria_ of Plautus and the _Phaedra_ of Seneca. These took place about 1485. Several other representations both of classical plays and of neo-Latin imitations occurred in Italy before the end of the century; and the practice spread to other countries affected by the humanist wave, soon establishing itself as part of the regular sixteenth-century scheme of education. By this time, of course, Greek as well as Latin dramatic models were available. The Latin translation of the _Plutus_ of Aristophanes by Leonardo Bruni (†1427) found several successors, and the play was acted at Zwickau in 1521. The study of Sophocles and Euripides began with Francesco Filelfo (†1481), but no representations of these authors are mentioned[644].

The outburst of dramatic activity in English schools and universities during the first half of the sixteenth century has already been noted. Wolsey may claim credit for an early encouragement of classical comedy in virtue of the performances of the _Menaechmi_ and the _Phormio_ given in his house by the boys of St. Paul’s in 1527 and 1528[645]. The master of St. Paul’s from 1522 to 1531 was John Ritwise, who himself wrote a Latin play of _Dido_, which also appears to have been acted before Wolsey[646]. The _Plutus_ was given at St. John’s College, Cambridge, in 1536; the _Pax_ at Trinity about a decade later[647]. A long series of English translations of classical plays begins with one of the _Andria_ printed, possibly by John Rastell, under the title of _Terens in Englysh_[648].

A more important matter is the influence exercised by classical models upon the vernacular interludes. This naturally showed itself in school dramas, and only gradually filtered down to the professional players. Two plays compete for the honour of ranking as ‘the first regular English comedy,’ a term which is misleading, as it implies a far more complete break with the past than is to be discerned in either of them. One is Nicholas Udall’s _Ralph Roister Doister_, the performance of which can be dated with some confidence in 1553, by which time its author may already have been head master of Westminster; the other is _Gammer Gurton’s Needle_, which was put on the stage at Christ’s College, Cambridge, has been ascribed to John Still, afterwards bishop of Bath and Wells, and to John Bridges, afterwards bishop of Oxford, but is more probably the work of one William Stevenson, who was certainly superintending plays at Christ’s College in 1550-3. Both plays adopt the classical arrangement by acts and scenes. But of the two _Gammer Gurton’s Needle_ is far closer to the mediaeval farce in its choice and treatment of subject. _Ralph Roister Doister_, although by no means devoid of mediaeval elements, is in the main an adaptation of the _Miles Gloriosus_ of Plautus. A slighter and rather later piece of work, _Jack Juggler_, was also intended for performance by schoolboys, and is based upon the _Amphitruo_. The earliest ‘regular English tragedy’ on Senecan lines, or at least the earliest which oblivion has spared, is the _Gorboduc_ or _Ferrex and Porrex_ of 1561. This falls outside the strict scope of this chapter. But a fragment of a play from the press of John Rastell (1516-33) which introduces ‘Lucres’ and Publius Cornelius, suggests that, here as elsewhere, the Elizabethan writers were merely resuming the history of the earlier English Renascence, which religious and political disturbances had so wofully interrupted.

Towards the end of Henry VIII’s reign, the course of the developing interlude was further diverted by a fresh wave of humanist influence. This came from the wing of the movement which had occupied itself, not only with erudition, but also with the spiritual stirrings that issued in the Reformation. It must be borne in mind that the attitude of mere negation which the English Puritans, no doubt with their justification in ‘antiquity,’ came to adopt towards the stage, was by no means characteristic of the earlier Protestantism. The Lutheran reformers were humanists as well as theologians, and it was natural to them to shape a literary weapon to their own purposes, rather than to cast it aside as unfit for furbishing. About 1530 a new school of neo-Latin drama arose in Holland, which stood in much closer relations to mediaevalism than that which had had its origin in Italy. It aimed at applying the structure and the style of Terence to an edifying subject-matter drawn from the tradition of the religious drama. The English _Everyman_ belongs to a group of related plays, both in Latin and in the vernaculars, on its moral theme. The _Acolastus_ (1530, acted 1529) of William Gnaphaeus and the _Asotus_ (1537, written †1507) of George Macropedius began a cycle of ‘Prodigal Son’ plays which had many branches. The movement began uncontroversially, but developed Protestant tendencies. It spread to Basle, where Sixt Birck, who called himself Xystus Betuleius, wrote a _Susanna_ (1537), an _Eva_ (1539), a _Judith_ (1540), and to France, where the Scotchman George Buchanan added to the ‘Christian Terence’ a ‘Christian Seneca’ in the _Jephthes_ (1554) and _Baptistes_ (1564) performed, between 1540 and 1543, by his students at Bordeaux. In these, which are but a few out of many similar plays produced at this period, the humanists drew in the main upon such scriptural subjects, many of them apocryphal or parabolic, as were calculated, while no doubt making for edification, at the same time to afford scope for a free portrayal of human life. This on the whole, in spite of the treatment of such episodes as the Magdalen _in gaudio_, was a departure from the normal mediaeval usage[649].

A new note, of acute and even violent controversy, was introduced into the Protestant drama by the fiery heretic, Thomas Kirchmayer, or Naogeorgos. Kirchmayer wrote several plays, but the most important from the present point of view is that of _Pammachius_ (1538), written during his pastorate of Sulza in Thuringia before his extreme views had led, not merely to exile from the Empire, but also to a quarrel with Luther. The _Pammachius_ goes back to one of the most interesting, although of course not one of the most usual, themes of mediaeval drama, that of Antichrist; and it will readily be conceived that, for Kirchmayer, the Antichrist is none other than the Pope. It is interesting to observe that the play was dedicated to Archbishop Cranmer, whose reforming _Articles_ of 1536 had roused the expectations of Protestant Germany. It was translated into English by John Bale, and was certainly not without influence in this country[650].

Both the merely edifying and the controversial type of Lutheran drama, indeed, found its English representatives. To the former belong the _Christus Redivivus_ (1543) and the _Archipropheta_ (1548) of the Oxford lecturer, Nicholas Grimald, one of which deals, somewhat exceptionally at this period, with the Resurrection, the other with John the Baptist. The _Absalon_ of Thomas Watson, the _Jephthes_ of John Christopherson (1546)[651], and the _Sodom_, _Jonah_, _Judith_, _Job_, _Susanna_, and _Lazarus and Dives_ of Ralph Radclif (1546-56)[652], can only conjecturally be put in this class; and Nicholas Udall, who wrote an _Ezechias_ in English, certainly did not commit himself irrecoverably in the eyes of good Catholics. John Palsgrave’s _Ecphrasis_ or paraphrase of _Acolastus_ (1540) is supplied with grammatical notes, and is conceived wholly in the academic interest. On the other hand controversy is suggested in the titles of Radclif’s _De Iohannis Hussi Damnatione_, and of the _De Meretrice Babylonica_ ascribed by Bale to Edward VI[653], and is undeniably present in the _Christus Triumphans_ (1551) of John Foxe, the martyrologist. This, like _Pammachius_, to which it owes much, belongs to the Antichrist cycle.

Nor was controversy confined to the learned language. As Protestantism, coquetted with by Henry VIII, and encouraged by Cromwell, became gradually vocal in England and awakened an equally resonant reply, the vernacular drama, like every other form of literary expression, was swept into the war of creeds. This phase, dominating even the professional players, endured through the reigns of Edward VI and Mary, and still colours the early Elizabethan interludes. Its beginnings were independent of the Lutheran influences that so profoundly affected its progress. The morality already contained within itself that tendency to criticism which was perhaps the easiest way to correct its insipidity. Historically it was politics rather than religion with which the interlude first claimed to interfere. The story begins, harmlessly enough, at court, with an allegorical ‘disguising’ during the visit of the Emperor Charles V to London in 1523, in which the French king, typified by an unruly horse, was tamed by Amitie, who stood for the alliance between Charles and Henry[654]. In 1526 John Roo’s morality, played at Gray’s Inn, of ‘Lord Governaunce’ and ‘Lady Publike-Wele’ wrung Wolsey’s withers, although as a matter of fact it was twenty years old[655]. Religion was first touched in 1527 in a piece of which one would gladly know more. It was played, as it seems, in Latin and French by the St. Paul’s boys under John Ritwise, before ambassadors from France. The subject was the captivity of the Pope, and amongst the singular medley of characters named are found ‘the herretyke, Lewtar’ and ‘Lewtar’s wyfe, like a frowe of Spyers in Almayn[656].’ This was, no doubt, all in the interests of orthodoxy; and a similar tone may be assumed in the comedies acted before Wolsey in the following year on the release of the Pope[657]. But much water passed under the mill in the next few years, and in 1533 there was a comedy at court ‘to the no little defamation of certain cardinals[658].’ In the same year, however, a proclamation forbade ‘playing of enterludes’ ‘concerning doctrines in matters now in question and controversie[659].’ This is a kind of regulation which it is easier to make than to enforce. Its effect, if it had any, was not of long duration. In 1537 much offence was given to Bishop Gardiner, the Chancellor of Cambridge University, by the performance amongst the youth of Christ’s College of a ‘tragedie,’ part at least of which was ‘soo pestiferous as were intolerable.’ This ‘tragedie’ was none other than the redoubtable _Pammachius_ itself[660]. In the same year, strict orders were issued to stay games and unlawful assemblies in Suffolk, on account of a ‘seditious May-game’ which was ‘of a king, how he should rule his realm,’ and in which ‘one played Husbandry, and said many things against gentlemen more than was in the book of the play[661].’ These were exceptional cases. Both the students of Christ’s and the Suffolk rustics had in their various ways overstepped the permitted mark. Certainly Henry was not going to have kingship called in question on a village green. But it is notorious that, in matters of religion, he secretly encouraged many obstinate questionings which he openly condemned. And there is evidence that Cromwell at least found the interlude a very convenient instrument for the encouragement of Protestantism. Bale tells us that he himself won the minister’s favour _ob editas comedias_[662]; and there is extant amongst his papers a singular letter of this same year 1537, from Thomas Wylley, the vicar of Yoxford in Suffolk, in which he calls attention to three plays he has written, and asks that he may have ‘fre lyberty to preche the trewthe[663].’ Cranmer, too, seems to have been in sympathy with Cromwell’s policy, for in 1539 there was an enterlude at his house which a Protestant described as ‘one of the best matiers that ever he sawe towching King John,’ and which may quite possibly have been John Bale’s famous play[664].

The position was altered after 1540, when Cromwell had fallen and the pendulum of Henry’s conscience had swung back to orthodoxy. Foxe records how under the _Act Abolishing Diversity in Opinions_ (1539), known as the _Act of the Six Articles_, one Spencer, an ex-priest who had become an interlude-player, was burned at Salisbury for ‘matter concerning the sacrament of the altar’; and how, in London, one Shermons, keeper of the Carpenters’ Hall in Shoreditch, ‘was presented for procuring an interlude to be openly played, wherein priests were railed on and called knaves[665].’ But the stage was by now growing difficult to silence. In 1542 the bishops petitioned the king to correct the acting of plays ‘to the contempt of God’s Word[666]’; and in 1543 their desire was met by the _Act for the Advauncement of true Religion and for the Abolishment of the Contrary_, which permitted of ‘plays and enterludes for the rebukyng and reproching of vices and the setting forth of vertue’; but forbade such as meddled with ‘interpretacions of scripture, contrary to the doctryne set forth or to be set forth by the kynges maiestie[667].’ This led to a vigorous protest from John Bale, writing under the pseudonym of Henry Stalbridge, in his _Epistel Exhortatorye of an Inglyshe Christian_. Its repeal was one of the first measures passed under Edward VI[668].

Lord Oxford’s men were playing in Southwark at the very hour of the dirge for Henry in the church of St. Saviour’s[669]. Almost immediately ‘the Poope in play’ and ‘prests in play’ make their appearance once more[670]. Edward himself wrote his comedy _De Meretrice Babylonica_. In 1551 the English comedies ‘in demonstration of contempt for the Pope’ were reported by the Venetian ambassador to his government[671]. But the players were not to have quite a free hand. It was now the Catholic interludes that needed suppression. A proclamation of August 6, 1549, inhibited performances until the following November in view of some ‘tendyng to sedicion[672].’ The _Act of Uniformity_ of the same year forbade interludes ‘depraving and despising’ the _Book of Common Prayer_[673]. A more effective measure came later in a proclamation of 1551, requiring either for the printing or the acting of plays a licence by the king or the privy council[674]. Mary, at whose own marriage with Philip in 1554 there were Catholic interludes and pageants[675], issued a similar regulation in 1553, though naturally with a different intention[676]. But this was not wholly effectual, and further orders and much vigilance by the Privy Council in the oversight of players were required in the course of the reign[677].

Only a few texts from this long period of controversial drama have come down to us. On the Catholic side there is but one, the play of _Respublica_ (1553). In this, and in the Protestant fragment of _Somebody, Avarice and Minister_, the ruling literary influence is that of Lyndsay’s _Satyre of the Thre Estaitis_. Of the remaining Protestant plays, _Nice Wanton_ (1560) and Thomas Ingelend’s _The Disobedient Child_ (n.d.) derive from the Dutch school of Latin drama and its offshoots. _Nice Wanton_ is an adaptation of the _Rebelles_ (1535) of Macropedius. _The Disobedient Child_ has its relations, not only to the play of Ravisius Textor already mentioned, but also to the _Studentes_ (1549) of Christopher Stymmelius. More distinctly combative in tendency is the _Lusty Juventus_ (n.d.) of R. Wever, who may be reckoned as a disciple of John Bale. The activity of Bale himself can be somewhat obscurely discerned as the strongest impelling force on the Protestant side. He had his debts both to Lyndsay and to Kirchmayer, whose _Pammachius_, if not his other plays, he translated. But he is very largely original, and he is set apart from the other great figures of the Lutheran drama by the fact that all his plays were written _in idiomate materno_. Moreover, though not without classical elements, they were probably intended for popular performance, and approach more closely to the mediaeval structure than to that of the contemporary interlude. In his _Scriptores_ he enumerates, under twenty-two titles, some forty-six of them. The five extant ones were probably all ‘compiled’ about 1538 while he was vicar of Thorndon in Suffolk. But some of them were acted at the market-cross of Kilkenny in 1553, and the others show signs of revision under Edward VI or even Elizabeth. In _God’s Promises_, _John Baptist_, and _The Temptation_, Bale was simply adapting and Protestantizing the miracle-play. The first is practically a _Prophetae_, and they are all ‘actes,’ or as the Middle Ages would have said ‘processes’ or ‘pageants,’ from a scriptural cycle. Of similar character were probably a series of eleven plays extending from Christ in the Temple to the Resurrection. A _Vita D. Joannis Baptistae_ in fourteen _libri_ perhaps treated this favourite sixteenth-century theme in freer style. The polemics are more marked in _Three Laws_, which is a morality; and in _King John_, which is a morality varied by the introduction of the king himself as a champion against the Pope and of certain other historical figures. It thus marks an important step in the advance of the drama towards the treatment of individualities. With the _Three Laws_ and _King John_ may be grouped another set of lost plays whose Latinized titles point unmistakably to controversy. An _Amoris Imago_ might be merely edifying; but it would be difficult to avoid meddling in matters of doctrine with such themes to handle as _De Sectis Papisticis_, _Erga Momos et Zoilos_, _Perditiones Papistarum_, _Contra Adulterantes Dei Verbum_, _De Imposturis Thomae Becketi_. A pair of plays _Super utroque Regis Coniugio_, must have been, if they were ever acted, a climax of audacity even for John Bale.

