Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199-1216 019880251X, 9780198802518

Table of contents :
Cover
Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Contents
List of Illustrations
List of Abbreviations
1: Introduction
1.1 King John, Royal Courts, and Historiography
1.2 Goals of This Book
1.2.1 Reconstruction of Court Life
1.2.2 Analysis of Court Life, Soft Power, and John’s Successes and Failures
1.2.3 The Court as a Site of Pleasure and Self-Gratification
1.3 The Structure of John’s Court
1.4 Sources
1.5 The Structure of the Book
2: Hunting and Falconry
2.1 Introduction
2.2 The Size, Importance, and Cost of the Royal Hunting Establishment
2.3 The Royal Forest, Money, and Hunting
2.4 The Forms of Royal Hunting and the King and Queen’s Involvement
2.5 Pleasure in the Service of Power: The Instrumental Purposes of Hunting
2.6 Hunting, the Malleability of Social Meaning, and Criticism of and Resistance to the King
2.7 Power in the Service of Pleasure: The Delights of Hunting
3: Luxury and Material Culture at Court
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Textiles, Furs, and Clothing
3.3 Gold and Silver Plate and Jewellery
3.4 The Royal Regalia
3.5 The Uses of Luxury Goods
3.6 Lavish Display and Royal Authority
3.7 Luxury and the Reinforcement of Hierarchy
3.8 The Regalia and the Special Status of the King and Queen
3.9 Giving Robes and Other Luxury Items
3.10 Was Luxury Politically Dangerous?
3.11 Luxury and Pleasure
3.12 The Importance of Things
4: Aspects of Court Culture
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Art and Music
4.3 Entertainers and Exotic Animals
4.4 Books and Learning
4.5 Games and Gambling
4.6 Chivalry and the Embrace of Martial Splendour
4.7 Sex, Courtly Love, Coercion, and Rebellion
4.8 Power, Pleasure, and Self-Gratification
5: Religious Practices at Court
5.1 Introduction
5.2 John’s Personal Religion and Religious Life at Court
5.3 The Projection of a Pious Image
5.4 The Failure to Successfully Create an Imageof Sacral Kingship
5.5 Pleasure, Piety, and Power
6: Food and Feasting
6.1 Introduction
6.2 Eating Well
6.3 Spices, Cooking, and Cuisine
6.4 Wine
6.5 Feasting at John’s Court
6.6 Etiquette, Lordship, and Deference
6.7 Food, Drink, Feasting, and Power
6.8 Food, Feasting, and the Contestation of Power
6.9 Food, Drink, Feasting, and Pleasure
7: Places and Spaces
7.1 Introduction
7.2 New Ways of Thinking about Castles and Palaces
7.3 Castles and Palaces, Tents and Pavilions
7.4 Aesthetic Landscapes
7.5 Landscapes, Utility, and Beauty
7.6 Itineration and Its Motives
7.7 Meetings with Magnates
7.8 Riding in Splendour
7.9 Processions and the Royal Entry
7.10 Power, Contestation, and Pleasure
8: King John and the Wielding of Soft Power
8.1 Introduction
8.2 John and His Relations with the Powerful
8.3 Symbolic Communication
8.4 Gifts
8.5 Administrative Kingship and Soft Power
8.6 How Successful Was John at Managing Soft Power?
9: John’s Court in a Comparative Context: A Preliminary Sketch
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Comparisons across Space
9.3 Comparisons across Time
Conclusion
Appendix 1: Royal Hunting Expenses
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

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Power and Pleasure

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Power and Pleasure Court Life under King John, 1199–1216 H U G H  M .  T HOM A S

1

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1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Hugh M. Thomas 2020 The moral rights of the author have been asserted First Edition published in 2020 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937115 ISBN 978–0–19–880251–8 DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.001.0001 Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work.

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To my daughter, Bella

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Acknowledgements I have incurred many debts in the course of researching and writing this book and it is my pleasure to acknowledge them here. Throughout my career, the University of Miami has been very supportive of scholarly research and I have greatly benefited in this project as in earlier ones. I carried out some of the earliest research and writing during a semester’s teaching relief through the university’s Center for the Humanities, where the other fellows provided useful feedback on my first chapter. Later I received a sabbatical that greatly speeded work on the project. The provost’s office and the College of Arts and Sciences provided money for summer research trips, the latter through awarding me a Cooper Fellowship. A&S also provided money for book production costs, including paying for the creation of maps and image reproduction rights. A Fulbright Fellowship, supplemented by yet more funds from A&S, allowed me to spend a wonderful term at King’s College, London, where David Carpenter and other members of the history department and medieval studies welcomed me warmly. The staffs of the Richter Library at the University of Miami, the British Library, the Institute of Historical Research, and the National Archives in Kew all helped me carry out my research. Jorge Alejandro Quintela Fernandez made two maps for the book. Martha Schulman helped me tighten and improve the prose throughout. Peter Dunn, Historic England, The National Trust, The Society of Antiquaries, the provost and fellows of Eton College, and Oxford University Press all gave permission to reproduce images. Many individual scholars also helped me with this project. My colleagues at the University of Miami continue to provide a supportive atmosphere and have provided feedback on early drafts through various seminars. Nicholas Vincent provided me with transcripts of unpublished charters of John and his predecessors from the Angevin Acta project. Ralph Turner gave me helpful notes and references from his own work and allowed me to use an unpublished article on John’s illegitimate children. Jo Edge also directed me to some good references. Lars Kjær provided me with a copy of his book in advance of publication and Ryan Kemp supplied me with an unpublished article. Stephen Mileson allowed me to use a map he had compiled and directed me to a useful article I had not read. Oliver Creighton, Laura Gianetti, John Gillingham, Leonie Hicks, Ben Jervis, Frédérique Lachaud, Ruth Mazo Karras, and Joe Snyder have read parts of the manuscript. Jesse Izzo read the whole thing, as did David Carpenter, who also shared a chapter on Henry III’s court in advance of publication. The anonymous readers of the original proposal to Oxford University Press helped set me on the right track. Bjorn Weiler, who read the final manuscript for

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viii Acknowledgements the Press, caught errors, supplied much new bibliography, made many useful suggestions to revise the manuscript, and generally helped me make many ­ improvements. Terka Acton first contacted me from OUP about this project and Stephanie Ireland, Cathryn Steele, Katie Bishop, and Sally Evans-Darby helped shepherd it along. All this help made this book much better than it would have been otherwise, and for that I am very grateful.

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Contents List of Illustrations List of Abbreviations

1. Introduction

xi xiii

1

2. Hunting and Falconry

25

3. Luxury and Material Culture at Court

54

4. Aspects of Court Culture

79

5. Religious Practices at Court

108

6. Food and Feasting

124

7. Places and Spaces

153

8. King John and the Wielding of Soft Power

184

9. John’s Court in a Comparative Context: A Preliminary Sketch

211

Conclusion228 Appendix 1: Royal Hunting Expenses

231

Bibliography Index

233 265

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List of Illustrations 2.1. Royal forests, royal dwellings, and a simplified royal itinerary, 1199–1307.

29

2.2. Seal of Isabella of Angoulême with bird of prey.

34

3.1. Obverse of King John’s seal.

70

4.1. Reverse of King John’s seal.

92

7.1. Plan of Corfe Castle. King John’s residential block with the gloriette is in the upper right of the plan.

160

7.2. Reconstruction of Ludgershall Castle and view of the north deer park.

165

7.3. Plan of Ludgershall Castle.

165

7.4. Plan of Odiham Castle.

166

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List of Abbreviations Book of Fees

Liber Feudorum: The Book of Fees Commonly called Testa de Nevill. 3 vols. London, 1920–31.

Constitutio Domus Regis

Constitutio Domus Regis: The Disposition of the King’s Household, ed. S.  D.  Church, published in Dialogus de Scaccario: The Dialogue of the Exchequer. Consitutio Domus Regis: The Disposition of the King’s Household, ed. Emilie Amt, 195–215. Oxford, 2007.

Misae 11J Misae 14J

Rotuli de Liberate (RL), 109–71. Documents Illustrative of English History in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries, ed. Henry Cole. London, 1844, 231–69. The Memoranda Roll for the Michaelmas Term of the First Year of King John (1199–1200), ed. Dorothy Stenton and H. G. Richardson. Pipe Roll Society n.s. 21. London, 1943. The Memoranda Roll for the Tenth Year of the Reign of King John (1207–8), ed. R. Allen Brown. Pipe Roll Society n.s. 31. London, 1957. Magni Rotuli Scaccariae Normanniæ sub Regibus Angliæ, ed. Thomas Stapleton. 2 vols. London, 1840–4.

MR 1J

MR 10J

MRSN

Pipe Roll Ireland 14J

PR

Prest Roll 7J Prest Roll 12J Prest Roll 14–18J

RCh Red Book of the Exchequer

‘The Irish Pipe Roll of 14 John, 1211–12,’ ed. Oliver Davies and David  B.  Quinn. Ulster Journal of Archaeology 4 (1941), Supplement, 1–76. Pipe Rolls. Citations are to the regnal years of reigning kings for the volumes of the pipe rolls published by the Pipe Roll Society. Documents Illustrative of English History in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries, ed. Henry Cole. London, 1844, 270–6. Rotuli de Liberate (RL), 172–253. ‘Praestita Rolle 14–18 John,’ ed. J. C. Holt, in Pipe Roll 17 John, ed. R.  Allen Brown, 89–100. Pipe Roll Society n.s. 37. London, 1961. Rotuli Chartarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, ed. Thomas Duffus Hardy. London, 1837. The Red Book of the Exchequer, ed. Hubert Hall. 3 vols. London, 1896.

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xiv  List of Abbreviations RL RLC RLP RN

ROF

Rotuli de Liberate ac de Misis et Praestitis, Regnante Johanne, ed. Thomas Duffus Hardy. London, 1844. Rotuli Litterarum Clausarum in Turri Londinensi Asservati, ed. Thomas Duffus Hardy. London, 1833. Rotuli Litterarum Patentium in Turri Londinensi Asservati, London, 1835. Rotuli Normanniae in Turri Londinensi Asservati, Johanne et Henrico quinto, Angliæ Regibus, ed. Thomas Duffus Hardy. London, 1835. Rotuli de Oblatis et Finibus in Turri Londinensi Asservati, Tempore Regis Johannis, ed. Thomas Duffus Hardy. London, 1835.

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1

Introduction 1.1  King John, Royal Courts, and Historiography King John was a very bad man; crueler than all others; he was too covetous of beautiful women and because of this he shamed the high men of the land, for which reason he was greatly hated. He never wished to speak truth. He set his barons against one another when­ ever he could; he was very happy when he saw hate between them. He hated and was jealous of all honourable noblemen. It greatly dis­ pleased him when he saw anyone acting well. He was full of evil qualities. But he spent lavishly; he gave plenty to eat and did so gener­ ously and willingly. People never found the gate or the doors of John’s hall barred against them, so that all who wanted to eat at his court could do so. At the three great feasts he gave robes aplenty to his knights. This was a good quality of his. The Anonymous of Béthune1 King John is one of the best known and most thoroughly studied of England’s medieval rulers. There are several reasons for this scholarly interest. As the quota­ tion above indicates, he was a controversial king, despised by many in his day, and the nature of his character continues to fascinate. Unlike many influential rulers who have received scholarly attention, he was an overwhelming failure, but his political failures had great consequences. His loss of Normandy and other con­tin­ en­tal lands to the French king, Philip II Augustus, left his dynasty primarily an insular power thereafter and meant that the Capetian kings would dominate France. His alienation of so many of his barons led to the issuing of Magna Carta, a document that no longer receives the quasi-religious reverence it once did, but which remains deeply important, both in its historical and mythological aspects. His reign was pivotal, if not in ways he would have imagined or welcomed.2 1  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs de Normandie et des rois d’Angleterre, ed. Francisque Michel (Paris, 1840), 105. The translation is adapted from John Gillingham, ‘The Anonymous of Béthune, King John and Magna Carta,’ in Janet S. Loengard, ed., Magna Carta and the England of King John (Woodbridge, 2010), 27–44, at 37–8. 2  For biographies of John, see Kate Norgate, John Lackland (London, 1902); Sidney Painter, The Reign of King John (Baltimore, MD, 1949); W.  L.  Warren, King John (Berkeley, CA, 1961); Ralph V. Turner, King John (London, 1994); S. D. Church, King John: And the Road to Magna Carta (New York, 2015); Marc Morris, King John: Treachery and Tyranny in Medieval England—The Road to

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0001

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2  Power and Pleasure One area of marked success, however, was that John’s government was remarkably innovative and successful in compiling and preserving records. As a result, we have far more detailed information on the workings of his government than that of any previous European ruler, giving us a good window into one of the key changes of the central Middle Ages: the development of royal bureaucracies and institutions. Several generations of historians have exploited these rich records for a variety of purposes, including biographies of John, histories of his reign, studies of his government and fiscal policies, and, above all, research on Magna Carta. This body of work surrounding King John’s rule remains one of the great historiographic achievements of medieval history, and excellent work continues to be done on these subjects. One aspect of John’s reign has been relatively neglected, however: the social and cultural life at his court. As the quotation above reveals, however, feasts and the giving of robes mattered greatly to his con­ temporaries, so greatly that to one critic John’s generosity in these matters off­ set—at least partially—his many character flaws. As we shall see, contemporaries also saw other aspects of life at court as very important, suggesting that we need to look more carefully at court life. The subject of life at court, of course, has not been entirely ignored. John’s bio­ graph­ers have often made passing reference to the king’s love of hunting, and other aspects of court culture appear in various contexts.3 No one, however, has used the reign’s rich records to focus on court life under John. This is partly because topics such as Magna Carta have understandably captured scholarly attention. Another key reason, however, was that for a long time few historians considered premodern court life worth studying. As Robert Bucholz noted in his history of the court of Queen Anne of England, scholars of the Whig, Marxist, or revisionist schools found royal courts elitist, reactionary, and wasteful.4 Many Magna Carta (New York, 2015); Frédérique Lachaud, Jean sans Terre (Paris, 2018). These works on Magna Carta or government in the period also offer extensive information about the reign, the revolt, and the document: H. G. Richardson and G. O. Sayles, The Governance of Mediaeval England from the Conquest to Magna Carta (Edinburgh, 1963), 321–94; J. C. Holt, The Northerners: A Study in the Reign of King John (Oxford, 1992); J.  C.  Holt, Magna Carta and Medieval Government (London, 1985); J. C. Holt, ‘Magna Carta, 1215–1217: The Legal and Social Context,’ in Colonial England, 1066–1215 (London, 1997), 291–306; Natalie Fryde, Why Magna Carta? Angevin England Revisited (Munster, 2001); Janet  S.  Loengard, ed., Magna Carta and the England of King John (Woodbridge, 2010); Nicholas Vincent, Magna Carta: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford, 2012); J.  C.  Holt, Magna Carta, ed. George Garnett and John Hudson, 3rd ed. (Cambridge, 2015); David Carpenter, Magna Carta (London, 2015). See also the excellent website on Magna Carta at http://magnacartaresearch.org. For the loss of continental possessions, the classic work is F.  M.  Powicke, The Loss of Normandy, 1189–1204: Studies in the History of the Angevin Empire, 2nd ed. (Manchester, 1960). See also Daniel Power, The Norman Frontier in the Twelfth and Early Thirteenth Centuries (Cambridge, 2004), 406–45, 532–8; Martin Aurell and Noël Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens: confrontations et héritages (Turnhout, 2006); Anne-Marie Flambard Héricher and Véronique Gazeau, eds., 1204, la Normandie entre Plantagenêts et Capétiens (Caen, 2007). 3  The fullest discussion of cultural issues is in Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 203–5, 219–42. 4 R. O. Bucholz, The Augustan Court: Queen Anne and the Decline of Court Culture (Stanford, CA, 1993), 2.

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Introduction  3 professional historians saw the study of court life as frivolous; better suited to antiquarians than serious scholars. As Timothy Reuter put it when noting the focus of historians of medieval English politics on administration, court activities like hunting, praying, court ceremony, and womanizing have been treated as ‘sim­ ply the froth on the top of serious government.’5 The very characteristics that make court life intriguing, even seductive, to modern people—hunting and fal­ conry, feasting upon exotic foods on gold and silver plate, luxurious clothing and lavish jewellery, chivalric pastimes—made it a dubious subject for most serious historians. The modern British monarchy, which has so little political power but receives so much attention for both its daily life and ceremonies, may make earl­ ier periods of court life seem politically trivial as well—the stuff of tabloid jour­ nalism and popular enthusiasm rather than scholarly history. Only when it came to patronage of high culture—painting, music, ballet, and so forth—did earlier generations of scholars tend to take court life seriously. In recent decades, how­ ever, the general attitude to the subject has begun to change. Norbert Elias, a sociologist with a strong historical bent, was instrumental in this change and is widely acknowledged as the progenitor of modern court studies.6 His two key works, Über den Prozess der Zivilisation and Höfische Gesellschaft, which began receiving widespread attention in the 1970s, made two broad argu­ ments. First, he claimed that royal courts had a profound influence in reshaping aristocratic manners, thereby softening a warrior nobility and teaching nobles to restrain their impulses and aggressiveness and embrace self-control. This, he believed, helped modernize European culture. Second, he argued that the elab­or­ ate round of court life at Versailles, and by implication other royal courts, had the profoundly important role of reinforcing royal absolutist control by creating a  peaceful competition for royal favour within the palace.7 Many of Elias’s 5  Timothy Reuter, ‘The Making of England and Germany, 850–1050: Points of Comparison and Difference,’ in Janet  L.  Nelson, ed., Medieval Polities and Modern Mentalities (Cambridge, 2006), 284–99, at 294. 6  John Adamson, ‘The Making of the Ancien-Régime Court 1500–1700,’ in John Adamson, ed., The Princely Courts of Europe: Ritual, Politics and Culture under the Ancien Régime, 1500–1750 (London, 1999), 7–41, at 8–10; Ronald G. Asch, ‘Introduction: Court and Household from the Fifteenth to the Seventeenth Centuries,’ in Ronald  G.  Asch and Adolf  M.  Birke, eds., Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age, c. 1450–1650 (Oxford, 1991), 1–38, at 1–2; Bucholz, The Augustan Court, 1; Jeroen Duindam, Myths of Power: Norbert Elias and the Early Modern European Court (Amsterdam, 1995); Jeroen Duindam, Vienna and Versailles: The Courts of Europe’s Major Dynastic Rivals, 1550–1780 (Cambridge, 2003), 7–9; Anna Bryson, From Courtesy to Civility: Changing Codes of Conduct in Early Modern England (Oxford, 1998); Rita Costa-Gomes, The Making of a Court Society: Kings and Nobles in Late Medieval Portugal (Cambridge, 2003), 1–2; Janet L. Nelson, ‘Was Charlemagne’s Court a Courtly Society?’ in Courts, Elites, and Gendered Power in the Early Middle Ages: Charlemagne and Others (Aldershot, 2007), 39–57, at 39; A.  J.  S.  Spawforth, ed., The Court and Court Society in Ancient Monarchies (Cambridge, 2007), 4–7. 7 Norbert Elias, Über den Prozeß der Zivilisation. Soziogenetische und psychogenetische Untersuchungen, 2 vols. (Basel, 1939); Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process (New York, 1978); Norbert Elias, Power and Civility: The Civilizing Process, Volume II (New York, 1982); Norbert Elias, Die höfische Gesellschaft: Untersuchungen zur Soziologie des Königtums und der höfischen Aristokratie (Neuwied, 1969); Norbert Elias, The Court Society (New York, 1983).

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4  Power and Pleasure conclusions have been challenged, particularly by early modernists, but the books remain influential, in part because they made scholars see the historical im­port­ ance of royal courts.8 The anthropologist Clifford Geertz has also had an important influence on court studies, especially with his 1980 work Negara: The Theatre State in 19thCentury Bali. His emphasis on symbolic power, on what he calls the poetics of power, is especially useful in uncovering aspects of royal power that exist along­ side the kinds of military, administrative, and economic forms of power that his­ tor­ ians have traditionally studied. Drawing on Walter Bagehot’s distinction between the dignified and efficient parts of government, Geertz aimed to correct what he saw as a persistent misconception about the relation between the two, namely that ‘the office of the dignified parts is to serve the efficient, that they are artifices, more or less cunning, more or less illusional, designed to facilitate the prosier aims of rule.’ While he may have gone too far in reversing matters and placing the efficient largely in service of the dignified, his work is helpful in rethinking older assumptions about the nature of power.9 Elias’s work, combined with the rise of social history, the increasing influence of anthropology on history, and the subsequent ‘cultural’ turn, fostered consider­ able interest among early modernists in royal and princely courts.10 The concerns of these scholars have varied widely, but there are several common themes. The first is the study of the organization of royal households, in many ways simply an extension of traditional interest in administrative history. The second is the study of cultural activity at court. This too has its traditional aspects, and it is shaped by an interdisciplinary concern for the history of art, music, and other forms of high 8  For criticism, see Duindam, Myths of Power; Adamson, ‘Making of the Ancien-Régime Court,’ 15–16; Asch, ‘Introduction,’ 15–16; Duindam, Vienna and Versailles, 7–9. 9 Clifford Geertz, Negara: The Theatre State in Nineteenth-Century Bali (Princeton, NJ, 1980). Quotation on p. 122. 10  The bibliography is extensive, but important works include: Sidney Anglo, Spectacle, Pageantry, and Early Tudor Policy (Oxford, 1969); Roy Strong, Splendor at Court: Renaissance Spectacle and the Theater of Power (Boston, MA, 1973); John Adamson, ed., The Princely Courts of Europe: Ritual, Politics and Culture under the Ancien Régime, 1500–1750 (London, 1999); Bucholz, The Augustan Court; Duindam, Vienna and Versailles; D. M. Loades, The Tudor Court (Totowa, NJ, 1987); Gregory Lubkin, A Renaissance Court: Milan under Galeazzo Maria Sforza (Berkeley, CA, 1994); Robert Muchembled, ‘Manners, Courts, and Civility,’ in Guido Ruggiero, ed., A Companion to the Worlds of the Renaissance (Oxford, 2002), 156–72; Guido Ruggiero, The Renaissance in Italy: A Social and Cultural History of the Rinascimento (New York, 2015), 268–325. Some works and collections that extend the subject to the Middle Ages and other periods are Ronald G. Asch and Adolf M. Birke, eds., Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age, c. 1450–1650 (Oxford, 1991); A. G. Dickens, ed., The Courts of Europe: Politics, Patronage, and Royalty, 1400–1800 (New York, 1977); David Starkey, ed., The English Court: From the Wars of the Roses to the Civil War (London, 1987); Sergio Bertelli, The King’s Body: Sacred Rituals of Power in Medieval and Early Modern Europe (University Park, PA, 2001); Werner Paravacini, ed., Luxus und Integration: Materielle Hofkultur Westeuropas vom 12. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert (Munich, 2010). Some good comparative works for courts around the world are Jeroen Duindam, Tülay Artan, and Metin Kunt, eds., Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires: A Global Perspective (Leiden, 2011); Jeroen Duindam, Dynasties: A Global History of Power, 1300–1800 (Cambridge, 2016).

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Introduction  5 culture, but recent work has started to look beyond the aspects of court life that fit into a modern high-culture framework. A third broad theme is the study of ­ritualized or at least highly formalized activities at royal and princely courts, both religious and secular. A fourth and particularly important theme has to do with courts, power, and politics, including how courts shaped relations between rulers and their nobles and other subjects; how courts strengthened and legitimized ­rulers by spreading propaganda; and how courts reified intangible aspects of royal authority. Historians of Western Europe in the Middle Ages have also begun to study royal and princely courts. One cluster of such studies focuses on the late Middle Ages. Not surprisingly, these have much in common with similar studies on the early modern period, though they have perhaps been less interested in purely cul­ tural matters.11 Another group has focused on the early Middle Ages, but they have a very different historiographic origin and a somewhat different set of inter­ ests: in particular, there is a great deal of work on ritual in politics, much of it influenced by anthropological models.12 Some of the subjects will seem obvious: 11 Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society; Chris Given-Wilson, The Royal Household and the King’s Affinity: Service, Politics and Finance in England, 1360–1413 (New Haven, CT, 1986); V. J. Scattergood and J. W. Sherborne, eds., English Court Culture in the Later Middle Ages (New York, 1983); M.  G.  A.  Vale, The Princely Court: Medieval Courts and Culture in North-West Europe, 1270–1380 (Oxford, 2003); C.  M.  Woolgar, The Great Household in Late Medieval England (New Haven, CT, 1999); Steven Gunn and Antheun Janse, eds., The Court as a Stage: England and the Low Countries in the Later Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 2006); John Carmi Parsons, ed., The Court and Household of Eleanor of Castile in 1290 (Toronto, 1977); Werner Rösener, Leben am Hof: Königs- und Fürstenhöfe im Mittelalter (Ostfildern, 2008); Karl-Heinz Spieß, Fürsten und Höfe im Mittelalter (Darmstadt, 2008). For work on the influential Burgundian court, see Chapter 9, note 52. 12  Important works on early medieval courts and the role of ritual include J. L. Nelson, Politics and Ritual in Early Medieval Europe (London, 1984), 133–71, 239–401; J. L. Nelson, ‘The Lord’s Anointed and the People’s Choice: Carolingian Royal Ritual,’ in David Cannadine and Simon Price, eds., Rituals of Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies (Cambridge, 1987), 137–80; Janet L. Nelson, Courts, Elites, and Gendered Power in the Early Middle Ages: Charlemagne and Others (Aldershot, 2007); Gerald Bayreuther, ‘Die Osterfeier als Akt königlicher Repräsentanz und Herrschaftsausübung unter Heinrich II (1002–1024),’ in Detlef Altenburg, Jörg Jarnut, and Hans-Hugo Steinhoff, eds., Feste und Feiern im Mittelalter (Sigmaringen, 1991), 245–53; Gerd Althoff, ‘Fest und Bündnis,’ in Detlef Altenburg, Jörg Jarnut, and Hans-Hugo Steinhoff, eds., Feste und Feiern im Mittelalter (Sigmaringen, 1991), 29–38; Gerd Althoff, Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter: Kommunikation in Frieden und Fehde (Darmstadt, 1997); Gerd Althoff, ‘Der frieden-, bündnis, und gemeinschaftstiftende Charakter des Mahles im früheren Mittelalter,’ in Irmgard Bitsch, Trude Ehlert, and Xenja von Erzdorff, eds., Essen und Trinken in Mittelalter und Neuzeit (Wiesbaden, 1997), 13–25; Gerd Althoff, Die Macht der Rituale: Symbolik und Herrschaft im Mittelalter (Darmstadt, 2003); Gerd Althoff, Family, Friends and Followers: Political and Social Bonds in Medieval Europe (Cambridge, 2004), 136–59; Geoffrey Koziol, Begging Pardon and Favor: Ritual and Political Order in Early Medieval France (Ithaca, NY, 1992); Karl Leyser, ‘Ritual, Ceremony, and Gesture: Ottonian Germany,’ Communications and Power in Medieval Europe: The Carolingian and Ottonian Centuries (London, 1994), 189–213; Frans Theuws and J.  L.  Nelson, Rituals of Power: From Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages (Leiden, 2000); Jean-Claude Schmitt and Otto G. Oexle, eds., Les tendances actuelles de l’histoire du Moyen Âge en France et en Allemagne (Paris, 2002), 231–81; Catherine Cubitt, ed., Court Culture in the Early Middle Ages: The Proceedings of the First Alcuin Conference (Turnhout, 2003); Timothy Reuter, ‘Regemque, quem in Francia pene per­ didit, in patria magnifice recepit: Ottonian Ruler Representation in Synchronic and Diachronic Comparison,’ in Janet L. Nelson, Medieval Polities and Modern Mentalities (Cambridge, 2006), 127–46; Julia Barrow, ‘Demonstrative Behaviour and Political Communication in Later Anglo-Saxon England,’

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6  Power and Pleasure politically important religious rites like coronation or secular ceremonies like the granting of arms. However, subtler matters—gestures such as bowing, kneeling, performing prostrations, embracing, and kissing—have also come under study. Various scholars have argued that supplication or ceremonial greetings that involved these gestures could have important political implications, as could activities we might categorize as mere etiquette, like going out to greet guests or carefully arranging seating at feasts. Scholars have even studied the political ­purposes of displays of emotion. Though modern people tend to treat emotions (at least ‘true’ emotions) as spontaneous, welling up rather than planned, a number of scholars have argued that the ferocious displays of anger by powerful people described in many sources did not result from a lack of control but were instead signals designed to elicit a response such as submission or compromise.13 One need not divorce medieval emotions too much from modern ones to recognize this as a possibility—calculated displays of rage and other emotions occur in modern politics as well.14 Much of what has been described here can be cat­egor­ ized as symbolic communication, a phrase I will adopt because so many of these acts were designed to convey messages.15 Although the scholarship on ritual, cere­monial, and symbolic communication has not been without controversy, it has played a decisive role in our understanding of early medieval culture.16 In part, scholars of early medieval Europe have focused on such subjects because they lack the kind of administrative records allowing one to reconstruct court life as fully as other scholars have done for later periods, and as I intend to Anglo-Saxon England 36 (2007), 127–50; Yitzhak Hen, Roman Barbarians: The Royal Court and Culture and the Early Medieval West (London, 2007); Levi Roach, ‘Penance, Submission and Deditio: Religious Influences on Dispute Settlement in Later Anglo-Saxon England (871–1066),’ Anglo-Saxon England 41 (2013), 343–72. A good overview of the literature may be found in Alexander Beihammer, ‘Comparative Approaches to the Ritual World of the Medieval Mediterranean,’ in Alexander Beihammer, Stavroula Constantinou, and Maria Parani, eds., Court Ceremonies and Rituals of Power in Byzantium and the Medieval Mediterranean (Leiden, 2013), 1–33, at 1–14. 13  See in particular Gerd Althoff, ‘Empörung, Tränen, Zerknirschung: Emotionen in der öffentli­ chen Kommunikation des Mittelalters,’ in Spielregeln der Politik im Mittelalter: Kommunikation in Frieden und Fehde (Darmstadt, 1997), 258–81; Barbara  H.  Rosenwein, ed., Anger’s Past: The Social Uses of an Emotion in the Middle Ages (Ithaca, NY, 1998); Fredric L. Cheyette, Ermengard of Narbonne and the World of the Troubadours (Ithaca, NY, 2001), 199–219; Stephen J. Spencer, ‘ “Like a Raging Lion”: Richard the Lionheart’s Anger during the Third Crusade in Medieval and Modern Historiography,’ English Historical Review 132 (2017), 495–532; Kate McGrath, Royal Rage and the Construction of Anglo-Norman Authority, c. 1000–1250 (London, 2019). 14  For some useful cautions about taking the difference between medieval and modern emotions too far, see Geoffrey Koziol, The Politics of Memory and Identity in Carolingian Royal Diplomas: The West Frankish Kingdom (840–987) (Turnhout, 2012), 403–5. 15  For this term, see Althoff, Die Macht der Rituale; Björn Weiler, ‘Symbolism and Politics in the Reign of Henry III,’ Thirteenth-Century England (2003), 15–41, at 17; Björn Weiler, ‘Knighting, Homage, and the Meaning of Ritual: The Kings of England and Their Neighbors in the Thirteenth Century,’ Viator 37 (2006), 275–99, at 275–6. An alternative is Julia Barrow’s ‘demonstrative behav­ iour’; Barrow, ‘Demonstrative Behaviour,’ 127–50. 16  For discussion of the controversy, see Chapter 8, 188.

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Introduction  7 do for John’s reign. However, a more important motive for medievalists has been to try to understand how early medieval polities were held together in the absence of the kinds of institutions and bureaucracies that John and other rulers in the central Middle Ages were noted for building—and that grew ever more signifi­ cant over time. Early explanations focused on the idea that sacral kingship gave rulers, particularly in certain dynasties like the Carolingians and Ottonians, a religious authority that could offset the lack of developed institutions. More recent scholarship has emphasized the role of all kinds of rituals and ceremonies, secular and religious alike, in binding early medieval polities together and allow­ ing their rulers to function. A number of historians have begun to investigate similar practices at royal courts in the central Middle Ages.17 However, such studies are not nearly as prominent for the period as for the early Middle Ages. More prominent has been the study of courtliness, which obviously delves into court life.18 But this has drawn more on literature and narrative sources than the kinds of records that allow one to observe court life in detail, and has focused more on broad social phenomena than reconstructing life at any particular court. There has been hardly any of this last kind of work for the period. The main exception is for the court of John’s parents, Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. Martin Aurell devoted much of his book on the Plantagenet court to Henry’s reign; Nicholas Vincent has produced an important article on Henry’s court; and Sybil Schröder has written a significant book on material culture at that court, drawing heavily on the king’s

17 Martin Aurell, ‘La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204): entourage, savoir et civilité,’ in La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204) (Poitiers, 2000), 9–46, at 39–46; Klaus Van Eickels, Vom inszenierten Konsens zum systematisierten Konflikt. Die englisch-französischen Beziehungen und ihre Wahrnemung an der Wende vom Hoch- zum Spätmittelalter (Stuttgart, 2002), 287–398; Weiler, ‘Symbolism and Politics,’ 15–41; Weiler, ‘Knighting, Homage, and the Meaning of Ritual,’ 275–88; Björn Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture: England and Germany, c. 1215–c. 1250 (Basingstoke, 2007); Scott Waugh, ‘Histoire, hagiographie et le souverain ideal à la cour des Plantagenêt,’ in Martin Aurell and Noël Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens: confrontations et héritages (Turnhout, 2006), 429–46; Nicholas Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ in Christopher Harper-Bill and Nicholas Vincent, eds., Henry II: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 2007), 278–334; Jacques Le Goff, Saint Louis (Notre Dame, IN, 2009), 480–518; Rebecca L. Slitt, ‘Acting Out Friendship: Signs and Gestures of Aristocratic Male Friendship in the Twelfth Century,’ Haskins Society Journal 21 (2010), 147–64; Lars Kjær, ‘Food, Drink and Ritualized Communication in the Household of Eleanor de Montfort, February to August 1265,’ Journal of Medieval History 37 (2011), 75–89; Fanny Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire: Construire un territoire politique (Rennes, 2014), 279–86; Wojtek Jezierski et al., eds., Rituals, Performatives, and Political Order in Northern Europe, c. 650–1350 (Turnhout, 2015). Even when not consciously addressing these issues, many other scholars have touched on them when speaking of things like political theatre: see, for instance, R.  R.  Davies, The First English Empire: Power and Identities in the British Isles, 1093–1343 (Oxford, 2002), 23–5. 18  The literature is vast, but see, for instance, C. Stephen Jaeger, The Origins of Courtliness: Civilizing Trends and the Formation of Courtly Ideals, 939–1210 (Philadelphia, PA, 1985); Josef Fleckenstein, ed., Curialitas: Studien zu Grundfragen der höfisch-ritterlichen Kultur (Göttingen, 1990); Aldo D. Scaglione, Knights at Court: Courtliness, Chivalry, and Courtesy from Ottonian Germany to the Italian Renaissance (Berkeley, CA, 1991).

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8  Power and Pleasure financial records.19 The narrative sources for Henry’s court, it must be admitted, are somewhat better than for John’s, and shed much light on his court. However, it is only with John’s reign that one finds the records that allow a reasonably com­ prehensive description of a royal court in the central Middle Ages, comparable to the scholarly work on later periods. Thus, a history of the court of King John can greatly expand our knowledge of the royal court in the central Middle Ages.

1.2  Goals of This Book 1.2.1  Reconstruction of Court Life The first aim of this book is, to the degree possible, to reconstruct social and cul­ tural life at King John’s court. To some degree, the contents of the archives shape which topics receive the most attention, including hunting; material culture; reli­ gious ceremonial; and food and feasting. However, these subjects appear fre­ quently in the records precisely because they were of special interest to John and his court, as they were to most royal and princely courts of the time. The primar­ ily descriptive layer of this project is fundamentally important precisely because so little work has appeared on court life in this period. Moreover, as individual chapters and sections will show, this reconstruction contributes to large existing literatures on medieval hunting, clothing and textiles, learning at court, chivalry, courtly love, feasting, etiquette, and ceremonial royal entries into towns. In some cases, it will also contribute to important current debates, for instance over the survival of sacral kingship after the Investiture Strife, the uses of castles, and medieval experiences of place and space. In other cases, it will provide useful spe­ cific findings. For example, wine historians have long associated the English shift to consuming Bordeaux rather than Loire valley wines with John’s loss of ter­ri­tor­ ies north of Gascony; my research not only confirms this but also shows how fast it happened, since the change is already apparent in wine purchasing for the royal court within a few years of 1204. However useful these contributions to the study of individual aspects of court life may be, it is the focus on a single court rather than a single topic that is crucial to providing a fuller understanding of the significance of courts. Though special­ ists in such subjects as hunting and feasting often try to provide context for such activities, the context here will be deeper and much more concrete. Moreover, looking at the court in the round allows one to see the pervasiveness of important 19  Martin Aurell, ed., La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204) (Poitiers, 2000); Sybille Schröder, Macht und Gabe: materielle Kultur am Hof Heinrichs II. von England (Husum, 2004); Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 278–344. See also Martin Aurell, ed., Culture politique des Plantagenêt (1154–1224) (Poitiers, 2003). For an important work that focuses on specific aspects of court life but extends to the reigns of Henry II’s sons, see Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire.

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Introduction  9 practices like gift exchange or displays of power and wealth across a range of court activities. More important still, researching a variety of activities reveals just how much effort and money went into maintaining court life. The English royal government strove not only to win wars and oversee justice, the traditional duties of a king, but also to maintain a magnificent court for the king. Though the sur­ viving records do not allow a systematic accounting of royal costs, various indi­ vidual figures I discuss throughout the book give a sense of just how much the royal government spent on activities such as hunting, distributing robes at feasts, and other aspects of court life—even during a period of ruinously expensive wars. These expenditures only increased the financial pressures John felt. Moreover, though the financial demands of warfare were the chief force impelling kings to develop ever more sophisticated methods to collect money, the desire to have a spectacular court was also a motive for the English kings to develop their preco­ cious bureaucracy. Finally, reconstruction of life at John’s court will provide a baseline for compari­ son with other courts, a subject I turn to in Chapter 9. Though, as I have stressed, similar systematic work has not been done for other princely and royal courts in the central Middle Ages, I hope to begin such work by looking at royal records from other courts around 1200 and piecing together material from a var­iety of other primary and secondary sources. The resulting comparison is highly tenta­ tive, but I suggest that many similarities existed not only between John’s court and those of other rulers in core cultural areas of Western Europe such as France, but also with the courts of rulers in places ranging from Wales and Norway to Byzantium and the Islamic world. The lack of systematic studies of courts until the late Middle Ages and early modern period presents challenges for a temporal com­ parison as well, but I have also ventured tentative comparisons there. In particular, I propose a combination of strong continuity with slow but cumulatively powerful change that meant that court life altered only gradually from generation to generation but far more radically in the span of centuries, so that early modern courts were very different from ones from the central Middle Ages.

1.2.2  Analysis of Court Life, Soft Power, and John’s Successes and Failures Norbert Elias placed the study of power at the centre of his exploration of court life, and most of his successors have followed his lead. Power will be one of the main subjects of this book as well. Much of the existing work on King John’s reign also focuses on power, of course, but mostly on institutional, military, or eco­ nomic forms rather than the kinds of symbolic or cultural power provided by activities like hunting and feasting. In his recent book, The Normans and Empire, David Bates has persuasively argued for extending the modern term ‘soft power’

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10  Power and Pleasure to medieval settings.20 I explore soft power at John’s court by focusing on four important questions. First, how did social and cultural life at John’s court provide him with soft power (though I will also look briefly at some ways in which the very nature of court life could undermine a ruler’s position)? Second, how did John’s enemies seek to contest and undermine the power he gained from his court? Third, how did the rise of administrative kingship affect earlier forms of soft power?21 Fourth, how effective was John at using soft power? I noted above that focusing on the court life of a single ruler allows the researcher to study court life in a thicker context and more concrete setting. As an example, instead of asking in the abstract what difference soft power made, one can ask how it helped, or failed to help, the particular ruler succeed. Though fail­ ure is obviously a major theme in John’s case, it is not the whole picture; John had successes as well as failures. He successfully laid claim to the inheritance of his brother Richard despite the competition of Arthur, the son of John’s older brother Geoffrey. I have already noted the growth of government, and this was ac­com­ pan­ied by a notable expansion of revenue collection during his reign. In a series of expeditions to Scotland, Ireland, and Wales from 1209 to 1211, John estab­ lished an impressive if temporary dominance within Britain and Ireland.22 Though few scholars would say John handled the crises he faced brilliantly, he did sometimes handle them well. For instance, faced with Innocent III, a pope who aggressively advanced papal rights, John entered into a dispute over succession to the archbishopric of Canterbury that led to personal excommunication and an interdict on England. He extracted himself from this by ultimately giving in to the pope on the narrow issue of the pope’s appointment of Stephen Langton to the position, but then cleverly gained papal support by making himself the pope’s vassal for England and Ireland.23 At the end of his reign, John faced a powerful array of enemies, including many English barons, the King of Scotland, Welsh 20  David Bates, The Normans and Empire (Oxford, 2013), 4, 18–23. 21  I draw the useful phrase ‘administrative kingship’ from C. Warren Hollister and John W. Baldwin, ‘The Rise of Administrative Kingship: Henry I and Philip Augustus,’ American Historical Review 83 (1978), 867–905. 22  For these expeditions and relations with Scotland, Ireland, and Wales more generally, see Seán Duffy, ‘King John’s Expedition to Ireland, 1210: The Evidence Reconsidered,’ Irish Historical Studies 30 (1996), 1–24; S.  D.  Church, ‘The 1210 Campaign in Ireland: Evidence for a Military Revolution?’ Anglo-Norman Studies 20 (1998), 45–57; A. A. M. Duncan, ‘King John of England and the Kings of Scots,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 247–71; Seán Duffy, ‘John and Ireland: The Origins of England’s Irish Problem,’ in S.  D.  Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 221–45; I. W. Rowlands, ‘King John and Wales,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 273–87; K.  J.  Stringer, ‘Kingship, Conflict, and State Making in the Reign of Alexander II: The War of 1215–1217 and Its Context,’ in Richard Oram, ed., The Reign of Alexander II 1214–1249 (Leiden, 2005), 99–156; Louise J. Wilkinson, ‘Joan, Wife of Llywelyn the Great,’ Thirteenth-Century England 10 (2005), 81–93; Colin Veach, ‘King John and Royal Control in Ireland: Why William de Briouze Had to Be Destroyed,’ English Historical Review 129 (2014), 1051–78; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 238–41, 473–5. 23  For a recent discussion of this dispute, see Christopher Harper-Bill, ‘John and the Church of Rome,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 289–315.

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Introduction  11 rulers, and (from May 1216) the future Louis VIII of France. His position could have collapsed in England, as it had in Normandy a decade earlier, but John recruited and maintained sufficient military strength to prevent this. After his death, this military power allowed the supporters of his young son, Henry, to drive out Louis and crown Henry king. John had many failures, but they were not the whole story. Moreover, when it came to his greatest failures, many factors worked against him or were beyond his control. The Angevin Empire was an unwieldy affair, involving too many territories, frontiers, and enemies.24 As is well known, many of the governing practices and techniques the rebels objected to in Magna Carta had been developed and used by John’s predecessors, even if the loss of his most important continental possessions forced him to ratchet up the financial pressure on his English subjects to dangerous levels. A significant if somewhat mysterious episode of inflation, now thought to be centred on John’s earliest years, added to the turmoil in royal finances caused by John’s efforts to recover Normandy, Maine, and Anjou.25 Despite the apparently overwhelming advantage in territories the Angevin dynasty had over the Capetians, their advantage in wealth was not com­ mensurate. Moreover, Philip’s acquisition of territories elsewhere in France, along with other financial initiatives, shifted the economic balance towards the French king, though historians debate which ruler had more income at the beginning of John’s reign.26 Clearly, there were many factors involved in the successes and 24 For recent work on the Angevin Empire, see Robert-Henri Bautier, ‘Empire Plantagenêt ou “éspace Plantagenêt” y eut-il une civilization du monde Plantagenêt?’ Cahiers de civilisation médiévale 29 (1983), 139–47; John Le Patourel, Feudal Empires: Norman and Plantagenet (London, 1984), 1–17, 289–309; J. C. Holt, ‘The End of the Anglo-Norman Realm,’ in Magna Carta and Medieval Government (London, 1985), 23–65; C. Warren Hollister, ‘Normandy, France, and the Anglo-Norman Regnum,’ in Monarchy, Magnates and Institutions in the Anglo-Norman World (London, 1986), 17–57; Turner, King John, 59–86; Ralph V. Turner, ‘The Problem of Survival for the Angevin “Empire”: Henry II’s and His Sons’ Vision versus Late Twelfth-Century Realities,’ American Historical Review 100 (1995), 78–96; Aurell, ‘La cour Plantagenêt,’ 9–46; Nicholas Vincent, ‘King Henry II and the Poitevins,’ in Martin Aurell, ed., La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204) (Poitiers, 2000), 103–35; John Gillingham, The Angevin Empire, 2nd ed. (London, 2001); Martin Aurell, The Plantagenet Empire, 1154–1224 (Harlow, 2007), 1–10, 186–218, 263–72; Aurell and Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens: confrontations et héritages; Martin Aurell and Frédéric Boutoulle, eds., Les seigneuries dan l’espace Plantagenêt (c. 1150–c. 1250) (Paris, 2009); Nicholas Vincent, ‘Jean sans Terre et l’origine de la Gascogne anglaise: droits et pouvoirs dans les arcanes des sources,’ Annales du Midi 123 (2011), 533–66. 25  For recent work, see J.  L.  Bolton, ‘The English Economy in the Early Thirteenth Century,’ in S.  D.  Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 27–40; Paul Latimer, ‘Early Thirteenth-Century Prices,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 41–73; Paul Latimer, ‘The English Inflation of 1180–1220 Reconsidered,’ Past and Present 171 (2001), 3–29. 26  J. C. Holt, ‘The Loss of Normandy and Royal Finance,’ in John Gillingham and J. C. Holt, eds., War and Government in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honour of J.O.  Prestwich (Woodbridge, 1984), 92–105; Nick Barratt, ‘The Revenue of King John,’ English Historical Review 111 (1996), 835–55; Nick Barratt, ‘The Revenues of King John and Philip Augustus Revisited,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 75–99; V. D. Moss, ‘The Norman Exchequer Rolls of King John,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 101–16; Nick Barratt, ‘Counting the Cost: The Financial Implications of the Loss of Normandy,’ Thirteenth-Century England 10 (2005), 31–9; John Gillingham, Richard I (New Haven, CT, 1999), 338–48; Vincent D. Moss, ‘La

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12  Power and Pleasure failures of John’s reign, many of them studied intensively. What this book seeks to add is a sustained focus on how the soft power produced at and by the court fit into the mix. The discussion of soft power is particularly important because so much depended on John’s personal relations with the powerful. For all the growing sophistication of royal bureaucracy, John’s power still depended most heavily on his ability to maintain the loyalty of existing noble and knightly followers and recruit new ones. I will pursue this subject more fully in Chapter 8; it suffices to say here that John lost most of his continental possessions early in 1204, and nearly lost England late in his reign, first and foremost because so many nobles and knights turned against him. Though Philip Augustus’s military prowess should not be ignored, the French king was able to sweep through Normandy, Maine, Anjou, and parts of Poitou so quickly because of a wave of defections. And it was, of course, a baronial revolt that later threatened John’s control of England. However, John avoided losing England to the rebel barons and subsequently to Prince Louis primarily because he was able to retain the loyalty of some of his nobles and knights and call on powerful followers from outside England. Of course, many factors, including John’s patronage in land and office, his need to raise money, and his use or abuse of his royal powers, shaped his followers’ reac­ tions, but the social and cultural interactions discussed in this book were crucial means for the king to potentially strengthen relations with his most powerful fol­ lowers. All things being equal, a king who wielded soft power successfully was more likely to succeed than a king who did not, and in close-run situations, soft power could tip the balance. Despite this, John’s use of soft power has been a rela­ tively neglected factor in his relations with the powerful: John Gillingham has addressed aspects of the topic, particularly the impact of John’s lavish expenditure on the court, and many others have touched on it, but more work is needed.27 However, one must look not only at John’s use of soft power, but also at how his enemies tried to contest that power, sometimes by employing their own soft power, but more often by undermining his. Much of the work on aspects of court life such as ritual performances, feasting, hunting, and the deployment of m ­ aterial culture comes from functionalist social science theories that focus on these ­activities’ purposes, most often with an eye to their role in relations of power. Early work on these activities understandably focused on how they worked, not on the potential for failure, on function rather than dysfunction, and often perte de la Normandie et les finances de l’État: les limites des interprétations financières,’ in AnneMarie Flambard Héricher and Véronique Gazeau, eds., 1204, la Normandie entre Plantagenêts et Capétiens (Caen, 2007), 75–91. 27  John Gillingham, ‘Wirtschaftlichkeit oder Ehre? Die Ausgaben der englischen Könige im 12. und frühen 13. Jahrhundert,’ in Werner Paravacini, ed., Luxus und Integration: Materielle Hofkultur Westeuropas vom 12. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert (Munich, 2010), 151–67.

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Introduction  13 discussed them abstractly, without much context. However, as Kim Esmark has remarked of the medieval historiography on rituals and ceremonies, ‘In recent years . . . attention has shifted toward problems of process, strategy, contention, variability, ambiguity, struggles over interpretation, and so on.’28 In this book, I  will stress how John’s enemies, in their actions and the stories they told and wrote about his activities, tried to counter and undermine the methods he employed to draw soft power from his court, and to some degree succeeded. Another major aim of this book is to use John’s reign to assess the impact that the development of administrative kingship had on earlier structures of soft power. There are several reasons for the difference between the early medieval historiography of government, with its emphasis on rituals and ceremonies, and that of the High Middle Ages, with its longstanding emphasis on administration. Clearly, the survival of records for the latter period has had an effect, but there also seems to be at least an implicit presumption that the rise of administration made soft power less important over the course of the central Middle Ages.29 Perhaps a Weberian model of a shift from charismatic rule to routine bureaucracy plays a role here. However, the scholars who are exploring ceremony and ritual in the central Middle Ages are blurring boundaries in that area, and rightly so. I argue that administrative kingship was in many ways compatible with traditional uses of soft power. In particular, I point to the way that the rise of government institutions gave rulers new tools and resources to project an aura of sacral king­ ship, engage in impressive ceremonial activities, and generally promote soft power. It is certainly possible that the rise of bureaucracies and institutions reduced the relative importance of soft power, and it is likely that they created challenges for the creation of soft power and altered aspects of how the court pro­ duced it. Nonetheless, I intend to show that administrative kingship could not only coexist with but actually strengthen many of the traditional practices of soft power at royal courts. Since the court remained an important potential source of soft power for John, the question is how well he wielded it. The debate over how able a king John was more generally and the degree to which he was responsible for the disasters of his reign is a longstanding one. Given the many factors involved, including those outside John’s direct control, any answer will be complicated. It is not my inten­ tion to relitigate the question of John’s overall competence, though my own cau­ tious view is that despite being reasonably intelligent and possessing some political talents, overall he was a disastrous ruler who bears much responsibility for his failures. Here, I simply wish to contribute to the larger discussion by 28 Kim Esmark, ‘Just Rituals: Masquerade, Manipulation, and Officializing Strategies in Saxo’s Gesta Danorum,’ in Wojtek Jezierski et al., eds., Rituals, Performatives, and Political Order in Northern Europe, c. 650–1350 (Turnhout, 2015), 237–67, at 237. 29  See the comments of Björn Weiler on this: Weiler, ‘Knighting, Homage, and the Meaning of Ritual,’ 275, 277, 298–9; Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture, xi, 130, 148.

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14  Power and Pleasure focusing on John’s skill at using soft power. As will become clear, John had an impressive and magnificent court and, as the Anonymous of Béthune indicated, he was generous in sharing its lavishness. Yet his glittering court seems not to have helped him much: John’s image was perhaps even poorer among con­tem­por­ ary writers than modern historians.30 To some degree, this was due to his poor hand­ling of relations with his nobles at court. In particular, according to chron­ic­ lers writing in the decade or so after John’s death, one major source of baronial discontent, which most scholars have not sufficiently accounted for, stemmed from a specific aspect of court life—John’s predatory pursuit of sexual relation­ ships with the wives and female relatives of his barons, as noted in the quotation at the beginning of this chapter. A less egregious but still important problem, I will argue, is that John forfeited many of the advantages of his court through his own bungling, especially at significant moments. Overall, John did not benefit as much as he should have from the soft power his court could provide.

1.2.3  The Court as a Site of Pleasure and Self-Gratification Although a significant portion of my analysis concentrates on power, it would be a profound mistake to discuss royal and princely courts only as sources of power. When contemporary sources wrote of court activities like hunting, they were more likely to speak about pleasure than power. Yet like political, military, and administrative histories, court histories tend to take a highly functionalist approach, focusing on the accumulation of power—as though humans acquire power, or use their existing power, solely to obtain more power. This is a mistake, and an important theme of this book will be the way the court was designed to provide pleasure and self-gratification to John and his leading followers. There are a number of reasons court historians have focused on power rather than pleasure. Power exerts a fascination, and it is easy to become fixated on it. A deterrent to the study of pleasure may be that its importance seems both obvious and analytically simple, indeed uninteresting, so that one can simply 30 For discussions of John’s medieval and modern reputation, see Painter, Reign of King John, 226–84; Richardson and Sayles, Governance of Mediaeval England, 321–36, 364–94; Warren, King John, 1–16; Holt, ‘King John,’ 85–109; David Carpenter, ‘Abbot Ralph of Coggeshall’s Account of the Last Years of King Richard and the First Years of King John,’ English Historical Review 113 (1998), 1210–30; John Gillingham, ‘Historians Without Hindsight: Coggeshall, Diceto and Howden on the Early Years of John’s Reign,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 1–26; Turner, King John, 1–19, 258–65; Matthew Strickland, War and Chivalry: The Conduct and Perception of War in England and Normandy, 1066–1217 (Cambridge, 1996), 53, 109–10, 203, 212–13, 223, 256–7; Jim Bradbury, ‘Philip Augustus and King John: Personality and History,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 347–61; Gillingham, Richard I, 335–48; Sean McGlynn, Blood Cries Afar: The Magna Carta War and the Invasion of England, 1215–1217 (Stroud, 2011), 242–9; Vincent, Magna Carta, 6–20, 36–52; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 70–97; Morris, King John, 285–98; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 185–205.

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Introduction  15 ac­know­ledge it and move on. The latter supposition, however, is problematic. It is true that evolution has created certain commonalities among the activities that give humans pleasure. The biological need for sustenance, for instance, makes consuming food a normal source of pleasure and it is therefore no surprise that feasting is so common across radically different human societies. That said, both pleasure and, as we shall see, comfort have a strong cultural element, for instance when it comes to food preferences. A useful parallel is with the study of emo­ tions, which have both a common evolutionary aspect and a strong cultural basis. Pleasure is therefore less straightforward than it seems, and scholars should study it with the same care and attention to nuance as we study power. A more specific reason for avoiding discussion of pleasure among court his­tor­ ians may be a reflexive defensiveness against the charge that studying courts is frivolous or elitist. Discussing hunting and entertainment as sources of power rather than pleasure perhaps makes them seem more respectable. Yet another deterrent to discussion of pleasure is that it can generate the kind of moral judge­ ments that Bucholz noted or that Elias described when he quoted at length from a scholar who referred to ‘very opulent and very extravagant courts,’ ‘refined tastes and perverse luxury,’ and ‘noble parasites.’31 I cannot claim to be free of such moral judgements, and indeed my own interest in pleasure at court emerges partly from civic and moral concerns about the growing inequality of our own times and the increasing power of modern plutocrats. Nevertheless, the historical importance of the elite pursuit of pleasure should not be ignored. After all, pleasure and self-gratification are extremely important human mo­tiv­ ators. What could be more likely than that rulers used courts not only to build power, but also to satisfy their own desires and those of privileged courtiers? Indeed, at times rulers risked or sacrificed power in the pursuit of pleasure. John’s pursuit of sexual gratification, as noted above, created major challenges to his power. While some rulers no doubt used their court to build power for its own sake, or perhaps for an ideological agenda, to ignore the way courts catered to the whims of the powerful often entails naively accepting the self-justifications of later monarchs and their supporters for the lavishness of royal courts. Thus a major theme of this book will be the way John’s royal court was designed to harness extensive resources in a very poor society to serve the pleasures of the king and those he favoured. Where Geertz spoke of the efficient part of govern­ ment serving the dignified part, I will speak of power sometimes serving pleasure. In pursuing this theme, I try to deepen our understanding of the cultural aspects of pleasure in the Middle Ages. I also discuss the complex relationship between

31 Elias, Court Society, 37–9. See also Alban Gautier, Le Festin dans l’Angleterre anglo-saxonne, v­ e-xie siècles (Rennes, 2006), 23–4; Christina Normore, A Feast for the Eyes: Art, Performance and the Late Medieval Banquet (Chicago, IL, 2015), 164–5, 192. See, however, Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste (Cambridge, MA, 1984), 367.

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16  Power and Pleasure power and pleasure. In Chapter 5, in which I discuss religious life at court, I add a third variable to the relationship: piety. This was perhaps a less important consid­ eration for John than for some other kings, but is worth considering briefly, even though pleasure will remain the more important focus. Whereas there is a vast amount of historiography on the court and power to build on, there is little on pleasure, which means that I can only begin the task of applying sophisticated analysis to pleasure. Nonetheless, by doing so I hope at least to start a conversa­ tion among scholars about the subject.

1.3  The Structure of John’s Court “In time I exist, and of time I speak,” said Augustine: and added, “What time is I know not.” In a like spirit of perplexity I may say that in the court I exist and of the court I speak, and what the court is, God knows, I know not. I do know however that the court is not time; but temporal it is, changeable and various, space-bound and wandering, never continuing in one state. When I leave it, I know it perfectly: when I come back to it I find nothing or but little of what I left there: I am become a stranger to it, and it to me. The court is the same, its members are changed.32 It has become traditional to use the above quotation from Walter Map, a courtier and critic of the court writing in the reign of Henry II, to describe the protean nature of the premodern court and the difficulty of defining it. The court’s precise nature can indeed be difficult to pin down, since contemporaries had no clear-cut definitions; in particular there was no clear dividing line between court and household. Modern historians of royal and princely courts speak of the court in various ways, often in terms of spaces, events, and processes, or as a group of people.33 For practical purposes, I will use the description Malcolm Vale applied to the court of John’s father: ‘The court of Henry II (1154–89), like its European counterparts, predecessors, and successors, was essentially an itinerant body, a place filled by a mobile assemblage of people. The court was where the ruler was.’34 Fortunately, because so much of royal government remained within the royal household in John’s reign, traditional administrative history has included 32 Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium: Courtiers’ Trifles, ed. M.  R.  James, C.  N.  L.  Brooke, and R. A. B. Mynors (Oxford, 1983), 2–3. 33  For discussions of the definition and nature of the court and terminology used by people of the time, see Asch, ‘Introduction,’ 7–9; Lubkin, Renaissance Court, ix–xii; Ralph  V.  Turner, Judges, Administrators and the Common Law in Angevin England (London, 1994), xx–xxii; Vale, Princely Court, 15–23; Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society, 2–3, 9–16. 34 Vale, Princely Court, 22. For a similar description of John’s court, see Carpenter, Magna Carta, 157.

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Introduction  17 much work on the structure of the court. There remains important work to be done in this area, but here I will simply summarize some key aspects as back­ ground for understanding the social and cultural life at court.35 John’s court moved constantly about his realms.36 He was what some scholars have called a saddle king, and Julie Kanter has estimated that he travelled 79,612 miles (128,123 km) during his reign. His average stop was 2.1 days in length, and stays of a week or more comprised only 12 per cent of his reign. On average, including his days at rest, he travelled about 13 miles a day.37 John’s court was far from unique. Walter Map compared Henry II’s court to a ghostly band that cease­ lessly followed the cursed King Herla after their return from an otherworldly visit to the court of a pygmy king.38 Itinerant rule, which can also be found in nonWestern societies from Java and Hawaii to East Africa and Morocco, was the norm in Western Europe in the Middle Ages.39 Carolingian and Ottonian kings, for instance, travelled at broadly comparable speeds to John.40 Rates did vary: Henry III chose a more leisurely pace than his father, John, or son, Edward I, though the latter also travelled less frenetically than John.41 England’s royal court tended to slow down in the later Middle Ages, but it remained itinerant, as did courts elsewhere in Europe.42 Indeed, European courts tended to settle in a fixed place only from the middle of the sixteenth century on, and even then courts 35  For government in John’s reign and the Angevin period in general, in addition to relevant sec­ tions of the biographies and works on Magna Carta, see T.  F.  Tout, Chapters in the Administrative History of Mediaeval England: The Wardrobe, the Chamber, and the Small Seals, 6 vols. (Manchester, 1967), 1:67–175; J. E. A. Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship (London, 1955); Richardson and Sayles, Governance of Mediaeval England; Doris M. Stenton, English Justice Between the Norman Conquest and the Great Charter, 1066–1215 (Philadelphia, PA, 1964); W. L. Warren, The Governance of Norman and Angevin England, 1086–1272 (Stanford, CA, 1987); Ralph V. Turner, The English Judiciary in the Age of Glanvill and Bracton, c. 1176–1239 (Cambridge, 1985); Turner, Judges, Administrators; David Carpenter, ‘The English Royal Chancery in the Thirteenth Century,’ in Adrian Jobson, ed., English Government in the Thirteenth Century (Woodbridge, 2004), 49–69. 36  Two important studies of royal itineration in the period are Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 139–65; S.  D.  Church, ‘Some Aspects of the Royal Itinerary in the Twelfth Century,’ Thirteenth-Century England 11 (2007), 31–45. 37  Julie Elizabeth Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship: The Itineraries of John and Henry III,’ Thirteenth-Century England 13 (2011), 11–26, at 11–17. For the phrase saddle king, see A. G. Dickens, ‘Monarchy and Cultural Revival: Courts in the Middle Ages,’ The Courts of Europe: Politics, Patronage, and Royalty, 1400–1800 (New York, 1977), 8–31, at 17; Loades, Tudor Court, 9. 38  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 26–31. 39  John William Bernhardt, Itinerant Kingship and Royal Monasteries in Early Medieval Germany, c. 936–1075 (Cambridge, 1993), 45–8; Clifford Geertz, ‘Centers, Kings and Charisma: Reflections on the Symbolics of Power,’ in Joseph Ben-David and Terry Nichols Clark, eds., Culture and Its Creators: Essays in Honor of Edward Shils (Chicago, IL, 1977), 150–71, 309–14. 40 Rosamond McKitterick, Charlemagne: The Formation of a European Identity (Cambridge, 2008), 180–4. 41  Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship,’ 18–24; Julie E. Crockford, ‘The Itinerary of Edward I of England: Pleasure, Piety, and Governance,’ in Alison L. Gascoigne, Leonie V. Hicks, and Marianne O’Doherty, eds., Medieval Routes in Europe and the Middle East (Turnhout, 2016), 231–57; Michael Prestwich, ‘The Royal Itinerary and Roads in England under Edward I,’ in Anke Bernau, Valerie Allen, and Ruth Evans, eds., Roadworks: Medieval Britain, Medieval Roads (Manchester, 2016), 177–97. See Chapter 7, 169, for more on royal itineration. 42 Given-Wilson, Royal Household, 22, 28; Woolgar, Great Household, 46.

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18  Power and Pleasure often travelled at certain times of the year.43 Though the change to sedentary courts was slow, the cumulative effects were powerful. Elias could use descrip­ tions of buildings to frame his study of court society at Versailles.44 In contrast, John stayed at many different kinds of buildings, and probably spent more of his waking hours on horseback than in any one type of structure. Essentially John and those who travelled with him lived as nomads, albeit ones who could draw on the resources of a sedentary society and who therefore enjoyed a lavish, if peri­pat­ et­ic, lifestyle. Though some servants, like the laundresses and carters who appear in one set of John’s surviving records, followed him constantly, the overall composition of the court changed continuously.45 Despite Walter Map’s learned comparison to the abstract mysteries of time, he was partly making a fairly mundane point that as the court moved, people constantly joined and left. One can see, for instance, royal falconers bringing hawks and falcons to and from the king, or individual royal huntsmen and their packs of hounds joining the court in hunting season and leaving thereafter. Royal messengers and emissaries constantly travelled to and from court, tying the king to his officials, subjects, allies, and enemies through a stream of oral and written messages.46 Powerful officials, who often had duties away from the king, came and went as well. Household accounts for March and most of April 1207 survive for Hugh de Neville, an important royal official, and they show Hugh and his household travelling in close proximity to the king and queen for most of March but going their own way for most of April.47 Queen Isabella sometimes accompanied the king and sometimes stayed apart from him with her own household. Secular and ecclesiastical magnates and foreign rulers and other powerful visitors would bring their retinues to travel with the king for a while, before spinning back off onto their own, generally less gruelling itineraries. At times, the court mushroomed, particularly for the great feasts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. At other times it shrunk nearly to its core. In terms of its personnel, the court was constantly changing and therefore far more fluid than the geographically fixed courts of more modern periods. The court’s core was already well developed by the beginning of John’s reign.48 The earliest comprehensive overview we have of an English royal court comes 43  Adamson, ‘Making of the Ancien-Régime Court,’ 10. 44 Elias, Court Society, 41–65. 45  Misae 11J 110, 118–19, 128, 135, 143, 159, 164; Misae 14J 231, 234, 244, 249, 251, 254, 258. 46 Mary  C.  Hill, The King’s Messengers, 1199–1377: A Contribution to the History of the Royal Household (London, 1961). 47  C. M. Woolgar, ed., Household Accounts from Medieval England, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1992), 1:110–16. 48  For work on the administration of the household/court of King John or of the Angevin period in general, see notes 2 and 35 in this chapter. For the reign of Henry II, Schröder provides a particularly good overview of the part of royal administration making purchases for the court; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 103–40. For later medieval royal households, see Given-Wilson, Royal Household, 1–27, 39–74; Vale, Princely Court, 34–68; Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society, 16–34. For medieval English aristocratic households, see Margaret Wade Labarge, A Baronial Household of the Thirteenth Century (New York, 1965), 53–70; Kate Mertes, The English Noble Household, 1250–1600: Good

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Introduction  19 from the Constitutio Domus Regis, which describes the early twelfth-century court of Henry I, John’s great-grandfather.49 Its most recent editor, Stephen Church, notes that it includes over 150 individuals, though since at least some of these received a daily ration of a loaf that fed four people, they probably had as­sist­ants, meaning the total size of the court was larger. Some members, like the chancellor and treasurer, were concerned with the wider government; others were focused on guarding the household or court. The vast majority, however, had tasks involv­ ing life at court. The largest single group, including bakers, butchers, cooks, but­ lers, and a fruiterer, dealt with the preparation and serving of food and drink. Others served in the royal hunt or the king’s chapel. One man was in charge of the king’s cortinas (hangings or tapestries), another with transporting his bed, and others with the royal table linens. Though no similar document survives for John’s reign, the records that do survive indicate the broadly similar nature of his court. In later periods, the government, including the royal household, was highly structured and compartmentalized, with different offices having very specific tasks. This process was already underway in the twelfth century, with the creation of the exchequer for handling money, but the royal court itself remained very fluid in John’s reign. For instance, the boundaries between the chamber and wardrobe, later two distinct departments, were only beginning to develop under John. The Angevin rulers were noted for the flexibility and omnicompetence of their officials, and these traits extended to the royal court. Much of John’s government was decentralized, in the hands of sheriffs and other local officials, or travelling justices, and some of it was stationed at Westminster and, early in John’s reign, Caen. Nevertheless, the court remained at the heart of the government, and many of those coming in and out of court came to deal with administrative matters. Moreover, in wartime, the court was the centre of the army. Even so, most of the royal court’s staff remained focused on the court itself rather than broader administration. In the medieval and early modern periods, members of royal families often had satellite courts.50 John’s legitimate children were too young during his life­ time to have their own establishments, but his mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, had her own following, which remained sizeable even after her partial retirement to Fontevraud Abbey.51 Queen Isabella also had her own household, but it appears Governance and Politic Rule (Oxford, 1988), 53–70; David Crouch, The Image of Aristocracy in Britain, 1000–1300 (London, 1993), 281–310; C. M. Woolgar, ed., The Elite Household in England, 1100–1550 (Donington, 2018). 49  Constitutio Domus Regis, xxxviii–lxviii, 195–215. 50 Tout, Chapters in the Administrative History, 1:252–9; Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society, 274–88. 51  Jane Martindale, ‘Eleanor of Aquitaine: The Last Years,’ in S.  D.  Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 137–64; Marie Hivergneaux, ‘Aliènor d’Aquitaine: le pouvoir d’une femme à la lumière de ses chartes (1152–1204),’ in Martin Aurell, ed., La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204) (Poitiers, 2000), 63–87; Nicholas Vincent, ‘Patronage, Politics and Piety in the Charters of Eleanor of Aquitaine,’ in Martin Aurell and Noël Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens:

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20  Power and Pleasure to have been small and unusually dependent on her husband’s.52 Unfortunately, the households of the two queens left no surviving records, so we are left only with the glimpses obtained from the records of John’s court. How large was John’s court? The size of Henry I’s core staff of more than 150 plus an unknown number of assistants is a reasonable minimum. As we shall see in Chapter  9, the general trend over the central and late Middle Ages was for courts to get bigger. It therefore seems likely that John’s court was larger than Henry I’s, but we should not assume that it had expanded by much, given that Henry was very wealthy. Certainly, some records hint at a fairly small court for John. For instance, the chamber/wardrobe operated with a handful of carters and men guiding packhorses on the payroll, and had only one laundress at a time, though she may have been expected to oversee local labour in the actual washing of the king’s wardrobe.53 However, when one starts accounting for the various branches of the household, the grooms accompanying horses, the many hunts­ men and dog handlers following the court during the long hunting season, and the retinues of magnates, officials, and other visitors, the number of people in the king’s vicinity was likely large. David Carpenter suggests that John’s court rarely had fewer than several hundred, while Stephen Church argues that there were probably at least 500 people present even when the court was at its smallest and that the number at grand feasts reached into the thousands, though of course these numbers included magnates and other guests with their retinues.54 The evi­ dence allows for no greater specificity, but these estimates are reasonable, if one includes the visitors and their retinues, and when one allows that these people could be spread across a fair amount of countryside at any given time. Already in King John’s reign, the royal court was a sizeable institution, capable of sustaining a complex social and cultural life.

1.4  Sources For two years of King John’s reign we know on what days he took his infrequent baths.55 This one detail gives some sense of just how much information the new confrontations et héritages (Turnhout, 2006), 17–60; Ralph V. Turner, Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen of France, Queen of England (New Haven, CT, 2009), 276–7, 285–8. 52  Nicholas Vincent, ‘Isabella of Angoulême: John’s Jezebel,’ in S. D. Church, ed., King John: New Interpretations (Woodbridge, 1999), 165–219, at 185–93, 199–200, 205–6. 53  See note 45 in this chapter. 54  Misae 11J 115, 137, 170; Misae 14J 237, 249, 262; Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 42; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 157. The text of the Constitutio Domus Regis contains a reference to royal bakers being sent ahead to buy for 40 pence a quantity of wheat that would allow them to make enough to feed 700 or 720 men (depending on the manuscript). If this was a daily purchase, it might give a number for the ordinary size of the court, including guests, but it is not certain this was the case; Constitutio Domus Regis, 200–1. 55  Constitutio Domus Regis, 208–9, note 30; Robert Bartlett, England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 1075–1225 (Oxford, 2000), 575.

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Introduction  21 records of John’s reign provide about life at court. The period in general was one of expanding record keeping and record preservation, but the shift from Richard’s reign to John’s sees a quantum leap in what survives, probably because of ­conscious attempts to copy and preserve records that had previously been ephem­ eral.56 Carpenter has noted that by rough count, the records of John’s reign run to approximately 8,650 pages in their modern printed editions.57 Many of the records concern judicial affairs or the gathering of revenue and shed little direct light on life at court, but there is still a wealth of pertinent information. Various types of records survive, a few of which also survive for earlier reigns.58 Pipe rolls, which mainly recorded moneys owed to the king but noted some expenditures on the king’s behalf, were the most important, with one from the reign of Henry I, and many more from the reigns of Henry II and Richard I. Although not a new type of record, the pipe rolls for John’s reign tend to be fuller than earlier ones, with more information about purchases for the court. There exists nearly a full run of John’s English pipe rolls, fragments from the Norman pipe rolls of his earlier years, and a modern copy of a single Irish pipe roll (now lost) from his fourteenth regnal year.59 Charters and writs are another traditional type of document, but in John’s reign the government began systematically preserving copies of these in three types of rolls: charter rolls, pa­tent rolls, and close rolls, the last of which contain orders about purchasing goods and thus supply a wealth of information about material culture at court.60 A var­iety of new records appear for the first time; memoranda rolls, recording notes from the pipe rolls; fine and oblate rolls, recording offers people made to the king for privileges and favours; and prest rolls, describing various advances and payments to individuals. A particularly important source for court life were the misae rolls, which record some of the day-to-day expenses of the king and his household, from his bath expenses on.61 Finally, miscellaneous documents

56  There remains some debate about whether all these efforts were new in John’s reign and who was responsible, but for our purposes the fact of their survival is key. For discussion of the rise in record keeping, see Tout, Chapters in the Administrative History, 1:33–8; 2:38–45; Painter, Reign of King John, 93–105; Nicholas Vincent, ‘Why 1199? Bureaucracy and Enrolment under John and His Contemporaries,’ in Adrian Jobson, ed., English Government in the Thirteenth Century (Woodbridge, 2004), 17–48; David Carpenter, ‘ “In Testimonium Factorum Brevium”: The Beginnings of the English Chancery Rolls,’ in Nicholas Vincent, ed., Records, Administration and Aristocratic Society in the Anglo-Norman Realm (Woodbridge, 2009), 1–28; Nicholas Vincent, ed., Records, Administration and Aristocratic Society in the Anglo-Norman Realm (Woodbridge, 2009), xvi–xviii; M. T. Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record: England, 1066–1307, 3rd ed. (Chichester, 2013), 58–75, 164–73. 57 Carpenter, Magna Carta, 89. 58  For a good discussion of what the various types of sources can tell us about the issues discussed in this book, see Gillingham, ‘Wirtschaftlichkeit oder Ehre,’ 153–64. 59  PR1J to PR17J; MRSN 2:499–575; Pipe Roll Ireland 14J. 60  RCh; MR1J 88–97; RL 1–108; RC; RP; RN 1–36, 45–122. For some of the types of charters and writs recorded, see Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 150–5. 61  Misae 11J; Misae 14J. For some useful comments on these, see Benjamin Wild, ed., The Wardrobe Accounts of Henry III, Publications of the Pipe Roll Society, NS 58 (London, 2012), xi–xiii, xxv–xxx.

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22  Power and Pleasure survive alongside the categories of purposely preserved documents, like lists of royal plate or a record of pigs delivered to the royal residence at Freemantle.62 For all the richness of the surviving records, they also have some important shortcomings. There are missing years for every sort of record and some of the most useful, in particular the misae rolls, have the worst survival rate. Written records for many routine aspects of court life were either not made or not pre­ served. The amount of information that survives on a given topic is therefore unpredictable; we can chart the king’s bath schedule but can make only rough estimates of the size of his court. Overall, for all the wealth of the royal records, they do not lend themselves to systematic analysis of, say, the amount of food the court consumed or the percentage of the royal budget that it required, facts that can sometimes be discovered for later courts. More important, even for the period before 1204, more records survive about the time the court spent in England than its sojourns on the continent, partly because many Norman records were lost and partly because record keeping in other continental territories remained extremely limited. As a result, it is hard to get a sense of how much the court changed as it moved from territory to territory. More important, this work will necessarily per­ petuate the usual unfortunate bias towards England at the expense of the con­tin­ en­tal Angevin territories. Most important, the individual pieces of information are often pretty barebones. In the absence of sources like diaries, one is left trying to reconstruct court life and its symbolic systems through lists of purchases and payments, or from terse royal orders with little context. As a result, I will use a variety of sources beyond the royal records. A particu­ larly useful set of sources are the works of court critics of the previous generation, like John of Salisbury, Walter Map, Nigel of Whiteacre, and Peter of Blois, who provided such a vivid picture of the court of Henry II, which John, of course, inherited after his brother’s death, and in which he would have learned how courts operated.63 For all their usefulness, however, these works need to be treated with 62  MR10J 119–25; National Archives C 47/3/46/4. 63 John of Salisbury, Policraticus sive de Nugis Curialium et de Vestigiis Philosophorum, ed. Clement  C.  J.  Webb, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1909); Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium; Nigel of Whiteacre, Nigellus de Longchamp dit Wireker. Vol. 1 Introduction, Tractatus Contra Curiales et Officiales Clericos, ed. André Boutemy (Paris, 1959); Peter of Blois, Opera, ed. J. P. Migne (Paris, 1855), 121–2, 195–210; Lena Wahlgren, The Letter Collections of Peter of Blois: Studies in the Manuscript Tradition (Göteberg, 1993), 140–73. For modern discussion of these sources and their biases, see Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 60–8; John W. Baldwin, Masters, Princes, and Merchants: The Social Views of Peter the Chanter and His Circle, 2 vols. (Princeton, NJ, 1970), 1:175–204; Robert Bartlett, Gerald of Wales, 1146–1223 (Oxford, 1982), 58–65; John D. Cotts, The Clerical Dilemma: Peter of Blois and Literate Culture in the Twelfth Century (Washington, D.C., 2009), 131–75; Jaeger, Origins of Courtliness, 54–100; Rolf Köhn, ‘ “Militia Curialis”. Die Kritik der Geistlichen Hofdienst bei Peter von Blois in der Lateinischen Literatur des 9–12 Jahrhunderts,’ in Albert Zimmerman, ed., Soziale Ordnungen im Selbsverständnis des Mittelalters (Berlin, 1979), 227–57; Gunnar Stollberg, Die soziale Stellung der intellektuellen Oberschicht im England des 12. Jahrhunderts (Lubeck, 1973), 123–9; Egbert Türk, Nugae curialium: Le règne d’Henri II Plantegenêt (1154–1189) et l’éthique politique (Geneva, 1977); Turner, Judges, Administrators, 159–79; Turner, English Judiciary, 1–16; Rösener, Leben am Hof, 244–54; Frédérique Lachaud, L’éthique du pouvoir au Moyen Âge: L’office dans la culture politique (Angleterre, vers

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Introduction  23 caution, since they were intended as moral treatises, not as objective ­descriptions of court life. Their works show that the Angevin royal court could be a difficult, unpleasant milieu, a point to which I will return in Chapter  8. However, the ­critics had strong motives to exaggerate the unpleasant aspects, since they wrote to dissuade clerics from serving at court. Clerics were not supposed to serve there except for religious purposes, but many did so, often in the hope of earthly reward and advancement. The court critics were intent on discouraging this not only by stressing the moral dangers of royal service but also by painting a vividly repellent portrait of court life, and I do not think modern scholars have always appreciated just how strong a motive the court critics had to depict court life in a negative way. Nonetheless, such sources are very useful for fleshing out our picture of court life. I use many other sources as well. Chronicles, saints’ lives, and other narrative sources provide glimpses of life at the courts of John and contemporary rulers. Chivalric romances, troubadour poems, and other literary works constitute another valuable if tricky source of information. Writers drew on their knowledge of historical courts, but one must account for fantasy, exaggeration, and the impact of earlier literary traditions. I also draw on the works of archaeologists and architectural and landscape historians to learn more about the material cul­ ture of the court and the many different environments, built and partially natural, in which it operated. Finally, I will use the pipe rolls of John’s predecessors and a handful of surviving records from the courts of the kings of Aragon and Philip Augustus for comparative purposes. All these sources have their own weaknesses and shortcomings, but alongside the royal records, they provide a reasonably full and rounded picture of life at the court of King John. Even with the additional sources, there are holes in what we know about King John’s court—there simply is not as much information as for many late medieval or early modern European courts. Coronations were arguably the most important royal ritual in Western Europe, and have been extensively studied, but we know almost nothing about John’s, and it therefore appears only in passing. Similarly, discussion of some important subjects, such as art and music or the lives of chil­ dren at court, will be brief or virtually nonexistent. Much excellent work has been done in recent decades on medieval queens and their households or courts, but the surviving records for Queen Isabella allow one to say little about her role at court, and what can be said has been covered in detail by Nicholas Vincent.64 1150–vers 1330) (Paris, 2010), 249–98, 590–8; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘La figure du clerc curial dans l’oeuvre de Jean de Salisbury,’ in Murielle Gaude-Ferragu, Bruno Laurioux, and Jacques Paviot, eds., La cour du prince: cour de France, cours d’Europe XIIe–XVe siècle (Paris, 2011), 301–20; Hugh M. Thomas, The Secular Clergy in England, 1066–1216 (Oxford, 2014), 139–53. 64  Vincent, ‘Isabella of Angoulême,’ 165–219. For some examples of works on medieval queens that also cover aspects of court life, see Parsons, ed., Court and Household of Eleanor of Castile; John Carmi Parsons, Eleanor of Castile: Queen and Society in Thirteenth-Century England (New York, 1995); Lindy Grant, Blanche of Castile, Queen of France (New Haven, CT, 2016).