What then, in sum, was the heritage which the early Elizabethan writers and players of interludes received from their immediate predecessors? For the writers there were the stimulus of classical method and a widened range both of intention and of material. Their claim was established to dispute, to edify, or merely to amuse. They stood on the verge of more than one field of enterprise which had been barely entered upon and justly appeared inexhaustible. ‘Tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical-pastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral’; they possessed at least the keys to them all. Their own work is a heterogeneous welter of all the dramatic elements of the past and the future. Belated morals and miracle-plays jostle with adaptations of Seneca and Plautus. The _dramatis personae_ of a single play will afford the abstractions of the allegory and the types of the farce side by side with real living individualities; and the latter are drawn indifferently from contemporary society, from romance, from classical and from national history. These are precisely the dry bones which one day, beneath the breath of genius, should spring up into the wanton life of the Shakespearean drama. The players had made good their footing both in courts and amongst the folk. But their meddlings with controversy had brought upon them the hand of authority, which was not to be lightly shaken off. Elizabeth, like her brother, signalized the opening of her reign by a temporary inhibition of plays[678]; and her privy council assumed a jurisdiction, by no means nominal, over things theatrical. In their censorship they had the assistance of the bishop of London, as ‘ordinary.’ The lesser companies may have suffered from the statute of 1572 which confined the privilege of maintaining either minstrels or players of interludes to barons and personages of higher degree[679]. But the greater ones which had succeeded in establishing themselves in London, grew and flourished. They lived down the competition of the amateurs which during the greater part of the century threatened to become dangerous, by their profitable system of double performances, at court and in the inn yards. Thus they secured the future of the drama by making it economically independent; and the copestone of their edifice was the building of the permanent theatres. But for courtesy and a legal fiction, they were vagabonds and liable to whipping: yet the time was at hand when one player was to claim coat armour and entertain preachers to sack and supper at New Place, while another was to marry the daughter of a dean and to endow an irony for all time in the splendid College of God’s Gift at Dulwich.

APPENDICES

A

THE TRIBUNUS VOLUPTATUM

[The _tribunus voluptatum_ was a municipal officer of the later Empire charged with the superintendence of the _spectacula_. He seems to have been appointed for life by the Emperor, and to have taken over functions formerly discharged by the praetors and quaestors. Mommsen, _Ostgothische Studien_ (_Neues Archiv_, xiv. 495), says that he first appears in the fifth century. Possibly, therefore, Suetonius, _Tiberius_, 42, ‘novum denique officium instituit a voluptatibus, praeposito equite R. T. Caesonio Prisco’ refers to some other post. A _titulus_, ‘de officio tribuni voluptatū qd a temelicis et scenariis,’ which should be _C. Th._ i. 19, is missing from the text. _C. Th._ xv. 7, 13 (413), is addressed to the _tribunus voluptatum_ of Carthage. The office was maintained in Italy under Theodoric (493-526). The _formula_ of appointment here given is preserved by Cassiodorus, _Variae_, vii. 10; cf. _Var._ vi. 19 ‘cum lascivae voluptates recipiant tribunum.’ The Senate is informed by _Var._ i. 43 (†509) of the promotion of Artemidorus, who had held the office, to be _praefectus urbanus_. The _tribunus voluptatum_ of Rome is referred to in two inscriptions of 522 and 526 (Rossi, _Inscr. Christ._ i. Nos. 989, 1005). One Bacauda is appointed _tribunus voluptatum_ in Milan by _Var._ v. 25 (523-6). Constantine Porphyrogenitus _de Caer._ i. 83 mentions an ἄρχων τῆς θυμέλης in the tenth-century court of Byzantium, who may be the same officer.]

_Formula Tribuni Voluptatum._

Quamvis artes lubricae honestis moribus sint remotae et histrionum vita vaga videatur efferri posse licentia, tamen moderatrix providit antiquitas, ut in totum non effluerent, cum et ipsae iudicem sustinerent. amministranda est enim sub quadam disciplina exhibitio voluptatum. teneat scaenicos si non verus, vel umbratilis ordo iudicii. temperentur et haec legum qualitate negotia, quasi honestas imperet inhonestis, et quibusdam regulis vivant, qui viam rectae conversationis ignorant. student enim illi non tantum iucunditati suae, quantum alienae laetitiae et condicione perversa cum dominatum suis corporibus tradunt, servire potius animos compulerunt. Dignum fuit ergo moderatorem suscipere, qui se nesciunt iuridica conversatione tractare. locus quippe tuus his gregibus hominum veluti quidam tutor est positus. nam sicut illi aetates teneras adhibita cautela custodiunt, sic a te voluptates fervidae impensa maturitate frenandae sunt. age bonis institutis quod nimia prudentia constat invenisse maiores. leve desiderium etsi verecundia non cohibet, districtio praenuntiata modificat. agantur spectacula suis consuetudinibus ordinata, quia nec illi possunt invenire gratiam, nisi imitati fuerint aliquam disciplinam. Quapropter tribunum te voluptatum per illam indictionem nostra fecit electio, ut omnia sic agas, quemadmodum tibi vota civitatis adiungas, ne quod ad laetitiam constat inventum, tuis temporibus ad culpas videatur fuisse transmissum. cum fama diminutis salva tua opinione versare. castitatem dilige, cui subiacent prostitutae: ut magna laude dicatur: ‘virtutibus studuit, qui voluptatibus miscebatur.’ optamus enim ut per ludicram amministrationem ad seriam pervenias dignitatem.

B

TOTA IOCULATORUM SCENA

John of Salisbury, _Polycraticus_ i. 8 (†1159, _P. L._ cxcix, 406), says, Satius enim fuerat otiari quam turpiter occupari. Hinc mimi, salii vel saliares, balatrones, aemiliani, gladiatores, palaestritae, gignadii, praestigiatores, malefici quoque multi, et tota ioculatorum scena procedit.’ The specific terms belong to John of Salisbury’s classical learning rather than to contemporary use; but his generic _ioculator_ is the normal mediaeval Latin term for the minstrel in the widest sense. Classically the word, like its synonym _iocularis_, is an adjective, ‘given to ioca,’ ‘merry.’ Thus Cicero, _ad Att_. iv. 16. 3 ‘huic ioculatorem senem illum interesse sane nolui.’ Similarly Firmicus Maternus (fourth century), _Mathesis_, viii. 22 ‘histriones faciat, pantomimos, ac scaenicos ioculatores,’ and 4 _Conc. Carthag._ (398), c. 60 (_C. I. C. Decr. Gratiani_, i. 46. 6) ‘clericum scurrilem et verbis turpibus ioculatorem ab officio retrahendum censemus.’ Here the technical meaning is approached, which Gautier, ii. 12, declares to be complete in Salvian (fifth century), _de gubernatione Dei_. I cannot, however, find the word in Salvian, though I do find _iugulator_, ‘cut-throat.’ I have not come across _ioculator_ as a noun before the eighth century (vol. i. p. 37), but thenceforward it is widely used for minstrels of both the _scôp_ and the _mimus_ type. A rarer form is _iocista_. _Ioculator_ gives rise to the equally wide French term _jouglere_, _jougleur_, which seems to merge with the doublet _jogeler_, _jougler_, from _iocularis_. Similarly _ioca_ becomes _jeu_, the equivalent of the classical and mediaeval Latin _ludus_, also in the widest sense. In Provençal _ioculator_ becomes _joglar_, in English _jugelour_, _jugelere_, _jogeler_, &c. Thus _S. Eng. Leg._ i. 271 (†1290) ‘Is iugelour a day bifore him pleide faste And nemde in his ryme and in is song þene deuel atþe laste’; King Horn (ed. Ritson), 1494 (†1300) ‘Men seide hit were harperis, Jogelers, ant fythelers.’ The incorrect modern French form _jongleur_ seems due to a confusion between _jougleur_ and _jangleur_, ‘babbler,’ and the English _jangler_ has a similar use; cf. _Piers the Plowman_, B. Text, _passus_ x. 31 (ed. Skeat, i. 286) ‘Iaperes and Iogeloures, and Iangelers of gestes.’ Here both words appear side by side. The English _jogelour_ sometimes has the full sense of the French _jougleur_, as in the instances just given, but as a term for minstrels of the higher or _scôp_ type it has to compete, firstly, with the native _gleeman_, from O. E. _gleoman_, _gligman_, and secondly, with _minstrel_; and as a matter of fact its commoner use is for the lower type of minstrel or buffoon, and in particular, in the exact sense of the modern _juggler_, for a conjuror, _tregetour_ or _prestigiator_. The latter is the usual meaning of _jogelour_, with the cognate _jogelrye_, in Chaucer; for the former, cf. Adam Davie (†1312) ‘the minstrels sing, the jogelours carpe.’ In English documents the Latin _ioculator_ itself to some extent follows suit; the _ioculator regis_ of late fifteenth or early sixteenth-century accounts is not a minstrel or musician, but the royal _juggler_ (cf. vol. i. p. 68). On the other hand the Provençal _joglar_ is differentiated in the opposite sense, to denote a grade of minstrelsy raised above the mere _bufos_ (vol. i. p. 63).

A street in Paris known at the end of the thirteenth century as the ‘_rue aus Jugléeurs_,’ came later to be known as the _rue des Ménétriers_ (Bernhard, iii. 378). This is significant of a new tendency in nomenclature which appears with the growth during the fourteenth century of the household entertainers at the expense of their unattached brethren of the road. _Minister_ is classical Latin for ‘inferior’ and so ‘personal attendant.’ The _ministeriales_ of the later Empire are officers personally appointed by the Emperor. Towards the end of the thirteenth century _minister_, with its diminutives _ministellus_ and _ministrallus_ (French _menestrel_), can be seen passing from the general sense of ‘household attendant’ to the special sense of ‘household _ioculator_.’ A harper was one of the _ministri_ of Prince Edward in 1270 (vol. i. p. 49). Gautier, ii. 13, 51, quotes _li famles_ (_famuli_) as a synonym for such _ioculatores_, and such doublets as ‘menestrel et serviteur,’ ‘menestrel et varlet de chambre.’ The _ministeralli_ of Philip IV in 1288 include, with the musicians, the _rex heraudum_ and the _rex ribaldorum_. From the beginning of the fourteenth century, however, _ministrallus_, with French _menestrel_, _menestrier_, and English _menestrel_, _mynstral_, is firmly established in the special sense. The antithesis between the _ministrallus_ and the unattached _ioculator_ appears in the terminology of the 1321 statutes of the Paris guild, ‘menestreus et menestrelles, jougleurs et jougleresses’; but even this disappears, and the new group of terms becomes equivalent to the _ioculator_ group in its widest sense. So too, _ministralcia_, _menestrardie_, _minstralcie_, although chiefly used, as by Chaucer, for music, are not confined to that; e.g. _Derby Accounts_, 109, ‘cuidam tumblere facienti ministralciam suam.’ The word is here approaching very near its kinsman _métier_ (vol. ii. p. 105). Wright-Wülcker, 596, 693, quotes from the fifteenth-century glossaries, ‘_simphonia_, mynstrylsy,’ and ‘_mimilogium_, mynstrisye.’

_Ioculator_ and _ministrallus_ are in their technical sense post-classical. But it is to be noted that the classical _histrio_ and _mimus_, widened in connotation to an exact equivalent with these, remain in full use throughout the Middle Ages. They are indeed the more literary and learned words, as may be seen from the fact that they did not give rise to Romance or English forms; but they are not differentiated as to meaning. In particular, I do not find that _mimus_ is used, as I have occasionally for convenience used it, to denote the lower minstrel of classical origin, as against the higher minstrel or _scôp_. Here are a few of many passages which go to establish this complete fourfold equivalence of _ioculator_, _ministrallus_, _mimus_ and _histrio_; _Gloss._ in _B.N. MS._ 4883ᵃ, f. 67ᵇ (Du Méril, _Or. Lat._ 23) ‘istriones sunt ioculatores’; _Constit. regis Minorcae_ (1337, Mabillon, _Acta SS. Bened. Ian._ iii. 27) ‘In domibus principum, ut tradit antiquitas, mimi seu ioculatores licite possunt esse’; _Conc. Lateran._ (1215), c. 16 ‘mimis, ioculatoribus et histrionibus non intendant.’ This triple formula, often repeated by ecclesiastics, is of course conjunctive, like ‘rogues and vagabonds.’ Guy of Amiens (†1068) calls Taillefer both _histrio_ and _mimus_ (vol. i. p. 43). At the beginning of the sixteenth century the royal minstrels are _histriones_ in the accounts of Shrewsbury, _ministralli_ in those of Winchester College (_App. E._ (_iv_)), _mimi_ in those of Beverley (Leach, _Beverley MSS._ 171). The _ioculator regis_, as already said, is by this time distinct. The Scottish royal minstrels appear in the Exchequer Rolls for 1433-50 as _mimi_, _histriones_, _ioculatores_ (_L. H. T. Accounts_, i, cxcix). The town musicians of Beverley, besides their specific names of _waits_ and _spiculatores_, have indifferently those of _histriones_, _ministralli_, _mimi_ (Leach, _Beverley MSS._ _passim_). It is largely a matter of the personal taste of the scribe. Thus the Shrewsbury accounts have both _histriones_ and _menstralles_ in 1401, _histriones_ in 1442, _ministralli_ regularly from 1457 to 1479, and _histriones_ regularly from 1483 onwards.

Many other names for minstrels, besides these dominant four, have been collected by scholars (Gautier, ii. 10; Julleville, _Les Com._ 17; Gröber, ii. 489; Bédier, 366). From the compliments exchanged in the _fabliau_ of _Des Deux Bordeors Ribaux_ (Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 1) one may extract the equivalence of _menestrel_, _trouvère_, _ribaud_, _bordeor_, _jougleur_, _chanteur_, _lecheor_, _pantonnier_. Of such subordinate names many are specific, and have been dealt with in their turn in chh. iii, iv. Others, again, are abusive, and found chiefly in the mouths of ecclesiastics, or as distinctive of the lower orders of minstrels. There are _garcio_, _nebulo_, _delusor_, _saccularius_, _bufo_, _ribaud_, _harlot_. There are _bourdyour_, _japer_, _gabber_, _jangler_ (vol. i. p. 84). There is _scurra_, an early and favourite term of this class; cf. Ælfric’s gloss (Ducange, s.v. _Iocista_), ‘_Mimus_, _iocista_, _scurra_, gligmon’; Wright-Wülcker, 693 (fifteenth-century gloss), ‘_scurra_, harlot’; and vol. i. p. 32. There is _leccator_, _leccour_ (cf. above and _App. F._ s.v. _Chester_). And finally, there are a few terms of general, but not very common, application. _Scenici_ and _thymelici_ come from the early Christian prohibitions (vol. i. pp. 12, 17, 24). More important are a group derived from _ludus_, which like _jeu_ has itself the widest possible sense, covering every possible kind of amusement. The _Sarum Statutes_ of 1319, in a _titulus_ dealing with _histriones_, speak of those ‘qui “menestralli” et quandoque “ludorum homines” vulgari eloquio nuncupantur’ (vol. i. p. 40). In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries appear such terms as _lusor_, _lusiator_, _ludens_, _interlusor_, _interludens_. The two latter of these are always specific, meaning ‘actor’; the three former are usually so, although they may occasionally have the more general sense, and this is probably also true of the English _player_. This question is more fully discussed in vol. i. pp. 84, 393, and vol. ii. p. 185.

C

COURT MINSTRELSY IN 1306

[From _Manners and Household Expenses of England in the Thirteenth and Fifteenth Centuries_, 141 (Roxburghe Club, 1841), from Exchequer Roll (King’s Remembrancer’s Dept.) in Rolls Office. The Pentecost feast of 1306 was that at which Prince Edward, who became in the next year Edward II, was knighted. It is described in the _Annales Londonienses_ (_Chronicles of Edward I and Edward II_, R. S. i. 146).]

Solutio facta diversis Menestrallis die Pentecostes anno xxxiiiiᵗᵒ.

[A. D. 1306.]

Le Roy de Champaigne } Le Roy Capenny } cuilibet v._marc._; Le Roy Baisescue } summa, xvj._li._ Le Roy Marchis } i._marc._ Le Roy Robert }

Phelippe de Caumbereye lx._s._; summa, lx._s._

} cuilibet iiij._marc._; Robert le Boistous } summa, Gerard de Boloigne } c. vj._s._ viij._d._ }

Bruant } cuilibet xl._s._; Northfolke } summa, iiij._li._

Carltone } Maistre Adam le Boscu } cuilibet xx._s._; Devenays } summa, lx._s._

Artisien } cuilibet xxx._s._; Lucat } summa, iiij._li._ Henuer } [x._s._]

Le menestral Mons. de Montmaranci } Le Roy Druet } Janin le Lutour } Gillotin le Sautreour } Gillet de Roos } Ricard de Haleford } Le Petit Gauteron } cuilibet xl._s._; Baudec le Tabourer } summa, xxvj._li._ Ernolet } Mahu qui est ove la dammoisele de Baar } Janin de Brebant } Martinet qui est ove le Conte de Warwike } Gauteron le Grant }

Le Harpour Levesque de Duresme x._s._

Guillaume le Harpour qui est ove le Patriarke } Robert de Clou } Maistre Adam de Reve } Henri le Gigour } Corraud son compaignon } Le tierz Gigour } Gillot le Harpour } cuilibet ij._marc._; Johan de Newentone } summa, Hugethun le Harpour lour compaignon } xxj._li._ di._marc._ Adekin son compaignon } Adam de Werintone } Adam de Grimmeshawe } Hamond Lestivour } Mahuet qui est ove Mons. de Tounny } Johan de Mochelneye } Janin Lorganistre } Simond le Messager }

Les ij. Trumpours Mons. Thomas de Brothertone } Martinet le Taborour } Richard Rounlo } Richard Hendelek } Janin de La Tour son compaignon } Johan le Waffrer le Roy } Pilk } Januche } } Gillot } Trumpours Mons. le Prince } Le Nakarier } Le Gitarer } cuilibet j._marc._; Merlin } summa, xl._marc._ Tomasin, Vilour Mons. Le Prince } Raulin qui est ove le Conte Mareschal } Esvillie qui est ove Mons. Pierres de Maule } Grendone } Le Taborer La Dame de Audham } Gaunsaillie } Guillaume sanz maniere } Lambyn Clay } Jaques Le Mascun } Son compaignon } Mahu du North } Le menestral ove les cloches } Les iij. menestraus Mons. de Hastinges } Thomelin de Thounleie } Les ij. Trompours le Comte de Hereforde } Perle in the eghe } Son compaignon } Janyn le Sautreour qui est ove Mons. de Percy } Les ij. Trumpours le Comte de Lancastre } Mellet } Henri de Nushom } Janyn le Citoler }

Gilliame } Fairfax } cuilibet xx._s._; Monet } summa, iiij._li._ Hanecocke de Blithe }

Summa totalis,—cxiiij._li._ x._s._—Et issi demoerent des cc._marc._, pur partir entre les autres menestraus de la commune,—xviij._li._ xvj._s._ viij._d._—Et a ceste partie faire sunt assigne Le Roy Baisescu, Le Roy Marchis, Le Roy Robert, et Le Roy Druet, Gauteron le Graunt, Gauteron le Petit, Martinet le Vilour qui est ove le Conte de Warewike, et del hostiel Mons. le Prince, ij. serjantz darmes ... clerke.

[Five lines of which only a few words are legible.]

Richard le Harpour qui est ove le Conte de Gloucestre. Wauter Bracon Trounpour Wauter le Trounpour Johan le Croudere Tegwaret Croudere Geffrai le Estiveur Guillot le Taborer Guillot le Vileur Robert le Vilour Jake de Vescy Richard Whetacre

A ceux xj., por toute la commune, xvii._li._ iiii._s._ viii._d._

_Denarii dati Menestrallis._

Vidulatori Dominae de Wak’ v._s._ Laurentio Citharistae di._marc._ Johanni du Chat, cum Domino J. de Bur’ di._marc._ Mellers v._s._ Parvo Willielmo, Organistae Comtissae Herefordiae v._s._ Ricardo de Quitacre, Citharistae di._marc._ Ricardo de Leylonde, Citharistae di._marc._ Carleton Haralde v._s._ Gilloto Vidulatori Comitis Arundelliae di._marc._ Amakyn Citharistae Principis v._s._ Bolthede v._s._ Nagary le Crouder Principis v._s._ Matheu le Harpour v._s._ Johanni le Barber v._s._ ij. Trumpatoribus J. de Segrave di._marc._ Ricardo Vidulatori Comitis Lancastriae v._s._ Johanni Waffrarario Comitis Lancastriae xl._d._ Sagard Crouther xl._d._ William de Grymesar’, Harpour xl._d._ Citharistae Comitissae Lancastriae xl._d._ ij. Menestrallis J. de Ber[wyke] xl._d._ Henrico de Blida xl._d._ Ricardo Citharistae xl._d._ William de Duffelde xl._d._ v. Trumpatoribus Principis, pueris, cuilibet ij._s._ x._s._ in _toto._ iiijᵒʳ. Vigil’ Regis, cuilibet di._marc._ xx._s._ Adinet le Harpour Perote le Taborer Adae de Swylingtone Citharistae ij._s._ David le Crouther xij._d._ Lion de Normanville ij._s._ Gerardo xij._d._ Ricardo Citharistae ij._s._ Roberto de Colecestria iij._s._ Jhanni le Crouther de Salopia xij._d._ Johanni le Vilour domini J. Renaude xij._d._ Johanni de Trenham, Citharistae ij._s._ Willielmo Woderove, Trumpatori ij._s._ Johanni Citharistae J. de Clyntone ij._s._ Waltero de Brayles xij._d._ Roberto Citharistae Abbatis de Abbyndone xij._d._ Galfredo Trumpatori domini R. de Monte Alto Richero socio suo ij._s._ Thomae le Croudere ij._s._ Rogero de Corleye, Trumpatori ij._s._ Audoeno le Crouther xij._d._ Hugoni Daa Citharistae ij._s._ Andreae Vidulatori de Hor’ ij._s._ Roberto de Scardeburghe xij._d._ Guilloto le Taborer Comitis Warrewici iij._s._ Paul’ Menestrallo Comitis Marescalli iij._s._ Matheo Waffraris domini R. de Monte Alto ij._s._ iij. diversis menestrallis, cuilibet iij._s._ ix._s._ Galfrido Citharistae Comitis Warrenniae ij._s._ Matill’ Makejoye xij._d._ Johanni Trumpatori domini R. de Filii Pagani xij._d._ Adae Citharistae domini J. Lestraunge xij._d._ Reginaldo le Menteur, Menestrallo domini J. de Buteturt xij._d._ Perle in the Eghe xij._d._ Gilloto Citharistae Domini P. de Malo Lacu x._s._ Roberto Gaunsillie xl._d._ Item. xl._d._ Jacke de Vescy di._marc._ Magistro Waltero Leskirmissour et fratri suo, cuilibet iij._s._ vj._s._

D

THE MINSTREL HIERARCHY

The term _rex_ is not seldom applied as a distinction amongst minstrels. At the wedding of Joan of England in 1290 were present King Grey of England and King Caupenny of Scotland, together with Poveret, minstrel of the Marshal of Champagne (Chappell, i. 15). Poveret is perhaps the ‘roy de Champaigne’ of the 1306 list, which also includes the ‘roys’ Capenny, Baisescue, Marchis, Robert, and Druet (_Appendix C_). A ‘rex Robertus,’ together with ‘rex Pagius de Hollandia,’ reappears in accounts of the reign of Edward II (1307-27), while one of the minstrels of the king was William de Morlee, ‘roy de North’ (Percy, 416-8; cf. vol. i. p. 49). In France a list of the ‘ministeralli’ of Philip IV in 1288 includes the ‘rex Flaiolatus,’ ‘rex Heraudum,’ and ‘rex Ribaldorum.’ A certain Pariset, who was minstrel to the Comte de Poitiers in 1314, signs the statutes of the Paris guild in 1321 as ‘Pariset, menestrel le roy,’ and the various ‘roys des menestreuls du royaume de France’ who appear in and after 1338 may have been heads at once of the king’s household minstrels and of the guild (_Appendix F_; cf. Bernhard, iii. 380). Further, the title is claimed by the authors of various pieces of minstrel literature. ‘Adenet le roi’ is the author of _Cleomadès_ (Paris, 84; Percy, 416-8), and ‘Huon le roi,’ perhaps identical with ‘Huon de Cambrai’ and ‘Huon Paucele,’ of the _fabliau_ of _Du Vair Palefroi_ (Bédier, 438; Montaiglon-Raynaud, i. 3). The term _rex_ is of course common enough in connexion with temporary or permanent associations of all sorts, and is probably of folk origin (vol. i. chaps. iv, viii). It is possible that some of these ‘rois’ may have been crowned by ‘puis’ (Lavoix, ii. 377), but it is more probable that they had some official pre-eminence amongst their fellows, and perhaps some jurisdiction, territorial or otherwise. Clearly this was the case with the ‘roy des ministralx’ at Tutbury. The appearance of the ‘rex Flaiolatus’ with the ‘rex Heraudum’ and the ‘rex Ribaldorum’ in the French list of 1288 is thus significant, for the latter had just such a jurisdiction over the riff-raff of the court (Ducange, s.v.), and I conceive the relation of the minstrel ‘roys’ to their fellows to have been much that of the ‘Kings at arms’ to the ordinary heralds. It seems that minstrels and heralds belonged to the same class of _ministri_. The order of the Emperor Henry II (vol. i. p. 52) couples ‘ioculatores et armaturi’ and ‘Carleton Haralde’ is actually rewarded in the 1306 list (_App. C_, p. 237). If one may quote a Celtic parallel, the _Arwyddfardd_ or heralds formed a regular division (†1100) of Welsh minstrelsy (E. David, _La Poésie et la Musique dans la Cambrie_, 72-91). Under Richard II the head of the English royal minstrels was a _rex_, but from 1464 onwards the term used is _marescallus_ (Rymer, xi. 512), and this again may be paralleled from the supreme position of the Earl Marshal in heraldry. At the head of the Earl of Lancaster’s minstrels in 1308 was an _armiger_. I only find this term again in the burlesque account of the ‘auncient minstrell’ shown before Elizabeth at Kenilworth (_Appendix H_). He was ‘a squier minstrel of Middilsex’ and, as he bore the arms of Islington, presumably a ‘wait.’

E

EXTRACTS FROM ACCOUNT BOOKS

I. DURHAM PRIORY.

[The entries, unless otherwise specified, are amongst the extracts (generally of _Dona Prioris_) from the Bursars’ Rolls between 1278 and 1371, printed by Canon Fowler in vols. ii, iii of the _Durham Account Rolls_ (Surtees Soc.). _D. H. B._ = _Durham Household Book_ (Surtees Soc.), _F. P._ = _Inventories and Account Rolls of Finchale Priory_ (Surtees Soc.). This was a cell of Durham Priory. The minstrelsy often took place at the _ludi Domini Prioris_, either in his _camera_ (_D. A._ ii. 424) or at Beaurepaire, Witton, or other _maneria_ of the Priory. There seem to have been in most years four _ludi ordinarii_ (_D. A._ ii. 296), though occasionally only two or three are mentioned. These were at the feasts of Candlemas, Easter, St. John Baptist, and All Saints (_D. A._ i. 242, iii. 932). But the Prior, Sub-Prior, and brethren seem often to have been _ludentes_, _spatiantes_, or _in recreacione_ (_D. A._ i. 118, 235), without much regard to fixed dates. In 1438-9 they were _ludentes_ for as much as eleven weeks and four days at Beaurepaire (_D. A._ i. 71). See also _D. A._ i. 16, 116, 120, 129, 137, 138, 142, 166, 207, 263; ii. 287, 419, 456, 515; iii. 810, s.vv. _Ludi_, &c.; _D. H. B._ 9, 13, 54, 141, 240, 339; _F. P._ 30, ccxcv, ccccxxxvi.]

1278. Menestrallo Regis Scociae. Menestrallo de Novo Castro.

1299. Roberto le Taburer.

1300-1. Cuidam hystrioni Regis.

1302-3. Histrionibus domini Regis.

1310-11. Hugoni de Helmeslaye stulto domini Regis. Cuidam Iugulatori d’ni Regis. Cuidam Cytharistae.

†1310. Histrionibus d’ni H. de Bello Monte. In scissura tunicae stulti. †1315. Histrionibus ad Natale.

1330-1. In uno garniamento pro Thoma fatuo empto. Histrionibus ad Natale. ” in fest. S. Cuthberti in Marcio. ” ad fest. S. Cuthberti in Sept. ” d’ni Henrici de Beaumond. Citharistae (in another roll ‘citharatori’) d’ni Roberti de Horneclyff ex precepto Prioris.

1333-4. Duobus histrionibus in die Veneris proximo post octavam beati Martini. Histrionibus d’ni Regis quando d’nus noster Rex rediit de Novo Castro. Stulto d’ni Episcopi. Histrionibus comitis Warenne. Histrionibus Regis Scociae.

1334-5. Histrionibus ad Natale.

1335-6. Histrionibus d’ni Regis Scociae. Duobus histrionibus die Sci. Cuthberti. Duobus histrionibus ex precepto Prioris. Histrionibus Novi Castri ad fest. S. Cuthberti. Histrionibus d’ni R. de Nevill, per Priorem. In 1 Cythara empta pro Thom. Harpour. 3ˢ. Cuidam histrioni apud Beaurepaire per R. de Cotam ex dono Prioris. Thomae fatuo ex precepto eiusdem.