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24  Power and Pleasure Nonetheless, the evidence for many subjects is extensive, and if the picture that emerges of John’s court is uneven, it is also very rich.

1.5  The Structure of the Book Although the subjects of each chapter will be obvious from the table of contents, a few words about the organization of the book may be helpful. I start with hunting because the available evidence is particularly rich, allowing me to put forth a nuanced discussion of how it provided John with soft power, how his enemies sought to counter that advantage, and how hunting gave pleasure. I follow with several chapters on various court activities, culminating in Chapter 6 on feasting, which incorporated or drew from many of the practices discussed earlier. Discussion of power and pleasure will appear in all these chapters, but Chapter 5, on religion at court, plays a particularly important role in discussion of power, since sacral kingship must be discussed in this context. Some of the arguments there will foreshadow a more focused exploration of power in Chapter 8. Before getting to that chapter, however, I shift gears slightly to discuss space and place in Chapter 7. Here, too, court activities appear, notably processions and formal royal entries into towns and cities. However, the chapter as a whole is focused less on activities than on the court’s relationship with and attitudes towards the various environments through which it travelled. As noted, Chapter 8 focuses on power, drawing on the evidence in earlier chapters to further analyse symbolic commu­ nication and gift exchange at John’s court, to discuss the relationship between administrative kingship and soft power, and to evaluate John’s handling of soft power. In Chapter 9, I turn to comparisons with other courts.

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2

Hunting and Falconry 2.1  Introduction On 21 March 1215, at a politically fraught time, John sent five falcons, including his best gyrfalcon, to two of his leading falconers, with very specific instructions on feeding the falcons with the flesh of goats, hens, and hares while they moulted. Nicholas Vincent has noted this letter as a sign of John’s tendency to micro­ manage. It is also a sign of John’s personal interest in hunting.1 That many medi­ eval kings, including John, had a passion for hunting is widely acknowledged in the scholarly literature. Yet with few exceptions biographers and other historians of English medieval rulers have devoted little attention to royal hunting or the royal hunt establishment.2 There is much work on medieval hunting more gener­ ally, and it often sheds light on royal practices, but only Robin Oggins’ work on falconry has focused on hunting at the English royal court.3 In contrast to the royal hunting establishment, the royal forests of England, which covered a sur­ prisingly large part of King John’s main realm, and in which much of the royal hunting took place, have received a great deal of attention.4 However, scholars of 1  RLC 192a. For a translation and commentary, see Nicholas Vincent, ‘King John’s Lost Language of Cranes: Micromanagement, Meat-Eating and Mockery at Court,’ http://magnacarta.cmp.uea.ac.uk/ read/feature_of_the_month/Mar_2015_3. 2  Frank Barlow, William Rufus (New Haven, CT, 1983), 119–32; Frank Barlow, ‘Hunting in the Middle Ages,’ The Norman Conquest and Beyond (London, 1983), 11–21; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 41–6, 143–73; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 321–2; John  M.  Steane, The Archaeology of the Medieval English Monarchy (London, 1993), 146–62. 3 Robin  S.  Oggins, The Kings and Their Hawks: Falconry in Medieval England (New Haven, CT, 2004). For other important works on medieval hunting, see La chasse au Moyen Age. Actes du Colloque de Nice (22–24 juin 1979) (Nice, 1980); Jörg Jarnut, ‘Die frühmittelalterliche Jagd unter rechts- und sozialgeschichtlichen Aspekten,’ Settimane di studio del Centro italiano di studi sull’alto Medioevo 31 (1985), 765–98; John Cummins, The Hound and the Hawk: The Art of Medieval Hunting (New York, 1988); André Chastel, ed., Le château, la chasse et la forêt. Les cahiers de Commarque (Commarque, 1990); Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997); Richard Almond, Medieval Hunting (Stroud, 2003); John Fletcher, Gardens of Earthly Delight: The History of Deer Parks (Eynsham, 2011); Fernando Arias Guillén, ‘El rey cazador. Prácticas cinegéticas y discurso ideológico durante el reinado de Alfonso XI,’ in Manual García Fernández, ed., El siglo XIV in primera persona: Alfonso XI, rey de Castilla y León (1312–1350) (Seville, 2015), 139–52. For a broader perspec­ tive, see Thomas T. Allsen, The Royal Hunt in Eurasian History (Philadelphia, PA, 2006). 4 Charles  R.  Young, The Royal Forests of Medieval England (Philadelphia, PA, 1979); Raymond Grant, The Royal Forests of England (Stroud, 1991); Oliver Rackham, Ancient Woodland: Its History, Vegetation and Uses in England, 2nd ed. (Dalbeattie, 2003), 177–88; David Crook, ‘The Forest Eyre in the Reign of King John,’ in Janet  S.  Loengard, ed., Magna Carta and the England of King John (Woodbridge, 2010), 63–82; Judith A. Green, ‘Forest Laws in England and Normandy in the Twelfth Century,’ Historical Research 86 (2013), 416–31.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0002

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26  Power and Pleasure the royal forest have generally paid little attention to hunting, concentrating instead on forest law and the opposition its onerous burdens created, the admin­ istration of royal forests, and the income they generated. Indeed, some scholars have argued that for the kings hunting soon became secondary to money in their administration of the royal forest. As David Carpenter has recently written: ‘Its main purpose was not to provide kings with areas for hunting, although they cer­ tainly were great huntsmen. It was to provide them with money.’5 However, the widespread failure by scholars of kingship in England to take the royal hunt as a serious subject of research is a mistake. Though the evidence for hunting, hawking, and falconry is scattered through­ out the royal records, a careful reconstruction reveals that King John’s hunting establishment was very large, that the government devoted considerable time and effort to managing its logistics, and that the king spent large sums of money on it despite needing to accumulate funds for his struggle with Philip Augustus. The question therefore arises of why the king spent so much. Scholars of medieval hunting have stressed that it could serve many purposes for aristocrats and rulers, helping them to build prestige and soft power. This chapter applies their findings to John’s court. However, I also show how critics of the king used his love of hunt­ ing to criticize him and undermine his authority, and how hunting practices themselves created opposition. In addition, I stress that when royal supporters and critics alike wrote about hunting, they emphasized pleasure rather than power, and that their views need to be taken seriously to understand royal invest­ ment in the sport.

2.2  The Size, Importance, and Cost of the Royal Hunting Establishment Though the evidence for hunting is scattered throughout the records, collectively it shows just how large a hunting establishment served the king, and how im­port­ ant the activity was to him. The largest part of the hunting establishment was devoted to hunting deer and other mammals with the assistance of hounds. The king owned various kinds of dogs. Most common were greyhounds (leporarii) that hunted by sight; pack dogs (canes de mota) or running hounds that hunted by scent and could pursue deer; and lymer dogs and brachets or bercelets, used to sniff out prey to start the hunt.6 One also finds references to boarhounds, wolf­ hounds, foxhounds, and hounds for roe deer, as well as setters and Spanish dogs

5 Carpenter, Magna Carta, 176–7. See also Young, Royal Forests, 6. 6  For discussion of hunting dogs in the medieval period, see Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 12–31; Almond, Medieval Hunting, 58–60.

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Hunting and Falconry  27 (espainellos—hence spaniels) for falconry.7 More striking than the variety was  their sheer number. In late May to early June 1213 a total of 458 dogs (163  ­greyhounds, 72 pack dogs, 223 unspecified type) were dispersed through the countryside in eleven packs, and on 28 December of that year 438 dogs (273  greyhounds, 158 pack dogs, 7 unspecified) were dispersed into three groups.8 References to separate packs of wolfhounds and other evidence show these numbers did not include all John’s dogs at that point, though it is impossible to say precisely how many more he had. With so many dogs, the king needed a large staff of huntsmen (occasionally designated magistri or masters to acknowledge their expertise9), dog handlers (berners for pack dogs and fewterers for greyhounds), and other helpers, simply called men or boys. I have found around thirty huntsmen operating across mul­ tiple years of the reign. As for dog handlers, one royal writ specified one fewterer for every four greyhounds, though this may have been an ideal.10 In 1213, eleven named huntsmen, fifty-six dog handlers, and fifteen other helpers oversaw the dispersal of the 458 dogs noted above. One can only estimate, but between the various kinds of men overseeing and handling the hunting dogs, there can hardly have been fewer than a hundred men involved. Some of these huntsmen received horses for their travels, and of course hunting itself involved large numbers of horses, at least some of whom were designated as hunters and presumably trained for that task. Not surprisingly, the king himself had at least one fine hunting horse, named Liard.11 Horses and grooms added to the size and cost of the hunt­ ing establishment. The part of the king’s establishment devoted to hawking and falconry was smaller but highly specialized, requiring the allocation of extensive resources. King John favoured gyrfalcons, peregrine falcons, and goshawks, all large, impres­ sive, and expensive birds of prey.12 Many of the best birds came from the north Atlantic, and when Håkon IV of Norway sent thirteen gyrfalcons from Iceland to Henry III in 1225, he said that Henry’s father, John, and his predecessors cher­ ished birds from that land ‘more than gold and silver.’13 John’s own records show the lengths to which he went to acquire northern birds of prey, frequently sending falconers to the great fairs at King’s Lynn, Yarmouth, and Boston in Eastern England, and on at least one occasion forbidding local officials from allowing anyone to sell birds before his men arrived. Once he even sent a royal official to 7 Boarhounds: PR4J 85; PR14J 169; Misae 14J 241; Prest Roll 12J 248; wolfhounds: PR9J 209; PR10J 103; RLC 68b; foxhounds: PR11J 125; PR16J 55; hounds for roe deer: Misae 14J 236; setters (cucheretti): PR16J 32; Spanish dogs: PR13J 29. 8  RLC 133a–35a, 158b. 9  PR13J 149; RLC 4b, 179b, 286b. 10  RLC 206b. 11  PR12J 93. 12  For discussion of birds of prey, see Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 10–16; Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 187–92. 13 Pierre Chaplais, ed., Diplomatic Documents Preserved in the Public Record Office, Volume 1, 1101–1272 (London, 1964), 125–6.

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28  Power and Pleasure Scandinavia, with letters of introduction to the king of Denmark, to purchase birds.14 John accumulated large numbers of raptors; in his fourteenth year, one set of payments went to eight falconers in charge of twenty-one gyrfalcons and twelve other falcons, but there were other falconers, not to mention hawkers (or ostringers) active in the same period who would have cared for other royal birds, so the total was no doubt dozens if not scores.15 Falcons and hawks required extensive and specialized training and care, especially since they were frequently taught to attack unusually large prey, such as cranes and herons, or to hunt in pairs, a behaviour not found in the wild.16 Individual royal falconers often led teams of mounted assistants and bird dogs.17 Like some huntsmen, they were sometimes designated as masters because of their skill and expertise, and expected generous remuneration.18 Organizing so many men, hounds, and birds to follow the king’s itinerary and meet the needs and opportunities of training and hunting represented a demanding logistical challenge. Stephen Church has shown how hundreds of dogs could follow the king during hunting seasons, and, as noted in Chapter 1, men, dogs, and birds were constantly travelling to and from the royal court, journeying to training sites and hunting grounds when away from court.19 In the winter of 1210–11, one pack of dogs and their handlers made a lengthy journey of approximately 300 miles from York via Stamford in Lincolnshire to Canford Magna in Dorsetshire in six weeks.20 Until the loss of Normandy, King John periodically had huntsmen, falconers, hounds, and birds of prey shipped back and forth across the Channel, and he later took part of his hunting establishment on his military campaigns to Poitou and Ireland. More impressive still, John had live game moved around, sometimes by sea, and occasionally had fallow deer or other game transported from England to Normandy to restock his parks, in one case sending three shiploads of animals.21 Clearly the royal government made considerable efforts to make hunting available to the king and his court wherever his journeys might take him. Though most of the analysis of the king’s residences will take place in Chapter 7, a brief discussion of their locations will further illustrate just how important hunting was to John and his ancestors. The following map, created by Stephen Mileson but based on an earlier one in the History of the King’s Works, shows just how many castles and residences were located inside or close to royal forests (see Figure 2.1). Fanny Madeline has also stressed the link between the forest and the 14  PR16J 20, 168; RLC 20a, 85a, 132a–b, 136a, 205b, 206b; Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 19–22, 56. 15  Misae 14J 251; Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 68. 16  For training and care, see Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 22–31; Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 200–9. 17  For instance, PR14J 87, 169. 18  For the use of the term magister see Misae 14J 237, 252, 258. 19  Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 37–8. 20  Prest Roll 12J 249–50. 21  PR3J 101–2; PR5J 105; PR6J 125; RL 75, 82.

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Hunting and Falconry  29

Figure 2.1  Royal forests, royal dwellings, and a simplified royal itinerary, 1199–1307. Reproduced with permission of Steven Mileson and Oxford University Press.

residences of Henry II and his sons, showing that they had hunting lodges and palatial dwellings near ducal forests in Normandy, though less so in their other continental possessions, probably reflecting a lack of governmental infrastructure outside of Normandy.22 The residences John himself built or remodelled tended 22 Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 294–303. See also Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 43–4. Michael Prestwich argues that a desire for good hunting helped shape the itinerary of Edward I; Prestwich, ‘Royal Itinerary and Roads,’ 182–3.

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30  Power and Pleasure to be at good sites for hunting and falconry. John also inherited many enclosed deer parks, which had various purposes but were designed above all for hunting, near his residences.23 Though parks may well have existed in the Anglo-Saxon period, kings and nobles had been building new ones since the Norman Conquest and stocking them with game, including then-exotic species like fallow deer, pea­ cocks, pheasants, and rabbits.24 John copied his forebears: in his second year he enclosed parks at Bolsover and Melbourne in Derbyshire, and a reference to grain fed to the king’s pheasants in the sole surviving Irish pipe roll from John’s reign indicates that he wanted the possibility of hunting exotic game there as well.25 For John, as for many of his ancestors, home was often where the hunting was, and they were willing to alter the environment to improve their chances of slaughtering game. John’s hunting establishment cost far more than historians have realized. The evidence for hunting expenses is scattered, and individual entries can make them seem trivial. For instance, various references suggest that the feeding of hunting dogs was only a halfpenny per day per dog. However, if one takes the 458 dogs recorded in late spring 1213, the total yearly costs for them would be £348 5s 5d, less a discount for the days they hunted and were fed part of the quarry.26 Unfortunately, because the evidence is so scattered and unsystematic, one can only suggest a very broad estimate of total costs, more an order of magnitude of spend­ ing than anything. Nonetheless, an overall yearly expenditure of £1,000, plus or minus several hundred pounds, seems to me a plausible estimate (I have provided more detail on the basis for this estimate in Appendix  1). Services and renders owed for tenancies granted by John’s ancestors would have cut some of his hunting expenses.27 However, John invested new lands in rewards to his falconers and hawkers, including grants or promises of estates worth over £70 yearly to members of the extensive Hauville family, who provided many of his falconers.28 Given that 23  Jean Birrell-Hilton, ‘La chasse et la forêt en Angleterre médiévale,’ in André Chastel, ed., Le c­ hâteau, la chasse et la forêt. Les cahiers de Commarque (Commarque, 1990), 69–80, at 69–72; Jean Birrell, ‘Deer and Deer Farming in Medieval England,’ Agricultural History Review 40 (1992), 112–26; Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 191–5; S.  A.  Mileson, Parks in Medieval England (Oxford, 2009), 4, 29–81. 24  Naomi Sykes, ‘Animal Bones and Animal Parks,’ in Robert Liddiard, ed., The Medieval Park: New  Perspectives (Windgather, 2007), 49–62, at 58–9; Naomi Sykes, The Norman Conquest: A Zooarchaeological Perspective (Oxford, 2007), 64–5, 68, 76–85; Fletcher, Gardens of Earthly Delight, 97–103. 25  PR2J 7–8; Pipe Roll Ireland 14J 32–3. 26  PR16J xii; Misae 14J 243–4, 246–8, 250, 254; RLC 21a, 26b, 51a, 53b, 125b–126b; NR 76; Prest Roll 7J 276. For non-payment on hunting days, see RLC 225b–26a, 286b. 27  For just a few examples, see Book of Fees 1: 4, 6, 8–13, 33; Red Book of the Exchequer 2: 457–9, 461–2, 466, 468; RLC 96a, 129a 10; Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 73, 77–9. 28  For grants to the Hauville family, see PR7J 128; RL 26, 69, 91; RLC 15b, 27b, 140a, 158b, 161b, 251a, 259b, 281a. For grants to other falconers or hawkers, see PR6J 129; RLC 9a; Book of Fees 1: 151; Red Book of the Exchequer 2: 530; RLCh 126b–127a; Tony K. Moore, ‘The Loss of Normandy and the Invention of Terre Normannorum, 1204,’ English Historical Review 125 (2010), 1071–109, at 1100. For both see Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 70–3.

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Hunting and Falconry  31 before the civil war at the end of his reign John typically had revenues of between £22,000 and £40,000 and could draw in far more in exceptional years (close to £100,000 in one case), the expenditures on hunting, if the figure above is broadly correct, would have been noticeable, but certainly manageable.29 Considering John’s desperate need for money to fight his wars, however, the resources he ­lavished on hunting show just how high a priority it represented.

2.3  The Royal Forest, Money, and Hunting Given the amount John spent on hunting, it is worth reconsidering the idea that the administration and laws of the royal forest were designed mainly to generate revenue. Hunting was clearly a major priority for John and, according to the chroniclers, for most of his predecessors as well. Moreover, forest law did, after all, protect the king’s deer and their environment, and the royal government was quite zealous about enforcement. As Barbara Hanawalt has noted, the forest laws created the first proactive police force in England, the first officers ‘who had a regular patrolling function and territory that was their beat.’30 To take one case from the few surviving records of forest pleas in John’s reign, Thomas Inkel, a forester in Northamptonshire, traced a trail of blood in the wood of Siberton to a local house where meat from a fallow deer was found. The resulting investigation led to the arrest of three men, one of whom died in prison.31 Many a relative of a murder victim in John’s reign might have wished the royal government had been as proactive in seeking justice for their kin. A comparison of royal expenditures on hunting with the admittedly much more firmly grounded figures on income from the royal forests shines a light on the respective importance of motives. Drawing from Nicholas Barratt’s figures, forest income averaged just over £950 a year, although it fluctuated widely from year to year.32 Over John’s reign, it looks as though forest revenues and hunting expenditures would broadly have can­ celled each other out. Though the forest income was clearly important, one should not doubt that the ostensible purpose of forest law, the protection of the king’s hunting, was also a real concern. John’s actions and decrees regarding hunting show that both income and hunt­ ing mattered. Money obviously played a major role in his eagerness to enforce forest law with heavy exactions on offenders, as Roger of Howden emphasized.33

29  Barratt, ‘The Revenue of King John,’ 839. 30  Barbara  A.  Hanawalt, ‘Men’s Games, King’s Deer: Poaching in Medieval England,’ Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 18 (1988), 175–93, at 176. 31  G. J. Turner, ed., Select Pleas of the Forest, Selden Society, 13 (London, 1901), 3–4. 32  Barratt, ‘The Revenue of King John,’ 846. 33  Roger of Howden, Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene, ed. William Stubbs, 4 vols. (London, 1868–71), 4:157. See also Holt, Northerners, 159–60.

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32  Power and Pleasure However, other actions focused on protecting hunting. Placing land under forest law near Corfe Castle, where John carried out extensive renovations, may have created a new source of potential revenue, but clearly was mainly designed to improve the hunting at a favoured residence.34 Moreover, John had a strong repu­ tation for preserving his access to birds of prey and forcibly protecting his game. According to Roger of Wendover, at his Christmas feast in 1208, John forbade the taking of young hunting birds from nests throughout England, and in 1209 ordered the hedges and ditches around fields in royal forests (where there was much private land) to be levelled, with the grain to be given to wild beasts.35 Roger was not the most trustworthy of chroniclers, and the latter claim seems unlikely, but the more reliable Dunstable Chronicle wrote of the destruction of hedges, ditches, and homes associated with newly cleared land in royal forests. Doris Stenton has suggested that these statements refer only to the workings of a harsh forest eyre in that year.36 Nonetheless, Wendover’s statements indicate that contemporaries associated John’s drive to enforce forest law with hunting as well as the desire for funds. Without denying the importance of forest revenue (or the great utility of timber management), I would stress that the remarkable forest administration of the English kings should be treated not only as a sign of their administrative and financial precocity but also of the deep importance hunting had to them and to their courtiers. But why was hunting so important that John and his government invested so much money and effort in it? Answering this question will occupy much of the remainder of the chapter, but first it will be use­ ful to describe the forms hunting took in the period and to discuss the king and queen’s personal involvement in falconry and hunting.

2.4  The Forms of Royal Hunting and the King and Queen’s Involvement King John, as the Anonymous of Béthune stressed, loved hunting with both birds and hounds.37 Unfortunately, no extended descriptions survive of his or his con­ temporaries’ hunts. Nonetheless, by combining information from John’s records with evidence from literary works, later hunting manuals, archaeology, and other sources, we can gain a general sense of what these hunts would have been like.38 34 Carpenter, Magna Carta, 209. Conversely, removing forest law from certain areas for payment shows John’s desire for cash, as David Carpenter pointed out to me. 35  Roger of Wendover, Liber qui Dicitur Flores Historiarum, ed. Henry G. Hewlett, 3 vols. (London, 1886–9), 2:49–51. 36  PR11J xxv–xxvi; Henry Richards Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 5 vols. (London, 1864–9), 3:31. 37  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 104, 109. 38 For good works on the technical aspects of hunting, see Cummins, Hound and the Hawk; Almond, Medieval Hunting; Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks. The pioneering historian of the forest, Oliver Rackham, believed that royal hunting, though highly symbolic, was very rare, but on this point

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Hunting and Falconry  33 Falconry and hawking could be carried out on a variety of terrains, depending partly on the hunting birds used and the prey, but were most closely associated with riverine environments. Indeed, a shorthand way of describing someone going hunting with birds was that the hunter went to the rivers, just as hunting with hounds was described as going to the forest. Large wading birds were the most spectacular prey, and John can be found taking multiple cranes in a single day with his raptors.39 However, animal bone finds from elite residences show that the upper classes consumed a remarkable variety of wild birds, implying a great variety in species hunted.40 While the number of participants was normally smaller than in hunting with dogs, falconry could potentially be a very sociable sport, as courtiers brought their own falcons and hawks to pursue the numerous birds that the king’s servants and dogs flushed. John’s wife, Isabella of Angoulême, was almost certainly among the participants; like many elite women, she had herself depicted on a seal holding a falcon or hawk (see Figure 2.2).41 Courtiers and guests without hunting birds could have accompanied the king and queen as spectators. As for hunting with dogs, the various sorts of prey required a number of hunt­ ing methods. The existence of boarhounds, foxhounds, and wolfhounds in the royal hunting establishment suggests that the king hunted for the animals such dogs hunted, although the wolfhounds may have been kept largely to protect the king’s other prey by eliminating natural predators. Called leporarii, or hare hounds, in Latin, greyhounds were used mainly for other prey, but were probably loosed on hares occasionally for amusement. But the dominant types of hunt at the court focused on deer. The most prestigious was the par force hunt, in which a particularly magnificent stag was chosen for long-distance pursuit. A well-trained lymer hound would scent it out and then relays of dogs that hunted by scent, placed along the stag’s likely path, would pursue. These relays probably explain the many pack dogs that followed the king on his travels, though the brachets and greyhounds may also have participated. One advantage of having so many dogs was that the royal huntsmen could cover many eventualities and ensure a large supply of fresh dogs throughout the hunt. The king and his courtiers would have followed on horseback, and it was in this kind of hunt that John and his followers he was almost certainly wrong, as Mileson has shown; Oliver Rackham, The History of the Countryside (London, 1986), 133–4; Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 181; Mileson, Parks in Medieval England, 15–24. 39  Misae 14J 250, 253. 40  U. Albarella and R. Thomas, ‘They Dined on Crane: Bird Consumption, Wild Fowling and Status in Medieval England,’ Acta Zoologica Cracoviensia 45 (2002), 23–38; Naomi Sykes, ‘The Dynamics of Status Symbols: Wildfowl Exploitation in England ad 410–1550,’ Archaeological Journal 161 (2005), 82–105. 41  Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, ‘Women, Seals, and Power in Medieval France, 1150–1350,’ Form and Order in Medieval France: Studies in Social and Quantitative Sigillography (Aldershot, 1993), IX 61–82, at 76; Elizabeth Danbury, ‘Queens and Powerful Women: Image and Authority,’ in Noël Adams, John Cherry, and James Robinson, eds., Good Impressions: Image and Authority in Medieval Seals (London, 2008), 17–24, at 20.

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34  Power and Pleasure

Figure 2.2  Seal of Isabella of Angoulême with bird of prey. Society of Antiquaries, London, Drawer A1.

used hunting horses like his prized Liard. The other major kind of deer hunt was the drive hunt, in which large numbers of red, fallow, and roe deer, and perhaps other animals, were driven towards waiting archers. Though drive hunts were less prestigious than the hunt par force, kings nonetheless participated; Henry I had men in his hunting establishment who were well paid to carry the king’s bow, and in 1212 one man held a tenancy for the service of carrying the king’s bow when he came to hunt in Dartmoor in Devonshire.42 Such hunts could be large scale: in one day in early December 1205, John and his hunting party took one hundred fallow deer and seventeen feral pigs in his park of Havering in Essex.43 This may explain the extraordinary number of greyhounds that John had with him at times—though scent hounds were used to locate and flush game, the king’s hunts­ men used greyhounds to drive the animals and take down those that had been wounded but not killed by the archers. 42  Constitutio Domus Regis 215; Book of Fees 1: 94. See also National Archives, SC 1/1/4, for an order to send bows and bercelets to Nottingham. 43  David Crook, ‘The Taking of Venison in the Forest of Essex, 1198–1207,’ Essex Archaeology and History 26 (1995), 126–32, at 128, 131.

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Hunting and Falconry  35 Formal deer hunts in the Middle Ages had a surprisingly ceremonial component, which was recorded most fully in later hunting manuals.44 These manuals described how the deer were butchered, or ‘unmade,’ in a precise and technical manner. The huntsmen then distributed the parts. Certain choice bits, such as the testicles and tongue, were set aside for the lord, and the right and left shoulders were given respectively to the best hunter and to the forester or parker in charge of the place where the hunt took place. Parts of the entrails (cuiriee) were fed to the dogs, in part so the taste, so different from the bread they usually ate, would inspire them in future hunts, but perhaps also so that even they, as Joyce Salisbury has put it, could participate in a kind of ritual feast.45 The bits assigned to the lord were then hung on a stick called a forchée, to be carried proudly before the return­ ing hunters. Hunting and hunting ceremonial had a specialized vocabulary, known only to the cognoscenti, and some later manuals devoted much of their space to terminology. Though the manuals came later, the ceremonial already existed in ­twelfth-century England. John of Salisbury, in a passage to which I will return, mocked it.46 In a famous scene in Gottfried von Strassburg’s Tristan, taken from a lost section of the version written by Thomas of Britain, the hero, newly arrived in Cornwall, teaches King Mark’s huntsman the proper methods of unmaking.47 The skeletons of deer at elite sites show that they were often divided up in the way the sources describe, since shoulder and leg bones were often missing, and Naomi Sykes shows that the practice was introduced by the Normans.48 It is impossible to demonstrate conclusively that such ceremonies were practised in John’s hunting, but an order the king issued during the Poitevin campaign of 1214 directed the seneschal of Angoulême that in the event the king’s huntsmen caught a great stag, certain portions should be sent to the queen, including the tongue, and certain to 44 Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 41–6; Almond, Medieval Hunting, 75–81; Susan Crane, Animal Encounters: Contacts and Concepts in Medieval Britain (Philadelphia, PA, 2013), 101–7. For the manu­ als, see Anne Rooney, Hunting in Middle English Literature (Cambridge, 1993), 7–20; Armand Strubel and Chantal de Saulnier, La poétique de la chasse au Moyen Age: les livres de chasse du XIVe siècle (Paris, 1994). 45  Joyce Salisbury, The Beast Within: Animals in the Middle Ages (London, 2011), 37–8. 46  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:22–3. 47 Gottfried von Strassburg, Tristan und Isold, ed. Friedrich Ranke (Berlin, 1962), 35–9, lines 2759–3080. Since a version of this scene also appears in the Scandinavian translation of Thomas’s work, it clearly originated with Thomas rather than Gottfried; Paul Szach, ed., The Saga of Tristram and Ísönd (Lincoln, NE, 1973), 26–8. See also A. Saly, ‘Tristan chasseur,’ La chasse au Moyen Age. Actes du Colloque de Nice (22–24 juin 1979) (Nice, 1980), 435–42; Rooney, Hunting, 86–9; Helmut Brackert, ‘ “Deist rehtiu jegerîe”: Höfische Jagddarstellungen in der deutschen Epik de Hochmittelalters,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 365–406, at 381–6; Sigrid Schwenk, ‘Die Jagd im Spiegel mittelalterlicher Literatur und Jagdbücher,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 407–64, at 408–17. 48 Naomi Sykes, ‘Animal Bones,’ in R.  Poulton, ed., A Medieval Royal Complex at Guildford: Excavations at the Castle and Palace (Guildford, 2005), 116–28, at 125–8; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 71–5. See also Richard Thomas, ‘Chasing the Ideal? Ritualism, Pragmatism and the Later Medieval Hunt in England,’ in Aleksander Pluskowski, ed., Breaking and Shaping Beastly Bodies: Animals as Material Culture in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 2007), 125–48.

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36  Power and Pleasure him, including the cauda, which may perhaps be translated here as testicles rather than the more normal tail.49 It is of course possible that this order simply provides evidence of taste preferences, but John’s court operated in a society in which these ceremonies were familiar, and it is hard to believe they did not follow them. Hunting parties could conceivably have involved large numbers of courtiers, magnates, and guests at royal court, and thus have been important social events— indeed, they appear as such in romances.50 In the par force hunt, as in modern fox hunting, large numbers could pursue the quarry across the country. In the kind of drive hunts that John’s large hunting establishment could have put on, large numbers of archers could have taken part and thus the king could have invited many guests to participate. The witness lists of charters certainly show that royal favourites and powerful magnates often accompanied the king to his hunting lodges. For instance, at various times ten different earls and various important royal followers were with the king at his forest lodge at Freemantle, and though there is no guarantee that they went hunting with him, it certainly seems likely.51 Indeed, it may well have been to add an element of sociability through large hunting parties that the Plantagenet kings sometimes held great councils at hunting palaces such as Woodstock and Clarendon. The queen may also have participated in the royal hunt. On two occasions in 1207, payments were made from the king’s accounts to the queen’s fewterers, so Isabella clearly had at least a small pack of hunting dogs.52 The dogs may have been kept simply to provide the queen with venison when her household was apart from the king’s, but medieval women actively hunted in later periods and places, particularly France, and one should not rule this out for John’s Poitevin queen.53 At the very least, she could have participated as a spectator, as occurred in romances.54 That spectators attended English hunts at this time is shown by Jocelin of Brakelond’s statement that although Abbot Sampson, as a good churchman, did not hunt or even eat venison, he created and stocked parks and kept hounds, and when eminent guests came, he and the monks would watch the hounds run.55 As 49  RLC 169b. Nicholas Vincent, however, suggests that the passage refers to the haunches and rump; Vincent, ‘Isabella of Angoulême,’ 183n58. 50  For example, Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, ed. Daniel Poirion (Paris, 1994), 4–6, 9; Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon: poème de Hue de Rotelande, fin du XIIe siècle, ed. A.  J.  Holden (Paris, 1979), 87–96. 51  RLCH 37a, 82a–b, 92a, 116b, 125b, 137a, 156a, 159a–b, 161a, 194b, 213a. In addition, Nicholas Vincent kindly supplied me with transcripts of two additional charters issued at Freemantle from the Angevin Acta project. 52  RLC 80b, 90a. 53 Almond, Medieval Hunting, 143–66; Sykes, ‘Animal Bones,’ 53–5; Fletcher, Gardens of Earthly Delight, 116–19; Amanda Richardson, ‘ “Riding Like Alexander, Hunting Like Diana”: Gendered Aspects of the Medieval Hunt and Its Landscape Settings,’ Gender and History 24 (2012), 253–70; Amanda Richardson, ‘Beyond the Castle Gate: The Role of Royal Landscapes in Constructions of English Medieval Kingship and Queenship,’ Concilium Medii Aevi 14 (2011), 35–53, at 43–52. 54  For one example, see 45 of this chapter. 55  Jocelin of Brakelond, The Chronicle of Jocelin of Brakelond, ed. H. E. Butler (London, 1949), 28.

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Hunting and Falconry  37 Chapter  7 will reveal, John may have designed one of his favourite castles, Ludgershall, to give spectators a good view of the hunt from a tower, chamber block, and earthworks.56 Presumably the carrying of the trophies of the hunt was also intended for an audience, including not only any spectators in the hunting grounds, but also the people back at the court itself, thus widening the circle of those who participated, at least vicariously. The consumption of game, no doubt accompanied sometimes by discussion of the hunting involved, also caused ­others to participate vicariously in the hunt. Directly or indirectly, the entire court was involved in hunting.

2.5  Pleasure in the Service of Power: The Instrumental Purposes of Hunting Historians of the hunt, along with some scholars of courts, have explored the pur­ poses of royal and aristocratic hunting, and though most have acknowledged that hunting was considered pleasurable, they typically focus on the practical, social, and political benefits of hunting.57 Unfortunately, writers of John’s reign did not analyse in any depth the advantages of hunting, though advocates of hunting in the later Middle Ages and early modern period defended it as preparation for war, a defence against idleness, and a means of exterminating pests. Modern his­ torians have necessarily relied heavily on inference supported by comparative studies, often influenced by anthropology. Because I find many of their inferences compelling, I draw on their conclusions, along with my own research and ana­ lysis, to explore the ways that John’s massive investment in hunting could have undergirded his power, prestige, and authority. As we shall see, John of Salisbury’s attack on hunting will be a particularly valuable source, since it was designed to undermine the sport by reversing the very points its practitioners took pride in. The most concrete benefit of hunting was the provision of venison, a term that then encompassed all game meats but mostly referred to venison in the modern sense. References to the salting of venison for preservation and to its transportation 56  See Chapter 7, 164. 57  Jarnut, ‘Die frühmittelalterliche Jagd,’ 771–6, 786–7; Nelson, ‘Carolingian Royal Ritual,’ 167–71; Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 2–8; Philippe Buc, L’ambiguïté du livre: prince, pouvoir, et peuple dan le commentaires de la Bible au Moyen Age (Paris, 1994), 112–22, 229–31; Joseph Morsel, ‘Jagd und Raum. Überlegungen über den sozialen Sinn der Jagdpraxis am Beispiel des spätmittelalterlichen Franken,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 255–87; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 41–6, 143–73; Allsen, Royal Hunt in Eurasian History, 119–232; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 322; Rösener, Leben am Hof, 216–20; Mileson, Parks in Medieval England, 20–1, 105–7; Martina Giese, ‘Kompetitive Aspekte höfischer Jagdaktivitäten im Frühmittelalter,’ in Matthias Becher and Alheydis Plassmann, eds., Streit am Hof im frühen Mittelalter (Bonn, 2011), 263–84; Eric Goldberg, ‘Louis the Pious and the Hunt,’ Speculum 88 (2013), 614–43; Crane, Animal Encounters, 101–19, 123–7; D. W. Rollason, The Power of Place: Rulers and Their Palaces, Landscapes, Cities, and Holy Places (Princeton, NJ, 2016), 136–67.

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38  Power and Pleasure are scattered throughout the royal records and clearly it was an important part of provisioning the royal household. On one occasion a ship was hired to transport venison from Torksey to York, probably for a Christmas feast, which suggests that John could demand game on a large scale.58 What mattered most about game meat was not the number of calories provided, though they should not be ignored, but its importance as a rare and highly valued food, a topic I explore more fully in Chapter 6.59 Hunting itself could bolster a hunter’s prestige, including a king’s, in various ways. John of Salisbury mockingly compared the procession of successful hunters returning with heads and other spolia, accompanied by the sound of pipes and horns, to a Roman triumph: these practices clearly celebrated hunters’ proficiency and success. Hunting demanded many kinds of knowledge. Some of this ­know­ledge was practical, if complex: how to find and hunt game, and how to raise, train, and handle hounds and birds of prey. Some was related to the kinds of cere­monial practices noted earlier; unmaking, distributing, and displaying the carcasses of the slain animals. Mastery of the arcane vocabulary of hunting was crucial, and John of Salisbury warned readers lest they misuse this terminology, ‘because you will be beaten or condemned for ignorance of all good things, if you do not know their figmenta.’ ‘These,’ he stated, ‘are the liberal arts (liberalia studia) of the nobility in our time.’60 Werner Rösener has even argued that because of the surrounding ceremonial practices, hunting, like tournaments, should be seen as part of the development of courtly culture.61 Medieval people clearly considered command of the skills and arcane know­ ledge associated with hunting a marker of aristocratic status. In Gottfried von Strassburg’s work, although Tristan, cast ashore in a strange land and desiring to conceal his identity, warily claimed to be the son of a merchant, his knowledge of the best manner of unmaking and his skill at playing the hunting horn allow the members of King Mark’s court to perceive his noble status.62 In other romances, hunting skills bring personal prestige and affirm aristocratic status. For instance, the eponymous hero of King Horn excels at hunting and hawking and can train hounds and birds of prey better than anyone.63 The sources for John’s court are not the sort that show this dynamic in action, but it may be that in sending 58  PR13J 89. For some figures and estimates on the large amount of game being provided to later kings, see Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 181; Birrell-Hilton, ‘La chasse et la forêt,’ 74–5; Birrell, ‘Deer and Deer Farming,’ 124–6; Robin S. Oggins, ‘Game in the Medieval English Diet,’ Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 3rd ser. 5 (2008), 201–17, at 203–6. 59  Another product of hunting was deer hide; RLC 121b, 172b. 60  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:22–3. 61  Werner Rösener, ‘Jagd und höfische Kultur als Gegenstand der Forschung,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 11–28. 62  Gottfried von Strassburg, Tristan und Isold, 35–42, lines 2759–3311. 63  Master Thomas, The Romance of Horn, ed. Mildred K. Pope and T. B. W. Reid, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1955–64), 1:12–13, 87. See also A. Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, roman du XIIIe siècle, 2 vols. (Paris, 1932), 1:5; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 239.

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Hunting and Falconry  39 precise instructions about caring for his best gyrfalcon and other birds, John was not only taking a practical interest but also displaying his command of high-status, aristocratic knowledge. Even a king, perhaps especially a king, could benefit from reinforcing his elite status through displays of prestigious knowledge, particularly during a hunt, surrounded by guests, magnates, and courtiers. Moreover, the king of England had a source of prestige from hunting that few monarchs, let alone magnates, could match: command of the extraordinary hunting grounds found in English royal forests and parks. When Louis VII enumerated the wealth of Henry II, comparing it to his own possession of no more than bread and joy, according to an anecdote of Walter Map, he spoke of followers, horses, gold, silk, gems, and game.64 The similarity between hunting and war was crucial to the status it conferred on members of a military elite. In peacetime, great nobles, princes, and kings could regularly display their willingness and ability to unleash violence, poten­ tially on a large scale, through hunting. The boar hunt, because of its dangers, was a particularly good vehicle to display military prowess. Indeed, the anonymous chronicler of Richard I’s many exploits on the Third Crusade took time from describing military achievements to provide a detailed account of Richard’s acci­ dental but successful encounter with a particularly fearsome boar.65 John’s father, Henry II, and probably John himself, used hunting as a stand-in for war more subtly. Both Jordan Fantosme and Ralph of Diceto praised Henry II for using hunting as a way to project steadfastness and confidence during the very dangerous revolt he faced in 1173–4. After praising Henry as the greatest king since Moses, save for Charlemagne, Jordan described how he refused to halt going to the river (for falconry) or pursuing wild beasts, no matter how much his enemies threatened him.66 Ralph depicted Henry as reacting with equanimity to his difficulties, maintaining a cheerful countenance, and frequently hunting alone early in the revolt.67 Taking the time to indulge in hunting projected the absence of panic, while subtly maintaining the ruler’s reputation for martial prowess. These ideas should inform our interpretation of a passage in which the Anonymous of Béthune stated that he did not know what King John felt in his heart upon hearing the news that Chinon, his last great stronghold in Anjou, had been lost to Philip Augustus, but that he made little of it and turned his atten­ tion to delighting in hawks and hounds and making merry with his wife.68 While 64 Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 450–1. See also Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler (De Principis Instructione), ed. Robert Bartlett (Oxford, 2018), 714–15. 65 Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, 2:3–5; Albert Stimming, ed., Der anglonormannische Boeve de Haumtone (Halle, 1899), 17–20; William Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium Peregrinorum et Gesta Regis Ricardi (London, 1864), 344–5. 66  Jordan Fantosme, Jordan Fantosme’s Chronicle, ed. R. C. Johnston (Oxford, 1981), 10–11. 67  Ralph of Diceto, Radulfi de Diceto Decani Lundoniensis Opera Historica, ed. William Stubbs, 2 vols. (London, 1876), 1:373–4. 68  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 104.

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40  Power and Pleasure the author was not praising John, a point to which I will return, if the depiction of the king’s reaction is accurate, John may have been trying to project confidence as he began preparing his ultimately futile efforts to reverse his disastrous losses to the French king. Partly because of its martial associations, hunting may also have served to re­affirm and advertise hunters’ masculine identities.69 Certainly hunting is closely tied to masculinity in many cultures, and John of Salisbury’s attempt to feminize hunting in his attack on the sport suggests this was true in twelfth-century England and France as well. However, falconry and hawking had complex associ­ ations when it came to gender, as female birds of prey are generally bigger than males and so were normally used in the sport, a fact widely noted at the time.70 Birds of prey were not inevitably gendered female in medieval literature—for instance, the lover in Marie de France’s Yonec who transforms from a hawk is male.71 Nonetheless, hunting birds had strong feminine associations. It was prob­ ably not just love of falconry that caused elite women like Queen Isabella to have themselves depicted with birds of prey on their seals; these images might allow them to implicitly claim the fierceness and prowess generally associated with rap­ tors—and with men in this patriarchal society. However, male taming and train­ ing of hawks and falcons, and male mastery over female raptors more generally, allowed these birds to be used as symbols of male dominance, albeit dominance over a worthy ‘prize.’ Thus, in King Horn, the eponymous character, returning after a long absence and testing his beloved Rigmel, speaks of having won and tamed a goshawk nearly seven years before, coming back to see if it is still valu­ able, and taking it if unblemished.72 This association between women and birds of prey may shed light on a distinctly odd letter John wrote on 30 October 1214, first discussed by Nicholas Vincent. Writing to Terric the Teuton, John said to him that he would soon be with him and that ‘we are thinking of you about the hawk (de austurco).’ He went on to say that even if he had been gone ten years, it would have been as though he had been absent for three days, and then urged Terric to take care of his charge and report frequently on it. Vincent, noting that Terric had just become the queen’s guardian, suggests that the letter, with its expression of longing, was meant as much for the queen as for Terric, and that John was using obscure language out of concern for the queen’s safety in the immediate aftermath of the failed Poitevin expedition. If Vincent’s interpretation is correct, John was acknowledging Isabella’s own association of herself with a bird of prey, as seen on 69  For hunting and gender, see Richardson, ‘Riding Like Alexander, Hunting Like Diana,’ 256–9. 70  For instance, John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:25; Gerald of Wales, Giraldi Cambrensis Opera, ed. J. S. Brewer, James F. Dimock, and George F. Warner, 8 vols. (London, 1861–91), 5:36–7; Alexander Neckam, De Naturis Rerum Libri Duo: With the Poem of the Same Author, De Laudibus Divinæ Sapientiæ, ed. Thomas Wright (London, 1863), 379. 71  Marie de France, Lais de Marie de France, ed. Karl Warnke and Laurence Harf-Lancner (Paris, 1990), 186–9. 72  Master Thomas, Romance of Horn, 1:144–5.

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Hunting and Falconry  41 her seal, but also implicitly placing himself in the place of the hawk’s master and owner, reasserting his masculinity even as it was undermined by the very threat to the queen to which he was reacting.73 The surviving records of the royal court are particularly revealing on the role of hunting animals, game animals, venison, and hunting rights in royal patronage and the network of gift exchange which (as I will argue in Chapter 8) continued to play an important role in English kingship and lordship, despite the rise of administrative kingship and the growing importance of money to royal govern­ ment. The giving of hunting animals, game, and venison can be found in various historical and literary sources, clearly showing it was a meaningful and estab­ lished practice.74 John’s records reveal gifts of birds of prey or hunting hounds to or from foreign rulers and magnates.75 Such small but valued gifts helped kings, princes, and magnates maintain alliances and close ties. Proffers from subjects to the king often included hunting animals, among them horses trained for the pur­ pose, birds of prey, and occasionally hounds.76 Proffers were generally hardheaded purchases of favours, grants, or even remission of royal anger from the king in return for hard cash, but the inclusion of animals and items such as bar­ rels of wine helped keep the proffers partly in the mental realm of the gift, a point I will return to in Chapter  8. One noteworthy example, involving an unusually large number of animals, came in the proffer that John’s great favourite (and later enemy), William de Briouze, made for three castles and associated lands in the Welsh Marches. Along with 800 marks, William offered three warhorses, five hunting horses, ten greyhounds, and twenty-four scent hounds. In late January 1206, in the same regnal year he made the proffer, William delivered all the ani­ mals to the king at Worcester.77 The presentation of so many valuable animals all at once must have been quite a spectacle and a strong public affirmation of the close bonds between the king and Briouze. The king’s gifts to his subjects consisted overwhelmingly of deer and other game, whether as live animals for stocking their parks, meat for their table, or the right to hunt a specific number of animals.78 The surviving records reveal the 73  RLC 175b; http://magnacarta.cmp.uea.ac.uk/read/itinerary/From_the_Tower__John_sends_a_ coded_message_to_his_queen; Vincent, ‘Isabella of Angoulême,’ 195–6. In the website discussion, Vincent notes a possible alternative interpretation of John’s letter as something of a threat. For another alternative interpretation of the writ, see Carpenter, Magna Carta, 90–1. 74 Rigord, Histoire de Philippe Auguste, ed. Élisabeth Carpentier, Georges Pon, and Yves Chauvin (Paris, 2006), 160–2; Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle, 42; [Roger of Howden], Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi Benedicti Abbatis, ed. William Stubbs, 2 vols. (London, 1867), 2:180; Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis: The Life of St. Hugh of Lincoln, ed. Decima  L.  Douie and David Hugh Farmer, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1985), 1:104; Master Thomas, Romance of Horn, 1:20–1; A. J. Holden, ed., Le Roman de Waldef (Geneva, 1984), 186; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 60. See also Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 157–9, 165–72. 75  PR6J 219; Misae 11J 145; Misae 14J 238–9, 250, 256; RLC 182b; ROF 551. 76  For example, ROF 10–12, 14, 18, 33–6, 41, 75, 89, 92–3, 98–9, 100, 104–5. 77  ROF 307–8; RLC 63a. 78  For similar gifts by Henry III and Edward I, see Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 181; Oggins, ‘Game,’ 207–9.

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42  Power and Pleasure extensive patronage provided by royal hunting (indirectly providing more ­evidence of the size and capabilities of the royal hunting establishment) and shed light on John’s use of gifts. Unfortunately, the two main sources for the gifts offer different pictures about their use. The first is a record of game taken in parts of Essex in the decade up to 1208, which suggests that John kept his wildlife patron­ age narrowly restricted to his closest followers, some of whom benefited hand­ somely. Geoffrey fitz Peter, earl of Essex and justiciar, received 455 deer, 1 wild bull, and 5 boars, and Hubert Walter, archbishop of Canterbury and a key administrator, received 188 deer.79 However, the other source, made up of scat­ tered references to grants in the close rolls, suggests a wider patronage. Some royal favourites among the baronage received handsome gifts; Earl Ranulf of Chester received one hundred fallow deer for a park. In general, however, royal favourites make fewer appearances in the grants in the close rolls than on the Essex list.80 The disparity between the two sources, and the likelihood that there were once similar records to the Essex list that have since been lost, make it hard to draw firm conclusions about just how John managed his grants of game and wild animals and to what ends. That said, the purposes of some grants are obvious. The king’s grant of sixtyfour deer to the royal favourite, William of Cornhill, bishop elect of Coventry and Lichfield, for his consecration feast was clearly a sign of favour.81 A grant of eighty fallow deer to a count of Guînes was obviously designed to strengthen an im­port­ ant continental alliance.82 More speculatively, a number of otherwise unusual grants in the early months of 1215 of small numbers of red deer to barons, includ­ ing Robert de Ros, Walter de Lacy, and Hugh de Mortimer, could have been made in hopes of shoring up the king’s deteriorating support in that year through inex­ pensive but symbolically rich acts of generosity.83 In any case, it is clear that John operated this large-scale, highly symbolic patronage of wild animals throughout his reign, even taking into account that some large ‘gifts’ (500 fallow deer for Eustace, bishop of Ely, and 700 for Stephen Langton, archbishop of Canterbury) were actually compensation for the royal seizure of deer from episcopal deer parks during the interdict.84 The Essex records record grants of over 1,100 deer and the surviving close rolls record grants of 2,422 fallow deer and 129 red deer, of which 1,900 fallow and 20 red deer were explicitly designated for parks and thus had to be captured alive and transported.85 This suggests that such ­gift-giving, though less important than the grants of lands or privileges usually

79  Crook, ‘Taking of Venison,’ 126–32. 80  RL 43; RLC 40b, 41a, 44b, 71b, 122b, 147a, 148b, 149b, 157b, 63b, 167b, 187b. 81  RLC 182b. 82  RL 95. 83  RLC 183a, 187b, 188a, 197b. 84  RLC 146a–b, 154b. For seizure of episcopal deer, see RLC 122b. 85  In addition to the references above, see RN 82; RL 33, 41, 43, 47; RLC 15b, 28b, 40b, 45b, 48b, 61a, 75b, 90b, 121a, 123a, 128b, 138b, 139a, 141a, 146a, 147b, 151b, 179b, 182a, 219a.

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Hunting and Falconry  43 studied by historians, still had an important role in the relationship between king and magnates. This was especially true since grants of animals or hunting rights meant the king was conferring not only the meat but also the prestige and pleasure of the hunt. One of John’s few successes in the campaign of 1214 was the capture of Robert III de Dreux, heir to a cadet branch of the Capetians. The Anonymous of Béthune described John as keeping Robert in honourable captivity and illustrated this claim by stating that the king had him taken ‘to the woods and the rivers and all delights that pleased him.’86 One document even indicates that one purpose of the royal forest was to provide routine hunting for magnates. In a writ of 11 June 1207 to Brian de Lisle, a major administrator and forest official, the king wrote that he much desired that capitales barones travelling through Brian’s bailiwick take game because ‘we do not have forests and beast for our use [alone] but also the use of our fideles.’ He went on to say that robbers, probably meaning poachers, were the real problem. If this statement accurately represented standard royal policy, then the royal forests represented a large and ongoing source of an in­tan­ gible patronage conferring prestige, honour, and pleasure on important barons.87 Inviting magnates, courtiers, and guests to join the king may have been an even greater source of intangible patronage, for it gave them the opportunity to re­affirm aristocratic identity and display aristocratic skills in the most exalted company. Finally, few aspects of royal government served to project royal power and authority more effectively than the hunt. As Thomas Allsen has written of royal hunts throughout Eurasia, . . . the royal hunt displays a ruler’s ability to marshal and order labor, military manpower, and individuals (both human and animal) with very special skills. Moreover, by the very nature of the hunt, these abilities were dramatically dem­ onstrated throughout the countryside for the edification of subjects. And a forceful demonstration in one sphere, such as the hunt, strongly implies an equivalent competency in others, such as tax collection or bandit suppression.88

One reason for itineration was to show the king’s power across his land, as I will argue in Chapter 7, and the large packs of dogs that accompanied him for parts of the year were a potent sign of that power.89 To pen thousands of deer in parks, move them about the countryside, and slaughter them in large numbers under­ scored the royal government’s capabilities and ability to inflict violence. Finally, 86  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 144. 87  RLC 85b. For explicit grants of hunting rights, see RLC 129a, 135b, 167b, 168a; RLCh 12a, 20a, 44a–b. 88 Allsen, Royal Hunt in Eurasian History, 8. 89  Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 37–8.

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44  Power and Pleasure the royal forests of England, defined by law rather than topography and ­encompassing far more than just woodland, covered huge areas (including the entire county of Essex); those living in or near them experienced forest law as a constant reminder of the force of royal authority. When the Anonymous of Béthune wanted to support his claim that John was the most feared king in England, Wales, Scotland, or Ireland since King Arthur, he stressed how little the wild beasts in his insular realms feared humans.90 So powerful was King John’s authority, he implied, that it shaped the behaviour of animals. The writer’s claim was no doubt exaggerated, but it shows how hunting and forest law created an image of mastery over men and beasts.

2.6  Hunting, the Malleability of Social Meaning, and Criticism of and Resistance to the King Though hunting practices and the related jargon and ceremonial practices carried associations with prowess, skill, nobility, masculinity, power, and authority, these were not fixed or incontestable.91 Indeed, there were ways in which John’s love of hunting may have undermined as well as enhanced his power and authority. Most strikingly, this was because John’s critics and enemies manipulated the social meanings of hunting to undermine him subtly. Before going further, however, it is worth pausing to consider John of Salisbury’s masterful attack on hunting. Although it comes from the previous generation and was not directed at a particular target, it shows how accepted views of hunting and the values of secular elites could be subverted. John of Salisbury’s motives were probably to wean clerical courtiers like his patron, Thomas Becket, from hunting, since it was forbidden to them; he may also have been motivated by rivalry between the secular and clerical elites for prestige and status. His substantive concerns focused on the expenditure and the loss of time entailed in hunting, possible neglect of office, the social burdens of forest law, and above all a pious rejection of worldly frivolities. However, to make hunting less attractive, he systematically dismantled any positive associations. He suggested that hunting hardly reveals prowess when carried out by an army of men and dogs rather than one’s own virtue. The comparison with a Roman triumph made the carrying of the forchée seem silly, and he stressed that an unsuccessful hunt brought gloom rather than glory. He ridiculed the unmaking ceremony with a quote from Juvenal about juggling knives, and made hunting jargon look 90  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 109. 91 Poaching was a way in which the elite power derived from hunting could be challenged; Roger  B.  Manning, Hunters and Poachers: A Social and Cultural History of Unlawful Hunting in England, 1485–1640 (Cambridge, 1993). Unfortunately, insufficient evidence survives to study this in John’s reign.

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Hunting and Falconry  45 ridiculous by comparing it to scholarly learning. He undermined the elite ­associations of hunting by emphasizing that the miserable clothes and frugal meals of hunters were hardly markers of aristocratic status. He asserted that hunt­ ing sapped the virile spirit, first because he associated it with a decline of reason (seen as a masculine attribute) and then because, like all sources of pleasure, it could corrupt and feminize men. In his eyes hunting, instead of enhancing a man’s status, reputation, and character, undermined them.92 His critique shows how an acute polemicist could turn the standard positive social interpretation of hunting on its head.93 More dangerous than this clerical critique for King John’s reputation was a sense among many secular nobles that hunting, although entertaining, was less daring and prestigious than participation in the great tournaments that had developed in the twelfth century. This theme is most fully developed in Ipomedon, Hue de Rotelande’s late twelfth-century romance, whose titular character takes the convention of hiding his true identity and background, what Susan Crane calls ‘chivalric incognito,’ to the parodic extent of concealing his warlike a­ bil­ities.94 Pretending to be a coward, he avoids public deeds of arms to concentrate on hunting. Even in this context, his hunting prowess gains him a certain amount of credit. His love interest, La Fiere, at whose court he serves in disguise, orders a great hunt and has a pavilion set up in a beautiful spot to observe. Ipomedon pursues a particularly impressive stag with a bercelet he himself has trained, catches it in front of La Fiere, kills it with only the help of his dog, then unmakes it and places its head on a pole in the approved manner. Deeply impressed, La Fiere points him out as an example of skilled hunting and begins to fall in love. So far, hunting does what it does for all good romance heroes in terms of establish­ ing their worth and prowess. La Fiere, however, does not pursue her love, lament­ ing that she has sworn to marry only the best knight, a role Ipomedon has pretended to reject, showing that hunting could only take a man so far. The limits of hunting’s prestige appear most forcibly in the most extended ­episode of the romance, a three-day tournament to which over 150 out of ­approximately 450 pages of the modern edition are devoted. Ipomedon, by this time established at the court of King Meleager, has again won prestige for his hunting prowess, but now earns mockery for pretending to go hunting instead of 92  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:19, 21–35, 245; 2:10, 40–1. 93 For clerical views of hunting and other discussions of John’s attacks, see Barlow, ‘Hunting,’ 18–19; Buc, L’ambiguïté du livre, 111–17; Thomas Szabó, ‘Die Kritik der Jagd—Von der Antike zum Mittelalter,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 167–229; Harald Wolter-von dem Knesebeck, ‘Aspekte der höfischen Jagd und ihrer Kritik in Bildzeugnissen des Hochmittelalters,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 493–572, at 523–9; Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 126–34; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 159–60; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 322–3. 94  Susan Crane, The Performance of Self: Ritual, Clothing, and Identity During the Hundred Years War (Philadelphia, PA, 2002), 125–37.

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46  Power and Pleasure to the tournament. Each day, he enters into the woods with his huntsmen, then puts on armour of a different colour, going to the tournament disguised as a dif­ ferent knight and winning the prize each time. Each evening, Ipomedon returns to the castle and presents the ladies with the heads of stags his huntsmen have caught. Messengers from Meleager, who is staying on the tournament field, bring word of the day’s fighting, praising the participants and exalting the mysterious knights who have won the prize each day, with the ladies hanging on every word. Ipomedon in turn describes his pretended hunting and praises his various dogs, sending a gift of venison to Meleager. Ipomedon establishes himself as a fool who thinks that hunting is as worthy as winning tournaments, that the deeds of dogs are equivalent to the deeds of knights, and that his gift of venison could confer prestige on a king who fought on the tournament field while Ipomedon has been entertaining himself in the woods. Again and again Hue describes the ladies mocking this hunter, who now appears boorish, while Ipomedon’s supporters and friends, including Meleager, suffer deep chagrin. Of course, they are in for a sur­ prise, for after the tournament, Ipomedon arranges to have his identity as the winning knight revealed. Nonetheless, the setup of the extended joke depends on a widely acknowledged idea that hunting was a distant second to tournaments when it came to aristocratic deeds.95 Ipomedon is an idiosyncratic romance, but a similar theme of hunting’s in­fer­ ior­ity to tournaments can be found in King Horn and, to turn to a historical source, in the History of William Marshal. In the latter, John’s older brother, Henry the Young King, and his followers find themselves bored in England after a year of hunting and individual jousts, and long to return to the tournament fields of France. Later, the poet laments the decline of chivalry since the Young King’s time, citing the popularity of dogs and birds as one reason for the (alleged) decline in the popularity of tournaments. For William Marshal’s circle, hunting was all well and good, but a distant second to the tournament.96 King John, however, appears to have been resolutely uninterested in tourna­ ments. The surviving evidence shows him as present at only one joust, before he became king, and the only clear reference in the royal records is a set of fines made by two aristocratic participants in a tournament forbidden by John in his first year.97 John’s lack of interest in tournaments was not unique—indeed, his father had banned them generally in England. Nonetheless it remains surprising, given that two of his brothers, Henry the Young King and Geoffrey, were active and well-known participants and that John’s other brother Richard was interested

95  Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 85–96, 184–7, 203–368. 96  Master Thomas, Romance of Horn, 1:86–7, 92; Anthony J. Holden, Stewart Gregory, and David Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 3 vols. (London, 2002–6), 1:122–3, 218–19. 97  ROF 75; Lucian of Chester, Extracts from the Liber Luciani De Laude Cestrie, ed. M. V. Taylor ([London], 1912), 9–10, 61–2; Strickland, War and Chivalry, 109–10.

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Hunting and Falconry  47 enough to end his father’s ban.98 John’s avoidance of tournaments and focus on hunting may have been a poor investment of time and resources when it came to garnering prestige, for by the end of the twelfth century, the tournament had sup­ planted hunting’s primary role in asserting aristocratic manhood. John’s baronial opponents, in contrast, had no doubts about the importance of tournaments. The baronial army assembled at tournament fields before moving against John and held at least one tournament after John’s issuing of Magna Carta, when both sides were taking precautions against the possible renewal of hos­til­ ities. Subsequently, after the invasion of Philip Augustus’s son at the request of the rebels, one of the baronial leaders, Geoffrey de Mandeville, was killed in one. A letter of the baronial leader, Robert fitz Walter, reveals that a tournament outside London during the period of uneasy peace was an excuse to keep many armed rebels near the city, so at that point there was a concrete reason for rebel dedica­ tion to the tournament. However, the rebels may also have intended to use their tournaments to send a message by contrasting their own participation in this highly prestigious, chivalric sport with John’s lack of interest and his dedication to the softer option of hunting.99 Their participation in tournaments, in other words, may have been a subtle form of propaganda. When it came to aristocratic prestige, both hunting and tournaments were far behind warfare.100 John certainly did not shun warfare, but he failed abysmally in his greatest struggle, with Philip Augustus, and indeed was back in England dur­ ing the crucial months when resistance collapsed in Normandy, Maine, and Anjou. I have suggested earlier that John’s dedication to hunting in the aftermath of that collapse, as described by the Anonymous of Béthune, was designed to pro­ ject calmness and resolution. However, the author himself, I believe, was im­pli­ cit­ly criticizing John for responding to disaster by taking delight in his dogs and birds and enjoying himself with his wife. Similarly, in the passage stressing John’s ability to protect wild beasts, which described John as devoting himself to hunt­ ing and falconry, the author was undoubtedly suggesting that John was devoting himself to the pleasures of the chase when he should have been fighting.101 This criticism was explicit in a mocking sirvente by the poet Bertran de Born the younger. In this poem, addressed to Savary de Mauleon, John’s key supporter in Poitou, Bertran unfavourably contrasted John with his brother Richard, whom the poet says would have spent lavishly to defend his lands. He criticized John for 98  Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:lxxx–lxxxi; Gillingham, Richard I, 255–6. 99  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:137–8, 176; Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 164; Vincent, Magna Carta, 61; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 298–9, 391, 411. For tournaments as a site of political opposition, see Juliet  R.  V.  Barker, The Tournament in England, 1100–1400 (Woodbridge, 1986), 12, 45–7. 100  See, for instance, William D. Paden, Tilde Sankovitch, and Patricia H. Stäblein, eds., The Poems of the Troubadour Bertran de Born (Berkeley, CA, 1986), 260–3, 394–5. 101 Anonymous of Béthune, ‘Chronique des rois de France,’ in Martin Bouquet and Léopold Delisle, eds., Receuil de Historiens de Gaule et de France (Paris, 1904), 750–75, at 104, 109.

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48  Power and Pleasure being more interested in fishing and hunting, in bercelets, greyhounds, and hawks, than in fighting, and called him a coward.102 Given John’s propensity to lavish funds on warfare and his active participation in various military cam­ paigns, Bertran’s criticism was unfair, but the point is that hunting could be depicted not as an honourable but as a dishonourable substitute for war. The greatest way in which devotion to hunting may have undermined rather than enhanced John’s power was the opposition that forest law aroused, since, as I have argued, John’s heavy-handed enforcement of it was inspired by his love of hunting as well as by a desire for money. As is well known, hostility to forest law was an important factor in the rebellion at the end of John’s reign. This hostility resulted in a promise in the 1215 version of Magna Carta to disafforest areas afforested by John himself and investigate the evil customs of forest officials and wardens of riparian areas used for falconry. This promise subsequently led to the forest charter of 1217. The widespread opposition to forest law is heavily studied and needs no detailed attention here.103 What is worth noting is that the social meanings of the king’s parks, hunting grounds, and wild animals could be turned against the king in rather concrete forms of social protest. According to what is traditionally called the Barnwell Chronicle (it actually originated at Crowland Abbey), rebels in Devonshire attacked the king’s residences and parks when they rose against the king. The same source states that the northern rebels later invaded the forests, selling timber and slaughtering beasts.104 These attacks were practical ways to harm the king, but more importantly, they had a symbolic element. ‘Park breaking,’ the practice of breaking into a park and slaughtering the owner’s wild animals, first appears with the harassment by Henry II’s followers of Thomas Becket, and would have a long subsequent history. It was a way of shaming park owners and could be used as a form of protest as well as of harassment.105 The slaughter of wild beasts was less traditional, but had occurred after the death of Henry I, who was noted for his harsh punishment of those who hunted his deer.106 If parks and the ability to dominate men, animals, and even the landscape were a mark of authority, then the attack on John’s parks was a powerful sym­bol­ ic­al challenge to his authority. If John’s ability to safeguard wild animals was a potent symbol of his power, as the Anonymous of Béthune articulated, then their 102  Thomas Wright and Peter  R.  Coss, eds., Thomas Wright’s Political Songs of England from the Reign of John to that of Edward II (Cambridge 1996), 3–6. For a later parallel, see Guillén, ‘El rey cazador,’ 151. 103 Young, Royal Forests, 60–70; Grant, Royal Forests, 133–40; Holt, Northerners, 157–64; Holt, Magna Carta, 284–6; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 176–7, 209–10, 414–16. 104 Walter of Coventry, Memoriale Fratris Walteri de Coventria, ed. William Stubbs, 2 vols. (London, 1872–3), 2:220, 222. For this chronicle as a Crowland production, see Carpenter, Magna Carta, 86–7. 105  Andrew Miller, ‘Knights, Bishops and Deer Parks: Episcopal Identity, Emasculation and Clerical Space in Medieval England,’ in Jennifer  D.  Thibodeaux, ed., Negotiating Clerical Identities: Priests, Monks and Masculinity in the Middle Ages (Basingstoke, 2010), 204–37. 106  K. R. Potter and R. H. C. Davis, eds., Gesta Stephani, Regis Anglorum (Oxford, 1976), 4–5.

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Hunting and Falconry  49 slaughter demonstrated his impotence. The critics and enemies of kings u ­ nderstood hunting’s symbolism as well as their rulers did, and could use it against them. King John struggled and sometimes failed in the arena of soft power, as in the realm of hard power. More generally, medieval people knew how to manipulate the symbolic aspects of hunting to contest as well as build soft power.

2.7  Power in the Service of Pleasure: The Delights of Hunting There is no doubt that kings devoted resources to hunting partly to derive power, status, and authority thereby, but as Mileson has argued, one should not take this too far: ‘If the king had many fine houses, wide forests, and expensively enclosed parks this may have been more because he enjoyed a certain lifestyle rather than because he consciously acquired them to impress his power (for all that he might like to show them off occasionally).’107 Though clearly I believe that kings did think about power when it came to hunting, I would also emphasize the im­port­ ance of pleasure. Whenever they commented on hunting, writers from King John’s broad milieu almost always stressed how much hunters loved the activity or took pleasure in it rather than any desire to gain status or express their author­ ity. Most notably, in the Dialogue of the Exchequer, Richard fitz Nigel, despite being deeply concerned with royal power and authority, described hunting as a diversion and escape for kings: ‘In forests are the retreats of kings and their great­ est delights. They go there for the sake of hunting, setting aside the cares of court for a while to enjoy themselves with a little quiet.’108 John’s predecessors were often described as loving or taking delight in the hunt109 and literary works often described hunting as a diversion or source of pleasure.110 So, too, did later medi­ eval works on hunting, and in their discussion of such works, Armand Strubel and Chantal de Saulnier have emphasized their authors’ belief that aristocratic pleasure was the chief justification for the hunt.111 Unfortunately, medieval ­writers simply took it for granted that hunting was pleasurable, assuming their audiences would know why. Thus, even though there are many more explicit

107 Mileson, Parks in Medieval England, 107–8. 108 Richard FitzNigel, Dialogus de Scaccario: The Dialogue of the Exchequer, ed. Emilie Amt (Oxford, 2007), 90–1. 109  Anglo-Saxon Chronicle E 1087; William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, ed. Richard Howlett, 2 vols. (London, 1884–5), 1:30, 280; Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 476–7; Peter of Blois, Opera, 198; Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 521–32; Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica: The Conquest of Ireland, ed. A. B. Scott and F. X. Martin (Dublin, 1978), 128–9. 110  For instance, Stewart Gregory, ‘Thomas’s Tristan,’ in Norris  J.  Lacy, ed., Early French Tristan Poems (Cambridge, 1998), 3–172, at 104–5; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 97; Marie de France, Lais, 72–3; Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, 1:25, 88, 98; Layamon, Layamon: Brut, ed. G. L. Brook and R. F. Leslie, 2 vols. (London, 1963–78), 1:374. See also Rooney, Hunting, 1. 111  Strubel and de Saulnier, La poétique de la chasse, 52, 127–72.

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50  Power and Pleasure statements linking hunting to pleasure than to power or status, modern historians still have to infer the sources of that pleasure. Two sources of pleasure from hunting, game consumption and the enjoyment of woodland, riparian, and wetlands environments, will be discussed in Chapters 6 and 7 respectively. Many of the other reasons hunting was pleasurable can easily be reconstructed. Hunts were suspenseful: would the hunters be cast into gloom by failure, as John of Salisbury mockingly described, or return home successful in a triumphant procession? The chance to display one’s skill with weapons or flaunt one’s command of obscure jargon no doubt pleased the more experienced and skilful. For many members of a martial elite, bloodlust was surely a part of the enjoyment. In the par force hunt, as in modern fox hunting, the exhilaration of riding at high speeds across the countryside and handling a horse in sometimes difficult circumstances must have been crucial. Even the bay­ ing of the hounds was a source of pleasure: Alexander Neckam, a noted scholar but also son of Richard I’s wet nurse and therefore familiar with the royal court, wrote in one of his works on the natural world that ‘the barking of dogs pursuing a delectable scent delights the ears of magnates more than the sweet harmony of musical instruments.’112 There is no way of knowing how skilled John was at hunting or how knowledgeable about it, but given how often court critics men­ tioned flattery, his courtiers and guests no doubt would have lavished praise on his abilities and wisdom regardless of his actual accomplishments. Exercising generosity was crucial to kingship, but John may also have enjoyed rewarding fol­ lowers and allies with gifts of hunting animals, wild beasts, and hunting rights. After all, exercising power, in the hunting field and more generally, can be its own form of pleasure. Sometimes the pleasure came from the spectacle rather than participation. When Alexander Neckam discussed the falcon, he focused on the display it offered, stressing its agility, audacity, and body fit for its task, and noting how it drew men’s eyes when it climbed to the heights and plummeted down swifter than a javelin.113 The spectacle was even more glorious when it was unusual or remarkable. Ralph of Diceto, in a chronicle largely devoted to great political, mili­ tary, and religious affairs, digressed to describe one such episode. A youth in the household of Richard fitz Nigel, then bishop of London, had trained his hawk to hunt teals, but once it seized a pike from the water, carrying it some way over land before dropping it. The spectacle of a hawk catching what was probably a very large fish rather than a light bird was considered quite remarkable; the bishop sent both bird and fish to John, not yet king but a dominant political figure at that moment since Richard I was on crusade. The bishop did so, Ralph wrote 112 Alexander Neckam, De Naturis Rerum, 252–3. See also Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 714–15. 113  Alexander Neckam, De Naturis Rerum, 380.

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Hunting and Falconry  51 (no doubt tongue in cheek), as ‘a memorial to the ages.’114 This event was recorded precisely because it was unusual, but falconers routinely sought to achieve the maximum possible spectacle. As Oggins has noted, one of the reasons cranes and herons were such desirable prey was that they were large and could fight back, thus providing a fine display of aerial combat, particularly when pitted against birds of prey trained to hunt in pairs.115 Hunting with dogs offered its own possi­ bility of display, either in the flight of a stag pursued by a parade of dogs and mounted hunters or the spectacle of large numbers of animals being driven past archers, shot, and then, in many cases, chased down by hounds. Spectacle sometimes edged into marvel, as seen in the pike story. Gerald of Wales provides other marvels related to hunting and deer such as a doe rather than a stag with a twelve-point rack of antlers caught in the hunt of a Welsh prince, who sent its head to Henry II.116 The many literary tales of magical hunts must have added to the marvellous associations of hunting. As John Cummins writes: The extent of literary uses of hunting motifs and symbols, especially those involving the chase of the deer in the later Middle Ages, suggests that for an impressionable aristocrat, brought up from his youth to appreciate such litera­ ture, embarking on a hunt must have been a kind of participatory theatre, wrapped in evocative associations: of white or white-footed harts which are really transformed princes; of devilish boars; of mysterious hermitages deep in the woods; of animals or hawks which lead the hunter away from his familiar environment and into the nebulous geography and landscape of Arthurian legend.117

Hunting fed the literary imagination, but, as Cummins suggests, literature enhanced the hunting experience.118 Hunting was often a social occasion; a chance or excuse for people to mingle. Later sources show that a meal might be served during a hunt, providing a good opportunity for socializing. One family held a generous tenancy from King John in Oxfordshire for providing such a meal when the king was in Wychwood 114  This occurred when Richard was on crusade, after John had driven Richard I’s justiciar, William Longchamp, from power; Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:102. 115 Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 33. 116  Gerald of Wales, Opera, 6:17, 141. 117 Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 9. See also Strubel and de Saulnier, La poétique de la chasse, 219–53. 118  For general works on hunting in medieval literature, see Marcelle Thiébaux, The Stag of Love: The Chase in Medieval Literature (Ithaca, NY, 1974); Rooney, Hunting; William Perry Marvin, Hunting Law and Ritual in Medieval English Literature (Cambridge, 2006); Fletcher, Gardens of Earthly Delight, 120–32. For works dealing with hunting in works from John’s broad milieu, see the works relating to the Tristan and Yseult cycle in note 47 of this chapter and J. Larmat, ‘La chasse dans les Lais de Marie de France,’ in La chasse au Moyen Age. Actes du Colloque de Nice (22–4 juin 1979) (Nice, 1980), 377–84; Wendy Marie Hoofnagle, The Continuity of the Conquest: Charlemagne and Anglo-Norman Imperialism (University Park, PA, 2016), 105–11.

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52  Power and Pleasure Forest.119 Literary works sometimes depicted hunting as an opportunity to form or create friendships, and John may well have used it to build ties with courtiers, magnates, and visiting dignitaries not just for power but also camaraderie.120 Friendships at the highest levels could sometimes be fraught because of political pressures, however, as the deterioration of John’s close relations with William de Briouze indicates; and Jeroen Duindam has suggested that kings therefore might yearn for the relatively uncomplicated kinds of companionship (uncomplicated at least for the king) provided by jesters and servants.121 The shared activities and concern created by hunting between a king and his professional hunters would have provided a particularly useful setting for such companionship, and Cummins has pointed to ties of affection between rulers and huntsmen.122 If this was true of John, he may have added a dash of condescension or even contempt to his affec­ tion. One of John’s master huntsmen was routinely called John Stultus or John le Fol (both meaning John the Fool), and three of the king’s few dog handlers whose names appear in the records were called Dogge Pecelance, Dogge Rastell, and Dogge de Marisco (Dog of the Marsh).123 Nicknames can be hard to interpret; these may simply be contemptuous, but could suggest a condescending but humorous affection on the part of the king and elite courtiers. Interaction with animals may also have rendered hunting pleasurable and, unlike some of their human handlers, animals were accorded a certain respect. The adjectives pulcher (beautiful) and bonus (good) were occasionally applied to hunting dogs and birds of prey in the royal records.124 Although hunting animals were by definition working animals, some of the most favoured may have, like later pets, provided companionship and affection as well as labour.125 In two ver­ sions of a comic, misogynistic story, current in John’s day, a man summoned by his lord to bring his most amusing entertainer, worst enemy, and best friend brought his son (an amusing toddler), his wife, and his dog.126 The terse royal records are unlikely to shed light on such affection, but references to payments that Ivo, usher of the king’s wardrobe, received for bringing to the king a single dog in January 1213 may hint that the king might have had favourites among his hundreds of dogs.127 Hunting, finally, was a form of escape, as indeed the quote from the Dialogue of the Exchequer indicates. John faced tremendous political pressures during his  reign, more than most kings, from his rivalry with Arthur, his long and 119  Book of Fees 1: 103. 120  Gregory, ‘Thomas’s Tristan,’ 104–5; Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, 1:153–4; 2:22. 121 Duindam, Vienna and Versailles, 234–5. 122 Cummins, Hound and the Hawk, 185–6. 123  For John, see PR14J 169; Misae 11J 147–8; Prest Roll 12J 248–9, 253; RLC 242a. For the others, see RLC 172a; Misae 14J 246. 124  PR9J 148; PR11J 159; PR12J 39; RLP 71a; ROF 178; RN 40. 125 Salisbury, The Beast Within, 115–20. 126  Alexander Neckam, De Naturis Rerum, 255–6; Holden, ed., Waldef, 71. 127  Misae 14J 251–2.

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Hunting and Falconry  53 unsuccessful struggle with Philip Augustus, his conflict with the church, and the barons’ revolt at the end of his reign. Though many of his problems were of his own making, the pressures were still real. Moreover, the court was not always pleasant. As David Crouch has written, ‘Who knows but that the hunting field was quite so popular in the Middle Ages because it got you away from the con­ spiracy and backbiting of the court for at least the morning?’128 If and when John used hunting to cement political ties with powerful magnates, the hunting field may not have been much of an escape. On other occasions, however, hunting with close associates and properly deferential, perhaps obsequious, huntsmen may well have been a welcome relief from the difficulties of war and politics. When modern scholars think about the crucial tasks of medieval royal ­administrations, they tend to think about waging war or maintaining a legal ­system, because these are major functions of modern government. They were important for John’s reign as well, but another important purpose of his adminis­ tration, neglected by most scholars, was to carry out hunting on a large scale. In part, ­rulers like John invested money, administrative resources, and even political cap­ital in hunting establishments because hunting brought intangible but i­ mportant benefits, including status, prestige, authority, and the opportunity to enhance relations with magnates through patronage and shared experiences of hunting. For most medieval commentators, however, hunting was associated with pleasure, and a king’s devotion to hunting could open him to criticism and scorn as well as praise and admiration. At royal courts, power and pleasure were in­ex­tric­ably intermingled, and it is not always clear when pleasure was harnessed in the ser­ vice of power and when power was harnessed in the service of pleasure. Historians of medieval royal courts should, of course, remain focused on issues of power, but they should not ignore the degree to which kings used their wealth and power to create pleasure for their associates and themselves. Courts were designed as much to produce pleasure as to produce power.

128  David Crouch, ‘Loyalty, Career and Self-Justification at the Plantagenet Court: The ThoughtWorld of William Marshal and His Colleagues,’ in Martin Aurell, ed., Culture politique des Plantagenêt (1154–1224) (Poitiers, 2003), 229–40, at 237.

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3

Luxury and Material Culture at Court 3.1  Introduction Doris Stenton, an influential scholar and editor of texts, wrote in the introduction to the pipe roll of John’s thirteenth year that ‘Again and again the reader is reminded of King John’s love of jewels and fine clothes. He was not content merely to own them. He used them.’1 Many other scholars have noted the splendour sur­ rounding John.2 Given how heavily John and his government invested in luxury goods at a time of great financial pressure, it is worth exploring why they con­ sidered material splendour to be so important. Almost no objects associated with the court survive, even in an archaeological context: this is a chapter on material culture that uses almost no actual materials.3 Fortunately, the royal records pro­ vide a good deal of evidence about the subject. I have chosen to focus on luxury items, specifically on rich textiles, plate, jewel­ lery, and the royal regalia. These were especially important to the royal court and stood apart from items that would have been more widely diffused throughout society. In defining luxury goods, I follow Arjun Appadurai, who proposes ‘that we regard luxury goods not so much in contrast to necessities (a contrast filled with problems), but as goods whose principal use is rhetorical and social, goods that are simply incarnated signs. The necessity to which they respond is funda­ mentally political.’4 Appadurai here uses ‘political’ in a broad an­thropo­logic­al sense, but I will argue that in the context of the royal court, luxury also had a more narrowly political use, though politics, even in the broader sense, was by no means the sole motivation for investing in luxury. 1  PR13J xxii. 2 Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 260; Warren, King John, 138–40; Turner, King John, 88–9; Church, King John, 131–2; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 226–31. 3 A few luxury items do survive from archaeological digs of royal sites, for instance from Ludgershall, but these can be hard to date to a specific reign; Peter Ellis, ed., Ludgershall Castle, Wiltshire: A Report on the Excavations by Peter Addyman, 1964–1972 (Devizes, 2000), 134, 161, 168. For other archaeological work on royal residences held by John, see Philip Rahtz, Excavations at King John’s Hunting Lodge, Writtle, Essex, 1955–57 (London, 1969); Thomas Beaumont James and A.  M.  Robinson, Clarendon Palace: The History and Archaeology of a Medieval Palace and Hunting Lodge Near Salisbury, Wiltshire (London, 1988); R.  Poulton, ed., A Medieval Royal Complex at Guildford: Excavations at the Castle and Palace (Guildford, 2005). For an overview of surviving items from the centuries in which John lived, see David A. Hinton, Gold and Gilt, Pots and Pins: Possessions and People in Medieval Britain (Oxford, 2005), 171–205. 4  Arjun Appadurai, ‘Introduction: Commodities and the Politics of Value,’ The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge, 1986), 3–63, at 38.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0003

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  55 Because no one has systematically studied luxury goods at John’s court, I will start with an overview of these goods. I will then turn to the way luxury goods bolstered royal authority and prestige, reinforced social hierarchies at court, and helped the king strengthen ties of lordship and create alliances. I will also discuss how luxury goods provided pleasure and comfort. Throughout, I will stress the importance to historians of thinking about luxuries in particular and material culture more generally in reconstructing court life in the central Middle Ages.

3.2  Textiles, Furs, and Clothing Even today, luxurious clothing and textiles provide the rich with status and pleas­ ure, but in premodern periods, when textile production was relatively far more expensive, they formed one of the most common and prestigious types of lux­uri­ ous consumption.5 Medieval and early modern rulers and their courts typically acquired large quantities of textiles, frequently of the most precious types, to flaunt their wealth and power.6 King John’s court was no exception. In 1211–12, John fitz Hugh, a major purchaser of goods for the king, bought, among other things, 6,000 ells of cloth (a typical English ell being 45 inches long), including 1,283 ells of scarlet, the most expensive woollen fabric, along with 216 pieces of silk cloth. The following year, fitz Hugh bought 7,680 ells of cloth at once, 5  This section draws heavily on my article Hugh M. Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles at the Court of King John of England, 1199–1216,’ Medieval Clothing and Textiles 15 (2019), 79–100. 6  For important works on medieval clothing and textiles and on their use at royal courts, see Michèle Beaulieu and Jeanne Baylé, Le Costume en Bourgogne, de Philippe le Hardi à la mort de Charles le Téméraire (1364–1477) (Paris, 1956); Kay Staniland, ‘Clothing and Textiles at the Court of Edward III, 1342–1352,’ in Joanna Bird, ed., Collectanea Londiniensia: Studies in London Archaeology and History Presented to Ralph Merrifield (London, 1978), 223–34; Kay Staniland, ‘Clothing Provision and the Great Wardrobe in the Mid-Thirteenth Century,’ Textile History (1991), 239–52; Stella Mary Newton, Fashion in the Age of the Black Prince: A Study of the Years 1340–1365 (Woodbridge, 1980); Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Liveries of Robes in England, c. 1200–c. 1330,’ English Historical Review 111 (1996), 279–98; Françoise Piponnier and Perrine Mane, Dress in the Middle Ages (New Haven, CT, 1997); Elisabeth Crowfoot, Frances Pritchard, and Kay Staniland, Textiles and Clothing, c. 1150–c. 1450, 2nd ed. (Woodbridge, 2001); Désirée G. Koslin and Janet E. Snyder, eds., Encountering Medieval Textiles and Dress: Objects, Texts, Images (Houndmills, 2002); Sarah-Grace Heller, Fashion in Medieval France (Cambridge, 2007); Margaret Scott, Medieval Dress and Fashion (London, 2007); Benjamin Wild, ‘The Empress’s New Clothes: A rotulus pannorum of Isabella, Sister of King Henry III, Bride of Emperor Frederick II,’ Medieval Clothing and Textiles 7 (2011), 1–31; Tina Anderlini, Le costume médiéval au XIIIème siècle (1180–1320) (Bayeux, 2014); David Gary Shaw, Necessary Conjunctions: The Social Self in Medieval England (New York, 2005), 145–54. For furs, see Elspeth  M.  Veale, The English Fur Trade in the Later Middle Ages (Oxford, 1966); Robert Delort, Le commerce des fourrures en Occident à la fin du Moyen Âge, 2 vols. (Rome, 1978). For textiles and metalwork, see Susan Mosher Stuard, Gilding the Market: Luxury and Fashion in Fourteenth-Century Italy (Philadelphia, PA, 2006). For clothing and textiles at Henry II’s and Edward I’s courts, see Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 29–41, 212–43; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Textiles, Furs and Liveries: A Study of the Material Culture of the Court of Edward I (1272–1307)’ (PhD Thesis, Oxford University, 1992); Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Les livrées de textiles et de fourrures à la fin du moyen âge: l’example de la cour du roi Edouard 1er Plantagenèt (1272–1307),’ in Michel Pastoureau, ed., Cahiers du Léopard d’Or, I, Le vêtement: Histoire, archéologie et symbolique vestimentaires au Moyen Age (Paris, 1989), 169–80.

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56  Power and Pleasure i­ncluding 1,400 ells of scarlet, for a total of £840 15s 6d.7 At his death, King John left behind at Corfe Castle a collection of 119 silk cloths from Hispania, thirtyone pieces of samite, a thick luxurious silk, and four baldekins, another type of luxurious silk fabric, with a collective value of approximately £500.8 Clearly John was willing to commit substantial resources to acquiring clothing and other textiles. Much of the cloth the court purchased was, of course, utilitarian, including canvas for tents and cheaper woollen fabrics for horse blankets. But the court glor­ied in lavish fabrics and furs. Scarlet was so finely made that it gave its name to the colour, since dyers used on it only the most expensive dye available, kermes, made from the eggs of Mediterranean insects and producing that colour.9 The court also wore woollen fabrics in a variety of weaves and colours, including green, blue, brown, black brown, and peacock. Silk, mainly from Iberia, possibly from Andalusian workshops, was also found at court. Judging by silk cloth left in tombs of the Castilian royal family, including John’s sister, Eleanor, it would have been quite striking.10 The fragment surviving from John’s tomb, which may have been from the stockpile at Corfe, travelled an even greater distance, from China.11 Much of the fur was also imported. As with fabrics, there was a hierarchy of furs, with lesser figures at court receiving rabbit and lambskin. Those who mattered generally wore sable, ermine, and, above all, red squirrel. Squirrel later fell out of favour, but during the medieval period, vair (made from the combined white bel­ lies and grey backs of the winter coat of the squirrel), gris (made from just the back), and bis (which retained more of the red of the summer coat) were ubiqui­ tous in elite clothing. The best came from Scandinavia and Russia, because the variants of the European red squirrel there had the thickest coats, and most furs at John’s court probably came from those regions.12 High-quality materials did not come cheaply. Even the cheapest wool fabric, burel, used for instance to make tunics for the king’s fewterers, cost 1s an ell, or six days’ wages for these dog handlers.13 Viride, burnet, and paonaz (peacock),

7  PR13J 107–9; PR14J 43. 8  Fred A. Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts for the Early Years of the Reign of Henry III, n.s. 44 (London, 1982), 34–5. Not all the silks have values attached. Those that are valued total at £338 and this estimate extrapolates from those values to the whole. 9  For medieval scarlets, see John H. Munro, ‘The Medieval Scarlet and the Economics of Sartorial Splendour,’ in Negley B. Harte and Kenneth G. Ponting, eds., Cloth and Clothing in Medieval Europe (London, 1983), 13–70; David Jenkins, ed., The Cambridge History of Western Textiles, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 2003), 2:212–17; Gale  R.  Owen-Crocker, Elizabeth Coatsworth, and Maria Hayward, Encyclopedia of Dress and Textiles in the British Isles c. 450–1450 (Leiden, 2012), 477–81; Martha Carlin and David Crouch, Lost Letters of Medieval Life: English Society, 1200–1250 (Philadelphia, PA, 2013), 42–5. 10 Matteo Mancini, ed., Vestiduras Ricas: El Monasterio de Las Huelgas y su época 1170–1340 (Madrid, 2005). 11 http://www.trc-leiden.nl/trc-needles/clothing-undergarment/individual-textiles-and-textiletypes/fragments-and-panels/worcester-cathedral-embroideries; Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 35. 12 Veale, English Fur Trade. For bis, see Wild, ‘The Empress’s New Clothes,’ 10–11. 13  PR14 John 58.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  57 elite fabrics, cost between 3s and 4s and the average per ell of scarlet was 6s 8d, the equivalent of forty days’ wages for the lowly fewterers. Many of the silk cloths at Corfe cost £2 apiece, and the pieces of samite cost £5, a sum that would have required a good chunk of a knight’s annual income. Panels of squirrel skin used as lining ranged from 27s to 53s 4d, ermine panels could cost £5, and individual sable skins ranged in price from 10s to 4 marks. According to Gerald of Wales, the sable coats given each year by the bishop of Lincoln to the king up to the reign of Richard I cost £100 each, the annual income of a modest barony.14 Luxury furs and textiles were costly. Textiles and, to a lesser extent, furs had many uses. I will defer discussion of some of these: altar cloths and vestments in Chapter 5; table linens in Chapter 6; and pavilions and horse trappings in Chapter 7. I will, however, glance ahead to note that in preparing for one lavish procession, horses were purchased to match the textiles bought to adorn the horses, a surprising reversal that underscores the centrality of textiles in the court’s material culture.15 Textiles were also used as hangings, although there is little information on this. Some paonaz cloth pur­ chased for Queen Isabella’s chambers was likely for hangings, and the brief descriptions of some silk cloths John gave to be hung at St Paul’s Cathedral resem­ ble those purchased and stored by the king, suggesting the latter too could be used as hangings.16 Royal bedchambers were important centres of royal activity and beds were therefore surprisingly important foci of royal authority; luxurious textiles were also used for bedding, along with rich furs.17 Since the court moved constantly, textiles and furs were an easier way to display wealth and status than elaborately carved furniture, and royal bed coverings made ample use of silk, scarlet, and fur. Among John’s treasures, inventoried with some of his most pre­ cious jewellery and regalia, was one cover embroidered with parrots, given by the viscount of Thouars, a powerful Poitevin noble, and another made of samite lined with sable, which must have been enormously costly given the costs of cloaks using that fur.18 But textiles were mainly used for clothing, for as a great lord it was John’s duty to clothe his ordinary servants and give rich gifts of clothing to elite followers and guests at court. The quotation from the Anonymous of Béthune at the beginning of the book shows that one of the few things he admired about King John was his generous distribution of robes at the major feasts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost.19 The royal government spent over £1,000 on robes and furs John 14  Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 83–7; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 7:33, 41. 15  See Chapter 7, 179—181. 16  RLC 88b, 109a; W.  Sparrow Simpson, ‘Two Inventories of the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, London,’ Archaeologia 50 (1887), 439–524, at 494–5; Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 82. 17 Hollie L. S. Morgan, Beds and Chambers in Late Medieval England: Readings, Representations and Realities (Woodbridge, 2017), 94–109. 18  RLCh 134a; Veale, English Fur Trade, 18; Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 83. 19  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 105.

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58  Power and Pleasure ­ istributed at the three great feasts of his ninth year and at least £685 13s 9d on d robes for Christmas 1205.20 The purchase of six sable skins, 235 panels of squirrel fur, and 89 panels of rabbit fur for the Christmas feast of 1207 suggests a distribution of robes to over 300 recipients.21 Unfortunately, no systematic record survives of the robes given at any particular feast, but there is scattered information on robes made for specific individuals at feasts or on other occasions. Earl Aubrey de Vere received robes of blood-red scarlet, and the favoured royal servant, Hugh de Neville, received robes of ruby scarlet lined with saffron silk.22 Most gifts of robes consisted of three pieces, a tunic, a supertunic or surcote, and a cloak, though the gift of two-piece robes was also fairly common. Full sets of robes routinely con­ tained six or seven ells, a goodly amount of fabric. Though scarlet was frequently used for elite clothing, viride, burnet, and even the relatively inexpensive russet were also used. Silk appears less frequently than one would expect from contem­ porary romances, mainly as linings and once as a separate garment granted to a follower.23 There are no records of sable or ermine in robes given to royal follow­ ers but vair, gris, and bis were distributed lavishly. Occasional references to the costs of scarlet robes, some of them explicitly described as being lined with vair, show prices ranging from 56s to 71s 8d, by no means paltry sums even for a pros­ perous knight. John dressed his household knights and honoured guests in style.24 Unfortunately, there is limited information on clothing for members of the royal family besides John. Only two brief records survive of clothing for royal children, and one and possibly both were for John’s illegitimate sons. Both received high-quality clothing.25 At various times, John’s government supplied clothes or materials for his wife, Queen Isabella; his discarded wife, Isabella, countess of Gloucester; his niece, Eleanor of Brittany, whom he kept in ­honourable captivity after the death of her brother, Arthur; two daughters of the king of Scotland in John’s custody; and members of these ladies’ households. Among other garments, they received robes of scarlet, viride, and burnet. Both Queen Isabella and Eleanor of Brittany had sets of silk-lined robes. Squirrel fur abounded, and on one occasion the queen received two panels of ermine, likely for linings. There are hints of elaborate ornamentation on at least one of the queen’s garments, and fuller records would likely provide further evidence of 20  PR7J 11; PR9J 30; RLC 87b, 103b, 106a. 21  RLC 103b. In the 1230s, Henry III was distributing as many as 452 sets of robes; Benjamin Wild, ‘A Truly Royal Retinue: Using Wardrobe Rolls to Determine the Size and Composition of the Household of Henry III of England,’ The Court Historian 16 (2011), 127–57, at 138–40. 22  Misae 14J 267. 23  In contrast, the use of cendal, a light silk, for lining was very common in grants by Henry III in the 1230s; Wild, ‘Truly Royal Retinue,’ 144–9. 24  This paragraph draws on Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 91–4. 25  RL 2; Misae 14J 244, 267. The Richard who received clothes in 1213 may have been John’s younger legitimate son, Richard of Cornwall, but more likely was his much older illegitimate son, Richard of Chilham.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  59 decoration. Overall, the surviving material indicates that the great women ­surrounding John dressed very well, as one would expect. Much more evidence survives for the king’s attire, which must be divided into his regular clothing (though this includes garments made for feasts) and certain garments that formed part of the regalia, the special items used in cor­ onations and other ceremonies that will be discussed later in the chapter. Some of his regular clothes were, in fact, quite ordinary, like leather leggings or boots lined with inexpensive lamb fleece, designed for practical use rather than dis­ play. However, John had plenty of luxurious clothing not in the regalia, includ­ ing not only regular sets of robes but also special ones for going to bed or getting up. He clearly enjoyed variety, for he had robes made in various fabrics, including viride, burnet, and stanfort. A few of his choices seem idiosyncratic by the standards of the time. One favourite fabric was russet, normally a cheap cloth, which he may have liked for its colour. In some cases, he paired it with red squirrel fur from purely red, summer coats, which was a very unusual look. But most of his clothes were conventional ones among the elite. He often wore robes of scarlet, and had more garments lined with vair or gris, including boots, shoes, and gloves, than with lamb. On one occasion, he paired robes of russet given by the abbot of Sempringham26 with ermine. He also used silk, though sparingly, outside his regalia; silk linings appear in several robes, and he had at least some garments made primarily of silk, in one case with a lining of gris. Other even more lux­uri­ous silks appear in the records, most likely for the king’s ordinary use, but pos­sibly as part of the regalia. Overall, the king dressed very well and, aside from his preference for russet and red fur, quite conventionally.27 Compared to the most extravagant descriptions of clothing in romances, the king’s clothing (apart from the regalia) and that of his court may seem disap­ pointing. When one takes into account the costs, however, John, his family members, and the court’s elite dressed lavishly and expensively, especially at great feasts. Anyone who came to royal court would have recognized that the lavish hangings and, for those privileged enough to enter the royal bedcham­ ber, the luxurious bedspreads showed the king’s great wealth. Similarly, anyone who attended a royal feast would have known, from the brightly coloured, well-made sets of robes using expensive woollens, the occasional touches of silk, and the exotic and expensive furs, that King John was a rich and gener­ ous king.

26  For this interpretation of ‘russet de Sempringham,’ see Lachaud, ‘Textiles, Furs and Liveries,’ 184. 27  These two paragraphs draw on Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 94–9.

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60  Power and Pleasure

3.3  Gold and Silver Plate and Jewellery A key part of the equipment of any self-respecting great household in the late Middle Ages and early modern period was its precious plate, and records of John’s reign show that this was already the case in the early thirteenth century.28 Two sources provide an idea of the scope of John’s silver collections. Inventories of plate in the charge of Hugh de Neville in 1207–8 include over 150 pieces weighing nearly 550 lbs, and in 1215, inventories of royal plate accumulated from a variety of stockpiles included over 200 pieces weighing over 500 lbs.29 These inventories and other references to royal plate included cups, bowls, basins, flagons, platters, candlesticks, and saltcellars. Some, like two vessels weighting 20 lbs each, were quite large.30 Gold plate was rarer, but on 1 February 1214, as he prepared to embark on his failed Poitevin campaign, John arranged for the delivery of fifteen gold cups, a bowl, and one saltcellar, and there are references to gold cups weigh­ ing 4 or 5 lbs or even more.31 There is no way of knowing what percentage of John’s total plate inventories and other sources recorded. Though many of the items were plain, some silver items were gilded, and some had designs. Details are generally more tantalizing than informative: a cup of Irish design, a shell-shaped bowl, and one set with rings and stones.32 However, one of the Neville inventories describes a handful of pieces in more detail, includ­ ing a pair of basins with leopards and other images in gold on their bottoms.33 Clearly, at least some of John’s plate had magnificent ornamentation. This likely added to the value and expense; the costs of manufacture could be high for the finest metalwork. For instance, work done on the royal regalia in John’s ninth year was charged at £1 for each pound of gold worked and 18 d for each pound of sil­ ver, or 7.5 per cent of the cost of the metal in the latter case.34 The regalia was a special case, but it is likely that the accumulation of royal plate involved large payments to goldsmiths and silversmiths. John was even more exuberant when it came to jewellery.35 A writ ac­know­ ledg­ing receipt from the Hospitallers of various pieces of jewellery and regalia in spring 1216 included nine great necklaces with many precious stones and a tenth described as having a diamond surrounded by rubies and emeralds.36 Various inventories recorded rings, brooches, and staffs decorated in gems and sometimes 28 Woolgar, Great Household, 177–92. 29  MR 10J 119–25; RLP 144b–150b. 30  RLC 64b. 31  RN 56–7; RLP 77b, 110a; Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 34–5. 32  RLP 146a. 33  MR 10J 121–2. 34  PR9J 50. 35  For medieval jewellery, see Geoffrey Egan and Frances Pritchard, Dress Accessories c. 1150–c. 1450, 2nd ed. (Woodbridge, 2002); Marian Campbell, Medieval Jewellery in Europe, 1100–1500 (London, 2009); Anderlini, Le costume médiéval, 81–95; Diana Scarisbrick, Jewellery in Britain, 1066–1837: A Documentary, Social, Literary and Artistic Survey (Wilby, 1994), 1–63; Ronald  W.  Lightbown, Medieval European Jewellery (London, 1992). Lightbown discusses some of John’s jewellery at pp. 105–6, 222, 307–8, 312. 36  RLP 173a, 174a–b.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  61 covered in them; one staff was embellished with sixty emeralds. These inventories and other sources also include belts of silk or leather with silver or gold buckles, often decorated with gold, silver, intaglios, and the inevitable precious stones. At any given time, John seems to have had hundreds of gemstones set in jewellery, sapphires above all. An inventory of royal jewellery and regalia held by five reli­ gious houses in 1203 reveals the items contained 221 sapphires, 174 emeralds, 101 rubies, 41 garnets, 28 diamonds, 14 turquoises, and smaller numbers of topazes, amethysts, pearls, carnelians, jaspers, peridots, onyxes, and cameos.37 At the end of his reign John left at Devizes Castle 272 rings set with precious stones, some of which must have been huge, given that two rings set with rubies had a combined value of 50 marks.38 Jewellery was not cheap; on one occasion, John fitz Hugh paid £226 13s 4d to two merchants from Piacenza for precious stones and rings.39 Unfortunately, most of the inventories do not contain values, but 111 of the rings at Devizes were valued at just over £927. Extrapolating from these prices, the additional rings could have been worth an additional £774 or more.40 When one adds in the many other pieces of jewellery in John’s various treasuries, it is clear he had invested huge sums of money in jewellery. There are several indications that John loved gemstones for their own sake, not simply as adjuncts to kingship. In December 1203 the king gave a great sapphire and ruby set in gold to Bury St Edmunds, then promptly took them back for his lifetime in return for a yearly grant of 10 marks; apparently he could not bear to give them up.41 Other signs of a passion for gems and jewellery include the king giving a yearly revenue of £1 to a man who had returned some lost jewellery to him; selecting specific jewellery to keep from the estate of Archbishop Hubert Walter; and on at least one occasion giving specific instructions to Reginald of Cornhill about how to set particular stones.42 Sapphires were the most highly val­ ued gemstones in John’s era, but even so, the sheer number of sapphires in John’s jewellery and the number of objects in which they appear suggest he had a par­ ticular preference for that stone.43 Because of archaeological discoveries like Sutton Hoo and because of the importance of treasure hoards in works set in the earliest centuries of the Middle Ages, like Beowulf and the Nibelungenlied, it is easier to see the importance of treasure for the early Middle Ages than for the period discussed here. Yet treasure was very important in John’s era as well. A commonly told story about Richard the Lionheart was that he besieged the castle where he died because he sought to claim recently discovered treasure. Gillingham has shown that this story is deeply 37  RCh 134a–b; RLP 54b–55a, 144b–150b, 173a. 38  Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 35–6. 39  PR13J, 112. 40  Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 32–6. I have estimated conservatively here, using the lower end of the price range in some cases and excluding some stones for which estimates are difficult. 41  RLP 37b; RLCh 114b. 42  PR4J 276; RL 13; RLC 22b, 44a. 43 Lightbown, Medieval European Jewellery, 11, 30.

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62  Power and Pleasure problematic, but fascination with treasure and a penchant for moralizing explains why both medieval writers and modern historians have found it irresistible.44 The popularity of the story of John’s loss of his baggage train at the Wash where, according to Roger of Wendover, he lost treasure, costly vessels, and ‘everything he loved’ also testifies to treasure’s powerful hold on the imagination.45 This loss hardly crippled the royalist cause and many rings and pieces of silk cloth clearly remained in royal castles at John’s death, but the loss of precious items and the emotional blow was too good for Roger to pass up. In thinking about material culture at John’s court, it is important to keep in mind the nearly universal allure of treasure to human beings.

3.4  The Royal Regalia The jewellery, clothes, and insignia in the royal regalia formed a particularly lav­ ish and heavily symbolic portion of John’s treasures. Aside from items such as crowns and sceptres that were ipso facto part of the regalia, it is not always pos­ sible to tell which items were included, but ‘regale’ and related terms probably had a technical meaning, and enough references to specific objects as part of the rega­ lia survive to build up a picture of it.46 John had several crowns, including one from Cyprus (no doubt plundered by Richard); one from Germany (perhaps inherited from the Empress Matilda or given by John’s nephew, Otto); one or more made for one of John’s coronations; and one made late in the reign by the goldsmith Henry of St Helena.47 He had two sceptres for which records survive, both with gold staffs; one topped with a dove, the other with a cross.48 The regalia included at least two swords, one of them supposedly owned by the legendary Tristan. Associated with the swords were a scabbard of gilded silver, a sword belt decorated with gemstones and gold trim, and golden spurs.49 As with his regular jewellery, John invested heavily in his crowns and other items in the regalia; 65 lbs of gold and 86 lbs of silver were used to make crowns and other ornaments for  one of John’s crownings, and later payments of 253 marks, 230 marks, and 100 marks were made to Henry of St Helena and his relatives for purchasing gold and stones to make John the crown noted above.50 Little is known of the queen’s 44 Gillingham, Richard I, 325–31. See also Jean Flori, Richard the Lionheart (Westport, CT, 2007), 202–15. 45  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:195. 46 For a discussion of regalia in the period, though not including clothing, see Johanna Dale, Inauguration and Liturgical Kingship in the Long Twelfth Century: Male and Female Accession Rituals in England, France and the Empire (York, 2019), 78–87. 47  PR9J xi–xii, 50; PR14J 16, 43, 49; Misae 14J 232; 14J RLC 125b–126a; 6J RLP 51b, 77b, 110a, 173a; 5J RLCh 134a–b. 48  RLP 77b, 173a. 49  RLP 51b, 77b. 50  PR9J xi–xii, 50; PR14J 43, 49; 14J RLC 125b–126a; Misae 14J 232.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  63 regalia, though the reference to a great ‘regale’ of the Empress Matilda shows that regalia existed for women. One of Queen Isabella’s seals shows her holding a ­sceptre with a cross and a bird on it.51 Not surprisingly, the garments that were explicitly part of John’s regalia were even richer than his other luxurious garments.52 One three-piece set of robes consisted of a tunic of white diasper silk, a dalmatic of ruby samite fringed with gold work and set with stones, and a cloak of the same fabric and border, dec­or­ ated with sapphires, pearls, and cameos, and fastened with one of the king’s mag­ nificent brooches. Another set of robes was made of purple silk. The regalia also included silk footwear, silk hose, and white gloves with gems on them. Unlike John’s ordinary clothing, the regalian clothes were made overwhelmingly of silk, and would have appeared quite distinctive compared to his other clothing and that of his secular courtiers. Strikingly, terms for ecclesiastical vestments such as sandalia and dalmatic, as well as pallium (used both for secular and ecclesiastical garments), were applied to these garments. Indeed, the descriptions of garments in the regalia resemble contemporary descriptions of vestments more than those of secular clothes, though no one would confuse a king bearing his crown, ­sceptre, and sword with a churchman.53 Overall, the king in his regalia would have stood apart from (and symbolically above) all his followers, secular and ecclesiastical, a point to which I will return. Unfortunately, no record survives of similar garments for the queen, but the expenditure of just under £75 to purchase robes for the king’s second coronation, which included the coronation of the queen, suggests she probably had them and that they were quite costly.54 Were John’s regalian garments as magnificent as the gloves of Frederick II or the famous cloak and other garments from the Norman kings of Sicily that still survive?55 We cannot know, but there is no doubt that the garments, crowns, sceptres, and other objects in his regalia were extraordinary treasures.

3.5  The Uses of Luxury Goods Why did John invest so much in luxury goods when his wars taxed his resources to politically dangerous levels? I will begin with two very specific practical uses of luxury goods in John’s reign, only the first of which would be considered useful by 51  RLP 142a; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_of_Angoul%C3%AAme. 52  RLP 35a, 54b–55a, 77b, 173a; RLCh 134a–b; Leopold G. Wickam Legg, ed., English Coronation Records (Westminster, 1901), 54–5. 53  For vestments, see Maureen Miller, Clothing the Clergy: Virtue and Power in Medieval Europe, c. 800–1200 (Ithaca, NY, 2014); Thomas, Secular Clergy, 309–10. 54  RL 4–5. Henry II spent a large sum on clothes for his daughter Joan for her marriage to the king of Sicily; PR22 Henry II, 12. 55 For images of these, see http://www.kaiserliche-schatzkammer.at/en/visit/collections/seculartreasury/selected-masterpieces.

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64  Power and Pleasure modern standards. An advantage of plate was that its owners could turn it into cash or use it in lieu of money, though when it was melted down the costs of manufacture were lost. On 1 May 1216, as he prepared for the invasion of Philip II’s son, Louis, John sent out commands to have plate turned into silver pennies, and on 9 June he commanded Hubert de Burgh to use plate to pay knights and ­sergeants fighting with him at Dover.56 In a pinch, other luxury goods could be used that way. William Marshal, regent for John’s young son, Henry, used most of the rings left at Devizes at John’s death to pay royalist soldiers garrisoned at Dover, Windsor, and Devizes, as well as knights and sergeants in the bands of various foreign captains. More surprisingly, though some of the silk cloths at Corfe were used for the king’s burial, William Marshal used the vast majority to provide gifts for or pay the money fiefs (often in arrears) of continental knights and nobles who had come to support John.57 These luxury items were an investment that could eventually be used as money, while paying cultural returns in the mean­ time. In the weeks following Magna Carta, John ordered a number of monasteries to send him the royal jewellery, plate, and other treasures stored there. These summons may have been designed not only to protect the treasures from the ­possibility of baronial seizure, but also to marshal resources against the possibility of war.58 The other supposedly practical use of luxury items, specifically gems, particu­ larly carved ones, derived from beliefs about their magical or quasi-magical qualities. Adam of Eynsham recorded a story from John’s meeting, shortly after Richard I’s death, with Hugh of Avalon, bishop of Lincoln, in which John showed him a stone set in gold and said that it had been given to one of his ancestors with the divine promise that any successor who possessed it would lose none of their lands. Hugh suggested that he should have trust in God rather than a stone, and the story was designed to condemn the king’s impiety and foreshadow the loss of Normandy, Anjou, and Maine.59 While a modern audience might see John as foolishly superstitious, belief in the efficacy of gems was perfectly respectable at the time, even if few would have placed as much faith in a specific one as John allegedly did.60 John’s first wife inherited an antique intaglio from her father, William, earl of Gloucester, which depicted an eagle between two standards; she used it as a counterseal, accompanied by the inscription ‘I am the eagle, guardian of my lady.’ This suggests she believed the antique gemstone provided protection 56  RLC 267a, 274b–275a. 57  Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 32–6. 58  RLP 144b–150b. 59  Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:139–40. 60  Joan Evans, Magical Jewels of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, Particularly in England (Oxford, 1922); Paul Studer and Joan Evans, eds., Anglo-Norman Lapidaries (Paris, 1924); Lightbown, Medieval European Jewellery, 96–100, 206; Nicholas Vincent, ‘The Great Lost Library of England’s Medieval Kings? Royal Users and Ownership of Books, 1066–1272,’ in Kathleen Doyle and Scot McKendrick, eds., 1000 Years of Royal Books and Manuscripts (London, 2013), at 81; Roberta Gilchrist, Medieval Life: Archaeology and the Life Course (Woodbridge, 2012), 246–7; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 240–1.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  65 of some sort, and shows the presence of gemstone lore in John’s circle.61 John’s preference for sapphires may also have stemmed partly from teachings on gem­ stones, for the learned Bishop Marbod of Rennes wrote in his influential lapidary that sapphires were fitting for kings and protected against a variety of physical ailments.62 John put most of his faith in money and military power, but his invest­ ment in gemstones probably depended partly on belief in their powers.

3.6  Lavish Display and Royal Authority It is by now a scholarly commonplace that displays of wealth and luxury could project royal authority and thus undergird the king’s power.63 Medieval people were equally aware of this phenomenon. William fitz Stephen’s description of the lavish goods Henry II sent with Thomas Becket when the latter journeyed to Paris to negotiate a royal wedding shows Henry’s cognizance of the importance of such display. It seems to have paid off, for William reports that the French remarked, ‘how remarkable this king of the English is, whose chancellor proceeds him thusly.’64 When English chroniclers wanted to show Richard I’s magnificence at a feast in Sicily during the Third Crusade, they zeroed in on his plate, all made of precious metals and beautifully decorated.65 One striking aspect of display at King John’s court is that it was not just nobles and powerful knights who received sets of robes made from expensive textiles. Two laundresses and a nurse, all in the queen’s household, received robes made of six or seven ells of paonaz and viride lined with rabbit fur.66 Similarly, a group of huntsmen received robes of viride and bles (perhaps a blue fabric), and a group of eight falconers received full robes of rabbit-lined paonaz.67 Some of these fabrics were also worn by members of the royal family. The gifts may sug­ gest how valued the services provided by these figures were, even the laundresses, who may have been treated as experts dealing with precious fabrics, setting them apart from more typically menial washerwomen. More important, the strikingly 61 Before becoming king, John also had an intaglio as a counterseal; Robert  B.  Patterson, ed., Earldom of Gloucester Charters: The Charters and Scribes of the Earls and Countesses of Gloucester to a.d. 1217 (Oxford, 1973), 24–5, plates XXXI–XXXII. 62 Campbell, Medieval Jewellery, 33. 63  For example, Robin Fleming, ‘Acquiring, Flaunting and Destroying Silk in Late Anglo-Saxon England,’ Early Medieval Europe 15 (2007), 127–58, at 157–8; Timothy Reuter, ‘ “You Can’t Take It with You”: Testaments, Hoards and Moveable Wealth in Europe, 600–1100,’ in Elizabeh  M.  Tyler, ed., Treasure in the Medieval West (York, 2000), 11–24, at 16. Schröder ably demonstrates how Henry II used textiles to project a positive image of royal lordship; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 206–10. 64  James Craigie Robertson and J.  B.  Sheppard, eds., Materials for the History of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, 7 vols. (London, 1875–85), 3:29–33. 65 Ambroise, The History of the Holy War: Ambroise’s Estoire de la guerre sainte, ed. Marianne Ailes and Malcolm Barber, 2 vols. (Woodbridge, 2003), 18; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 172–3. 66  RLC 109a, 184b. 67  RLC 97a–b; PR14J 91.

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66  Power and Pleasure colourful and remarkably high-status clothing would have made them stand out and drawn attention to the wealth and standing of the royal court. Though Frédérique Lachaud has demonstrated that livery as a kind of uniform, revealing allegiance to a lord through the wearing of his colours, was a later development, she shows it had antecedents in John’s era and before.68 The unified appearance of groups of huntsmen and falconers noted above was an example of these ante­ cedents and may have been common at John’s court, creating a vivid spectacle of different units in the court in different colours but all showing their membership in John’s retinue.69 As Lachaud notes, one of the purposes of livery was to enhance a lord’s status, and it is likely that John’s aim in dressing his huntsmen, falconers, and even laundresses so well was to show what a great and generous lord he was. Common in peacetime, luxurious display was even more important in war. Ralph of Coggeshall wrote that when King John sailed to Poitou in 1214 to try to reconquer his continental lands, he took with him an inestimable treasure of gold, silver, and precious stones.70 The royal records confirm this. In addition to the gold plate noted earlier, on 1 February 1214 John sent for 40,000 marks, a gold crown, and two chests containing gold and jewellery. Other documents from the campaign refer to two chests of jewels, some of the king’s luxurious belts, and sil­ ver plate.71 No doubt much of this was meant for gifts and payments, but it is also likely that John hoped that displaying his great wealth would help convince Poitevin, Angevin, and other nobles to return to his allegiance. In the end, many of his treasures fell into French hands, or so William the Breton claimed, when John fled from an army led by Philip II’s son, Louis. According to William, the French seized gold cups, silver plate, glittering garments, ornaments, and a lux­ uri­ous tent, thus transferring any status they provided from the English to the French, with the additional prestige of having been seized in war.72 William’s par­ tisan boasts must be taken with a grain of salt, but there is no doubt that lux­uri­ ous goods were seen not as a frivolous distraction from war, but as an adjunct to it. Wars had to be fought in style, and luxury enhanced rather than detracted from military success.

68  Lachaud, ‘Liveries of Robes,’ 279–98. See also Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 224–5; Church, King John, 85. 69  For a similar phenomenon at the court of Henry III, see Wild, ‘Truly Royal Retinue,’ 136, 138. 70 Ralph of Coggeshall, Radulphi de Coggeshall Chronicon Anglicanum, ed. Joseph Stevenson (London, 1875), 168. 71  RLC 163a; RLP 110a, 112a, 119a. 72  Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ in H.-F. Delaborde, ed., Oeuvres de Rigord et de Guillaume le Breton, vol. 2 (Paris, 1885), 1–385, at 293.

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3.7  Luxury and the Reinforcement of Hierarchy Many scholars have stressed the way in which livery in particular and clothing more generally was used to display and thereby reinforce status differences in the Middle Ages. In the late Middle Ages sumptuary laws came on the scene, but as Lachaud has shown, the use of clothing to mark hierarchy existed long before them.73 Despite the relatively luxurious robes given to less important figures in the household, clothing at John’s court was very hierarchical.74 I have already noted the ways in which higher-ranking people tended to get more expensive fab­ rics and furs. In many cases only the value of clothing given to followers or guests was recorded, but these figures themselves reveal a hierarchy of payments, from 5s for tunics for fewterers to 30s for robes for ordinary chaplains, to the sums between 56s and 71s 8d cited earlier for scarlet robes for important guests at court. In part, the costs differed because the fabrics differed. The design of clothes could also distinguish rank. The king’s officials sometimes bought panels of fur of different lengths; on one occasion Reginald of Cornhill purchased a panel with thirteen rows of vair for the queen, and two panels each of ten and eleven rows for unnamed but clearly high-status members of her household. Almost certainly the panels were for robes of different length, suggesting that even a garment’s length showed status difference.75 Less information survives about jewellery or plate and hierarchy, but at feasts, gold and silver would have been reserved for the most important people while everyone else would have used the less expensive dishes, probably ceramic but possibly wooden, that the royal household purchased in bulk.76 For anyone who attended the court, especially on important occasions, there would have been no doubt who were the most powerful and highestranking members. 73 Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Dress and Social Status in England Before the Sumptuary Laws,’ in Peter  R.  Coss and Maurice Keen, eds., Heraldry, Pageantry and Social Display in Medieval England (Woodbridge, 2002), 105–23. For livery and hierarchy, see Françoise Piponnier, Costume et vie sociale: La cour d’Anjou, XIVe–XVe siècles (Paris, 1970), 195–230; Lachaud, ‘Liveries of Robes,’ 289–92; Crane, Performance of Self, 6–7; Wild, ‘The Empress’s New Clothes,’ 12–16. For clothing more generally, see Delort, Le commerce des fourrures, 1:522–60; Raymond van Uyten, ‘Showing Off One’s Rank in the Middle Ages,’ in Wim Blockmans and Antheun Janse, eds., Showing Status: Representation of Social Positions in the Late Middle Ages (Turnhout, 1999), 19–34; Reuter, ‘Nobles and Others,’ 118; Monica L. Wright, Weaving Narrative: Clothing in Twelfth-Century French Romance (University Park, PA, 2009), 20–1. 74  For a fuller discussion and references, see Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 93–4. 75  RLC 103b, 104a. 76  PR7J xxxviii, 160; PR12J xxxiv–xxxv, 62, 121; PR13J xxi–xxii, 109; RLC 157b, 259b. There is some indication that higher-quality ceramics could be used at elite tables; Ben Jervis, Pottery and Social Life in Medieval England: Towards a Relational Approach (Oxford, 2014), 98–103. Nonetheless, the surviv­ ing ceramics from royal sites in the period were not especially rare, exotic, or fine; Rahtz, Excavations at King John’s Hunting Lodge, 91–111; James and Robinson, Clarendon Palace, 169–76; Ellis, ed., Ludgershall Castle, 181–200; Poulton, ed., Medieval Royal Complex at Guildford, 43–60.

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3.8  The Regalia and the Special Status of the King and Queen Coronations were crucial in establishing and displaying the legitimacy of ­monarchs, and crowns, sceptres, and other parts of the regalia clearly distinguished kings and queens from their subjects. Unfortunately, the descriptions of John’s ducal inauguration, first coronation, and second, with his wife, are so brief that they provide little room for analysis.77 However, the coronation ordo, or outline of the liturgical aspects of the coronation, current in John’s day does show the deep symbolic importance with which some parts of the regalia were invested. The sword, sceptre, and staff were all described in the ordo as signs of the king’s duty to discipline wrongdoers and provide justice, and the stones set in the crowns of both king and queen were linked to the virtues monarchs were sup­ posed to have.78 Such thinking was not limited to the coronation ordo; for instance, Ralph Niger, in his De Re Militari et Triplici Via Peregrinationis Ierosolimitane, written in the context of the Third Crusade, provided a detailed study of the symbolism of royal regalia.79 Such passages, in turn, were part of a wider tendency to allegorize gems and jewellery, as with so many other things in medieval life.80 In such a context, the items in the regalia were not simply visual props, but spurs to thinking about kingship and its significance. Nor did the regalia appear only at the beginning of a reign, for coronations occurred at other times, increasing the impact of the regalia. Indeed, as Johanna Dale has shown in a recent book, since anointing was the key moment that made the king a king, consecration is probably a better term than coronation for the inauguration ceremonies of kings, though one that is unlikely to take hold.81 Roger of Wendover describes three occasions after John’s initial coronation and his dual coronation with Queen Isabella in which he wore the crown at Easter or Christmas, and on two occasions the archbishop of Canterbury placed the crown on him and (in one instance) Isabella.82 Other chronicles mention some of these occasions, and the Margam Chronicle adds one as well. All were very early in his

77  Typical of the brief descriptions of John’s coronation at Westminster are Gervase of Canterbury, The Historical Works of Gervase of Canterbury, ed. William Stubbs, 2 vols. (London, 1879–80), 2:92; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:287–8. For the ducal ceremony, see Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:144. 78  Wickam Legg, ed., English Coronation Records, 34–8. 79  Ralph Niger, De Re Militari et Triplici Via Peregrinationis Ierosolimitane (1187/88), ed. Ludwig Schmugge (Berlin, 1977), 132–40. 80  See, for instance, a letter of Innocent III to Richard I giving him four rings with four gems and discussing the virtues linked to these gems, or a letter of John of Salisbury to his brother, thanking him for a gold ring with a sapphire and discussing the symbolism of the gold and the gemstone; C.  R.  Cheney and W.  H.  Semple, eds., Selected Letters of Pope Innocent III Concerning England (1198–1216) (London, 1953), 1–2; John of Salisbury, The Letters of John of Salisbury, ed. W. J. Millor, H. E. Butler, and C. N. L. Brooke, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1979–86), 1:36–41. 81 Dale, Inauguration and Liturgical Kingship, 136–41. 82  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:287–8, 301–2, 311, 316.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  69 reign; the last was Easter 1202.83 However, it is possible that coronations ­con­tinued later in his reign. In the Norman period, and possibly the late AngloSaxon era as well, English kings adopted a widespread practice of being crowned on the three feast days of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, a practice described as crown-wearings rather than coronations by modern scholars.84 Most scholars have concluded—on the basis of good but not irrefutable evidence—that English kings abandoned this as a regular practice perhaps as early as the second decade of Henry I’s reign.85 It is at least possible that John revived this practice, but even if this is not the case, John certainly used his regalia throughout the reign, although we cannot know precisely how. He ordered regalia to be sent to him in the weeks before two Christmas feasts, in 1204 and again in 1207, and on other occasions as well.86 As noted earlier, he had new crowns made later in the reign.87 John’s crowns, sceptres, and other pieces of regalia clearly continued to reinforce his kingship long after his inaugural coronation. In addition to personal appearances, John, like other rulers, had a traditional means of disseminating an iconic image of himself with his regalia: the royal seal. On the obverse of the seal, John is seated on a throne, wearing his crown, and holding a sword and a sceptre mounted on an orb (see Figure  3.1).88 As noted earlier, the seal of the queen also shows her with regalia. The king’s seal would have been widely disseminated among the political elites who often obtained royal charters, and they would have been reminded of his authority any time they consulted one. It is also possible that some clothing associated with the regalia was used even when crowns and sceptres were not. One chronicle described Richard I elab­or­ ate­ly outfitted in Limassol, Cyprus in a silk tunic and cloak, highly decorated with embroidery and gold edging, and an elaborate sword belt and scabbard. The 83 Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:172; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:160; Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 2:93, 410; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 1:25. 84  H. E. J. Cowdrey, ‘The Anglo-Norman “Laudes regiae”,’ Viator 12 (1981), 37–78; Michael Hare, ‘Kings, Crowns and Festivals: The Origins of Gloucester as a Royal Ceremonial Centre,’ Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society 115 (1997), 41–78. 85 Judith A. Green, The Government of England under Henry I (Cambridge, 1986), 21; Gillingham, Richard I, 271–7; David Carpenter, The Struggle for Mastery (London, 2003), 294; John Robert Maddicott, The Origins of the English Parliament, 924–1327 (Oxford, 2010), 68–72. Richardson and Turner, however, argue that Henry II did not give up the practice; H. G. Richardson, ‘The Coronation in Medieval England: The Evolution of the Office and Oath,’ Traditio 16 (1960), 111–202, at 126–7, 129; Turner, Eleanor of Aquitaine, 156. 86  RLP 48a–b, 54b–55a, 77b, 110a, 142a; PR3J 259; PR6J 120; RLC 122b. 87  PR9J xi–xii, 50; PR13J 107; PR14J 43–4, 49; Misae 14J 232; RLC 125b–126a. The regular perfor­ mance of the Laudes Regiae, which I will discuss in subsequent chapters, would support the possibility of regular crown-wearings on the great feast days. 88  The basic imagery of the obverse of John’s seal went back to that of Edward the Confessor, for which see Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, ‘The King Enthroned, a New Theme in Anglo-Saxon Royal Iconography: The Seal of Edward the Confessor and Its Political Implications,’ in Form and Order in Medieval France: Studies in Social and Quantitative Sigillography (Aldershot, 1993), IV 53–88. For the importance of seals in reinforcing the religious status of kings, see Dale, Inauguration and Liturgical Kingship, 191–214. For the reverse side of the seal, see Chapter 4, 91—92.

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Figure 3.1  Obverse of King John’s seal. Reproduced by permission of the Provost and Fellows of Eton College.

description says he was dressed regale, which may refer specifically to wearing part of the regalia.89 Although we tend to focus on royal insignia such as crowns, sceptres, and swords or lances of office, clothing was also important. The Siete Partidas, a law code commissioned by Alfonso X of Castile in the middle of the thirteenth century, proclaimed that ‘The ancient sages established the rule that kings should wear garments of silk, adorned with gold and jewels, in order that men might know them as soon as they saw them, without enquiring for them . . . .’90 This would not apply to the ruler’s ordinary woollen dress either in England or Castile, but clearly special clothing marked kings out on particularly important occasions, and its similarity to ecclesiastical vestments signalled the monarchs’ continuing claim to a sacral status paralleling that of high church officials. Together, the clothing and the insignia made the regalia an important tool of royal power.

89  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 197–8. 90  As quoted in Maria Judith Feliciano, ‘Muslim Shrouds for Christian Kings? A Reassessment of Andalusi Textiles in Thirteenth-Century Castilian Life and Ritual,’ in Cynthia Robinson and Leyla Rouhi, eds., Under the Influence: Questioning the Comparative in Medieval Castile (Leiden, 2004), 101–31, at 117. See also Etelvina Fernández González, ‘ “Que los reyes vestiessen paños de seda, con oro, e con piedras presiosas”. Indumentarias ricas in los reinos León y Castillla (1180–1300): entre la tradición islámica y el Occidente cristiano,’ in Simposio Internacional El legado de al-Andalus. El arte andalusí en los reinos de León y Castilla durante la Edad Media (Valladolid, 2007), 367–408, at 368.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  71

3.9  Giving Robes and Other Luxury Items Royal generosity and gift exchange are major themes throughout this book, and luxury items like cups and jewels were common gifts at royal court. John fre­ quently made individual gifts of plate and jewellery, and occasionally distributed jewellery and belts more widely, including at least once on New Year’s Day, a trad­ ition­al day for gift-giving.91 Above all, the giving of robes at feasts by kings (and other great men) was one of the most important practices of lordship in the period. A well-known passage in the poem of William Marshal describes that great noble, on his deathbed, chastising a cleric for suggesting that he sell the scarlet robes lined with squirrel intended for his knights so he could give alms for his soul, and vehemently emphasizing the importance of carrying out the distri­ bution.92 So culturally significant was the tradition that Roger of Wendover occa­ sionally noted John’s distribution of robes at feasts in his chronicles, even though it was clearly routine.93 As the Anonymous of Béthune’s rare burst of praise for John’s granting of robes indicates, John was noted for his generosity in this practice.94 Who benefited from John’s largesse? Unfortunately, no adequate record of recipients of robes at any of the great feasts has survived. As we have seen, groups of falconers and huntsmen received robes, and this likely happened at feasts. Two records refer to robes purchased for the king’s knights and, in one case, sergeants for Easter and Pentecost feasts, showing that the military figures in the king’s household received them, as one would expect.95 The king’s clergy also received robes.96 The accounts of William Scissor, the king’s main tailor late in his reign, as well as other sources, reveal gifts of clothing to great nobles and favoured royal servants, including Earls Aubrey de Vere and William Longsword, and important officials like Hugh de Neville, Brian de Lisle, Robert of Turnham, and Henry fitz Count. Both earls received sets of robes linked in the accounts with robes made for the king, with de Vere’s gift also linked to the queen. This suggests matching sets of robes, which would have increased the honour paid to the earls and sig­ nalled their closeness to the king.97 The specific times of the year when many of these were made indicate they were for great feasts. Fuller evidence would prob­ ably provide a more complex picture, but what does survive shows that John dis­ tributed robes at feasts to the valued members of his household and to close supporters.

91  PR14J 45; RLC 128a. 92  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:436–9. See also David Crouch, The English Aristocracy, 1070–1272: A Social Transformation (New Haven, CT, 2011), 52–3. 93  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:311, 2:44, 97. 94  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 105. 95  RLC 27b; PR10J 97. 96  PR10J 116. 97  Misae 14J 240, 260; RL 102; PR8J 47.

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72  Power and Pleasure John also gave robes and gifts of plate and other luxury items at other times. Not surprisingly, John also favoured close followers or their kin on these occa­ sions. For instance, John presented a valuable piece of plate to one of his stewards, Peter of Stokes, and a silver cup to a favourite, Peter de Maulay, for the use of Peter’s mother.98 In addition, he gave robes and other gifts to powerful figures from more remote parts of his realms. Only loosely tied to the royal court, these men included Irish kings and other ‘fideles’ in Ireland; Madog ap Gruffydd, prince of half of Powys and at times an ally of John; and the mayor of Queen Isabella’s comital town of Angoulême.99 The king sometimes granted clothing to the chil­ dren or young relatives of powerful men, including Wilekin de Cantilupe, a mem­ ber of a family of royal favourites, and Elias de Pontibus, relative of a seneschal of Poitou.100 A final category of followers who received robes or plate were foreign knights who entered the king’s service, including Hugh de Boves, the great mer­ cenary captain; Walter de Baillolet, a Flemish knight; and Gosewin le Born, who held a money fief from the king.101 John clearly used gifts of luxury items to nour­ ish his relations with the diverse followers he needed to hold together his dis­par­ ate realms and to recover lands lost to Philip Augustus. One gift is particularly striking: a few days before the issuing of Magna Carta, John ordered that Walter de Beauchamp, one of the rebel barons, be given three luxurious silk cloths to augment his robes. This unusually rich gift of textiles may have been a futile attempt to lure Walter to the king’s side.102 John also used gifts to foster diplomacy, as had his father, Henry II, and as was no doubt common in the period.103 He gave gifts to envoys of foreign rulers, including the pope; John’s nephews, the Emperor Otto and Henry, Count Palatinate of the Rhine (but generally called duke of Saxony in the English sources); the king of Norway; the count of Flanders; and El-Adil, the brother of Saladin. Most, like wandering knights in romances, received robes from their royal host, but two received precious cups.104 More important, of course, were the gifts provided, either through envoys or in person, to the rulers themselves. Ralph of Coggeshall described how John rode to meet Ferrand, count of Flanders, and showered him with gold, silver, and precious stones, in the run-up to John’s great continental campaign of 1214.105 The royal records reveal gifts, mostly plate and jewellery, to the pope, Emperor Otto and Count (or Duke) Henry, the king of Norway, the duke of Limburg, and the count of Holland. These gifts were valuable and some must have been beautifully decorated; for instance, Henry received four gilded cups worth £25, and the duke of Limburg received a gilded cup weighing 98  RL 272; RLC 175a. 99  PR12J 149; RLC 186b; Misae 14J 267. 100  Misae 14J 237–8, 245, 261; RLP 85b. For Renaud de Pontibus as seneschal, see Vincent, ‘Jean sans Terre et la origine de la Gascogne Anglaise,’ 555. 101  Misae 14J 267; RLC 95a, 128a. 102  RLC 214a. 103 Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 180–98. 104  PR9J xvi–xvii, 30; PR13J 107; RLC 123a, 159b, 226a, 231a. 105  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 168.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  73 6 marks (4 lbs) but with workmanship that cost an additional 3 marks. These gifts were relatively trivial for such wealthy men, but they also provided honour and status. Otto, writing to share news with his uncle, expressed deep gratitude for a selection of plate, rings, and belts; though he described them as ‘ludicri,’ perhaps best translated as ‘playthings,’ he emphasized the distinction they conferred upon him.106 The importance of the pope’s goodwill to John is obvious, and excepting the king of Norway, all the secular notables listed here were part of John’s alliance against Philip Augustus. Though relatively unimportant materially, in psy­cho­ logic­al terms, these gifts were crucial. The records reveal less about the gifts John received, but he must have been a frequent recipient of luxury items, particularly from other rulers. In his writ ordering that a set of gifts be gathered for the king of Norway, John explicitly stated that they should be sufficiently worthy to be honourably sent to a king who had himself sent many jewels.107 With subjects there was less expectation of reci­ procity, but John also received gifts from them. Items given as part of various financial proffers were gifts of a sort, and though proffers of jewellery were rare, the bishop of Bath did offer a ruby ring and the royal official Warin fitz Gerold a ruby worth 20 marks.108 Among the inventories of plate in the custody of Hugh de Neville was a group of silver items given by the citizens of London to the king, and other gifts from subjects can be found as well.109 Stephen Church has pointed out that such gifts were a good way to win the king’s favour; indeed, in 1211 the monks of Bury St Edmunds secured a promise of free election from John partly by offering him a number of gold and silver ornaments.110 The lines between bribes, salary, and gifts were often blurred, which made the culture of gift-giving even more important in helping to create links between John, his subjects, and his fellow rulers.111

3.10  Was Luxury Politically Dangerous? In Chapter 2, I argued that John’s love of hunting, an activity normally associated with power and military prowess, could be used against him by his enemies. One might expect this to be true for his love of luxury as well. After all, ecclesiastical 106  PR13J 107; Misae 14J 256; RLC 126b, 168a, 231; RLCh 133b; Cazel, ed., Roll of Divers Accounts, 35. 107  RLC 168a. 108  ROF 15, 389. 109  RLCh 134b; John Thorpe, ed., Registrum Roffense (London, 1769), 122. 110 Church, King John, 132; Rodney M. Thomson, ed., Chronicle of the Election of Hugh, Abbot of Bury St. Edmunds and Later Bishop of Ely (Oxford, 1974), 4–5. 111  For the blurring of these lines and their relationship with questions of honour and morality, see Knut Görich, ‘Geld und “Honor”. Friedrich Barbarossa in der Italien,’ in Gerd Althoff, ed., Vorträge und Forschungen: Formen und Funktionen öffentlicher Kommunikation im Mittelalter (Stuttgart, 2001), 177–200; Knut Görich, ‘Geld und Ehre: Friedrich Barbarossa,’ in Klaus Grubmüller and Markus Stock, eds., Geld im Mittelalter: Wahrnehmung—Bewertung—Symbolik (Darmstadt, 2005), 113–34.

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74  Power and Pleasure condemnation of fine clothes and luxurious living was widespread during the Middle Ages. Much of this was directed against women, so powerful men were insulated to some degree.112 Nonetheless, men were also criticized, as when a par­ tisan of Richard I, in condemning the French on the Third Crusade for not suffi­ ciently supporting Richard, attacked their luxurious, fashionable clothing.113 Sometimes these criticisms focused on royal courts. Orderic Vitalis’s attack on clothing at William Rufus’s court is famous, but closer to John’s time were the criticisms of John of Salisbury about clothing and the love of precious ornaments, perhaps inspired by Henry II’s court.114 Schröder has argued that there was a fair amount of ambivalence at Henry’s court about extravagant clothing, with praise for the king when he sometimes wore simple clothing.115 The luxury described in this chapter therefore seems an obvious target for John’s critics. Nonetheless, one finds little if any such criticism. One possibility is that this absence of criticism is a trick of the evidence. The court critics of Henry II’s reign were mostly no longer writing in John’s reign, and religious moralists had other, more pressing complaints about the king, above all his conflict with Pope Innocent III over the election of the archbishop of Canterbury. Hunting drew criticism for specific reasons: it was linked with forest law, a particularly unpopular aspect of Angevin royal government, and John’s lack of participation in tournaments had no parallel in the realm of luxury goods that could be used against him. Like his father, John sometimes dressed plainly and in a utilitarian fashion.116 Moreover, many of John’s baronial opponents themselves valued luxury, and many benefited at times from the king’s generosity. Nonetheless, aversion to hypocrisy has rarely stopped political figures from attacking their enemies and given the amount of criticism of John in the sources, it is remarkable that his enemies neglected this potential weapon. One tentative answer to this puzzle may be that even the religious thought that royal courts should be a place of magnificence. In 1125, when a number of German bishops summoned the missionary bishop, Otto of Bamberg, to elect the next king of Germany, they urged Otto to come in the ‘courtly fashion of princes of old.’ The election of a king apparently required that even a saintly bishop display a certain level of ­splendour.117 Kings themselves were not just allowed but expected to display magnificence, an attitude that may have increased during the thirteenth century. Later in the century, Matthew Paris lamented that in 1248, the financially strapped Henry III had all his precious plate and jewellery disassembled and melted down

112  E.  Jane Burns, Courtly Love Undressed: Reading through Clothes in Medieval French Culture (Philadelphia, PA, 2002), 37–44, 149–52. 113  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 330–1. 114 Orderic Vitalis, The Ecclesiastical History of Orderic Vitalis, ed. Marjorie Chibnall, 6 vols. (Oxford, 1969–80), 4:186–9; John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:12, 158–9, 313–14. 115 Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 29–41. 116  Thomas, ‘Clothing and Textiles,’ 96. 117  Klaus Nass, ed., Codex Udalrici, 2 vols. (Wiesbaden, 2017), 2:601–2.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  75 for bullion, ignoring the value of the workmanship, and he criticized the king for not giving away the usual robes to his knights in 1251, comparing him ­unfavourably to his predecessors.118 In this passage, Matthew, otherwise one of John’s harshest critics, implicitly praised his generosity. The silence of the critics suggests that in creating a magnificent court, John was acting in proper royal fashion. That said, in one respect John’s expenditures on luxury items represented a danger. His relentless quest for money was the most important single factor in prompting the barons’ revolt. War drove most of this demand, but the ex­pend­ iture on clothing, plate, and jewellery (not originally intended to be spent on war, even if it sometimes was) was still significant and only added to the king’s need for money and the resulting political stresses.

3.11  Luxury and Pleasure Scholars who study textiles have been more alert than many to the historical importance of pleasure. Thus Sarah-Grace Heller, in her exploration of fashion in medieval France, includes the positive valuation of pleasure and seduction (in both a broad and a more narrowly sexual sense) as one of ten points in evaluating whether a system of fashion existed in a specific historical period. As she notes, ‘joias,’ the vernacular term for jewels, conveys the delight taken in them.119 Certainly the moral critics of elaborate clothing and other luxury items associated them with worldly pleasures—that, of course, was precisely the problem. As with hunting, however, the exact sources of pleasure derived from clothing, plate, and jewellery must be teased out, often through inference. Again like hunting, the sta­ tus, prestige, and power associated with luxury goods must often have been a source of pleasure in itself. Gift-giving had many practical and political functions, but the giving and receiving of valuable presents could also have been a source of delight. As so often, power, status, and pleasure were intertwined. What of aesthetic pleasure? Even here, issues of power and status can be involved. Pierre Bourdieu, in a classic work of sociology, made clear how much taste and aesthetic choices are influenced by issues of class, status, and aspiration. Though the details of this process would have been radically different in John’s time, it is likely that in such a stratified society similar processes would have been at work.120 No doubt individuals at John’s court sometimes pretended to aesthetic 118  Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, ed. Henry Richards Luard, 7 vols. (London, 1872–83), 5:21–2. Matthew’s claims receive some corroboration from the royal records: Lars Kjær, ‘Matthew Paris and the Royal Christmas: Ritualised Communication in Text and Practice,’ Thirteenth-Century England 14 (2013), 141–54, at 152. 119 Heller, Fashion in Medieval France, 9, 38–42, 73. 120 Bourdieu, Distinction. See also Crane, Performance of Self, 7.

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76  Power and Pleasure views they did not genuinely possess to match high-status norms. More ­commonly, expectations about what aristocrats were supposed to like would have shaped their tastes. Nonetheless, many factors other than class and status go into aesthetic choices, and those shaped by sociological factors can be perfectly ­genuine. In the 1960s, when Elspeth Veale wrote her definitive study of the English medieval fur trade, fur was still very much associated with status, as it had been in the Middle Ages. However, she emphasized an aesthetic response that she clearly shared: ‘Furs are soft and of subtle colours, with a lustre and beauty ­nothing can match, and medieval men and women took particular p ­ leasure in them, not hesitating to apply to them epithets like “delicate,” “delightful,” or “beautiful”.’121 Can one find evidence of appreciation of luxury items for the aesthetic pleas­ ures they provide? Certainly Matthew Paris’s focus on the workmanship of royal plate and jewellery suggests an aesthetic appreciation. The lovingly detailed por­ trayals of luxury items found in the literature of the time, like Chrétien de Troyes’ minute description of clothing given by Guinevere to his heroine Enide, or Hue de Roteland’s careful depiction of an elaborate gold cup covered with gems, sug­ gest a belief that beautiful objects appealed to their audiences on aesthetic grounds.122 At John’s court, the existence of highly ornamented plate, including basins with designs of leopards, carefully designed jewellery, vivid woollen fab­ rics, and beautiful silks, all suggest a desire for aesthetic pleasure. Particularly noteworthy were choices in which aesthetic considerations appear to have out­ weighed status concerns. Had John and leading members of his court considered only the cost and therefore status of the textiles they chose, they would have worn only silk and scarlet, and they certainly would not have put on fabrics sometimes worn by their laundresses. Presumably they considered having a variety of fabrics and a mix of colours important enough to risk blurring status lines. John’s par­ ticular choice of russet and red fur indicates a willingness to embrace an aesthetic choice that flouted the conventions of the time. Of course, at court the choice of clothing would have had multiple drivers, but there is evidence that beauty and the pleasure it provided were among them. What of comfort? As John Crowley has shown, specific views about what is comfortable, and even the very idea of comfort, are culturally constructed and historically contingent to a surprising degree.123 Unsurprisingly, however, medi­ eval people tried to embrace comfort at times. Romances speak of elite figures wearing (or not wearing) certain clothing to respond to weather.124 With expen­ sive furs such as vair and ermine, display may often have been a more important 121 Veale, English Fur Trade, 3. 122  Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 40–1; Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 196–7. 123 John E. Crowley, The Invention of Comfort: Sensibilities and Design in Early Modern Britain and Early America (Baltimore, MD, 2001). 124  For instance, Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 163, 412.

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Luxury and Material Culture at Court  77 consideration than staying warm in cold weather, but the king’s possession of boots and a tunic for going to bed lined with lamb, and the royal couple’s posses­ sion of cloaks lined with the same, all point to a desire for comfort regardless of status.125 So too did the royal rain cloaks that appear in the records.126 Often enough, admittedly, a desire for status outweighed comfort. Martha Carlin and David Crouch have argued that a full set of woollen robes could have weighed over 21 lb even without lining.127 If this is correct, it is hard to see how they could have been comfortable, even allowing for differences in cultural ideas of comfort and the fact that medieval elites would have been accustomed to wearing such clothes. Nonetheless, other royal garments do show that comfort was not entirely forgotten in the creation of the royal wardrobe. And alongside comfort, there would have been the sensual, sometimes sensuous appeal of luxury goods, par­ ticularly textiles and furs. The feel of furs, silks, and finely made woollens would surely have given pleasure in both clothing and bedding. Indeed, rich textiles made beds not only grand but also sensuous places. As the narrator of The Romance of Horn said of the eponymous hero of that romance, ‘no lady had seen him who did not love him and want to hold him, embracing him under an ermine coverlet without the knowledge of her lord.’128

3.12  The Importance of Things ‘Clothes make the man.’ So goes the saying, which applies to women too. In their study of clothing in early modern England, Ann Rosalind Jones and Peter Stallybrass have stressed that in ceremonies of investiture, clothing could indeed ‘make’ a person a member of a guild or household—or a king.129 Obviously inher­ itance, marriage, and coronations were the prime drivers in making John and Isabella monarchs, but the royal regalia, including the clothes in it, played a role. Recent decades have seen increasing scholarly exploration of and theorizing about the impact of things on people.130 The study of material culture in various disciplines has played a major role in this, as has the sociological approach called Actor-Network Theory (ANT), advanced most notably by Bruno Latour, which argues that humans exist in constantly changing networks not only with other humans but with objects; that objects affect people in powerful ways; and that 125  Misae 11J 150–1; Misae 14J 251, 255, 257–8. 126  PR6J 131; Misae 11J 170–1; Misae 14J 267, 269; RLC 144b, 145a–b. 127  Carlin and Crouch, Lost Letters, 44–5. 128 Thomas, Romance of Horn, 16. 129  Ann Rosalind Jones and Peter Stallybrass, Renaissance Clothing and the Materials of Memory (Cambridge, 2000), 2. 130 See, for instance, Kellie Robertson, ‘Medieval Things: Materiality, Historicism, and the Premodern Object,’ Literature Compass 5 (2008), 1060–80; Kellie Robertson, ‘Exemplary Rocks,’ in Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, ed., Animal, Vegetable, Mineral (Washington, D.C., 2012), 91–121; Gilchrist, Medieval LIfe, 216–53.

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78  Power and Pleasure objects play an important role in allowing some humans to gain power over ­others.131 One need not accept every aspect of ANT to accept that humans are in­ev­it­ably bound up in a relational network with objects in which humans have an impact on objects but objects also have an influence on humans. A recent book by the archaeologist Ben Jervis has used ANT and Bourdieu’s idea of habitus (which may be roughly defined as the influence of daily activities and the every­ day en­vir­on­ment on people) to discuss the impact of ceramics in medieval England on various forms of identity. These influences were often imperceptible to the people themselves and were not necessarily the result of anyone’s conscious intent, but sometimes human actors set things in motion. Jervis argues that ‘Through bringing together items of material culture it was possible to become noble, with the maintenance of relationships with the material world making durable this constant process of becoming, which also forced others to relate to their surroundings in particular ways, both to situate themselves, but also the new lord, within a web of social connections.’132 Relations among humans, of course, were crucial to establishing claims to nobility, but having the proper things mattered greatly. The same was true of claims of royalty, and John’s jewels and plate, the clothes he wore and gave away, and above all the regalia helped him become and remain king. Late in John’s reign, the wardrobe, which was in charge of the king’s clothes, ­jewellery, and other valuables, began splitting from the chamber, eventually becoming one of the major bureaucratic and financial court offices.133 This chapter may help explain this ascension, for the wardrobe’s earliest duties not only gave it proximity to the king but also placed it in charge of things that were dear to his heart, including treasure, and were important to royal power. John and his ­government invested heavily in luxury items. To some degree, the motives were ones historians might once have considered frivolous: pleasure, comfort, and diversion. However, these items were also clearly sources of prestige and tools in building alliances and creating loyalty. Whatever their purposes, they were highly valued. It is important, therefore, to remember that John’s court was made up not only of people, but also of things.

131  For a good overview of this approach, see Bruno Latour, Reassembling the Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network-Theory (Oxford, 2005). 132 Jervis, Pottery and Social Life, 84. 133  For the early functions of the wardrobe, see Tout, Chapters in the Administrative History, 1:67–9.

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4

Aspects of Court Culture 4.1  Introduction Like any royal court, John’s court hosted a wide variety of cultural activities. As we have seen, ample evidence survives for some, including hunting and material culture. For others, records are more limited. These activities form the subject of this chapter and include art and music; entertainers and exotic animals; books and learning; games and gambling; chivalry; and sex and courtly love. This list obviously forms something of a miscellany. In modern terms, it includes both high and low culture, though such a division does not transfer well to the Middle Ages. It excludes some likely activities at court, such as the recitation of poetry and other literature, because no evidence survives. Above all, it is determined by the amount of evidence, and although the recording and survival of far more evidence on some subjects than others no doubt partly reflects the priorities of the king and his courtiers, it also reflects the vagaries of bureaucratic choices about what needed to be recorded and what records had to be preserved.1 Yet for all the odd juxtapositions, discussion of these various activities will reveal just how rich cultural life was at John’s court. One aspect of court life, however, John’s aggressive and sometimes coercive pursuit of sex, will show the stark possibilities of exploitation at court and complicate the generally positive picture we tend to have of court culture. The evidence presented in this chapter, especially on sexual exploitation, will provide further insights into power, contestation, pleasure, and self-gratification at court, and will add the subject of suffering there.

4.2  Art and Music Art and music have received much attention in studies of early modern courts not only because they are high-status modern subjects with their own disciplines, but also because many early modern courts were important centres of artistic and musical patronage. Medieval kings could be important patrons: when it comes to art and architecture, one only has to consider John’s son, Henry III, with his 1  Thus at least one roll of liveries (or salaries) once existed, and could have revealed much about, for instance, musicians at court; Prest Roll 12J 244.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0004

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80  Power and Pleasure rebuilding of Westminster and his many other projects.2 Unfortunately, for John’s court the evidence is far more limited than for his son’s, probably due to a com­ bin­ation of a shorter reign, fewer surviving records, and less interest on the king’s part. Nonetheless, John and his court certainly patronized artists and musicians. For artistic works, much of the evidence appears in other sections of the book. In Chapter 3, I discussed the rich textiles John’s court imported, including elab­or­ ate­ly decorated silks, and the fine jewellery and precious plate that the king and  court commissioned. His architectural patronage will appear in Chapter  7. Here, I will focus on manuscript and wall painting. Unfortunately, no surviving ­il­lu­min­ated manuscripts can be connected directly to John or his court.3 As we shall see, John owned many books, and it is therefore likely that he commissioned manuscript illumination, but this must remain speculative. As for wall paintings, the evidence for John’s father, Henry II, commissioning such works is quite strong.4 The evidence for John is more circumstantial. An Adam Pictor (or Painter) shared oversight of expensive renovations at the king’s lodgings in the royal castle at Hereford, suggesting that painters might have had an important role in such ­renovations.5 Another painter, named Robert, held a pension from the king early in his reign, suggesting an integral role in John’s (or perhaps Richard’s) court.6 Thus, the evidence for John’s patronage of painting is limited but suggestive. More evidence survives of John’s patronage of music.7 Glimpses of sacred music appear in John’s generous payments to various royal chaplains and clerics who performed the Laudes regiae, a traditional hymn associating rulers with the  Triumphant Christ, at the great religious feasts of Easter, Pentecost, and Christmas. Three of the men who most frequently received such payments, Jacob de Templo, Henry of Hereford, and Robert de Saintes, were described as masters. Though this title most likely referred to their general education as clerics, it is at least possible that it referred to a mastery of music, possibly combining the abstract mastery of musical theory taught in the schools with a more practical command of the skills required for church music.8 A manuscript that survives in 2  R. Kent Lancaster, ‘Artists, Suppliers and Clerks: The Human Factors in the Art Patronage of King Henry III,’ Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institute 35 (1972), 81–107; Paul Binski, The Painted Chamber at Westminster (London, 1986); Paul Binski, Westminster Abbey and the Plantagenets: Kingship and the Representation of Power, 1200–1400 (New Haven, CT, 1995). For the artistic patronage of rulers in the later Middle Ages, see Vale, Princely Court, 70–1, 165–70, 247–82. 3  For one possibility based on circumstantial but plausible evidence, see Stella Panayotova, ‘Art and Politics in a Royal Prayerbook,’ Bodleian Library Record 18 (2005), 440–59. 4  Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 678–81; Neil Stratford, ‘The Wall-Paintings of the PetitQuevilly,’ in Jenny Stratford, ed., Medieval Art, Architecture and Archaeology at Rouen (London, 1993), 51–9; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 293. 5  PR5J 55. 6  RLC 12a. 7  For a later period, see Nigel Wilkins, ‘Music and Poetry at Court: England and France in the Late Middle Ages,’ in V. J. Scattergood and J. W. Sherborne, eds., English Court Culture in the Later Middle Ages (New York, 1983), 183–204. 8  RN 34; MR 1J 90; RL 1, 14, 25, 93; RLC 4a, 26b, 34b, 51b, 62b, 71a, 82a, 85b, 99a, 183b, 196b, 222a; RLP 150a; Paul Webster, King John and Religion (Woodbridge, 2015), 27–8.

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Aspects of Court Culture  81 Italy and includes polyphonic Latin songs about Henry II, Richard I, and other members of John’s family suggests that the courts and households of John’s relatives boasted an innovative and learned circle of court composers.9 The same is at least possibly true of John’s court. As for less learned secular music, there survive various references to the repair or making of trumpets and horns, including some gilded with gold, and at least one horn that may have been for the king’s own use.10 The royal records also note unnamed trumpeters and a number of named musicians in royal service: John Bataille, trumpeter; Alexander Cytharista (or harper); Alan le Harpur; and Jakelin and Vielet, the viol players.11 John clearly had at least a small musical establishment outside the royal chapel. Music had many purposes at medieval courts. The music of the royal chapel was obviously religious. Horns were frequently used in hunting, and various ­contemporary literary sources such as the works of Hue de Roteland show that prowess with hunting horns was yet another aspect of aristocratic hunting culture. ‘Oh God, how sweetly it cries,’ La Fiere exclaims in one of Hue de Roteland’s works, when she hears the hero, Ipomedon, sounding the hunting horn.12 One Lancashire landholder held a small manor from the king for the service of his horn during the hunt, and given John’s passion for hunting it is likely that he used his own personal horn in this context.13 Music was also closely associated with war and the contemporary intellectual, Peter of Blois, even described certain instruments as necessary for war.14 The Anonymous of Béthune described John as having trumpeters sound the call to battle on one occasion during Prince Louis’ invasion, and the trumpeter John Bataille’s byname reveals his military ­as­so­ci­ations.15 In addition, contemporary sources indicate that music was played at important moments in a monarch’s travels, and an alternative record of the Lancashire tenure noted above was that its holder sounded his horn upon the king’s arrival in the area.16 Last but far from least, music was a source of entertainment and pleasure. Contemporary literary sources show aristocratic or royal men and women performing themselves, and though there is no evidence of this 9  For the royal chapel and polyphony at court, see Ian Bent, ‘The English Royal Chapel before 1300,’ Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association 90 (1963–4), 77–95; Thomas, Secular Clergy, 302–4. 10  PR6J 131; PR14J 49; Misae 11J 132; Misae 14J, 257. 11  PR6J 9, 131; PR16J 28; RL 92; Prest Roll 12J 242, 244, 246; RLC 172b, 197b, 227b–228a; John Southworth, The English Medieval Minstrel (Woodbridge, 1989), 52. 12 Barlow, William Rufus, 125; Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 90–1; Hue de Rotelande, Protheslaus, ed. A. J. Holden, 3 vols. (London, 1991–3), 1:53. 13  Book of Fees 1:220, 227. 14  Peter of Blois, Petri Blesensis Tractatus Duo: ‘Passio Raginaldi, Principis Antiochie,’ ‘Conquestio de Dilatione Vie Ierusolimitane,’ ed. R. B. C. Huygens (Turnhout, 2002), 68. See also Jordan Fantosme, Chronicle, 98–101, 126–7; Robert  W.  Jones, Bloodied Banners: Martial Display on the Medieval Battlefield (Woodbridge, 2010), 63–83. 15  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 169–70. 16  Red Book of the Exchequer 2:464; Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 2:87; Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:33; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 156, 211–12; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 6:62–3; Constance Bullock-Davies, Menestrellorum Multitudo: Minstrels at a Royal Feast (Cardiff, 1978), 19.