†1335. Istrionibus d’ni Regis. Istrionibus Reginae apud Pytingdon. Istrionibus [die Dominica proxima post festum Epiphaniae, quo die d’nus Episcopus epulabatur cum Priore]. Will’o de Sutton, Citharaedo d’ni Galfridi Lescrop eodem die. Istrionibus die Natalis Domini.

†1336. Duobus istrionibus d’ni Regis. Edmundo de Kendall, Cytharaeto, de dono Prioris ad Pascha. Menestrallis de dono [quando Episcopus epulabatur cum Priore].

†1337. In 1 pari sotularium pro Thoma fatuo.

1338-9. Several payments to ‘istriones’ and ‘menestralli.’ In 4 ulnis burelli scacciati emptis pro garniamento Thomae Fole per preceptum Prioris.

1339-40. In panno empto in foro Dunelm. pro uno garniamento pro Thoma fatuo. Willelmo Piper istrioni d’ni Radulphi de Nevill die Circumcisionis.

1341. Pelidod et duobus sociis suis histrionibus d’ni Regis post Natale Domini.

1341-42. In garniamentis emptis pro ... Thoma fatuo (and similar entries, or for ‘Russet,’ ‘pannus,’ ‘Candelwykstret’ in other years).

†1343. Various payments to ‘Istriones.’

1347-8. ‘Istrionibus,’ &c.

1350-51. Istrionibus ad Natale. ” ad S. Cuthbertum in Sept.

1355-6. Will’o Pyper et aliis istrionibus ad Natale. Item duobus istrionibus d’ni Episcopi et duobus istrionibus Comitis de Norhamton in festo Sci. Cuthberti in Marcio. Item istrionibus d’ni Episcopi ad festum Paschae. Item istrionibus in festo Sci. Cuthberti in Sept.

1356-7. In sepultura Thomae fatui et necessariis expensis circa corpus eius, per manus d’ni Prioris (similar entry in miscellaneous roll, ‘Thomae Fole,’ _D. A._ iii. 719). Diversis ministrallis (_D. A._ iii. 718).

†1357. Et Will’o Blyndharpour ad Natale. Et Ioh’i Harpour d’ni Ioh’is de Streuelyn et Will’o Blyndharpour de Novo Castro. Et duobus Trompours Comitis de Norhamton apud Wyuestow. Et cuidam Harpour vocato Rygeway. Istrionibus d’ni Episcopi (and Harpers, &c.).

†1360. Petro Crouder apud Pityngton, per Capellanum. Item eidem Petro pro uno quarterio ordii sibi dato per Priorem. Duobus Istrionibus Episcopi in festo Assensionis Domini. Et cuidam Istrioni Maioris villae Novi Castri per Capellanum.

1360-61. Will’o Pyper et aliis istrionibus ad Natale per manus Ioh’is del Sayles. Cuidam Welsharpour d’ni Will’i de Dalton. Item histrionibus aliorum dominorum.

1361-2. In uno viro ludenti in uno loyt et uxori eius cantanti apud Bewrpayr (_D. A._ i. 127, _Hostiller’s Accounts_).

1362. Item cuidam histrioni harper episcopi Norwychiae in festo Transl. Sᶜⁱ. Cuthberti. Cuidam Istrioni Jestour Jawdewyne in festo Natalis Domini. Will’o yᵉ kakeharpour ad idem festum. Et Barry similem sibi ad id. festum. Et cuidam ystrioni caeco franco cum uno puero fratre suo. Barry harper ex precepto Prioris in una tunica empta.

1363-4. Item cantoribus in Adventu Domini cum histrionibus ibidem ex dono Prioris. Item cuidam histrioni die Dominica _Quasimodo geniti_.

1364-5. To two players of the Lord Duke at the said feast (of St. Cuthbert) (Raine, _St. Cuthbert_, 109, _Surtees Soc._).

1365-6. Barry Harpour, ystrionibus, &c.

1366-8. Ministrallis, Istrionibus.

1368-9. Rob’o Trompour et Will’o Fergos ministrallo in die Sci. Cuthberti.

1373-4. Duobus Ministrallis cum uno Weyng.

1374. 12 ministrallis in festo Sᶜⁱ. Cuthb.

1375-6. Ministrall. in die S. Cuthb. in Mar. Cuidam ministrallo ludenti coram domino Priori in camera sua. Tribus ministrallis Comitis del Marchie ludentibus coram domino Priore. Cuidam ministrallo domini Regis veniente cum domino de Neuill. 12 ministrallis in festo Sci. Cuthb. in Sept. 4 ministrallis domini Principis in festo exaltacionis Sᶜᵉ. Crucis. Cuidam ministrallo in festo Sᶜⁱ. Mathaei. Ministrallis in festo Sᶜⁱ. Cuthb. in Marcio anno Domini, &c. lxxvᵗᵒ. Duobus ministrallis in die Pasche.

1376-7. Willielmo Fergos et Rogero Harpour caeco ad Natale Domini. Aliis ministrallis domini de Percy in eadem fest.

1377-8. Haraldis, histrionibus et nunciis, ut patet per cedulam.

1378-9. Histrionibus ... dominorum Regis, Ducis, et aliorum dominorum.

1380-1. Iohanni Momford ministrallo domini Regis.

1381-2. Ministrallis domini de Neuill apud Beaurepaire cum domina de Lomly. Ministrallo domini Ducis cum uno saltante in camera domini Prioris. (and others.)

1384-5. Ministrallis domini Regis.

1394-5. Ministrallis in festo S. Cuthb., Henrici Percy, domini Ducis Lancastr., domini de Neuill, Ducis Eborac., de Scocia, comitis Canciae, ad Nat. Domini, de Hilton, Ric. Brome ministrallo, in fest. S. Cuthb. in Marc. Uni Trompet domini Regis. Uni Rotour de Scocia.

1395. Item, in vino, speciebus, in donis datis Confratribus, ministrallis et aliis diversis, ex curialitate (_F. P._ cxv).

1399-1400. Ministrallis.

1401-2. Ministrallis.

1416-7. Ministrallis. Diversis pueris ludentibus coram eodem priore in festo Sᶜⁱ. Stephani hoc anno.

1441-2. Per ... capellanum [et] ... per bursarium ministrallis domini Regis et aliorum dominorum supervenientibus.

1446-7. Ministrallis.

1449-50. Ministrallis.

1464-5. Et solvit Iohanni Andrewson et sociis suis operantibus pro nova tectura unius camerae vocatae le Playerchambre (_F. P._ ccxcv).

1465. Item j por de ferro in camera Prioris, j in le plaer cha ... (_F. P._ ccxcviii).

1496. Paid to Robert Walssch for two days playing John Gibson of Elvet ‘herper’ (_D. H. B._ 340).

1532-3. ... bus lusoribus ... Regis, in regardis, in auro, 15ˢ. Et custodi ursorum et cimearum dominae Principis. Et capellano, per bursarium, pro 4 lusoribus domini Comitis de Darby, in auro, 7ˢ. 6ᵈ. (_D. H. B._ 143, the last two items crossed out).

1536-7. In diversis donis datis ministrallis diversorum dominorum.

1538. Paid to the ministrels (_ministrallis_) at ‘le musters’ upon ‘le Gelymore.’

1539-40. Paid to the players (_lusoribus_) of Auklande at Christmas before Master Hyndley, as a present (_D. H. B._ 340).

1554-5. [Cathedral Account.] Paid for two mynstralles.

II. MAXSTOKE PRIORY.

[Printed by Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 97, ‘_ex orig. penes me_.’]

‘In the Prior’s accounts of the Augustine canons of Maxstoke in Warwickshire, of various years in the reign of Henry VI (1422-61), one of the styles or regular heads is _De Ioculatoribus et Mimis_....

Ioculatori in septimana S. Michaelis, ivᵈ. Citharistae tempore natalis domini et aliis iocatoribus, ivᵈ. Mimis de Solihull, viᵈ. Mimis de Coventry, xxᵈ. Mimo domini Ferrers, viᵈ. Lusoribus de Eton, viiiᵈ. Lusoribus de Coventry, viiiᵈ. Lusoribus de Daventry, xiiᵈ. Mimis de Coventry, xiiᵈ. Mimis domini de Asteley, xiiᵈ. Item iiij mimis domini de Warewyck, xᵈ. Mimo caeco, iiᵈ. Sex mimis domini de Clynton. Duobus mimis de Rugeby, xᵈ. Cuidam citharistae, viᵈ. Mimis domini de Asteley, xxᵈ. Cuidam citharistae, viᵈ. Citharistae de Coventry, viᵈ. Duobus citharistis de Coventry, viiiᵈ. Mimis de Rugeby, viiiᵈ. Mimis domini de Buckeridge, xxᵈ. Mimis domini de Stafford, iiˢ. Lusoribus de Coleshille, viijᵈ.... [1432] Dat. duobus mimis de Coventry in die consecrationis Prioris, xiiᵈ.’

III. THETFORD PRIORY.

[From Collier, i. 55, 84, on the authority of a ‘MS. of the expenses of the Priory of Thetford, from 1461 to 1540, lately in the collection of Mr. Craven Orde, and now of the Duke of Newcastle.’]

‘The mention of “plays” and “players” does not begin until the 13ᵗʰ of Henry VII; but “Minstrels” and “Waytes” are often spoken of there as receiving rewards from the convent. The following entries, regarding “plays” and “players,” occur between the 13ᵗʰ and 23ʳᵈ of Henry VII:—

13 Henry VII [1497-8]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard 12 capital plays, 4ˢ. Itᵐ. sol. to menstrell and players in festo Epiphaniae, 2ˢ.

19 Henry VII [1503-4]. Itᵐ. sol. to the play of Mydenale, 12ᵈ.

21 Henry VII [1505-6]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard lusoribus et menstrall, 17ᵈ.

23 Henry VII [1507-8]. Itᵐ. sol. in regard lusoribus div. vices, 3ˢ 4ᵈ. Itᵐ. sol. in regard to Ixworth play, 16ᵈ. Itᵐ. sol. in regard to Schelfanger play, 4ᵈ.

... From the 1ˢᵗ to the 31ˢᵗ Henry VIII, the King’s players, the King’s jugglers, the King’s minstrels, and the King’s bearwards were visitors of Thetford, and were paid various sums, from 4ᵈ to 6ˢ 8ᵈ, by the Prior of the convent there, as appears by the entries in the account-book during that period. On one occasion, 16 Henry VIII, Cornyshe, “the master of the King’s chapel,” was paid 3ˢ 4ᵈ by the prior; but he was then, probably, attendant upon the King, who is not unfrequently spoken of as having arrived, and being lodged at the Priory. Mr. Brandon and Mr. Smith are more than once rewarded as “Jugglers of the King.” The Queen’s players, the Prince’s players, and the players of the Queen of France, also experienced the liberality of the Prior, as well as those of the Duke of Norfolk, the Duke of Suffolk, the Earl and Countess of Derby, Lord and Lady Fitzwater, the Lord Privy Seal, the Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Challoner and two gentlemen who are called Marks and Barney.’

IV. WINCHESTER COLLEGE.

[Extracts from _computi_ partly by Hazlitt-Warton, ii. 98, and partly by M. E. C. Walcott, _William of Wykeham and his Colleges_, 206. The _satrapae_ of 1466 and 1479 are said by Mr. Walcott to have been local notables, but a collation to them would not cost so little or be grouped with rewards to minstrels in the _computus_. Ducange says that the word is used ‘pro quodam ministro vel satellite.’ The Magdalen accounts use it for the ‘serjeants’ of the mayor of Oxford (Macray, _Register_, i. 15).]

1400. In dono lusoribus civitatis Wynton venient. ad collegium cum suo tripudio ex curialitate, xijᵈ.

1412. In dat. Ricᵒ. Kent bochier tempore regno suo vocat. Somerkyng, xijᵈ.

1415. In dat. diversis hominibus de Ropley venientibus ad coll. die Sanct. Innoc. et tripudiantibus et cantantibus in aula coram Epō. scholarium, xxᵈ.

1422. Dat. histrioni dⁿⁱ epi Wynton et ioculatori ejusdem 5ᵗⁱ die Ianuarii, cuilibet, xxᵈ.

1425. Dat. Gloucester ioculatori ludenti coram custode et sociis penultimo die Iulii, ob reverentiam ducis Exon. xijᵈ.

1426. Dat. ministrellis d. epi Wynton tempore Nat. Dni. ex curialitate et honestate, ijˢ viiiᵈ. Dat. ij ministrallis comitissae de Westmorland vęnient’ ad coll. xxᵈ.

1433. In dat. mimis dⁿⁱ cardinalis venient’ ad collegium erga festum natale Dⁿⁱ iiijˢ.

1462. Dat’ Epo Nicholatensi visitanti Dominum custodem in hospitio suo de nocte Sᵗⁱ. Nicholai, iiijᵈ.

1464. Et in dat. ministrallis comitis Kanciae venient. ad coll. in mense Iulii, iiijˢ iiijᵈ.

1466. Et in dat. satrapis Wynton venientibus ad coll. festo Epiphaniae, cum ijˢ dat. iiij. interludentibus et J. Meke citharistae eodem festo, iiijˢ.

1467. Et in datis iiijᵒʳ mimis dom. de Arundell venient. ad coll. xiij. die Febr. ex curialitate dom. custodis, ijˢ. In dat. Ioh. Pontisbery et socio ludentibus in aula in die circumcisionis, ijˢ.

1471. In dat. uni famulo dⁿⁱ regis Angliae venienti ad collegium cum Leone mense Ianuarii, xxᵈ.

1472. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Regis cum viijᵈ. dat. duobus Berewardis ducis Clarentiae, xxᵈ. Et in dat. Iohanni Stulto quondam dom. de Warewyco, cum iiijᵈ dat. Thomae Nevyle taborario. Et in datis duobus ministrallis ducis Glocestriae, cum iiijᵈ. dat. uni ministrallo ducis de Northumberland, viijᵈ. Et in datis duobus citharatoribus ad vices venient. ad collegium viijᵈ.

1477. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Principis venient. ad coll. festo Ascensionis Domini, cum xxᵈ. dat. ministrallis dom. Regis, vˢ.

1479. Et in datis satrapis Wynton venientibus ad coll. festo Epiphaniae, cum xijᵈ dat. ministrallis dom. episcopi venient. ad coll. infra octavas epiphaniae, iiiˢ. Dat. lusoribus de civitate Winton. venientibus ad collegium in apparatu suo mens. Iulii, vˢ vijᵈ.

1481. Et in sol. ministrallis dom. regis venientibus ad collegium xv die Aprilis cum xijᵈ solut. ministrallis dom. episcopi Wynton venientibus ad collegium iᵒ die Iunii, iiijˢ iiijᵈ. Et in dat. ministrallis dom. Arundell ven. ad coll. cum viijᵈ dat. ministrallis dom. de la Warr, ijˢ iijᵈ.