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82  Power and Pleasure at John’s court, such performances, unpaid and therefore unlikely to appear in the royal records, were certainly possible.17 More confidently, one can assert that the harpist and viol players in John’s service entertained the royal court, with their instrumental performances perhaps accompanied by song or used to accompany dances. John’s own appreciation for one musician is shown by the very generous gift of £1, several months’ wages for a skilled worker, that he gave to Markward, drummer of the visiting count of Holland, on Palm Sunday 1213, perhaps for a bravura performance in the day’s celebrations.18

4.3  Entertainers and Exotic Animals Court fools and jesters were another important type of medieval and early modern entertainer.19 Early in his reign, John made a grant of land in Normandy to William Piculf, his fool, and William’s son Geoffrey, for the service of acting the fool.20 Alms given at different points in the reign to a Chysi stultus (fool) and a Simon of Cambrai, inaneus, may represent charity, but medieval patrons sometimes supported the mentally impaired for entertainment as well as for religious motives.21 Though I have suggested that John’s huntsman, John Stultus, derived his byname as a sign of the king’s slightly contemptuous affection, John Southworth’s idea that this huntsman also served as a court fool is certainly worth considering: one can imagine many opportunities for physical pratfalls on the hunt.22 Roland the Farter, a now mildly famous entertainer who served John’s father, Henry II, was dead by John’s reign, but a successor still held Roland’s land from King John in 1212 for the service of leaping and whistling at the king’s Christmas feast.23 Once again, the surviving evidence is limited, but it does show that John’s court sponsored entertainers of the sort common in the period. Possession of exotic animals was an important mark of kingship in the period and another source of entertainment. Henry I’s menagerie at Woodstock is well known and Henry II and Henry III also possessed beasts from distant lands such as camels and elephants.24 Late in his own life and towards the end of John’s reign, 17  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 1:176–9; 2:428–31. Thomas, Romance of Horn, 1:12, 41, 95–6; Marie de France, Lais, 268–9; Stimming, ed., Boeve de Haumtone, 104, 106. 18  Misae 14J 257. 19  John Southworth, Fools and Jesters at the English Court (Stroud, 1998). 20  RN 20–1. 21  PR4J 21; PR5J 89; PR16J 135. 22 Southworth, Fools and Jesters, 40. 23  Book of Fees 1:136. For Roland, see Southworth, English Medieval Minstrel, 47; Valerie Allen, On Farting: Language and Laughter in the Middle Ages (New York, 2007), 12, 161–77; Martha Bayless, ‘Subversion,’ in Julia C. Crick and Elisabeth van Houts, eds., A Social History of England, 900–1200 (Cambridge, 2011), 402–9, at 405–8. 24 William of Malmesbury, Gesta Regum Anglorum: The History of the English Kings, ed. R. A. B. Mynors, Rodney M. Thomson, and Michael Winterbottom, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1998–9), 1:740–1; Michael Prestwich, ‘The “Wonderful Life” of the Thirteenth Century,’ Thirteenth-Century England 7 (1999), 161–71, at 164. Rodulfus Tortarius, a monk of Fleury, described in a poem a visit to Caen

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Aspects of Court Culture  83 Alexander Neckam, son of Richard I’s nurse, pictured a nameless ruler’s court with exotic animals, including a lion watched over by keepers and bound by chains, with boys teasing it just beyond the end of its reach, and a bright-green parrot that could imitate human speech.25 Strikingly, around the time of Alexander’s writing, the pipe rolls record expenses for a lion, its keepers, its chain, and a special door to keep it in whatever enclosure John used to hold it at the Tower of London.26 Perhaps Alexander had seen John’s lion being tormented by the boys at John’s court or by servants and visitors at the Tower. The lion only appeared in two pipe rolls, suggesting it did not survive very long, and there is no record of similar exotic species kept for show (though one wonders if Alexander had also seen a parrot at court). However, it may be a mistake to differentiate too sharply between exotic imported curiosities and the kinds of animals more common at court. Martina Giese has fruitfully discussed Frederick II’s hunting animals in conjunction with his more exotic beasts.27 Gyrfalcons may have appealed to John and so many other enthusiastic falconers not only because of their size, hunting abilities, and impressive appearance, but also because they were generally imported from the far north and thus had something of the exotic about them. But the prestige provided by any particularly fine bird of prey, hound, or horse had parallels to that of the exotic species found in menageries. An interesting example of a set of animals that was simultaneously exotic and indigenous, marvellous and domestic, comes in an anecdote by the Anonymous of Béthune. In this story, William de Briouze’s wife, Matilda, presented Queen Isabella with 300 cows and one bull, all entirely white except for their red ears. The Anonymous told the anecdote mainly to make more poignant Matilda’s death by starvation in John’s prison after the king turned against her husband, a former favourite, joining it with a story that she claimed to have 12,000 cattle that could produce enough cheese to feed one hundred men trapped in a castle for a long siege.28 Despite its polemic use, there is reason to take the story seriously. I noted in Chapter  2 William’s gift of a large number of hunting animals to the king.29 White cattle with red (or black) ears exist today in isolated herds that have an old history, and white cattle with red ears appear in various medieval Welsh sources. where he claims to have seen a king enter with a large train including an Ethiopian leading a lion, leopard, camel, and ostrich. Martina Giese suggests the king was Henry I; Martina Giese, ‘Die Tierhaltung am Hof Kaiser Friedrichs II. zwischen Tradition und Innovation,’ in Knut Görich, Jan Keupp, and Theo Broekmann, eds., Herrschaftsräume, Herrschaftspraxis und Kommunikation zur Zeit Kaiser Friedrichs II. (Munich, 2008), at 151–2; Rodulfus Tortarius, Rodulfi Tortarii Carmina, ed. Marbury B. Ogle and Dorothy M. Schullian (Rome, 1933), 325–6. For a useful discussion of exotic animals and their importance to rulers, see Sharon Kinoshita, ‘Animals and the Medieval Culture of Empire,’ in Jeffrey J. Cohen, ed., Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Ethics and Objects (New York, 2012), 35–63. 25  Alexander Neckam, Alexandri Neckam Sacerdos ad Altare, ed. Christopher James McDonough (Turnhout, 2010), 142–3. 26  PR13J xxii–xxiii, 109–10; PR14J 44. 27  Giese, ‘Tierhaltung,’ 121–71. 28  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 111–15. 29  See Chapter 2, 41.

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84  Power and Pleasure Even if the Anonymous exaggerated the size of the family herds, the Briouzes were major landowners, so it is plausible that they could have gathered a large number of cattle with particular features. However, these cattle would not only have had an arresting appearance but also important cultural associations: white cows with red ears had otherworldly connections in Celtic tales and laws, which the Briouzes, as lords on the Welsh Marches, surely knew.30 In his book, Audun and the Polar Bear, William Miller used an Icelandic tale of a man who spent all his money on a Polar Bear and, after a complicated series of events, made his modest fortune by giving it to a king of Denmark, to explore deeply the nature of gift exchange. Among other lessons from this work, an important one is that the backstory to the gift could add greatly to the value of a gift.31 A gift of so many white cattle with red ears would not have been limited to their economic value, though that was itself far from negligible. The presentation of the animals would have been a rich visual spectacle; an occasion for delight and wonder. Most important, for a society that loved marvels and had become accustomed, through Breton lais and Arthurian romance, to particularly value Celtic marvels, an explanation of the otherworldly associations of such cattle would have been particularly welcome, and would, coincidentally, have underscored the cultural competence of Matilda and her family in dealing with the Welsh. Exotic animals may have been curiosities, but curiosities could be culturally very important.

4.4  Books and Learning John’s parents, Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, have well-established reputations as important patrons of learning and literature. There is debate over the extent of their patronage, but there is no doubt that their courts were influential cultural centres.32 John and his court, in contrast, have gathered no such reputation, among either contemporaries or modern scholars. At first glance, this lack 30  Jessica Hemming, ‘Bos Primigenius in Britain: Or, Why Do Fairy Cows Have Red Ears,’ Folklore 113 (2002), 71–82; Robin Chapman Stacey, ‘King, Queen and Edling in the Laws of the Court,’ in Thomas Charles-Edwards, Morfydd E. Owen, and Paul Russell, eds., The Welsh King and His Court (Cardiff, 2000), 29–62, at 36. 31  William Ian Miller, Audun and the Polar Bear: Luck, Law, and Largesse in a Medieval Tale of Risky Business (Leiden, 2008). 32  For some of the more recent work on this, see Karen M. Broadhurst, ‘Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine: Patrons of Literature in French?’ Viator 27 (1996), 53–84; Aurell, ed., Culture politique des Plantagenêt; Ruth Harvey, ‘Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Troubadours,’ in Marcus Bull and Catherine Léglu, eds., The World of Eleanor of Aquitaine: Literature and Society in Southern France between the Eleventh and Thirteenth Centuries (Woodbridge, 2005), 101–14; John Gillingham, ‘The Cultivation of History, Legend, and Courtesy at the Court of Henry II,’ in Ruth Kennedy and S. Meacham-Jones, eds., Writers of the Reign of Henry II (London, 2006), 25–52; Jean Flori, Eleanor of Aquitaine: Queen and Rebel (Edinburgh, 2007), 280–313; Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 88–101, 134–62; Turner, Eleanor of Aquitaine, 167–73.

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Aspects of Court Culture  85 of a reputation for learning and literature seems fully justified. The only ­dedication of a book to John that I know of is Gerald of Wales’s rededication to him of his account of the English invasion of Ireland, the Expugnatio Hibernica, ori­gin­al­ly dedicated to Richard I. However, Gerald regularly and futilely sought royal recognition of his works and in this case was probably mainly motivated by a desire to get John to further the conquest of Ireland, where many of Gerald’s relatives had settled, rather than by any real hope of royal reward. Nor is there any indication that John paid the least notice to the work or rewarded Gerald for it.33 The presence of entertainers at John’s court suggests royal patronage of vernacular, oral literature. However, despite the ties of other members of John’s family to the troubadour culture of southern France and despite the fact that John’s queen, Isabella of Angoulême, was Poitevin, the only reference to John as king in the surviving body of troubadour poetry is the hostile poem of Bertran de Born the Younger discussed in Chapter 2.34 It is easy to see why John has not gained the reputation of his parents as a patron of learning and literature. Nonetheless, John’s court may have been a greater centre for learning than his reputation suggests. First, there were many clerics in his circle with the title of magister or master, a sign of a high level of education, often at the emerging universities of Paris, Bologna, and Oxford. I noted three of them earlier in a musical context. Another cleric who sang the Laudes regiae for John, Ambrose, may have been the Ambroise who composed a vernacular account of Richard I’s crusade.35 Some 14 per cent of the many ecclesiastical benefices granted by John went to men with the title magister, and this is an underestimate, given that the royal scribes were not consistent in applying the title and used titles with greater prestige, such as archdeacon, when there was a choice.36 Not all these clerics were particularly close to the king, but several of his most important clerical advisors were magistri, including his chancellors Walter de Gray and Richard Marsh, and one of John’s most versatile servants, William of Wrotham. Clerical intellectuals sometimes denigrated the learning of clerical administrators, partly because they felt that these clerics misused talents and skills that should have been reserved for the church. However, either William of Wrotham or William de Sainte-MèreÉglise, a royal administrator under John’s predecessor who was bishop of London during John’s reign, was a patron of the highly influential Latin grammarian, Geoffrey of Vinsauf, showing that learned administrators could appreciate the lively intellectual life of the period.37 John, of course, may have valued his most

33  Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 261–5. For the possible patronage by John of two poems by Henry of Avranches, see Josiah Cox Russell and John Paul Heironimus, eds., The Shorter Latin Poems of Master Henry of Avranches Related to England (Cambridge, MA, 1935), 30–3. 34  See Chapter 2, 47–48. 35 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 2:2. 36 Thomas, Secular Clergy, 113. 37 John Gillingham, ‘Stupor mundi: 1204 et un obituaire de Richard Coeur de Lion depuis longtemps tombé dan l’oubli,’ in Martin Aurell and Noël Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens:

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86  Power and Pleasure highly educated courtiers simply for their administrative skills, but the fact remains that such men could frequently be found at court. Indeed, given the steady rise of the schools and universities throughout the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, John’s court probably had larger numbers of educated clerics than his father’s did. The most telling evidence that John and his court may have been surprisingly learned comes from his collection of books. Though no surviving manuscripts can be definitively associated with the king or his court, a number of works are mentioned in the royal records.38 On 29 April 1205, John had a history of England written in French sent to him. On 29 March 1208, he asked the sacrist of the abbey of Reading to send him a collection of religious and theological works, including the entire Old Testament in six volumes, Hugh of St Victor’s De Sacramentis, Peter Lombard’s Sentences, various works of Augustine, the work of the Roman rhetorician Valerius Maximus, a treatise by Origen, and an obscure patristic work, the De Generatione Divina by Candidus Arianus. Although ­scholars debate the issue, it is likely that these books were John’s rather than loans from the monastic library. The royal writ described the sacrist as being ‘quit’ of the book, a technical term that suggests he delivered the king’s own books to him after John had stored them there just as he stored jewellery, plate, and regalia at religious houses. A few days later he had a work ‘called Pliny’ sent to him from Reading.39 As Rodney Thomson, a leading expert on books and learning in the period, has written, ‘This is a quite extraordinary set of books to be associated with a layman . . . . There is nothing comparable throughout twelfth- or thirteenthcentury Europe.’40 These examples of deliveries of named books are admittedly isolated in the surviving records, but there are other occasions when the royal government paid for the movement of the king’s books, in one case purchasing chests and carts to move them overseas, which suggests a sizeable library.41 John no doubt would have had help from clerics in reading and interpreting his learned works, but that was expected, and even the limited surviving evidence of the king’s books suggests considerable intellectual curiosity. Had contemporary chroniclers and other clerical writers been more sympathetic to John, he might well have left behind him a greater reputation for learning.

confrontations et héritages (Turnhout, 2006), 397–411, at 409–11; Geoffrey of Vinsauf, Poetria Nova, ed. Margaret F. Nims and Martin Camargo (Toronto, 2010), 95. 38  For a book possibly associated with Queen Isabella, see Vincent, ‘Great Lost Library,’ 98. 39  RLC 29b, 108a–b. 40 Rodney M. Thomson, Books and Learning in Twelfth-Century England: The Ending of ‘Alter Orbis’ (Walkern, 2006), 64. See also Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record, 162–3; Vincent, ‘Great Lost Library,’ 84–5; Stephen Church, ‘King John’s Books and the Interdict in England and Wales,’ in Laura Cleaver and Andrea Worm, eds., Writing History in the Anglo-Norman World: Manuscripts, Makers and Readers, c. 1066–c. 1250 (York, 2018), 149–65. 41  PR5J xvi, 139; PR6J 131.

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4.5  Games and Gambling Games and gambling do not generally receive the same scholarly attention accorded to books and learning, but they were an important part of court life. A number of entries in the surviving misae and prest rolls show that John was an enthusiastic player of ‘tabulas’ or ‘tables,’ which was not a single game but a series of games played on a hinged board with markers and often dice, some versions of which were the ancestors of modern backgammon.42 Two entries reveal expenses for making leather containers for transporting the boards on the king’s journeys. One of the boards was made of ivory.43 A larger set of entries reveal sums paid off for the king’s gambling, mostly on his own games, one presumes, but perhaps sometimes for wagers on others. The sums involved ranged from 4d to 25s 8½d. Most were 10s or less, minor amounts for the king and his associates, though certainly not for ordinary people of the time. Such entries show the people John associated with in one of his major forms of relaxation. His gambling partners formed a very small circle. Considering that fewer than fifty records of gambling debts survive, it is striking to see some individuals appear seven or more times. None were women; almost all were close associates and favourites of the king. There were a few exceptions, such as John Bucuinte, a prominent citizen of London, and Saer de Quincy, earl of Winchester and later a rebel baron. However, even the gaming companions who were later rebels, including the northern ­barons Robert de Ros and Simon of Kyme, had had close ties to the king or had tried to win his favour earlier in the reign. Most of the players were strong loyalists, including four of the earls closest to the king: John’s half-brother, William Longsword, earl of Salisbury (an especially frequent gambling companion); Geoffrey fitz Peter, earl of Essex; Ranulf, earl of Chester; and William II de Ferrers, earl of Derby. Others were leading administrators and favourites, including Hugh de Neville and the gambling companion mentioned most often in the surviving evidence, Brian de Lisle. Some, like the knight Robert of Burgate, were important members of John’s household. All in all, John seems to have gambled with those upon whom he relied most heavily to govern.44 As striking as John’s love of ‘tabulas’ in the records is the absence of chess, a point noted by Danny Danziger and John Gillingham, who sardonically state that 42 For ‘tabulas’ see H.  G.  A.  Murray, ‘The Mediaeval Games of Tables,’ Medium Aevum 10 (1941), 57–69. 43  Misae 11J 125; Misae 14J 225. 44  Besides those listed above, John gambled with Pagan of Chaworth, head of a prosperous landholding family; Ingelran de Pratell, a member of John’s household; Warin fitz Gerold, member of a prominent family in royal administration; William Briwerre the Younger, son of one of John’s favorites; Henry fitz Count, an illegitimate relative who gained John’s favour; and one William Mar,’ who may be William Marshal, though the absence of the title of earl is striking; Misae 11J 131, 139–40, 147, 155, 157–69; Misae 14J 249–50, 252–4; Prest Roll 7J 272, 275; Prest Roll 12J 176, 181, 196, 208–9, 231, 237–8, 240–1, 243–4; Prest Roll 14–18J 89, 92, 98.

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88  Power and Pleasure chess is a game of skill.45 We cannot be certain John did not play chess. Though it is inconceivable that regular tournaments would fail to appear in the surviving financial records, one can imagine chess matches slipping through without appearing in the records, since they did not require extensive organization. Nonetheless, there are no references to chessboards or to gambling debts related to chess, even though medieval players regularly gambled on the game. Indeed, the only reference at all to John playing chess is a decidedly unlikely anecdote in the later, highly fictionalized biography of a historical rebel against John, Fulk fitz Warin, in which the two came to blows over a chess game.46 Yet chess was an extremely important game in England in the central Middle Ages (so important that the exchequer drew its name from the chessboard) and skill at chess was an important source of aristocratic prestige.47 Thus John’s apparent lack of interest in the game is striking, comparable in some ways to his lack of interest in tournaments.

4.6  Chivalry and the Embrace of Martial Splendour Richard I remains closely associated with chivalry in the modern popular and scholarly imagination. John does not, no doubt because of his awful personal reputation. When modern historians discuss the medieval phenomenon of chivalry, they often focus on codes and conduct. Thus, Keen, in his classic work, described chivalry ‘as an ethos in which martial, aristocratic and Christian elem­ ents were fused together,’ and as ‘the secular code of honour of a martially orient­ed aristocracy.’48 Important works on chivalry in England and Normandy in the long twelfth century revolve around the conduct of aristocrats in war.49 However, because John’s conduct in war, and by implication his chivalry or lack thereof, has been so much discussed in biographies and works on his reign, I will discuss another aspect of chivalry, namely chivalric cultural practices (or lack thereof) at John’s court. I have already discussed one major chivalric practice that 45  Danny Danziger and John Gillingham, 1215: The Year of Magna Carta (London, 2003), 75. For an overview of chess in the period, see Richard Eales, Chess: The History of a Game (New York, 1985), 39–70. 46  E. J. Hathaway et al., eds., Fouke le Fitz Waryn, Anglo-Norman Texts, 26–8 (Oxford, 1975), 22–3. 47  For chess’s importance in England in the period, see Paul Milliman, ‘Ludus Scaccarii: Games and Governance in Twelfth-Century England,’ in Daniel E. O’Sullivan, ed., Chess in the Middle Ages and Early Modern Age: A Fundamental Thought Paradigm of the Premodern World (Berlin, 2012), 63–86. For its prestige, see Richard Eales, ‘The Game of Chess: An Aspect of Medieval Knightly Culture,’ Ideals and Practices of Medieval Knighthood 1 (1986), 12–34. 48  Maurice Keen, Chivalry (New Haven, CT, 1984), 16, 152. For an important work on chivalry with specific reference to John’s brother, Richard I, see Flori, Richard the Lionheart, 221–347, 403–12. 49  John Gillingham, ‘Killing and Mutilating Political Enemies in the British Isles from the Late Twelfth to the Early Fourteenth Century: A Comparative Study,’ in Brendan Smith, ed., Britain and Ireland, 900–1300: Insular Responses to Medieval European Change (Cambridge, 1999), 114–34; John Gillingham, The English in the Twelfth Century: Imperialism, National Identity, and Political Values (Woodbridge, 2000), 41–58, 209–31; Strickland, War and Chivalry.

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Aspects of Court Culture  89 was absent at court: tournaments. However, John and his court did embrace other chivalric practices, including dubbing and heraldry. Moreover, through the use of martial images, spectacular arms and weaponry, and trappings of war such as banners, John and his followers adopted and projected a celebration of aristocratic warfare. I will start with this last phenomenon. For at least some medieval writers, war was an opportunity for panoply and glorious display. This was most common in secular literature, in which writers often gloried in the details of their heroes’ armour, weapons, and other gear, but it was also true of historical accounts. Close to John’s time, Ambroise’s account of Richard I’s crusade and the Latin chronicle that translated and adapted that work are full of the splendours of the crusader armies (or occasionally their enemies), including their fine horses, flashing weapons and glittering armour, magnificent pennons and banners, and, of course, the accompanying music.50 The descriptions in these two works are particularly detailed, but as Robert Jones has noted of medieval authors, ‘There is rarely a battle scene written in which the author does not comment on the splendour of the host, their armour flashing in the sun.’ Jones points out that military historians have tended to focus on the purely functional aspects of armour, weapons, and military equipment, but he makes a strong case for the psychological, military, and cultural importance of military display.51 John’s taste for military display has not gone unnoticed.52 However, there is room for further exploration. The vast majority of references to military matters and expenditures covered purely pragmatic matters and items, but a desire for pomp comes through in some entries in the royal records. A purchase of seven horse ‘covers’ (probably caparisons), three with gold lions and four with silk ones, in the fiscal year 1205/6 shows how warhorses, themselves markers of status and display, could be made to appear even more magnificent.53 Banners had practical purposes on the battlefield, but by their very nature were also display items. A great deal of prestige was attached to them, and just as the Anonymous of Béthune implicitly criticized John for having the trumpets sounded against Louis and then retreating, so Ralph of Coggeshall criticized him for erecting the royal English dragon banner against Louis and then fleeing.54 The royal government periodically purchased banners,

50 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:10, 24, 74–5, 92–3, 157–8; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 156, 189–90, 211–12, 249, 367. 51 Jones, Bloodied Banners. The quotation is at p. 108. For the importance of horses and arms, see also Joachim Bumke, Courtly Culture: Literature and Society in the High Middle Ages (Berkeley, CA, 1991), 155–78. For the use of military panoply to assert exalted status, see Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 177–98, 217–51. 52 See in particular Nicholas Vincent, http://magnacarta.cmp.uea.ac.uk/read/feature_of_the_ month/Apr_2015_4; and Emma Mason, ‘The Hero’s Invincible Weapon: An Aspect of Angevin Propaganda,’ Ideals and Practices of Medieval Knighthood 3 (1990), 121–37. 53  PR8J xxvi, 47. 54  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 182.

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90  Power and Pleasure often in conjunction with ‘tunics for arming,’ probably surcoats worn over armour, which would have enhanced their wearers’ magnificence. In the 1212 pipe roll, for instance, appears a payment for twelve pennons and four ‘plate’ banners, and on 6 April 1216, John ordered the hasty provision of five banners and five ‘tunics for arming.’ On at least one occasion silk was ordered for surcoats and banners and the purchases often involved gold, perhaps as much as 2 lbs of gold in the 1216 order, so these objects must have been quite splendid. Indeed, Vincent suggests the somewhat mysterious ‘plate’ banners were made of beaten gold rather than fabric embroidered with gold thread; either way, the materials were costly and the effects no doubt impressive.55 John knew how to dress up war to glorify it, while glorifying himself as an elite warrior in the process.56 When it comes to the most important instruments of warfare, armour and weapons, it becomes particularly hard to separate purely pragmatic military purposes from the glorification of war. Metal armour and weapons were thoroughly practical in protecting knights and inflicting harm on their enemies, but they also glittered and made knights (and horses57) look splendid—some writers described them as looking like angels.58 However, there are a handful of references to attempts to make weapons and armour appear even more spectacular. The pipe roll of 1211 records the purchase of 150 gold leaves to gild 567 lances—one envisions a large troop of the king’s knights bearing a forest of lances tipped in gold.59 The Chronicle of the Third Crusade refers to helmets covered with jewels in a ­crusader army preparing to march on Jerusalem.60 Such helmets existed; on 30 October 1215, during the siege of Rochester, a royal writ commanded William Scissor, who was responsible for caring for the king’s arms and armour as well as his clothes, to give a foreign knight supporting John any of the king’s helmets ‘except the one gilded (deaurata) with stones.’61 The most precious of John’s armaments was, of course, the sword said to have belonged to Tristan.62 Since it was kept with the regalia, it was probably used largely in a ceremonial capacity. However, one should perhaps not make too strong a distinction between ‘parade’ weapons and armour and items used in battle. A frequent image in Anglo-Norman literature was of combatants smashing precious stones and other 55  Nicholas Vincent, http://magnacarta.cmp.uea.ac.uk/read/feature_of_the_month/Apr_2015_4. 56  PR10J 97; PR14J 44; PR2H3 xii, 57; RLC 109a, 143b, 193b. Based on the order dates, Vincent suggests that some of the surcoats and banners were purchased for Easter, which may well be true, but given contemporary descriptions of armies, I suspect they were used for warfare as well as ceremony. 57  Metal horse barding was relatively new in this period, but Richard had captured 140 horses ‘­covered in iron’ in 1198 at the battle of Gisors; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:58. I owe this reference to Oliver Creighton. 58 Bumke, Courtly Culture, 165. 59  PR13J xxi, 108. 60  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 367. 61  RLC 233b. Such helmets were also found in the possession of Henry III; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Armour and Military Dress in Thirteenth- and Early Fourteenth-Century England,’ in Matthew Strickland, ed., Armies, Chivalry and Warfare in Medieval Britain and France (Stamford, 1998), 344–69, at 361. 62  RLP 77b.

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Aspects of Court Culture  91 ornamentation off their opponents’ helmets in duels and battles.63 One might ­discount literary works and argue that crusaders replaced their gem-studded helmets for battle, but it is also possible that conspicuous consumption was as valued in warfare as it was in other aspects of aristocratic life. What better way to show disregard for cost than to charge into battle wearing valuable silk surcoats that were unlikely to survive any serious combat, to gild lances with gold, or to risk a functional but expensively decorated helmet in battle? Even if John’s helmet with the precious stones and the gilded lances were meant just for ceremony, as the sword of Tristan almost certainly was, the imagery was important. As Emma Mason has remarked, John and his brothers’ supposed possession of legendary swords enhanced their authority and status, and could imply that the owner had in­herit­ed the earlier hero’s charisma.64 The helmet and gilded lances, along with the golden banners and surcoats, marked John as a heroic and wealthy knight like the literary heroes of works of the day, and as a leader of a glittering host. Such propagandistic images were largely conveyed in person by John himself and the followers carrying his banners or gilded lances. In the politics of the day, in which a small aristocracy wielded tremendous military and political power and in which armies were relatively small, personal appearances carried more weight than pictorial images. Nonetheless, depictions in stone, paint, or wax would have extended the reach of the king’s image making.65 Any sculpted or painted images from John’s lifetime have been lost, but we have large numbers of his wax seals, representing thousands or tens of thousands that once existed in the possession of those holding royal charters. As noted in Chapter 3, the obverse of the seal showed John with his royal regalia, including a sword. The martial imagery of the reverse is even more striking, for it shows the king as a mounted warrior, a helmet on his head and a sword in his hand, ready to smite his enemies (see Figure 4.1). In a period when many aristocratic seals depicted their owners this way, John’s seal established him as one of their number, a knight among knights, as well as a king.66 Of course, the core imagery of the reverse of John’s seal was not innovative; in fact, it went back to William the Conqueror.67

63  Hue de Rotelande, Protheslaus, 1:120–1; Stimming, ed., Boeve de Haumtone, 121; Holden, ed., Waldef, 92; Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, 2:60, 111, 135. 64  Mason, ‘The Hero’s Invincible Weapon,’ 124. 65  For the image John’s supporters and successor tried to create of him on his tomb, see Jane Martindale, ‘The Sword on the Stone: Some Resonances of a Medieval Symbol of Power (The Tomb of King John in Worcester Cathedral),’ Anglo-Norman Studies 15 (1993), 199–241. 66 Brigitte Bedos-Rezak, ‘Signes et insignes du pouvoir royal et seigneurial au Moyen Age: le témoignage des sceaus’ and ‘The Social Implications of the Art of Chivalry: The Sigillographic Evidence (France 1050–1250),’ in Form and Order in Medieval France: Studies in Social and Quantitative Sigillography (Aldershot, 1993), I 47–62 and VI 1–31; Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 242–3; Carpenter, Struggle for Mastery, 294. 67  Adrian Ailes, ‘The Knight’s Alter Ego: From Equestrian to Armorial Seal,’ in Noël Adams, John Cherry, and James Robinson, eds., Good Impressions: Image and Authority in Medieval Seals (London, 2008), 8–11, at 8.

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92  Power and Pleasure

Figure 4.1  Reverse of King John’s seal. Reproduced by permission of the Provost and Fellows of Eton College.

However, the imitation added to the image’s power by linking John to a series of successful military predecessors from William I to Richard the Lionheart. John’s royal seal also has a small but important place in the history of English heraldry. Over the course of the twelfth century, heraldry became a key element in chivalry, and by John’s reign, it was thoroughly entrenched.68 John’s own interest in heraldry appears in a royal writ, issued during the disastrous campaign of 1214, requesting that a royal cleric provide him with a shield of arms (scutum de armis) ‘such as you last gave us and better and more beautiful if it can be done.’69 Though John employed the traditional dragon banner of the English kings, he and his father and brothers had adopted lions in their personal heraldry. John’s identification with lions is shown by the lions on the horse caparisons noted ­earlier, a belt with little lions (leuncules) on it that was among his treasures, and the appearance of two lions in his coat of arms on the seal he employed before

68  For a good overview of heraldry in the context of chivalry, see Keen, Chivalry, 125–42. For heraldry in John’s broad milieu, see Adrian Ailes, ‘Heraldry in Twelfth-Century England: The Evidence,’ in Daniel Williams, ed., Twelfth-Century England: Proceedings of the 1988 Harlaxton Symposium (Woodbridge, 1990), 1–16; Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 220–51. For debate over the purposes and origins of heraldry, see Adrian Ailes, The Origins of the Royal Arms of England: Their Development to 1199 (Reading, 1982), 21–31; Adrian Ailes, ‘The Knight, Heraldry and Armour: The Role of Recognition and the Origins of Heraldry,’ Medieval Knighthood 4 (1992), 1–21; Jones, Bloodied Banners, 11–32, 57–67. 69  RLC 166b.

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Aspects of Court Culture  93 becoming king.70 It is quite possible that John acquired his actual lion as a living symbol of his family’s heraldic emblem. Adrian Ailes has demonstrated that different members of John’s family used different coats of arms featuring lions in a variety of ways, including on John’s earlier seal. When John became king, however, he and his advisors adopted the coat of arms featuring three lions passant guardant (striding and gazing at the viewer) used in Richard’s second royal seal, for John’s seal. This choice helped depict him as his brother’s legitimate successor during his early struggles with his nephew Arthur, and was probably also designed to link him to Richard’s chivalric charisma. Whatever the motives, these lions have remained a feature of the royal coat of arms ever since, and though Richard and his advisors designed them, John’s adoption changed them from the personal badge of an individual king to a hereditary symbol of a lineage.71 The larger point is that John and his advisors were knowledgeable participants in the practice of heraldry and used it to enhance the king’s image as an aristocratic warrior. John and his court also participated in the chivalric ritual of dubbing.72 John himself had been knighted in 1185 at the age of eighteen by his father, Henry II, shortly before being sent at the head of an expedition to Ireland.73 On several occasions, John’s government paid for various items associated with knighting ceremonies, presumably held at court. These expenditures included £21 10s 2d for three robes of silk, three robes of viride lined with squirrel fur, ceremonial bedding for vigils, and horse trappings for dubbing three unnamed men.74 On New Year’s Day 1202, while in Mayenne on the continent, John knighted a subject named Robert de Leveland, and the next day helped him make financial arrangements when Robert took the cross for the Fourth Crusade.75 Most notably, in 1212, John knighted the future Alexander II of Scotland, at the age of fourteen, in London, a politically noteworthy ceremony that drew the attention of a number of chroniclers, though unfortunately the royal records provide little information about it.76 The dubbings of knights was obviously a periodic event at John’s court. At the end of his book on chivalry, Keen wrote, ‘The rise of the secular courts, as centres of culture and as a natural meeting ground of clergy with nobility,

70  RLP 145a–b; Adrian Ailes, ‘The Seal of John, Lord of Ireland and Count of Mortain,’ Coat of Arms n.s. 4 (1981), 341–50. 71  Ailes, ‘Seal of John,’ 341–50; Ailes, Origins of the Royal Arms, 39, 77; Adrian Ailes, ‘Governmental Seals of Richard I,’ in Phillipp Schofield, ed., Seals and Their Context in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 2015), 101–10. 72  For good overviews of the ritual, see Keen, Chivalry, 64–82; Bumke, Courtly Culture, 231–47. 73  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 2:303. 74  RLC 56a; PR11J xiii, 10; PR6J 213. For similar grants under Edward I, see Lachaud, ‘Textiles, Furs and Liveries,’ 274–84. 75  RL 25–6; RLP 4b. 76  Misae 14J 232; Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 164; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:60; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 4:400; Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 2:206; Joseph Stevenson, ed., Chronica de Mailrose (Edinburgh, 1835), 113. The expenditure in the misae roll was only £14 4s 8d, but it is likely that far more was spent.

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94  Power and Pleasure provided the context for [chivalry] to grow up from a warrior’s code into a ­sophisticated secular ethic, with its own mythology, its own erudition, and its own ­rituals which gave tangible expression to its ideology of honour.’77 John’s court was clearly one of these centres of culture, nurturing the growth of chivalry, one of the most important cultural developments of the Middle Ages.

4.7  Sex, Courtly Love, Coercion, and Rebellion Like many though certainly not all kings, John had an active sexual life both in and out of marriage. The misae roll of John’s fourteenth year has a reference to an amica, or mistress, of King John named Demoiselle Susanna and another reference to an unnamed mistress, perhaps also Susanna.78 John certainly had other mistresses, some of them, as we will see, of noble family. In addition to five le­git­ im­ate children with Queen Isabella, he had many illegitimate children with various women: an unpublished paper by Ralph  V.  Turner brings the number of known ones up to ten.79 What of courtly love? After all, John was the youngest son of Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the figures most closely associated with that phenomenon. Courtly love is, of course, a modern scholarly construct, and though it is certainly not invented out of whole cloth, most of the sources for it are literary rather than historical. Nonetheless, John’s court existed in a culture that was heavily invested in thinking about romantic love and sex, and indeed this was an important period in the development of Western ideas about romantic love.80 Such ideas are more closely associated with France than England, but John’s parents came from France, and he controlled large parts of that realm until 1204. There are at least hints that the English royal court might be associated with love. A late twelfth-century Anglo-Norman poem featuring a dialogue between lovers described the male as a member of the court, providing oblique evidence that even in England the royal court could be imagined as a place where one might find courtly lovers.81 A strap end (a metal piece designed to prevent a leather strap from fraying) dating from 1190–1240 found at one of John’s favourite castles, Ludgershall, has the word

77 Keen, Chivalry, 253. 78  Misae 14J 234, 267. 79  Ralph  V.  Turner, ‘The Illegitimate Offspring of King John of England.’ I would like to thank Professor Turner for sharing this with me in advance of publication. See also Painter, Reign of King John, 232–4; Chris Given-Wilson and Alice Curteis, The Royal Bastards of Medieval England (London, 1984), 126–31. 80  For some recent overviews of courtly love from a historical rather than literary perspective, see Bumke, Courtly Culture, 360–413; Flori, Eleanor of Aquitaine, 239–71; William M. Reddy, The Making of Romantic Love: Longing and Sexuality in Europe, South Asia, and Japan, 900–1200 (Chicago, IL, 2012). 81  Gaston Paris, ‘Le Donnei des Amants,’ Romania 25 (1896), 497–541, at 502.

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Aspects of Court Culture  95 ‘May’ written on it along with floral embellishments. The word is often found on love tokens because of the literary associations of the month with love.82 John had a reputation for being uxorious, at least early in his reign. Both Roger of Wendover and the Anonymous of Béthune chided him for spending too much time delighting in his young wife, Isabella of Angoulême, as his military position collapsed in Normandy. The latter stressed how much John loved her, while also describing them quarrelling in the aftermath of the military collapse.83 These criticisms were part of the more general portrayal of John as overly concerned with pleasurable activities during wartime. They were also loosely associated with a vision of John as sexually depraved that will be discussed below.84 Nonetheless, claims about John’s love for his wife present him in a somewhat unexpected light. The royal records occasionally show John engaged in romantic gestures. The reference to one mistress appears in the misae rolls because John had a chaplet of roses, picked from the garden of one of his chief officials, sent to her in the middle of May. John’s own appreciation of flowers, or perhaps his use of them in the pursuit of women, is reflected in an expenditure for having a container used to dry roses made for him. He provided Demoiselle Susanna with robes made of dark burnet cloth lined with yellow silk, the inclusion of silk being a sign of high favour.85 The courting of elite women, often for adulterous affairs, was of course an integral part of courtly culture, at least in the literary imagination, while the statements about John’s love for his wife could fit into the world imagined in many romances in which marriage and romantic love were intertwined. We tend to think, with good reason, of royal marriages as political affairs, but Ralph of Diceto described John as considering one potential match, with a Portuguese princess, because ‘her fame enticed his soul.’ This was the kind of language used in literary works to describe noblemen falling in love with distant women through their reputations, but it also echoes the language several writers used about Richard I’s initial attraction to his wife, Berengaria. At a minimum, contemporary ideas about love affected the way even hard-headed chroniclers thought about royal marriages, and it is likely they had some influence on how nobles thought about sexual relations and love.86 It is certainly possible, even probable, that John was influenced by contemporary ideas about love. 82  Ellis, ed., Ludgershall Castle, 127. 83 Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:316; 2:8–9. Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 104–5. 84  Matthew Paris also criticized Queen Isabella for adultery and incest, charges that seem to me highly unlikely. For a full discussion of these allegations, see Vincent, ‘Isabella of Angoulême,’ 200–4. 85  Misae 14J 234, 267. For Maytime and flowers in later medieval courts, see Crane, Performance of Self, 39–72. 86  Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:170. For Richard and Berengaria (including a dissenting account from Richard of Devizes), see William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, 1:346; Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:19; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 175; Richard of Devizes, The Chronicle of Richard of Devizes of the Time of King Richard the First, ed. John T. Appleby (London, 1963), 25.

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96  Power and Pleasure In the end, though, courtly love provides a poor lens through which to view sexual activity at John’s court. For instance, paid sex was probably also found at court. One of the offices at the court, to which a small manor was attached, was that of overseeing the court prostitutes. Already established in the time of Henry II, it still existed in 1212 when Henry de Mare held land in Oxfordshire for s­ erving as a royal doorkeeper or usher and managing the royal prostitutes.87 No further evidence survives for prostitution at court, and it is at least possible that the office was a relic of earlier practices. That said, it would hardly be surprising if an ­overwhelmingly male institution that included many powerful and wealthy ­individuals utilized paid sex. More important, John was something of a sexual predator, not only by our standards but by the standards of his own day, and his sexual activities had dangerous political consequences for him. When writers analysed the causes of bar­ on­ial discontent against John, in the decade or two after his death, they continually returned to his sexual activities with baronial women. In discussing the wave of defections by Norman barons that led to the loss of Normandy to Philip Augustus in 1204, the poetic biographer of William Marshal asked, ‘Why could John not win the hearts of his people?’ He referred to the depredations of mercenaries but went on, ‘But that was nothing; if he caused shame concerning men’s wives and daughters, he did not pay two pennies of compensation.’88 Roger of Wendover, discussing the failed conspiracy of 1212 against John, referred to unjust exactions, seizures of land, and exiling of nobles, but started by saying, ‘There were at that time many nobles in the kingdom of England whose wives and daughters (with them murmuring) the king oppresserat’ (I will return to the meaning of opprimo).89 The Waverley Chronicle stated that the baronial rebels of 1215 were motivated by John’s legal tyranny, but also because he had violated (violo) their wives and daughters.90 As we have seen, the Anonymous of Béthune wrote that John ‘was too covetous of beautiful women and because of this he shamed the high men of the land, for which reason he was greatly hated.’91 A fifth passage, from a fragment of a vernacular history of Philip Augustus, dating to the years 1219–26, deserves a little more attention, since although it was published nearly a century ago by Charles Petit-Dutaillis, it has not, to my ­knowledge, been discussed by historians of John’s reign. Describing John on the eve of the Magna Carta Revolt, it states, ‘Then King John was in England and was  signed with the cross. And he desired to keep neither faith nor oath nor 87  Book of Fees 1:103; Danziger and Gillingham, 1215, 32. 88  Encore n’ert de ce nul conte/Mais se il lor feseient honte/De lor femes e de lor filles, Ja n’en fust amendé deus billes. Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:131–2. 89  Erant insuper hac tempestate multi nobiles in regno Anglae quorum rex uxores et filias illis murmurantibus oppresserat; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:63. 90  Uxores filiasque eorum violabat; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 2:282. 91  De bieles femes estoit trop couvoiteus; mainte honte en fist as haus homes de la tierre; par coi il fu moilt haïs; Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 105.

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Aspects of Court Culture  97 agreements with his English. Then he acted worse than before and slept with their wives, daughters, and relatives, either by force or other means, and he judged knights like villeins and caused them to die in his prison and he seized their castles and inheritances. The earls and barons of England gathered together and said they would not endure this anymore.’92 In the decade or so after John’s death, there was clearly a consensus among writers that John’s sexual relations with his barons’ wives and kinswomen were a major source of unrest.93 Their claims receive some corroboration from the fact that some of John’s illegitimate children had noble mothers. Most notably, the Anonymous of Béthune recorded that the mother of Richard of Chilham was a sister of William de Warenne, earl of Surrey, and thus John’s own cousin.94 The mother of another illegitimate son, Osbert Giffard, clearly came from the im­port­ ant if prolific noble family of Giffard, and Sidney Painter made a circumstantial but compelling case that the mother of yet another son, Oliver, was the sister of Fulk fitz Warin, the historical figure upon whom the hero of Fouke le Fitz Waryn is based.95 More speculative cases have been made for other noblewomen as ­mistresses.96 Another type of corroboration comes from other contemporary sources that also referred, if briefly, to John as lustful.97 More important as corroboration were early claims about John’s relations with specific women. It must be noted that some of the most vivid stories about John’s relations with noblewomen were recorded several generations later, and often contain elements that are clearly fanciful. Such stories provide further evidence of John’s reputation for aggressive pursuit of noblewomen, but otherwise are best simply set aside.98 However, two claims come from the period immediately ­following John’s death. William the Breton, an admittedly highly biased source, claimed that John’s half-brother, William Longsword, earl of Salisbury, formerly

92  Li rois Jehans fu en Engleterre, et estoir croisiés, et ne volt tenir ne foi ne sairement ne covenances a ses Englois; ançois lor fist pis que devant, et jut a lor femes et a lor filles, et a lor parentes, et par force et autrement; et rejemboit les chevaliers com vilains et faisoit morir en sa prison, et lor toloit casteax et yretages. Li conte et li baron d’Engleterre trainsent ensemble, et dissent qu’il ne sofferroient mais se; Charles Petit-Dutaillis, ‘Fragment de l’Histoire de Philippe-Auguste, roi de France. Chronique en français des années 1214–1216,’ Bibliothèque de l’École des chartes 87 (1926), 98–141, at 124. 93  The Crowland Abbey chronicler, admittedly, does not make this claim, but he never summarized the causes of baronial anger; Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 232. 94  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 200. 95  Sidney Painter, ‘Who Was the Mother of Oliver Fitz Roy?’ in Fred A. Cazel, ed., Feudalism and Liberty: Articles and Addresses of Sidney Painter (Baltimore, MD, 1961), 240–3. 96 Painter, Reign of King John, 231, 235; Rachel Swallow, ‘Gateways to Power: The Castles of Ranulf III of Chester and Llywelyn the Great of Gwynedd,’ The Archaeological Journal 171 (2014), 289–311, at 299–300. 97  Gerald of Wales, Opera, 5:200; Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ 243–4. 98  William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, 2:521; Harry Rothwell, ed., The Chronicle of Walter of Guisborough, Camden Series (London, 1957), 152–3; William Dugdale, Monasticon Anglicanum, 6 in 8 vols. (London, 1846), 6.1:147; Thomas de Burton, Chronica Monasterii de Melsa, ed. Edward Augustus Bond, 3 vols. (London, 1866–8), 1:403. For debunking of these stories, see Norgate, John Lackland, 289–90; Painter, Reign of King John, 234; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 200–1.

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98  Power and Pleasure one of John’s most loyal supporters, deserted to Louis when the latter invaded England, because John had slept with the earl’s wife when William had been Philip’s prisoner after his capture while leading John’s forces at the Battle of Bouvines.99 Most importantly, the Anonymous of Béthune recorded Robert fitz Walter as claiming that one reason for his flight from England with his family in 1212 was that John had wanted to have sex with his daughter Matilda by force.100 A surprising number of historians, including some who take seriously the sexual charges against John, have raised doubts about this claim because Robert also advanced another reason for his rebellion and the chronicle’s author posited a third.101 Though Robert may of course have lied or the writer could have invented the story, I am baffled by the idea that Robert could not have had more than one motive, or that his claims are suspect because the chronicler did not lay them out logically like a legal brief but instead presented them in a scattershot fashion not uncommon for narrative sources.102 There is also at least some potential corroboration for the claims of some of the writers noted above that John’s sexual aggression prompted active resistance to his rule, though it should be noted that many of the rebels noted below had various possible motives for rebellion, including the calculation, once Louis invaded, that John’s cause was lost. If one believes William the Breton, John’s sexual aggression was the main reason for William Longsword’s desertion. Robert fitz Walter was a key leader of the baronial resistance and another rebel leader, Geoffrey de Mandeville, had been married to Robert’s daughter at the time John allegedly tried to rape her. Fulk fitz Warin led his own minor revolt against John and later joined the baronial revolt.103 John’s illegitimate son, Osbert Giffard, fought for his father, as did other members of the Giffard family, but some were rebels and two were among the staunch rebel defenders of Rochester Castle.104 Earl William de Warenne, brother of one of John’s mistresses, deserted the king after Louis’ invasion, though he quickly turned to the royalist side after John’s death.105 Any individual piece of evidence that John’s sexual relations with noblewomen created an intensive political backlash could be dismissed; medieval chroniclers sometimes invented or credulously repeated slurs and lies or simply made 99  Guillaume le Breton, ‘Gesta Philippi Regis,’ in H.-F.  Delaborde, ed., Oeuvres de Rigord et de Guillaume le Breton, vol. 1 (Paris, 1882), 168–333, at 311. 100  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 121. 101 Norgate, John Lackland, 290–2; Painter, Reign of King John, 234, 261; Warren, King John, 230; Holt, Northerners, 80n5; Turner, King John, 216; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 200–1. 102  For a similar reaction, see Gillingham, ‘Anonymous of Béthune,’ 39n62. 103  Painter, ‘Who Was the Mother of Oliver Fitz Roy?’ 243. For Fulk’s revolt and his later participation in the baronial revolt, see Painter, Reign of King John, 48–52. 104  RLC 241b, 276b, 283b–284a, 286b; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:151. 105  Hugh de Neville, whose wife Painter suggested might have been a mistress, turned a castle over to Louis; Warren, King John, 252; David Carpenter, The Minority of Henry III (London, 1990), 6, 12; Turner, King John, 255; McGlynn, Blood Cries Afar, 171–2; Church, King John, 235; Morris, King John, 279. For doubts about Hugh de Neville’s wife as John’s mistress, see Holt, ‘King John,’ 88–9.

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Aspects of Court Culture  99 mistakes. However, the number of chroniclers who made this claim, and the amount of corroboration (however problematic each individual piece), makes this claim incontrovertible, at least in my view. But what made John’s sexual activity so objectionable? After all, John was certainly not unique as a king in having sexual relations outside of marriage, including with noblewomen. John’s greatgrandfather, Henry I, had had more than twenty illegitimate children, and John’s contemporary and neighbour to the north, William I of Scotland, had several, and in each case some of the mothers were of noble birth.106 John seems to have violated social norms in a way that particularly angered contemporaries, as the very use of the verb violo in the Waverley Chronicle suggests. Of course, any extramarital sex violated religious norms in the period, which may have influenced the views of religious writers on the subject. However, three of the five works stating that John’s sexual activity caused baronial unrest were composed in the vernacular, and thus almost certainly under secular patronage for a secular audience. The claims themselves were about baronial, not ecclesiastical anger. Pious barons may, of course, have been offended by violations of religious norms, but that hardly explains why John’s offences provoked so much more anger than those of other kings. Honour mattered more. In a deeply patriarchal society in which female honour was closely tied to sexual purity, having a female relative engage in extramarital sex, even with a king, could reflect badly on a nobleman’s honour, and two of the vernacular sources explicitly referred to the shame the barons suffered. To be a cuckold was particularly shameful. There were, of course, advantages to having a connection with the king, even of a disreputable nature. The king could compensate for his offences by providing favours and benefits to the families of the women he slept with. Because the king was an important source of prestige, he could even ameliorate any shame by enhancing a family’s honour in other ways. Even with compensation, royal affairs with noblewomen must have been touchy matters. But according to the poem of William Marshal, John provided no compensation worth speaking of, which may even have deepened the shame by suggesting that the king did not judge the affected noble families’ honour worth bothering about. The lack of compensation could have left such nobles simmering with anger, sometimes for years, making them eager to retaliate when the opportunity arose. Most important was the king’s use, at least upon occasion, of force or other forms of coercion. Violence and subtler forms of coercion were certainly not the only ways John obtained sexual gratification, as the gifts to mistresses noted earl­ ier in this section reveal. The romance Fouke le Fitz Waryn claimed that ‘King

106  Given-Wilson and Curteis, Royal Bastards, 60–73; C. Warren Hollister, Henry I (New Haven, CT, 2001), 41–5, 228–31; Alice Taylor, ‘Robert de Londres, Illegitimate Son of William, King of Scots, c. 1170–1225,’ Haskins Society Journal 19 (2008), 99–119. For the development of ideas about il­legit­ im­acy, see Sara McDougall, Royal Bastards: The Birth of Illegitimacy, 800–1230 (Oxford, 2016).

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100  Power and Pleasure John was a man without conscience, evil, contrary, and hated by all good people, and lecherous, and if he could hear of any beautiful lady or maiden, the wife or daughter of earl, or baron, or of any other, he wished to have her at his will; either to entrap her by promise or gift, or to ravish her by force, and for this he was greatly hated.’107 As noted earlier, this is a deeply unreliable source, but the likelihood that one of John’s mistresses may have come from the family (though the romance does not record it) might have caused this aspect of John’s character to stick in family memory. Even if that is not so, the account can still be used as a record of how a medieval king might have used different methods to have sex with noblewomen, including both seduction and rape. The Earl Warenne maintained a cordial relationship with John until Louis’ invasion, and it seems unlikely he would have done so had the king raped his sister. But John may well have used coercion or force in other cases. Roger of Wendover’s term oppresserat, a form of the Latin verb opprimo, is worth investigating further. As is well known, the words rapio and raptus were ambiguous in Roman and medieval law, referring to abduction and elopement as well as rape.108 As a result, when writers wished to describe violently forced co­itus, they had to use other terminology. A common approach in twelfth- and ­thirteenth-century English legal treatises and an important confessors’ manual from late in John’s reign was to use the verb opprimo with an adverb or adverbial phrase denoting violence.109 When readers encountered Roger of Wendover’s passage, they would therefore probably have heard echoes of rape. The lack of an adverb or adverbial phrase, however, suggests that Roger referred to coercion rather than physical violence, and a medieval ruler had many ways to put heavy pressure even on high-status women, including the threat of violence, but also of unjust exactions or other abuses of power. That said, two sources, the anonymous biographer of Philip Augustus and Robert fitz Walter (as recorded in the Anonymous of Béthune), clearly accused John of rape or attempted rape. The likelihood that John was a rapist, at least upon occasion, needs to be taken seriously.

107  Hathaway et al., eds., Fouke le Fitz Waryn, 35. 108  J.  B.  Post, ‘Ravishment of Women and the Statutes of Westminster,’ in J.  H.  Baker, ed., Legal Records and the Historian (London, 1978), 150–64; James A. Brundage, ‘Rape and Seduction in the Medieval Canon Law,’ in Vern  L.  Bullough and James  A.  Brundage, eds., Sexual Practices and the Medieval Church (Buffalo, NY, 1982), 141–8, 262–6; John Marshall Carter, Rape and Medieval England: An Historical and Sociological Study (Lanham, MD, 1985), 35–9; Kathryn Gravdal, Ravishing Maidens: Writing Rape in Medieval French Literature and Law (Philadelphia, PA, 1991), 2–11; Corinne J. Saunders, Rape and Ravishment in the Literature of Medieval England (Cambridge, 2001), 33–119; Caroline Dunn, Stolen Women in Medieval England: Rape, Abduction, and Adultery, 1100–1500 (Cambridge, 2013), 18–81. 109  Felix Liebermann, Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen (Halle, 1903–16), 1:256–7, 346–7; G. D. G. Hall, ed., The Treatise on the Laws and Customs of the Realm of England, Commonly Called Glanvill (Oxford, 1993), 175–6; George  E.  Woodbine, ed., Bracton on the Laws and Customs of England, 4 vols. (Cambridge, MA, 1968–77), 2:403, 415; Thomas of Chobham, Thomae de Chobham Summa Confessorum, ed. F. Broomfield (Louvain, 1968), 353.

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Aspects of Court Culture  101 Not surprisingly, the thirteenth-century reactions to John as a sexual predator overlapped with modern ones but also differed in important ways. It is likely that any sexual relations between John and non-noblewomen, including rape, would have been considered a personal and religious issue rather than a political cause. Power and class, of course, matter today, but not to the same degree. But even with noblewomen, medieval and modern views diverge. Strikingly, several of the medieval claims about John’s sexual relations with noblewomen do not say whether they involved coercion or seduction. As Ruth Karras has shown, in medieval discussions, the consent of women or lack thereof was often irrelevant to the (generally male) writers.110 The sources discussed here concern the grievances of medieval men, not women. To some degree this reflects the fact that men were the main political actors, so their grievances had the most political impact. However, it also reflects the contemporary view that men were also victims in cases of sexual crimes against their female relatives, and that family honour was a more important issue than female consent. This is not to say that medieval women lacked agency; John’s first, discarded wife, who had many reasons to dislike her former husband, participated in the rebellion against him, at first with her new husband, Geoffrey de Mandeville, but after his death on her own.111 Nonetheless, in this deeply patriarchal society, John’s abuse of noblemen’s honour probably mattered more than the abuse of noblewomen’s bodies that had caused the shame. In any case, John’s pursuit of sexual gratification was clearly an aspect of court life that created severe political tensions.

4.8  Power, Pleasure, and Self-Gratification Some of the general ways in which the activities and phenomena discussed above could enhance King John’s power will be obvious. Art, music, entertainers, and military pomp could all increase the king’s reputation as a wealthy and magnificent ruler. Though cultural gaps between our own society and John’s make it hard to fully determine what activities provided the most cultural capital in Western Europe around the year 1200, command of the intricacies of chivalry and courtly love would almost certainly boost a king’s status among the secular aristocracy, as a reputation for learning certainly could among the clergy.112 The ability to provide various forms of entertainment, including music, entertainers, gambling, and prostitutes, would, one imagines, enhance the king’s reputation as a generous host and gracious lord. Military pomp, including martial music, golden banners, 110  Ruth Mazo Karras, Sexuality in Medieval Europe: Doing unto Others, 3rd ed. (New York, 2017), 155–61, 173–8. 111  Nicholas Vincent, ‘A Queen in Rebel London, 1215–17,’ in Linda Clark and Elizabeth Danbury, eds., ‘A Verray Parfit Praktisour’: Essays Presented to Carole Rawcliffe (Woodbridge, 2017), 23–50. 112  For kings and learning, see John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:250–6.

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102  Power and Pleasure gilded lances, and Tristan’s sword, may not have been as important to military success as hiring soldiers, gathering supplies, and stockpiling arms, all of which John also arranged, but could boost morale and help gain a king a reputation as a leader worth following. John’s military failures ultimately deprived him of such a reputation, but he clearly made an effort to create the best image possible under the circumstances. Many of the specific activities I have noted in this section had specific benefits. The singing of the Laudes regiae was part of an effort I will discuss in Chapter 5 to emphasize the sacral aspects of kingship. John’s lion with its heraldic ties and quasi-totemic status could have enhanced his reputation as a fierce king. Playing ‘tables’ and gambling with close followers could reinforce those friends’ ties to the king. Knighting King William of Scotland’s son, the future Alexander II, visibly demonstrated the dominance John had gained through his campaign against that kingdom in 1209.113 Even John’s sexual activities, including those within the aristocracy, may have had certain political benefits by giving him a reputation for aggressive virility and allowing him to display dominance over his nobles. To what degree John and his advisors consciously used the kinds of cultural activities discussed here to enhance royal power is unclear. Certainly, con­tem­por­ ar­ies were aware of the possibilities: Hugh Nunant, bishop of Coventry, and Gerald of Wales claimed that during the Third Crusade, Richard’s chancellor and effective regent, William Longchamp, bishop of Ely, patronized singers and jesters so that they would write and sing songs that would enhance his reputation.114 Some scholars argue for the Plantagenets in general very consciously using Arthurian legend and other cultural material as propaganda.115 I am somewhat sceptical about the extent to which kings directly used contemporary secular ­literature, but the arguments of these scholars are worth considering, and it is unlikely that John and his courtiers paid no thought to the propaganda value of owning the sword of Tristan. Tradition, an instinctual grasp of how culture could enhance royal power, and conscious planning to build the royal image probably all played a role in making many of the cultural practices discussed here sources of soft power. As with hunting, however, other obvious sources of royal and aristocratic prestige could be contested. This is easiest to demonstrate with military pomp. Just as John of Salisbury sought to undermine the prestige secular aristocrats gained 113  Bjorn Weiler is right to note the political complexity of high-profile thirteenth-century knightings in general and this one in particular, and to stress that William and Alexander benefited from it as well, but he would no doubt acknowledge that John’s display of dominance was an important aspect of the ceremony; Weiler, ‘Knighting, Homage, and the Meaning of Ritual,’ 283-4. 114 Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:143; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 4:427; Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 85–6. 115  This is the theme of several articles, including the editor’s, in Aurell, ed., Culture politique des Plantagenêt.

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Aspects of Court Culture  103 from hunting, so too he took aim at what he saw as their overblown military ­pretensions. Drawing his terminology from the classics, as so often, he attacked vainglorious knights (milites gloriosi) who gilded their shields and military equipment and made ‘a memorial for the ages’ if they broke a lance, ‘or if a bit of gold is knocked from their shield,’ aiming precisely at the kind of decorated arms and armour that John’s government subsequently purchased.116 More pointedly, John’s own critics used his employment of military pomp against him. When the Anonymous of Béthune and Ralph of Coggeshall wrote that he sounded the trumpets or raised his standard against Prince Louis but then withdrew, they were using his entirely standard use of trumpets and banners to create an implicit contrast between martial posturing and cowardly retreat.117 English royal heraldic lions may seem more heroic than the French royal armorial symbol, the fleurde-lis, but that only made it more satisfying for Gerald of Wales, who had become a harsh critic of the Plantagenets and eager champion of the Capetians by the end of John’s reign, to refer to the lilies of the French kings routing the ‘atrocious and voracious beasts, bears, leopards, and lions,’ when talking about Philip’s 1214 victory over John’s coalition.118 The nickname of Softsword that chroniclers sometimes applied to John, especially in France, powerfully undermined the effort John made to create a heroic martial image. As I have stressed, however, one should not view court culture solely through the lens of power. An indirect way of making this point is to consider several missed opportunities for John to build up soft power. In Chapter 2, I noted John’s refusal to embrace tournaments, which his enemies may have used against him. His apparent disinterest in the prestigious game of chess is a similar example of him forgoing an obvious source of status. Yet another lost opportunity concerns the patronage of writers. Nicholas Vincent has written on the ‘strange case’ of the missing biographies of the Plantagenet kings, noting that unlike their AngloNorman predecessors and Capetian contemporaries, John’s family did not seem intent on having flattering biographies of themselves written. Vincent has suggested some important reasons for the absence of such biographies: the fallout from Thomas Becket’s death made it awkward for churchmen to write laudatory biographies of Henry II or his descendants, while infighting within the family made it less likely that they would commission posthumous biographies for each other. Nonetheless, if John could find clerical administrators to stand by him throughout the interdict, he could have found ones to write flattering reports of him. In the end, as Vincent suggests, John and other members of the dynasty may 116  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:11–13. John’s reference was no doubt to Plautus’s play, Miles Gloriosus, but in the context it seems fitting to translate miles as knight rather than the classical soldier. 117 Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 169–70; Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 182. 118  Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 720–1.

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104  Power and Pleasure simply have had no interest in promoting such works.119 This was a lost ­op­por­tun­ity not only for John and his predecessors to enhance their reputation for posterity, but also to improve their contemporary reputation. One could argue that John was simply not very adept at building soft power, but this ignores the fact that his more successful relatives also ignored some of these opportunities. Another explanation is that perhaps kings and their courtiers did not devote every waking moment and all their efforts to building soft power. Sometimes, perhaps, kings just wanted to enjoy themselves. An even more important point is that cultural practices at court sometimes undermined royal power. The church’s avowed opposition to worldly pomp meant that some of the cultural activities that enhanced royal glory also undermined royal claims to sacral kingship. As usual, the most rhetorically powerful critic of the worldly court was John of Salisbury. Some of his criticisms were very broad, as when he attacked flattery and the misuse of gifts.120 However, others related to the specific practices discussed in this chapter. Though he did not entirely reject court entertainments when practised in sober moderation, he stressed that moral, social, and religious dangers lurked everywhere. Gaming and gambling could lead to lying, squandering property, and theft. Love songs were rustic and foolish. Entertainers were a harmful form of self-indulgent luxury as well as being distastefully obscene. In one passage, he praised good hosts but condemned those who squandered money on prostitutes, musicians, and entertainers of many different kinds, or on feeding ‘lions, bears, monkeys, monsters, and abuses of nature of this sort.’ In another passage, he depicted entertainers and prostitutes as a waste of royal resources, which he stated belonged to the kingdom rather than the king himself.121 He criticized kings who engaged in extramarital sex and condemned courtiers pimping their wives, daughters, and sons to gain royal favour.122 For John of Salisbury, the indulgences of the court undermined the fitness of soldiers, contributing to the alleged military failings of his own day.123 John’s voice was that of a preacher, and no doubt the vast majority of contemporaries, including the clerics, took his criticisms of royal courts as councils of perfection. Nonetheless, such attacks did undermine the attempts of kings to claim a moral and religious high ground. In secular terms, there were also trade-offs. As John of Salisbury pointed out, the resources kings invested in entertainments came at the cost of military investments. King John’s relatively modest investments in entertainment and pomp

119  Nicholas Vincent, ‘The Strange Case of the Missing Biographies: The Lives of the Plantagenet Kings of England 1154–1272,’ in David Bates, Julia  C.  Crick, and Sarah Hamilton, eds., Writing Medieval Biography, 750–1250: Essays in Honour of Professor Frank Barlow (Woodbridge, 2006), 237–57. 120  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:177–90, 205–9, 216–32, 330–4, 346–50. 121  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:245, 247; 2:32. 122  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:216–21, 247–8. 123  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:9–13, 40–1.

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Aspects of Court Culture  105 paled in comparison to his investments in hunting, let alone in warfare, and ­probably paid for themselves in soft power. Nonetheless, here too there was a trade-off, in this case between soft power and the hard power that money could buy in the form of soldiers and military equipment. More important, King John’s dangerous and disastrous sexual pursuit of noblewomen indicates that he was quite willing to sacrifice power for self-gratification. In this respect, it seems to me, historians have underestimated the impact on the politics of the reign of this important aspect of court life, ignoring contemporary writers in doing so. Three of the five passages discussed above explicitly describe John’s aggressive pursuit of noblewomen as a crucial part of the baronial unrest at the end of John’s reign that led to Magna Carta, yet modern works on that document have little to say about the subject. Sir James Holt, the greatest late ­twentieth-century scholar on the subject, did not mention the charges at all in his book on Magna Carta and devoted only a footnote in The Northerners, about many of the baronial rebels, to disputing two specific allegations, ignoring the more general ones.124 Vincent, in his 2012 history of Magna Carta, made several brief, in some cases dismissive, allusions to various charges, but did not discuss the general allegations in any detail.125 To his credit, David Carpenter, in his 2015 work on the subject, did describe John’s sexual aggression as one of two key charges against him. Otherwise, however, he discussed them only briefly.126 Some bio­graph­ers of John’s reign have given credence to some of the allegations, some have not, but in contrast to the medieval writers discussed above, they have almost all treated them as a minor factor in the politics of the reign, devoting between a paragraph and two or three pages to them.127 Even Sidney Painter, the biographer who devoted the most attention to John’s sexual activities, did not draw attention to the consistent claims of contemporary writers about their political im­port­ance.128 Recently, Stephen Church has argued that concerns about John’s sex life are primarily modern, writing that John’s production of many ­illegitimate children ‘has given many modern historians—many still languishing under the delusion that our hang-ups about sex are the same as those held by our medieval ancestors—the opportunity to heap opprobrium on the heads of monarchs who bedded women other than their wives.’129 Our concerns and hang-ups about sex are indeed different from theirs, but pace Church, modern historians have treated the king’s sexual activities as far less important than medieval

124 Holt, Magna Carta; Holt, Northerners, 80n5. 125 Vincent, Magna Carta, 43–4, 50, 57. 126 Carpenter, Magna Carta, 79–80, 92, 275–6, 282. See also Carpenter, The Minority of Henry III, 5–6, 30. 127 Warren, King John, 189–90, 230; Turner, King John, 215–16; Morris, King John, 295; Lachaud, Jean sans Terre, 200–1. See also McGlynn, Blood Cries Afar, 127–8. Gillingham stressed the im­port­ ance and weight of the sexual charges but not in a context that allowed elaboration; Gillingham, ‘Anonymous of Béthune,’ 38–9. 128 Painter, Reign of King John, 231–5. 129 Church, King John, 86–7.

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106  Power and Pleasure commentators did and have downplayed the chroniclers’ claims about political consequences. There are various reasons modern historians have generally paid so little attention to the signal importance medieval writers placed on the political ramifications of King John’s sexual aggression. The starkest general accusation about John as a rapist, in the fragmentary biography of Philip Augustus, has remained unknown. The surviving royal records provide much more evidence on other sources of unrest in the reign, particularly financial ones, than on sexual grievances, and historians tend to go where the evidence is. Magna Carta itself does not address the issue, though this is hardly surprising. As Holt noted, Magna Carta mainly advanced claims about pointed disputes of law, but no one had to legally establish that it was wrong for monarchs to rape or have affairs with the wives and daughters of their barons.130 Moreover, the document had to be approved by the king, who was unlikely to formally admit to such deeds, so the rebels would have had to address these issues informally. Almost certainly our own society’s difficulties in coming to grips with sexual violence or even ac­know­ledg­ing its widespread nature have spilled over into the area of historical inquiry. Moreover, when the issues have been discussed, historians tend to treat John as a defendant in court, assessing each problematic piece of evidence for judicial proof rather than looking at patterns and probabilities, as we would do for other his­tor­ic­al issues. The later, clearly fictionalized accounts of John’s pursuit of noblewomen appear to have discredited more contemporary evidence, though why this should be the case is unclear. A final reason, the one most pertinent to the subject of the book, is a tendency to look at court life and cultural issues as politically insignificant compared to military, fiscal, judicial, and institutional power. John’s fiscal exactions and misuse of royal justice certainly enraged his barons, but so too did his pursuit, sometimes by coercion, of sexual gratification from the wives and relatives of his barons. The focus on hard power and the tendency to treat many aspects of court life as frivolous has, I would argue, caused modern his­tor­ians to seriously underestimate the political impact of John’s aggressive sexual pursuit of noblewomen. The sources of cultural patronage in the central Middle Ages were diverse and diffuse. Besides the royal courts, there were noble and knightly households, ­bishops, monasteries, and nunneries. In a recent book, I stressed the neglected im­port­ance of a less well-known group: wealthy clerics beneath the level of ­bishop.131 Nor should one ignore the contribution of townspeople and peasants in producing various aspects of medieval culture. But courts were important sources of patronage, as this chapter shows. King John was clearly not the greatest cultural patron among medieval kings, but he and his court nonetheless

130  See especially Holt, Magna Carta, 254.

131 Thomas, Secular Clergy, 298–319.

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Aspects of Court Culture  107 ­atronized a wide variety of cultural activities from learning and music to p ­gambling and the acquisition of exotic animals. And while John was not the most chivalric of kings and was a dangerous sexual predator, both chivalry and romance had at least a minor presence at his court. Life at his court was rich. Yet John’s sexual aggression should remind us that for all the cultural richness of medieval courts, they were also places where kings could abuse their power in the ugliest of ways in the pursuit of self-gratification.

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5

Religious Practices at Court 5.1  Introduction On 23 November 1200, the body of Hugh of Avalon, Bishop of Lincoln, who had recently died in London, was brought to Lincoln for burial. King John, King William of Scotland, and a number of secular and ecclesiastical magnates in Lincoln for a great council went out from the city to meet the body. Bishop Hugh, who had a reputation for saintliness and would subsequently be canonized, had often challenged and chastised the Angevin kings, who nonetheless maintained good relations with him. John ‘put aside royal pride’ and joined archbishops and bishops in carrying Hugh’s coffin. ‘Humbly submitting their necks,’ and ignoring the mud and filth, they trudged down the road in their finery to the city gate, where they relinquished their burden to other magnates who wished a similar honour. In conjunction with the great council and the funeral, John subsequently met with a crowd of Cistercian abbots, with whom he had been having a fierce dispute over their reluctance to pay new taxes. The abbots prostrated themselves before John, but he urged them to rise up and prostrated himself in turn, weep­ ing, and sought reconciliation, promising to build a Cistercian house. He kept this promise by founding Beaulieu Abbey.1 These are not the kinds of religious scenes one normally associates with King John, whose reputation for impiety in his own day most modern historians have left unchallenged. Yet a recent book by Paul Webster, King John and Religion, shows that religious activities were thoroughly woven into his daily life, chal­len­ ging the traditional picture of his irreligiousness. Despite his reputation, John took measures to ensure he had access to religious worship on a regular basis; participated fully in the cult of saints; supported monks, nuns, and hermits; made sure family members received religious commemoration; and frequently gave alms to the poor. Webster has described John’s religious life in detail, showing how the king maintained an ‘infrastructure of personal religion.’ Since inevitably 1  For accounts of these events, see Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 102–12; Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:225–32; Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:171; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:141–5; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 1:25; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:307; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 7:114–16. For Hugh, see Henry Mayr-Harting, St. Hugh of Lincoln (Oxford, 1987). For Beaulieu Abbey, see S. F. Hockey, Beaulieu: King John’s Abbey, A History of Beaulieu Abbey Hampshire, 1204–1538 (London, 1976); C. J. Holdsworth, ‘Royal Cistercians: Beaulieu, Her Daughters and Rewley,’ Thirteenth-Century England 4 (1992), 139–50.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0005

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Religious Practices at Court  109 this infrastructure encompassed the whole royal court, Webster has thoroughly covered religious life there.2 I will therefore dispense with the sort of descriptive section found in previous chapters. Instead, I will begin by illustrating some precise ways in which John’s personal religious life shaped the court’s religious life. I will then argue that many aspects of religious life at John’s court were designed to show the religiosity of the king and, to a lesser degree, his courtiers, in order to create an aura of piety. Medievalists have long shown interest in sacral kingship and the religious ­reputations of kings because religious authority could provide rulers with a par­ ticularly potent form of soft power. However, this is also an area in which medi­ eval­ists often think of contestation. The old warhorse of ‘church and state’ means that we are acutely aware of how ecclesiastical figures undermined sacral kingship and challenged the religious authority of kings. A more specific historiography argues that the decline of sacral power was particularly acute in England, where kings focused on hard power through building administrations to raise money, particularly in comparison to Capetian France, where sacral kingship supposedly remained more robust. Nicholas Vincent has argued that this contrast is over­ stated, and that the Plantagenets were interested in strengthening those aspects of sacral kingship still available, but until very recently, few historians have paid attention to this phenomenon in Angevin England.3 Webster’s findings show that John did not ignore the religious aspects of kingship, and I will use the evidence of the religious activity at John’s court to support Vincent’s argument. Yet there is no doubt that the Angevins had limited success in their efforts and that John in particular failed badly, given the hostility to him in so many of the ecclesiastical sources. There are obvious and well-known reasons for these dynastic and per­ sonal failures, but I will focus on more subtle day-to-day ways in which John, despite trying assiduously to build up his religious authority, undermined his own efforts, making it easier for his critics to shape the deeply negative picture of his piety they passed on to posterity. In previous chapters, I have shown the ways in which pleasure and power were intertwined and the ways they could clash. Religion added a third complication. On an obvious level, because royal authority derived partly from religious author­ ity, the pursuit of sinful pleasure was one way that pleasure could undermine power. Paradoxically, however, the pursuit of piety had parallels with the pursuit of pleasure in its potential to weaken royal power. Money spent for religious pur­ poses was money that could not be spent on hiring soldiers, and raising that 2 Webster, King John and Religion. The quotation is at p. 193. 3  Nicholas Vincent, ‘The Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings of England, 1154–1272,’ in Colin Morris and Peter Roberts, eds., Pilgrimage: The English Experience from Becket to Bunyan (Cambridge, 2002), 12–45, at 39–40; Nicholas Vincent, ‘King Henry III and the Blessed Virgin Mary,’ in R. N. Swanson, ed., The Church and Mary (Woodbridge, 2004), 126–46, at 127; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 328.

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110  Power and Pleasure money could exacerbate the king’s political problems. Most medieval kings relied heavily on resources obtained from the churches of their lands; how could they fulfil pious demands to give these up without losing power? Ideally, a medieval monarch tried to make all three imperatives work together, using pious deeds to build up sacral kingship while trying to provide churches enough practical bene­ fits so that exploitation of church resources was forgiven, and perhaps taking pleasure in attending religious services, hearing sacred music, and observing beautiful churches, all the while trying to achieve salvation.4 In practice, juggling the three was difficult, and a final aim of this chapter is to observe some of the ways in which these difficulties manifested themselves.

5.2  John’s Personal Religion and Religious Life at Court Studies of great households in the later Middle Ages show that the household was, among other things, a religious unit. The religious practices that shaped the daily lives of great magnates also shaped the daily rhythms of their household.5 The same would have been true of the royal court. As Vincent has argued for the Plantagenets generally and Webster for John more particularly, religious concerns even shaped the court’s movements. John’s journeys could be seen in part, in Vincent’s terms, as perpetual pilgrimage. His journeys took him to eight or nine cathedral cities every year and he was often at places with cathedrals or major monastic churches on important religious festivals.6 Where John went, the royal court went, and a payment for the offerings that knights (presumably household knights) made alongside the king when he venerated relics in early November 1212 at Reading Abbey shows that members of his household could join him in religious ceremonies on visits to important churches.7 John took great care to cre­ ate new chapels at favourite royal dwellings in his itinerary and to provide these and existing ones with vestments, books, and liturgical items. He also maintained a travelling chapel close by at all times, and at least part of his relic collection travelled with him—indeed, the mobile chapel was a major loss in the disaster to his baggage train in the Wash shortly before his death. Fixed and movable chapels provided regular access to religious services not only for the king, but also for his

4  For enjoyment of sacred music, see Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 97; Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:86–7. 5 Mertes, English Noble Household, 139–60; Woolgar, Great Household, 84–6, 90–6, 176–9. 6  Vincent, ‘Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings,’ 12–45; Vincent, ‘King Henry III and the Blessed Virgin Mary,’ 129–31; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 306–8; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 268–9; Webster, King John and Religion, 38–42; Paul Webster, ‘Making Space for King John to Pray: The Evidence of the Royal Itinerary,’ in Alison  L.  Gascoigne, Leonie  V.  Hicks, and Marianne O’Doherty, eds., Medieval Routes in Europe and the Middle East (Turnhout, 2016), 259–86. 7  Misae 14J 246.

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Religious Practices at Court  111 court, or at least its leading members.8 That the court as a whole observed the standard religious fasts of the period is revealed by the occasional distribution of alms when leading administrators, courtiers, and mercenary captains broke fast.9 Religious practices were simply part of court life.

5.3  The Projection of a Pious Image Medievalists have been concerned with sacral kingship at least since Marc Bloch’s work on beliefs that the king’s touch could heal and Ernst Kantorowicz’s work on the Laudes regiae.10 Much work has been done on sacral kingship in the early Middle Ages, especially for the Ottonian dynasty.11 The reason for this interest is that sacral kingship was such an important source of power, capable of creating respect verging on awe for kings. The more closely the king was associated with God and the more the wills of the king and God were perceived as aligned, the more obedience became a religious duty. Moreover, sacral kingship justified the authority rulers often had over the church in their realms, authority that provided kings with resources and the ability to appoint loyal ecclesiastical servants to positions of power and wealth. It is no surprise then that even kings who might not have been particularly pious would want to cultivate an aura of religiosity. The routine religious activities of the king and his courtiers meant that at the very least, any visitor to court would have seen the king’s entourage carrying out basic Christian functions. However, other religious practices would have broadcast the piety of the king and his court more forcibly, and some could foster an image of kingship as sacred. Certain ceremonies were intended precisely for that purpose. Chief among these were the inaugurations and other coronations of John and Isabella discussed in Chapter  3.12 As noted earlier, little information survives on these rituals, but they were clearly imbued with sacral associations, from the reli­ gious ceremonies that accompanied them to the royal clothing that had similarities to ecclesiastical vestments and the items of regalia that were explicitly associated with Christian virtues. John’s choice to be consecrated as king of England on the Feast of the Ascension underscored the sacral nature of that ceremony. 8  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 183–4; Webster, King John and Religion, 24–7, 56; Webster, ‘Making Space,’ 271–7. See also PR3J xix; Vincent, ‘Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings,’ 34. 9 Webster, King John and Religion, 119–20. For the standards of fasting in the period, see Bridget Ann Henisch, Fast and Feast: Food in Medieval Society (University Park, PA, 1976), 28–33. The figures involved were Geoffrey fitz Peter, William Briwerre, Thomas Basset twice, Richard Marsh, Thomas de Samford, Henry fitz Count, and Hugh de Boves. 10  Marc Bloch, Les rois thaumaturges. Étude sur le caractère surnaturel attribué á la puissance royale particulièrement en France et en Angleterre (Paris, 1924); Ernst  H.  Kantorowicz, Laudes Regiae: A Study in Liturgical Acclamations and Mediaeval Ruler Worship (Berkeley, CA, 1946). 11 For instance Karl Leyser, Rule and Conflict in an Early Medieval Society: Ottonian Saxony (London, 1979), 83–107. 12  See Chapter 3, 68—69.