1483. Sol. ministrallis dom. regis, ven. ad coll. iijˢ iiijᵈ.

1484. Et in dat. uni ministrallo dom. principis et in aliis ministrallis ducis Glocestriae v die Iulii, xxᵈ.

1536. In dat. ministrallis dⁿⁱ regis venientibus ad coll. xiij die April pro regardo, ijˢ.

1573. In regardis dat’ tibicinis dominae reginae cum vino, vijˢ iiijᵈ. In regardis dat. lusoribus dominae reginae, vjˢ viijᵈ.

V. MAGDALEN COLLEGE, OXFORD.

[Extracts from account books made by J. R. Bloxam and W. D. Macray, _A Register of the Members of St. Mary Magdalen College, Oxford_, First Series, ii. 235; New Series, i. 3; ii. 3. The dates given below are for the year in which the account begins.]

1481. pro cerothecis pro chorustis, iiijᵈ.

1482. vᵒ die Decembris pro cerothecis episcopi in festo S. Nicholai iiijᵈ.

1483. pro cerothecis datis ad honorem Sancti Nicolai duobus choristis, viijᵈ.

1484. pro cerothecis Episcopi in festo Sancti Nicholai et eius crucem ferentis, viijᵈ.

1485. ‘Ursarii’ of Lord Stanley dined with the Fellows.

1486. pro factura sepulturae erga pascham, xijᵈ. ‘Sex vagatores’ dined with the servants. Solut. viᵒ die Ian. citharistis et mimis tempore ludi in aula in regardo, in tempore Nativitatis Domini, viijᵈ. Solut. pro quodam ornamento lusorum vocato _ly Cape mayntenawnce_, ixᵈ.

1487. pro vestimentis lusorum tempore Nativ. Domini, consilio unius decani, iiˢ ijᵈ. pro clavis ad pannos in ornatum aulae pendendos, jᵈ.

1488. Sol. Iohanni Wynman pro scriptura unius libri de servicio episcopi pro die Innocencium, vᵈ.

1490. Singers from Abingdon, London and Hereford entertained.

1494. Sol. Pescode servanti quandam bestiam vocatam _ly merumsytt_ ex consilio seniorum, quia Rex erat apud Woodstocke, xijᵈ.

1495. Sol. Henrico Mertyn pro lino, _alyn_, et aliis emptis pro ludo in die Paschae, xvijᵈ ob. Sol. Pescod ducenti duo animalia nuncupata _mermosettes_.

1502. Sol. in expensis factis tempore Nativitatis Domini, in biberiis post interludia et alia, xiijˢ iiijᵈ.

1506. To John Burgess, B.A., ... xᵈ were paid for writing out a miracle-play (‘scriptura lusi’) of Sᵗ. Mary Magd., and vˢ. for some music; and viijᵈ to a man who brought some songs from Edward Martyn, M.A. For his diligence with regard to the above miracle-play, Kendall, a clerk, was rewarded with iˢ. pro expensis mimi, iiijˢ, at Christmas.

1507. in quatuor refectionibus citharistae, at Epiphany.

1508. Sol. famulo Regis ducenti ursam ad collegium, ex mandato Vice-presidentis, xijᵈ.

1509. Sol. pane, cibo et aliis datis pueris ludentibus in die Paschae, mandato Vicepr. xvijᵈ ob.

1510. Sol. pro expensis factis in aula tempore Nativitatis Domini, xiijˢ iiijᵈ. Sol. cuidam mimo tempore Nativitatis Domini in regardo, viijᵈ.

1512. Sol. Petro Pyper pro pypyng in interludio nocte Sancti Iohannis, vjᵈ. Sol. Iohanni Tabourner pro lusione in interludio Octavis Epiphaniae, vjᵈ. Sol. Roberto Johnson pro una tunica pro interludiis, iiijˢ.

1514. pro carnibus [? carbonibus] consumptis in capella tribus noctibus ante Pascha et in tempore Nativitatis, ijˢ.

1518. To Perrot, the Master of the choristers, ‘pro tinctura et factura tunicae eius qui ageret partem Christi et pro crinibus mulieribus, ijˢ vjᵈ.’

1520. pro pane ... datis clericis in vigiliis Sᵗⁱ. Nicolai. pro cerothecis puerorum in festo Sancti Nicolai.

1526. pro merendis datis episcopo capellanis clericis et aliis in vigilia Sᵗ. Nicolai.

1529. pro ... episcopo Nicholai.

1530. pro pueris in festo Sancti Nicholai.

1531. Solut. mimis dominae principisshae, xxᵈ. Pro biberio dato sociis et scolaribus post interludia in tempore Natalis Domini, vjˢ viijᵈ.

1532. To the Queen’s players, by the President’s order, xiiᵈ. pro biberio dato sociis post ludum baccalaureorum in magna aula, vjˢ viijᵈ.

1535. pro merenda facta in vigilia Sancti Nicolai. Actors at Christmas, iiiiˢ iiijᵈ. pro merenda facta post comediam actam, ixˢ iijᵈ. ‘ioculatoribus Regis,’ by the President’s order, xxᵈ.

1536. pro biberio in nocte Sancti Nicholai. Sol. mimo pro solatiis factis sociis et scholasticis tempore Nativitatis Domini, viijˢ.

1537. pro carbonibus consumptis in sacrario, per custodes sepulchri, et per pueros in festis hiemalibus, ijˢ [and in other years].

1539. pro bellariis datis sociis cum ageretur comedia, viijˢ.

1540. pro epulis datis sociis eo tempore quo agebatur tragedia, viijˢ iiijᵈ. pro bellariis datis sociis et clericis vigilia divi Nicolai, iiijˢ viijᵈ. pro pane et potu datis semicommunariis dum curabant publicam exhibere comediam, xxᵈ.

1541. A ‘tympanista’ was hired at Christmas and comedies acted.

1554. 30 Ian. in adventu [dom. Matravers] ad tragedias per duas noctes, xlijˢ viijᵈ ob. Pro epulis datis sociis post exactas tragedias, xˢ ixᵈ.

The only Elizabethan entry I need note is:—

1561. Sol. Joyner, pictori, depingenti portenta religiosorum in spectaculo Baulino, iijˢ iiijᵈ ... depingenti nomina haeresium in spectaculo (in aula) quod choristarum moderator [Richard Baull] ordinavit.

VI. SHREWSBURY CORPORATION.

[Extracts from the Bailiffs’ accounts by Owen and Blakeway, _Hist. of Shrewsbury_ (1825), i. 262, 267, 275, 284, 290, 292, 325 sqq.; and by W. D. Macray in _Hist. MSS._ xv. 10. 25. It is not always clear to which calendar year an entry belongs. The accounts run from Michaelmas to Michaelmas, but Owen and Blakeway generally quote entries under one calendar year and sometimes under one regnal year.]

1401. ‘Histriones’ of the Prince and the Earl of Stafford. ‘Menstralles’ of the Earls of Worcester and Stafford.

1409. Players [i.e. in these early accounts, ‘histriones,’ not ‘lusores’] of the countess and earl of Arundel, of Lord Powis, Lord Talbot, and Lord Furnivall. Players ‘in honorem villae’ at the marriage of a cousin of David Holbache.

1437. Minstrels of earl of Stafford.

1438. Livery to two town minstrels, ‘voc. _waytes_.’

1442. Some town minstrels called ‘histriones.’ In same year, ‘histrionibus regis,’ and in subsequent years ‘histrionibus’ of earl of Shrewsbury and others, including one ‘voc. Trumpet.’

1450. Players and minstrels at coming of duke of York from Ireland.

1457. Denaria soluta uni ministrallo domini principis [Edward] pro honestate villae. Quatuor ministrallis domini ducis de Bukyngham. Duobus ministrallis d’ni de Powys. 1 lagenae vini de Ruyn dictis ministrallis. Denaria data uni ministrallo d’ni principis et suo puero. iiij. ministrallis d’ni ducis de Eboraco. iv. ministrellis d’ni ducis de Excestro.

1474. Regardo ministrallis d’ni ducis de Clarence.

1478. Waltero Harper ministrallo d’ni principis. Regardo dato uni ministrallo ducis Gloucestris vocato le Taborer. Regardo sex ministrallis d’ni Regis.

1479. Soluta pro liberata ministrallorum vocatorum Wayts, quilibet eorum. Soluta pro conductu unius ministralli vocati Wayt a villa de Norhampton usque Salop. Soluta pro quodam regardo dato uni ministrallo d’ni Regis via elemosinaria causa eius paupertatis et aetatis.

[From this point _histriones_ replaces _ministralli_ in the accounts.]

1483. Soluta pro quodam regardo dato sex histrionibus domini Regis pro honestate villae. Pro vino dato dictis histrionibus in praesencia ballivorum et aliorum proborum hominum pro honestate villae. Pro liberatura communium histrionum vocatorum le Wayts villae. Soluta ursenario domini Regis pro honestate villae.

1495. Pro vino dato domino Principi [Arthur] ad ludum in quarell.

1496. Wine given to the minstrels of our Lord the King. To the King’s minstrels. To the Queen’s minstrels. To the Prince’s players. To the Earl of Derby’s players. To the Earl of Shrewsbury’s players.

1503. In regardo dato ij Walicis histrionibus domini Regis.

1510. ‘Lusoribus’ in feast of Pentecost. ‘Histrionibus’ of Earl of Shrewsbury and King.

1516. In vino, pomis, waffers, et aliis novellis datis et expenditis super abbatem Salop et famulos suos ad ludum et demonstrationem martiriorum Felicianae et Sabinae in quarera post muros. In regardo dato lusoris eiusdem martirii tunc temporis hoc anno.

1517. Regardo ursinario comitis Oxoniae. In regardo dato ursinario domini Regis pro agitacione bestiarum suarum ultra denarios tunc ibidem collectos.

1518. In vino expendito super tres reges Coloniae equitantibus in interludio pro solacio villae Salop in festo Pentecost.

1520. Ralph Hubard, minstrel of Lord de ‘Mountegyle.’ In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ interlusoribus comitis Arundele ostendentibus ballivis et comparibus suis diversa interludia. Et in vino dato eis et aliis extraneis personis intuentibus interludia, ultra denarios collectos. In regardo dato histrionibus Iohannis Talbot militis pro melodia eorum facta in presencia ballivorum. In regardo dato iij histrionibus comitis Arundelle pro honestate villae Salop. In regardo dato Benet & Welles histrionibus comitis Salop. In regardo ij histrionibus comitissae de Derby pro honestate villae Salop. Et in vino expendito per ballivos et compares suos audientes melodiam eorum. Histrionibus domini Regis ex consuetudine. In regardo dato et vino expendito super Willelmum More histrionem domini Regis eo quod est caecus et principalis citherator Angliae.

1521. Regardo dato M. Brandon ioculatori domini Regis pro honestate villae Et in vino expendito par ballivos & compares suos videntes lusum et ioculationem dicti ioculatoris ultra ij denarios collectos de qualibet persona villae extraneis exceptis. Soluta pro una roba nova depicta, sotularibus & aliis necessariis regardis & expensis factis super Ricardum Glasyer, abbatem de Marham, pro honestate & iocunditate villae. In regardo dato portitori communis campanae circa villam pro proclamacione facta pro attendencia facienda super abbatem de Marham tempore Maii hoc anno. In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ histrionibus domini Regis de consuetudine. Histrionibus comitis Derby. Regardo dato ursinario ducis Suffolke ultra 2ˢ. 3ᵈ. de pecuniis collectis de circumstantibus ad agitacionem ursarum suarum. Pro ursinario domini marchionis Dorsett.

1522. ‘Ursenarius’ of duke of Suffolk. In regardo dato ioculatori domini Regis.

1524. ‘Histrio’ of Henry Knight. ‘Histriones’ of Earl of Derby. ‘Histriones’ of Lord Mount Egle.

1525. In regardo dato iiij histrionibus comitis Arundell. Et in vino expendito super ballivos & compares suos audientes melodiam et ludentes inspicientes. In regardo dato iiijᵒʳ interlusoribus ducis Suffolk. Interludes of the Lady Princess, and wine spent at hearing their interludes.

1526. In regardo dato custodi cameli domini Regis ostendenti ballivis et comparibus suis ioca illius cameli. Interlusoribus dominae principissae. Ralph Hubard, minstrel of Lord de ‘Mountegyle,’ with one Lokkett.

1527. In regardo dato lusoribus villae tempore veris et mensis Maii pro iocunditate villae. Interlusoribus dominae principissae. Interluders of our Lord the King. ‘Histriones,’ of Sir John Talbot, Arthur Neuton and Sir John Lyngen.

1528. ‘Ursenarius’ of marquis of Exeter.

1530. ‘Histrio’ of baron of Burford.

1531. Data interlusoribus dominae principissae.

1533. Soluta Thomae Eton pro factura unius mansionis de duobus stagiis pro domino presidenti [Bishop of Exeter] et ballivis tempore ludi septimana Pentecostes. Et in regardo dato lusoribus ad dictum lusum et pro reparacione ornamentorum suorum. In vino dato domino presidenti & ballivis in mansione sua tempore lusi in Quarrera pone muros. In regardo dato lusoribus & interlusoribus domini Regis ostendentibus & offerentibus ioca sua. Et in vino expendito super eos et comitivam ballivorum & comparium suorum audientium & supervidentium lusum & melodiam eorum. In expensis factis in garniamentis, liberatis et histrion[ibus] pro domino abbate de Marham tempore mensis Maii pro honestate villae hoc anno.

1535. In regardo m[agistro] Brandon, ioculatori domini Regis. In regardo dato histrionibus extraneis melodiam et cantilenas eorum coram ballivis et comparibus pronunciantibus.

1538. Data in regardo lusoribus domini privati sigilli. Data in regarda lusoribus domini principis [Edward]. Expendita super lusores domini principis, domini privati sigilli, domini visitatoris ... pro honestate villae. ‘Histriones’ of Sir Thomas Cornewall and of Thomas Newport. Rogero Philipps, goldsmyth, pro argento et emendacione colarium histrionum villae. ‘Ursenarius’ of marquis of Exeter.

1540. Data in regardo quibusdam interlusoribus de Wrexam ludentibus coram ballivis et comparibus suis in vino tunc expendito. ‘Item, Mr. Bayleffes left on pᵈ more the same day at aftʳ the play. ‘Item, the vj men spend appon the kyng’s pleyers in wyne. ‘Item, there was left on pᵈ by Mr. Bayleffs wᵗ my Lorde Prinssys plears on Sonday after Seint Bartlaumew day. ‘Item, there was sent them the nyght to supper a poˡ of red and a poˡ of claret. ‘Item, Mr. Bayleffs left on pᵈ on Sonday after owre Lade day wyth my Lord Prinsys plears.’ Cuidam iugulatori ludenti coram ballivis.

1541. ‘Ursenario ducis Norfoxiae.’

1542. In vino dato interlusoribus post interlusum in cimitirio sancti Cedde coram commissariis domini Regis ballivis et aliis. Cuidem ursuario de la Northewiche. Ursiatori praepotentis viri comitis Derby ad ij tempora. Pro reparacione et pictura ornamentorum abbatis de Mayvole. Et soluta pro una toga de nova facta dicto abbati de Mayvole. Soluta Ricardo Glasier pro labore suo in ludendo abbatem de Mardall.