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112  Power and Pleasure The great royal feasts at Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost provided important regular occasions to celebrate sacral kingship. Contemporaries were very con­ scious of these celebrations as religious events. For instance, when praising Richard I’s lavish celebration of Christmas in Sicily during the Third Crusade, one chronicler stressed the honour due a religious feast so closely linked to the redemption of humanity.13 The regular performance of the Laudes regiae on these feast days was particularly important. I have already noted these performances in a musical context, but their most important purpose was to celebrate the close­ ness between rulers and God.14 As Ernst Kantorowicz wrote, ‘The laudes invoke the conquering God—Christ the victor, ruler, and commander—and acclaim in him, with him, or through him his imperial or royal vicars on earth.’15 Dramatic ceremonies in specific circumstances such as the funeral of Hugh of Avalon could also advertise the king’s religiosity. A particularly important one, designed to publicize John’s reconciliation with the church, came after John had made peace with the pope, when the formerly exiled bishops, led by Archbishop Stephen Langton, came to the king at Winchester. As the Waverley Chronicle and Roger of Wendover described it, the two sides staged an effective piece of political theatre. John fell at the feet of the bishops, weeping and asking for mercy, where­ upon they tearfully raised him up. John kissed Stephen Langton, and the bishops led him into Winchester Cathedral where they then absolved him, chanting psalm 50 in the Vulgate ordering of the psalms. This psalm, attributed to a repent­ ant King David, a key Old Testament model for sacral kingship, begins: ‘Have mercy on me Lord, according to your great mercy.’ To cement the image of reli­ gious harmony, the king heard mass with the archbishop presiding, and then offered a mark of gold on the altar. Afterwards, the king and the bishops feasted together with secular nobles. According to Wendover, the magnates wept with joy at the king’s absolution, suggesting the political theatre was effective.16 As Webster shows, John was a reasonably generous donor to religious houses and orders.17 Some of John’s grander acts of ecclesiastical patronage were also large and costly advertisements for his piety. His endowment of lands and churches for Beaulieu allowed it to become a reasonably wealthy Cistercian house, and he invested approximately £2,000 in cash and movables in building the abbey and stocking its lands.18 Perhaps even more important politically was John’s patronage of churches in Rouen, above all the cathedral, which Webster studied

13  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 172. 14  See Chapter 4, 80. 15 Kantorowicz, Laudes Regiae, 14. 16  Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 2:276; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 81–2; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 3:36. 17 Webster, King John and Religion, 29–32, 61–84. 18  This is Webster’s calculation; Hockey has a slightly smaller figure; Hockey, Beaulieu: King John’s Abbey, 10–27; Webster, King John and Religion, 61–71; Holdsworth, ‘Royal Cistercians,’ 145–6.

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Religious Practices at Court  113 in particular detail.19 After Rouen Cathedral suffered a devastating fire early in his reign, John granted 2,300 livres (£575 sterling) for repairs and rebuilding. One of John’s own documents described the cathedral as the mother church of Normandy, and in his ultimately unsuccessful efforts to rally the Normans against Philip Augustus, his support for the cathedral provided an opportunity to show that he was a good and pious duke.20 A steady stream of smaller gifts to a wide variety of religious houses, including timber and lead for building, precious vest­ ments, and tithes of venison, provided frequent reminders of the king’s generosity and piety.21 In particular, John made frequent gifts of small sums of cash to nun­ neries. Since many nunneries were small and financially struggling, this was a potentially effective and low-cost means of gaining the gratitude of poor but influential religious figures.22 An especially clever example of John’s generosity to religious women was the gifts of nearly half a million salted herrings he made during his thirteenth and fourteenth years to nunneries throughout his kingdom. This was during the interdict, and for nuns to go to court or send representatives to obtain money from an excommunicated king would have been problematic, but the deliveries of fish could be organized through John’s sheriffs and the market­place, thus sparing them contact with an excommunicate. The complicated logistics themselves would have ensured widespread awareness of the king’s claims to piety in the face of papal sanctions against him.23 One specific type of gift to religious houses, relics, not only helped the king cultivate a reputation for pious generosity but also associated him with the cult of saints. John’s gifts included two very prestigious alleged relics: a piece of the Holy Sepulchre, brought back by Richard I from crusade, which John gave to Battle Abbey, and the head of Philip the Apostle, possibly obtained indirectly from the sack of Constantinople in 1204, which he gave to Reading Abbey. The latter was encased in a golden reliquary studded with gems.24 Another gift of relics probably had a pointed political as well as religious message. Shortly before the fall of 19  Paul Webster, ‘King John and Rouen: Royal Itineration, Kingship, and the Norman “Capital”, c.  1199–1204,’ in Leonie  V.  Hicks and E.  Brenner, eds., Society and Culture in Medieval Rouen, 911–1300 (Turnhout, 2013), 309–37; Webster, King John and Religion, 50–1, 88. 20  RLCh 100b. 21  For gifts of building materials, see RL 60, 70; RN 85; RLC 25b, 87a, 148a, 150a, 151b, 182a, 229a, 280b; Pipe Roll Ireland 14J 16–17. For gifts of hangings, vestments, and jewels, see RLP 37b; RLC 175a; Simpson, ‘Two Inventories,’ 494–5; Thorpe, ed., Registrum Roffense, 123; ‘Abstract of a Shorter Chronicle of Battle,’ in J.  S.  Brewer, ed., Chronicon Monasterii de Bello (London, 1846), at 184. For tithes of hunting, see RLC 140a; RLP 44b, RLCh 136a, 189b. For an excellent discussion of such gifts in the reign of Henry II, see Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 57–76. 22 Webster, King John and Religion, 120–2. 23  PR13J 8, 43, 69, 94, 109, 111, 113, 126, 131, 139, 164, 188, 221, 236, 251, 254, 261; PR14J 11, 18, 23, 27, 46, 51, 58, 71, 77, 82, 87, 102, 113, 124, 129, 136, 161. For other religious activities during the interdict, see Webster, King John and Religion, 159–61. 24  ‘Shorter Chronicle of Battle,’ 184; B.  R.  Kemp, ed., Reading Abbey Cartularies: British Library Manuscripts, Egerton 3031, Harley 1708, and Cotton Vespasian E XXV, 2 vols., Camden 4th ser., 31, 33 (London, 1986–7), 1:75–6, 188–9; Vincent, ‘Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings,’ 34; Webster, King John and Religion, 55–6.

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114  Power and Pleasure Normandy, John granted to Rouen Cathedral relics of St Samson and St Magloire, seized from Dol Cathedral in 1203 during his campaign against the Bretons. We only have a brief notice of the gift, but one may speculate that John had multiple purposes for this ‘sacra furta’ or sacred theft. The trophies provided evidence of triumph in war at a time when confidence in John’s military skills was declining. Successful relic theft could be construed as indicating that saintly support had shifted from the Bretons to John and the Normans. Thus, taking the relics not only punished his enemies, whom he considered rebels, but could also be seen as a sign that God shared his views. Conferring the relics on Rouen was another opportunity to show his good and pious lordship in Normandy.25 John also took care to associate himself with living holy people, partly no doubt to improve his religious reputation. He often provided hermits, anchorites, and anchoresses with royal largesse, and sometimes arranged for them to live near favoured royal ­hunting lodges, such as Brill or Clipston.26 An even broader way of advertising royal piety was the practice of giving alms to the poor.27 John’s reign includes the first recorded ‘Royal Maundy,’ in which kings gave food and clothing to the poor on the Thursday before Easter.28 John also regularly distributed alms throughout the year through royal almoners. Special grants of alms occurred when the king hunted on saints’ days or he or his officials broke religious fasts; as a form of commemoration for predecessors; and in times of famine. His generosity could be on a large scale. In the spring and summer of 1203, during a time of famine, the royal government fed a total of 500  poor in Gloucester, Bristol, Devonshire, and Cornwall for nearly three months. In the following year it fed 2,100 poor people for over three months in places ran­ging from Exeter to London, at a cost of over £300.29 Over the course of John’s reign the court would have fed many thousands of poor scattered through­ out England (and no doubt the king’s other lands), and thousands more would have witnessed these testaments to the pious generosity of the king and his court.

25  Webster, ‘King John and Rouen,’ 331. The classic work on relic theft is Patrick J. Geary, Furta Sacra: Thefts of Relics in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton, NJ, 1991). For other indications of John’s interest in the cult of relics, see Webster, King John and Religion, 37–60; Emma Mason, ‘St Wulfstan’s Staff and Its Uses,’ Medium Aevum 53 (1984), 157–79. 26  RLC 20a; RLCh 158b; Webster, King John and Religion, 122–4. 27 Hilda Johnstone, ‘Poor-Relief in the Royal Households of Thirteenth-Century England,’ Speculum 4 (1929), 149–67, at 152–3; Charles R. Young, ‘King John and England: An Illustration of the Medieval Practice of Charity,’ Church History 29 (1960), 264–74; Webster, King John and Religion, 110–30; Katherine Harvey, http://magnacartaresearch.blogspot.co.uk/2014/03/an-un-christian-kingking-john-and.html. For the way in which almsgiving could act as a public spectacle, see Marta VanLandingham, Transforming the State: King, Court and Political Culture in the Realms of Aragon (1213–1378) (Leiden, 2002), 111–13. 28 Arnold Kellett, ‘King John in Knaresborough: The First Known Royal Maundy,’ Yorkshire Archaeological Review 62 (1990), 69–90; Webster, King John and Religion, 117–18. 29  PR5J 59, 71, 80; RL 95–6; PR6J 80, 94, 106, 121, 146, 176, 177, 187, 248; Webster, King John and Religion, 94, 114–15. See also Johnstone, ‘Poor-Relief,’ 153; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 91–2.

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Religious Practices at Court  115 John’s embrace of the many possible facets of Christian kingship fell far short of his son’s enthusiastically pious activity, but as Webster has argued, John did the sorts of things kings were expected to do. In the process, he and his courtiers demonstrated the Angevin concern with sacral kingship that Vincent has empha­ sized. Occasionally John could be quite adept at performing Christian kingship— indeed, Henry Mayr-Harting has commented on John’s able use of Hugh of Avalon’s funeral to reconcile with the Cistercians.30 Another instance comes from the life of the saintly hermit Robert of Knaresborough, which tells how one of the king’s chief administrators and more notorious courtiers, Brian de Lisle, brought John to visit Robert. In true ascetic fashion, Robert showed his disdain for secular pomp and power by ignoring the king and continuing to kneel in prayer. When urged by Brian to rise and honour John, Robert asked if the king could make an ear of grain as God could, whereupon John showed proper humility by admitting he could not. Subsequently, according to the story, he rewarded the hermit with a grant of land for his holiness. An order from the king to Brian to grant land to the hermit survives in the close rolls, suggesting the story may be true, in which case John behaved precisely as a Christian king should in this potentially awkward situation, thus winning at least one favourable anecdote about his piety.31

5.4  The Failure to Successfully Create an Image of Sacral Kingship For all the efforts of John and his courtiers to create and project an image of pious kingship, and despite John’s occasional successful performances of the role, the sur­ viving evidence shows that he failed badly, reducing his aura of sacral kingship and undermining his power. No ruler, of course, ever achieved anything like complete religious dominance in his or her realm—even future saints like Louis IX of France were challenged on religious grounds. But John’s efforts to lift his religious standing met with notably little success, particularly in comparison to his rival, Philip Augustus. While English writers regularly attacked John on religious grounds, Philip’s biographer, William the Breton, justified Philip’s projected invasion of England on religious and moral grounds, and both he and his p ­ redecessor Rigord associated miracles with Philip, including in some of his military campaigns.32 Before addressing John’s failure to secure a favourable religious image, it is ne­ces­sary to discuss the definition of sacral kingship and some of the related 30  Henry Mayr-Harting, Religion, Politics and Society in Britain, 1066–1272 (Harlow, 2011), 163. 31  RLC 249a; Joyce Bazire, ed., The Metrical Life of St. Robert of Knaresborough, Early English Text Society (London, 1953), 64–6, 124–5; Brian Golding, ‘The Hermit and the Hunter,’ in John Blair and Brian Golding, eds., The Cloister and the World (Oxford, 1996), 95–117. 32  Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ 20–1, 26–7, 57–8, 97–8, 243–9, 255, 261–2, 375–9; Rigord, Histoire de Philippe Auguste, 176–8, 258–60.

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116  Power and Pleasure historiography. Like many terms that historians use, sacral kingship is an ­amorph­ous one. At its core in the Middle Ages were the religious rituals that made kingship in part a religious office with religious duties. As with any church office, the religious nature of the office did not depend on the behaviour or char­ acter of a given incumbent; even an evil king was an anointed king. Yet beyond this narrow if important sense, sacral status was not something a ruler either had or did not have. Karl Leyser, in his work on Ottonian kingship, showed that the Ottonians did not just rely on their consecration, but carried out many religious activities to build up a sacred aura.33 Moreover, just as for bishops, priests, and other churchmen, perceived character mattered greatly for kings aspiring to reli­ gious authority. Indeed, an impious person who held religious office was more exposed to moral criticism than others, though obviously kings were not held to the same precise standards as bishops, abbots, and abbesses, since their duties were so different. More important, for a ruler to receive the full benefit of religious office and for subjects to feel most keenly that obedience to the king was a religious duty, a widespread reputation for piety was very useful. Thus, for my purposes here, sacral kingship was a combination of kingship as a partially religious office, ­religious activity at court, and the ruler’s religious reputation in society at large. Among medievalists, the concept of sacral kingship has probably been most important in the German historiography.34 According to earlier scholarship, for the Ottonians and early Salians, sacral kingship was almost a political programme, binding the Reich together despite the lack of developed institutions. Many types of evidence were seen as illustrating their efforts to achieve this and success in doing so, most vividly a number of remarkable illustrations showing God crown­ ing rulers, emphasizing the divine source of their powers. However, scholars argued that the papal reform and the humiliation of Henry IV before the pope at Canossa drastically reduced the effectiveness of sacral kingship as a tool for the emperors to dominate their territories, leading to the decline of imperial power. In this view, French and English kings also saw sacral kingship being reduced in effectiveness by the Gregorian reform, but without the same dire consequences because they were able to build new forms of power through building up fiscal and other government institutions. Some scholars have argued that England’s precocious institution building, for all its benefits, helped undermine sacral kingship even more in that country. This argument deserves special attention here, for it relates to an important topic of Chapter  8: the relationship between the growth of administration, life at court, and soft power. Several scholars have made this argument. David Carpenter has

33 Leyser, Rule and Conflict, 83–107. 34 For a good overview of this historiography and recent challenges to it, see Johanna Dale, ‘Conceptions of Kingship in High-Medieval Germany in Historiographical Perspective,’ History Compass 16 (2018), 1–11.

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Religious Practices at Court  117 suggested that increasing bureaucratization and routinization diminished the charisma of kingship.35 Geoffrey Koziol has argued that English royal prowess in raising money was one of a number of reasons the Capetians were more success­ ful at retaining their sacral status in the twelfth century.36 Leyser has written that because the Angevins had achieved rational government to a greater extent than elsewhere, its systems bit deeply and regularly into the lives of most people; it was ‘for this reason believed and felt to be wicked government.’ Leyser argued that Henry II in particular tried to offset this by associating himself with holy men like Bishop Hugh of Lincoln, despite Hugh’s frequent criticism of him, in hopes that some of his sacrality would rub off. Kings, in other words, could no longer rely on their own sacred status but had to get it second-hand.37 In the last couple of decades, however, claims about the decline of sacral king­ ship have come under attack. For the German side, Ludger Körntgen has argued that the historiographical passages and the manuscript illuminations that seem to illustrate sacral kingship so vividly need to be investigated in their very specific historical, social, and artistic contexts rather than as part of a broad political pro­ gramme. To a large degree, the purposes were more religious than political, though of course the two cannot be entirely separated. At the same time as he somewhat deflates the political significance of sacral kingship before the Gregorian reform, he also queries how big an impact that reform had, arguing that the dispute caused a disturbance rather than serving as a key historical ­pivot.38 On the English side, Bjorn Weiler has shown that there was a strong trad­ ition of bishops admonishing and confronting kings that long predated the bureaucracies of the Angevin kings, suggesting that one should be wary of exag­ gerating the impact of ‘big government’ on the reputation of those kings.39 Hugh of Lincoln certainly criticized aspects of Angevin government, but as Ryan Kemp shows in a forthcoming article, his anger about this tended to be focused on royal servants; his criticisms of kings tended to be about personal and moral failings, not administrative kingship. Kemp also shows that earlier kings had sought out similar relationships with holy men, indicating that this was not a new habit of Angevin kings desperate for some religious credibility lost because of a rise in

35 Carpenter, Struggle for Mastery, 295. 36  Geoffrey Koziol, ‘England, France, and the Problem of Sacrality in Twelfth-Century Ritual,’ in Thomas  N.  Bisson, ed., Cultures of Power: Lordship, Status, and Process in Twelfth-Century Europe (Philadelphia, PA, 1995), 124–48. 37  Karl Leyser, ‘The Angevin Kings and the Holy Man,’ in Henry Mayr-Harting, ed., St. Hugh of Lincoln (Oxford, 1987), 49–73, at 53. 38 Ludger Körntgen, Königsherrschaft und Gottes Gnade: Zu Kontext und Funktion sakraler Vorstellungen in Historiographie und Bildzeugnissen der ottonisch-frühsalischen Zeit (Berlin, 2001); Dale, ‘Conceptions of Kingship,’ 1–11. 39  Björn Weiler, ‘Bishops and Kings in England, c. 1066–c. 1215,’ in Ludger Körntgen and Dominik Waßenhoven, eds., Religion and Politics in the Middle Ages: Germany and England by Comparison (Berlin, 2013), 157–203.

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118  Power and Pleasure bureaucracy.40 Vincent has rather memorably cautioned against going too far and suggesting ‘that the Plantagenets preserved the sacrality of the pre-Gregorian kings, or that they can be regarded simply as Ottonians with pipe rolls.’41 Even so, his work along with that of Johanna Dale and others shows that sacral kingship can be fruitfully studied in a post-Gregorian period.42 One should not ignore the impact of disputes of kings with popes or other churchmen, though Henry II’s fight with Thomas Becket, and the latter’s martyrdom, probably loomed larger in John’s reign than the earlier papal reform. Nonetheless, John’s failure to benefit much from sacral kingship can clearly not be blamed solely on the impact of the reform movement or the rise of administrative kingship. In fact, one can argue that the application to religion of the kinds of routines being applied to other aspects of government, such as finance, had numerous advantages in helping kings maintain an active religious life at court, making it easier to project an aura of sacral kingship. The machinery of government meant that the complex daily structure of medieval religion continued despite the diffi­ culties of constant itineration. The king could attend mass and venerate relics without great difficulty, and worship went on at court with the frequency and regularity so prized in the Middle Ages. Mechanisms were in place to distribute alms to the poor or to nuns, and indeed the broader financial apparatus of gov­ ernment made it easier to supply cash for religions donations of all sorts, im­port­ ant in a period in which giving away land from a shrinking royal demesne was problematic. The routinization of religion meant that the court continuously pre­ sented a reasonably reliable image of pious activity, while giving John some flexi­ bility. If he wished to go hunting on an important saint’s day or break a fast, he could mitigate his sin simply by issuing an order for the feeding of 100, 500, or even 1,000 poor people. These routines might themselves diminish the kind of charisma derived from unexpected and dramatic displays of piety. Crucially, however, they did not prevent such displays. King John could still slog through the mud carrying the body of a holy bishop or prostrate himself before a gather­ ing of abbots. Thus, the rise of administrative kingship probably had a more com­ plex impact on sacral kingship than scholars have suggested, and it is most accurate to say that the growth of royal government simultaneously strengthened and weakened the ability of kings to project an aura of piety. If sacral kingship was still a potential tool in the royal toolbox in the early ­thirteenth century, it is important to investigate John’s own handling of it in order to understand why he failed so badly. One important part of this consisted of his 40  Ryan Kemp, ‘Hugh of Lincoln and Adam of Eynsham: Angevin Kingship Reconsidered,’ forth­ coming in the Haskins Society Journal. 41  Vincent, ‘Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings,’ 40. 42  Vincent, ‘Pilgrimages of the Angevin Kings,’ 39–40. For other discussions of the history of sacral kingship, see Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 110–19; Webster, King John and Religion, 4–7; Dale, Inauguration and Liturgical Kingship.

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Religious Practices at Court  119 disputes with the church over various matters, including his quarrel with the Cistercian order over taxation early in his reign; his clashes with his half-brother Geoffrey, Archbishop of York, over various matters, including taxation; and above all his confrontation with Pope Innocent III over the latter’s appointment of Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury, leading to the interdict from 1208 to 1213. In such clashes John, like other kings in similar situations, faced crucial trade-offs. Given the vast collective wealth of the church, forgoing taxation on religious houses and churchmen would have deprived the king of much revenue in a time of expensive wars. By submitting to papal interference in the Canterbury election, John potentially compromised his royal ability to appoint other bishops and abbots. John could perhaps have handled the situation more cleverly, but there was no perfect way to handle such disputes. John’s clashes with churchmen have been covered in detail by other historians, so I will not discuss them at greater length, but they clearly undermined his religious reputation.43 Though some of the difficulties John and his advisors faced in trying to protect the king’s religious reputation were beyond their control or involved difficult trade-offs, others were self-inflicted. John’s sexual activities, which were obviously well known, cannot have helped his religious reputation, and some of the credit John gained with churchmen for carrying Bishop Hugh’s body may have been squandered when the king diverted some of the revenues of Hugh’s vacant dio­ cese to pay expenses for an illegitimate son.44 Almsgiving could alleviate but not eliminate the negative consequences for the king and court’s religious reputation of John’s tendency to go hunting on feast days or break fasts, the latter a habit shared with leading officials. People paid attention to the religious minutiae of royal lives. Rigord praised Philip Augustus for giving gifts to the poor rather than entertainers and for his pious hatred of oaths, so great that if he heard a gambler, even a knight, swear in his presence, he would have him thrown in a lake.45 Promoters or detractors of rulers could use small details of personal behaviour to good effect in building or destroying a ruler’s reputation for piety. It is also possible that John undermined any claim to sacral kingship through arrogance and sheer incompetence, at least according to stories told by Hugh of Avalon’s biographer, Adam of Eynsham. According to Adam, not long after Richard I’s death, John met Hugh, who had just buried Richard, at Chinon, and sought to gain his favour by seeking his counsel and displaying his piety. A few 43  For John’s disputes with churchmen, see Painter, Reign of King John, 151–202; C.  R.  Cheney, ‘King John’s Reaction to the Interdict in England,’ Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 4th ser. 31 (1949), 129–50; Warren, King John, 154–73; Richardson and Sayles, Governance of Mediaeval England, 337–68; Turner, King John, 147–74; Harper-Bill, ‘John and the Church of Rome,’ 289–315; Webster, King John and Religion, 131–72. 44  RL 12; PR3J 192–3. 45 Rigord, Histoire de Philippe Auguste, 128–30, 224–6; John W. Baldwin, The Government of Philip Augustus: Foundations of French Royal Power in the Middle Ages (Berkeley, CA, 1986), 358–9; Jim Bradbury, Philip Augustus: King of France, 1180–1223 (London, 1998), 167–8.

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120  Power and Pleasure days later, at an Easter service, all went awry. First John delayed making a ­cere­monial offering of twelve gold coins that an official put in his hands, jokingly saying that a few days before he would have put them in his purse. This infuriated Hugh, who refused to accept the coins himself and told John to put them down and go away. As Hugh preached, John sent him three messages asking him to cut his sermon short and celebrate mass, since he was hungry and wished to break his fast, presumably at a feast after the service. A week later, when the Archbishop of Rouen was inducting John as duke of Normandy, the archbishop handed him the lance with a banner that served as a ducal insignia, which John promptly dropped, because he had turned around to laugh with some of his courtiers and was paying insufficient attention to the ceremony. Some scepticism is in order here. In this same passage Adam claims that John had not taken communion since he was an adult, an implausible accusation. Adam was writing towards the end of John’s reign, and he treated the dropping of the lance as a prophecy for John’s loss of Normandy. Though an accident of this sort is certainly possible, one must be wary of conveniently prophetic events. The other stories are more plausible. One can well imagine an awkward attempt at humour about John’s sudden rise in status and wealth going wrong, and as we have seen, there is plenty of corroborating evidence for John’s dislike of fasting even on important religious festivals. If these stories are true, they show the king needlessly infuriating a key bishop and future saint.46 There is further evidence suggesting that John could be surprisingly foolish about how his actions might be perceived. Jocelin of Brakelond complained that on John’s highly symbolic journey to Bury St Edmunds shortly after his cor­on­ ation, he stayed with the monks at great cost to the monastery, but only offered one penny during mass and presented to the altar only a silk cloth, which he had to borrow from an abbey official. At the time of Jocelin’s writing, royal officials had not yet paid the official for the silk.47 That John and his officials could indeed be careless about the highly symbolic provision of gifts is suggested by similar incidents found in the royal records, such as an occasion when the king borrowed a vestment from a monastic official at Worcester to offer on the altar there, though on that occasion at least the official was repaid. John even had to borrow the gold he offered in the great ceremony in which he was absolved after the interdict.48 None of these incidents was serious, but they show carelessness with ritual, and as Jocelin’s comment indicates, people remembered and resented such failures. More serious was an episode that allegedly took place during John’s dispute with his half-brother, Archbishop Geoffrey of York, over Geoffrey’s resistance to John’s taxation. According to this story, when Geoffrey and the Bishop of Durham knelt at John’s feet to ask him to treat Geoffrey and his followers more leniently, 46  Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:142–4. For discussion of Eynsham’s possible biases, see Leyser, ‘The Angevin Kings and the Holy Man,’ 55; Webster, King John and Religion, 20–4. 47  Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle, 116–17. 48  RL 84; PR6J 89; RLC 148b, 170a.

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Religious Practices at Court  121 the king scorned their petition. When Geoffrey then prostrated himself to ask for mercy, John prostrated himself in turn, but in order to mock Geoffrey, saying, ‘behold, lord archbishop, how I did for you what you did for me.’49 Gillingham includes this incident in a list of episodes in which John was said to have mocked people in politically disastrous ways, and I will return to it and similar episodes in Chapter 8.50 In this context, one may simply note that John’s mockery of an archbishop’s gesture of humility would hardly have encouraged observers to view him as pious. To what extent did John sabotage his own efforts and those of his advisors to create an image of him as a pious king? Biases in the sources make certainty impossible, but there is enough evidence to suggest that in minor but cumula­ tively important ways John damaged his reputation for no political benefit. Despite the overall intelligence of his efforts and his occasional display of competence, he probably did himself a good deal of harm through incompetence. Measuring his needless errors against the other factors that harmed his reputation but were either beyond his control or represented tricky trade-offs is difficult. Had John not had to face financial hardships and an aggressive pope, and had he been a more successful ruler and a more generous donor, lapses in fasting and careless­ ness about giving would probably have been forgiven, and his efforts to present himself and his court as thoroughly Christian more successful. However, John did not have these easier circumstances, and in the challenging conditions of his reign, in which he needed every source of power he could get, he could ill afford to fritter away the benefits of sacral kingship.

5.5  Pleasure, Piety, and Power Though John may have sacrificed a measure of his sacral kingship by his incom­ petence, as we have seen he also did so by satisfying his desires for sexual ­gratification, which he apparently considered worth the political cost. From the perspective of power politics, it was foolish to sacrifice a reputation for piety in pursuit of pleasure, but it is unrealistic to think that even kings, who would have been forced to think more about power than most people, would always sacrifice pleasure for power (whatever we may think of the type of pleasure in question). I  have stressed the tension between power and pleasure elsewhere. The ­expenditure of resources on John’s sexual pursuits was not a problem, but it cost him dearly in terms of soft power. However, John may have thought it was worth it.

49  Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 2:lix–lxi. 50  See Chapter 8, 208; Gillingham, ‘Historians without Hindsight,’ 6.

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122  Power and Pleasure In theory, for members of this society, piety and power should have gone together, since from the perspective of ecclesiastical writers, divine favour was the most important political advantage one could have. Even from a modern per­ spective, a reputation for piety was an undoubted political asset. Nonetheless, piety, like pleasure, could and often did clash with the pursuit of power. One only has to consider the reign of John’s ostentatiously pious son, Henry III, which had so many disasters of its own. A major factor in Henry’s problems was financial. Robert Stacey, in discussing the financial background to the baronial revolt, has noted that Henry spent £2,000 a year on Westminster Abbey alone over the space of many years, and rightly suggests that it is doubtful if his total expenditure of £30,000 bought him sufficient prestige to warrant the cost.51 But of course ­pol­it­ical capital was only one of Henry’s aims in rebuilding the abbey; his own salvation and a desire to please God were probably the chief goals. Nonetheless, Henry’s profligacy, including his expenditures on religion, brought political ­turmoil and civil war. I have noted some of John’s expenditures above; perhaps £2,000 total plus property on Beaulieu, £575 on Rouen, and over £300 on the poor in a famine year. There were plenty of other lesser expenditures, which would have added up, but overall John’s spending on piety was not extravagant. Indeed, it was likely in the same general range as his expenditure on hunting, if not smaller. From a political perspective, the cost-benefit ratio is impossible to calculate. Overall, John’s individual religious investments were sensible, giving maximum return in reputation for reasonable amounts of money. In the end, however, the hostility of most ecclesiastical chroniclers suggests that politically much of his investment was wasted. But what of the religious perspective? There has been much debate about John’s piety or lack thereof. Webster, I think rightly, prefers the term ‘personal religion’ because we can only see the externals of John’s religious performance as we have no writings from him that show his inner thinking.52 While Henry III’s actions were consistent enough to make inferences about a high level of inner piety rea­ sonable, with John the evidence is not so clear cut. I am sceptical that John was very pious but could easily be mistaken. Certainly, there would have been mem­ bers of his court for whom religion was important. Where piety was involved, and particularly where pious people thought about the trade-offs between building power and avoiding eternal damnation, there must have been a great deal of ag­on­iz­ing. When one adds in the pursuit of pleasure, a pursuit made easier by John and his court’s power, the calculations became even more complex. Despite John’s reputation for impiety, religion played an important role in his life and that of the court. In part, religious life at court was designed to promote the 51 Robert C. Stacey, Politics, Policy, and Finance under Henry III, 1216–1245 (Oxford, 1987), 240–3. 52 Webster, King John and Religion, 1–2.

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Religious Practices at Court  123 king’s reputation for piety and sustain what remained of the sacral kingship found in earlier generations. John, his courtiers, and his administrators pursued these aims partly through spectacularly staged events, like the king’s humble carrying of the body of St Hugh, and partly through routine methods like minor gifts to religious houses and the distribution of alms to the poor. Yet John and his court failed miserably. Many of the reasons, such as his fight with Pope Innocent III over the Canterbury election, are well known. It is worth adding, however, that John’s own incompetence and his pursuit of pleasure also significantly under­ mined his efforts to create a Christian image around king and court. Balancing the demands of religion, power, and pleasure was inevitably difficult, and John and his courtiers failed to achieve the optimum balance.

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6

Food and Feasting 6.1  Introduction William the Breton, in a brief episode in his epic poem on the victories of Philip Augustus, provided a dark vignette of John as a treacherous host. It was set during Richard’s reign, when John had rebelled against his brother and King Philip had put him in charge of the important Norman town of Evreux, though not its castle. William wrote that John, having already betrayed his father and brother, decided to betray Philip to gain Richard’s forgiveness. He invited all French knights and their followers in Evreux to a feast, and all but a few came and set down their arms. Armed English fighters then descended upon them, slaughtering 300 men, whose heads John had set on pikes around the town. Although Richard deeply disapproved, he forgave John for his rebellion; Philip burned down Evreux in retaliation. Given William the Breton’s partisanship, the story must be treated with some scepticism. It is certainly not impossible, but such an ambush would have been difficult to accomplish (though easier if John’s fighters were local Normans rather than English). Moreover, betrayal at a feast was a literary cliché: William himself referred to the iconic massacre of the Britons at a feast by the Saxon invaders, Hengist and Horsa, made famous by Geoffrey of Monmouth.1 As that very reference indicates, however, treachery at a feast was considered an especially evil betrayal because it used and subverted a type of social occasion that had deep cultural significance. Social scientists have long recognized that food and the interactions surrounding it profoundly shape human cultures and societies.2 Though medieval food and feasting have long fascinated medieval historians, except in works intended for general audiences, feasts tended to come second to the study of warfare, ­institutions, and politics. When society as a whole was being studied, food was investigated primarily by economic historians. There were, of course, important exceptions, but only in the past generation have historians treated medieval

1  Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ 115–17; Geoffrey of Monmouth, The History of the Kings of Britain: An Edition and Translation of De Gestis Britonum (Historia Regum Britanniae), ed. Michael D. Reeve and Neil Wright (Woodbridge, 2007), 134–7. 2  The literature is vast but some useful introductions to it are Stephen Mennell, All Manners of Food: Eating and Taste in England and France from the Middle Ages to the Present (London, 1985); Roy C. Wood, The Sociology of the Meal (Edinburgh, 1995); M. Jones, Feast: Why Humans Share Food (Oxford, 2007).

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0006

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Food and Feasting  125 feasting and the cultural and social aspects of eating with the care they deserve. The result has been an outpouring of work.3 However, while food and feasting at John’s court have not been ignored, his reign has not been systematically studied for evidence on these subjects.4 One aim of this chapter is to show how important feasting was at John’s court. I have, of course, already laid the groundwork for this: in Chapter 2 I wrote about the importance of providing game to feasts, and in Chapter 3 I discussed the giving of robes and the use of gold and silver plate on those occasions. In Chapter 4, I discussed entertainment and music at feasts, and in Chapter 5 I noted that the greatest feasts provided opportunities for the king to project an image of sacral kingship. The very fact that so many different aspects of court life related to feasts reveals their importance. Nonetheless, there is far more to say about feasting, and a substantial portion of this chapter is devoted to reconstructing feasts at John’s court. First, however, I will discuss food at court more generally. One subject I will not fully explore is the regular provision of foodstuffs at court, nor will I try to reconstruct the total costs of supplying food and drink to the court. These are important topics, but the records required to discuss them with any confidence do not survive. What does survive is information on more exotic provisions, including game, wine, spices, and other special foods, which had to be purchased or acquired specially, which meant they appear in financial and other records in a way that the day-to-day provision of bread, ale, ordinary meat, and other staples did not. Such information reveals what made food at court unusual and what 3  Again, the literature is vast, but the following includes some overviews, key pieces of scholarship, and particularly relevant works: Henisch, Fast and Feast; Agathe Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en Bourgogne au XVe siècle. Le banquet du faisan (1454): Aspects politiques, sociaux et culturels (Montreal, 1984); Bumke, Courtly Culture, 182–96, 203–30; Detlef Altenburg, Jörg Jarnut, and Hans-Hugo Steinhoff, eds., Feste und Feiern im Mittelalter (Sigmaringen, 1991); Martin Aurell, Olivier Moulin, and Françoise Thélemon, eds., La sociabilité à table. Commensalité et convivialité à travers les âges (Rouen, 1992); Massimo Montanari, The Culture of Food (Oxford, 1994); Massimo Montanari, Food Is Culture: Arts and Traditions of the Table (New York, 2006); Massimo Montanari, Medieval Tastes: Food, Cooking, and the Table (New York, 2015); Irmgard Bitsch, Trude Ehlert, and Xenja von Erzdorff, eds., Essen und Trinken in Mittelalter und Neuzeit, 2nd ed. (Wiesbaden, 1997); Bertelli, The King’s Body, 191–212; Bonnie Effros, Creating Community with Food and Drink in Merovingian Gaul (New York, 2002); Bruno Laurioux, Une histoire culinaire du Moyen Âge (Paris, 2005); Peter Hammond, Food and Feast in Medieval England (Stroud, 2005); C. M. Woolgar, D. Serjeantson, and T. Waldron, eds., Food in Medieval England: Diet and Nutrition (Oxford, 2006); C.  M.  Woolgar, ‘Feasting and Fasting: Food and Taste in Europe in the Middle Ages,’ in Paul Freedman, ed., Food: The History of Taste (Berkeley, CA, 2007), 163–95; C. M. Woolgar, The Culture of Food in England, 1200–1500 (New Haven, CT, 2016); C. M. Woolgar, ‘Medieval Food and Colour,’ Journal of Medieval History 44 (2018), 1–20; Gautier, Le festin dans l’Angleterre anglo-saxonne; Alban Gautier, ‘Festin et politique: servir la table royale dans le haut Moyen Âge,’ in L’alimentazione nell’alto medioevo: pratiche, simboli, ideologie (Spoleto, 2016), 907–34; Julie Kerr, ‘Food, Drink and Lodging: Hospitality in Twelfth-Century England,’ Haskins Society Journal 18 (2007), 72–92; Kjær, ‘Matthew Paris and the Royal Christmas,’ 141–54; Normore, A Feast for the Eyes; Ernst Schubert, Essen und Trinken im Mittelalter, 3rd ed. (Darmstadt, 2016). See also a group of articles on food at court in Food and History vol. 4, no. 1 (2006) and a special issue on feasting and gifts of food in the Journal of Medieval History vol. 37, no. 1 (2011). 4  For good but brief treatments of feasts and their preparation at John’s court, see Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 222–3; Warren, King John, 137, 139; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 162.

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126  Power and Pleasure foods this society particularly valued. The early sections of the chapter will explore special foods; spices, cooking, and cuisine; and wine. I will then reconstruct feasts at court on the basis of the royal records. One subject about which the royal records provide little information is manners, but other contemporary sources can make up this deficit. Towards the end of the chapter I will turn to power, contestation, and pleasure.

6.2  Eating Well Among the horrors of life at the court of Henry II, according to Peter of Blois, was the awful, indeed dangerous, food and drink served there. The bread was heavy, under-baked, and had weeds mixed in with grain. The meat was as likely to come from a diseased animal as a healthy one, and the fish, though costly, was old and stank. The ale tasted as bad as it looked, and the wine was so mouldy, cloudy, rancid, and dreg-filled that drinking it required shutting one’s eyes and sieving it through one’s teeth, grimacing all the while.5 It would hardly be surprising if the logistical problems created by the constant itineration of the Angevin kings meant that food was sometimes awful at their courts. However, as noted before, Peter depicted the court in a most unpleasant light to dissuade clerics from serving there.6 Moreover, the food and drink that someone like Peter, who was not in the inmost circle, could obtain was probably not the same as that provided to the king and his chief followers. There is, in fact, plentiful evidence in the records of John’s reign of the care taken to provide good food and drink, at least for the king and those closest to him. In many respects the court diet reflected that of medieval England and France more generally, particularly among the elites, with its emphasis on grains (usually in the form of bread for the better off), and meat for those who could get it. One notable differentiating factor was the quantity consumed. Though the surviving evidence does not provide a good overall sense of just how much food John’s court needed, a glimpse comes during the remodelling of the kitchens at his residences at Marlborough and Ludgershall, when John ordered installation of a furnesium in each that could cook two or three oxen.7 More important for our purposes, however, is the emphasis in the royal records on quality and variety in foodstuffs and on obtaining rare foods that were valued not only for their own sake, but also because they were associated with high social rank.8 5 Wahlgren, Letter Collections of Peter of Blois, 141, 149–50, 159–60. 6  For the context in which Peter was writing, see Cotts, Clerical Dilemma, 131–75; Thomas, Secular Clergy, 117–53. 7  RLC 52b. 8  For links between food and social status, see Henisch, Fast and Feast, 155–9; Bumke, Courtly Culture, 178–82; Allen J. Grieco, ‘The Social Politics of Pre-Linnaean Botanical Classification,’ I Tatti

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Food and Feasting  127 Nowhere is the emphasis on quality more apparent than in the bread served to the king, his family, and those close to him. In one unusually detailed set of writs, the king, no doubt advised by his kitchen staff, gave careful instructions to his bailiffs at Taunton about the milling and storage of wheat flour to make panis dominicus (lordly bread) for an unnamed illegitimate son; John then sent his baker to prepare the bread.9 Other, briefer, references to the high-quality wheat flour used for panis dominicus are scattered through the records.10 References also survive to the making of pastry for the king and to a sergeanty for making wafers.11 Though everyone in medieval society consumed bread, the king and the elite ate special bread considered appropriate to their status. Meat, of course, was also widespread in the Middle Ages, but particularly associated with the wealthy. Animal bones excavated at royal sites show the wide var­ iety of domestic and game animals consumed at court.12 Pigs were a particularly important meat source—orders went out periodically to slaughter large numbers of pigs (just under 700 in 1211–12) to create a store of preserved meat for the court.13 One apparent delicacy was pickled pig parts, particularly the heads.14 The highest status food was, of course, game, including the flesh of deer, feral pigs, and various species of birds; as Chapter 2 indicated, game could be supplied in large amounts.15 In that chapter, I noted that while on campaign in Poitou in 1214 the king ordered a huntsman to send choice bits of any slain stag to him and the queen, showing the royal couple’s desire to dine on the finest, most prestigious portions of the carcass.16 Studies: Essays in the Renaissance 4 (1991), 131–49; Bruno Laurioux, ‘Table et hiérarchie à la fin du Moyen Âge,’ in Carole Lambert, ed., Du manuscrit à la table (Montreal, 1992), 87–108; Montanari, The Culture of Food, 83–94; Montanari, Food Is Culture, 115–26; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 67–77; Albarella and Thomas, ‘They Dined on Crane,’ 23–38; Ken Albala, Eating Right in the Renaissance (Berkeley, CA, 2002), 184–216; Paul Freedman, ed., Food: The History of Taste (Berkeley, CA, 2007), 15–16; Richard Thomas, ‘Food and the Maintenance of Social Boundaries in Medieval England,’ in Katheryn C. Twiss, ed., The Archaeology of Food and Identity (Carbondale, IL, 2007), 130–51; Oggins, ‘Game,’ 217. 9  RLC 31a. For this kind of bread and high-status bread more generally, see Woolgar, Culture of Food, 61–82; Woolgar, Great Household, 123–4. 10  PR13J 40; Misae 11J 129; RLC 58a, 136a, 261b. 11  PR10J 140; Red Book of the Exchequer 2:457. For pastries and wafers, see Henisch, Fast and Feast, 77, 129. 12 Rahtz, Excavations at King John’s Hunting Lodge, 113–15; James and Robinson, Clarendon Palace, 260–5; Sykes, ‘Animal Bones,’ 116–28; Thomas Beaumont James and Christopher Gerrard, Clarendon: Landscape of Kings (Bollington, 2007), 86–7. 13  PR7J 255; PR10J 62; PR13J xxi–xxii, 110–11; RLC 15a. For the importance of pork in elite diets, see Thomas, ‘Food and Social Boundaries,’ 138; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 42–4. 14  RLC 97a, 157a–b, 177a, 181b–182a; Woolgar, Culture of Food, 73–4. 15 Rackham, The History of the Countryside, 125, 134–5; Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 181; Christopher Dyer, Standards of Living in the Later Middle Ages: Social Change in England, c. 1200–1500 (Cambridge, 1989), 60–1; Albarella and Thomas, ‘They Dined on Crane,’ 23–38; Thomas, ‘Food and Social Boundaries,’ 130–51; Sykes, ‘Wildfowl Exploitation,’ 82–105; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 20–4, 61–8, 89–90; Oggins, ‘Game,’ 202–6; Woolgar, Culture of Food, 10–11, 119–22. 16  RLC 169b.

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128  Power and Pleasure Fish, especially salted or dried sea fish, was also a major part of the medieval diet, particularly because of frequent abstention from meat on fast days. The fish bones and shells at royal sites show that a large variety of fish and shellfish was consumed at court, with the royal records showing the purchase of large numbers of salted or dried herrings in particular.17 Fresh fish, however, was much more desirable and of much higher status.18 Thus one tenancy in East Anglia was held for the service of carrying to the king, wherever he was in England, pastries with the ‘first’ herrings, presumably from the earliest catch of the fishing season. These might have been fish pies, but pastry shells were sometimes used to preserve fresh fish, and that was probably the case here.19 Even the lowly herring could be high status if it was sufficiently fresh. Other wild fish, like turbot or salmon, were also caught and provided to the king.20 More important were fresh fish provided from vivaries, or fishponds, of which there were many on royal estates.21 King John took an active role in maintaining and expanding these and, after his Irish campaign, he ordered a new pond to be built in Limerick.22 Many royal orders concerned the catching of fish and transportation to the royal court; and special barrels were sometimes built and filled with water to transport live fish for restocking or for the royal table.23 Though the infrastructure for providing the king and those close to him with fresh fish was not as large as the hunting ap­par­ atus discussed earlier, it was nonetheless still impressive, a sign of the seriousness with which the royal court took its food. Lamprey was an especially valued species despite being considered dangerous to one’s health; or perhaps that was an enticement, as Paul Freedman has suggested. Indeed, the death of John’s great-grandfather, Henry I, was famously attributed to a ‘surfeit of lampreys.’24 Lampreys were prestigious enough for the king’s subjects to include them in proffers to him seeking favours and benefits.25 Strikingly, the king strove to oversee and control the provision of lampreys, and not just on his own estates, for instance requiring the servants of foreign rulers 17 James and Robinson, Clarendon Palace, 264–5; Poulton, ed., Medieval Royal Complex at Guildford, 128–32; James and Gerrard, Clarendon, 87–8; PR5J 235; PR13J 109; RLC 22b, 37a–38a. 18  Christopher Dyer, ‘The Consumption of Fresh-Water Fish in Medieval England,’ in Michael Aston, ed., Medieval Fish, Fisheries and Fishponds in England (Oxford, 1988), 1:27–38, at 27–8, 33–4; Woolgar, Great Household, 120–3; Woolgar, Culture of Food, 113–16; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 25, 60–1; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 72–8. 19  Book of Fees 1:128. For the use of such pastries to transport fish, see Woolgar, Great Household, 122. 20  PR7J 103, 197; PR13J xxi–xxii, 110; RLC 191b. 21  J. M. Steane, ‘The Royal Fishponds of Medieval England,’ in Michael Aston, ed., Medieval Fish, Fisheries and Fishponds in England (Oxford, 1988), 1:39–68. 22  PRJ1 219–20; PR2J 52, 249; PR3J 55; PR5J 161; PR6J 89; PR7J 221; PR8J 187; PR13J 84, 178; RLC 19a, 66b, 261b; RLP 99b; Pipe Roll Ireland 14J 70–1. 23  For the employment of fishermen, see for example PR11J 127; RLC 26a, 289a; Prest Roll 12J 244. For the transportation of fish, see for example PR3J 194; PR6J 146; RL 83, 88; Prest Roll 12J 244; RLC 17b, 20b, 22a. For barrels, see PR16J 125; Woolgar, Great Household, 122–3. 24  Freedman, ed., Food: The History of Taste, 12. 25  PR7J 93; PR8J 14; PR9J 215; ROF 241, 342, 511.

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Food and Feasting  129 and nobles to get his permission to obtain lampreys in his territories.26 In John’s second year, the inhabitants of Gloucester had to purchase his goodwill because ‘they did not respect him as they ought to have concerning his or their lampreys,’ and six years later he told them he was setting fixed prices on them.27 John clearly saw controlling the availability of lampreys as a matter of royal concern, presumably to make sure his court had good access to this high-status delicacy. Another delectable but dangerous food was fruit, especially raw fruit, based on its place in humoural theory.28 Overeating of peaches was a contributing factor to King John’s death, at least according to Roger of Wendover.29 Modern readers may doubt this diagnosis, but there is no doubt that the king and courtiers liked their fruit. The king granted the office of sheriff of Rouen to a citizen of Rouen for the provision of 500 pears ‘of St. Regulus,’ a symbolic, largely honorary rent that shows the high esteem in which fruit was held.30 The misae rolls recorded the purchase or renting of panniers and even carts to carry the king’s fruit, thus ensuring that he and those closest to him could enjoy fruit on their travels.31 Dried fruits imported from warmer lands were a particular luxury. Dates appear once in the surviving records for John’s reign, when 1,500 were purchased. Figs appear more frequently. They were purchased for as ‘little’ as 6s or as much as 16s 1d a basket (between twenty-four and sixty-four days’ wages for a skilled labourer). In early 1214, as John prepared to embark for Poitou, orders were sent to the sheriff of London to obtain figs as quickly as possible and send them ‘day and night’ so they would get to the king before he departed on his fateful con­tin­en­tal campaign.32 Perhaps John could not do without them, or perhaps he wished to provide lavishly for the ­continental nobles he hoped would support him against King Philip. Figs were not the only exotic, imported delicacies John and his officials were eager to get aboard ship—the same writ called for two loads of almonds and 30 lbs of rice. Purchases of rice occur only occasionally in the royal records, but royal officials bought almonds more often, sometimes by the hundreds of pounds; on one occasion they acquired 1450 lbs, or nearly three quarters of a ton. Relatively cheap at only 2d or 3d a pound, almonds were still luxuries since this price represented a day’s wages for a skilled labourer.33 Almonds and rice were frequently associated with spices and were often used in elite medieval cooking—almond milk in particular could substitute for dairy foods banned on fast days—and are discussed in section 6.3 on cooking and cuisine.34 Nonetheless, from the modern 26  RLP 5a; RLC 159b. 27  ROF 96; RLP 68b. 28 Albala, Eating Right in the Renaissance, 12–13, 109–10, 171, 206. 29  Freedman, ed., Food: The History of Taste, 12; Hammond, Food and Feast in Medieval England, 88, 98; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:196. 30  RLCh 113a. 31  Misae 11J 135; Misae 14J 243–6. 32  PR10J 171; PR13J 108; PR14J 49–50; RLC 25a, 44b–45a, 88b, 128b, 162a. 33  PR6J 120; PR8J 47; PR9J 30, 143; PR10J 171; PR13J 108, 178; PR14J 49–50; PR16J 79; RLC 14a, 15a, 22a, 25a, 44b–45a, 64b, 81a, 87a, 88a–b, 101b–102a, 128b, 157a–b, 162a, 188a, 193b. 34 Henisch, Fast and Feast, 44–5; Dyer, Standards of Living, 62–3.

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130  Power and Pleasure perspective they represent foodstuffs and offer more evidence of the royal ­government’s efforts to provide the king and the elite members of the royal household with rare, prestigious, and high-quality food.

6.3  Spices, Cooking, and Cuisine In 1982, the anthropologist Jack Goody famously distinguished between cooking in some African societies he had studied and the elite cuisines of many Eurasian cultures. Goody listed key characteristics of these cuisines, including a class basis and link to the elites; a range of ingredients and menus resulting from exchange, tribute, and commerce; specialization of cooking, with high-status cooking often taken over by males; and links to at least rudimentary literacy, with written re­cipes and commentary on food. Among the Eurasian cuisines Goody included medieval European cooking, noting the early recipes by John’s contemporary, Alexander Neckam. These recipes, it may be noted, came in a teaching guide to Latin vocabulary, but they were clearly drawn from practice. One provided precise instructions for roast pork, seasoned with garlic and salt, and another described how to boil fish in water and wine and serve it with a green sauce made of herbs, garlic, pepper, and salt.35 In recent decades, much work has appeared on late medieval cooking, drawing heavily from, among other sources, the many cookbooks that survive from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Because of radical shifts in French cuisine in the early modern period that came to influence Europe as a whole, modern Western cooking is radically different from medieval cooking. Humoural medicine shaped medieval cooking in important ways, and indeed some recently discovered English recipes, pre-dating Neckam by a generation and now the earliest known medieval ones, appear in a collection of medical treatises. However, Giles Gasper and Faith Wallis, the scholars who published these recipes, argue cogently that the recipes in question came from a primarily culinary context that was being rationalized by reference to medical theory, rather than being purely dietetic and medical in nature. Medieval cuisine was designed to be tasty as well as healthy.36 Medieval cooking depended heavily on sauces made with spices, valued for their humoural influences and exotic origins. It was more like modern Indian and other Asian cuisines than modern Western cooking. Rather than allowing ingredients to speak for themselves, medieval cooking emphasized the mixing of flavours. Ingredients were ground up and mixed together, and a favourite trick 35  Jack Goody, Cooking, Cuisine and Class: A Study in Comparative Sociology (Cambridge, 1982); Tony Hunt, Teaching and Learning Latin in Thirteenth-Century England, 3 vols. (Woodbridge, 1991), 1:183. 36  Giles E. M. Gasper and Faith Wallis, ‘Salsamenta pictavensium: Gastronomy and Medicine in Twelfth-Century England,’ English Historical Review 131 (2017), 1353–85.

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Food and Feasting  131 was to present a dish that looked like one thing but was made from something quite different. Presentation was important, with, for instance, peacock put back in its skin and feathers to look like a living bird. Spices were used for colour as well as taste. Not all aspects of fourteenth- and fifteenth-century medieval cooking ne­ces­sar­ily existed in the early thirteenth century, but the similarity between the re­cipes recorded by Neckam and those in late medieval cookbooks suggests a broad continuity in cooking.37 There is no way of knowing if John’s cooks were familiar with Neckam’s ­recipes, but there is strong evidence that they participated in at least some of the elite cooking practices of the later Middle Ages. Above all, there is plentiful evidence of the importance of spices and sauces in their cooking. The royal records include multiple references to spices, including purchases of specific amounts, sometimes with prices listed.38 Pepper, unsurprisingly, was the most used spice. It was commonly bought in lots ranging from 10 to 60 lbs, but purchases as large as 100 and even 242 lbs are recorded. Cumin was a distant second, with purchases from 6 to 60 lbs. Other spices were bought in amounts from half a pound or less to 4 lbs, and included (in rough order of frequency and quantity of purchases) cinnamon, ginger, cloves, nutmeg, galingale, cardamom, and mace. Late medieval English cooking embraced the use of sugar early, but it only appears once in John’s records.39 In comparison to the total royal budget or some of the expenditures on hunting or textiles, the amount spent on spices was small. The largest single purchase was £7 2s 7d for the 242 lbs of pepper. Nonetheless, spices were clearly luxury items. Even the price of a pound of the cheapest spice, cumin, around 2¼d to 2½d per pound, was equal to a day’s pay of a skilled labourer. Pepper cost between 6½d and 8d a pound, and cloves, the most expensive spice, cost from 1 mark to £1 a pound, making it approximately worth its weight in silver at its highest price.40 The number of occasions on which spices were linked 37  For European cuisine, see Melitta Weiss Adamson, ed., Regional Cuisines of Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays (New York, 2002); Laurioux, Une histoire culinaire du Moyen Âge; Montanari, Food Is Culture, 62–5; Woolgar, ‘Feasting and Fasting,’ 163–95; Paul Freedman, Out of the East: Spices and the Medieval Imagination (New Haven, CT, 2008), 19–49. For English cuisine, see Constance  B.  Hieatt and Sharon Butler, eds., Curye on Inglysch: English Culinary Manuscripts of the Fourteenth Century (Including the Forme of Cury), Early English Text Society (Oxford, 1985), 1–15; Constance B. Hieatt, ‘Medieval Britain,’ in Melitta Weiss Adamson, ed., Regional Cuisines of Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays (New York, 2002), 19–45; Colin Spencer, British Food: An Extraordinary Thousand Years of History (London, 2004), 36–68; Hammond, Food and Feast in Medieval England, 126–30; Woolgar, Great Household, 136–65; C. M. Woolgar, ‘Fast and Feast: Conspicuous Consumption and the Diet of the Nobility in the Fifteenth Century,’ in Michael Hicks, ed., Revolution and Consumption in Medieval England (Woodbridge, 2001), 7–25, at 19–23; Woolgar, Culture of Food, 83–103; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 86–93. 38  The most useful references to the purchases of spices are PR11J 11, 108–9; PR14J 43–4, 47; Misae 14J 245; RLC 21b, 22a, 64b, 86b, 88a–b, 91b, 101b–102a, 128b, 155a, 156b, 157a–b, 175a, 244b, 259b. 39  PR8J 48. 40  Price data is often limited and needs to be treated cautiously. The prices or price ranges of other spices include cinnamon 1s to 2s 6d; ginger 9d to 2s 6d; galingale 5s; saffron 7s to 12s; nutmeg 7s to 12s; and mace 10s. For prices later in the thirteenth century, see Labarge, Baronial Household, 90–6.

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132  Power and Pleasure in the royal records to the making of the king’s sauce (salsa), to his ‘saucery’ (salsaria), or to Geoffrey, his sauce maker, shows that then, as later, spicy sauces were a staple of elite medieval cuisine.41 It is harder to be sure that other characteristics of late medieval cooking were present at John’s court. There are indications that the later medieval obsession with the appearance of food was already present in the period. John of Salisbury’s reference to animals stuffed with other animals has been linked to later medieval practices of disguising one type of meat as another.42 The cut marks on peacock bones from the twelfth century at Carisbrooke Castle, an important baronial residence, suggest that the practice of presenting cooked peacock with the skin and feathers back on was already in existence.43 It is unfortunately impossible to know if John’s cooks presented food this dramatically, but the purchases of saffron indicate that colour, at least, was already an important consideration in cooking. The specialization of cooking, with males taking over high-status positions, was certainly true at John’s court (and indeed was nothing new). The most im­port­ant cooks received ample remuneration. In John’s sixth year, Master Roger of the Kitchen received 7d per day in pay, only a penny less than knights, and his  yearly salary would have been over £10, an income equal to many gentry ­landowners. The same year John gave Master Reimbald, his cook, land worth £9 yearly, and the year before Geoffrey, the royal sauce maker, received rural and urban property worth £7 7s 8d yearly, effectively making them both at least minor members of the gentry.44 Was the kind of elite cuisine that Goody describes present as early as John’s reign? Alban Gautier, writing of the late Anglo-Saxon era, is hesitant, but Naomi Sykes argues that one can speak of such a cuisine for the Norman period.45 For John’s reign, most of the characteristics Goody described are visible. Many of the foods acquired for John’s court were distinctively high status and typical of elite consumption. A range of ingredients was obtained through trade, rents, and the occasional gift, and John obviously employed skilled, specialist cooks. The only characteristic one cannot pinpoint at John’s court were cookbooks, though the surviving recipes from other contexts show that the interaction of literacy and cooking had at least begun. More generally, even if cooking at John’s court was not as elaborate as at later medieval courts, the king and the elite members of his court enjoyed the benefits of a complex food culture that set their meals apart from those enjoyed by most inhabitants of his realms.

41  PR10J 97; PR14J 43; PR16J 28; RLC 88a–b, 101b–102a, 128b, 156b, 175a. 42  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:252–3, 271–2; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 186. 43 Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 90. 44  RLC 9b, 14a; RL 20, 49, 108. 45 Alban Gautier, ‘Cooking and Cuisine in Late Anglo-Saxon England,’ Anglo-Saxon England 41 (2013), 373–406, at 373–406; Sykes, Zooarchaeological Perspective, 90.

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Food and Feasting  133

6.4  Wine According to the Anonymous of Béthune, John and his followers were sadly ­lacking in discernment when it came to wine. The writer told how, during a short period of amity between the two kings early in John’s reign, Philip loaned John his residence and hunting lodge at Fontainebleau, complete with provisions. After John and his retinue left, Philip and his followers had a good laugh, because the English (as the chronicler described them) drank the worst wines, and left the best untouched.46 The gibe was pointed, for few foodstuffs had the aristocratic prestige of wine, particularly in places like England and Normandy where wine was mostly imported and therefore only associated with the elites.47 Both because of its prestige and the need to import it to John’s wealthiest and best recorded realms, few aspects of consumption were as well documented at his court as wine. Whatever their refinement or lack thereof, John and his followers were enthusiastic wine drinkers, partly, no doubt, because wine (like ale) was often safer than water, which could easily be contaminated in a premodern setting. An audit of his stockpiles of wine in England in his fourth year reveal that John had accumulated (before he departed unexpectedly for the continent) over 717 tuns, or barrels, comprising over 150,000 gallons of wine.48 Transporting wine to royal residences represented a major logistical challenge once it had reached England; there are references to using fifteen, thirty, even forty carts to carry wine.49 It was also a major expense; at various times royal officials spent £507, £596, or even £953 on wine, in the last case in addition to at least one other large purchase of wine (£392) the same year.50 Like the sums spent on hunting or textiles, these purchases would have been perfectly manageable within John’s budget, but they nonetheless represented major investments. Even late in his reign, when John was fighting for survival, his officials continued to spend heavily on wine, drawing on the king’s Gascon revenues to do so.51 Wine was clearly a high priority at John’s court. Did wine connoisseurship exist in the Middle Ages? Ernst Schubert thinks not but emphasizes that concern for quality was present.52 Whatever the French thought about John’s discernment, he was certainly concerned about the quality of the wines served to him. Various writs show the efforts to ensure that goodquality wine was provided to the court, with John refusing to pay for poor wine, fining men for purchasing bad wine for him, and even issuing vague threats 46  Anonymous of Béthune, ‘Chronique des rois de France,’ 760. 47  For overviews of the wine trade in the period, see Alan David Francis, The Wine Trade (London, 1972), 1–24; Susan Rose, The Wine Trade in Medieval Europe 1000–1500 (London, 2011). For wine at Henry II’s court, see Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 174–204. 48  PR4J xvi–xvii, 82–4. For gallons per tun, see Rose, Wine Trade, xvi. 49  PRJ1 129; PR3J 284; Misae 14J 239. 50  PR13J 40, 110; PR14J 45; RLC 26b. 51  RLP 185b, 186b, 187b, 198b. 52 Schubert, Essen und Trinken im Mittelalter, 198–203.

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134  Power and Pleasure against Reginald of Cornhill, a major royal purchaser, if he did not provide good wine.53 Perhaps like Peter of Blois, he sometimes had to sieve wine through his teeth. Given the difficulties of making, preserving, and transporting good wine in medieval conditions, it would not be surprising if even the king sometimes consumed awful-tasting wine, but clearly he tried to obtain the best wine he could. What kind of language was used to describe the nature and quality of wine in the royal records?54 Only very rarely was wine described as being red or white. Terms for quality were vague, the most common being ‘good’ and occasionally ‘better’ or ‘best.’ On a few occasions, wines were described as ‘strong’ or ‘durable,’ the latter attesting to the difficulty of preventing wine from going bad. Sometimes distinctions were made between ordinary (expensible or dispensible) wine and good wine, or sometimes wine ‘for our mouth,’ meaning for the consumption of the king and his chosen guests. On one occasion, such wine was described as vinum dominicum, perhaps by analogy with panis dominicus. Narrative writers of the time had a fuller vocabulary to describe wines. The poem on William Marshal described a wine as ‘full bodied, radiant, clear, sweet, and fine,’ while the scholar Peter of Cornwall spoke of smoothness, sweetness, and purity.55 Alexander Neckam displayed a talent for exuberant metaphor that would impress the most extravagant modern wine aficionado, comparing one wine to a stroke of lighting; that wine also had, among other attributes, the strength of a building in a Tironensian abbey and the subtlety of a Parvipontan (an influential Parisian school of philosophy) truth.56 Surely there are at least hints of connoisseurship here, and in any case the concern for quality is clear. Wine had a very powerful gustatory, literary, and symbolic place in medieval society, and John and his court fully embraced this wine culture. Indeed, John had an important role in the history of wine in France and England, albeit one stemming largely from his military failures. Scholars of the wine trade have dated the beginning of the rise of the Bordeaux wine region, and its long history of exporting wine to England, to John’s loss of Anjou and much of Poitou early in his reign, and to his son’s loss of La Rochelle in 1224. To thank Bordeaux and other local towns for their help in resisting Philip Augustus’s attempts to push into Gascony, John granted them trading privileges that helped them emerge as export centres. More important, John’s defeats meant that for the next few centuries, the Bordeaux region had the advantage of being the only wine-producing region with 53  RLC 52a, 95b, 149b, 152a, 173b; ROF 244. 54  For a similar discussion, drawing on a broader range of sources, see Azélina Jaboulet-Vercherre, The Physician, the Drinker, and the Drunk: Wine’s Uses and Abuses in Late Medieval Natural Philosophy (Turnhout, 2014), 81–128. Humoural theory probably influenced thinking about wines as well as food; Allen J. Grieco, ‘Medieval and Renaissance Wines: Taste, Dietary Theory, and How to Choose the “Right” Wine (14th–16th Centuries),’ Medievalia 30 (2009), 15–42. 55  British Library Royal MS 7 C XIV, fol. 8r; Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:120–1. 56 Hunt, Teaching and Learning, 1:183.

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Food and Feasting  135 political connections to the large English market.57 A study of wine consumption at King John’s court helps verify this argument, but also complicates it somewhat. Unfortunately, the origin of the wine purchased by John’s government was only ­sporadically specified. However, enough evidence does survive to create a reasonably convincing picture of changing consumption patterns. In marked contrast to the French royal records, which described wines in very local terms,58 the English and Norman records mostly ascribed wines to very broad regions—Poitou, Anjou, ‘France’ (which primarily refers to the Ile de France but might have included surrounding regions), and Gascony.59 As Schröder shows, during Henry II’s reigns, wines came to England and Normandy from northern France, Anjou, Poitou, and the Rhineland and Moselle valleys.60 Similar patterns emerged early in John’s reign. In the audit of 717 tuns noted earl­ ier, 158 came from Anjou, 125 from Poitou, and 150 from the Rhineland and Moselle vineyards, with the remainder’s origins unidentified. A number of other references to Angevin and Poitevin wines appear in other English and Norman records for John’s first six years.61 After Philip’s conquests around 1204, major purchases of wines from these regions diminished rapidly. The large amount of Rhineland and Moselle wine in the audit may have been unusual, as only a couple of references totalling four tuns survive from later periods, even though Philip’s victories would not have blocked their import. Poitevin wines completely disappeared from the picture, though John still held parts of Poitou. In contrast, Angevin wines continued to be imported in small amounts and were clearly highly valued, since the king sometimes made gifts of them, and positive adjectives such as ‘good’ or ‘of the better sort’ were applied to them with unusual frequency. It makes sense, of course, that Philip’s conquests might diminish exports of Angevin and even Poitevin wine of England, but references to ‘French’ wines, which occasionally appeared in the earlier records of the reign, actually expanded after Philip’s conquests, with purchases ranging from seventeen to 155 tuns. Clearly wines from northern France continued to be available, and in particular 57  Yves Renouard, ‘Le Grand commerce des vins de Gascogne au Moyen Age,’ Revue historique 221 (1959), 261–304; Rose, Wine Trade, 46–7, 61–2. 58  Ferdinand Lot and Robert Fawtier, eds., Le premier budget de la monarchie française. Le compte général de 1202–1203 (Paris, 1932). 59 Other occasional references are to Saxon wine; wine from Orleans, La Réole, and perhaps Soissons; ‘meysac’ wine (probably from the Moissac region); and wine from such unidentifiable places as Blenc and Musca. For references to wines from all these regions, see PR2J 89; PR4J 82–4; PR7J 129; PR8J 32, 47, 123, 156, 172; PR9J 52, 71; PR11J 50; PR13J 29, 94, 110; PR14J 18, 45, 48, 57, 98; PR16J 28; PR2H3 15–16; MRSN 510; Misae 14J 261; RN 79, 80, 105; RL 7; RLC 1a, 2b, 3a, 5b, 21a, 25a, 42a, 44a, 52a, 64b, 70a, 70b, 72b, 88b, 89a, 99b, 114a, 117b, 118a, 121a, 124a, 126a–b, 128a, 128b, 129a, 135b, 136b, 138b, 151a, 153b, 157a–b, 175a, 179a, 180a, 185a, 189b, 193b, 196a, 217b, 220a, 220b, 225a; ROF 94, 230, 303, 360, 433; Sidney Raymond Packard, ‘Miscellaneous Records of the Norman Exchequer, 1199–1204,’ Smith College Studies in History 12 (1926), 1–116, at 10, 73. 60 Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 177–9, 194. 61  Such Rhenish and Moselle wines were called by some variation of the term ‘oblinquo’; Francis, The Wine Trade, 15.

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136  Power and Pleasure John’s government continued to acquire the highly desirable and prestigious wines of Auxerre, which must have been shipped via the Yonne and Seine rivers through Philip’s chief city of Paris, mostly in modest amounts but on one occasion to the tune of sixty tuns.62 There was clearly no permanent embargo of wines from Philip’s territories to England and it is at least possible that some of the ‘French’ wines were in fact from Anjou or even Poitou, in which case the swift changes in consumption patterns were more apparent than real. Similarly, it is possible that the apparent lack of Gascon wines before Philip’s great conquests, except for a single grant or allocation of six tuns on one occasion in Normandy, may also be illusory, since large quantities of unidentified wines could have been Gascon. Nonetheless, it is striking that the first definite large purchase of Gascon wines (fifty-nine tuns) came in August 1204, when Philip already controlled Normandy and was moving against Anjou and Poitou. By the final years of John’s reign, the royal court was making purchases of 220 tuns, 267 tuns, and even 304 tuns of wine from Gascony. It was only in the final third of John’s reign that the king made gifts of Gascon wine or requested it; this is also when positive adjectives such as ‘good’ began to be attached to Gascon wine. Perhaps it took the king and court some time to develop a taste for Bordeaux wine or to find the best suppliers. Nonetheless, based on the surviving evidence, it is indeed likely that the great English appetite for Bordeaux wines had its birth in John’s reign. The love of wine was closely intertwined with the cuisine of the day. Wine was used in making sauces; on one occasion an entire tun of wine was destined for this purpose.63 And spices, especially cloves, were used in wine, with entire tuns of spiced wine shipped across country for the court.64 Indeed, one man held a tenancy for the service of making the king’s clarry, or spiced wine.65 More generally, wine, along with the special foods I discussed earlier, helped set elite cuisine and, more specifically, royal cuisine apart from ordinary eating and cooking. Indeed, nowhere except with spices was the importance of trade and exchange, one of Goody’s key characteristics of elite cuisine, more crucial. The ability to stock over 150,000 gallons of wine marked John as a great and powerful king.

6.5  Feasting at John’s Court Though most aspects of social life at court were too quotidian for chroniclers to write about, great feasts were sufficiently significant to attract tradition. Thus 62  Auxerre wines were the most expensive, and on one occasion the government paid 8 marks for one tun, an extraordinary price; RLC 25a. For their prestige, see Rose, Wine Trade, 14, 91–3; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 179. 63  PR16J 28. 64  PR13J 254; RLC 55b. For spiced wines, see Rose, Wine Trade, xvii. 65  Book of Fees 1:13; Red Book of the Exchequer 2:461.

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Food and Feasting  137 Roger of Howden and later Roger of Wendover regularly stated where John was on Christmas and sometimes on Easter or Pentecost, occasionally adding comments about the king’s distribution of robes or the nature and size of the company feasting with him.66 As these comments and the Anonymous of Béthune’s praise, quoted at the beginning of the book, show, John’s feasts made a splash.67 Unfortunately, no good extended chronicle account of a feast at John’s court survives like the descriptions of Richard I’s great Christmas feast in Sicily during the Third Crusade, with its distinguished guests, magnificent plate, excellent service, and lavish distribution of gifts.68 However, John’s records provide plentiful evidence of preparations for feasts, and these, in conjunction with cautious use of descriptions of other feasts, can help us reconstruct what John’s great feasts were like.69 Before doing so, however, it is worth digressing briefly to discuss feasts the king attended as a guest, because these too were important social, cultural, and political events. Though John stayed mostly at his own residences at his own expense during his constant travels, he periodically visited powerful nobles and followers, and hosting the king in style was an opportunity to gain prestige and status as well as favour. The daily accounts that survived of Hugh de Neville, one of John’s great administrators, for two months in 1207 show the preparations for one such visit. The king arrived at Hugh’s manor of Little Hallingbury in Essex, near Hatfield Forest, on Saturday 10 March, and left on Monday 12 March. Hugh’s accounts show his household gathering foodstuffs in the four days leading up to the visit and having them carted to Little Hallingbury. Since Lent had just begun, the heart of the main feast was seafood, including lampreys, salmon, oysters, whelks, haddocks, rays, a large amount of cod, 4,000 herring or more, and £5 15s worth of salted eels. Hugh’s servants also purchased large quantities of bread and ale, and for seasoning and flavour, they procured mustard, garlic, and a massive amount of onions. Overall, Hugh spent approximately £30, the annual income of a wealthy knight, on the king’s brief visit, including £8 13s 3d for bread; £13 2s 8½d for fish; £3 11s 4d for ale; 15s for dishes; and £2 16s 8d for transporting the purchases. Presumably Hugh drew wine and spices from existing stores, which

66 Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:106, 114, 156, 160; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:311–13, 316; 2:9, 12, 35, 49, 54, 58, 60, 97, 113. See also Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 2:171–2. Roger of Howden had done the same for John’s father and brother. For a map of these places, see Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 350. 67  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 105. 68 See also Ambroise’s similar description of Richard’s three-day coronation feast: Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 3, 18; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 172–3. 69  Some particularly useful literary descriptions from the broad period include Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 26–31; Geoffrey of Monmouth, History of the Kings of Britain, 208–15; Wace, Wace’s Roman de Brut: A History of the British, Text and Translation, ed. Judith Weiss (Exeter, 2002), 256–67; Layamon, Layamon: Brut, 593–4, 633–46; Thomas, Romance of Horn, 1:15–16, 139–41, 153; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 47–51, 162–4, 168–9, 766–8.

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138  Power and Pleasure would have driven his expenses even higher.70 The pipe rolls of Winchester show meat and dairy consumption for visits outside of Lent. On 6 November 1208, when the king visited Peter des Roches, bishop of Winchester and one of his closest advisors, for the feast of St Leonard, the royal and episcopal households and any other guests consumed seventeen sides of bacon, five and a quarter oxen, nearly 300 hens, and an unspecified amount of pickled pig parts. Five large cheeses and nineteen small ones were split between this feast and another.71 The hosting of the king was clearly an occasion for massive consumption, and though the amounts no doubt reflected the size of the king’s retinues and the retinues of any other major guests, there was likely also a premium placed on having plenty of food. Though the feasts John’s followers held for him were no doubt elaborate affairs, the great feasts held by the king himself were normally far grander, and involved much advance planning. When other scholars have briefly looked at feasting at John’s court, they have focused on a particular feast; here I will combine the sources from throughout the reign, keeping in mind that not every type of prep­ ar­ation would have been needed for every feast and that a food that appeared at one feast did not necessarily appear at all. One concern was having a proper venue. Certain sites, like the great halls at Westminster and Winchester, were designed for such feasts and no doubt kept in repair for them. However, when John wanted to have Christmas at Oxford in 1205, he sent out orders in November to have the royal residences there repaired and put into proper order.72 On occasion, royal pavilions were conveyed to the sites of great feasts, perhaps for more feasting space or for lodging guests.73 Firewood, charcoal, tripods, and pots might all be ordered, along with tables for the feasters.74 The tables would have been purely functional, but table linens were crucial for display.75 For each feast, the royal government bought hundreds of ells or more of linen, generally from Wiltshire, which presumably had a reputation for fine linen production.76 Plate was even more important than linen.77 Royal officials can be found buying precious items for specific feasts, including gilded basins, knives with ivory handles, and salt cellars.78 More commonly, plate was brought out of storage for feasts.79 The discussion in Chapter 3 of John’s plate gives an idea of the magnificence of the tables where the king and the most prominent guests sat. However, even 70  Woolgar, ed., Household Accounts, 1:112. 71  Hubert Hall, ed., The Pipe Roll of the Bishopric of Winchester for the Fourth Year of the Pontificate of Peter des Roches, 1208–1209 (London, 1903), 23. 72  RLC 56b; Prest Roll 7J 272. See also PR6J xxxiii–xxxiv, 106–7. 73  PR14J 44; RLC 157b. 74  PR13J 112; RLC 22a, 58a, 88a–b, 157b. 75  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus Danielis Becclesiensis, ed. J. Gilbart Smyly (Dublin, 1939), 38, 83–4; Henisch, Fast and Feast, 147–55; Woolgar, Great Household, 149–50; Schubert, Essen und Trinken im Mittelalter, 156–7. 76  See note 93 in this chapter. 77  For both plate and more ordinary dishes used at feasts, see Henisch, Fast and Feast, 164–89; Steane, The Archaeology of the Medieval English Monarchy, 134–7; Woolgar, Great Household, 151–7. 78  PR14J 45, 49; RLC 88a. 79  PR14J 49; RLC 60a, 180b, 184b; MR10 119.

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Food and Feasting  139 John’s large collection of plate was insufficient for the guests at royal feasts, and the royal records reveal purchases of large numbers of cheaper dishes made of ceramics or perhaps wood.80 Arrangements also had to be made for entertainment and the massive distribution of robes at the Christmas feasts, not to mention the king’s own feasting garments; on one occasion, William Scissor can be found doing last-minute work on a set of robes for the king the day before Christmas.81 Food and drink, of course, formed the heart of a feast, and the royal records show the anxiety about having sufficiently large quantities. Large orders of spices might be made specifically for large feasts; for instance, on 17 December 1213, an urgent order was sent to procure 50 lbs of pepper, 2 lbs of saffron, and 100 lbs of almonds by Christmas. Normally wine would have been drawn from the king’s storehouses, but the same order called for twenty tuns of good, new drinking wine, and four tuns of the best wine, two red and two white, ‘for our mouth.’82 In Chapter 2, I noted a shipload of game that, from its timing, was probably sent for a Christmas feast, and fifty red deer were ordered for another feast.83 Preparations for the 1213 Christmas feast seem to have run late, for on 17 December of that year several other requests (containing an uncharacteristic amount of pleading) went out for items for Christmas, including several appeals for pheasants, partridges, and other birds.84 Requests for the meat of domestic animals were also included in the writs of that day and entries relating to orders of meat were the most common related to feasts in the royal records. Such orders were often large. In December 1206, for instance, the sheriff of Hampshire received an order for twenty oxen, 100 sheep, 100 pigs, and 1,500 hundred hens, along with 5,000 eggs, and there is no certainty that he was the only provider of meat for that feast.85 Fish was another important item, and an order of 10,000 herrings, 1,800 whiting, 900 haddocks, and 3,000 lampreys was very likely for Christmas 1210: orders of 10,000 eels were definitely made for two other Christmas feasts.86 Humbler foods, like peas and white beans, made single appearances.87 Surprisingly, neither bread nor ale appear in the surviving records in reference to great feasts, though both must have been present in large quantities. Presumably, they could be acquired through regular channels without the sorts of special requests that would be noted in writs or pipe rolls. The records of John’s feasts are too fragmentary to make any quantification possible, but they suggest a heavy emphasis on both var­ iety and quantity of food.