1548. Interlusoribus ludentibus cum domino abbate de Marall. Soluta Iohanni Mason, peynter, pro pictura togae pro dicto domino de Marrall. In regardo istrionibus ludentibus ante viros armatos. Cuidam istrioni ludenti ante viros equiles equitantes ad Scociam.

1549. James Lockwood ‘servienti et gestatori domini Regis.’ Interluders of Sir John Bridges and of Sir Edward Braye. William Taylor, and others, interluders of the town of Salop, playing there in the month of May. ‘Histriones’ of William Sheldon and of Lord Ferrers [last use of term histrio].

1552. Interluders of Lord Russell. Soluta domino de abbott Marram et pro apparatu eorum videlicet pro calciamentis tunicis et aliis vestibus.

1553. Expendita per ballivos et associatos suos die lunae in le Whitson wuck post visum lusum. Pro tunicis et aliis vestimentis ac pistura eorundem pro Robyn Hood. In vino dato eisdem interlusoribus. In regardo le tomlers.

1554. In regardo Thomae Staney le jugler. Wyett le gester.

1559. Regardo lusiatoribus domini Stafford.

1561. Item, gyvyn unto my lord Wyllybe’s playarys in reward. Item, spent at the gullet on the saem playarys.

1565. To Master Baly Pursell with the Quenes players.

1566. Yeven Mr. Justes Throgmerton’s mynstrell.

1574. Paid and geven to my L. Sandwayes man, the berwart. The players of noblemen and others and ber-wards of noblemen and mynstrells of noblemen, this yere, viiiˡⁱ xˢ viijᵈ.

1576. Leid out to my lord of Derby and my lord Staffart’s musicions.

1582. Bestowed on her Majesty’s players this yere.

1591. To my lord of Derby’s musysyons, and to the erle of Woster’s players ... to my L. Beachem men, beinge players.

[From _Books of Council Orders in Hist. MSS._ xv. 13, 16, 18.]

1556. 16 May. The bailiffs to set forward the stage play this next Whitsontide for the worship of the town and not to disburse above £5 about the furniture of the play.

1570. 8 July. Lease of pasture ‘behind the walles, exceptinge the Quarrell where the plases have bine accustomyd to be usyd.’

1575. 17 July. Five marks to be given to Mr. Churchyard for his pains taken in setting forth the show against the Queen’s coming, being sent hither by the Lord President.

VII. THE HOWARDS OF STOKE-BY-NAYLAND, ESSEX.

[From accounts of Sir John Howard, in _Manners and Household Expenses_ (Roxburghe Club, 1841), 325, 511.]

2 May, 1465. Item that he [my master] delyverd the pleyers at Moleyns [a servant of Sir John’s] weddynge, ijˢ.

12 Jan. 1466. And the sonday nexte after the xij day, I ȝafe to the pleyeres of Stoke, ijˢ.

[From accounts of John, Lord Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk, in _Household Books of John, Duke of Norfolk, and Thomas, Earl of Surrey_ (ed. Collier, Roxburghe Club, 1844), 104, 145, 146, 148, 149, 202, 336, 339.]

29 Aug. 1481. I paid to the pleirs of Turton [Thorington] Strete, xxᵈ.

26 Dec. 1481. Item, the xxvj day of December, my Lord toke the Plaiers of Kokesale [Coggeshall], iijˢ iiijᵈ.

27 Dec. 1481. Item, to the Plaiers of Hadley [Hadleigh], and the olde man and ij. children, vjˢ viijᵈ.

7 Jan. 1482. Item, to the Plaiers of Esterforde, iijˢ iiijᵈ.

9 Jan. 1482. Item, to Senclowe, that he paid to my Lord of Essex [Henry Bourchier] men, plaiers, xxᵈ. Thei are of Canans.

22 May, 1482. Item, that my Lord yaffe to the cherche on Whitson Monday at the pley, xˢ.

25 Dec. 1482. Item, on Crystemas day, my Lord gaff to iiij pleyers of my lord of Gloucestres, iijˢ iiijᵈ. Item, the same day, my Lord gaff to iiij pleyers of Coksale, iijˢ iiijᵈ.

9 Jan. 1483. Item, the same day, my Lord paid to Garard, of Sudbury, for all suche stoffe as folewyth, that he bought for the Dysgysing [a schedule of paper, gunpowder, ‘arsowde,’ pack-thread, &c., follows]. Summe totall, xxjˢ ob.

[From accounts of Thomas, Earl of Surrey, in _Household Books_ (_ut supra_), 515, 517, 519.]

20 Dec. 1490. Payd for xviij yardes of lynen cloth, that M. Leynthorpe had for dysgysyng, at iiijᵈ the yard, ... vjˢ iiijᵈ.

[Other expenses for the disguising follow.]

27 Dec. 1490. Item, payd to the playars of Chemsford, vjˢ. viijᵈ.

2 Jan. 1491. Item, the said day, in reward to the panget [pageant (?)], iijˢ iiijᵈ. Item, payd to ——, when he went to Bury to fach stuff for dygysers on Saynt Stevens day, xvjᵈ.

8 Jan. 1492. Item, in reward to the players of Lanam [Lavenham], xlˢ.

[The Howard accounts also include many payments for minstrelsy, &c. The Duke of Norfolk kept singers, a harper, children of the chapel, and two fools, ‘Tom Fool’ and Richard, ‘the fool of the kitchen.’]

VIII. THE ENGLISH COURT.

[From Rymer, _Foedera_, x. 387. A memorandum _de strenis, liberatis et expensis_, at Christmas, 1427.]

A Jakke Travail et ses compaignons feisans diverses jeuues et entreludes dedeins le feste de Noell devant notre dit sire le roi, 4 lib.

Et as autres jeweis de Abyndon feisantz autres entreludes dedeins le dit feste de Noel, 20 sol.

[Extracted by Collier, i. 50, from the _Household Book_ of Henry VII, 1491-1505, and the _Book of King’s Payments_, 1506-9. I cannot identify the former; the latter appears to be vol. 214 of the _Miscellanea of the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer_ (Scargill-Bird, _Guide to the Public Records_, 228). I omit, here and below, entries referring to minstrelsy, disguisings, and plays by the King’s players and the Chapel. Probably some of the performances were given at London; others before the King on progress. I have corrected some of Collier’s dates from the similar entries in Bentley, _Excerpta Historica_, 85, taken from a transcript in _B. M. Add. MS._ 7099.]

1 Jan. 1492. To my Lorde of Oxon pleyers, in rewarde, £1.

7 Jan. 1493. To my Lorde of Northumberlande Pleyers, in rewarde, £1.

1 Jan. 1494. To four Pleyers of Essex in rewarde, £1. To the Pleyers of Wymborne Minster, £1.

6 Jan. 1494. To the Frenche Pleyers for a rewarde, £1.

31 Dec. 1494. To 3 Pleyers of Wycombe in rewarde, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

4 Jan. 1495. To the Frenshe Pleyers in rewarde, £2.

20 July, 1498. To the pleyers of London in rewarde, 10ˢ.

14 June, 1499. To the pleyers with Marvells, £4.

6 Aug. 1501. To the Pleyers at Myles End, 3ˢ 4ᵈ.

2 Jan. 1503. To the Pleyers of Essex in rewarde, £1.

20 May, 1505. To the Players of Kingeston toward the bilding of the churche steple, in almasse, 3ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1506. To the players that played afore the Lord Stewarde in the Hall opon Sonday nyght, 6ˢ 8ᵈ. To my lorde Princes players that played in hall on new-yeres even, 10ˢ.

25 Dec. 1506. To the Players that played affore the Lord Stewarde in the Hall opon Tewesday nyght, 10ˢ.

2 Jan. 1509. To my lord of Buckingham’s pleyers that playd in the Hall at Grenewich, 6ˢ 8ᵈ.

[Extracted by Collier, i. 76, from the _Book of King’s Payments_ for 1509-17, now vol. 215 of the _Miscellanea of the Treasury of the Receipt of the Exchequer_. The document is more fully analysed in Brewer, ii. 1441. It is an account of the Treasurer of the Chamber.]

6 Jan. 1512. To the Players that cam out of Suffolke, that playd affore the Lorde Stewarde in the Kings Hall opon Monday nyght, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1515. To the Erle of Wiltyshires playres, that shulde have played in the Kings Hall oppon Thursday at nyght, in rewarde, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

1 Jan. 1516. To the Erle of Wilshire’s players, 13ˢ 4ᵈ.

[From _Accounts of Treasurer of Chamber_ in _Trevelyan Papers_ (C.S.), i. 146, 161, 174.]

1 Jan. 1530. To the Prince’s plaiers.

1 Jan. 1531. To the Princes pleyers. Item, paid to certain Players of Coventrye, as in wey of the Kinges rewarde, for playnge in the Corte this last Cristmas.

1 Jan. 1532. To the Princesse plaiers.

F

MINSTREL GUILDS

A. FRANCE.

1. _Arras_, †1105.

The famous _Pui d’Arras_ (vols. i. p. 376, ii. p. 88) was in a sense a minstrel guild. According to tradition a plague was stayed by a simultaneous apparition of the Virgin in a dream to two minstrels, which led to the acquisition of ‘le joyel d’Arras,’ the miraculous ‘cierge de notre Dame.’ This was about 1105, and the result was the foundation of the _Confrérie_ or _Carité de N. D. des Ardents_, which afterwards developed into the _pui_. This was not confined to minstrels, but they were predominant. The _Statutes_ say, ‘Ceste carité est estorée des jogleors, et les jogleors en sont signors[680].’ The objects of the _pui_, however, were religious, social, and literary. It was not a craft guild, such as grew up two centuries later.

2. _Paris_, 1321.

Ordinances were made in 1321 ‘à l’acort du commun des menestreus et menestrelles, jougleurs et jougleresses’ of Paris for the reformation of their ‘mestier,’ and registered with the provost of Paris in 1341. They chiefly regulate the employment of minstrels within the city. The ‘mestres du dit mestier’ are to be ‘ii ou iii preudes hommes’ appointed by the provost on behalf of the King. A number of ‘guètes’ and other minstrels sign, beginning with ‘Pariset, menestrel le roy,’ and ending with ‘Jaque le Jougleur.’ As a possible head of the ‘mestier’ is named ‘li prevost de Saint-Julian.’ This seems to contemplate the foundation of the _hospice et confrérie_ under the patronage of SS. Julian and Genesius, and in close connexion with the ‘mestier,’ which actually took place 1328-35. But in the later Statutes of 1407 the head of the guild is called the ‘roy des ménestriers,’ and as by this time the guild seems to claim some authority over the whole of France, it is probable that this ‘roy’ was identical with the ‘roy des menestreuls du royaume de France,’ a title which occurs in various documents from 1338 onwards. He may also have been identical with the ‘roy’ of the King’s household minstrels (cf. p. 239). The Paris guild lasted until the suppression of all such privileged bodies in 1776[681].

3. _Chauny._

The corporation of ‘les Trompettes jougleurs’ of Chauny was founded during the fifteenth century. This town claimed to provide _bateleurs_ for all the north of France[682].

B. ENGLAND.

There are two early jurisdictions over minstrelsy, which are not strictly of the nature of guilds.

1. _Chester._

Tradition has it that †1210 Randal Blundeville, Earl of Chester, besieged by the Welsh in Rhuddlan Castle, was relieved by Roger Lacy, constable of Cheshire, with a mob of riff-raff from Chester Midsummer fair. Randal gave to Lacy, and Lacy’s son John gave to his steward Hugh de Dutton and his heirs the ‘magistratum omnium leccatorum et meretricum totius Cestriae.’ The fact of the jurisdiction is undoubted. It was reserved by the charter to the London guild in 1469, claimed by Laurence de Dutton in 1499, admitted upon an action of _quo warranto_ as a right ‘from time immemorial,’ further reserved in the first Vagrant Act (1572) which specifically included minstrels, and in the successive Acts of 1597, 1603, 1628, 1641, 1713, 1740, 1744. It lapsed when this last Act was repealed in 1822. Up to 1756 the heir of Dutton regularly held his _curia Minstralciae_ at Chester Midsummer fair, and issued licences to fiddlers in the city and county for a fee of 4½_d._, afterwards raised to 2_s._ 6_d._ Thomas Dutton (1569-1614), under puritan influences, inserted a proviso against piping and dancing on Sundays[683].

2. _Tutbury._

Letters patent of John of Gaunt dated 1380 and confirmed by an ‘inspeximus’ of Henry VI in 1443 assigned ‘le roy des ministralx’ in the honour of Tutbury to arrest all minstrels within the honour not doing service on the feast of the Assumption. It was a custom that the prior of Tutbury should provide a bull for a bull-running by the assembled minstrels on this feast. The court was still held by an annual ‘king of the fiddlers,’ with the steward and bailiff of the honour (including Staffs., Derby, Notts., Leicester, and Warwick), at the end of the seventeenth century, and the minstrels claimed to be exempt, like those of Chester, from vagrancy legislation. But their rights were not reserved, either by the Charter of 1469 or the Vagrant Acts[684].

The first English craft guild of minstrels is later by a century and a half than that of Paris.

3. _London._

A charter of Edward IV (1469), ‘ex querelosa insinuatione dilectorum nobis Walteri Haliday, marescalli [and seven others] ministrallorum nostrorum,’ declares that ‘nonnulli rudes Agricolae et Artifices diversarum Misterarum Regni nostri Angliae finxerunt se fore Ministrallos. Quorum aliqui Liberatam nostram, eis minime datam, portarunt, seipsos etiam fingentes esse Ministrallos nostros proprios. Cuius quidem Liberatae ac dictae Artis sive Occupationis Ministrallorum colore in diversis Partibus Regni nostri praedicti grandes Pecuniarum Exactiones de Ligeis nostris deceptive colligunt et recipiunt.’ Hence illegitimate competition with the real minstrels, decay of the art, and neglect of agriculture. The charter then does two things. It makes the royal minstrels a corporation with a marshall elected by themselves, and it puts them at the head of a ‘Fraternitatem sive Gildam’ of minstrels already existing in the chapel of the Virgin in St. Paul’s, and in the royal free chapel of St. Anthony. All minstrels in the country are to join this guild or be suppressed. It is to have two _custodes_ and to make statutes and ordinances. The jurisdiction of Dutton over Chester minstrels is, as already stated, reserved[685]. A ‘serviens’ or ‘serjeant’ seems to have been an officer of the guild[686]. With this exception nothing more is heard of it until 1594, when a dispute as to the office of the Master of the Musicians’ Company called for the intervention of the Lord Keeper[687].’ In 1604 the Company received a new charter, which gave it jurisdiction within the city and a radius of three miles from its boundaries. It was further restricted to the city itself under Charles I. It still exists as the Corporation of the Master, Wardens, and Commonalty of the Art or Science of the Musicians of London[688].

The London guild would appear, from its peculiar relation to the royal household minstrels, and its claim to jurisdiction throughout the country, to have been modelled upon that of Paris. This claim was evidently not maintained, and in fact at least three other local guilds can be shown to have existed in the sixteenth century. A search, which I have not undertaken, would probably readily discover more.

4. _Canterbury._

Ordinances, dated 1526, of the ‘felowshyp of the craft and mystery of mynstrells’ give the prerogative right to perform in the city to the members of this body, saving the privileges of the city waits, and ‘the King’s mynstrells, the Queane’s, my Lord Prince’s, or any honorable or wurshipfull mann’s mynstrells of thys realme[689].’

5. _Beverley._

An order of the Governors of the city (1555) recites an old custom ‘since Athelstan’ of the choice by minstrels between Trent and Tweed of aldermen of their fraternities during Rogation days, and renews orders for the ‘fraternity of our Lady of the read arke in Beverley.’ The statutes deal with the employment of minstrels in Beverley, and with their ‘castells’ at the Rogation-day procession. A new member must be ‘mynstrell to some man of honour or worship or waite of some towne corporate or other ancient town or else of such honestye and conyng as shalbe thought laudable and pleasant to the hearers.’ It is claimed that such are excluded from the ‘Kyng’s acts where they speake of vacabonds and valiant beggers.’ Quite in the spirit of the London charter of 1469 it is ordered that ‘no myler shepherd or of other occupation or husbandman or husbandman servant’ shall assume the functions of a minstrel outside his own parish[690]. The earliest notice of this guild in the Beverley archives seems to be in 1557[691], but the terms of the order and the existence of pillars put up by the minstrels in fifteenth-century churches in Beverley[692] point to some informal earlier association.

6. _York._

A craft of Mynstrells certainly existed by 1561, in which year they undertook the pageant of Herod at the Corpus Christi plays[693].

G

THOMAS DE CABHAM

[The following extract from a _Penitential_ formerly ascribed to John of Salisbury, but now to Thomas de Cabham, Bishop of Salisbury (†1313), is printed by B. Hauréau, _Notices et Extraits de Manuscrits_, xxiv. 2, 284, from _B. N. MSS. Lat._ 3218 and 3529ᵃ, and by F. Guessard and C. Grandmaison, _Huon de Bordeaux_, vi., from _B. N. Sorbonne MS._ 1552, f. 71. The two texts differ in several points. According to Gautier, ii. 22, there are several similar thirteenth-century _Penitentials_, and it is difficult to say which was the original. The doctrine laid down about minstrels is often repeated in later treatises. See e.g. a passage from the fifteenth-century _Le Jardin des Nobles_ in P. Paris, _Manuscrits français_, ii. 144.]

Tria sunt histrionum genera. Quidam transformant et transfigurant corpora sua per turpes saltus et per turpes gestus, vel denudando se turpiter, vel induendo horribiles larvas, et omnes tales damnabiles sunt, nisi reliquerint officia sua. Sunt etiam alii qui nihil operantur, sed criminose agunt, non habentes certum domicilium, sed sequuntur curias magnatum et dicunt opprobria et ignominias de absentibus ut placeant aliis. Tales etiam damnabiles sunt, quia prohibet Apostolus cum talibus cibum sumere, et dicuntur tales scurrae vagi, quia ad nihil utiles sunt, nisi ad devorandum et maledicendum. Est etiam tertium genus histrionum qui habent instrumenta musica ad delectandum homines, et talium sunt duo genera. Quidam enim frequentant publicas potationes et lascivas congregationes, et cantant ibi diversas cantilenas ut moveant homines ad lasciviam, et tales sunt damnabiles sicut alii. Sunt autem alii, qui dicuntur ioculatores, qui cantant gesta principum et vitam sanctorum, et faciunt solatia hominibus vel in aegritudinibus suis vel in angustiis, et non faciunt innumeras turpitudines sicut faciunt saltatores et saltatrices et alii qui ludunt in imaginibus inhonestis et faciunt videri quasi quaedam fantasmata per incantationes vel alio modo. Si autem non faciunt talia, sed cantant in instrumentis suis gesta principum et alia talia utilia ut faciant solatia hominibus, sicut supradictum est, bene possunt sustineri tales, sicut ait Alexander papa. Cum quidam ioculator quaereret ab eo utrum posset salvare animam suam in officio suo, quaesivit Papa ab eo utrum sciret aliquod aliud opus unde vivere posset: respondit ioculator quod non. Permisit igitur Papa quod ipse viveret de officio suo, dummodo abstineret a praedictis lasciviis et turpitudinibus. Notandum est quod omnes peccant mortaliter qui dant scurris vel leccatoribus vel praedictis histrionibus aliquid de suo. Histrionibus dare nichil aliud est quam perdere.

H

PRINCELY PLEASURES AT KENILWORTH

[From _Robert Laneham’s Letter_ (ed. F. J. Furnivall for New Shakspere Society (1890); and in Nichols, _Progresses of Elizabeth_, i. 420) describing the entertainment of Elizabeth by the Earl of Leicester at Kenilworth, in July, 1575. G. Gascoigne, _The Princelye Pleasures at the Courte at Kenelworth_ (1576, in Nichols, i. 502), leaves undescribed what he calls the ‘Coventrie’ (ed. 2, ‘Countrie’) shows.]

I. A SQUIRE MINSTREL.

Mary, syr, I must tell yoo: Az all endeuoour waz too mooue mirth & pastime (az I tolld ye): éeuen so a ridiculoous deuise of an auncient minstrell & hiz song waz prepared to haue been profferd, if méet time & place had béen foound for it. Ons in a woorshipfull company, whear, full appointed, he recoounted his matter in sort az it should haue been vttred, I chaunsed too be: what I noted, heer thus I tel yoo: A parson very méet séemed he for the purpoze, of a xlv. yéers olld, apparelled partly as he woold himself. Hiz cap of: his hed séemly roounded tonster wyze: fayr kemb, _that_ with a spoonge deintly dipt in a littl capons greaz was finely smoothed too make it shine like a Mallard’s wing. Hiz beard smugly shauen: and yet hiz shyrt after the nu trink, with ruffs fayr starched, sléeked, and glistening like a payr of nu shooz: marshalld in good order: wyth a stetting stick, and stoout, that euery ruff stood vp like a wafer: a side gooun of kendall green, after the freshnes of the yéer noow, gathered at the neck with a narro gorget, fastened afore with a white clasp and a keepar close vp to the chin: but easily for heat too vndoo when he list: Séemly begyrt in a red caddiz gyrdl: from that a payr of capped Sheffield kniuez hanging a to side: Out of hiz bozome drawne forth a lappet of his napkin, edged with a blu lace, & marked with a trulooue, a hart, and A. D. for Damian: for he was but a bachelar yet.

Hiz gooun had syde sleeuez dooun to midlegge, slit from the shooulder too the hand, & lined with white cotten. Hiz doobled sleeuez of blak woorsted, vpon them a payr of poynets of towny Chamblet laced a long the wreast wyth blu threeden points, a wealt toward the hand of fustian anapes: a payr of red neatherstocks: a pair of pumps on hiz féet, with a cross cut at the toze for cornz: not nu indéede, yet cleanly blakt with soot, & shining az a shoing horn.

Aboout hiz nek a red rebond sutable too hiz girdl: hiz harp in good grace dependaunt before him: hiz wreast tyed to a gréen lace, and hanging by: vnder the gorget of hiz gooun a fair flagon cheyn, (pewter, for) siluer, as a squier minstrel of Middilsex, that trauaild the cuntrée this soommer seazon vnto fairz & worshipfull mens hoousez: from hiz chein hoong a Schoochion, with mettall & cooller resplendant vpon hiz breast, of the auncient armez of Islington:

[Apparently the minstrel was got ready; but not shown. He was to have recited an Arthurian romance in verse.]

II. THE COVENTRY HOCK-TUESDAY SHOW.

And héertoo folloed az good a sport (me thooght) prezented in an historicall ku, by certain good harted men of Couentrée, my Lordes neighboors thear: who, vnderstanding amoong them _the_ thing that coold not bee hidden from ony, hoow carefull and studious hiz honor waz, that by all pleazaunt recreasions her highnes might best fynd her self wellcom, & bee made gladsum and mery, (the ground-worke indeede, and foundacion, of hiz Lordship’s myrth and gladnesse of vs all), made petition that they moought renu noow their olld storiall sheaw: Of argument, how the Danez whylom héere in a troubloous seazon wear for quietnesse born withall, & suffeard in peas, that anon, by outrage & importabl insolency, abuzing both Ethelred, the king then, and all estates euerie whear beside: at the greuoous complaint & coounsell of Huna, the king’s chieftain in warz, on Saint Brices night, Ann. Dom. 1012 (Az the book sayz) that falleth yéerely on the thirtéenth of Nouember, wear all dispatcht, and the Ream rid. And for becauz the matter mencioneth how valiantly our English women for looue of their cuntrée behaued themseluez: expressed in actionz & rymez after their maner, they thought it moought mooue sum myrth to her Maiestie the rather.

The thing, said they, iz grounded on story, and for pastime woont too bee plaid in oour Citee yéerely: without ill exampl of mannerz, papistry, or ony superstition: and elz did so occupy the heads of a number, that likely inoough woold haue had woorz meditationz: had an auncient beginning, and a long continuauns: tyll noow of late laid dooun, they knu no cauz why, onless it wear by the zeal of certain theyr Preacherz: men very commendabl for their behauiour and learning, & swéet in their sermons, but sumwhat too sour in preaching awey theyr pastime: wisht therefore, that az they shoold continu their good doctrine in pulpet, so, for matters of pollicy & gouernauns of the Citie, they woold permit them to the Mair and Magistratez: and seyed, by my feyth, Master Martyn, they woold make theyr humbl peticion vntoo her highnes, that they might haue theyr playz vp agayn.

But aware, kéep bak, make room noow, heer they cum! And fyrst, ... Captain Cox cam marching on valiantly before, cléen trust, & gartered aboue the knée, all fresh in a veluet cap (master Goldingha_m_ lent it him) floorishing with hiz tonswoord, and another fensmaster with him: thus in the foreward making room for the rest. After the_m_ proudly prickt on formost, the Danish launsknights on horsbak, and then the English: each with their allder poll marcially in their hand. Eeuen at the first entrée the méeting waxt sumwhat warm: that by and by kindled with corage a both sidez, gru from a hot skirmish vnto a blazing battail: first by speare and shield, outragious in their racez az ramz at their rut, with furious encoounterz, that togyther they tumbl too the dust, sumtime hors and man: and after fall too it with sworde & target, good bangz a both sidez: the fight so ceassing; but the battail not so ended: folloed the footmen, both the hostez, ton after toother: first marching in ranks: then warlik turning, the_n_ fro_m_ ranks into squadrons, then in too trianglz; fro_m_ that intoo rings, & so winding oout again: A valiant captain of great prowez, az fiers az a fox assauting a gooz, waz so hardy to giue the first stroke: then get they grisly togyther: that great waz the actiuitée that day too be séen thear a both sidez: ton very eager for purchaz of pray, toother vtterly stoout for redemption of libertie: thus, quarrell enflamed fury a both sidez. Twise the Danes had _th_e better; but at the last conflict, beaten doun, ouercom, and many led captiue for triumph by our English wéemen.

This waz the effect of this sheaw, that, az it waz handled, made mooch matter of good pastime: brought all indéed intoo the great court, een vnder her highnes windo too haue been séen: but (az vnhappy it waz for the bride) that cam thither too soon, (and yet waz it a four a clok). For her highnes beholding in the chamber delectabl dauncing indéed: and héerwith the great throng and vnrulines of the people, waz cauz that this solemnitee of Brideale & dauncing, had not the full muster waz hoped for: and but a littl of the Couentrée plea her highnes also saw: commaunded thearfore on the Tuisday folloing to haue it ful oout: az accordingly it waz prezented, whearat her Maiestie laught well: they wear the iocunder, and so mooch the more becauz her highnes had giuen them too buckes, and fiue marke in mony, to make mery togyther: they prayed for her Maiesty, long, happily to reign, & oft to cum thither, that oft they moought sée héer: & what, reioycing vpon their ampl reward, and what, triumphing vpon the good acceptauns, they vaunted their play waz neuer so dignified, nor euer any players afore so beatified....

Tuisday, according to commandement, cam oour Couentrée men: what their matter waz, of her highnes myrth and good acceptauns, and rewarde vntoo them, and of their reioysing thearat, I sheawd you afore, and so say the less noow.

I

THE INDIAN VILLAGE FEAST

[From Sir Walter Elliot, _On the Characteristics of the Population of Central India_, in _Journal of the Ethnological Society of London_, N. S. i. 94 (1869).]

In the north-east corner of the central mountainous region represented on the map, between the Mahanadi and Godavery rivers, is found a tribe which has preserved its normal character remarkably free from change and from external influence. The Konds, or, as they call themselves, the Kuingas, although only discovered within the last thirty-five years, are better known than most of the other barbarous tribes from the fact that for ages they have been in the habit of sacrificing human victims in great numbers to secure the favour of the deities presiding over their dwellings, fields, hills, &c., but especially of the earth-goddess.

The successful efforts employed to abolish this barbarous rite have made the subject familiar to all, and it is remarkable that such knowledge should have failed to attract attention to a practice precisely similar in its objects and in its details, which is observed in every village of Southern India, with this single difference, that a buffalo is substituted for a human victim. My attention was early drawn to this practice, which is called the festival of the village goddess (_Devi_, or _Grama Devati_), the descriptions of which led me to believe it might throw light on the early condition of the servile classes, and resolving to witness its celebrations, I repaired to the village of Serúr, in the Southern Mahratta country, in March, 1829. It would occupy too much time to describe the ceremony in full, which is the less necessary as the details vary in different places; but the general features are always the same.

The temple of the goddess is a mean structure outside the village. The officiating priests are the Parias, who, on this occasion, and on it alone, are exempt from the degrading condition which excludes them from the village, and from contact with the inhabitants. With them are included the Mangs or workers in leather, the Asádis or Dásaris, _paria_ dancing-girls devoted to the service of the temple, the musician in attendance on them called Rániga, who acts also as a sort of jester or buffoon, and a functionary called Pót-raj, who officiates as _pujári_ to a rural god named also Pót-raj, to whom a small altar is erected behind the temple of the village goddess. He is armed with a long whip, which he cracks with great dexterity, and to which also at various parts of the ceremony divine honours are paid.

All the members of the village community take part in the festival with the hereditary district officers, many of them Brahmans. The shepherds or _Dhangars_ of the neighbouring villages are also invited, and they attend with their priests called _Virgars_ or _Irgars_, accompanied by the _dhol_ or big drum peculiar to their caste. But the whole is under the guidance and management of the Parias.