80  PR7J xxxviii, 160; PR12J xxxiv–xxxv, 62, 121; PR13J xxi–xxii, 109; RLC 157b, 259b. 81  Misae 14J 269. 82  PR9J 30; RLC 88a–b, 157a–b. 83  PR13J 89; RLC 184b. 84  RLC 157b. 85  For this and other requests for meat, see PRJ1 79; PR6J 88, 146; PR7J 120, 161; PR8J 182; PR9J 139; RL 93; RLC 28b, 75a, 97a, 157a–b, 184b. 86  PR13J 109; PR17J 66; RLC 157b. 87  PR13J 109; RLC 28b.

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140  Power and Pleasure A final kind of preparation was the provision of symbolic service at feasts. Contemporary sources reveal that proper service at table was crucial to the success of a feast, a subject I will pursue more fully in section 6.6. Much of the routine service at royal feasts was no doubt provided by the ordinary household members, but great feasts also included culturally significant performances of service by important people, a widespread phenomenon in medieval Europe.88 Thus Roger of Howden described individual earls serving the royal table at Henry II’s Christmas feast in 1186, and earls, barons, and leading citizens of London and Winchester serving as groups at Richard I’s first coronation. He even describes a dispute between the citizens of London and Winchester for the right to serve the wine at Richard’s second coronation, after his release from captivity, with the former offering 200 marks for the privilege. Clearly, service at a royal feast was a high honour as well as a duty. Unfortunately, Roger was less forthcoming about John’s coronations or early feasts, but he did say that at John’s first coronation William Marshal and Geoffrey fitz Peter, both of whom had previously held earldoms but only received the title of earl that day, served at the royal table.89 More evidence of honorary service at feasts and coronations comes from lists of tenancies. John Russell, a knight high in John’s favour, held one for being marshal of the butlery and thus in charge of the wines at Christmas and Easter, while others held land for serving with cups, basins, or fine linen cloths.90 Many of these tenancies had been established by earlier kings, but John created at least one new one for a magnate who was particularly close to him, William de Ferrers, earl of Derby. On 27 June 1213, John granted Ferrers a dwelling in London, specifying that he serve the king at all annual feasts ‘with head uncovered, without a hat, with a garland [perhaps a coronet] the breadth of his little finger.’91 How big were these feasts? Numbers are hard to recover from the scattered evidence. The 154 cups of precious metal gathered from John’s treasuries after Magna Carta may give a rough upper limit on the number of highly honoured guests he might expect, but purchases of inexpensive dishes on different occasions, including 1,200 pitchers, between 500 and 1,500 cups, and between 1,100 and 4,000 plates and platters, suggest far larger numbers.92 Unfortunately moving from numbers of dishes to numbers of people is tricky since, on the one hand, plates and even cups could be shared and, on the other hand, any major feast would involve several courses of multiple platters. That said, it seems safe to judge that, at the very least, hundreds of guests would be expected. The varying numbers of ceramic or wooden dishes ordered indicate that individual feasts were of different sizes. 88 Bumke, Courtly Culture, 188–9. 89  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 2:317; 3:8–12, 247–8; 4:90. 90  Book of Fees 1:85, 92, 122, 139; Red Book of the Exchequer 2:457, 506–7, 547. 91  RLCh 193; RLP ii. For the garland as a circlet or coronet, see Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 198–211. 92  For cups of precious metal, see RLP 144b–150b. For ordinary dishes, see Chapter 3, note 76.

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Food and Feasting  141 Assuming that the amount of linen ordered for feasts can serve as a rough proxy for their size, linen orders can give an idea of trends in feast size over the course of the reign. After a purchase of 2,000 ells for the king’s first coronation feast, such purchases disappear for several years, probably because the king spent so much time in his continental lands, for which relatively few records survive. For his fifth through eighth years, purchases of between 100 and 500 ells appear for various feasts. For his ninth through sixteenth years, the purchases ranged from 800 to 1,000 ells, suggesting that John’s feasts grew along with his wealth. For Christmas 1215, however, in the midst of the great rebellion, only 366 ells were ordered; clearly the revolt reduced his willingness and ability to attract a large gathering.93 Other than the cost of robes, which I discussed in Chapter 3, the cost of feasts is hard to uncover.94 Ordinary dishes were surprisingly cheap—29s for a combined total of 1,900 cups and platters on one occasion. Silver and gold plate was obviously more expensive, but could be reused and represented stored wealth.95 Food was also relatively cheap; for instance, £4 for sixty sheep provided for one Pentecost feast.96 Cumulative expenses may have added up, however. Thus, one writ referred to £400 18s 10d for the expenses of a stay in Winchester at Christmas, though unfortunately it is impossible to know what precisely this covered.97 Overall, my impression is that John’s feasts were costly, but not extravagantly so in terms of overall royal finances.

6.6  Etiquette, Lordship, and Deference As noted earlier, excellent service was considered a crucial aspect of a proper feast: John of Salisbury, Gerald of Wales, Ambroise, and Ambroise’s Latin adapter all mentioned it when describing banquets.98 Neither the royal records nor any narrative sources provide much information on the service at John’s court, but various contemporary sources, above all Daniel of Beccles’ late twelfth-century Urbanus Magnus, provide a good overview of what was expected of servers and guests and can help us understand how ideas about table manners might have shaped royal feasts.99 Daniel’s work was probably directed towards the lower end 93  PRJ1 169; PR7J 161; PR8J 181–2; PR10J 193; PR12J 76; PR14J 147; PR17J 48; 5J Hardy Liberate 93; RLC 15b, 25b, 58b, 66a, 75a, 98a, 127b, 157a–b, 180b, 220b. 94  For a comparison with the better-documented feasts of Henry III’s reign, see Carpenter, Magna Carta, 162. 95  PR12J 62. 96  PR7J 182. 97  RLC 75b. 98  John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:270–1; Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 96–7; Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:4, 18; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 173. 99  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus. For scholarship on this work see Bartlett, England under the Norman and Angevin Kings, 582–8; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘L’enseignement des bonnes manières en milieu de cour en Angleterre d’après l’Urbanus magnus attribué à Daniel de Beccles,’ in Werner Paravicini and Jörg Wettlaufer, eds., Erziehung und Bildung bei Hofe (Stuttgart, 2002), 43–53; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Littérature de civilité et “processus de civilisation” à la fin de XIIe siècle: le cas

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142  Power and Pleasure of the elite, but he claimed to provide guidance on how to behave within the royal hall, and he and other aspirational members of the lesser elite no doubt eagerly imitated royal practices to the extent possible. Much of his guidance about appearing refined inevitably involved etiquette, and much of his advice about manners focused on feasting. The scholars who have studied Daniel’s work have described many characteristics of his advice, including careful control of speech and the body, the need to appear affable, and the importance of the appearance and care of one’s body. These are all important, but here I wish to concentrate on three areas: the complexity of table manners that already existed in the period; the ability of the host to use feasts to both reflect and shape social hierarchy; and the importance of social inferiors behaving deferentially to their superiors. Daniel’s sections on dining are filled with specific instructions on an array of topics, including how to serve wine and when to say ‘Wassail’ and ‘Drinkhail.’100 Many of the instructions are strange to modern readers because they involve dining patterns foreign to us, like the extensive use of fingers combined with the sharing of dishes by pairs of diners, which Daniel addresses in his advice about not reaching into the dish at the same time, politely cutting food for one’s dinner partner, and not licking one’s fingers. His advice can seem bizarre and hilarious to modern readers: when spitting, it is best to turn around from the dinner table; when belching, look at the ceiling; only the lord may urinate in the hall. Such instructions might suggest a crude society in which any behaviour at all was acceptable, but in fact Daniel’s work shows that there were strong ideas about proper manners and that ignorance of them made one look rustic and boorish. One common and socially crucial practice Daniel describes is the lord granting some of the food and drink set before him to others.101 Daniel’s advice focuses on how the guest should react, but Herbert of Bosham’s vita of Thomas Becket shows how Becket used the practice to honour guests. According to Herbert, when anglais d’après l’Urbanus magnus,’ Les Échanges culturels au Moyen Âge: XXXIIe congrès de la SHMES (Paris, 2002), 227–39; John Gillingham, ‘From Civilitas to Civility: Codes of Manners in Medieval and Early Modern England,’ Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 6th ser. 12 (2002), 267–89; Fiona Whelan, The Making of Manners and Morals in Twelfth-Century England: The Book of the Civilised Man (London, 2017). For other work on table manners and etiquette, see Henisch, Fast and Feast, 190–205; Hammond, Food and Feast in Medieval England, 102–23; Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 59–82; Kerr, ‘Food, Drink and Lodging,’ 80–6; Matthew  M.  Reeve, ‘Gothic Architecture and the Civilizing Process: The Great Hall in Thirteenth-Century England,’ in Robert Bork, William W. Clark, and Abby McGehee, eds., New Approaches to Medieval Architecture (Farnham, 2011), 93–109. For broader background on the kinds of values celebrated in this and other works, see Jaeger, Origins of Courtliness; Thomas Zotz, ‘Urbanitas. Zur Bedeutung und Funktion einer antiken Wertvorstellung innerhalb der höfischen Kultur des hohen Mittelalters,’ in Josef Fleckenstein, ed., Curialitas: Studien zu Grundfragen der höfisch-ritterlichen Kultur (Göttingen, 1990), 392–451. 100  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus, 31–43, 48–9, 78. 101  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus, 37–8. Robert Grosseteste also noted this practice in his discussion of table manners; Dorothea Oschinsky, ed., Walter of Henley and Other Treatises on Estate Management and Accounting (Oxford, 1971), 404–5. For modern discussion, see Henisch, Fast and Feast, 191; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 188–9; Woolgar, Culture of Food, 174.

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Food and Feasting  143 Thomas saw someone seated in a position he might not consider sufficiently ­honourable or having to give up his seat to someone of higher status, Thomas would make sure the unfortunate guest received food from his own dish and drink from his own cup as a sign of honour.102 Herbert used this practice to show what a vigilant and thoughtful host Thomas was, but it also reveals two aspects of feasting that advertised and reinforced social hierarchy: the assignment of seating and the sharing of the lord’s food. No doubt for the most part choices of where to seat guests and with whom the host should share food reflected existing status, but since favour as well as status factored into such decisions, a host could use seating and the sharing of food and drink to honour some guests and subtly dishonour others. Terms like panis dominicus or wine for ‘our mouth’ that appear so frequently in the records of John’s court clearly originated with the practice of the lord at a feast receiving the finest quality food and then sharing it with those he favoured, and it is a near certainty that the king would have practised this widespread custom at his own feasts. One of the most striking aspects of Daniel’s advice to those wishing to appear refined is his emphasis on deference. This, of course, is particularly true of ser­ vers; for instance, when the lord is drinking, they should kneel. But those dining, especially at the host’s table, were also encouraged to be deferential, not speaking unless spoken to and not sitting next to the lord unless asked. If the lord spoke to a guest or moved to kiss him, the guest should take off his hat, and if the lord was seated, the guest should receive the kiss on bended knee. Guests should not turn their backs to the lord or stretch their legs or arms towards him or other lords and ladies. Control of body and speech are thus particularly important in the presence of superiors. The class of the guest mattered; in Daniel’s less exalted circle, for instance, knights and clerics did not need permission to sit down.103 Such guests probably had to be more cautious at the royal court, but no doubt there as well, the ways in which lords and ladies of different ranks interacted with the king varied. Nonetheless, the stipulation that William de Ferrers had to serve the king bare-headed is a reminder that even the great had to show deference to the king. Manners at feasts, like the food eaten and the clothes worn at them, were designed to reinforce social and political hierarchies.

6.7  Food, Drink, Feasting, and Power As seen in previous chapters, gift exchange helped shape power structures in the Middle Ages, and gifts of food and wine fit this pattern.104 The royal records show 102  Robertson and Sheppard, eds., Materials, 3:228–9; Kerr, ‘Food, Drink and Lodging,’ 82. 103  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus, 37–9, 42–3, 45–6. 104  See in particular C. M. Woolgar, ‘Gifts of Food in Late Medieval England,’ Journal of Medieval History 37 (2011), 6–18.

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144  Power and Pleasure the king receiving tuns of wine, and lampreys or fish, often in return for royal favours.105 More common were gifts from the king. Just as John granted deer from his parks to stock his subjects’ parks, so he sent fish to restock the fishponds of two major noble supporters, Earl William Marshal and William Longsword, earl of Salisbury.106 More common were royal gifts of tuns of wine.107 Some of these gifts were to bishops and other ecclesiastical figures, and may have been a mixture of pious gifts (in particular, wine meant for celebration of the mass108) and favours to powerful supporters. Most of John’s gifts of wines were to the earls closest to him, like Earl Geoffrey fitz Peter, his justiciar (who received several gifts of as many as twenty tuns); important administrators, like Hugh de Neville and Brian de Lisle; and household knights. Only rarely did John use wine to reward or signal favour to those not in the inner circle.109 Very occasionally, he used gifts of wine to strengthen diplomatic ties, as when he ordered a shipload of wine to be sent from Poitou to his nephew and military ally, the Emperor Otto.110 As important as gift exchange may have been in creating networks and alliances, feasting was more important, and many scholars have discussed its role in creating (and contesting) soft power.111 The ways that feasting built royal power in various interconnected ways will be apparent from the discussion so far. They allowed the king to display wealth and generosity, reinforced social hierarchy, provided opportunities to show favour, and served as occasions for the per­form­ ance of sacral kingship. Not only were they an occasion for giving gifts, but feasts were themselves a sort of gift from the host to the guests; it is no accident that much of Marcel Mauss’s seminal work on gift-giving and reciprocity included feasting as a central feature.112 Moreover, feasts advertised and reinforced 105 For some examples, see PR7J 129, 131; PR8J 14, 32, 123, 134; ROF 65, 83, 94, 199, 224. Sometimes the fish were for stocking fishponds rather than the table. 106  RLC 17b, 191b. 107  Some grants, particularly in the Norman rolls, may have been allocations for military supplies, and others may have represented exchanges (RLC 128b, 135b) or even sales (RLC 1b; ROF 199). Overall, though, most grants appear to be gifts. For some examples, see PR4J xvii, 83; PR6J 213; RLC 1a, 1b, 3a, 4b, 16a, 16b, 18b, 28b, 30b; RLP 151b; RN 31, 65, 78, 79, 89, 103, 105. 108  RLC 62b. 109  Recipients in Normandy included Robert Tresgoz, Robert de Harcourt, the earl of Leicester, and Henry de Ferrers. Recipients in England included the earls of Essex, Salisbury, and Chester; the power­ful nobleman, Robert de Ros; and royal officials and household knights such as Brian de Lisle, Warin fitz Gerold, Simon de Pateshull, Thomas de Samford, Reginald de Cornhill, John de Grey, Hugh de Neville, Engelard de Cigogné, Thomas Esturmy, Daniel Pincerna, and John fitz Hugh. 110  PR16J 28; RLC 138b, 179a; RLP 129b. 111  A particularly good introduction is Lars Kjær and A. J. Watson, ‘Feasts and Gifts: Sharing Food in the Middle Ages,’ Journal of Medieval History 37 (2011), 1–5. See also Henisch, Fast and Feast, 194–6; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en Bourgogne, 11, 99–108; Bumke, Courtly Culture, 208–10; Althoff, ‘Fest und Bündnis,’ 29–38; Althoff, ‘Charakter des Mahles,’ 13–25; Althoff, Family, Friends and Followers, 152–9; van Uyten, ‘Showing Off One’s Rank,’ 19–34; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 198–201; Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture, 19–24; Slitt, ‘Acting Out Friendship,’ 156–9; Kjær, ‘Food, Drink and Ritualized Communication,’ 75–89; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 177–92; Gautier, ‘Festin et politique,’ 907–34. 112  Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies (London, 1990).

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Food and Feasting  145 s­ olidarity between ruler and subjects and could signal alliances and the making or res­tor­ation of peace. The very act of attending a royal feast could remind followers and subjects of the loyalty they already owed the king because of previous favours and rewards and because of his office and their oaths. Anthropologists and sociologists have stressed the importance of sharing food in shaping social inter­actions, and there is no doubt that feasts were an important tool for medieval kings in building soft power. Much of this operated on such a routine or even subconscious level that contemporary writers could simply note that the king held a great feast, perhaps remarking on unusually important guests, and let the reader fill in the blanks. However, occasional comments and anecdotes show that contemporaries paid attention to feasts and might note particularly important aspects. Examples from the reigns of John’s father and brother can illuminate the context in which John operated. Gerald of Wales wrote that when Henry II held court at Dublin, the sumptuousness of his table and the quality of his service favourably impressed the Irish rulers who had come to see him.113 Ralph of Diceto and Roger of Howden showed how Henry II and the Young King tried to convey an image of amity after the revolt of 1173–4 by feasting together and sharing both chamber and high table, and similarly, when the future Richard I rebelled against his father and joined forces with Philip II, the two allies showed their unity by sharing a dish when eating and a bed when sleeping.114 Both Ambroise and his Latin adapter celebrated the magnificence of Richard I’s feasts, and the latter explicitly stressed Richard’s generosity and the king’s attention to hierarchy in the gifts he gave to his guests and the places he seated them.115 One reason feasts were particularly important is that they gathered together an important audience for the performance of power. The greatest feasts were often attended by powerful lords and their retainers, some of whom had high status themselves. These guests would not only observe events at feasts first-hand but could subsequently recount them to relatives, friends, and neighbours. If one received unusual favour from the king or, conversely, was seated at a place below one’s station and ignored by the king, powerful people would see it and could spread the word. Indeed, how one was treated at a feast could conceivably influence one’s standing among one’s peers, not just one’s relationship with the king. In a society highly attuned to nuances of prestige, status, and honour, great royal feasts would therefore have been highly charged proceedings. Walter Map recounted an episode at a great Christmas feast, with many powerful guests, of Henry II, in which William de Tancarville, who was out of favour with the king,

113  Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 96–7. 114  Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 1:99; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 2:71–2, 276, 318. 115 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:18, 136; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 143, 172–3, 195, 329. For hierarchical seating, see also Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:247–8.

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146  Power and Pleasure staged a risky but successful confrontation. William entered with a crowd of knights and forcibly grabbed from another man the silver basins containing water to wash the king’s hands, claiming it as his own right as royal chamberlain to do so. Henry II not only bore patiently William’s actions, but justified his patience by reference to a similar story. William, of course, gained honour by successfully asserting his rights, but for Walter Map the story reflected most favourably on Henry II for his forbearance and mercy. For both, the audience made the inter­ action far more noteworthy than it would otherwise have been.116 Feasts were not the only place in which powerful participants and therefore a powerful audience assembled; this might occur at great hunts and certainly did at important religious rites such as coronations. However, great feasts formed a regular but extremely important kind of occasion in which cultural and social life intersected with power. How much did John benefit from the care and resources he lavished on feasts? I have already noted the Anonymous of Béthune’s grudging admiration, and Roger of Wendover also recognized his efforts. In passing references, chroniclers noting specific political aspects of some of his feasts, particularly those celebrating (and advertising) reconciliations, most notably when John and his baronial opponents ate and drank together after they had struck the deal that resulted in Magna Carta.117 Feasts could be used to convey other political messages. When Roger of Wendover commented that at Christmas 1209 all the nobles feasted with John although he had been excommunicated, Roger’s primary purpose was to condemn them, but in the process he revealed how John used a great feast to show that despite his feud with the papacy, his secular support was unwavering.118 Perhaps the most striking account of John’s use of a feast, however, was an un­usual one. Late in John’s reign, a hermit, Peter of Wakefield, prophesied that John’s crown would pass to another by Ascension Day 1213, the fourteenth anniversary of his coronation. According to the Crowland Chronicle, John had a great tent pitched in an open field, having had heralds issue summons to celebrate the feast day with the king, and he held a particularly jocund celebration, enjoying himself immensely (exhilarante) with his bishops and magnates. Perhaps he was celebrating the failure of the prophecy but he was also using the feast to project calm in an unsettled political climate that the prophecies had exacerbated.119 Clearly, the king was acutely aware of the way feasts could send political messages. Perhaps the most profound political impacts of feasts, however, were the most routine. Every feast, from the great Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost festivals to 116  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 488–97. 117  Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 2:220; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 372. See also Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 107–8; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 2:276; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:81–2; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 3:36. 118  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:54. 119  Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 2:211–12; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:62–3, 77.

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Food and Feasting  147 the relatively modest ones like that hosted by Hugh de Neville, celebrated the king’s greatness and re-enacted the hierarchical social structure of which the king was the earthly head. Michael Dietler and Joan Gero, in their respective afterwords to The Archaeology and Politics of Food and Feasting in Early States and Empires, emphasize the role of food and feasting in maintaining political structures. Dietler stresses the fragile, volatile, and transitory nature of many early states and empires, and says of such polities that ‘They are a fluid process rather than a durable thing, and they depend upon constant hard work in the micropolitical struggles of negotiation and legitimation to survive and operate.’ Much of that work, in his view, took place in meals and feasting.120 Gero argues that feasts acted as a primary public context to instruct people about how to behave in a ‘state-like’ manner by letting them learn or repeat their status and rank vis-a-vis others. ‘So instead of seeing feasts as events, I prefer to see them as a contextrenewing practice, where producing feasts at the same time produces social outcomes that encourage their existence.’121 In England (though not in the Angevin Empire as a totality), John ruled a more stable polity than many of the states and empires studied in this collection, and he had more institutional powers than many of their rulers. Nonetheless, it is useful to consider John’s rule (and those of other medieval monarchs) not only via institutional processes, like collecting taxes and raising armies, but also through cultural processes, including the holding of feasts. After all, food and feasting continued to be important tools for rulers through the rest of the Middle Ages and the early modern period.

6.8  Food, Feasting, and the Contestation of Power As so often with soft power, both the events that built it and the stories told about those events could be used to challenge as well as enhance authority. Indeed, feasting was particularly open to debate, manipulation, and dispute. Moralists like John of Salisbury considered feasting in moderation urbane and civilized but saw excessive eating and alcoholic consumption as sinful and even barbaric. They often linked it with softness and military weakness, as when John of Salisbury contrasted the warlike Welsh with unimpressive knights at Henry II’s court who frequently killed Muslims—but only with their boasting at feasts.122 Feasts themselves were often sites of disputes over honour, status, and precedence, as with 120  Michael Dietler, ‘Clearing the Table: Some Concluding Reflections on Commensal Politics and Imperial States,’ in Tamara. L.  Bray, ed., The Archaeology and Politics of Food and Feasting in Early States and Empires (New York, 2003), 271–82. 121 Joan  M.  Gero, ‘Feasting and the Practice of Stately Manners,’ in Tamara. L.  Bray, ed., The Archaeology and Politics of Food and Feasting in Early States and Empires (New York, 2003), 285–8. 122 John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 2:12–13, 41, 233, 249–93, 315–27. For other writers linking excessive feasting and military softness, see Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 330–1; Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 408–11; Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 244–5.

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148  Power and Pleasure Walter Map’s story of William de Tancarville, and could even lead to violence, as when the attempt of leading members of the English Jewish community to enter Richard I’s coronation banquet sparked a riot that led to a series of pogroms.123 King Arthur’s Round Table first appeared in Wace’s account of the king: and when Layamon translated Wace into English, he explained its origins as connected to a particularly violent dispute that had arisen at a feast over seating precedence. With a round table, no such dispute could arise.124 Feasts were designed to foster amity, but they often produced the opposite. Although there is no record of a dispute over precedence at one of John’s feasts, he did engage in a rivalry with Hubert Walter, his chancellor and the archbishop of Canterbury, over who was the most brilliant host. Hubert had a notable reputation for magnificence; in fact, in an otherwise positive portrayal, Ralph of Coggeshall criticized him for using the income from his archbishopric and his government position to support an overly lavish lifestyle, including elaborate buildings, a large retinue, and a splendid table.125 Though Hubert’s income could not compare with John’s, he was very rich and did not have to finance ruinous wars, so he may well have held feasts rivalling those of the king. According to Roger of Wendover, in 1200 King John held a Christmas feast at Guildford at which he handed out many robes, and Hubert, striving to equal the king, did the same at Canterbury, which angered John. That Easter, John and Isabella were guests at Canterbury, putting Hubert to great expense.126 The Anonymous of Béthune told a similar story. In his version, John, despite being envious of Hubert’s greatness, attended a Christmas feast at Canterbury which the archbishop held in great style. John then asked if the archbishop knew why the king had stayed so long, whereupon Hubert graciously replied that it must have been to do him honour. ‘By the teeth of God,’ said the king, ‘it is otherwise,’ going on to explain that he did it to ruin the archbishop, since no one could rival his magnificence. Hubert then asked where the king would hold his next great feast, at which point the king asked what business it was of his. ‘Do you know why I asked?’ said the archbishop. ‘Because I would like to be where you will be . . . and I will undertake to hold a finer court than you and in the court I will spend more than you, 123  William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, 294–8; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:12; [Roger of Howden], Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, 2:83. For another noteworthy instance, see Geffrei Gaimar, Estoire des Engleis: History of the English, ed. Ian Short (Oxford, 2009), 326–9. For a broader overview of feasts gone wrong, see D. M. Hadley, ‘Dining in Disharmony in the Later Middle Ages,’ in Maureen Carroll, D. M. Hadley, and Hugh Willmott, eds., Consuming Passions: Dining from Antiquity to the Eighteenth Century (Stroud, 2005), 101–19. For the complex relationship between events at feasts and how writers presented them, see Kjær, ‘Matthew Paris and the Royal Christmas,’ 141–54; Lars Kjær, ‘Feasting with Traitors: Royal Banquets as Rituals and Texts in High Medieval Scandinavia,’ in Wojtek Jezierski et al., eds., Rituals, Performatives, and Political Order in Northern Europe, c. 650–1350 (Turnhout, 2015), 269–94. 124 Layamon, Layamon: Brut, 2:592–9. 125  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 160. 126  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:311.

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Food and Feasting  149 give more robes, make more new knights, and do more good works than you. And at Pentecost I will do the same thing if I am alive then, and still Hubert Walter will have something to eat.’127 The Anonymous of Béthune’s account, as we shall shortly see, was designed to make John look bad. Nonetheless, the stories probably do record memories of an actual rivalry. On some level, this was no doubt merely personal, especially for Hubert. But for a relatively new king who was under severe military pressure on the continent, there may have been real danger in being overshadowed at the great feasts by one of his own officials. In 1223, when two factional leaders at the young Henry III’s court held rival Christmas courts, the far greater attendance at one of them helped tip the balance between the two.128 John’s rivalry with Hubert Walter was less fraught, but John might well have felt that being outmatched at feasting could subtly undermine his authority. Even worse, the sharing of feasts or other meals could conceal wavering loyalties or treacherous intent.129 According to one account, when King John prepared to seize future rebel Robert fitz Walter for besieging a priory in a patronage dispute, a friend of Robert’s slipped away and alerted Robert, allowing him to flee. The king was enraged that ‘someone who ate my bread’ had warned Robert.130 On some level, such expressions were merely metaphorical. However, the biographer of William Marshal criticized one Norman magnate for entertaining John with a meal, receiving rewards from him, kissing him, and then defecting to Philip Augustus shortly after John left.131 In that case the shared meal was a deliberate part of the deception. But, of course, this deception was far less treacherous than John’s alleged slaughter of guests at Evreux that began the chapter. As can be seen, it is often hard to know what actually happened at feasts. However, these accounts do tell us how writers (and presumably others) used narratives about feasts and metaphors about food to build reputations and, in some cases, to criticize those they disliked. Roger of Wendover’s account of John’s rivalry with Hubert Walter probably suggested overreach by the archbishop. In contrast, the Anonymous of Béthune’s account celebrated the archbishop, lavishing superlatives on him and praising his magnificence and magnanimity, making John appear small-minded, envious, and ungrateful in contrast. Similarly, the Anonymous’s anecdote about John and his retinue drinking only the bad wines at Fontainebleau was designed to humiliate the king and his followers as lacking true aristocratic discernment. Roger of Wendover, in a passage hostile to the king,

127  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 105–7. My translation draws on Charles R. Young, Hubert Walter, Lord of Canterbury and Lord of England (Durham, NC, 1968), 151–2. 128 Stacey, Politics, Policy, and Finance, 29; Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture, 21. 129  For some parallels, see Slitt, ‘Acting Out Friendship,’ 159–64. 130 Thomas Walsingham, Gesta Abbatum Monasterii Sancti Albani, ed. Henry  T.  Riley, 2 vols. (London, 1867–9), 1:226–8. 131  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:131–2.

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150  Power and Pleasure condemned John’s alleged indolence in defending his continental lands by ­referring to him feasting with the queen, implicitly using the moral view that associated excessive love of food and drink with martial weakness.132 Harshest of all, William the Breton used the story of John’s slaughter of the French at a feast to depict him as an evil traitor who deserved to be driven from his lands by Philip Augustus. Whether true or not, these stories show the way John’s contemporaries saw food and feasting as intertwined with loyalty and power, and how feasts themselves and the stories people told of them could both build up royal power and ­challenge and undermine it.

6.9  Food, Drink, Feasting, and Pleasure The link between food, feasting, and pleasure is not as straightforward as one might presume. When the Irish rulers visited Henry II’s court during his visit to Ireland, among the dishes they tried, at the king’s command, was crane, which, as Gerald of Wales tells us, they had hitherto abhorred.133 Since the flesh of cranes has been described as ‘tough, gross, sinewy,’ one may well sympathize with the Irish guests.134 Crane probably became a favoured food not for its innate qualities but because of its rarity and association with the aristocratic sport of falconry. The consumption of food and drink is of course intimately associated with pleasure, but as this example illustrates, the relationship can be complex. To take a modern example: ‘Coffee is one of the great, marvelous flavors. Who could deny that? Well, actually, anyone drinking coffee for the first time would deny it . . . . It is bitter and characterless; it simply tastes bad the first time you encounter it.’135 Taste is biological but it is also cultural. Massimo Montanari has written, ‘The organ of taste is not the tongue, but the brain, a culturally (and therefore historically) determined organ through which are transmitted and learned the criteria for evaluations.’ It is probably better to say, as Montanari does in a later formulation, that the brain directs and judges the sensation of the tongue, but this quotation nicely captures the cultural and historical aspects of taste.136 Although royal cooks may have found ways to make crane more palatable, we can presume that at least some of Henry II’s Irish guests continued to abhor it. Montanari suggests that some people might have to eat high-status foods despite disliking them and Chris Woolgar has argued that at least in the later Middle Ages, the colour, ­presentation, and shape of foods at feasts were sometimes more important than 132  Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 1:316. 133  Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 96–7. 134  Albarella and Thomas, ‘They Dined on Crane,’ 25. 135  Robert  C.  Bolles, ‘A “Mixed” Model of Taste Preference,’ in Roger  L.  Mellgren, ed., Animal Cognition and Behavior (Amsterdam, 1983), 65–82, at 68. Quoted in Mennell, All Manners of Food, 2. 136 Montanari, Food Is Culture, 61; Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 199.

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Food and Feasting  151 their taste.137 One can imagine that some diners, when first introduced to strange spices or exotic game meats, might have wished for plainer fare. Nonetheless, the power of culture to shape taste undoubtedly meant that the elites John entertained delighted even in dishes that modern people might find terrible. While the sources do not speak in any detail about what made food tasty, they do take for granted that food and drink were a source of pleasure. One can point, for instance, to the famous story in which Louis VII of France enumerated all the wealth and power possessed by other rulers, especially Henry II, but said that in France they had bread and wine and joy.138 The last word on food at court, however, should be left to Peter of Blois. Despite his complaints about the quality of food for those chasing the king around the countryside, when he imagined a worldly cleric explaining his decision to serve there, among the enticements the cleric listed was the exquisite and sumptuous food at court.139 For all the tensions feasting might cause, there were plenty of obvious ways in which it also brought pleasure: good food and wine, of course; cultivated manners and service; entertainment and spectacle; the delight in wearing and beholding fine clothes or seeing glittering dishes of precious metals; good conversation; and the chance to see friends and acquaintances from far away. For the king, there was the satisfaction of being the centre of attention and of presiding over an occasion that brought honour and prestige. For honoured guests there might be the gratification of getting a seat that displayed one’s status, and for the socially ambitious, there could be the thrill of being favoured with drink from the king’s special wine or morsels from his own dishes. A description of John’s brother, Richard I, may give a sense of the pleasure that sharing food and drink could bring even to a king under great pressure. Ralph of Coggeshall condemned Richard’s increased harshness and greed after his return from crusade and captivity. ‘At the table, however, placed with his inner circle, he appeared affable and agreeable, because his jokes and games with them relaxed his savage spirit.’140 Coggeshall is ­probably referring to informal meals, but he nonetheless shows the solace a shared meal with the right company could provide. Perhaps John found similar relaxation eating with his favourites or at the great feasts he presided over. Feasting may have been a significant foundation of soft power, but it was also an important source of pleasure. Those who followed the royal court about the countryside did not always have wonderful dining experiences, but royal administrators worked to ensure that the king and those closest to him got the best possible food and drink. The

137 Montanari, Medieval Tastes, 13, 72; Woolgar, ‘Fast and Feast,’ 22–3. 138  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 450–1; Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 714–15. 139  C. Wollin, ed., Petri Blesensis Carmina (Turnhout, 1998), 267. 140  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 92.

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152  Power and Pleasure acquisition of good wine and food, the frequent use of spices, and the rewards lavished on cooks show the court participating fully in the development of the complex European cuisine found in the late Middle Ages. John and his government also contributed to the development of Bordeaux as a wine district, first by losing the lands from which they had once drawn much of their wine, then by making large-scale purchases from the region. Food and feasting bolstered royal power by giving the king an opportunity to show his magnificence and generosity, build ties with his magnates, and, thanks to the customary manners of the period, reinforce their deference. As always, enemies and critics could contest the king’s soft power, in this case by telling stories of his envy or treacherous behaviour. And, as one would expect, food and feasting were great sources of pleasure.

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7

Places and Spaces 7.1 Introduction In late June 1212, as the king travelled through northern England, his cooks set up a makeshift kitchen in the local reeve’s barn in Haltwhistle, Northumberland, then accidently burned the barn down.1 When modern people think of life at royal and imperial courts, we usually think of great palaces like Versailles, Buckingham Palace, and the Forbidden City, not makeshift kitchens in rural barns. John did own palaces, including Westminster Palace with its huge great hall. However, because his court was constantly on the move, court life could not be focused around one great palace or even a handful of them. John had scores of castles and other residences scattered throughout England, with many more in his continental lands (at least until 1204), and some in Ireland.2 Therefore, one must also imagine the royal court in castles, hunting lodges, and even the occasional monastery. Tents and luxurious pavilions also played a role. However, John, like many other rulers, spent much of his time outdoors. Not only did hunting and falconry take the court to forests and wetlands, but much of court life, including moments of social and cultural significance, took place on the road, often quite literally. The first sections of the chapter will discuss King John’s buildings and his tents and pavilions. An important shift in castle studies over the past couple of decades, which has de-emphasized their military importance in favour of their domestic and ceremonial sides, will inform this discussion. This new castellology places particular emphasis on the presence of designed landscapes around castles and other residences. The chapter will proceed outward from designed landscapes to less domesticated, albeit heavily managed wetlands and forests to investigate contemporary perceptions of these settings. How did John and his courtiers ex­peri­ence these environments and how should this affect our thinking about designed landscapes? Itineration and its impact on social (and therefore political) relations between king and magnates is the next topic. The importance of horses, horse trappings, and processions will be investigated, as will the place of John’s

1  Misae 14J 234. 2  For the many royal castles and other palaces owned by English kings in the Middle Ages, see vol. 2 of Howard Colvin, The History of the King’s Works, 6 vols. (London, 1963–82). For a map showing the main places John stayed throughout his realms, see Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 349.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0007

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154  Power and Pleasure court in the long history of the ceremonial adventus or royal entry. The chapter will end with a discussion of the relative importance of power, contestation, and pleasure in the interactions of the court with the places and spaces in which they found themselves.3

7.2  New Ways of Thinking about Castles and Palaces Though John had inherited many castles, palaces, and hunting lodges, he invested heavily in building and refurbishing various kinds of residences. In England alone, the incomplete records show that he spent over £17,000 on castles, including over £2,000 on Scarborough Castle alone, and over £4,000 on other kinds of residences. R. Allen Brown, who compiled these figures, convincingly argued that John was instrumental in determining where such expenditures were made.4 Several scholars have noted his acquisition of new unfortified residences in England despite the large number he inherited.5 In the past, however, attention has focused on John and other medieval kings as castle builders. In John’s case, the imbalance in money spent on castles and other residences helped justify this approach. More generally, however, the traditional emphasis on political and military history meant that the military architecture of castles received far more attention than domestic architecture. Now, however, scholars pay increased attention to purely domestic architecture.6 More important has been a revolution in castle studies, whereby castles are seen not only as fortresses, but as aristocratic homes surrounded by designed or ornamental landscapes. In this new picture, castles are similar to the great country homes of early modern and modern

3 For an overview of the theoretical background on place and space, see Janette Dillon, The Language of Space in Court Performance, 1400–1625 (Cambridge, 2010), 6–8. 4 Colvin, History of the King’s Works, 2:51–91; R. Allen Brown, ‘Royal Castle Building in England, 1154–1216,’ Castles, Conquest and Charters: Collected Papers (Woodbridge, 1989), 19–64; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 37. 5  Thomas Beaumont James, The Palaces of Medieval England c. 1050–1550: Royalty, Nobility, the Episcopate and Their Residences from Edward the Confessor to Henry VIII (London, 1990), 57; Steane, The Archaeology of the Medieval English Monarchy, 81; Danziger and Gillingham, 1215, 170. 6  This interest in domestic architecture does, however, have earlier roots; P. A. Faulkner, ‘Domestic Planning from the Twelfth to the Fourteenth Centuries,’ The Archaeological Journal 115 (1958), 150–83; Rahtz, Excavations at King John’s Hunting Lodge; Margaret Wood, Norman Domestic Architecture (London, 1974); Philip Rahtz, The Saxon and Medieval Palaces at Cheddar: Excavations 1960–62 (Oxford, 1979); Annie Renoux, Fécamp. Du palais ducal au palais de dieu (Paris, 1991); Annie Renoux, ‘Résidences et châteaux ducaux normands au XIIe siècles: L’apport des sources comptables et des données archéologiques,’ in Maylis Baylé, ed., L’architecture Normande en Moyen Âge (Caen, 1997), 1:197–217; Michael Thompson, The Medieval Hall: The Basis of Secular Domestic Life, 600–1600 ad (Aldershot, 1995); Graham D. Keevil, Medieval Palaces: An Archaeology (Stroud, 2000); Gwyn Meirion-Jones, Edward Impey, and Michael Jones, eds., The Seigneurial Residence in Western Europe ad c. 800–1600 (Oxford, 2002); Reeve, ‘Gothic Architecture and the Civilizing Process,’ 93–109; Morgan, Beds and Chambers; Rollason, Power of Place, 9–98.

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Places and Spaces  155 aristocrats. Some of this new work focuses on the buildings themselves.7 Much of it encompasses both buildings and landscapes.8 The findings of the new castellology are only slowly making their way into the wider historiography, but Fanny Madeline, in her detailed study of the building works of Henry II and his sons, has applied many of its lessons to their residences.9 I will narrow her focus to John’s reign. What are the main findings of the recent work? A number of scholars have emphasized castles and palaces as status symbols and markers of authority designed to impress and even overawe visitors and viewers. Their high status could be reinforced by visual references to past powers—such as the Romans—as

7  P. A. Faulkner, ‘Castle Planning in the Fourteenth Century,’ The Archaeological Journal 120 (1963), 215–35; T.  A.  Heslop, ‘Orford Castle, Nostalgia, and Sophisticated Living,’ Architectural History 34 (1991), 36–58; Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 252–80; T. A. Heslop, Norwich Castle Keep: Romanesque Architecture and Social Context (Norwich, 1994); Pamela Marshall, ‘The Ceremonial Function of the Donjon in the Twelfth Century,’ Château Gaillard 20 (2002), 141–51; Pamela Marshall, ‘The Great Tower as Residence,’ in Gwyn Meirion-Jones, Edward Impey, and Michael Jones, eds., The Seigneurial Residence in Western Europe ad c. 800–1600 (Oxford, 2002), 27–44; Pamela Marshall, ‘Some Thoughts on the Use of the Anglo-Norman Donjon,’ in John A. Davies et al., eds., Castles and the Anglo-Norman World (Oxford, 2015), 159–74; Jeremy  A.  Ashbee, ‘The Function of the White Tower under the Normans,’ in Edward Impey, ed., The White Tower (New Haven, CT, 2008), 125–39; Leonie V. Hicks, ‘Magnificent Entrances and Undignified Exits: Chronicling the Symbolism of Castle Space in Normandy,’ Journal of Medieval History 35 (2009), 52–69; Jervis, Pottery and Social Life, 98–103. Much of this work has been Anglophone, but for castles and soft power, see Annie Renoux, ‘Les fondemonts architecturaux du pouvoir princier en France (fin XIe–début XIIIe siècle),’ in Les Princes et le Pouvoir au Moyen Ages. Actes du XXIIIe congrès de la SHMESP (Paris, 1993), 167–94. For an overview of French and German work on royal and princely palaces and residences, see Schmitt and Oexle, eds., Les tendances actuelles, 307–96. For a good study of how people thought about castles in the period, see Abigail Wheatley, The Idea of the Castle in Medieval England (York, 2004). 8  James and Robinson, Clarendon Palace; James, Palaces of Medieval England; James and Gerrard, Clarendon; Michael Hughes, ‘Hampshire Castles and the Landscape 1066–1200,’ Landscape History 11 (1989), 27–60; Paul Everson, ‘Delightfully Surrounded with Woods and Ponds: Field Evidence for Medieval Gardens as Large-Scale Designed Landscapes,’ in Paul Pattison, ed., There by Design: Field Archaeology in Parks and Gardens (Oxford, 1998), 32–8; Christopher Taylor, Parks and Gardens of Britain: A Landscape History from the Air (Edinburgh, 1998); Christopher Taylor, ‘Medieval Ornamental Landscapes,’ Landscapes 1 (2000), 38–55; Oliver  H.  Creighton, Castles and Landscapes (London, 2002); Oliver  H.  Creighton, Designs upon the Land: Elite Landscapes of the Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 2009); Oliver  H.  Creighton, Early European Castles: Aristocracy and Authority, ad 800–1200 (London, 2012); Oliver H. Creighton and R. A. Higham, ‘Castle Studies and the “Landscape” Agenda,’ Landscape History 26 (2006), 5–18; Matthew Johnson, Behind the Castle Gate: From the Middle Ages to the Renaissance (London, 2002); Charles Coulson, Castles in Medieval Society: Fortresses in England, France, and Ireland in the Central Middle Ages (Oxford, 2003); Robert Liddiard, ‘Landscapes of Lordship’: Norman Castles and the Countryside in Medieval Norfolk, 1066–1200 (Oxford, 2000); Robert Liddiard, ‘Castle Rising, Norfolk: A “Landscape of Lordship”?’ Anglo-Norman Studies 22 (2000), 169–86; Robert Liddiard, Castles in Context: Power, Symbolism and Landscape, 1066 to 1500 (Macclesfield, 2005); Amanda Richardson, The Forest, Park and Palace of Clarendon, c. 1200–c. 1650: Reconstructing an Actual, Conceptual and Documented Wiltshire Landscape (Oxford, 2005); Amanda Richardson, ‘ “The King’s Chief Delights”: A Landscape Approach to the Royal Parks of Post-Conquest England,’ in Robert Liddiard, ed., The Medieval Park: New Perspectives (Windgather, 2007), 27–48; Richardson, ‘Beyond the Castle Gate,’ 35–53; Jon Gregory and Robert Liddiard, ‘Visible from Afar? The Setting of the Anglo-Norman Donjon,’ in John  A.  Davies et al., eds., Castles and the AngloNorman World (Oxford, 2015), 147–58; Rollason, Power of Place, 9–239. Some key articles by Coulson and others have been collected in Robert Liddiard, ed., Late Medieval Castles (Woodbridge, 2016). 9 Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 287–314.

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156  Power and Pleasure well as the incorporation of very old elements, like prehistoric earthworks. They often included striking facades and ornamentation designed for visual effect rather than military purposes, even if the intended effect was militaristic in nature. Thus elements of designs could appear defensive, but be ineffective in actual fighting. Philip Dixon has described specific buildings within castles as theatres of lordship. Focusing on Knaresborough, he notes the inclusion of design features, for instance light shining from a window onto the high seat of the owner, that could enhance his or her authority. He has even argued that convoluted approaches to important rooms may have been intended to keep guests off balance rather than deter attackers.10 Scholars using the technique of access analysis, which studies the ability of people to move through buildings, argue that castles and other residences were designed to control and limit access to the owner and set up spaces that were intended not so much for privacy as for intimate groups. Kings and particularly queens often had chambers that were as far removed as possible from the main entrance, at least in terms of intervening gates, doors, and other barriers that could prevent visitors from moving further.11 Even the AngloNorman donjon or great tower, the military refuge of last resort in earlier thinking, may have been designed as much for ceremonial purposes as for defence or residence. Defence was merely one consideration in castle design. The relation between elite dwellings and the surrounding landscape has received even more attention than the buildings themselves. One focus is on viewsheds. Castles and palaces, the argument goes, were placed to be seen from far around in order to increase their impact as visual representations of lordship and power. They were also often sited to command a view of the surrounding countryside, both to see approaching enemies and to provide a pleasurable prospect. Rooftop viewing areas and windows with seats built into them could enhance the experience. Adjuncts to castles and palaces such as forests, parks, fishponds, gardens, orchards, vineyards, dovecotes, and walkways had practical purposes but also helped to create a designed and partly ornamental landscape. Having a park or forest close by made hunting convenient and let castle owners and their followers look out on a striking landscape of trees and woodland 10  Philip Dixon, ‘The Donjon of Knaresborough: The Castle as Theatre,’ Château Gaillard 14 (1990), 121–39; Philip Dixon, ‘Design in Castle Building: The Controlling of Access to the Lord,’ Château Gaillard 18 (1998), 47–56. See also Creighton, Early European Castles, 109–24. 11  Amanda Richardson, ‘Gender and Space in English Royal Palaces c.1160–c.1547: A Study in Access Analysis and Imagery,’ Medieval Archaeology 47 (2003), 131–65; Katherine Weikert, ‘Place and Prestige: Enacting and Displaying Authority in English Domestic Spaces during the Central Middle Ages,’ in Scott  D.  Stull, ed., From West to East: Current Approaches to Medieval Archaeology (Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 2014), 91–115; Katherine Weikert, ‘Creating a Choreographed Space: English Anglo-Norman Keeps in the Twelfth Century,’ in Liz Thomas and Jill Campbell, eds., Buildings in Society: International Studies in the Historic Era (Oxford, 2018), 127–39. David Crouch in particular emphasizes that intimacy rather than privacy was the aim; Crouch, Image of Aristocracy, 265–6. For the importance of controlling access generally, see Vale, Princely Court, 58–9; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 313–14.

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Places and Spaces  157 pasture. Vivaries or fishponds provided not only fresh fish but also sheets of reflective water that enhanced the beauty of the surrounding area. Along with providing food and medicine, gardens were places to enjoy. Chapels and hermitages were primarily religious, but could also increase the allure of the landscape. Even apparently defensive features—like moats and earthworks—could enhance the aesthetic interest of the surroundings, and earthworks could also serve as viewing platforms. Carefully designed, complicated routes up to castles or palaces displayed the impressiveness of the buildings and the pleasures of the surrounding landscape. Thus, later landscape designers like Capability Brown drew on a tradition that went back at least to the twelfth century and possibly earlier. The new approach to castles has proved controversial, despite points of widespread agreement.12 Everyone acknowledges that castles had domestic as well as military functions, and members of the newer school accept that many castles had military functions. The debate is over the degree to which castles should be seen as fortresses or great houses, over specific interpretations of individual castles, and over the extent to which the new claims are grounded in the evidence. Much of the debate rests on the surviving buildings, ruins, and landscape features, since castle owners and designers left few records of their intentions. At best, the written sources provide brief references from which modern readers must make broad inferences about the purposes of castles. However, the narrative sources do show that contemporaries clearly viewed castles and palaces as parts of landscapes. The new work on castles cites several convincing examples such as characters taking pleasure in looking out of windows at the surrounding landscapes in the romances of Chrétien de Troyes or Gerald of Wales and others depicting the palace of the bishop of Lincoln at Stow as ‘delightfully surrounded by woods and  ponds.’13 Indeed, once one begins looking, descriptions of buildings in ­landscapes, admittedly often brief, pop up frequently.14 Some of these relate to the castles or residences of John. The Anonymous of Béthune described John’s favoured residence at Freemantle as being on top of a hill in the midst of a forest.15 In his poetic panegyric of Philip II, William the Breton often noted the fields,

12 Liddiard, Castles in Context, 1–11; Colin Platt, ‘Revisionism in Castle Studies: A Caution,’ Medieval Archaeology 51 (2007), 83–102; O. H. Creighton and Robert Liddiard, ‘Fighting Yesterday’s Battle: Beyond War or Status in Castle Studies,’ Medieval Archaeology 52 (2008), 161–9. 13  Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 57, 863, 881; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 7:72–3; Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 1:104; Everson, ‘Delightfully Surrounded,’ 32; Taylor, ‘Medieval Ornamental Landscapes,’ 39; Coulson, Castles in Medieval Society, 126–7; Creighton, Castles and Landscapes, 4–5; Creighton, Designs upon the Land, 167, 180, 214; Liddiard, Castles in Context, 111–19, 142–3. 14  Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus, 72; Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 454–5; Thomas of Marlborough, History of the Abbey of Evesham, ed. Jane E. Sayers and Leslie Watkiss (Oxford, 2003), 46–7; Wace, Roman de Brut, 256; Layamon, Layamon: Brut, 2:632–3; Holden, ed., Waldef, 99; Otto of Freising and Rahewin, Gesta Friderici I Imperator, ed. G. Waitz and B. de Simson, 3rd ed. (Hanover, 1912), 344–5; Peter of Blois, Opera, 200. 15  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 147.

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158  Power and Pleasure meadows, vineyards, gardens, and rivers surrounding or adjacent to castles. He described Loches, an old Angevin castle that John lost to Philip Augustus, as being surrounded by poor fields but with a nearby river that was useful in watering the fields and gardens and pleasant to look at, an adornment to the castle.16 Even a formula used in John’s charters to exempt monasteries from contributing money or labour to royal building projects treated castles as components in heavily manipulated landscapes: castles, walls, ditches, and bridges were listed alongside parks, fishponds, enclosures, and causeways.17 The written evidence for the newer theories on the uses of specific buildings to support soft power is less extensive. However, one writ of John commands the sheriff of Worcestershire to replace the wooden gatehouse to the castle at Worcester with a stone one that would be ‘bona et pulchra’ (good and beautiful). It is possible that John simply found a strong fortification to be a thing of beauty, but the adjective ‘pulchra’ suggests that the gatehouse was intended as much to impress guests as to defend the castle.18 John’s castles certainly had martial purposes, and much can be learned about their military uses from the royal records, but in this book I will explore the newer interpretations to show how John used buildings and landscapes to enhance his soft power and provide pleasure for himself and his court.19

7.3  Castles and Palaces, Tents and Pavilions Though John spent more on castles than unfortified residences, he still expended large sums on the latter. For instance, he spent over £500 on Kingshaugh, Nottinghamshire, building a residence and enclosing a park there.20 Moreover, the gap between the £17,000 spent on castles and the £4,000 paid out for other residences is misleading, since much of the money spent on castles went to domestic buildings within them. Unfortunately, the royal records rarely break down expenditures on castles, but the frequent references to money spent on the king’s ‘houses’ in castles suggest that much was spent on non-military aspects.21 Sometimes the expenditures on individual residences in castles was quite high; of the over £1,400 spent on Corfe Castle, at least £275, and possibly far more, went 16  Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ 28, 128–9, 193, 215, 225–6. 17  RLCh 2b, 4a, 6a–b, 8a–b, 8b–9b, 10b, and passim. 18  RL 93. 19 For an example of records shedding light on military purposes, see Neil Christie and O. H. Creighton, Transforming Townscapes: From Burh to Borough—The Archaeology of Wallingford, ad 800–1400 (London, 2013), 153–4, 158. Unfortunately, sufficient evidence does not survive to study one important strand of the new work, on gender and space; Roberta Gilchrist, ‘The Contested Garden: Gender, Space and Metaphor in the Medieval English Castle,’ Gender and Archaeology: Contesting the Past (London, 1999), 109–45; Creighton, Designs upon the Land, 175–9; Sykes, ‘Animal Bones,’ 53–5; Hicks, ‘Magnificent Entrances,’ 52–69; Morgan, Beds and Chambers, 171–213. 20  PR13J 550; Colvin, History of the King’s Works, 2:970. 21  Taking just the first two pipe rolls of the reign: PRJ1 2, 8, 37, 52, 102, 130, 155, 170, 209, 240, 245; PR2J 2, 8, 37, 52, 102, 130, 155, 170, 209, 240, 245.

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Places and Spaces  159 to the king’s houses.22 Ultimately, it is impossible to know the precise balance in spending on residences and fortifications, but certainly John’s expenditure on domestic architecture was considerable. We know most about John’s domestic building in England, but early in his reign he also invested in royal residences in Normandy, and there is a great hall in Poitier that probably dates to his reign.23 When the royal records provide specificity about expenditures on domestic architecture, they show John building or remodelling the standard buildings and rooms one would find in elite residences; halls, chambers, and kitchens, with several references to wardrobes and one to a cellar.24 Jeremy Ashbee has argued that cloisters were a feature of royal residences as well as monasteries in this period, and there is at least one possible reference to a cloister in one of John’s charters.25 There are hints of attempts to make residential quarters visually beautiful—I noted the likelihood of painted designs in Chapter  4 and the use of hangings and elaborate beddings in Chapter 3.26 Elaborate beddings also suggest a desire for comfort, as do expenditures on chimneys. Money spent on windows indicates an interest in providing ample illumination and possible viewpoints for gardens and designed landscapes.27 Artificial illumination was a luxury in preindustrial times, and John’s records show frequent purchases of hundreds of pounds of wax and thousands of candles.28 Life inside royal residences in his reign was clearly luxurious. Occasional chronicle references show how intimate spaces were used to limit access to the king, particularly when delicate political matters were discussed. For instance, Ralph of Coggeshall describes how John, when he was settling his dispute with the Cistercians, called the abbots into his chamber and subsequently retired to a ‘very secret cubicularium’ with two or three nobles to take counsel.29 Gerd Althoff has stressed the distinction between situations in which the king received open, ‘public’ advice, and the equally important taking of private or even ‘secret’ advice, which allowed the kind of plain speaking, manoeuvring, and exchange of ideas that would be inadvisable in an open forum. Here we can see how different spaces could be used to accommodate various levels of privacy.30

22  PR4J 85; Colvin, History of the King’s Works, 2:617. 23  MRSN 513–14, 548–9, 573; RN 25–6, 35, 111; Nurit Kenaan-Kedar, ‘The Impact of Eleanor of Aquitaine on the Visual Arts in France,’ in Martin Aurell, ed., La cour Plantagenêt (1154–1204) (Poitiers, 2000), 39–60, at 47–50. 24  PRJ1 87; PR3J 103, 195; PR4J 17; PR5J 151; PR6J 47, 123; PR7J 272; PR8J 79, 119; PR9J 188; PR10J 103; PR13J 67–8, 83–4; RL 83; RLC 32b, 41a, 41b, 52b, 94b, 105a, 117b. 25  RLCh 55b; Jeremy  A.  Ashbee, ‘Cloisters in English Palaces in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries,’ Journal of the British Archaeological Association 159 (2006), 71–90. 26  See Chapter 3, 57; Chapter 4, 80. 27  PR3J 55, 103; PR6J 123; PR7J 133; PR12J 62; PR13J 83; RL 12. 28  PR3J 258; PR8J 47; PR9J 31; PR16J 28; Crowley, The Invention of Comfort, 112–22. 29  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 107–8. 30 Althoff, Spielregeln, 157–85; Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture, 114–15, 127. For a similar point, see Barrow, ‘Demonstrative Behaviour,’ 141–3.

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160  Power and Pleasure The king could also use an invitation into a special space to show favour. Thus, after a long election dispute at Bury St Edmunds (and during the period John was negotiating with the barons at Runnymede), he signalled his favour to the new abbot by inviting him to sit on his royal bed with him after dinner at Windsor Castle.31 That John consciously included small intimate spaces in his building plans is shown by the reference in one royal writ to the construction of a privata camera at Hereford Castle.32 No one has performed a systematic analysis of access in any of the buildings John had constructed, but it is noteworthy that he placed his new residential block at Corfe Castle behind an inherited great donjon, furthest away from the outer gates (see Figure 7.1).33 Like his contemporaries, John used architecture to create secluded and intimate spaces. Though in ruins, John’s domestic buildings at Corfe reveal much else. His ­predecessors had chosen an impressive site for the castle, high atop a hill with

Figure 7.1  Plan of Corfe Castle. King John’s residential block with the gloriette is in the upper right of the plan. © National Trust/Front Row Graphics Ludgershall; Historic England. 31  Thomson, ed., Chronicle of the Election of Hugh, 170–1. 32  RLC 41a. 33  Some of the outer stone walls in the image were later than John’s reign, but the access route to the inner parts of the castle would probably have been the same.

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Places and Spaces  161 magnificent views, including glimpses of a harbour in the distance.34 John’s new buildings were constructed of high-quality ashlar masonry in a style similar to contemporary work at Wells Cathedral and Glastonbury Abbey. A sixteenthcentury plan shows them overlooking a garden, but it is not clear if it was there in John’s time. In the surviving ruins, there are lancet windows with window seats, creating comfortable viewing spots. A chamber in a part of the building now lost, which likely had excellent views over the castle walls, was called the ‘Gloriette’ in documents of 1261. It was the first of a handful of ‘Gloriettes’ in England. There is debate about whether that name came from a Romance translation of an Arabic term for pavilions in Islamic gardens or from the Prise d’Orange, a twelfth-century chanson de geste, where the term was applied to the magnificent palace of a Muslim ruler. In either case, the term alluded to the luxury and exoticism of Arabic culture. What made this lost room special is unclear: probably a com­bin­ ation of special architectural and decorative features. John’s pride in his residential block and the whole castle complex is shown by his order telling Peter de Maulay, constable of Corfe, that Robert de Dreux III, a relative of Philip II whom John’s forces had captured, be honourably hosted in the king’s new hall and shown around the old donjon if he desired.35 Compared to the outpouring of work on castles and palaces, there has been very little Anglophone scholarship on royal pavilions and tents. However, Schröder has shown just how important they were at Henry II’s court for both practical purposes and for displaying royal power and authority, and Lachaud, though focusing on Edward I’s military uses of them, details just how impressively large they could be. Edward I had tents of various sizes that were designated as halls, chapels, and chambers. The royal ‘chamber’ was 45 feet long and one ‘hall’ was 140 feet.36 Large and magnificent pavilions were not new in Edward’s day. Henry II presented Frederick I with a tent so large it required special machinery to set up, and when Richard I arrived in Sicily, he demanded as part of his sister’s dowry a silken pavilion in which 200 knights could dine.37 Manuscript illuminations, descriptions in romances, and occasional references in documentary

34 For John’s work at Corfe and the ‘Gloriette’ see http://www.finerollshenry3.org.uk/content/ month/fm-07-2011.html; Jeremy  A.  Ashbee, ‘ “The Chamber called Gloriette”: Living at Leisure in Thirteenth- and Fourteenth-Century Castles,’ Journal of the British Archaeological Association 157 (2004), 17–40; Matthew M. Reeve and Malcolm Thurlby, ‘King John’s Gloriette at Corfe,’ Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 64 (2005), 168–85; Sharon Farmer, ‘La Zisa/Gloriette: Cultural Interaction and the Architecture of Entertainment in Medieval Sicily, France and Britain,’ Journal of the British Archaeological Association 166 (2013), 99–123; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 96–7. Ashbee argues redecoration by Henry III might have led to the chamber receiving the name, but there is no reason to assume this was the case. 35  RLP 138b. 36 Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 244–78; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Les tentes et l’activité militaire. Les guerres d’Édouard Ier Plantagenêt (1272–1307),’ Mélanges de l’École Française de Rome 111 (1999), 443–61. See also Bumke, Courtly Culture, 126–8. 37  Otto of Freising and Rahewin, Gesta Friderici I, 171; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:61.

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162  Power and Pleasure sources indicate that royal pavilions could be highly decorated, featuring gilded pommels and crests among other ornamental features.38 Indeed, in wartime, luxurious tents and pavilions were eagerly sought as plunder.39 John seems not to have relied on these temporary lodgings during his regular itineration; he and other rulers used them mainly for military campaigns or great gatherings for feasts and assemblies when permanent buildings were insufficient.40 In both circumstances, tents and pavilions were important displays of royal magnificence. Less survives about John’s tents and pavilions than is ideal, but passing references to them, their use, and the men in charge of them are scattered throughout the royal records.41 John was certainly willing to invest resources in them, at one point spending over £71 for ten pavilions and related incidentals.42 The French boasted that when John retreated from La Roche-au-Moines during the 1214 campaign, they seized the royal pavilions, revealing their symbolic importance. William the Breton described them as being woven with barbaric thread, indicating that they were made of some special cloth or decorated with embroidery.43 This suggests the likely magnificence of at least some of John’s pavilions, and indicates that his mobile structures, like his more permanent ones, were designed to impress.

7.4  Aesthetic Landscapes Did John oversee the creation of designed, aesthetically pleasing landscapes? The evidence must be pieced together, as is inevitably the case for the Middle Ages. He certainly had a model patron in his father, Henry II, who was responsible for Everswell in the park at Woodstock, one of the most famous designs of the Middle Ages. Now lost, it is known from written records and a seventeenth-century sketch. Henry had a fountain built there in the 1160s that fed a series of ponds, and thirteenth-century sources record a chamber called Rosamund’s chamber, after Henry’s mistress, Rosamund Clifford, which (if the name was original) may 38  Lachaud, ‘Les tentes et l’activité militaire,’ 448–9; Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 248–55; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 276. For some literary descriptions of tents see Marie de France, Lais, 138–9; Ewert, ed., Gui de Warewic, 1:118–19; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 701; Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 212–13; Emmanuèle Baumpartner, ‘Peintur et écriture: la description de la tente dans les romans antiques au XIIe siècle,’ in Danielle Buschinger, ed., Sammlung—Deutung—Wertung. Ergebnisse Probleme, Tendenzen und Perspektiven philologischer Arbeit (Stuttgart 1988), 3–11. 39 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:27, 169–72; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 194, 390; Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:30–1. 40 Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 1:474; Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:136; Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, 5:574. 41  For the purchase, repair, and carting of tents, see PR6J 125; PR7J 133; PR11J 27; PR13J 107–8; PR14J 44; Misae 14J 241; RLC 28b, 100a–b, 119a, 125b–126a, 128b, 166b; Prest Roll 7J 270–1; Prest Roll 12J 208. For royal use of them in wartime, see Prest Roll 12J 181; RLC 207a. 42  PR13J 108. 43 Guillaume le Breton, ‘Philippidos,’ 293; Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 144; Anonymous of Béthune, ‘Chronique des rois de France,’ 767.

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Places and Spaces  163 have been used as a place for their trysts. H. M. Colvin long ago proposed two possible inspirations for this garden: the water gardens of Sicily, Spain, and the Islamic world, or a garden described in the romance of Tristan and Isolde. The garden, of course, was part of a larger landscape, including the palace of Woodstock and the rest of the park.44 Clearly, sophisticated landscape design existed by the time John came to the throne. The royal records show that John paid for various elements that modern w ­ riters argue went into the designed landscapes. I have already noted John’s expenditures on parks, which were a key component of landscapes of lordship in the period.45 I have also noted the construction of fishponds.46 In his fifth year, John paid over £10 to have a garden enclosed at Marlborough; this large sum suggests either a spacious walled garden within the castle or an even larger fenced one nearby.47 Dovecotes provided a prestigious food source but could also be an element in designed landscapes, and John had several built.48 Even the hermitages that John established at some of his hunting residences may have been intended not only for religious purposes, but also to imitate the landscapes of romances, which often featured hermits in wooded areas.49 Although some of these features were added piecemeal, they could have been intended to reshape existing landscapes. In some cases, however, several features were added together, suggesting the possibility of sustained design programmes intended to reshape the features of a castle or palace and the land around it. For instance, when John had the garden built at Marlborough, he had work done on the fishpond and the castle there. At Tewkesbury, John had mews constructed and a park enclosed in conjunction with work on chimneys and windows in one round of renovations; in another, he had a kitchen and dovecote built along with work on the defences and a chamber and

44 Colvin, History of the King’s Works, 2:1013–16; Howard Colvin, ‘Royal Gardens in Medieval England,’ in Elisabeth  B.  MacDougall, ed., Medieval Gardens (Washington, D.C., 1986), 7–22, at 18–20; James Bond, ‘Woodstock Park in the Middle Ages,’ in James Bond and Kate Tiller, eds., Blenheim: Landscape for a Palace (Stroud, 1987), 22–54, at 46–8; Ashbee, ‘Cloisters in English Palaces,’ 78–83. 45  See Chapter 2, 28–30. For parks as landscapes, see Bond, ‘Woodstock Park in the Middle Ages,’ 22–54; John Cummins, ‘Veneurs s’en vont en Paradis: Medieval Hunting and the “Natural” Landscape,’ in John Howe and Michael Wolfe, eds., Inventing Medieval Landscapes: Senses of Place in Western Europe (Gainesville, FL, 2002), 33–55; Richardson, ‘King’s Chief Delights,’ 27–48; Aleksander Pluskowski, ‘The Social Construction of Medieval Park Ecosystems: An Interdisciplinary Perspective,’ in Robert Liddiard, ed., The Medieval Park: New Perspectives (Windgather, 2007), 63–78; Creighton, Designs upon the Land, 122–66; Mileson, Parks in Medieval England, 82–115; Fletcher, Gardens of Earthly Delight, 83–96; Sharon Farmer, ‘Aristocratic Power and the “Natural” Landscape: The Garden Park at Hesdin, ca. 1291–1302,’ Speculum 88 (2013), 644–80; Fiona Beglane, Anglo-Norman Parks in Medieval Ireland (Dublin, 2015), 122–60. 46  See Chapter 6, 128. 47  PR5J 161. For medieval gardens, see John Harvey, Mediaeval Gardens (London, 1981); Teresa McLean, English Medieval Gardens (New York, 1981). 48  PR8J 126, 149; PR13J 67; PR16J 69; RLC 15b, 53a. 49  See Chapter  5, 113–114; Richardson, Forest, Park and Palace of Clarendon, 132–4; Creighton, Designs upon the Land, 19, 139–40.

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164  Power and Pleasure other domestic buildings.50 Clearly the king thought about altering his castles in conjunction with the landscapes around them. In detailed studies, archaeologists and landscape historians have argued that two castles that John built or substantially altered, Ludgershall in Wiltshire, and Odiham in Hampshire, contained elements of landscape design. John held Ludgershall for part of Richard I’s reign and all of his own, and the pipe rolls show several expenditures on it, including for the repairs of a park. There were eventually two parks at Ludgershall, one of which was adjacent to the castle on the north side. This was a long, narrow park running east to west, and the north part of the castle intruded into it, making the park particularly narrow as it passed the castle. Within the northern section of the castle, a tower and a chamber block were built around 1200, and are probably attributable to John. Curiously, the section of the earthworks near these buildings and overlooking the park was broad and flat. Traditionally, the earthworks have been viewed as defensive, but in a recent study of Ludgershall, Paul Everson and Graham Brown have reinterpreted this part as ornamental, a terraced walk designed to give a view into the park. Everson suggests that the north park was used for drive hunts that could be viewed from the earthworks, the upper floor of the chamber block, and the roof of the tower. In other words, key parts of Ludgershall Castle were designed not for defence but to facilitate admiration of the royal hunt (see Figures 7.2 and 7.3). Given the problems of dating and the lack of written evidence, this interpretation must be tentative, but would certainly fit in with John’s love of hunting.51 Odiham was one of the castles on which John spent most freely, over £1,200, and Graham Brown has argued that it was set in an ornamental, watery landscape.52 The castle was besieged by Louis in his invasion of England, so it certainly had military uses, but according to the Anonymous of Béthune, John had built it for enjoyment (que li rois fist faire por lui deporter). The chronicler described it as placed in a beautiful meadow near woods,53 and the castle was built on two moated platforms in a bend in the river Whitewater, surrounded by riparian wetlands ideal for falconry. Nearby was a large park, 4 miles in circumference.54 At some point, an octagonal tower was built there, which Madeline has interpreted in symbolic terms, parallel to Heslop’s findings about the symbolic aspects of Henry II’s polygonal donjon at Orford.55 Brown suggests the tower may be somewhat later, but attributes the remains of a heavily decorated doorway to John’s reign, indicating that his buildings may have been highly ornamented. 50  RL 12; PR3J 55l; PR13J 67–8. 51  RLC 52b; PR5J 161; Colvin, History of the King’s Works, 2:730; Ellis, ed., Ludgershall Castle, 13, 83–91, 101–6, 249. 52  Graham Brown, Odiham Castle, Hampshire (Swindon, 2004), 1–24. For a more traditional interpretation of the site, see Patricia MacGregor, Odiham Castle, 1200–1500: Castle and Community (Gloucester, 1983). 53  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 174. 54  Richardson, ‘King’s Chief Delights,’ 28. 55 Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 314.

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Places and Spaces  165

Figure 7.2  Reconstruction of Ludgershall Castle and view of the north deer park. Peter Dunn, Historic England. N

North deer park

Legend: Tower and chamber block Earthworks Town deer park

0

0.25

0.5 Miles

South deer park

Figure 7.3  Plan of Ludgershall Castle. Jorge Alejandro Quintela Fernandez. Illustration after plans in Peter Ellis, ed. Ludgershall Castle, Wiltshire: A Report on the Excavations by Peter Addyman, 1964–1972 (Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, 2000).

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166  Power and Pleasure N

k par eer To d

Legend: Octagonal tower Earthworks

ver W hit ew are

Moat River Marsh

Ri

Road

0

100

200 Metres

Figure 7.4  Plan of Odiham Castle. Jorge Alejandro Quintela Fernandez. Illustration after plans in Graham Brown, Odiham Castle, Hampshire, English Heritage Archaeological Investigations Report Series A1/17/2004 (Swindon, 2004).

Brown argues that broad flat-topped platforms on the site could have served as prom­en­ades to look across the river and marshes and back into the castle and any gardens therein. The site, with its two enclosed platforms, was designed to control access to the king. As at Corfe, the royal residences were furthest from the entrance. Furthermore, the complicated routes to the castle and between the castle and park seem to have been designed to provide eye-catching views. Once again, the conclusion must remain somewhat conjectural, but it is likely that Odiham, like Ludgershall, can be seen as a castle/great house set in an ornamental landscape (see Figure 7.4).

7.5  Landscapes, Utility, and Beauty Towards the end of Designs upon the Land: Elite Landscapes of the Middle Ages, Oliver Creighton asks, ‘Did the landscapes with which this book has been concerned have aesthetic value to medieval contemporaries?’ His answer is an

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Places and Spaces  167 emphatic yes.56 Though this view has gained widespread acceptance among ­specialists in landscape and castle studies, those outside the field, and even some insiders, may be sceptical. The occasional references to the beauty of a landscape feature outside a royal dwelling or to pleasure from viewing such features show that medieval people received aesthetic pleasure from them, but one may reasonably ask if the aesthetic pleasures were secondary to utility.57 Were earthworks, fishponds, and parks created for beauty or for defensive purposes, fresh fish, and good hunting? Did kings, queens, and aristocrats find beauty in the forests or wetlands in which they hunted with dogs and birds of prey, or did they value such lands mainly because of their usefulness? A number of scholars, mostly in literary fields, have studied medieval attitudes towards forests and, to a lesser degree, wetlands, and their work shows the rich and complex ways medieval people responded to these environments.58 These studies are useful, but their findings are not always simple to apply to historical contexts. Like writers of all periods, medieval authors used landscapes sym­bol­ic­ al­ly. They were heavily influenced by classical traditions of the locus amoenus or pleasant place, a literary landscape that typically combined various features like trees, fountains, birdsong, and the sighing of the wind. Such classically inspired traditions could possibly have been imitatively antiquarian and thus not reflect contemporary views, though because learned clerics formed an important part of the elite and Latin traditions heavily affected vernacular literature, the greater likelihood is that classical views of nature and the landscape influenced medieval aristocratic ones. Christian religious interpretations, particularly the idea of wilder landscapes as the wilderness to which the religious should retreat, also shaped narrative accounts.59 Moreover, we can easily be misled by our cultural assumptions about landscapes and environments, which are influenced by specific cultural movements, like Romanticism and environmentalism, and based partly on distinctive modern interactions with landscapes. The issue of medieval perceptions of landscapes, both designed and undersigned, is a huge and complex subject, and here I will only take on a small piece of the puzzle, arguing that a modern tendency to contrast practical functionality and aesthetic value may 56 Creighton, Designs upon the Land, 223. 57  Robert Liddiard and Tom Williamson, ‘There by Design? Some Reflections on Medieval Elite Landscapes,’ Archaeological Journal 165 (2008), 520–35; Mileson, Parks in Medieval England, 95–8. 58  Derek Pearsall and Elizabeth Salter, Landscapes and Seasons of the Medieval World (Toronto, 1973); Philippe Ménard, ‘Le château en forêt dans le roman médiéval,’ in André Chastel, ed., Le château, la chasse et la forêt. Les cahiers de Commarque (Commarque, 1990), 189–214; Corinne J. Saunders, The Forest of Medieval Romance: Arvernus, Broceliande, Arden (Cambridge, 1993); John Howe, ‘Creating Symbolic Landscapes: Medieval Development of Sacred Space,’ in John Howe and Michael Wolfe, eds., Inventing Medieval Landscapes: Senses of Place in Western Europe (Gainesville, FL, 2002), 208–23; Catherine Clarke, Literary Landscapes and the Idea of England, 700–1400 (Woodbridge, 2006). 59  For a good discussion from an eco-historical perspective, see Ellen  F.  Arnold, Negotiating the Landscape: Environment and Monastic Identity in the Medieval Ardennes (Philadelphia, PA, 2013), 22–61.

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168  Power and Pleasure encourage us to see a binary choice between utility and beauty. Since the industrial revolution and the rise of Romanticism and the celebration of art for art’s sake, it is easy to view economic production and beauty as opposed. Here I will argue that for medieval taste, beauty and utility, far from being mutually exclusive, went hand in hand. I start with a neglected set of descriptions by Gerald of Wales of the royal forest of Treville in Herefordshire.60 He tells the story of how Abbot Adam of Dore, Gerald’s rival for the bishopric of St David’s, persuaded Richard I, late in his reign, to sell part of the land there for timber by falsely asserting it was a poor forest and a lair for robbers. After Richard’s death, however, John, who knew the woods well from having hunted in them, discovered the deception and tried, ultimately unsuccessfully, to reverse matters. Gerald stresses the abbot’s duplicity by heaping praise on this foresta amoena. It was beautiful and striking (pulchra et praeclara), even extremely beautiful (pulcherrima), delightful and elegant (delectabilis et decora), splendid to look at (ad speculum speciosa), and far excelled all the other woods and royal forests in England by its unique splendour (speciocitas). What made this woodland so extraordinary? Although the part of the manuscript with a detailed description is fragmentary, several features stand out. One was that it was filled with wild beasts; in other words, a good hunting ground. But Gerald also wrote about the woodland itself, with its noble trees, and tall, upright oaks, straight underneath and branching out only at the top, ‘arranged as though ordered through a kind of natural artifice to delight the viewer.’ He described the ground beneath as flat, as if levelled with a plane, and free of underbrush. Anyone who has seen old growth forests on flat lands will know that sometimes they can have the atmosphere of a cathedral, with trunks as columns and the foliage as a vaulted ceiling, and one wonders if Gerald, who as a child built sand monasteries and churches in the place of sandcastles, saw it this way.61 However, the other thing that stands out about this landscape was its utility. Tall, straight oaks would make excellent timber for major building projects, and Gerald explicitly praised the timber the forest could provide. A flat woodland with little underbrush would have been an exceptional venue for a par force hunt. Even the mention of excellent waters, a standard feature of the locus amoenus, came in conjunction with a mill. In Gerald’s description, visual beauty and utility were closely united. The compatibility of beauty with utility also becomes clear from twelfth-century descriptions of the Isle of Ely and other sites, mainly monastic, adjacent to wetlands or other watery environments and combining designed and heavily reconfigured landscape elements with wetlands and forests.62 In discussing these descriptions, 60  Gerald of Wales, Opera, 1:104; 4:186–92, 206. 61  Gerald of Wales, Opera, 1:21. 62  Henry of Huntingdon, Historia Anglorum: The History of the English People, ed. Diana E. Greenway (Oxford, 1996), 348–9, 692–3; E.  O.  Blake, ed., Liber Eliensis, Camden Society, 3rd ser., 92 (London, 1962), 2–5, 180–1, 398–400; Pauline A. Thompson and Elizabeth Stevens, ‘Gregory of Ely’s Verse Life and Miracles of St. Æthelthryth,’ Analecta Bollandiana 106 (1988), 333–90, at 360–2; W.  Dunn MacRay, ed., Chronicon Abbatiae Ramseiensis (London, 1886), 7–8, 38.

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Places and Spaces  169 Catherine Clarke and Stephen Rippon have rightly stressed the emphasis on reclaiming land through the draining of wetlands.63 As they say, the reclamation of wild lands could be a metaphor for reclaiming souls, and of course reclaimed land was also land made more productive. However, reclamation was not the whole story. In most cases the writers also praise the un-reclaimed wetlands and sometimes woodlands as well. Thus Henry of Huntingdon noted ‘very beautiful fens’ (pulcherrimas paludes) at Peterborough, and the Ramsey Chronicler described the beauty (pulchritudo) of Ramsey mere and the pleasure of looking at another one nearby. The descriptions of wetlands and woodlands, above all at Ely, emphasized their suitability for hunting and fishing, though, as Susan Oosthuizen has noted, writers also stressed the richness of the pasture provided by periodically flooded meadows.64 The descriptions note decorative elem­ents, including zephyrs, songbirds, and flowers, but utility nonetheless remained crucial in making ­managed woods and wetlands, as well as reclaimed lands, beautiful. Another facet of the descriptions was the inclusion of multiple elements in them, including domestic animals, gardens, fields, meadows, fruit trees, ponds, fountains, and even buildings, suggesting that John’s contemporaries valued var­iety in their landscapes. The above descriptions do not refer to landscapes around royal residences. Nonetheless, these descriptions provide several lessons. They show an ap­pre­ci­ ation for both landscapes that were heavily reshaped by humans and those where the human footprint was less intensive. They also show that contemporaries found beauty in variety and that the mixture of landscape elements around castles and palaces may have existed for both utilitarian and aesthetic purposes. Above all, they show that the aesthetic and the utilitarian could be tied closely together in responses to landscapes and that utility may have added to aesthetic pleasure. Thus any question of whether rulers and magnates reshaped the landscapes around their residences for utilitarian or aesthetic purposes may represent a false dichotomy. For John and other great lords, reshaping the countryside around their residences made them both more useful and more beautiful.

7.6  Itineration and Its Motives From a modern perspective, the itinerant nature of medieval kingship seems both strange and unpleasant. The latter viewpoint is not entirely anachronistic: two of the ablest writers of the twelfth century, Walter Map and Peter of Blois, hated 63 Clarke, Literary Landscapes, 67–89; Stephen Rippon, ‘ “Uncommonly Rich and Fertile” or “not very Salubrious”? The Perception and Value of Wetland Landscapes,’ Landscapes 10 (2009), 36–60, at 53–4; Stephen Rippon, ‘Water and Land,’ in Julia  C.  Crick and Elisabeth van Houts, eds., A Social History of England, 900–1200 (Cambridge, 2011), 38–45, at 43–5. 64  Susan Oosthuizen, The Anglo-Saxon Fenland (Oxford, 2017), 111.

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170  Power and Pleasure travelling with John’s father, Henry II.65 I have already described Peter’s objections to the food, but the travel itself was a major grievance.66 Walter and Peter described a court continually in chaos as it moved about. Peter, who compared court life to a kind of martyrdom suffered for unworthy worldly reasons, provided detail. In a humorous letter to the king, he described how hard it could be to track down the court, but in the rhetorical attack he launched to deter clerics from joining the court, he painted a harsher picture, describing courtiers wandering through the forest after dark looking for even vile lodgings and drawing swords over places pigs would not have fought over. Peter lamented the need to bribe corrupt royal officials for help while travelling, and described courtiers being thrown out of lodgings by royal officials while their meals were being cooked or eaten or even after they had gone to bed, despite having paid the requis­ite bribes. When Walter and Peter compared Henry’s court to the followers of King Herla (or Herlekin), they were likening it to a band of the undead tormented by being compelled to travel ceaselessly. Peter had religious motives to exaggerate the horrors of the court, and Walter was more interested in a good story than historical accuracy, but it would not be surprising for constant travel to cause hardship. The itineration of the courts of Henry II and his sons was certainly more orderly than Walter and Peter’s accounts described, but Stephen Church has shown that some chaos was unavoidable.67 John’s court was not blessed, or cursed, with such vivid writers as Henry II’s, but the records show the many problems that arose, like having to leave baggage behind when the king travelled to inaccessible regions or having a large wagon train carrying wine stall when a river flooded.68 Though John’s famous loss of his baggage train in the fens was not a crippling disaster, it vividly illustrates the problems that came with itinerant kingship.69 More important, a story from the Anonymous of Béthune shows that Peter of Blois’ claim about courtiers fighting over lodgings was not hyperbole. In it, Geoffrey de Mandeville, who was travelling with the king towards Marlborough, sent followers ahead to secure lodgings. By the time Geoffrey arrived, his men had been thrown out by the followers of William Briwerre, one of John’s favourites. When Geoffrey ordered the inter­lopers to leave, a fight broke out in which he killed the leader of William’s men. This prompted a heated confrontation between John, Geoffrey, and Geoffrey’s fatherin-law, Robert fitz Walter, deepening a divide that ended with Robert and Geoffrey rebelling against John in 1215.70 In a society that placed great value on 65  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 30–1, 370–5, 470–3; Wahlgren, Letter Collections of Peter of Blois, 145–65; Peter of Blois, Opera, 121–2. 66  See Chapter 6, 126. 67 Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 139–65; Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 31–45. 68  Misae 11J 137–8; Misae 14J 240, 248. 69  Holt, ed., Magna Carta and Medieval Government, 111–22. 70  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 116–18. For discussion of this passage, see Painter, Reign of King John, 260–1. For a confrontation over housing in Richard I’s reign, see Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:245–6.

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Places and Spaces  171 honour and precedence, the hunger and weariness of a long day’s travel could prove dangerous, and itineration must have exacerbated the tensions that were inevitable at any royal court. Why did medieval royal courts travel so much? Scholars of the medieval German empire have studied this question most thoroughly, but there is now a good amount of work on the itineration of English kings, and the explanations are various and complicated.71 Economic motives were probably not central. There had been a time when kings had to travel from manor to manor to use up food supplies, but that time was long past, given the development of extensive local trade and markets.72 One should not underestimate the importance of custom. John and other kings may have travelled because all their predecessors and contemporaries travelled, though as Kanter showed, the speed and frequency of rulers’ travel varied greatly.73 Pilgrimage and a desire for fresh hunting grounds, as we have seen, could be important motives. Constant travel meant that royal households, which formed the core of armies in the period, could easily transition to mobilizing for military campaigns. Most important, even with the growth of royal bureaucracy, itinerancy meant frequent contact with different regions, an advantage in governing large territories. Jolliffe’s work identified many functions and advantages of itinerant government, and Doris Stenton showed travelling’s connection to John’s oversight of the conduct of justice.74 Though kings had many officials to collect money, itineration could help. Roger of Howden described John travelling through the north of England personally levying penalties for the breaking of forest law, and recent work has shown a close link between the king’s travels and the sums accumulated in fines.75 Moreover, travel allowed John to meet and interact with powerful people across his realms. To the extent that meetings with powerful nobles and churchmen focused on finances, administration, 71  For work on England, see Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 139–65; Given-Wilson, Royal Household, 32–9; Aurell, Plantagenet Empire, 25–8; Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 31–45; Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship,’ 11–26; Levi Roach, ‘Hosting the King: Hospitality and the Royal Iter in TenthCentury England,’ Journal of Medieval History 37 (2011), 34–46; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 265–86, 345–50; Crockford, ‘Itinerary of Edward I,’ 231–57; Prestwich, ‘Royal Itinerary and Roads,’ 177–97. For work on the empire and elsewhere, see Hans Conrad Peyer, ‘Das Reisekönigtum des Mittelalters,’ Vierteljarhrschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 51 (1964), 1–21; Geertz, ‘Centers, Kings and Charisma,’ 150–71, 309–14; Bernhardt, Itinerant Kingship; Andreas Kränzle, ‘Der abwesende König. Überlegungen zur ottonischen Königsherrschaft,’ Frühmittelalterliche Studien 31 (1997), 120–57; Vale, Princely Court, 136–62; Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society, 291–309; Caspar Ehlers, ‘Wie sich ambulante zu residenter Herrschaft entwickelt hat,’ in B.  Jussen, ed., Die Macht des Königs. Herrschaft in Europa vom Frühmittelalter bis in die Neuzeit (Munich, 2005), 106–24, 376–7; McKitterick, Charlemagne, 171–88; Knut Görich, Friedrich Barbarossa. Eine Biographie (Munich, 2011), 145–58. 72  Thomas Charles-Edwards, ‘Early Medieval Kingships in the British Isles,’ in Steven Basset, ed., Origins of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms (London, 1989), 28–39, 245–8; Alban Gautier, ‘Hospitality in Pre-Viking Anglo-Saxon England,’ Early Medieval Europe 17 (2009), 23–44. 73  Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship,’ 18. 74 Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 155–65; Stenton, English Justice, 91–5, 110. 75  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:15; Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship,’ 17; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 217.

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172  Power and Pleasure and warfare, they lie beyond the scope of this book. However, such meetings also involved social interaction, generally intertwined with political interaction, a combination that is the subject of section 7.7. A final motive of itineration was to enhance the ruler’s soft power.76 Itineration, particularly at the beginning of a reign, allowed the ruler to take symbolic possession of the land. By performing ceremonial activities throughout the realm or realms, the ruler displayed his or her power and religious or political status far and wide. As Geertz states, writing of itineration by rulers in nineteenth-century Morocco, ‘When kings journey around the countryside, making appearances, attending fetes, conferring honors, exchanging gifts, or defying rivals, they mark it, like some wolf or tiger spreading his scent through his territory, as almost physically part of them.’ Itineration allowed a king to display wealth and magnificence not only at his residences but also during the journeys between them. Only a select few might attend court in the palace, but many could see a king riding through towns or the countryside, and he could use these opportunities to show off, as we shall see.

7.7  Meetings with Magnates John’s constant travels gave him ample opportunity to meet with the most powerful people in his lands, although it is not clear how much advantage he took to solidify ties with secular and ecclesiastical magnates.77 The witness lists to his charters, which supply the most plentiful evidence of who surrounded him at any given time, are dominated by the magnates, officials, and household figures closest to him. This may indicate that John did not take sufficient advantage of his opportunities, but caution is warranted, partly because the witness lists in the charter rolls are often truncated and partly because individuals who were closest to the king may have been considered most useful as witnesses. Even so, the surviving witness lists show that John met magnates outside his inner circle on a regular basis. He travelled particularly widely in his first year, and his charter attestations show that he met most of the Norman and English bishops and a scattering of bishops from Aquitaine, Ireland, and Wales. He also met seventeen earls or counts from England and Normandy, and other barons from both those regions and from Aquitaine. In his ninth regnal year, to take a random year, his travels were limited to England, and in the course of it, he met most of the active English bishops; ten English earls; various barons; a few bishops and barons from Ireland; and the brothers of an important Welsh figure. Strikingly, in both years 76  See in particular Geertz, ‘Centers, Kings and Charisma,’ 150–71, 309–14; Bernhardt, Itinerant Kingship, 46–53; Costa-Gomes, Making of a Court Society, 295; Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 44; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 308; Roach, ‘Hosting the King,’ 35, 41–4; Kanter, ‘Peripatetic and Sedentary Kingship,’ 17; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 263, 268–9, 277–86. 77 Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire, 273, 349.

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Places and Spaces  173 he met several of the barons who revolted against him at the end of the reign.78 Business of various sorts was no doubt an important motive for such meetings, but they also had a social component, albeit one closely related to the exercise of lordship and power. For one thing, these meetings could involve gifts. In John’s sixth year, a candidate for the valuable and disputed office of archdeacon of Richmond offered John 300 marks to obtain the position, and he also brought the king two palfreys, ‘when the king rested at his lodgings at Easingwold,’ on a journey through Yorkshire. The gift of horses was an extension of the monetary bribe, but it brought a personal touch and probably allowed the cleric a chance to personally seek royal support while the king looked over his new animals.79 More costly, but perhaps more efficacious, was the chance to offer the king hospitality, since hospitality created an important link between guest and host.80 The costly feast prepared by Hugh de Neville, noted in Chapter 6, no doubt helped Hugh cement his ties with the king.81 Those less close to the king might also offer hospitality. Henry fitz Hervey of Ravensworth, for instance, was a powerful and wealthy tenant on the earldom of Richmond and an influential figure in northwestern Yorkshire, but by no means close to the king. On 27 February 1201, John issued a charter at Ravensworth, where he was presumably a guest during a journey through northern England. In the weeks before and after, Henry received various royal charters to his benefit, suggesting that he used his position as host to his advantage.82 The building of ties worked both ways: just as aristocrats could use these op­por­tun­ ities to gain royal favour, the king could use them to build personal ties with any aristocrats he chose. Indeed, in one charter granting fifty-five acres to his justiciar, Geoffrey fitz Peter, one can see John trying to create a regular rhythm of visits and gift exchange with this crucial official. As rent for the land, John specified that whenever he visited Geoffrey at the latter’s estate in Kimbolton, his host was to provide hay for the king’s personal horses, wine for the king and two other knights, and one pike and two bream. A money rent would have been more practical, but this set-up gave the king a symbolic rent tied to hospitality, perhaps with a quasi-ceremonial presentation of the wine and fish whenever he visited.83 Itineration had both advantages and disadvantages in controlling access to the king, a challenge in any monarchy. On one hand, a sensible ruler wanted to be able to interact with as many powerful subjects as possible to handle practical business and build up ties. Hospitality, gift exchange, and other forms of social 78  RLCh 1a–62a, 166–78b; Thomas Rymer, ed., Foedera: 1066–1272 (London, 1816), 76. I have also gone through the charters for those two years that have been collected for the Angevin Acta project. Thanks to Nicholas Vincent for generously sharing them with me. 79  ROF 119. 80  For hospitality in the period, see Kerr, ‘Food, Drink and Lodging,’ 77–92; Julie Kerr, ‘ “Welcome the Coming and Speed the Parting Guest”: Hospitality in Twelfth-Century England,’ Journal of Medieval History 33 (2007), 130–46. 81  See Chapter 6, 137–138. 82  RLCh 88b–89b, 101b. 83  RLCh 144b.

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174  Power and Pleasure contact could make this more effective and might also provide pleasant social interchanges for the ruler. On the other hand, the ruler needed to avoid being overwhelmed by the many people who wanted attention, and there was also merit to making interaction with the king rare and therefore valuable. Although John’s residences were designed at least partly to control access, control was most easily established in the kinds of large palaces with many rooms possible for stationary courts. However, itineration also had its advantages. As described above, travel ensured that kings could meet magnates, even if the latter were not inclined to travel to court, and often those meetings would have been more intimate than those held at great palaces. But travel could also limit access. Many people might desire frequent, repeated access to kings, and at a stationary court anyone with sufficient resources could simply hang about waiting for opportunities. One had to have serious persistence and motivation to follow the king about the countryside to constantly seek admittance to his presence. Itineration may have helped kings achieve the right balance of frequently meeting the powerful without being overwhelmed by those seeking repeated royal audiences. The necessity of riding constantly and openly through the countryside brought more specific disadvantages and benefits. It was hard to limit access outside a building, and Walter Map extolled Henry II for his patience when crowds of ­people demanded his attention, even to the extent of pushing and pulling him about.84 However, the long hours riding from place to place provided the king time to converse with those riding close to him. A famous story in the biography of William Marshal is set during a time when William suffered from John’s extreme displeasure, and the two men’s followers were carrying out a proxy war in Ireland. The king, despite demanding that William follow the court, refused to see him and made others shun him as well. One day, however, as they journeyed out of Guildford, John called William to him and, presumably as they rode alongside each other, told him an elaborate lie about the defeat of William’s men and the deaths of some close followers. The author’s goal was to demonstrate William’s forbearance and quick thinking in the face of John’s malevolence, but for our purposes, the key point is that the king could use his journeys to interact with court­ iers and guests individually or in small groups.85

7.8  Riding in Splendour Even at its most ordinary, John’s court must have been an impressive sight.86 Lines of carts and bands of retainers, both the king’s and those of any magnates following 84  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 484–7. 85  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:190–5. 86  Church, ‘Royal Itinerary,’ 31–45.

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Places and Spaces  175 court, would have passed local people, pausing in their tasks to take in the ­spec­tacle. Depending on the season, there would have been huge packs of dogs or high-status birds of prey. Even more impressive were the hundreds of horses. Horses were crucial to medieval aristocratic life, for war, hunting, transporting goods, and, above all, riding from place to place.87 It is no surprise that John was active in the international market, acquiring horses from Lombardy and Iberia through gifts and purchases, and at times using a Flemish knight, William de Baillolet, as an agent.88 John’s port of La Rochelle apparently had a major horse market, and he sought to carefully oversee it, perhaps to limit sales to nearby enemies, but probably also to ensure his access to high-quality mounts.89 Horses were, of course, important display items. In a lengthy depiction of Richard I’s magnificent appearance and clothing at Limassol during his conquest of Cyprus, one writer described Richard’s Spanish horse, providing a detailed picture before concluding by saying the steed was so handsome that no painter could reproduce it.90 Modern attention tends to focus on warhorses, which were often the most expensive, but palfreys, horses bred and trained for riding, with a gait designed for maximum comfort over long distances, were also highly valued, and at least as important at the royal court.91 Indeed, throughout John’s reign proffers to the king of palfreys were far more common than offers of warhorses.92 Palfreys, like warhorses, could be display animals—both Marie de France and Chrétien de Troyes described beautiful fictional palfreys.93 These palfreys were associated with female characters, but the monks of St Augustine’s, Canterbury once attempted to win royal support by offering the king (along with a large sum of money) a palfrey for his own person, describing it as ‘fit for the royal saddle.’94 Palfreys could be magnificent animals, and unlike warhorses would have been on constant display during royal itineration. Horse tackle has received far less attention than horses from historians, but archaeologists have provided useful information and contemporary sources, both

87  For horses and horse breeding in the period, see R. H. C. Davis, The Medieval Warhorse: Origin, Development and Redevelopment (London, 1989); Ann Hyland, The Medieval Warhorse from Byzantium to the Crusades (Stroud, 1994); Ann Hyland, The Horse in the Middle Ages (Stroud, 1999); Charles Gladitz, Horse Breeding in the Medieval World (Dublin, 1997). For a current archaeological project on warhorses led by Oliver Creighton, see http://medievalwarhorse.exeter.ac.uk. 88  PR9J 30; PR10J 154–5, 171; PR11J 10; PR17J 41; Misae 14J 238, 251; RLC 163b, 168b, 176b, 180a, 190b; RLP 90b. For the use of horses as gifts, see PR10J 171; RLC 86a, 181b; RLP 137a; Rigord, Histoire de Philippe Auguste, 368. 89  RLP 13b, 45a, 66b, 67b, 118a. 90  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 197. 91 Davis, Medieval Warhorse, 67; Gladitz, Horse Breeding in the Medieval World, 157; Hyland, Horse in the Middle Ages, 28–30; Carlin and Crouch, Lost Letters, 159. 92  ROF throughout. 93  PR10J 171; RLC 86a, 181b; RLP 137a; Marie de France, Lais, 162–3; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 130. 94 A. H. Davis, William Thorne’s Chronicle of Saint Augustine’s Abbey Canterbury Now Rendered into English (Oxford, 1934), 155.

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176  Power and Pleasure historical and fictional, show just how important it was.95 So common was ­ornamentation that the Portable Antiquities Scheme, designed to record stray finds in England and Wales, currently has records of over 2,000 decorative horse harness pendants alone.96 Elite decoration could be spectacular. At Limassol, Richard I’s saddle was of multiple colours and partly gilded, as were his harness and spurs. Two golden lions, snarling, each with a paw stretched out as if preparing to fight, stood at the back of his saddle.97 Writers of romance described extremely luxurious horse trappings, and Chrétien de Troyes declared that his character Enide had a set worth £1,000 in the coinage of Chartres, at least in one variant in the manuscript tradition.98 Fictional accounts could undoubtedly be hyperbolic, but the records of John’s court contain references to the acquisition of beautiful or gilded saddles, and to gilded reins and bridles, mostly destined for royal women. One saddle for Queen Isabella cost over 7 marks, far more than the yearly wages of a skilled worker.99 John himself made several small gifts of land for a yearly rent of gilded spurs, and though the rent was honorary, it is likely the spurs were used.100 Colourful textiles added distinction to the horse and rider. Most notable were the caparisons with gold or silk lions I noted in Chapter 4.101 Less impressive but still noteworthy was the blue and scarlet cloth purchased for saddle blankets (and possibly caparisons), which added vivid colour to the rider’s array, especially when scarlet was combined with gilded saddle and harness, as occurred in at least two royal purchases.102 Whether such elaborate saddles, harness, and textiles would have been used for the royal household’s ordinary itin­er­ ation is not clear, but they certainly would have been used on ceremonial occasions, and they show the importance of the road as a venue for royal display.

7.9  Processions and the Royal Entry Among the great ceremonies of the later Middle Ages and early modern period was the ceremonial entry of a ruler, usually into a city. This normally took place on his or her first visit after coming into office, but sometimes occurred on other politically important occasions. Extensive records of these survive from the

95  John Clark, The Medieval Horse and Its Equipment c. 1150–c. 1450, 2nd ed. (Woodbridge, 2004), 43–74, 124–46. 96 https://finds.org.uk. 97  Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 197. See also Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 1:102–3; Bumke, Courtly Culture, 176; Jones, Bloodied Banners, 2. 98  Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 70, 130–1, 1091. See also Hue de Rotelande, Ipomedon, 411; Jones, Bloodied Banners, 142. 99  PR9J xiii, xxx; PR13J 108; RLC 81a, 144b, 150b, 175a. 100  RLCh 137b–138a, 209b–210a, 218a. 101  See Chapter 4, 89–90. 102  Misae 11J 239; RLC 109a–b, 150b, 175a.

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Places and Spaces  177 fourteenth century onwards, allowing for plentiful scholarship on the subject.103 Such royal or princely entries normally had a number of elements: a formal procession out from the city to greet the ruler; a heavily choreographed entry into the city; a slow journey through the richly decorated city, often with brief, highly symbolic skits—or tableaux vivants—performed by townspeople; a religious cere­ mony; feasting and festivities; and the provision of gifts to the ruler. These ceremonies, however, were not new in the later Middle Ages; the royal adventus, as historians of earlier periods call it, had roots going back to Roman triumphs.104 The royal adventus certainly existed in England in the late twelfth and early thirteenth century. However, they were not the only formal or ceremonial activities that took place on the road under Henry II and his sons. The sources also reveal formal processions by churchmen, townspeople, and others. Going out to greet worthies such as high-ranking churchmen, nobles, and, of course, kings was a normal and important aspect of elite political life, and even kings would process out to greet other rulers and show them honour.105 Itineration by kings and 103 R. Withington, English Pageantry: An Historical Outline (Cambridge, MA, 1918–26), 1:124–97; Bernard Guenée and Françoise Lehoux, Les entrées royales françaises de 1328 à 1515 (Paris, 1968); Anglo, Spectacle, Pageantry, and Early Tudor Policy, 21–35, 56–97, 170–206, 283–94, 327–38, 346–59; Jacques Heers, Fêtes, jeux, et joutes dans les sociétés d’Occident à la fin du moyen âge (Montreal, 1971), 18–32; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en Bourgogne, 75–9; Ana Maria Alves, Entradas régias Portuguesas: uma visāo de conjunto (Lisbon, 1986); Lorraine Attreed, ‘The Politics of Welcome: Ceremonies and Constitutional Development in Later Medieval English Towns,’ in Barbara A. Hanawalt and Kathryn  L.  Reyerson, eds., City and Spectacle in Medieval Europe (Minneapolis, MN, 1994), 208–31; Gordon Kipling, Enter the King: Theatre, Liturgy, and Ritual in the Medieval Civic Triumph (Oxford, 1998); Bertelli, The King’s Body, 62–113; Mario Damen, ‘Princely Entries and Gift Exchange in the Burgundian Low Countries: A Crucial Link in Late Medieval Political Culture,’ Journal of Medieval Studies 33 (2007), 233–49; Dillon, Language of Space, 18–36; Teofilo Ruiz, A King Travels: Festive Traditions in Late Medieval and Early Modern Spain (Princeton, NJ, 2012); Neal Murphy, Ceremonial Entries, Municipal Liberties and the Negotiation of Power in Valois France, 1328–1589 (Leiden, 2016). 104  Ernst  H.  Kantorowicz, ‘The “King’s Advent” and the Enigmatic Panels in the Doors of Santa Sabina,’ in Selected Studies (Locust Valley, NY, 1965), 37–75; Bumke, Courtly Culture, 213–19; James  M.  Murray, ‘The Liturgy of the Count’s Advent in Bruges, from Galbert to Van Eyck,’ in Barbara  A.  Hanawalt and Kathryn  L.  Reyerson, eds., City and Spectacle in Medieval Europe (Minneapolis, MN, 1994), 137–52; D.  A.  Warner, ‘Ritual and Memory in the Ottonian Reich: The Ceremony of Adventus,’ Speculum 76 (2001), 255–83; Althoff, Die Macht der Rituale, 171–7; Görich, Friedrich Barbarossa, 148–52; Leonie  V.  Hicks, ‘Through the City Streets: Movement and Space in Rouen as Seen by the Norman Chroniclers,’ in Alison L. Gascoigne, Leonie V. Hicks, and Marianne O’Doherty, eds., Journeying along Medieval Routes in Europe and the Middle East (Turnhout, 2013), 125–49, at 140–5; Jonathan Shepard, ‘Adventus, Arrivistes and Rites of Rulership in Byzantium and France in the Tenth and Eleventh Century,’ in Alexander Beihammer, Stavroula Constantinou, and Maria Parani, eds., Court Ceremonies and Rituals of Power in Byzantium and the Medieval Mediterranean (Leiden, 2013), 337–71; Rollason, Power of Place, 202–39. 105  Bernard Itier, The Chronicle and Historical Notes of Bernard Itier, ed. Andrew W. Lewis (Oxford, 2012), 52–3; Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 1:403, 432–3; 2:67, 114–15, 173; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 2:97; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 142, 446; Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 1:324–5; William Stubbs, ed., Epistolæ Cantuarienses, the Letters of the Prior and Convent of Christ Church, Canterbury (London, 1865), 298; Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 62–3; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:93–4; Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 104–7; Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 1:486–7; 2:116–19; Diana E. Greenway and Leslie Watkiss, eds., The Book of the Foundation of Walden Monastery (Oxford, 1999), 158–9; Adam of

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178  Power and Pleasure others was undoubtedly one reason these processions and greetings were so important. In essence, royal entries and other formal events on the road were pieces of itin­er­ation made ceremonial and marked out as special. The distinction between formal royal entries and other kinds of ceremonies is sometimes unclear, partly perhaps because ceremonial practices were still fluid, but also because ­writers before the fourteenth century usually only provided passing references to processions and royal entries. This not only makes it hard to distinguish the royal entry from other practices, but also makes it difficult to know to what degree the extremely elaborate royal entries of the late Middle Ages and the early modern period were new or were simply newly revealed in fuller sources, though both factors were probably at work.106 More unfortunate still, there are no detailed contemporary descriptions of any of John’s royal entries or other processions. However, broadly contemporary descriptions provide some idea of what they might have looked like. Jordan Fantosme’s description of Londoners going out to greet Henry II, on his return from the continent during the 1173–4 rebellion, makes the process look fairly elaborate but also more spontaneous than later royal entries. According to Jordan, the Londoners dressed in their finest clothes, including silk garments, and rode out on their palfreys to greet the king. The barons (meaning the elite citizens) of London then embraced the king one by one in a long, drawn-out ceremony, replete with vows of loyalty from the Londoners and thanks from the king, to whom the Londoners also gave gifts. They then escorted Henry to Westminster.107 The middle of a war was a time when monarchs needed such affirmations, but it was also a time when little could be prepared in advance, so it is not clear that this was a typical royal entry. Other sources also give a sense of royal entries in this period. These include accounts of Henry of Champagne’s entry into Acre as he assumed the kingship of Jerusalem; of Henry VI and Constance entering Rome and Palermo before and after their conquest of Sicily; of Philip II’s passing though towns and villages on his return from victory at Bouvines; and fictional royal entries in Chrétien de Troyes’ romances.108 These accounts have several common aspects: going out to meet the ruler; hanging textiles out of windows and laying carpets on the ruler’s route; strewing flowers, reeds, herbs, and other sweet-smelling substances on the streets; playing music; and giving gifts.

Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:148, 154, 163; Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle, 82; Thomson, ed., Chronicle of the Election of Hugh, 26–7, 126–7; Peter of Blois, The Later Letters of Peter of Blois, ed. Elizabeth Revell (Oxford, 1993), 113–14. 106 Ruiz, A King Travels, 49–63. 107  Jordan Fantosme, Chronicle, 142–5. 108 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:456–7; Otto of St Blasien, Ottonis de Sancto Blasio Chronica, ed. Adolf Hofmeister (Hanover, 1912), 62–3; Pietro da Eboli, Book in Honor of Augustus (Liber ad Honorem Augusti), ed. Gwenyth Hood (Tempe, AZ, 2012), 122–3, 150–2; Guillaume le Breton, ‘Gesta Philippi Regis,’ 296; Chrétien de Troyes, Œuvres complètes, 58, 396–7.

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Places and Spaces  179 Ambroise’s account of Richard I’s entry into Messina during the Third Crusade, subsequently expanded by the Latin Itinerarium, shows another facet of royal entries: the need for the ruler’s train to impress the audience, especially on military campaigns. Both accounts described a magnificent entry, dominated by Richard’s royal galleys with their painted prows, crammed with warriors carrying glittering lances, banners flying, shields hanging on the sides, and musicians filling the air with the sound of trumpets. The two sources emphasized that it was a king’s duty to appear as grand as possible on such campaigns to ensure that the magnificence of their arrival mirrored their authority and power. Both contrasted Richard’s glorious entry to Philip II’s much poorer showing. There was a defensive element to these descriptions: though both emphasized how impressed the audiences were, Ambroise noted that the locals were upset with Richard’s grandiose entry, and, in another account, William of Newburgh revealed that it provoked controversy and unhappiness from both the locals and from Richard’s ally (and rival) Philip.109 Nonetheless, these accounts show that grand entries were an important way to project royal power. There are brief notices in narrative sources of John’s involvement in processions. A Worcester chronicler described how the monks processed out to greet the king when he came to worship at the shrine of St Wulfstan. On another occasion, John refused a procession from the canons of Beverley to express his unhappiness with their superior, his half-brother, Archbishop Geoffrey of York.110 Rigord reveals that when John visited Philip II during a rare period of rapprochement between the kings, Philip received him with a procession into St Denis, accompanied by hymns and songs of praise.111 Even these sparse references make the political importance of processions obvious. More notably, Matthew Paris elaborated on Roger of Wendover’s bare account of the Emperor Otto’s visit to London in 1207 by saying that at John’s command, the city welcomed both king and emperor with flowers, hangings, torches, candles, the ringing of bells, and processions. Matthew may simply have imagined what the visit must have been like based on practices in his own time, but all these elements were certainly possible for John’s reign.112 The royal records provide more information. Early in John’s reign, the men of Gloucester and Newcastle-upon-Tyne proffered 20 marks and 40 marks and two palfreys respectively for the king’s bonus adventus, and the men of York were forced to offer £100 for a number of offences, including not going out to greet the

109 Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:9–10; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 155–7; William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, 1:324–5. 110  Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 4:395; Webster, ‘Making Space,’ 267; Peter Draper, ‘King John and St Wulfstan,’ Journal of Medieval History 19 (1984), 41–50, at 46–7; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:25. 111 Rigord, Histoire de Philippe Auguste, 368. 112  Matthew Paris, Historia Anglorum, ed. Frederic Madden, 3 vols. (London, 1866–9), 2:108–9.

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180  Power and Pleasure king along the road when he arrived at their city.113 One suspects that John had expressed displeasure about the gifts he received from the first two towns, and clearly he had expectations, based on the customs of the period, about how the citizens of York should have greeted him. More intriguing than these brief references, and particularly revealing, are a set of purchases noted in the pipe roll of John’s fourteenth year.114 A somewhat puzzling entry links a royal cleric, Arnulf of Aukland, with 140 palfreys and accompanying sambucas (probably saddle blankets), gilded harness, spurs, and peacock hats. Arnulf may originally have been intended to acquire these items but ultimately much of the purchasing was done by John fitz Hugh, one of the chief buyers for the royal court. Included in a purchase he made of 7,680 ells of cloth were 243 ells of blanchet, a relatively coarse cloth, which were to be dyed with kermes, the expensive dye generally used only for scarlets. This cloth was specifically to be used for sambucas. Later comes the mention of eighty-nine palfreys marked as ad sambucas, or bought for the sambucas, suggesting the horses were purchased specifically to match each other and make the scarlet accessories stand out, a hypothesis strengthened by the reference in John’s first pipe roll to fourteen white horses, which indicates that the court occasionally grouped horses by their colouring.115 Fitz Hugh also bought forty saddles for the sambucas and forty-five peacock hats which (given a reference to hats with peacock feathers in a Marshal family document) probably included actual feathers.116 In addition, fitz Hugh purchased 140 sets of girths, 140 gilded spurs, 40 gilded sets of reins, 140 lengths of silk cord or lace, and 140  pairs of gloves. He spent £168 19s 2d on these purchases, not counting ­whatever portion of the £840 spent on textiles was designated for the sambucas. Where the remaining palfreys, peacock hats, and gilded reins were to come from is unclear, but it is possible that other royal agents purchased them or that they came from stores, since 108 peacock hats had been purchased the previous year.117 One intriguing possibility is that some of the 7,680 ells of cloth, including scarlet, which fitz Hugh bought were intended to provide clothing for the 140 riders. Even if this was not the case, the cavalcade of 140 riders, with matching horses, gilded tackle, brightly coloured textiles, and peacock hats, must have c­ reated a vividly impressive display. Though these purchases may have been meant for a variety of purposes, including displaying the king’s grandeur during normal itineration, I believe that they were made with John’s projected continental campaign in mind. This hypothesis stems partly from the particular importance to kings of revealing their

113  ROF 111, 119, 152. 114  PR14J 43–4, 48. 115  PR1J 129. 116  David Crouch, ed., The Acts and Letters of the Marshal Family: Marshals of England and Earls of Pembroke, 1145–1248, Camden Society (London, 2015), 309. 117  PR13J 107–8.

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Places and Spaces  181 magnificence on military campaigns. It also comes from the fact that a purchase the previous year of gold leaf to gild the tips of 567 lances was made in conjunction with the purchase of the first set of peacock hats, along with horse tackle and kermes and alum (a fixing agent) for dying blanchet, presumably for a similar cavalcade. Obviously, the king and his officials did not intend an armed cavalcade, with knights dressed in armour, but such lances would provide a military touch. In his long-awaited campaign, John hoped to recapture major towns and cities he had lost to Philip Augustus, and a new entry into a recaptured city was precisely the context in which the most formal ceremonies would have been useful. I suspect that in ordering these purchases, John envisioned himself riding into Poitier, Angers, Rouen, and other great towns at the head of a splendid cavalcade—indeed, one wonders if he did not in fact lead such a cavalcade into Angers and other places he briefly occupied in 1214. These suggestions remain speculative, but there is no doubt that these purchases were intended to create a large parade of similarly equipped riders to impress the onlookers gathered to watch.

7.10  Power, Contestation, and Pleasure The projection of royal power and wealth has been a theme throughout this ­chapter. Castles undergirded royal power not only because of their military uses but also because they served as a showcase for the king’s military power and wealth. Palaces, designed landscapes, and pavilions also underscored royal wealth and magnificence. Royal structures, both fixed and movable, provided places in which the king could play host, thereby winning praise and putting others in his debt as guests. The more complex structures allowed monarchs to show graded favour, as only the most exalted and favoured would be allowed into the inner chambers, allowing rulers to manipulate the desire of powerful people for the status that familiarity with the king might give. Itineration, in contrast, exposed rulers to large numbers of their subjects, and John clearly took advantage of his travels to project magnificence beyond his residences, through the display of fine horses and beautiful saddles and harnesses. The magnificent, matched gear just noted displayed wealth and power, while advertising the solidarity and loyalty of the king’s followers. In addition, itineration allowed rulers to build ties with their followers through guesting and feasting with local elites. In short, the pursuit and projection of power permeated the designs of the places in which rulers lived and helped guide the way they moved through their lands. As always, enemies and detractors could contest and undermine royal power through criticism and the stories they told about the king. Excessive display was a possible source of reproach. Thus, a generation before, Gervase of Chichester, one of Becket’s followers, had condemned ‘superfluous’ expenditures on ‘towers and

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182  Power and Pleasure palaces encircled with walls, and enclosures of beasts, woods, pools, and also deep fishponds.’118 However, the expectation expressed by writers such as Ambroise that rulers display magnificence largely inoculated John and other monarchs against the religious criticisms of lavishness so common in the period. Instead, some critics attacked John as a bad guest—one who failed to live up to the expected obligations created by hospitality or perhaps even subverted them. When Jocelin of Brakelond noted that John left only one penny at the altar after a visit to Bury St Edmunds, as noted in Chapter 5, the critique was not only about John’s lack of piety, but also his bad behaviour for giving nothing to honour the monastery and recompense it for the expenses of his stay.119 Roger of Howden described how, when visiting Beverley early in his reign, John ‘for a price’ guested with a man who had been excommunicated by Archbishop Geoffrey of York. Roger implied that the king not only sold his favour and defied an important church sanction, but in doing so turned the culturally freighted relationship between guest and host into a sordid monetary transaction.120 According to the Melrose Chronicle, during his northern campaign in 1216, John had his troops burn down Berwick-upon-Tweed, kindling the fire in the house he was staying in with his own hands, ‘against the custom of kings.’121 Enemies could also use the king’s own ceremonial tools against him. Pamela Marshal has argued that donjons served as symbols of a lord’s authority during his absence, and this argument could be extended to castles as a whole.122 In this context, baronial seizure of royal castles during the revolt at the end of John’s reign, like devastation of the king’s woods and slaughter of his deer, may have had a symbolic as well as military function.123 More explicitly, when the canons of St Paul’s London held a solemn procession during that rebellion to welcome Louis, son of Philip Augustus, and the citizens of the town went out to greet him, they were publicly recognizing Louis, not John, as their rightful ruler.124 When it comes to castles, palaces, pavilions, and designed landscapes, the importance of pleasure will be obvious. As Thomas Beaumont and Christopher Gerrard have written in their book on Clarendon Palace and its landscape, ‘Another theme, not peculiar to Clarendon but exemplified here, is pleasure. Pleasure in landscapes and vistas, flora and fauna, in buildings and furnishings, in entertainment, food and sport.’125 Unlike other scholars, landscape historians and the new castellologists have taken the study of royal and elite pleasure seriously, and here I have added the suggestion that landscapes further away from buildings, including 118  British Library, Royal MS 3 B X, fol. 87r. Gervase’s context was the misuse of ecclesiastical funds. 119  See Chapter 5, 120; Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle, 116–17. 120  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:156. 121  Stevenson, ed., Chronica de Mailrose, 122. It is possible, however, that John contravened royal custom here not by being a bad guest but by carrying out the plebeian task of starting a fire. 122  Marshall, ‘Some Thoughts,’ 161. 123  I owe this suggestion to Leonie Hicks. 124  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 171; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 3:46. 125  James and Gerrard, Clarendon, 5.

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Places and Spaces  183 woodlands and wetlands, could also provide viewing pleasure, and that beauty could go hand in hand with utility for medieval people. It is harder to see where the pleasure of itineration lay. Clearly, practical and political motives played a larger role than the pursuit of pleasure in the constant travel of medieval kings. Yet the allure of forests that had had time to recover from earlier hunting ex­ped­ itions, a variety of landscapes, and pilgrimage sites and other attractions may have been powerful. The chance to revel not in one palace but in many residences and to constantly encounter the new must have had its attractions. And finally, both residences and itineration allowed the king to take pleasure in showing off his wealth and taste by receiving guests in impressive buildings or guiding them through designed landscapes; by riding a beautiful horse harnessed and saddled in magnificent fashion; or by leading a cavalcade into a city he could claim as his own, watched by a large audience. As always, the display of wealth and power could be its own form of pleasure.

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8

King John and the Wielding of Soft Power 8.1 Introduction When modern historians study the failure of Magna Carta to achieve peace between King John and his barons, they understandably tend to focus on the military situation, the longstanding issues that lay between the king and his nobles, and the precise demands encapsulated in the document. The Anonymous of Béthune had an altogether different focus when he discussed the renewal of hostilities. In his account, after John had made peace with the barons, he lay in bed, ill and unable to walk. He summoned the twenty-five guarantors of the charter to come into his chamber to issue judgement, presumably on various specific matters raised by individual rebels, but they refused, saying that this violated their rights, and demanded that he come to them—if he could not walk, he could be carried. Moreover, when he did come, the barons refused to stand, a severe breach of etiquette that slighted his authority.1 The chronicler showed his disapproval by labelling the barons’ actions proud and outrageous, and he depicted the king as growing angry and plotting revenge. In this telling, it was not the barons’ political demands that provoked the king to discard the peace, but their gesture of disrespect.2 One need not accept this interpretation of the failure of Magna Carta or even the truth of this particular story to recognize that for medieval people, what Bagehot called the dignified parts of government might have mattered far more than we think they should, given our focus on the ‘efficient’ parts. Soft power mattered, particularly in a society in which status and honour were fundamentally important. Discussion of soft power has run throughout the book, but here I wish to focus more narrowly on the subject. As the story above suggests, symbolic forms of communication were an extremely important part of medieval politics, and though I have discussed many incidents and stories that could fall under that umbrella, I wish to introduce new ones to pursue the subject more closely. Gift exchange has also appeared throughout the book, but I analyse it too more closely. In subsequent sections, I wish to show how administrative kingship in many ways enhanced the king’s ability to wield traditional forms of soft power. In Chapter 5, 1 For the etiquette of sitting and standing in the presence of a ruler, see Görich, Friedrich Barbarossa, 164–5. 2  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 151.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0008

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  185 I quoted Vincent’s warnings against treating the Plantagenets simply as Ottonians with pipe rolls. His warning against any facile or simplistic comparison is well taken. Nonetheless, I want to use the phrase with a twist. What happened to the exercise of older forms of soft power when a dynasty that shared many traditional characteristics with the Ottonians developed the kind of strong administration implied by pipe rolls? Finally, I intend to explore why John, despite having a magnificent court that displayed wealth, power, and generosity, apparently benefited so little from it during the many struggles he faced.

8.2  John and His Relations with the Powerful Before discussing soft power, however, more needs to be said about John’s relations with the powerful, particularly members of the secular elites who could provide military support or opposition. John’s failures in retaining the allegiance of his followers and leading subjects were striking. Indeed, the comprehensive collapse of loyalty to him in Normandy, a part of France held by English kings for gener­ ations, and in Anjou, the paternal homeland of his dynasty, was nothing short of stunning. Of course, after it became clear that Philip II would win, nobles and knights were faced with a choice of changing allegiance or losing their land, but it is noteworthy how few loyally followed John into exile or abandoned extensive continental estates for less important ones in England. Moreover, the earliest deserters, those who started the tidal wave of defections, could not have confidently predicted the outcome.3 Equally striking were the desertions of some of those closest to John during the baronial rebellion, particularly after Louis invaded. Some of the king’s most important administrators, including such bureaucratic stalwarts as Hugh de Neville and the royal cleric William of Wrotham, turned their backs on John, even surrendering a castle to his enemies in Hugh’s case. Stephen Church has shown that a third of John’s household knights, frequent recipients of royal favours and expected to form the core of his military forces, deserted him during the rebellion.4 Most striking was the desertion of his own half-brother, William Longsword, formerly one of his strongest supporters. Once again, calculations that John’s cause was doomed, and that loyalty to him would lead to dispossession and exile, undoubtedly came into play. Nonetheless, the lack of loyalty among those who should have been most loyal was remarkable and raises questions about John’s handling of soft power. Yet if John was remarkably adept at forfeiting the loyalty of nobles who were his direct subjects, he was also surprisingly successful at collecting prominent 3  For the earliest deserters, see Powicke, Loss of Normandy, 174–7. 4 S.  D.  Church, The Household Knights of King John (Cambridge, 1999), 97–8, 104–11, 145–50, 154–5.

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186  Power and Pleasure followers from outside his lands, and this success has not always received the attention it deserves. Indeed, his efforts to recruit such followers can be found throughout his records. Some of these followers were recruited from the Irish Sea area, particularly Rǫgnvaldr, king of Man; Alan, lord of Galloway; and Alan’s brother Thomas.5 Most were from Flanders, Hainault, and the surrounding regions in northern France and the northwestern part of the empire. These included some of the region’s great magnates, among them the counts of Flanders, Holland, and Boulogne. John offered some of them land, but many more received money fiefs, with Bryce Lyon finding evidence for nearly 300 such fees.6 John originally recruited these followers to further his aims in Ireland or on the con­tin­ ent, an effort that culminated in the invasion of France that Philip crushed at the Battle of Bouvines. Ultimately, however, John’s ability to attract support from beyond his lands gave him the connections and infrastructure to quickly create the sizeable army of foreigners that helped him to withstand the baronial revolt and French invasion at the end of his reign.7 John’s foreign supporters are often described as mercenaries, and though this term may well be accurate for the fighters of lesser rank, it is misleading for the elite. For one thing, some of the ‘mercenaries’ were actually John’s subjects from Poitou or Gascony, though the sources made no real distinction between them and the warriors from the Low Countries.8 None of the foreign magnates among John’s continental followers came to his aid during the rebellion (some were still Philip’s captives after Bouvines), but many of those who rallied to him in England were nobles and knights. Money fiefs may not have created as durable a form of lordship as grants of land, but many holders of money fiefs, perhaps all, performed homage to John, often travelling to England to do so. John was therefore not simply their employer, but also their lord, and was sometimes described as such in the documents related to their fees. Indeed, John and these followers occasionally expressed their esteem and love for each other in letters and charters, indicating stronger bonds than the mere exchange of service for cash, or at least the pretence of such bonds.9 The degree to which nobles primarily based outside John’s realms could be seen as his men is illustrated by the fact that Count Renaud of Boulogne served as one of four comital guarantors for his peace with the church after the interdict. Similarly, Alan of Galloway was listed in Magna

5  RLCh 191a; R.  Andrew McDonald, Manx Kingship in Its Irish Sea Setting, 1187–1229: King Rǫgnvaldr and the Crovan Dynasty (Dublin, 2007), 129–42; Richard Oram, The Lordship of Galloway (Edinburgh, 2000), 113–21. 6  Bryce D. Lyon, ‘The Money Fief under the English Kings, 1066–1485,’ English Historical Review 66 (1951), 161–93. 7  S.  D.  Church, ‘The Earliest English Muster Roll, 18/19 December, 1215,’ Historical Research 67 (1994), 1–17. 8  Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 2:226; Roger of Wendover, Flores Historiarum, 2:147. 9  RLP 94a; RLCh 190b–191a, 197a, 221b–222a.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  187 Carta as one of the followers John consulted before issuing that document.10 Obviously cash was the most important incentive he could offer foreign followers. Nonetheless, to describe elite followers as mercenaries misses the point that John was trying to build ties of lordship with them and therefore had to treat them with much the same care as he treated followers who held land from him. Indeed, because John could not use the same coercive power of royal administration as he could against subjects, soft power may have been an even more important tool for attracting the loyalty of prominent foreign followers. Not surprisingly, John made grants of robes, vessels, and horses to these followers just as he did to the nobles and knights of his own lands.11 As a result, the issue of John’s ability to effectively use soft power matters not only for his relations with his own subjects but also for his ties with the so-called mercenaries who proved so important at the end of his reign. There were obviously many reasons that nobles from inside and outside John’s land chose to follow him or reject his leadership: calculations about the political advantages and disadvantages involved; rewards for service in the form of land or money; anger at suffering financial harm at the king’s hand; and many more. Equally obviously, soft power only went so far. The granting of robes or food from the king’s own dish at a feast was not likely to satisfy a magnate from whom the king had extracted land or large sums of money. Nonetheless, John’s relations with the nobility inside and outside his lands were very unusual in some ways and obviously very important. This makes a study of soft power at his court particularly interesting.

8.3  Symbolic Communication As noted in Chapter 1, historians of the early Middle Ages, and increasingly those of the central Middle Ages, have done a great deal of work on ritual and cere­ monial, including not only formal religious or secular rites, like consecrations of kings or dubbing ceremonies, but also socially significant gestures, such as bowing or kneeling, matters of etiquette, and even displays of emotion. Collectively, these rituals, gestures, and displays of emotion may be described as symbolic communication.12 Though I will emphasize communication, we might also, drawing on Gero’s description of feasts, noted in Chapter 6, describe such ac­tiv­ ities as context-renewing practices that continually reinforced political and hier­ arch­ic­al structures.13 As we shall see, however, they were also capable of being

10  Magna Carta, preamble; Rymer, ed., Foedera, 1066–1272, 111–12. 11  Misae 14J 242, 249–50, 262–4, 267; PR11J 10; RLC 95a, 126b, 128a. 12  See Chapter 1, 5–6. 13  See Chapter 6, 146–147.

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188  Power and Pleasure manipulated to undermine or alter such structures. In either case, their political importance is notable. Before discussing the uses of ritual in the politics of John’s reign, it is important to address an important controversy over the application of social science approaches to the study of ritual in the Middle Ages. In an influential book, The Dangers of Ritual, Philippe Buc makes some telling points, although sometimes directed at strawmen.14 First of all, Buc points out that ritual is a broad, even inchoate, category that risks intellectual flabbiness. As Geoffrey Koziol notes in his review of the book, the concept of ritual is hardly unique in that way—and Buc himself uses broad terms like ‘ceremony’ and ‘solemnity’ as substitutes. Nonetheless, one reason I use the phrase ‘symbolic communication’ is to achieve at least a little more precision, precisely because these behaviours were so often meant to convey important messages, often political in nature. Another of Buc’s points is that imposing social science models on medieval behaviour risks distorting our understanding of what was going on and disguises what medieval people thought was happening, particularly because of a very specific intellectual genealogy, going back to the Protestant Reformation, that he traces for the concept of ritual. I am not convinced of the overwhelming influence of the particular intellectual genealogy he describes, but certainly any modern model, whether of feudalism or ritual, risks distorting more than it clarifies. I therefore do my best to test the modern theories I use against the evidence and to pay suitable attention to the medieval cultural context. Buc’s most important point is that modern scholars do not have access to the events or behaviours themselves, but only to written accounts, often carefully crafted ones by authors who had an axe to grind or who interpreted contemporary rituals in light of biblical or Late Antique ­models. Relatedly, different writers could depict and interpret the same ceremony, or similar ones, very differently, depending on their own purposes, biases, and predispositions. I will not only try to be sensitive to these problems but also to draw them into my argument, by discussing how John’s enemies could shape their accounts to undermine or distort John’s use of symbolic power. Buc is certainly right to warn us of dangers, but I believe the benefits of discussing symbolic communication warrant the risk. Although the bulk of this section will be about John’s reign, I will start with a discussion of something that did not happen at the first coronation of his brother, Richard I, since it provides unusual insight into the planning of acts of symbolic communication. At the time of Richard’s accession, Archbishop Baldwin of Canterbury was embroiled in a bitter fight with the cathedral monks of

14  Philippe Buc, The Dangers of Ritual: Between Early Medieval Texts and Social Scientific Theory (Princeton, NJ, 2001). For what I agree is his somewhat unfair characterization of earlier scholarship, see Geoffrey Koziol, ‘The Dangers of Polemic: Is Ritual Still an Interesting Topic for Historical Study?’ Early Medieval Europe 11 (2002), 367–88.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  189 Canterbury over his plan to build a college for his secular clerics, which the monks feared was a move to partially or wholly supplant them as the cathedral’s dominant religious body. Not long after the coronation, the monks sent a report to Geoffrey, their subprior, who had departed into exile to seek aid from a papal legate. According to the letter, the convent had sent eight monks with vestments to the coronation because they had heard that after crowning the king, the archbishop planned to prostrate himself at his feet to request protection and con­firm­ation for the collegiate church. The eight monks planned to stage a counter-prostration, and the monks had also recruited Bishop Reginald of Bath, Bishop Hugh of Durham, and other allies to join them in their dramatic response. But in the end Archbishop Baldwin did not prostrate himself or make any request about the collegiate church, perhaps, the monks speculated in their letter, because he had been warned about their countermeasures. Whatever the reason, their plans had been made unnecessary.15 What the monks and the archbishop were considering was supplication, a practice whereby petitioners could seek pardon or favour through a formal request accompanied by gestures of humility or submission such as bowing or prostration. Koziol has analysed supplication in Francia in an earlier period, showing how common and influential the practice was.16 What is striking about this case is that instead of a possibly fictionalized account by a later third party, of the sort Buc has cautioned against, one can see potential participants matter-offactly discussing intentions and strategy. Gerd Althoff has argued that though such acts of symbolic communication often seem spontaneous in the sources, they were generally staged; certainly in this case there was advance planning.17 In contrast to Althoff ’s argument that all parties carefully negotiated these matters in advance, however, in this instance there was the potential for competing acts of symbolic communication that might have caught Richard by surprise and put him in an extremely awkward position at his coronation. Here another concept that Althoff has stressed, of Spielregeln, or ‘rules of the game,’ is helpful. The monks knew how the ‘game’ was played; they knew that the archbishop’s supplication, right on the heels of crowning the king, could easily pressure Richard into the most publicly possible statement of support for the archbishop’s position. They had a plan for thwarting this attempt, though a risky one, given the disruption their counterstrike would have caused. Their willingness to take the risk may have been inspired by the fact that one prominent churchman, Bishop Hugh of Lincoln, was noteworthy for his willingness to flout convention and be disruptive 15  Stubbs, ed., Epistolæ Cantuarienses, 308. For the dispute, see David Knowles, The Monastic Order in England: A History of Its Development from the Times of St. Dunstan to the Fourth Lateran Council, 940–1216, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, 1963), 318–22, 325–6; C. R. Cheney, Hubert Walter (London, 1967), 135–57. For context, see Thomas, Secular Clergy, 343–64. 16 Koziol, Begging Pardon and Favor, passim. 17  See in particular Althoff, ‘Demonstration und Inszenierung,’ 229–57.

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190  Power and Pleasure to achieve his ends, and often did so with success, as when King Richard refused him a kiss of peace and he grabbed the king’s clothes to demand it, eventually causing the king to relent with a small smile.18 However, as a future saint of aristocratic background, Hugh could get away with things that others could not. Moreover, causing a scene at a coronation was particularly risky. But perhaps the Canterbury monks simply hoped that their plans would leak to the archbishop and king and pressure the archbishop to abandon his plan. If so, their strategy achieved the desired outcome. Though Koziol believed that supplication became less important over the course of the twelfth century, as kings relied more on administration for building power and on chivalry to strengthen ties with the nobility, the English evidence indicates that supplication remained important.19 Various sources describe acts of supplication at the courts of Henry II and Richard I, and the kings themselves sometimes used the practice.20 Startlingly, given Richard the Lionheart’s heroic image, an illumination in Peter of Eboli’s panegyric of the Emperor Henry VI shows Richard kissing the emperor’s feet while in the latter’s captivity.21 That this is not simply imperial propaganda is indicated by the fact that Roger of Howden and William of Newburgh described the emperor raising Richard up, indicating that he had in fact prostrated himself, or at least knelt; supplication, however humiliating, would have been a wise choice in the dire circumstances in which Richard found himself.22 Therefore, there is every reason to believe that supplication and other forms of symbolic communication might remain important in John’s reign. Indeed, John himself employed the practice of supplication. Even before he became king, John was recorded as having thrown himself to his father’s feet to request that Henry accept the patriarch of Jerusalem’s request to send him to the Holy Land to become king of Jerusalem.23 Some years later, he cast himself, weeping, at Richard’s feet to request pardon for revolting against him.24 The first act of supplication failed, but according to Ralph of Coggeshall, the second prompted Richard to weep in turn and to grant pardon. I have already noted other acts of supplication, including the mutual prostration when John made peace with the Cistercians and his prostration before Archbishop Stephen Langton and other

18  Adam of Eynsham, Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis, 2:100–3. 19 Koziol, Begging Pardon and Favor, 286–8. 20  Anne Duggan, ed., The Correspondence of Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1162–1170, 2 vols. (Oxford, 2000), 2:820–1, 880–1; Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 1:400–1; [Roger of Howden], Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, 1:82; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 1:221–2; 2:4–5; Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 1:323, 355, 373, 480–1; 2:400; Jocelin of Brakelond, Chronicle, 23; Gerald of Wales, Opera, 1:52. 21  This image may be seen in Pietro da Eboli, Book in Honor of Augustus, 256. 22  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:199; William of Newburgh, Historia Rerum Anglicarum, 1:387–8; Pietro da Eboli, Book in Honor of Augustus, 252–6. 23  Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 202–3; Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 534–5. 24  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 64.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  191 bishops after making peace with the church.25 Naturally, John was more usually the object rather than the practitioner of supplication and other sources show monks supplicating his pardon or favour. These acts were clearly powerful tools; by their own accounts the monks of Bury once placated John’s anger through a carefully choreographed act of supplication, and the monks of St Augustine’s got the king in a receptive mood in another dispute by ‘approaching his indignation in humility and his anger in supplication,’ though they still had to proffer money and a palfrey to gain their wishes.26 As this last example suggests, supplication was often only one part of a larger process of dispute resolution. Nonetheless, acts of supplication were powerful moments that contemporaries viewed as pivotal in relations between rulers and their subjects. I discussed the practice of riding out to meet and thereby honour the king in Chapter 7 in the context of itineration and processions; that practice was part of a politically important and broader practice of using formal greetings to bestow honour on the powerful. At times it behoved the king himself to ride out to ­honour others, particularly visiting rulers, or to accompany them on their de­part­ ure, as Henry II, Richard I, and John are all known to have done.27 A story by the Anonymous of Béthune reveals, albeit probably in a humorous way, the calculations that went into such a gesture. The writer’s probable patron, Robert of Béthune, was with the king at Canterbury when news came that Count Ferrand of Flanders, a crucial ally, had arrived at Dover. Robert asked King John why he did not go at once to greet the count. ‘Listen to this Fleming,’ the story relates the king saying, ‘he thinks his lord, the count of Flanders, is a big deal.’ ‘By Saint James,’ replied Robert, ‘I am right that he is.’ John then laughed and immediately rode off to Dover, going so fast that he left much of his retinue behind. As the king approached the count’s lodgings, the count went out to greet him, and when they met, John dismounted and kissed him. Only a powerful figure deserved such a display of honour from the king, and the count took care to show respect in turn, but the story reveals the importance even for kings of showing the proper cour­tesy.28 The Anonymous of Béthune’s story that opened the chapter shows greeting ­practices being used more confrontationally. If the story is true, in forcing the king to come to them and refusing to stand when he entered, the barons were clearly signalling a shift in the balance of authority.29 Even if false, the story illustrates how gestures that could be seen as merely courteous took on powerful meanings and served as forms of symbolic communication. As we have seen, there

25  See Chapter 5, 108, 112. 26 Davis, William Thorne’s Chronicle, 155; Thomson, ed., Chronicle of the Election of Hugh, 162–3. 27  For Henry and Richard, see Ralph of Diceto, Opera Historica, 1:433; Roger of Howden, Chronica, 2:192–3; 3:97; Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 536–7. For John, see Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 2:92; Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 113. 28  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 140. 29  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 151.

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192  Power and Pleasure were many of these, including sharing dishes at feasts.30 In the right circumstances, even ordinary gestures could take on charged meanings. For instance, Gervase of Canterbury described a conference between John and Philip where, after a first meeting failed and a second had gone on for a while, the kings suddenly embraced each other, signalling a breakthrough.31 The very fact that writers took the trouble to record such moments indicates their importance as methods of communication in medieval politics. Displays of royal anger should be viewed similarly, though one should not always assume the emotions were artificial. The Angevin kings were famous for their displays of rage, most notably in the description in an anonymous letter to Thomas Becket of Henry II, in a fit of rage at one of his men, tearing off his hat, cloak, and other clothes, stripping the silk covering off his bed, and chewing on the straw that filled the mattress.32 Indeed, Jolliffe long ago treated anger and ill will (ira et malevolentia) as characteristic of Angevin government, and John was no exception.33 One royal financial account refers casually to the king having hit a messenger from Bayonne, suggesting that this sort of action may have been fairly routine.34 More dramatically, during a dispute with the monks of St Augustine’s, Canterbury over the patronage of a wealthy church at Faversham, some of the monks and their followers barricaded themselves in the church and rectory, barring royal and archiepiscopal officials from entering. According to a chronicler of the monastery, John, ‘as if turned to madness,’ ordered that the church and house be burned with the men inside, although his followers eventually dissuaded him. If this story is true and John had actually intended to burn a holy site with religious figures inside in a fight over the patronage of a single benefice, however wealthy, he would indeed have been insane. If, however, one follows those ­scholars who think such displays of rage were intended for show, then the episode appears both more believable and more understandable. John’s orders were meant to intimidate the monks and signal the depth of his displeasure, but having accomplished that, he could allow himself to be talked down. In the end, the display was simply one episode in a long dance of legal manoeuvrings, acts of restrained coercion, negotiations, and gestures, including the incident of supplication by the monks noted earlier, which eventually resulted in a settlement.35 I have argued elsewhere that many of the episodes of anger and intimidation in the Becket dispute were staged to pressure the archbishop rather than being spon­ tan­eous outbursts, and in general it is likely that in making a frequent show of their

30  See Chapter 6, 145. 31  Gervase of Canterbury, Historical Works, 2:92. 32  Duggan, ed., Correspondence of Thomas Becket, 1:542–3. Nicholas Vincent suspects some elab­ ora­tion with biblical echoes in this story, but nonetheless there are many accounts of Angevin royal rage; Vincent, ‘The Court of Henry II,’ 311–12. 33 Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 87–109. 34  Misae 11J 165. 35 Davis, William Thorne’s Chronicle, 137–57.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  193 anger the Angevin rulers were using a tool that was common in the period.36 As is well known, the Angevin kings accepted proffers for their goodwill and grace or to remit their anger and ill will, and proffers and payments for those purposes abound in John’s records.37 Such proffers make most sense in a society in which royal displays of anger were not simply gauges of the king’s feelings at a given moment, but signals that the targets of his anger needed to appease him. A final and related form of symbolic communication can be classed as comportment, by which I mean the ability to control one’s outward expression of emotion. While this might seem to clash with arguments about the displays of apparently uncontrolled rage, if one sees displays of rage as a tool, then they were in fact controlled, at least to some extent. Quite likely, other displays of emotion, including calmness, could also be a tool. Jaeger has shown the importance of gestures, gait, bearing, and carriage in the clerical realm, and at least some of this spilled over to the secular side of the court.38 Here I will focus on the ability to express calm or even good cheer, where appropriate, in the face of misfortune, danger, and sorrow. Both Roger of Howden and Ralph of Coggeshall praised Richard I for his comportment during captivity, the former remarking that Richard knew how to control his spirit and overcome fortune with constancy; the latter praising Richard’s good cheer and noting that he knew how to bear himself as was fitting for the circumstance.39 On occasion, John is depicted as having the same ability to put a good face on adversity. In Chapter 6, I noted his display of good cheer while feasting on his coronation anniversary with Peter of Wakefield’s ominous prophecy looming over him, and Ralph of Coggeshall described him as concealing his dismay, at least at first, when one of his planned expeditions to the continent unravelled.40 Thus, kings could engage in symbolic communication by displaying more subtle emotions than anger. In considering symbolic communication, and more generally in thinking about John’s ability to handle soft power, it is important to keep the social im­port­ ance of honour in mind. Honour was a key form of social capital. To be con­ sidered honourable or to possess honour was very much an end in itself, a source of prestige and no doubt of personal satisfaction. But it was also an advantage in dealing with others: it enhanced the worth of one’s opinion and advice; made it easier to influence others or attract followers; allowed one to make more valuable associations; and provided a host of other benefits. For medieval aristocrats there were of course many sources of honour, including birth, wealth, and prowess on 36  Hugh M. Thomas, ‘Shame, Masculinity, and the Death of Thomas Becket,’ Speculum 87 (2012), 1050–88. 37  To take examples only from the first sixth of the fine rolls, ROF 26–7, 67, 69, 74, 98, 100. 38  C. Stephen Jaeger, The Envy of Angels: Cathedral Schools and Social Ideals in Medieval Europe, 950–1200 (Philadelphia, PA, 1994), 9–13, 111–16, 260–2. For a broad look at gestures in the Middle Ages, see Jean Claude Schmitt, La raison des gestes dans l’Occident médiéval (Paris, 1990). 39  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:199; Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 58. 40  Walter of Coventry, Memoriale, 2:211–12; Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 152.

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194  Power and Pleasure the battlefield or in other endeavours. The king’s court, however, was an im­port­ant arena for the possible acquisition or loss of honour. For one thing, it provided an important audience, above all at feasts or other great occasions, but also even on ordinary days, when one’s actions and the treatment one received from others could receive attention and raise or lower one’s reputation. Many actors could contribute to this, but above all the king could determine who received honour and status and sometimes who lost it in the various interactions at court. If ­honour was important, so too was shame, and the harm of suffering shame was only magnified when it happened at court. Of course, events at court, and the resulting shame or dishonour, were subsequently modified by how people recounted the events, whether orally or in writing, and it is only through the written accounts that we have access.41 Nevertheless, the events themselves mattered greatly, and how a king handled such events, and honoured or shamed those around him, was an important aspect of successful kingship, and symbolic communication played an important role in the bestowal of shame and honour. John’s government was run on financial accounts, careful record keeping, and ongoing institutionalization of law, but it was also a government of gestures and displays of emotion. Of course, the impact of these forms of soft power should not be exaggerated. John’s show of respect when greeting the Irish king, Áed Méith Ó Néill, during his second Irish expedition, by dismounting and kissing him, did not prevent him from losing Ó Néill’s support when he demanded tribute from him.42 Gerald of Wales described Henry II as personally accompanying Patriarch Heraclius of Jerusalem to Dover in an attempt to appease him for his blunt refusal to go to the aid of the Holy Land or send one of his sons. In Gerald’s words, though, this gesture and others like it were flatteries (blanditiae) and offerings of honour (beneficii honoris) that, Gerald implied, were hollow compared to providing substantive aid.43 Yet one should not underestimate the importance of symbolic communication. The Anonymous of Béthune’s utter indifference to the specifics of Magna Carta, as opposed to what he saw as the barons’ arrogant refusal to treat John respectfully in their meeting with him, may not have been very good history, but it provides a glimpse of the mindset and priorities of at least one contemporary, and reveals the importance of symbolic communication.

8.4 Gifts At this point, the importance of gift-giving at John’s court will be obvious. Gifts have peppered the earlier chapters: hunting animals, hunting rights, deer, and 41  This, of course, is a key point in Buc, Dangers of Ritual. 42  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 113; Duffy, ‘King John’s Expedition to Ireland,’ 13–17. 43  Gerald of Wales, Instruction for a Ruler, 536–7.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  195 venison; robes, plate, and jewellery; relics and other religious items; wine. There has also been ample discussion of hospitality and feasts, themselves a form of gift. Other kinds of gifts may be added to the picture, including royal grants of timber, ships captured from the French, and, most coveted of all, land.44 Not only were the gifts themselves important, but the act of giving was itself a form of symbolic communication, and could sometimes make quite a spectacle, as when vividly coloured textiles were distributed when the king granted robes at a feast. Gifts to the king could also turn into spectacles, and the Briouze family seems to have been particularly adept at this with William’s presentation of so many hunting animals to the king and Matilda’s gift of hundreds of white cattle with red ears to the queen.45 Gift-giving was sometimes routine, sometimes quite spectacular, but extensive and woven into the fabric of court life; indeed, in many ways acting to weave that fabric. As a prelude to analysing John’s adeptness at handling gift-giving, it is useful to probe a little deeper into the subtleties of the practice. A vast literature on the importance of gift-giving in premodern societies has developed over the years.46 Gifts served many functions, but winning gratitude and favour was foremost, a fact of which contemporaries were keenly aware. Early in Henry III’s reign, the great courtier, Hubert de Burgh, received a letter from an ally informing him that the young king had received the palfrey Hubert had sent him with affection and praised it greatly, ‘from which I was happy and rejoiced, for I know that the close relationship (affinitas) of the lord king is of great value to you and that you will be easily able to have and hold [the relationship] and his love.’47 As the scholarship on gift-giving shows, however, the simple picture of gifts earning gratitude, 44  For examples of timber, see RN 112; RLC 40b, 43b, 50a, 66b, 99b; for ships, see RLC 117a, 118b, 120a; Beryl E. R. Formoy, ‘A Maritime Indenture of 1212,’ English Historical Review 41 (1926), 556–9, at 557. Grants of land are scattered throughout the charter rolls. 45  See Chapter  2, 41; Chapter  4, 83—84; RLC 63a; Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 111–15. 46 The seminal work was Mauss, The Gift. Other works I have used for this section are Barbara  H.  Rosenwein, ‘The Family Politics of Berengar I, King of Italy (888–924),’ Speculum 71 (1996), 247–89; Felicity Heal, ‘Reciprocity and Exchange in the Late Medieval Household,’ in Barbara  A.  Hanawalt and David Wallace, eds., Bodies and Disciplines: Intersections of History and Literature in Fifteenth-Century England (Minneapolis, MN, 1996), 179–98; Natalie Zemon Davis, The Gift in Sixteenth-Century France (Madison, WI, 2000); Esther Cohen and Mayke De Jong, eds., Medieval Transformations: Texts, Power, and Gifts in Context (Leiden, 2001); Valentin Groebner, Liquid Assets, Dangerous Gifts: Presents and Politics at the End of the Middle Ages (Philadelphia, PA, 2002); Florin Curta, ‘Merovingian and Carolingian Gift Giving,’ Speculum 81 (2006), 671–99; Wendy Davies and Paul Fouracre, eds., The Languages of Gift in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2010); Woolgar, ‘Gifts of Food,’ 6–18; Jenny Benham, Peacemaking in the Middle Ages: Principles and Practice (Manchester, 2011), 71–80; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Freigebigkeit, Verschwendung und Belohnung bei Hofe, ca. 1150–1300,’ in Werner Paravacini, ed., Luxus und Integration: Materielle Hofkultur Westeuropas vom 12. bis zum 18. Jahrhundert (Munich, 2010), 85–104. For important discussions of gift-giving in the courts of John’s father, Henry II, and grandson, Edward I, see Schröder, Macht und Gabe, 77–104; Lachaud, ‘Textiles, Furs and Liveries,’ 176–219, 249–85. 47  Walter Waddington Shirley, Royal and Other Historical Letters Illustrative of the Reign of Henry III (London, 1862–6), 1:160.

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196  Power and Pleasure though not incorrect, vastly oversimplifies the situation in societies or contexts where gift-giving had great importance. As Chris Wickham has stated, ‘gift giving was always complicated, always strategic, always risky, always potentially ambiguous, with meanings that could be attached and competed over both at the moment of giving and later.’48 Matters were especially complicated for rulers, partially because they were supposed to uphold justice and gifts could easily blur into bribes, but also because their honour was so intertwined with the giving, receiving, and withholding of gifts, as Knut Görich has discussed in relation to Frederick Barbarossa.49 More broadly, issues of self-interest versus selflessness abound when it comes to gift exchange. From Marcel Mauss on, scholars have emphasized the im­port­ ance of reciprocity in gift-giving practices, and the principle of reciprocity has certainly played a large role across many cultures.50 With reciprocity, one expected a return on one’s gifts. A surviving gift inventory for Henry III’s reign shows a constant flow of gifts to and from the king. Indeed, much of what Henry received he gave away to others, sometimes very quickly.51 This constant exchange at least suggests that gift-giving was intended to create networks of reciprocity. Yet arguably, the whole point of gifts is that they are not self-interested. As Valentin Groebner has written, ‘Gifts possess seductive power, eloquence, and the capacity to transform social circumstances because . . . they are as far removed as possible from calculation and self-interest.’52 Lars Kjaer has recently demonstrated the influence of classical ideals about gift exchange on England in the central Middle Ages, and classical writers emphasized that virtuous people did not give primarily in hopes of receiving a return.53 These warnings and their repetition by medieval writers, of course, reveal that people often did desire reciprocity, but one should not dismiss them as empty rhetoric. Moreover, such ideals meant that reciprocity, when it occurred, had to be disguised; otherwise gift-giving would not be significantly different from trade.54 How in fact did gift exchange relate to commerce? Whereas Mauss and other early scholars of the gift tended to see cash economies replacing gift economies, most recent scholarship envisions the two overlapping throughout history, at least in any society with even a rudimentary cash

48  Chris Wickham, ‘Conclusion,’ in Wendy Davies and Paul Fouracre, eds., The Languages of Gift in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2010), 238–61, at 261. 49  Görich, ‘Geld und Honor,’ 177–200; Görich, ‘Geld und Ehre,’ 113–34. For John of Salisbury on gifts and bribes, see John of Salisbury, Policraticus, 1:187–90, 205–9, 330–4, 346–50. 50 Mauss, The Gift. 51 Benjamin Wild, ‘A Gift Inventory from the Reign of Henry III,’ English Historical Review 125  (2010), 529–69; Nicholas Vincent, ‘An Inventory of Gifts to King Henry III, 1234–5,’ in David Crook and Louise J. Wilkinson, eds., The Growth of Royal Government under Henry III (Woodbridge, 2015), 121–46; Lars Kjær, The Medieval Gift and the Classical Tradition: Ideals and the Performance of Generosity in Medieval England, 1100–1300 (Cambridge, 2019), 172–82. 52 Groebner, Liquid Assets, Dangerous Gifts, 1. 53 Kjær, Medieval Gift, passim. 54 Groebner, Liquid Assets, Dangerous Gifts, 1, 10, 13.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  197 economy.55 Certainly sales and gifts had existed side by side for centuries in England before John.56 In principle, the two were quite different, but in practice, continuing expectations of reciprocity made the boundaries between sale and gift blurred. Wendy Davies has argued that one should see a spectrum between two poles rather than sharp distinctions, and subtleties rather than confusion in medieval thinking about the difference between them.57 When it came to the relationship between king and nobles, there was a desire to downplay any hint of a relationship built on cash rather than gift exchange. One of the oddities about John’s military practices, particularly during his Irish campaign of 1210, was that he loaned his noble and knightly subjects a great deal of cash on military expeditions without any apparent effort to seek repayment. Stephen Church has conjectured, I think rightly, that the grants were payments disguised as loans to preserve the nobles’ sensibilities.58 One might even say that this pretence allowed both parties to avoid any implication that the nobles were serving for pay rather than fulfilling their tenurial duties and providing proper reciprocity for the lands which they or (usually) their ancestors had received by royal gift. An anecdote of the Anonymous of Béthune lends credence to Church’s theory and suggests a similar dynamic existed with the noble followers John attracted from overseas during the baronial revolt. The chronicle records how, despite tensions with John, the Flemish fighters supporting him accompanied him to Marlborough. There, however, the king did a great ‘villainy’ by having treasure brought into his chamber before their very eyes but giving them none, after which they left for Flanders.59 One may reasonably suspect the author of being less than candid here; he had to justify his patron, Robert of Béthune, and others deserting John during war. Indeed, Gillingham suggests that Robert switched sides to Louis.60 What is noteworthy, however, is how the author frames the supposedly crucial breaking point for the Flemish; certainly not that the Flemish were being prudent or that the king was not paying them enough. Rather, he suggests that the king dishonoured them by parading his treasure before them but not rewarding them with it, implicitly claiming that they were inspired by an injury to their honour rather than greed or fear. By making John a miserly and dishonourable lord rather than a bad paymaster, the Anonymous saved face for his patron. Lyon asked why kings like John relied on money fiefs rather than simple payments to mercenaries and postulated that the strength of the ‘feudal 55 Davis, The Gift in Sixteenth-Century France, 43–66. 56 Rory Naismith, Money and Power in Anglo-Saxon England: The Southern English Kingdoms 757–865 (Cambridge, 2012), 252–64. 57  Wendy Davies, ‘When Gift Is Sale: Reciprocities and Commodities in Tenth-Century Christian Iberia,’ in Wendy Davies and Paul Fouracre, eds., The Languages of Gift in the Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2010), 217–37. 58  Church, ‘1210 Campaign in Ireland,’ 51–7. 59  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 150–1. 60  Gillingham, ‘Anonymous of Béthune.’

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198  Power and Pleasure system’ was the reason. An alternative possibility is that by removing the transfer of money from individual acts of military service, such fiefs preserved recipients from the possible taint of mercenary status. Traditional ties of lordship based on landholding created an ongoing reciprocal gift exchange of land in return for service and loyalty, thereby removing lordship and military service from the vulgar monetary sphere. Money fiefs marked by the performance of homage aimed to replicate such permanent and honourable ties of gift exchange, with cash rather than land as the reward for loyalty, but without the problematic implication of direct payment for services rendered.61 If these hypotheses are correct, keeping relations with nobles in the realm of gift-giving rather than the cash nexus was an important strategy for medieval rulers. Various cultures have different ideas of what should be bought and sold and what should remain in the sphere of gift exchange. As Igor Kopytoff has written, in reference to a study of the Tiv people of Nigeria, ‘We blandly accept the existence of an exchange sphere of political or academic favors, but would be as shocked at the idea of monetizing this sphere as the Tiv were at first at the idea of monetizing their marriage transactions.’62 Medieval boundaries between gift and sale were politically fraught, and some of the methods used by the Angevin kings, particularly John, to raise money made their relationship even more problematic than usual. In their efforts to get cash, the Angevin kings monetized many aspects of royal government in ways that may shock us, though our economy is more monetized overall. For instance, kings married off rich heiresses and widows in their gift in return for cash and, as suggested earlier, even the king’s emotions, particularly anger, were partially monetized. Such practices may have created social tension. There is some indication that John tried to lessen or disguise the increasing monetization of relations between king and subjects, or so the curious history of non-monetary portions of proffers to the king suggests. I have noted the inclusion of animals such as birds of prey and horses, as well as wine and other goods, in proffers to the king. Such items were included in proffers throughout the Angevin period, but Richard I had started to phase them out. After his return from captivity, he began seeking cash equivalents for animals and thereby cleared out a substantial backlog of payments.63 However, John reversed this process, even at times specifying that specific debtors could not substitute cash for ­palfreys.64 John may initially have calculated that such proffers were a convenient way to obtain the horses and hunting birds the court needed, but if so, he was

61  Lyon, ‘Money Fief,’ 190–1. 62 Igor Kopytoff, ‘The Cultural Biography of Things: Commoditization as Process,’ in Arjun Appadurai, ed., The Social Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective (Cambridge, 1986), 64–91, at 77. 63 Oggins, Kings and Their Hawks, 60–1. 64  RLC 119a; ROF 238, 239–40, 242, 263, 339.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  199 wrong, perhaps because the royal administration had a cumbersome process for inspecting and approving the birds (and presumably the horses) accepted as proffers.65 For whatever reason, debtors normally provided the promised animals or goods only after they had paid in all the cash they owed, and often they substituted cash for animals. A large backlog of owed animals quickly developed. Thus, in John’s first pipe roll, one horse was delivered to the royal government, cash was substituted for five more horses, and twenty-eight were owed at the end of the year. By John’s fourteenth pipe roll, though four horses were delivered and cash was paid as whole or partial substitution for thirty-eight in that year, over 400 remained outstanding.66 In practical terms, John’s reversal of Richard’s policy of routinely commuting animals for cash was a failure. Simple cash proffers would have been much more efficient, and the only way to collect most of these debts remained converting them to cash. Why then did he continue to encourage the proffering of animals? He was probably trying to increase the ‘giftiness’ of these transactions (to borrow a term from Wickham) and thereby make the many deals between him and his subjects look less like commercial ventures and more like honourable exchanges of favours and gifts between lord and follower.67 It is doubtful that these efforts had much success, given the sheer number of cash proffers and the size and risks or losses involved in many, but the effort does suggest that John and his government were aware of the dangers of turning relationships with the nobility into a commercialized market rather than an arena of lordship cemented by personal ties and gift exchange. The cultural importance of gift-giving, in other words, remained strong even as the impact of commercializ­ ation grew.