The festival commences always on a Tuesday, the day of rest among the agricultural classes, both for man and beast. The most important and essential ceremonies take place on the second and fifth days. On the former, the sacred buffalo, which had been purchased by the Parias, an animal without a blemish, is thrown down before the goddess, its head struck off by a single blow and placed in front of the shrine with one fore-leg thrust into its mouth. Around are placed vessels containing the different cereals, and hard by a heap of mixed grains, with a drill plough in the centre. The carcase is then cut up into small pieces, and each cultivator receives a portion to bury in his field. The blood and offal are collected into a large basket, over which some pots of the cooked food which had been presented as a meat offering (_naivedya_) had previously been broken, and Pót-raj taking a live kid called the _hari-mariah_, hews it in pieces over the whole. The mess (_cheraga_) is then mixed together, and the basket being placed on the head of a naked Mang, he runs off with it, flinging the contents into the air, and scattering them right and left, as an offering (_bhut-bali_) to the evil spirits, and followed by the other Parias, and the village Paiks, with drawn swords. Sometimes the demons arrest the progress of the party, when more of the mess is thrown about, and fowls and sheep are sacrificed, till the spirits are appeased.

During the whole time of the sacrifice the armed paiks keep vigilant guard, lest any intruder should secrete a morsel of flesh or a drop of blood, which, if carried off successfully, after declaring the purpose, would transfer the merit of the offering to the strangers’ village.

On the return of the party from making the circuit of the village another buffalo, seized by force wherever it can be found (_zulmi-khulga_) is sacrificed by decapitating it in the same manner as the former; but no particular importance is attached to it, and the flesh is distributed to be eaten.

The third and fourth days are devoted to private offerings. On the former all the inhabitants of caste, who had vowed animals to the goddess during the preceding three years for the welfare of their families, or the fertility of their fields, brought the buffaloes or sheep to the _paria pujári_, who struck off their heads. The fourth day was appropriated exclusively to the offerings of the Parias. In this way, some fifty or sixty buffaloes and several hundred sheep were slain, and the heads piled up in two great heaps. Many women on these days walked naked to the temple in fulfilment of vows, but they were covered with leaves and boughs of trees and surrounded by their female relations and friends.

On the fifth and last day (Saturday) the whole community marched in procession, with music, to the temple, and offered a concluding sacrifice at the Pót-raj altar. A lamb was concealed close by. The Pót-raj having found it after a pretended search, struck it simply with his whip, which he then placed upon it, and, making several passes with his hands, rendered it insensible; in fact, mesmerised it. When it became rigid and stiff he lifted it up and carried it about on the palm of his hand, to the amazement of the spectators, and then laid it down on the ground. His hands were then tied behind his back by the _pujári_, and the whole party began to dance round him with noisy shouts, the music and the shepherd’s drum making a deafening noise. Pót-raj joined in the excitement, his eyes began to roll, his long hair fell loose over his shoulders, and he soon came fully under the influence of the _numen_. He was now led up, still bound, to the place where the lamb lay motionless. He rushed at it, seized it with his teeth, tore through the skin, and ate into its throat. When it was quite dead, he was lifted up, a dishful of the meat offering was presented to him; he thrust his bloody face into it, and it was then, with the remains of the lamb, buried beside the altar. Meantime his hands were untied, and he fled the place, and did not appear for three days. The rest of the party now adjourned to the front of the temple, where the heap of grain deposited the first day was divided among the cultivators, to be buried by each one in his field with the bit of flesh. After this a distribution of the piled-up heads was made by the hand of the Rániga. About forty sheep’s heads were given to certain privileged persons, among which two were allotted to the Sircar! For the rest a general scramble took place, paiks, shepherds, Parias, and many boys and men of good caste, were soon rolling in the mass of putrid gore. The heads were flung about in all directions, without regard to rank or caste, the Brahmans coming in for an ample share of the filth. The scramble for the buffalo heads was confined to the Parias. Whoever was fortunate enough to secure one of either kind carried it off and buried it in his field. The proceedings terminated by a procession round the boundaries of the village lands, preceded by the goddess, and the head of the sacred buffalo carried on the head of one of the Mangs. All order and propriety now ceased. Rániga began to abuse the goddess in the foulest terms; he then turned his fury against the government, the head man of the village, and every one who fell in his way. The Parias and Asádis attacked the most respectable and gravest citizens, and laid hold of the Brahmans, Lingayats, and Zamindars without scruple. The dancing-women jumped on their shoulders, the shepherds beat the big drum, with deafening clangor, and universal license reigned.

On reaching a little temple, sacred to the goddess of boundaries (_polimera-amma_), they halted to make some offerings, and bury the sacred head. As soon as it was covered, the uproar began again. Rániga became more foul-mouthed than ever. In vain the head-men, the government officers, and others tried to pacify him by giving him small copper coins. He only broke out with worse imprecations and grosser abuse, till the circuit being completed, all dispersed; the Parias retired to their hamlet outside the town, resuming their humble, servile character, and the village reverted to its wonted peaceful appearance.

Next day (Sunday) the whole population turned out to a great hunting-party.

I found this remarkable institution existing in every part of India where I have been, and I have descriptions of it corresponding in all essential points, from the Dekhan, the Nizam’s country, Mysore, the Carnatic, and the Northern Circars. The details vary in different places, but the main features agree in all, and correspond remarkably with the _Mariah_ sacrifice of the Konds, which also varies considerably on minor points in different places.

J

SWORD-DANCES

I. SWEDEN (_Sixteenth Century_).

[From Olaus Magnus, _Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus_ (1555), Bk. xv. chh. 23, 24.]

Ch. 23, _de chorea gladiatoria vel armifera saltatione_.

Habent septentrionales Gothi et Sueci pro exercenda iuventute alium ludum, quod inter nudos enses et infestos gladios seu frameas sese exerceant saltu, idque quodam gymnastico ritu et disciplina, aetate successiva, a peritis et praesultare sub cantu addiscunt: et ostendunt hunc ludum praecipue tempore carnisprivii, maschararum Italico verbo dicto. Ante etenim tempus eiusdem carnisprivii octo diebus continua saltatione sese adolescentes numerose exercent, elevatis scilicet gladiis sed vagina reclusis, ad triplicem gyrum. Deinde evaginatis itidemque elevatis ensibus, postmodo manuatim extensis, modestius gyrando alterutrius cuspidem capulumque receptantes, sese mutato ordine in modum figurae hexagoni fingendi subiiciunt, quam rosam dicunt: et illico eam gladios retrahendo elevandoque resolvunt ut super uniuscuiusque caput quadrata rosa resultet: et tandem vehementissima gladiorum laterali collisione, celerrime retrograda saltatione determinant ludum, quem tibiis vel cantilenis, aut utrisque simul, primum per graviorem, demum vehementiorem saltum et ultimo impetuosissimum moderantur. Sed haec speculatio sine oculari inspectione vix apprehenditur quam pulchra honestaque sit, dum unius parcissimo praecepto etiam armata multitudo quadam alacritate dirigitur ad certamen: eoque ludo clericis sese exercere et immiscere licet, quia totus deducitur honestissima ratione.

Ch. 24. Alia etiam iuvenum exercitatio est, ut certa lege arcualem choream ducant et reducant, aliis quidam instrumentis, sed eadem ut gladiatorum saltantium disciplina reducta. Arcubus enim seu circulis inclusis [inclusi?], primum modesto cantu heroum gesta referente vel tibiis aut tympanis excitati, gyrando incedunt seque dirigentis, qui rex dicitur, sola voce reducunt, tandem solutis arcubus aliquantulum celerius properantes mutua inclinatione conficiunt, veluti alias per gladios, rosam, ut formam sexangularem efficere videantur. Utque id festivius sonoriusque fiat, tintinnabula seu aereas campanulas genu tenus ligant.

II. SHETLAND (_Eighteenth Century_).

[From Sir Walter Scott’s _Diary_ for August 7, 1814, printed in Lockhart, _Life of Scott_ (1837), iii. 162; (1878) i. 265.]

At Scalloway my curiosity was gratified by an account of the sword-dance, now almost lost, but still practised in the Island of Papa, belonging to Mr. Scott. There are eight performers, seven of whom represent the Seven Champions of Christendom, who enter one by one with their swords drawn, and are presented to the eighth personage, who is not named. Some rude couplets are spoken (in _English_, not _Norse_), containing a sort of panegyric upon each champion as he is presented. They then dance a sort of cotillion, as the ladies described it, going through a number of evolutions with their swords. One of my three Mʳˢ. Scotts readily promised to procure me the lines, the rhymes, and the form of the dance.... A few years since a party of Papa-men came to dance the sword-dance at Lerwick as a public exhibition with great applause.... In a stall pamphlet, called the history of Buckshaven [Fifeshire], it is said those fishers sprung from Danes, and brought with them their _war-dance_ or _sword-dance_, and a rude wooden cut of it is given.

[A footnote by Lockhart adds:—]

Mr. W. S. Rose informs me that, when he was at school at Winchester, the morris-dancers there used to exhibit a sword-dance resembling that described at Camacho’s wedding in _Don Quixote_; and Mr. Morritt adds that similar dances are even yet performed in the villages about Rokeby [Yorks, N.R.] every Christmas.

[The following account was inserted in a note to Scott’s _The Pirate_ (1821).]

To the Primate’s account of the sword-dance, I am able to add the words sung or chanted, on occasion of this dance, as it is still performed in Papa Stour, a remote island of Zetland, where alone the custom keeps its ground. It is, it will be observed by antiquaries, a species of play or mystery, in which the Seven Champions of Christendom make their appearance, as in the interlude presented in _All’s Well that ends Well_. This dramatic curiosity was most kindly procured for my use by Dr. Scott of Haslar Hospital [died 1875], son of my friend Mr. Scott of Melbie, Zetland. Dr. Hibbert has, in his _Description of the Zetland Islands_, given an account of the sword-dance, but somewhat less full than the following:—

‘WORDS USED AS A PRELUDE TO THE SWORD-DANCE, A DANISH OR NORWEGIAN BALLET, COMPOSED SOME CENTURIES AGO, AND PRESERVED IN PAPA STOUR, ZETLAND.

PERSONÆ DRAMATIS[694].

(_Enter MASTER, in the character of SAINT GEORGE._)

Brave gentles all within this boor[695], If ye delight in any sport, Come see me dance upon this floor, Which to you all shall yield comfort. Then shall I dance in such a sort, As possible I may or can; You, minstrel man, play me a Porte[696], That I on this floor may prove a man.

[_He bows, and dances in a line._

Now have I danced with heart and hand, Brave gentles all, as you may see, For I have been tried in many a land, As yet the truth can testify; In England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Italy, and Spain, Have I been tried with that good sword of steel.

[_Draws, and flourishes._

Yet I deny that ever a man did make me yield; For in my body there is strength, As by my manhood may be seen; And I, with that good sword of length, Have oftentimes in perils been, And over champions I was king. And by the strength of this right hand, Once on a day I kill’d fifteen, And left them dead upon the land. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care, But play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight. Although my strength makes you abased, Brave gentles all, be not afraid, For here are six champions, with me, staid, All by my manhood I have raised.

[_He dances._

Since I have danced, I think it best To call my brethren in your sight, That I may have a little rest, And they may dance with all their might; With heart and hand as they are knights, And shake their swords of steel so bright, And show their main strength on this floor, For we shall have another bout Before we pass out of this boor. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care To play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight.

[_He dances, and then introduces his knights as under._

Stout James of Spain, both tried and stour[697], Thine acts are known full well indeed; And champion Dennis, a French knight, Who stout and bold is to be seen; And David, a Welshman born, Who is come of noble blood; And Patrick also, who blew the horn, An Irish knight amongst the wood. Of Italy, brave Anthony the good, And Andrew of Scotland King; Saint George of England, brave indeed, Who to the Jews wrought muckle tinte[698]. Away with this!—Let us come to sport, Since that ye have a mind to war. Since that ye have this bargain sought, Come let us fight and do not fear. Therefore, brave minstrel, do not care To play to me a Porte most light, That I no longer do forbear, But dance in all these gentles’ sight.

[_He dances, and advances to JAMES of Spain._

Stout James of Spain, both tried and stour, Thine acts are known full well indeed, Present thyself within our sight, Without either fear or dread. Count not for favour or for feid, Since of thy acts thou hast been sure; Brave James of Spain, I will thee lead, To prove thy manhood on this floor.

[_JAMES dances._

Brave champion Dennis, a French knight, Who stout and bold is to be seen, Present thyself here in our sight, Thou brave French knight, Who bold hast been; Since thou such valiant acts hast done, Come let us see some of them now With courtesy, thou brave French knight, Draw out thy sword of noble hue.

[_DENNIS dances, while the others retire to a side._

Brave David a bow must string, and with awe Set up a wand upon a stand, And that brave David will cleave in twa[699].

[_DAVID dances solus._

Here is, I think, an Irish knight, Who does not fear, or does not fright, To prove thyself a valiant man, As thou hast done full often bright; Brave Patrick, dance, if that thou can.

[_He dances._

Thou stout Italian, come thou here; Thy name is Anthony, most stout; Draw out thy sword that is most clear, And do thou fight without any doubt; Thy leg thou shake, thy neck thou lout[700], And show some courtesy on this floor, For we shall have another bout, Before we pass out of this boor. Thou kindly Scotsman, come thou here; Thy name is Andrew of Fair Scotland; Draw out thy sword that is most clear, Fight for thy king with thy right hand; And aye as long as thou canst stand, Fight for thy king with all thy heart; And then, for to confirm his band, Make all his enemies for to smart.

[_He dances.—Music begins._’

‘FIGUIR[701].

‘The six stand in rank with their swords reclining on their shoulders. The Master (Saint George) dances, and then strikes the sword of James of Spain, who follows George, then dances, strikes the sword of Dennis, who follows behind James. In like manner the rest—the music playing—swords as before. After the six are brought out of rank, they and the Master form a circle, and hold the swords point and hilt. This circle is danced round twice. The whole, headed by the Master, pass under the swords held in a vaulted manner. They jump over the swords. This naturally places the swords across, which they disentangle by passing under their right sword. They take up the seven swords, and form a circle, in which they dance round.

‘The Master runs under the sword opposite, which he jumps over backwards. The others do the same. He then passes under the right-hand sword, which the others follow, in which position they dance, until commanded by the Master, when they form into a circle, and dance round as before. They then jump over the right-hand sword, by which means their backs are to the circle, and their hands across their backs. They dance round in that form until the Master calls “Loose,” when they pass under the right sword, and are in a perfect circle.

‘The Master lays down his sword, and lays hold of the point of James’s sword. He then turns himself, James, and the others, into a clew. When so formed, he passes under out of the midst of the circle; the others follow; they vault as before. After several other evolutions, they throw themselves into a circle, with their arms across the breast. They afterwards form such figures as to form a shield of their swords, and the shield is so compact that the Master and his knights dance alternately with this shield upon their heads. It is then laid down upon the floor. Each knight lays hold of their former points and hilts with their hands across, which disentangle by figuirs directly contrary to those that formed the shield. This finishes the ballet.

‘EPILOGUE.

‘Mars does rule, he bends his brows, He makes us all agast[702]; After the few hours that we stay here, Venus will rule at last. Farewell, farewell, brave gentles all, That herein do remain, I wish you health and happiness Till we return again.

[_Exeunt._’

The manuscript from which the above was copied was transcribed from _a very old one_, by Mr.