8.5  Administrative Kingship and Soft Power As the argument about John’s attempt to restore ‘giftiness’ to largely cash proffers indicates, the rise of administrative kingship could disrupt some of the traditional ways in which soft power was used to smooth relations between ruler and subjects. Nonetheless, administrative kingship did not make traditional forms of soft power obsolete. As many sections of this book have shown, soft power was still vital in John’s reign, not just a vestigial survival. In many ways, in fact, the long, slow development of the European state through the Middle Ages and the early modern period actually enhanced rulers’ ability to use soft power effectively. For instance, both Groebner and Natalie Zemon Davis have emphasized that gifts played an important role in the construction of the early modern state, indicating

65  Richard FitzNigel, Dialogus de Scaccario, 182–3. 67  Wickham, ‘Compulsory Gift Exchange,’ 193–216.

66  PR1J; PR14J.

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200  Power and Pleasure that soft power and the rise of the bureaucracy could be closely intertwined.68 The rise of administrative kingship may have reduced the relative importance of many forms of soft power, but the greater capabilities that bureaucracy gave rulers provided them with the means to make expressions of soft power more grandiose, more impressive, and therefore more effective. At the simplest level, effective revenue collection and management provided a king like John the income for many forms of display and generosity: a huge hunting establishment; large purchases of plate, jewellery, and rich clothing; generous patronage of music, entertainment, and books; ample religious offerings; and massive quantities of food and drink, much of it exotic and costly. None of these types of investments in soft power were new, but administrative kingship gave rulers the scope for greater magnificence. However, the rise of bureaucracy did more than provide cash. Importing wine and distributing it throughout England, or gathering the large quantities of food, drink, textiles, and dishes for a glorious feast, were challenging logistical tasks, as was managing the complex movement of dogs, birds, hunters, and falconers throughout the king’s realms and supplying their needs. The development of increasingly effective bureaucracies made these endeavours easier and manageable on a larger scale. Conversely, the desire of ­rulers for more effective displays of soft power (and greater pleasure) provided an impetus for the rise of administrative kingship. Warfare no doubt remained the chief stimulus to the rise of sophisticated royal government, and the growth of royal justice was crucial, but the demands of hunting, material splendour, feasting, and sacral kingship were also important stimuli. Far from being antagonistic, administrative kingship and many traditional forms of soft power were mutually reinforcing. Similarly, though the increasing use of documents obviously had an impact on forms of communication, the continuing importance of symbolic communication suggests that writing expanded the tools of communication rather than simply replacing oral and non-verbal communication.69 Moreover, though the terse language of routine writs was a far cry from the kinds of symbolic communication discussed earlier, aspects of the latter spilled over into writing. Henry Bainton has argued that important documents were often read aloud at great councils. Drawing on Weberian terminology and Timothy Reuters’s discussion of the political importance of assemblies for projecting royal authority, he writes: ‘So while the use of the written word for political purposes may well have formed part of the process of the routinization of charisma, it remained bound up with

68 Davis, The Gift in Sixteenth-Century France, 8; Groebner, Liquid Assets, Dangerous Gifts, 11–12, 139. 69 For a useful discussion of the differences writing made, see Weiler, Kingship, Rebellion and Political Culture, 139–48.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  201 the spectacles of charismatic rule.’70 Public reading was itself a form of symbolic communication. Moreover, forms of symbolic communication infiltrated the seemingly purely practical world of bureaucratic writing, as various scholars have noted.71 Take expressions of precedence. Physical expressions of precedence such as seating arrangements and the order in which someone might receive the kiss of peace remained a crucial aspect of symbolic communication throughout the Middle Ages and beyond, but are barely mentioned in the records for John’s reign. However, Josiah Cox Russell showed that the witness lists to John’s charters had a fairly standard order of precedence, not just between different groups like the clergy and laity, but also within groups. Thus, for instance, there was a clear order of precedence among the earls. Russell linked this to seating arrangements; more broadly, this order of precedence for attestations was probably a written mani­fest­ ation of the kind of careful attention to rank and precedence that undoubtedly permeated all sorts of routine court activities and gestures.72 Even the language of gestures made its way into writing. In their letters about their dispute with Archbishops Baldwin and Hubert over the planned collegiate church, the Canterbury monks and their allies sometimes performed what might be called virtual supplications, writing that they embraced the feet or placed themselves at the feet of the recipient.73 Something similar seems to be going on in a rare survival of what must have been a very routine writ to John by one of his important administrators and supporters, Robert de Vieuxpont, reporting the receipt of military supplies. Robert ended his address clause with the statement, ‘salute et se totum ad pedes,’ which can probably be translated as ‘greetings and himself entirely at [your] feet.’74 One way that rulers could show favour was forms of address. To illustrate how much John favoured William de Briouze, before turning against him, William Marshal’s biographer said the king described the favourite as seignor and mestre.75 In surviving Latin writs and charters, such terms as dilectus (beloved) and fidelis (faithful) were used to demonstrate esteem and favour. Of course, sometimes this was formulaic, especially when used for foreign worthies. For instance, in letters to Philip Augustus negotiating a truce after the Battle of Bouvines, John addressed

70  Henry Bainton, ‘Literate Sociability and Historical Writing in Later Twelfth-Century England,’ Anglo-Norman Studies 34 (2012), 23–39. Quotation at p. 39. 71 Koziol, Politics of Memory and Identity, 33–7; Hagen Keller, ‘Hulderweis durch Privilegien: symbolische Kommunikation innerhalb und jenseits des Textes,’ Frühmittelalterliche Studien 38 (2004), 309–21; Levi Roach, ‘Public Rites and Public Wrongs: Ritual Aspects of Diplomas in Tenth- and Eleventh-Century England,’ Early Medieval Europe 19 (2011), 182–203; Charles Insley, ‘ “Ottonians with Pipe Rolls”? Political Culture and Performance in the Kingdom of the English, c. 900–c. 1050,’ History 102 (2017), 772–86. 72  Josiah Cox Russell, ‘Social Status at the Court of King John,’ Speculum 12 (1937), 319–29. 73  Stubbs, ed., Epistolæ Cantuarienses, 10, 86, 145, 222–3, 283–4, 358–60, 437–8, 445–6. 74  PR8J xxvii. 75  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:208–9.

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202  Power and Pleasure Philip as his ‘beloved lord,’ clearly an expression of scribal obedience to protocols rather than of John’s true feelings.76 However, in writs to his subjects, John uses such expressions with more restraint. As Michael Burger has shown, expressions of love and affection were common in routine communication among clergy, so it is perhaps not surprising that on a percentage basis, the royal chancery used these terms more frequently for clerical recipients. Even within this group, however, favourite royal clerics were much more likely to be addressed this way than ­others.77 Among lay recipients, once one sets aside powerful foreign nobles and ­rulers, the preference for royal favourites is even more pronounced. One might expect, for instance, that John’s scribes would routinely flatter all his earls, but in the enrolled letters usually only those close to him received the affectionate greetings.78 Inclusion or omission of this language did not affect the substance of the writs and charters; it was simply another form of symbolic communication. Thus, even the most routine aspects of administrative kingship were tinged with trad­ition­al practices of soft power. More generally, administrative kingship was not at all inimical to the exercise of traditional forms of soft power: instead it often supported them.

8.6  How Successful Was John at Managing Soft Power? Not surprisingly, a major preoccupation of scholarship on John’s reign concerns his character, abilities, and the degree to which he was responsible for the disasters he encountered. In this chapter, I look at only a small part of that issue: did John’s management of soft power improve his position or contribute to his failures? As noted in Chapter 1, my opinion of John’s overall ability is that although he had some strengths as a ruler, on balance he was a disaster. That said, both wider assessments of his abilities and the narrower one presented below are problematic. For example, the question of whether Philip Augustus or John had a greater income to finance their wars would be relatively straightforward—if we had complete financial records for both. As it is, even the most careful calculations must be approximations.79 More broadly, there are so many variables and

76  RLP 154b, 155a. 77  For some examples, see RLCh 15a, 37a, 64a–b, 73a, 74b, 75b; Michael Burger, Bishops, Clerks, and Diocesan Governance in Thirteenth-Century England: Reward and Punishment (Cambridge, 2012), 211–24. 78  RN 30; RLP 5a, 7b, 20a, 20b; MR 1J 89–90, 93–5; RL 1; RLC 125a; RLCh 58b, 70b–71a, 73a, 74b–75b, 87b–88a, 92b, 95b, 97a–b, 98b–99a, 100a–b, 102a, 103b. It is true that such greetings could sometimes be truncated when writs and charters were copied into the rolls; for instance, an original writ to Hugh de Neville contains the language but the copy in the patent roll does not; National Archives, London, DL 10/58; RLP 71a. Nonetheless, the pattern seems so pronounced that it is hard to believe it could be an artefact of the copying. 79  See Chapter 1, note 26.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  203 intangibles in determining what causes individual political and military leaders to succeed or fail that even scholars of later periods with access to massive amounts of evidence often disagree strongly. Compounding the problem are the inevitable biases in the sources, which are frequently quite strong in John’s case. A false or distorted anecdote intended to make him look bad (or good), though useful in revealing cultural norms, could provide a thoroughly misleading picture. Cultural differences are an additional barrier. These are particularly problematic for soft power as one often has to interpret nuances that would probably have been clear to the intended audience but could mislead or confuse us. For instance, I have interpreted the exchange between John and Robert of Béthune about greeting the Count of Flanders as an instance of banter, in which case John’s handling of the situation looks good; he created rapport with his Flemish supporters by joking with them, then rode off and paid proper respect to the count. However, other interpretations are possible. Perhaps the Anonymous of Béthune, no great admirer, was depicting John as so boorish that he had to be prodded to carry out even the most obvious of courtesies.80 Thus any assessment of John’s management of soft power must necessarily be tentative and provisional. With all that in mind, I argue here that John’s handling of sacral power, as discussed in Chapter 5, was typical of his management of soft power more generally. When it came to the larger picture of marshalling resources and taking the steps necessary to project an aura of power, he and his government were quite good. When it came to specific instances, John’s abilities were much more mixed, and often he needlessly undercut himself. I have made the case throughout the book that John and his government excelled at producing what might be called the theatre of royal power.81 The magnificence of the king and court was displayed through rich clothing, fine jewellery, lavish feasts, and even exotic animals. Gilded lances and splendid banners, as well as the accumulation of more ordinary weapons and armour, ensured the projection of military power. Gaudy processions, elegant palaces and castles, and royal parks and forests made royal power visible throughout John’s realms. Royal regalia, the chanting of the laudes, and visits to churches projected an aura of divine support, while hunting parties and forest administrators displayed the royal capacity for violence far and wide. A steady flow of gifts fostered networks of lordship and political alliances and created a reputation for royal generosity. There can be little doubt that the machinery of Angevin government allowed John to project royal power in style.

80  For the story as a negative anecdote about John, see Gabrielle M. Spiegel, Romancing the Past: The Rise of Vernacular Prose Historiography in Thirteenth-Century France (Berkeley, CA, 1993), 249. For the difficulties of interpreting other stories I will discuss below, see Holt, ed., Magna Carta and Medieval Government, 88–9. 81  For a similar point, see Gillingham, ‘Wirtschaftlichkeit oder Ehre,’ 165–6.

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204  Power and Pleasure There were, of course, dangers in investing too much in soft power (not to mention pleasure). A ruler who spent too much money in these ways might come up short when money was needed to finance armies and other forms of hard power. Figures discussed earlier show that John spent heavily on court life, probably more heavily than most scholars have realized; around £1,000 a year on hunting; over £1,000 for robes one year; £953 on wine on one occasion; £500 for the silks and £1,700 for the jewellery left at Corfe Castle; and over £2,000 on Beaulieu over some years. These figures add up to significant sums, even allowing for John’s prowess at raising money. The question remains whether they would have hampered John’s war efforts. Unfortunately, it is hard to get even an approximate sense of John’s overall expenditures.82 For later courts, one of the biggest sources of spending would have been on the food, drink, and other day-to-day costs of the court, but we know little about this for John’s court. Given how fragmentary our knowledge of John’s expenditures is, it is difficult to assess the impact of his spending on soft power and pleasure on his political and military endeavours. There are at least some indications that John’s spending on the magnificence of his court did not cause him grave difficulties. For one thing, despite these expenses, he built an enormous war chest, perhaps 200,000 marks.83 Second, although the spending of later medieval and early modern kings was frequently criticized as too lavish, that was not an important issue in the grievances related to Magna Carta, which were focused on the methods the king used to raise money, not how it was spent.84 One should not make too much of a silence in the sources, but this at least suggests that the barons considered the king’s expenditures on luxury, display, and pleasure appropriate, given the need for any king to maintain a magnificent court. Even though financial strains were one of the major factors in baronial unrest in the reign of Henry III, Matthew Paris strongly criticized the king when he tried to make economies, despite admitting he did so to diminish his debt.85 Similarly, for all their unhappiness with John’s fiscal demands, John’s barons may not have con­sidered his expenditures on feasting, hunting, and distributing robes a source of grievance, particularly when they benefited from his largesse. For all the negative attention John received in the chronicles, he did not have to contend with later stereotypes of a corrupt, luxurious royal court being challenged by virtuous nobles. 82 For the best attempt to estimate royal expenditures in the period, see Gillingham, ‘Wirtschaftlichkeit oder Ehre,’ 161–4. 83  J. E. A. Jolliffe, ‘The Chamber and Castle Treasuries under King John,’ in Richard William Hunt, W.  A.  Pantin, and R.  W.  Southern, eds., Studies in Medieval History Presented to Frederick Maurice Powicke (Westport, CT, 1979), 117–42, at 134–5. 84 For later complaints, see Given-Wilson, Royal Household, 14–15, 110–38; C.  D.  Fletcher, ‘Corruption at Court? Crisis and the Theme of Luxuria in England and France, c. 1340–1422,’ in Steven Gunn and Antheun Janse, eds., The Court as Stage: England and the Low Countries in the Later Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 2006), 28–38. 85  Matthew Paris, Chronica Majora, 5:21–2, 114, 199.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  205 That said, John’s insatiable demands for money were a major (perhaps the major) source of unrest in England, and though the requirements of war drove the demand, generous spending on court life increased the pressure, and though the worst of the inflation from the beginning of his reign was over by the time he began spending more on court, higher prices for luxuries as well as war did not help.86 Lowering such expenditures would have had its own cost in reducing soft power, but given the exigencies of John’s military position, it might have been the wiser choice. Even though his spending on court life did not prevent him from amassing a large war chest, reduced expenditures would have allowed him to spend more on war or reduce his fiscal demands. Moreover, the royal bureaucracy designed to safeguard one of John’s favourite activities, hunting, had clear pol­it­ ical costs. Forest law, which I have argued was designed to protect hunting as well as raise revenue, was deeply unpopular. Similarly, complaints in clause 48 of Magna Carta about the keepers of rivers were probably related to falconry, and restrictions on forced contributions to bridge building in clause 23 may have been at least partly about bridges built to make falconry in wetlands easier, though this has been debated.87 Expenditures on court life and protection of the king’s hunting did not lie at the heart of baronial discontent; nonetheless, they contributed. Before turning from financial considerations to John’s personal abilities, it is worth briefly noting that even though the court was designed in part to enhance royal power, certain aspects of court life by their very nature could repel people. Far better evidence for this comes from the court critics of Henry II’s reign than from the royal records of John’s reign.88 These writers attacked many aspects of court life, some of which I have noted, particularly the moral shortcomings of the court and the problems of itineration and poor food.89 One could add the constant need to flatter and bribe and the frequent danger of backstabbing. Though the depiction of the court as a hellish place was clearly deeply exaggerated to deter clerics from serving there, one can nonetheless easily see from their accounts how the court could be a difficult place to operate. Generally, of course, courtiers received the blame, at least in public writings about the court, but one could see how resentment could spread to even the most able king in such settings and how this resentment might cause problems in times of political crisis. The court could clearly alienate as well as attract. That said, all rulers faced the potential of court life to alienate people. More important for our purposes are John’s own abilities or failings. When one turns

86  For the timing of the inflation, see Latimer, ‘Early Thirteenth-Century Prices,’ 41–73. 87 Painter, Reign of King John, 323; Alan Cooper, Bridges, Law and Power in Medieval England, 700–1400 (Woodbridge, 2006), 81–3; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 205–6. 88  The key works for this are John of Salisbury, Policraticus; Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium; Nigel of Whiteacre, Tractatus Contra Curiales; Peter of Blois, Opera, 121–2, 195–210; Wahlgren, Letter Collections of Peter of Blois, 140–73. For secondary discussion, see Chapter 1, note 63. 89  See Chapter 4, 104; Chapter 6, 126; Chapter 7, 169–170.

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206  Power and Pleasure to John’s skill at handling soft power in personal interactions, the record is ­complicated, but I would argue the negative outweighs the positive. Admittedly, John could be quite astute at times, as with his prostration to the Cistercian abbots to help settle a vexing dispute early in his reign. Another example comes from the Anonymous of Béthune. Shortly after the competition between John and Hubert Walter for magnificent feasting (not one of John’s finer moments), Hubert and his men joined the royal encampment preparing for a Poitevin expedition. A fight broke out between Hubert’s men and those of Saer de Quincy, earl of Winchester. Hubert was furious, and both he and Saer summoned their men to escalate the fighting. When John heard this, he mounted his horse, rode to the archbishop, and got down from his horse, begging him not to start a larger fight. The act of dismounting first was itself an act of deference and therefore of supplication, and Hubert immediately dismounted in turn and agreed to John’s request, though filled with shame about backing down to Saer. In noting this last, the Anonymous may have implied that John should have done more to assuage the archbishop’s feelings, but assuming this story is true, the king acted promptly and effectively to halt what could have been a disastrous conflict on the eve of a major military expedition.90 Another wise action was granting the title of earl to William Marshal and Geoffrey fitz Peter at his coronation. They had previously held the land of their earldoms but not yet received the dignity, and John thus provided a great honour to two crucial magnates at no financial cost to himself.91 That said, there are many indications that John frequently mishandled soft power.92 I have noted missed opportunities, above all in not sponsoring tournaments (though, of course, this might have been wise financially). In social interaction and in dispensing minor favours, as with more substantive forms of patronage, John kept his circle small, focusing on a limited number of earls, ­barons, and administrators while excluding many powerful people.93 This small circle was made up of the men he gambled with and those to whom he gave most gifts of wine and (according to some records) deer.94 These were the men addressed affectionately in documents. When it came to the granting of lands, offices, wardships, marriages, and other valuable but limited forms of patronage, kings had to make hard choices, and there were good practical arguments for John’s tendency to reserve these resources either for those who paid most or for 90  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 107. There are some chronological problems with this story, since it has John then travel to Poitou, suggesting a date of 1206, by which time Hubert Walter was dead. Nonetheless, the anecdote may have been real even if incorrectly placed in the chronology of John’s reign. 91  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 4:90; Luard, ed., Annales Monastici, 2:72. 92 For a similar argument, though one focused on John’s lack of chivalry and courtliness, see Gillingham, ‘Wirtschaftlichkeit oder Ehre,’ 165–7. 93  It is worth noting, however, that the hated foreigners targeted in Magna Carta and other sources do not seem to have been prominent in this inner circle. 94  See Chapter 2, 41; Chapter 4, 87; Chapter 6, 143–144.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  207 his closest and most useful followers, though Holt has argued he mismanaged that kind of valuable patronage as well.95 With cheaper forms of favour, it would have made sense to cultivate a wider circle, particularly among the baronage, in order to build stronger ties with powerful political players outside his inner circle. Though John was a generous giver, as claimed by the Anonymous of Béthune and demonstrated by his expenditure on items like the robes granted at feasts, he all too often fumbled the actual act of giving. I have noted the awkward scenes of joking about his offering with Bishop Hugh of Lincoln, the tendency to have to borrow the items he gave to churches, and the incident during the Magna Carta revolt in which he brought out treasure but gave none to his Flemish followers.96 In addition, John could act in ways that surely undermined his reputation for generosity. For instance, he sometimes demanded in return more than he gave in exchanges recorded in the fine rolls. Two men on two different occasions owed two tuns of wines for one the king gave them, and Richard de Camville owed three palfreys for one he had insisted the king give him.97 Most notably, Earl Ranulf, the foremost magnate in England, had to offer the king a palfrey in order to obtain a lamprey from him on one occasion. This exchange was so lopsided that one might assume it was a joke, especially since the king subsequently forgave Ranulf the palfrey. However, a date in the following entry in the fine rolls suggests this proffer happened sometime in January 1205, a month after John had ordered the seizure of Ranulf ’s lands in several counties. Though by March 1205, Ranulf and the king had reconciled, and Ranulf was thereafter an important supporter, it is likely that this ‘gift exchange’ represented a display of pettiness on the king’s part.98 His record of gift exchange with another key magnate, William Marshal, was also problematic. In a very flowery letter to William marking their reconciliation after the Marshal had helped rally the Anglo-Irish baronage on his behalf, John remarked that William’s son, who was a royal hostage, needed new riding equipment and robes. The king offered to pay for them, but expected to be paid back, thereby missing an opportunity to show William further favour at a relatively small price and soften the awkwardness of holding the son as a hostage.99 More substantively, the Marshal’s biography reported that during a campaign in Gascony, William had given John 500 marks of plunder, whereupon the king praised him for his generosity and promised a reward, a promise that went unfulfilled.100 Through episodes like these, John may well have sacrificed much of the credit he accrued from his magnificent feasts, generous distribution of robes, and other forms of largesse. 95  Holt, ed., Magna Carta and Medieval Government, 134–42. 96  See Chapter 5, 119—120; 187 of this chapter. 97  ROF 239, 366, 485; PR7J 33; PR8J 4; PR16J 81. 98  ROF 239; PR7J 33; PR8J 4. For relations between John and Ranulf, see Painter, Reign of King John, 28–9. 99  RLC 132b. 100  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:98–9. See Kjær, Medieval Gift, 144.

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208  Power and Pleasure John probably also failed sometimes to show the calm, determined comportment that was expected of a king under pressure. Although Ralph of Coggeshall reported that John initially concealed his dismay when he first realized the planned expedition to Poitou in 1205 might not take place, his reaction once things really fell apart was less collected. Ralph described him as weeping and wailing when caught between his followers’ urging against the expedition and the shame of having it fail. Ralph also reported that, having apparently accepted that the expedition would not occur, John started travelling towards Winchester, only to turn back to his ship and sail about fruitlessly while his supporters persuaded him not to go to Poitou with an insufficient army.101 Similarly, the biographer of William Marshal described an earlier scene—during John’s final days in Normandy—in which William criticized the king for not paying attention to the first signs of discontent there. John reacted by retiring angrily to his chamber and then leaving early the next day without telling most of his followers, who had to rush after him.102 John might well have had a very different account of these events, but these two passages suggest that he had gained a reputation for losing his cool and flailing around in a very public way when faced with adversity. Gillingham has described another of John’s failings as the tendency to mock others or encourage his retinue to do so, noting that this violated one of the most basic rules in medieval courtesy literature.103 According to Gerald of Wales, this tendency started as early as John’s 1185 expedition to Ireland, when his followers pulled on the beards of Irish rulers, with the disastrous diplomatic consequences one might expect.104 Insults, like displays of anger, could no doubt put pressure on those with whom the king was displeased and could even be helpful in mo­tiv­ at­ing allies. According to the Anonymous of Béthune, when some of John’s Flemish followers retreated from the rebels during the baronial revolt, John insulted them for doing so. Stung, Robert of Béthune, at the next engagement, urged his fellows to risk death rather than retreat shamefully, and on this occasion their opponents retreated.105 However, even such ‘productive’ insults had costs, and that incident may have been one of the reasons that the Anonymous of Béthune, probably reflecting his patron’s views, so disliked John. Insults created enemies and, despite the qualifications noted here, Gillingham is almost certainly correct that John’s overly free use of insults and mockery brought him widespread hostility. Though displays of anger could be useful, excessive reliance on it was probably also a mistake, since forcing powerful figures to back down or submit could create a backlash in a society that valued honour so highly. Jolliffe was

101  Ralph of Coggeshall, Chronicon Anglicanum, 152–3. 102  Holden, Gregory, and Crouch, eds., History of William Marshal, 2:136–9. 103  Gillingham, ‘Historians Without Hindsight,’ 6; Gillingham, ‘Anonymous of Béthune,’ 41–2. 104  Gerald of Wales, Expugnatio Hibernica, 236–7. 105  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 148–9.

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King John and the Wielding of Soft Power  209 almost certainly right that John used anger as a weapon more frequently than his father and brother had, and that he paid a higher price for it.106 Humour was another important and useful political tool that could be misused. When properly employed, as Katrin Beyer has shown, it served many purposes; defusing difficult situations, creating and strengthening friendships, and gaining prestige for wit, among others.107 The question is how well John used humour. This is particularly hard to answer since it is often difficult to identify jokes. The royal records record some utterly baffling transactions, and some scholars have plausibly treated these as jokes.108 John’s son, Henry III, had a series of ridiculous fines levied on one of his clerics, and these were explicitly described as a joke when they were cancelled, so it is certainly plausible that similar jokes could occur under John.109 On a minor scale, a royal valettus had to offer one palfrey for a ‘license to eat,’ though this was subsequently pardoned.110 A more famous example is a proffer of 200 hens by Hugh de Neville’s wife to spend a night with her husband.111 Even more striking is the record of what a number of prom­ in­ent magnates and administrators pledged to the king if the royal favourite, Peter de Maulay, who had apparently incurred John’s wrath, angered the king again. Powerful people often served as pledges for agreement by others with the king, generally offering cash to the king if the other party failed to fulfil the bargain, and in this case some of the most powerful offered to give palfreys if Peter angered the king. Eight, however, including leading administrators like Hugh de Neville and Brian de Lisle, promised that they would let themselves be bound to be beaten if he did so.112 If this was not a joke, it is an astonishing testimony to John’s willingness to force followers to place themselves in a potentially brutal and shameful situation, and of their obsequious willingness to do so, but it is precisely because the case seems so astonishing that it may have been a joke. Even if these were jokes, however, Carpenter and Vincent are surely correct in depicting them as cruel or humiliating, particularly if, as Painter speculated, Hugh de Neville’s wife was John’s mistress. Even cruel jokes can sometimes create camaraderie, and such jokes can also underscore and reinforce a powerful figure’s dominance, which has its own uses, as recent history has shown. Nonetheless, one wonders if courtiers laughed dutifully but seethed inwardly at the humiliation they or others faced, and if they looked forward to taking their revenge when the opportunity presented itself. As noted earlier, any assessment of John’s handling of soft power must remain tentative, but if the interpretations above are correct, the king’s missteps lost him 106 Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 103, 106–7. 107 Katrin Beyer, Witz und Ironie in der politischen Kultur Englands im Hochmittelalter: Interaktionen und Imaginationen (Würzburg, 2012). 108 Painter, Reign of King John, 230–2; Nicholas Vincent, Peter des Roches: An Alien in English Politics, 1205–1238 (Cambridge, 1996), 70; Vincent, Magna Carta, 44–5; Carpenter, Magna Carta, 92. 109 https://frh3.org.uk/content/month/fm-11-2011.html. 110  ROF 485, 532. 111  ROF 275. 112  RLCh 191a–b.

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210  Power and Pleasure much of the advantage he should have gotten for magnificence and generosity. Some of this may simply have been awkwardness and miscalculation. John may not have been a good observer of the impact of his actions, and a prince and later king surrounded by courtiers who rose or fell through his favour would likely not receive a realistic picture of how his actions affected others. However, personal and psychological self-indulgence was probably another factor. As I emphasized in Chapter 4, by preying on noblewomen for sexual gratification, John deeply worsened his relations with his nobles, and this kind of behaviour may have been repeated elsewhere on a lesser scale. Though displays of anger could be calculated and utilitarian, it is also likely that venting rage brought John emotional and psychological satisfaction. If so, since those around him could not easily retaliate, he could gain such satisfaction repeatedly without immediate consequences. The longer-term consequences, however, might be dire. Similarly, cruel jokes and other displays of dominance might have been emotionally gratifying; if so, there was little to stop John from indulging in them. If these suggestions are correct, John frittered away considerable advantages and alienated many of his barons and knights, including some who should have been closest to him, partly to gratify his own emotional demands. In previous chapters I have discussed the importance of both power and pleasure in shaping court life. In this chapter I have focused on power, but we should not ignore the possible importance of royal pleasure, including forms of self-gratification most of us would find deeply troubling. The pursuit of pleasure, if carried out unwisely or at others’ expense, could sharply undermine power. Though the movement towards administrative kingship was one of the most important developments of John’s reign, it should not blind scholars to the on­going importance of more traditional forms of soft power. Feasting, gift-giving, and symbolic communication did not disappear or cease to matter with the growth of the bureaucracy; at most they lost relative importance. However, administrative kingship allowed rulers to make feasts more magnificent, gifts more widespread, and some types of symbolic communication, like processions, more impressive. Far from rendering such forms of power negligible, bureaucracies and the revenues they brought in allowed rulers to use soft power more ef­fect­ive­ly. Much, however, still depended on the king’s abilities. John’s bureaucracy gave him the tools to develop soft power on a larger scale than his predecessors had, and to his credit he did so without spending so much that he impeded his ability to wage war or employ other forms of hard power. Nonetheless, his spending on soft power and pleasure doubtless increased the financial pressures that helped provoke baronial unrest. Moreover, John’s personal wielding of such tools, though sometimes astute, often backfired, perhaps because of miscalculation, but also because of self-indulgence. Just as John knew how to plan military operations on a large scale but often failed to bring them off, he knew how to carry out large displays of soft power, but often stumbled, because of his own shortcomings, when it came to execution.

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9

John’s Court in a Comparative Context A Preliminary Sketch

9.1 Introduction A study of John’s court not only reveals much about the king’s reign, but also contributes to our understanding of the historical development of court culture in Western European society. As noted in Chapter 1, there is relatively little work of the sort carried out in this book for other royal and princely courts of the central Middle Ages in Western Europe, apart from the court of John’s father, for which less evidence survives. This chapter asks two major questions. First, to what extent was John’s court representative of courts of the period in the medieval West and nearby regions? Second, what can his court tell us about the place of the central Middle Ages in the long developmental arc of Western courts from the late Roman imperial court to the famous royal courts of the early modern period? The answers I provide here will necessarily be tentative and impressionistic, partly because one case study (or two, if one adds the works on Henry II’s court) is only a start, but mostly because of the unevenness in evidence. As I stressed in Chapter 1, the unusually rich records, by the standards of the period, for John’s reign make his court an ideal subject. However, the lack of equivalent records for his immediate contemporaries makes detailed comparisons difficult. Enough survives from the reign of Philip Augustus to make a broad comparison of like with like, and the fiscal accounts of Catalonia from 1151–1213 also provide potential points of comparison. Similarities are easier to establish than differences in these cases: the presence of particular aspects of court life in two sets of records can demonstrate the former, but apparent differences may stem merely from vari­ations in the amount and type of surviving evidence. For other contemporary courts, including highly developed ones such as the Byzantine imperial court, equivalent records do not survive, and though one can make comparisons based on other sources, mostly narrative accounts, such comparisons are necessarily impressionistic. I have not attempted to be comprehensive in my comparison. Instead, I have chosen a group of brief case studies. These have been chosen on the basis of the survival of royal records; of other useful records or secondary works where such records do not survive; and, to the extent possible, by chronological closeness to John’s reign, though in a number of cases I have had to cast a wider temporal net.

Power and Pleasure: Court Life under King John, 1199–1216. Hugh M. Thomas, Oxford University Press (2020). © Hugh M. Thomas. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198802518.003.0009

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212  Power and Pleasure The problem of disparate records only increases when turning to the long temporal arc. Though much better records survive from John’s reign than from his father’s (and from Henry II’s reign than from those of earlier rulers), nonetheless the amount surviving from 1199–1216 pales compared to that from the courts of later medieval rulers, let alone early modern ones. As a result, it can be very hard to tell if something that appears in the records for the first time in a given reign is actually new or merely appears so because of new records. There is the danger that greater documentation as time passed can exaggerate the degree to which courts grew in complexity and richness over time. In terms of sources, one is rarely comparing like with like, even from one generation to the next, let alone from century to century. As a result, caution is in order. But despite the difficulties of both geographic and temporal comparison, it is worth presenting some tentative suggestions about the place of John’s court in a broader context.

9.2  Comparisons across Space Three main types of surviving royal records shed light on life at the French royal court during Philip Augustus’s reign. The first, royal registers, provide more information on government and administration than court life, but they do include documents recording royal alms, inventories of plate and jewels, and a list of places owing the king hospitality on his itineration.1 More important for our purposes are a royal financial account for 1202–3 and a household account of the subsidiary household of Philip’s son, Louis, and Louis’ wife, Blanche of Castile, for 1213, which provide information on several relevant topics.2 The total evidence they preserve relating to issues discussed in this book is minuscule compared to that in surviving English and Norman records, but they nonetheless reveal strong similarities between the English and French courts. These include the broad similarities one would expect such as the importance of food, textiles, almsgiving, and gift exchange, as well as more specific ones. The same stones and types of jewellery appear in the French and English records. There is a large overlap in the sorts of clothes, furs, and textiles that appear, with only minor differences; for instance, the French court frequently used a kind of cloth called camelin that is absent in the English records in John’s reign.3 The French court had the same type of hunting establishment as the English, though it was probably far smaller. The records, nonetheless, also suggest differences. References to entertainers abound in the relatively brief account of the household of Louis and Blanche, particularly

1  John W. Baldwin, ed., Les Registres de Philippe Auguste (Paris, 1992), 183–95, 204–6, 229–37, 243. 2  Lot and Fawtier, eds., Le premier budget; Robert Fawtier, ‘Un fragment du compte de l’hôtel du prince Louis de France pour le terme de la Purification 1213,’ Le Moyen Age 43 (1933), 225–50. 3  Camelin does appear under Henry III; Wild, ‘Truly Royal Retinue,’ 135.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  213 in comparison to what appears in the fuller records of Philip and, especially, John. This may simply be an accident of record keeping, but Lindy Grant has suggested that Louis and Blanche were far more supportive of music and entertainment than Philip Augustus, who notoriously refused to support entertainers. Similarly, they may have been greater patrons of music and entertainment than John.4 A primarily institutional rather than personal difference between the courts was the heavy French reliance on well-established customary rights of hospitality to carry out their itineration, whereas the Angevin kings relied on their own resources and ad hoc hospitality, at least in England and Normandy. Nonetheless, the overall impression is of great similarity between the two courts. This is hardly surprising; John’s Norman and Angevin predecessors and the Anglo-Norman aristocrats dominant at his court came from the same northern French cultural milieu that shaped the king of France’s court. The fiscal accounts of the count-kings of Catalonia and Aragon are very different kinds of records from their English and Norman counterparts and therefore a weaker basis for comparison.5 As one might expect, they suggest a greater cultural distance from John’s court than that found at the French royal court. There is a greater gap in the types of textiles that appear, and food items such as spinach and sweets occur there but not in the English records. Nonetheless, there are similarities in the terminology for clothing and the love for falcons and pepper. One suspects that a visitor from England would have found some aspects of the Catalan-Aragonese court strange, but only within a broader framework of a similar court structure and lifestyle. When one moves beyond courts with surviving administrative records, comparisons become more difficult. Among the European rulers whose lives overlapped with John’s, Frederick I Barbarossa has perhaps received the most attention from both medieval writers and modern scholars. Indeed, Gilbert of Mons and other writers provided far more detail for the emperor’s greatest assembly, held at Mainz in 1184 to knight his sons, than Angevin writers did for any event held by John. Gilbert and the other writers described many aspects of the event that impressed them, ranging from a temporary wooden palace, lodgings, and a sea of tents to jousting, plentiful food, and the remarkable generosity of Frederick’s sons and other magnates.6 For all the richness of the narrative sources, however, the 4  Grant provides a good picture of Louis and Eleanor’s household and a fuller one of court culture under Blanche as regent and queen mother; Grant, Blanche of Castile, 47–8, 169–74, 180–1, 204–6, 230–64. 5  Thomas  N.  Bisson, ed., Fiscal Accounts of Catalonia under the Early Count-Kings (1151–1213), 2 vols. (Berkeley, CA, 1984). 6  Gilbert of Mons, La chronique de Gislebert de Mons, ed. Léon Vanderkindere (Brussels, 1904), 154–63; Heinz Wolter, ‘Der Mainzer Hoftag von 1184 als politisches Fest,’ in Detlef Altenburg, Jörg Jarnut, and Hans-Hugo Steinhoff, eds., Feste und Feiern im Mittelalter (Sigmaringen, 1991), 193–9; Görich, Friedrich Barbarossa, 505–14; John B. Freed, Frederick Barbarossa: The Prince and the Myth (New Haven, CT, 2016), 446–9.

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214  Power and Pleasure paltry surviving documentary records do not allow for the detailed reconstruction and analysis of the many aspects of court life I have been able to include in this book. As a result, scholars of Barbarossa’s court have concentrated on somewhat different matters than I have. For instance, Knut Görich has focused on the emperor’s ideas of honour; Heinz Krieg has analysed the presentation of Frederick’s character in narrative writings and chancery documents; and Alheydis Plassmann has used charter attestations to provide an extremely detailed analysis of Frederick’s interaction with magnates at his assemblies and on his travels more generally, a subject I touch on only briefly.7 Görich’s excellent overview of Frederick’s court in his biography of the court does discuss some of the subjects I  have covered, including itineration, palaces and tents, and learning; and it is particularly rich in its analysis of symbolic communication, displays and concealment of emotion, the use of space at court, etiquette, and other aspects of soft power. However, there is far less on the emperor’s hunting establishment, food and feasting, and material culture, simply because the records do not survive.8 The difference between the available evidence and therefore the modern scholarship makes precise comparisons between the English and imperial courts difficult. Nonetheless, one comes away with a very strong sense of similarity. This is perhaps best illustrated by Rahewin’s description of Frederick’s activities, which included daily attendance at services; hunting with horses, dogs, birds, and bows (thus clearly including all types of hunting); presiding over abundant and formal dining; position-appropriate clothing; and building projects, including a carefully designed landscape at Kaiserlautern.9 Gilbert of Mons’ chronicle, which focuses on the counts of Hainaut, particularly Count Baldwin V (1150–95), allows us to see that similarities also extended to princely courts. It does admittedly show administrative differences from England; like the kings of France, Baldwin relied more heavily than John on fixed rights of hospitality, including similar rights for his huntsmen, though he remitted the latter when he died. Personally, Baldwin differed from John in attending tournaments. In other respects, however, he presided over a similar round of court activities. Gilbert describes Baldwin’s attendance at services and his pious actions (despite his love of secular pleasures); his elaborate feasts, including at Christmas; and his generosity to his knights. Where other authors stressed deference towards rulers, Gilbert emphasized Baldwin’s proper interaction, including his way of speaking, with his followers, but the importance of correct manners 7  Knut Görich, Die Ehre Friedrich Barbarossas. Kommunication, Konflikt, und politisches Handeln im 12. Jahrhundert (Darmstadt, 2001); Heinz Krieg, Herrscherdarstellung in der Stauferzeit. Friedrich Barbarossa im Spiegel seiner Urkunden und der staufischen Geschichtsschreibung (Ostfildern, 2003); Alheydis Plassmann, Die Struktur des Hofes unter Friedrich I. Barbarossa nach den deutschen Zeugen seiner Urkunden (Hanover, 1998). 8 Görich, Friedrich Barbarossa, 145–220. For a briefer overview of Frederick’s court, see Rösener, Leben am Hof, 53–60. 9  Otto of Freising and Rahewin, Gesta Friderici I, 343–5.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  215 and deportment remains apparent. A list of hereditary officials of Hainaut from 1212–14, slightly after Baldwin’s time, reveals a household that was smaller than that of Henry I in the Constitutio Domus Regis, but similar in structure. The list also reveals many specific points of similarity to the English court, including the importance of service at the comital table and the expectation that garments would be distributed to household members.10 Obviously the court of the counts of Hainault could not have competed with John’s in size and splendour, but in other respects the two courts resembled each other closely. Moving somewhat forward in time, chancery records do survive for Frederick II’s Italian realm for 1239–40, and these, along with other sources, shed light on some aspects of court life. Once again, one can point to many similarities: the maintenance of a large hunting establishment; investment in domestic architecture and landscape features such as fish ponds; concern for good wine; the significance of precious clothing, textiles, and horse gear; and the diplomatic importance of gift exchange.11 Some differences may be due to personal taste: Frederick, who wrote a treatise on falconry, seems to have had far more interest in hunting with birds than with dogs; more than fifty falconers appear in the 1239–40 chancery records.12 Other differences were due to the fact that the kingdom of Sicily stood on the borders of Western European culture and had many contacts with Byzantium and the Islamic world. Though other rulers, including John, had exotic animals, Frederick had an unusually large collection, including the first giraffes in Europe since the Roman period.13 More strikingly (and disturbingly), Frederick sent to Palermo to command that five slaves, specifically described as black, be trained as musicians; no doubt he chose such slaves specifically for their exotic background.14 Turning to other sources, the cultural accomplishments of Frederick and his court, while occasionally exaggerated as David Abulafia has shown, were nonetheless impressive compared to those of John and his court. Some, like his ­founding of the University of Naples or patronage of vernacular Italian poetry influenced by troubadour poetry, were firmly anchored in European culture. However, the sponsorship of translations of works by Muslim and Jewish scholars and Frederick’s exchange of letters with Muslim rulers on learned topics show the

10  Gilbert of Mons, La chronique, 107–9, 116–17, 125, 127, 140, 154–63, 237, 311–12, 333–43. For Baldwin’s household see Rösener, Leben am Hof, 81–3. For the list of officials, see Vale, Princely Court, 35–7. 11  Cristina Carbonetti Vendittelli, ed., Il Registro della Cancelleria di Federico II del 1239–1240, 2 vols. (Rome, 2002), 1:86–7, 92–4, 119–21, 131–2, 139–40, 175–6, 202–3, 207–14, 223, 280–6, 355–6, 371, 377, 386–7, 413–14, 418–19, 421–2, 435–6, 444–7, 461–2, 468, 471–4; 2:524, 539–40, 543–4, 555–6, 558–9, 612–13, 653, 684, 688–92, 696–8, 718, 724–5, 737–8, 915–19; Johannes Fried, ‘Kaiser Friedrich II. als Jäger,’ in Werner Rösener, ed., Jagd und höfische Kultur im Mittelalter (Göttingen, 1997), 149–66. 12  Fried, ‘Kaiser Friedrich II. als Jäger,’ 152–3; Giese, ‘Tierhaltung,’ 127–8. 13  Vendittelli, ed., Registro, 1:201–2; 2:606; Giese, ‘Tierhaltung,’ 121–71. 14  Vendittelli, ed., Registro, 1:219–20, 424–5.

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216  Power and Pleasure ways his court spanned cultures, like those of his Norman predecessors in the kingdom of Sicily.15 There were thus certainly aspects of Frederick II’s court that would have seemed strange to courtiers from John’s lands. That said, one should not exaggerate the differences and, equally important, one should remember that Western courts valued exoticism and were open to aspects of Islamic and Byzantine influence. One exotic practice Frederick introduced to Western Christendom was that of hunting with cheetahs, often called leopards in the Western sources. Some of the so-called leopards that Frederick sent to John’s son, Henry III, may actually have been hunting cheetahs, and John’s grandson, Edward I, certainly got a pair of them from a Mongol ruler.16 Frederick’s own greatest intellectual accomplishment, his treatise on falconry, discussed a subject of interest both to Western and Islamic rulers and elites. In general, medieval and modern assumptions to the contrary, one should not exaggerate the differences found as one moves beyond the core cultural areas of medieval Western Europe. The survival of sagas of King Sverre (ruled 1184–1202) and Håkon IV (ruled 1204–63) and a thirteenth-century guide to kingship called the King’s Mirror allows us to see aspects of the Norwegian court from the late twelfth to the mid-thirteenth century.17 It is true that when a cardinal stopped in England on the way to crown Håkon in 1247, according to the saga account, the English, out of envy, told him that he would not get any decent food or drink and warned him about the grimness of the people. However, desiring to cater to the cosmopolitan tastes of his visitor, Håkon had sent abroad for supplies lacking in Norway, and the saga assures its audience that at the coronation feast the cardinal praised both provisions and people. Elsewhere, the sagas reveal many similarities to courts elsewhere in Europe: the importance of royal regalia; the custom of holding glorious feasts at Christmas as well as on special occasions for the mon­ archy; at least one instance of powerful men ceremonially serving at the royal table; extensive building by rulers, including of feasting halls; the custom of gift 15  David Abulafia, Frederick II: A Medieval Emperor (London, 1988), 251–89. 16 Vendittelli, ed., Registro, 1:201–2, 360–1; 2:522–3, 606, 655–6; Giese, ‘Tierhaltung,’ 133–5; Allsen, Royal Hunt in Eurasian History, 256–7. 17  Among the secondary works, Daniel Brégaint provides a good discussion of symbolic communication amongst a broader discussion of communication in general by Norwegian kings: David Brégaint, Vox Regis: Royal Communication in High Medieval Norway (Leiden, 2016). Hans Jacob Orning ably analyses feasting at the Norwegian court and in a study of loyalty and obedience discusses supplication and royal anger: Hans Jacob Orning, ‘Festive Governance: Feasts as Rituals of Power and Integration in Medieval Norway,’ in Wojtek Jezierski et al., eds., Rituals, Performatives, and Political Order in Northern Europe, c. 650–1350 (Turnhout, 2015), 175–207; Hans Jacob Orning, Unpredictability and Presence: Norwegian Kingship in the High Middle Ages (Leiden, 2008), 167–74, 184–92. Sverre Bagge provides a good overview of Norwegian kingship in the central Middle Ages along with brief discussions of court culture and royal itineration: Sverre Bagge, From Viking Stronghold to Christian Kingdom: State Formation in Norway, c. 900–1350 (Copenhagen, 2010), 170–4, 267–72. For sacral kingship and rituals of kingship in nearby Sweden, see Philip Line, Kingship and State Formation in Sweden, 1130–1290 (Leiden, 2007), 350–62, 388–400.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  217 exchange with other rulers; the high value placed on fine clothing and textiles, including scarlets and silks; hunting with hawks and hounds; even the use of gaudy horse trappings such as gilded saddles.18 As for the King’s Mirror, its author had many of the same concerns as Daniel Beccles and the writers of later courtesy manuals, even though the details sometimes differed. In discussing the royal court, the author stressed morality, but also proper deportment, elegant speech, good table manners, appropriate clothing, and even training for jousting. Above all, the audience learns about how to interact with the king, with an emphasis on deferential behaviour throughout.19 It is possible that some of the behaviours common to courts elsewhere were importations; the thirteenth century saw the Norwegian king and nobles translating courtly romances from elsewhere in Europe, possibly as part of a broader acculturation.20 Nonetheless, the point remains that once the royal court of Norway becomes reasonably visible in the sources, it resembles other courts in many ways. The English snobbery about the Norwegian court was far from unique; elites from the core cultures of Western Europe had a tendency to stress the otherness of societies on the periphery. For instance, Gerald of Wales’s anecdote about Henry II making Irish rulers eat crane was intended partly to emphasize that they were outsiders to mainstream European court culture.21 An anecdote by the Anonymous of Béthune in which John, during his Irish campaign of 1210, presented a warhorse with a valuable saddle and bridle to the king of Connacht, Cathal Crobderg Ó Conchobair, and the Irish king promptly removed the saddle and harness and rode bareback, had similar intentions.22 Such anecdotes were part of a pattern of increasingly treating the Irish and other Celtic speakers as barbarians. One must therefore be wary of writers’ tendency to exaggerate Irish and Welsh strangeness and so-called backwardness.23 Unfortunately, relatively little is known of Irish courts in the period, but the survival of Welsh and Latin treatises about Welsh royal courts means we know a fair amount about them. Certainly, one can find rules that appear odd from an English perspective, and one notable cultural difference was that poets had a much higher status at Welsh courts than in French or English ones. Nonetheless, the laws and other sources show much that is familiar, including the importance of hunting and falconry; the celebration of the three great feasts of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost; the granting of clothing to the rulers’ followers at those feasts; and the distribution of

18  J. Sephton, ed., The Saga of King Sverri of Norway (London, 1899), 25, 52, 99; G. W. Dasent, ed., The Saga of Hacon (London, 1894), 56, 114, 202, 247, 251–60, 271–2, 301, 303, 307, 330–3, 338, 371–3. 19  Laurence Marcellus Larson, ed., The King’s Mirror (New York, 1917), 162–234. 20 Brégaint, Vox Regis, 186–94. 21  See Chapter 6, 150–151. Despite being born in Wales, Gerald was culturally more English and French than Welsh. 22  Anonymous of Béthune, Histoire des ducs, 112. 23 Bartlett, Gerald of Wales, 159–71; Gillingham, English in the Twelfth Century, 3–18, 41–58.

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218  Power and Pleasure the rulers’ own food and drink as a sign of favour.24 Indeed, it is likely that the largest difference between English and Welsh courts was scale, given the vast ­disparity in wealth, rather than culture. Western European writers also tended to find the Byzantine court strange and culturally foreign, although they were likely to be grudgingly impressed by it. As Paul Magdalino has noted: ‘Between 829 and 1204, the Byzantine imperial court was the most ancient, wealthy, and splendid in the Christian world.’25 There were certainly aspects of court life that would have seemed exotic to Western visitors: eunuchs, chariot races, unfamiliar liturgy in Greek rather than Latin, even prob­ably the sheer splendour of the court, at least until crusaders pillaged Constantinople in 1204. Yet there would also have been much that was broadly familiar. Feasting, hunting, lavish textiles, and the absorption of many Christian practices into court life all would have had strong parallels, even if the details differed. After all, as Jonathan Shepard has emphasized, Byzantine court practices influenced Western ones, including those of rulers like John’s distant predecessor, William the Conqueror.26 Even where one might expect differences, there could be surprising similarities in detail. Given the far more sedentary nature of the Byzantine court, one might not expect elaborate horse harnesses or tents to be important aspects of the court’s material culture. Yet the two most important treatises for understanding Byzantine court culture reveal that that court showed off with elab­or­ ate­ly equipped and decorated horses, and the emperors used lavish tents on military campaigns.27 Even the Byzantine practice of proskynesis, which could 24  Thomas Charles-Edwards, Morfydd  E.  Owen, and Paul Russell, eds., The Welsh King and His Court (Cardiff, 2000). For a recent discussion of these laws that emphasizes their relationship to contemporary literature and political discourse and thereby explains some of the oddities, see Robin Chapman Stacey, Law and the Imagination in Medieval Wales (Philadelphia, PA, 2018). 25  Paul Magdalino, ‘In Search of the Byzantine Courtier: Leo Choirosphaktes and Constantine Manasses,’ in Henry Maguire, ed., Byzantine Court Culture from 829 to 1204 (Washington, D.C., 1997), 141–65, at 141. For the court more generally, see Averil Cameron, ‘The Construction of Court Ritual: The Byzantine Book of Ceremonies,’ in David Cannadine and Simon Price, eds., Rituals of Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies (Cambridge, 1987), 106–36; Henry Maguire, ed., Byzantine Court Culture from 829 to 1204 (Washington, D.C., 1997); Paul Magdalino, ‘Court and Capital in Byzantium,’ in Jeroen Duindam, Tülay Artan, and Metin Kunt, eds., Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires: A Global Perspective (Leiden, 2011), 131–44; Ruth Macrides, ‘Ceremonies and the City: The Court in Fourteenth-Century Constantinople,’ in Jeroen Duindam, Tülay Artan, and Metin Kunt, eds., Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires: A Global Perspective (Leiden, 2011), 217–35; Rosemary Morris, ‘Beyond the De Ceremoniis,’ in Catherine Cubitt, ed., Court Culture in the Early Middle Ages: The Proceedings of the First Alcuin Conference (Turnhout, 2003), 235–54. A  good collection with a comparative approach is Alexander Beihammer, Stavroula Constantinou, and Maria Parani, eds., Court Ceremonies and Rituals of Power in Byzantium and the Medieval Mediterranean (Leiden, 2013). For both the Byzantine and medieval Islamic courts, I am necessarily using a broader period for comparison. 26  Jonathan Shepard, ‘Courts in East and West,’ in Peter Linehan and Janet  L.  Nelson, eds., The Medieval World (London, 2001), 14–36; Shepard, ‘Adventus, Arrivistes and Rites of Rulership,’ 337–71. 27  Konstantinos Porphyrogennetos, Konstantinos Porphyrogennetos: The Book of Ceremonies in Two Volumes, ed. Ann Moffatt, 2 vols. (Canberra, 2012), 1:80–1, 99, 105; Ruth Macrides, J. A. Munitiz, and Dimiter Angelov, eds., Pseudo-Kodinos and the Constantinopolitan Court: Offices and Ceremonies (Farnham, 2014), 387–91; Margaret Mullet, ‘Tented Ceremony: Ephemeral Performances under the

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  219 include gestures like bowing, prostration, and kissing feet, and seems quite exotic to modern sensibilities, was similar to acts of supplication in Western Europe.28 Certainly the Byzantine court differed from Western courts in significant ways, but one should not exaggerate those differences. Islamic courts would no doubt have seemed even more exotic to Western vis­it­ ors, particularly because of the religious differences, which both sides viewed as fundamental.29 Islamic courts also seem to have placed a greater value than did most Western courts on the written and spoken word and literary refinement. To some degree this difference might be a matter of surviving source material, which in the Islamic case is literary rather than documentary. The court of Henry II and Eleanor, with its literary patronage and the presence of raconteurs like Walter Map, seems closer to such courts than John’s. Nonetheless, literary culture in Western Europe, particularly in Latin, may have been less focused on courts than its Islamic counterpart, given the plenitude of patronage available in ecclesiastical institutions like cathedrals, monasteries, and the emerging universities. There would no doubt have been many other differences. Yet in the Islamic case, too, one can speak of broad similarities, including feasting, hunting, and the im­port­ ance of splendid clothing. Oleg Grabar has written of a shared culture of objects, and though his focus is on interchange between Byzantine and Arabic courts, the concept can be extended to Western European ones as well.30 That, after all, was why English chroniclers were so eager to itemize the plunder Richard captured in his raid on Saladin’s great caravan, and why Western European courts spent heavily on luxury items made in the Islamic world. When Richard and Saladin negotiated during the Third Crusade, they exchanged gifts of hunting dogs, pears and other fruit, and jewellery and other small treasures.31 The two rulers and their advisors clearly shared a cultural understanding of how negotiating operated and of the importance of gift exchange in that context. Komnenoi,’ in Alexander Beihammer, Stavroula Constantinou, and Maria Parani, eds., Court Ceremonies and Rituals of Power in Byzantium and the Medieval Mediterranean (Leiden, 2013), 487–513. 28  For the types of proskynesis, see Macrides, Munitiz, and Angelov, eds., Pseudo-Kodinos, 386. 29  For Islamic courts, see Cynthia Robinson, In Praise of Song: The Making of Courtly Culture in ­al-Andalus and Provence, 1005–1134 a.d. (Leiden, 2002); Albrecht Fuess and Jan-Peter Hartung, eds., Court Cultures in the Muslim World, Seventh to Nineteenth Centuries (London, 2011); Nadia Maria El Cheikh, ‘To Be a Prince in the Fourth/Tenth-Century Abbasid Court,’ in Jeroen Duindam, Tülay Artan, and Metin Kunt, eds., Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires: A Global Perspective (Leiden, 2011), 198–216. For a comparative collection with several pieces on Islamic court culture, see Maurice A. Pomerantz and Evelyn Birge Vitz, eds., In the Presence of Power: Court and Performance in the Pre-Modern Middle East (New York, 2017). For a broad comparison of many aspects of governance, see Political Culture in Three Spheres: The West, Byzantium and Islam, c. 700–c. 1500: A Framework for Comparison, ed. Catherine Holmes, Jonathan Shepard, Jo Van Steenbergen, and Bjorn Weiler, forthcoming from Cambridge University Press. 30  Oleg Grabar, ‘The Shared Culture of Objects,’ in Henry Maguire, ed., Byzantine Court Culture from 829 to 1204 (Washington, D.C., 1997), 115–29. 31  Roger of Howden, Chronica, 3:114; [Roger of Howden], Gesta Regis Henrici Secundi, 2:171, 180; Ambroise, History of the Holy War, 1:120; Stubbs, ed., Itinerarium, 241, 296.

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220  Power and Pleasure There are several reasons for these broad similarities in court life. One is that the shared functions of rulers’ courts were likely to produce parallels in court life, not only in the cultures discussed here, but also in monarchies throughout the world. The typical desire of rulers to project power, reinforce hierarchy, and gratify their desires meant that elaborate ceremonies, lavish displays of wealth, and entertainments and pastimes would be common across cultures. Feasting and gift exchange are universal human activities, and personal ornamentation is quite common. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that such phenomena as splendid food and drink, rich attire, and the giving and receiving of treasures appear repeatedly at courts. There were thus likely to be similarities even between court cultures that saw no interaction and shared no common background.32 However, a second factor for the societies discussed above was that they had many contacts, even if often indirect or hostile. People, objects, and ideas flowed constantly throughout Europe, and also between Europe and the Islamic world.33 Third, the societies discussed above all had cultural roots in the late Roman world, though the continuing impact of Roman culture varied widely.34 Obviously, the similarities I have outlined here should not be taken too far, particularly for the courts that were geographically and culturally most distant from the overlapping cultural zones of England and northern France. Cultural differences between courts did stand out to medieval people at times, and when writers wished to emphasize differences between peoples, even a small variation like the Irish rejecting cranes as food could be treated as a marker of difference. Nonetheless, assuming any language difficulties could be overcome, John’s court­ iers would probably have quickly adjusted to courts elsewhere in Europe, and most would have found the court of Philip Augustus very familiar. Scholars are increasingly wary of ideas of English exceptionalism, and though some aspects of English government were unusual, particularly the level of financial and bureaucratic institutionalization, in cultural terms John’s court was very much in the European mainstream and would have shared many characteristics with the courts of Byzantium and the Islamic world.

9.3  Comparisons across Time Though specialists in late medieval court culture have often drawn comparisons with the early modern period, the lack of substantial work on court life in the central Middle Ages means that there has been little effort to extend the trajectory 32  For comparative works covering courts throughout the world, see Duindam, Artan, and Kunt, eds., Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires; Duindam, Dynasties. 33  For the Eurasian scope of royal hunting culture, for instance, see Allsen, Royal Hunt in Eurasian History, 233–64. 34  For royal courts in the ancient world, see Spawforth, ed., Court and Court Society.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  221 earlier. There is an important exception, however. In his seminal work on ‘the civilising process,’ Norbert Elias used the central Middle Ages as his starting point. In part, the culture of the period served as the ‘uncivilised’ baseline out of which he saw court life developing, but he also saw the process beginning roughly in the twelfth century.35 Nonetheless, for Elias, the Renaissance was the key period of change, and he implicitly included medieval nobles among the groups he deemed ‘younger’ or ‘more childish.’36 Not surprisingly, some medievalists have pushed back, arguing that many of the traits Elias and his followers attributed to post-medieval courts and many of the social norms they saw as early modern developments existed in the Middle Ages. In the context of the English court in the central Middle Ages, Gillingham’s article on the subject, which relies heavily on Daniel of Beccles’s Urbanus Magnus, is most relevant.37 Others, most notably C. Stephen Jaeger and Aldo Scaglioni, have embraced the idea of a civilising process, but moved much of it earlier into the Middle Ages.38 I admire Elias’s ability to cover such a broad timespan and am sympathetic to his efforts to investigate how subtle cultural changes could have a large social impact. Nonetheless, I remain sceptical of his model, whatever the chronology, because of its teleological tendencies, the sheer weight it places on the effects of changes in manners at court, and the objections of scholars like Gillingham. Unfortunately, this particular study does not provide a good basis on which to evaluate arguments about ‘the civilising process.’ It deals only with a limited span of time and, more important, is largely based on royal records rather than the etiquette manuals and narrative sources that would be required to test Elias’s theories. Nonetheless, the arguments about changes in court life I make in this section will provide useful context for scholars thinking about Elias’s arguments and other possible ways in which historical developments at royal courts might have reshaped the societies in which they existed. When one compares John’s court to later Western European courts, there is both continuity and change. Strands of continuity include the long history of the adventus or royal entry noted in Chapter 7, which stretched from the late Roman Empire deep into the early modern period.39 Hunting was as common at early modern courts (including the papal court) as at medieval ones.40 Walter Map 35 Elias, Civilizing Process, 1:69–70; 2:13–90. 36 Elias, Civilizing Process, 1:xiii. 37 Gillingham, ‘From “Civilitas” to Civility,’ 267–89. See also Matthew Innes, ‘ “A Place of Discipline”: Carolingian Courts and Aristocratic Youth,’ in Catherine Cubitt, ed., Court Culture in the Early Middle Ages: The Proceedings of the First Alcuin Conference (Turnhout, 2003), 59–76; M. G. A. Vale, ‘Ritual, Ceremony and the “Civilising Process”: The Role of the Court, c. 1270–1400,’ in Steven Gunn and Antheun Janse, eds., The Court as a Stage: England and the Low Countries in the Later Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 2006), 13–27. 38 Jaeger, Origins of Courtliness; C. Stephen Jaeger, ‘Origins of Courtliness after 25 Years,’ Haskins Society Journal 21 (2010), 187–216; Scaglione, Knights at Court. 39  See Chapter 7, 179. 40  Henry Dietrich Fernández, ‘The Patrimony of St Peter: The Papal Court at Rome, c. 1450–1700,’ in John Adamson, ed., The Princely Courts of Europe: Ritual, Politics and Culture under the Ancien Régime, 1500–1750 (London, 1999), 141–63, at 145.

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222  Power and Pleasure described how, a generation before John, the French King, Louis VII, constructed a park at Fontainebleau for hunting and other pleasures.41 During the Versailles period, the French court continued to spend six weeks every year there during the hunting season.42 As this last example suggests, at times one can speak not only of continuities in broad court activities such as hunting, feasting, and ma­ter­ ial display, but also of specific details. A similar example of surprisingly specific continuity can be found in England. In the letter in which the monks of Canterbury Cathedral discussed their preparation for Richard I’s coronation, they also noted that the barons of the Cinque Ports were associated with the canopy that was carried over the king during part of the ceremony. Hundreds of years later, at the coronation of Charles II, those barons still had that association.43 Even Elias’s examples of table manners from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century include specific continuities along with important changes.44 As with similarities between the royal courts across different lands, there are a number of reasons for this continuity. Similarity of function once again plays a role. Duindam has observed that there was continuity of court structures from the fourteenth to seventeenth centuries because of continuity in the functions of the court, but there is no reason that this principle cannot be taken back to King John’s period or well before.45 Institutional continuity obviously played a major role within individual polities. Even today, the British monarchy utilizes Westminster and Windsor, sites with a royal tradition going back to the eleventh century, for ceremonial purposes and court functions. An ongoing emphasis on tradition and, in later periods, the appeal of the archaic strengthened the desire for continuity. Above all, perhaps, the influence of Christianity in Western Europe from the time of Constantine to the present day created a strong ideological and ceremonial framework in which royal traditions could be preserved. Individual dynasties and polities may have faltered over time, but the overall history of royal and princely courts in Western Europe saw unbroken continuity from the late Roman period to the fall of most monarchies in the modern period, and the remaining constitutional monarchies are still linked to aspects of that history. Yet when one turns one’s attention from the court of King John to early modern courts in England and throughout Europe, one seems almost to have entered a different world.46 The sheer size of courts and of individual departments within them was generally much larger. Moreover, the level of elaboration and splendour in activities like royal entries or entertainments at feasts was often on a different

41  Walter Map, De Nugis Curialium, 454–7. 42 Duindam, Vienna and Versailles, 148. 43  Stubbs, ed., Epistolæ Cantuarienses, 308; Bertelli, The King’s Body, 100. 44 Elias, Civilizing Process, 1:84–99. 45  Jeroen Duindam, ‘Court Life in Early Modern Vienna and Versailes: Discourse versus Practice,’ in Steven Gunn and Antheun Janse, eds., The Court as a Stage: England and the Low Countries in the Later Middle Ages (Woodbridge, 2006), 183–95, at 183–4. 46  For works on early modern courts, see Chapter 1, note 10.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  223 scale, even allowing for the fact that better sources provide fuller and more detailed views of court activities. For instance, though royal entries in John’s reign doubtlessly involved more ceremonial and display than the bare mentions in the records reveal, it is hard to believe that the elaborate pageantry of tableaux vivants and other ceremonial aspects of early modern entries could have existed without leaving a trace in the royal records. It is difficult to convey just how much more elaborate and splendid early modern courts seem in comparison to John’s, but a few specifics can help. According to R. J. Knecht, when the court of Francis I of France, who ruled 1515–47, was on the move, some 18,000 horses were needed.47 John had a handful of departments that each used a few wagons and packhorses, and even though they would have been joined by the horses of huntsmen, royal officials, and guests at court, there is simply no comparison. According to Sidney Anglo, Henry VII of England spent over £128,000 on jewels between 1491 and the end of his reign in 1509.48 Even allowing for price rise and the many gaps in John’s records, it is difficult to see how John, fond as he was of gems, could have spent anything like that during his reign. Rafael Dominguez Casas has compiled a nearly 200-page prosopography of the artisans who worked for Ferdinand and Isabella, including painters, illuminators, brick-and-tile makers, jewellers, embroiderers, musicians, sculptors, and armourers.49 Even if we had equivalent records for John’s reign, it is inconceivable that we would find so many artisans. All these examples, it must be stressed, come from the beginning of the early modern period, and royal courts only became larger and more elaborate as the early modern period progressed. One can point to exceptions in the overall growth and growing elaboration of different aspects of court life—it is unlikely, for instance, that many early modern European hunting establishments much exceeded John’s in size and scope. Nonetheless, the overwhelming impression one gets from studying the records of John’s reign and the secondary literature about the early modern court is that the splendour and elaborateness of court life expanded dramatically. At first glance, such comparisons may seem to demonstrate that the transition from the Middle Ages to the early modern period ushered in major changes, but such an assumption is misleading. Though one would not want to ignore the impact that the intellectual and cultural changes associated with the Italian Renaissance and its iterations elsewhere in Europe had on royal and princely courts, it would be deeply problematic to place too much weight on old-fashioned ideas about the end of the Middle Ages. Malcolm Vale, in his book on princely courts from 1270 to 1380, has argued that ‘in many ways, the distinction often 47  R. J. Knecht, ‘Francis I: Prince and Patron of the Northern Renaissance,’ in A. G. Dickens, ed., The Courts of Europe: Politics, Patronage, and Royalty, 1400–1800 (New York, 1977), 99–119, at 103. 48 Anglo, Spectacle, Pageantry, and Early Tudor Policy, 104–5. 49  Rafael Dominguez Casas, Arte y etiqueta de los Reyes Católicos: artistas, residencias, jardines y bosques (Madrid, 1993), 27–200.

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224  Power and Pleasure made between medieval household and early modern, or Renaissance, court is an inherently false and artificial one.’50 And indeed when one compares John’s court not to early modern ones but to late medieval ones, the same gap in the size and splendour of the court appears, even if it is less pronounced.51 This is particularly true of the most famous late medieval court, that of the dukes of Burgundy, which was an influential precursor of many early modern courts, especially in the Hapsburg lands. The artistic and cultural patronage of the Burgundian dukes, the rich material culture they supported, and their elaborate feasts involving extraordinary pageantry and entertainment put anything John produced to shame.52 Yet the same is true for other royal and princely courts, including those of late medieval English kings.53 If Henry VII far outspent John on jewellery, so too did Richard II. John’s lists of jewellery and plate, impressive as they are, pale in comparison to those recorded in Richard II’s inventories.54 Nor does one need to go as far as the late fourteenth century to see a difference in court splendour. Both Henry III and Edward I seem to have spent far more on alms than John, and Lachaud’s work suggests that Edward spent far more on the distribution of robes to followers.55 Based on what I have found in John’s records, it is hard to imagine that he had a feast that could remotely compare to one Edward I held at Pentecost 1306, at which he dubbed perhaps 300 knights and for which he gathered over 100 entertainers.56 For all of Matthew Paris’s tendency to praise John’s feasts in comparison to those of his son, Henry III, John’s surviving records give no

50 Vale, Princely Court, 18. 51  For works on medieval courts, see Chapter 1, notes 11–12. 52  There is extensive work on the Burgundian court. I have relied on Vale’s comparative study noted above and also on C. A. J. Armstrong, ‘The Golden Age of Burgundy: Dukes That Outdid Kings,’ in A.  G.  Dickens, ed., The Courts of Europe: Politics, Patronage, and Royalty, 1400–1800 (New York, 1977), 55–75; Lafortune-Martel, Fête noble en Bourgogne; Werner Paravacini, ‘The Court of the Dukes of Burgundy: A Model for Europe?’ in Ronald G. Asch and Adolf M. Birke, eds., Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age, c. 1450–1650 (Oxford, 1991), 69–102; Peter Arnade, Realms of Ritual: Burgundian Ceremony and Civil Life in Late Medieval Ghent (Ithaca, NY, 1996); Andrew Brown, ‘Bruges and the Burgundian “Theatre-State”: Charles the Bold and Our Lady of the Snow,’ History 84 (1999), 573–89; Damen, ‘Princely Entries and Gift Exchange,’ 233–49; Andrew Brown and Graeme Small, eds., Court and Society in the Burgundian Low Countries c. 1420–1520 (Manchester, 2007). 53  Gervase Matthew, The Court of Richard II (London, 1968); Parsons, ed., Court and Household of Eleanor of Castile; Scattergood and Sherborne, eds., English Court Culture; Given-Wilson, Royal Household; Ralph A. Griffiths, ‘The King’s Court during the Wars of the Roses: Continuities in an Age of Discontinuities,’ in Ronald G. Asch and Adolf M. Birke, eds., Princes, Patronage, and the Nobility: The Court at the Beginning of the Modern Age, c. 1450–1650 (Oxford, 1991), 41–67; Nigel Saul, Richard II (New Haven, CT, 1997), 327–65. 54  Jenny Stratford, Richard II and the English Royal Treasure (Woodbridge, 2012). 55  For the alms of later kings, see Johnstone, ‘Poor-Relief,’ 149–67; Arnold Taylor, ‘Royal Alms and Oblations in the Later Thirteenth Century: An Analysis of the Alms Roll of 12 Edward I (1283–84),’ in Frederick G. Emmison and Roy Stevens, eds., Tribute to an Antiquary: Essays Presented to Marc Fitch by Some of His Friends (London, 1976), 93–125; Sally Dixon-Smith, ‘The Image and Reality of AlmsGiving in the Great Halls of Henry III,’ Journal of the British Archaeological Association 152 (1999), 79–96. For spending on liveries, see Lachaud, ‘Textiles, Furs and Liveries,’ 217. 56 Bullock-Davies, Menestrellorum Multitudo. See also Southworth, English Medieval Minstrel, 64–83; Woolgar, Great Household, 26–9.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  225 indication he hosted as impressive a feast as Henry did for the marriage of his daughter Margaret to Alexander III of Scotland in 1251. The menu for that celebration included at least 300 deer, 7,000 hens, over 2,100 partridges, 125 swans, 115 cranes, 120 peacocks, 290 pheasants, 400 rabbits, 1,300 hares, 400 pigs, 70 boars, 200 salmon, 10,000 haddocks, 68,500 loaves of bread, and 120 tuns of wine.57 English and other medieval rulers did not wait until the advent of ‘modernity’ to increase the splendour of their courts. Nothing I have read suggests that the shift of court life towards greater size, elaboration, and splendour was the result of any one great leap within a single gen­er­ ation or even century, though future scholarship may change this picture. Instead, a comparison of courts in different periods suggests a slow evolution towards larger and more complex courts. No doubt this evolution stalled at times in individual courts because of economic depression, fiscal crises, or the frugal tastes of particular rulers, but the overall trajectory from John’s reign forward remains clear. Nor was there any revolution in John’s own period. One has an impression of greater splendour at John’s court than at those of his predecessors, although the ever-decreasing amount of evidence as one goes back in time makes comparison harder with each generation and increases the danger that variations in record keeping may deceive us. If the twelfth and preceding centuries did see an increase in the splendour and complexity of courts, as I believe, it was clearly of a gradual nature. Aurell and Madeline have studied the courts of Henry II, Richard I, and John as a group and noted no sign of radical change in the period.58 A reading of Schröder’s work on material culture at the court of King Henry II and a perusal of many of the pipe rolls that were her most important source show a great deal of continuity. Henry II’s government can be found making payments for the same types of objects and activities as John’s: carting wine and venison; buying cloth and furs for the royal family; distributing robes; investing in dwellings, parks, and vivaries; purchasing luxurious food and drink; making diplomatic gifts; and arranging passage for hunters and dogs across the English Channel.59 Even if John’s court was more splendid than his father’s, or became so once he had amassed sufficient wealth, it was not radically different in any way. Going back a couple more generations, though Henry I’s sole surviving pipe roll is not particularly revealing about court culture, it does show some comparable activities, including 57  Kay Staniland, ‘The Nuptials of Alexander III of Scotland and Margaret Plantagenet,’ Nottingham Medieval Studies 30 (1986), 20–45; Rackham, Ancient Woodland, 181; Hammond, Food and Feast in Medieval England, 125–6. 58 Aurell, Plantagenet Empire; Madeline, Les Plantagenêts et leur empire. See, however, Jolliffe, Angevin Kingship, 260. 59  PR2 Henry II–34 Henry II; Schröder, Macht und Gabe. Evidence of social and cultural life at Richard I’s court is limited and comes mostly from his first English pipe roll and his two surviving Norman pipe rolls, but what survives suggests patterns similar to the reigns of his father and brother; PR1 Richard I; Vincent D. Moss and Judith A. Everard, eds., Pipe Rolls of the Exchequer of Normandy from the Reign of Richard I, 1194–5 and 1197–8 (London, 2016).

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226  Power and Pleasure limited purchases of wine, spices, and textiles; expenditures for moving wine and venison; and payments to entertainers.60 That document and the Constitutio Domus Regis both suggest a fair amount of continuity, and Judith Green is no doubt right to argue that Henry I’s court served as a precursor to that of the Plantagenets.61 Nor is there any reason to believe that the trajectory I have suggested did not stretch back into the Anglo-Saxon period, given that the Normans adopted so much of Anglo-Saxon government.62 Earlier courts prob­ably were less magnificent than John’s, and the cumulative change was probably large, but the change once again was likely evolutionary, not revolutionary. One could find all sorts of ways to show this general trajectory towards larger, more lavish, and more complex courts, but one good if rough proxy is the numbers of individuals involved. Most such calculations are estimates and must be treated with caution, but various scholars have calculated the size of royal and princely courts in England and elsewhere from the court of Henry I (based on the Constitutio Domus Regis) onward. Again and again the calculations show an increase over time, both in the Middle Ages and the early modern period. GivenWilson, for instance, sees a growth in the core of the English court from between 100 and 150 in Henry I’s reign (almost certainly an underestimate), to 500 or more in the fourteenth century, to over 800 under Henry VI, to around 1,500 in the early seventeenth century.63 Though the growth of courts and the growing elaboration of court life was gradual, over the course of centuries the cumulative change would have been immense. As a result, early modern courts could be greater centres of cultural production and patronage than medieval ones. Even if one allows for missing evidence, John’s patronage of literature, music, and art was hardly sufficient to create important cultural trends that influenced society much beyond the court. The courts of early modern rulers were better placed to be cultural powerhouses and 60  Judith A. Green, ed., The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Thirty First Year of the Reign of King Henry I (London, 2012), 1, 10, 13, 34, 113, 120. 61  Judith A. Green, ‘Henry I and the Origins of the Court of the Plantagenets,’ in Martin Aurell and Noël Tonnerre, eds., Plantagenêts et Capétiens: confrontations et héritages (Turnhout, 2006), 485–95. For the court of Henry’s brother, William Rufus, see Barlow, William Rufus, 137–55. 62 For Anglo-Saxon royal courts, see James Campbell, ‘Anglo-Saxon Courts,’ in Catherine Cubitt, ed., Court Culture in the Early Middle Ages: The Proceedings of the First Alcuin Conference (Turnhout, 2003), 155–69. For discussions of material culture among the Anglo-Saxon elites, see Robin Fleming, ‘The New Wealth, the New Rich and the New Political Style in Late Anglo-Saxon England,’ Anglo-Norman Studies 23 (2001), 1–22; Ann Williams, The World before Domesday: The English Aristocracy, 900–1066 (London, 2008), 85–137. 63  Most scholars have put Henry I’s court at around 150, but this does not include the military household, and Barlow noted that the Constitutio provides bread allowances for far more people; Given-Wilson, Royal Household, 4, 11, 22, 258–9; Barlow, William Rufus, 143n222; Frédérique Lachaud, ‘Order and Disorder at Court: The Ordinances of the Royal Household in England in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries,’ in Holger Kruse and Werner Paravacini, eds., Höfe und Hofordnungen, 1200–1600 (Sigmaringen, 1999), 103–16, at 106–7. See also Knecht, ‘Francis I,’ 99–100; Saul, Richard II, 333–4; Adamson, ed., Princely Courts of Europe, 11–12; Woolgar, Great Household, 9–10; Duindam, Vienna and Versailles, 30–2, 35–6, 51–63, 69–85, 302–3; Wild, ‘Truly Royal Retinue,’ 130–1, 134–5, 142.

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John ’ s Court in a Comparative Context  227 to shape the societies around them. Yet for all that, the glittering early modern courts of Britain, France, the Hapsburgs, and other realms and dynasties could be so brilliant only because of the accumulation of wealth, custom, and ceremonial developed across generations of rulers. Two main engines drove this increasing elaboration of European royal courts from the central (or, in some cases, early) Middle Ages onward: the general economic growth in Western Europe and governments’ growing ability to collect money.64 Of course, other forces also shaped the history of courts. The rise of cities supported court growth not only by supplying increased revenue to governments, but also by producing luxuries for courtly consumption and creating urban forms of ceremonial rulers could use to enhance their court cultures.65 Religious shifts were also crucial. Because of the importance of Christianity to court culture, religious developments like the Protestant Reformation had a huge impact. New cultural and intellectual movements continuously changed courts, including in the central Middle Ages, when novel ideas about elite love and new practices such as the tournament created lasting changes. Nor was there any strict correlation between wealth and cultural brilliance at court; Irish and Welsh poetry reveal that relatively poor courts could produce outstanding cultural products. Nonetheless, because wealth was so important to creating splendour and complexity at royal courts, economic and fiscal development played the crucial roles in the elaboration of court life discussed here. It is likely that increased fiscal capacity was as important as economic growth, if not more so. It is striking, for instance, that the economic travails of the later Middle Ages seem to have had little impact on the continuing expansion of courts and the ongoing elaboration of court culture. The ever-increasing expense of warfare was the main motivation for ever-increasing revenue collection, and warfare swallowed up most of the results. Nonetheless, just as John’s feasts grew in size as he gained more money, so too other rulers used growing revenues for court life as well as warfare. As I argued in Chapter 8, the growth of administrative kingship facilitated (and was partly inspired by) the growth of a more elaborate cultural life at royal courts. I noted at the beginning of this work that earlier generations of scholars tended to neglect the cultural history of English and other medieval courts in favour of fiscal and administrative subjects. Paradoxically, in doing so they may have revealed the greatest contribution King John and other members of his lineage made to changing court history. Though none, including Henry II and Eleanor, appear to have carried out any great cultural revolution, they helped build the kind of fiscal apparatus that served as the long-term motor for the growth and elaboration of royal courts in England and throughout Western Europe. 64  The pattern in other parts of the world, many with their own flourishing court cultures, would of course have been quite different. 65  Edward Muir, Civic Ritual in Renaissance Venice (Princeton, NJ, 1981); Barbara A. Hanawalt and Kathryn L. Reyerson, eds., City and Spectacle in Medieval Europe (Minneapolis, MN, 1994); Arnade, Realms of Ritual; Brown, ‘Bruges and the Burgundian “Theatre-State”, ’ 573–89.

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Conclusion The splendour of John’s court may have fallen short of those of the early modern French kings at Versailles or his own Tudor, Stuart, and Hanoverian successors, but he presided over an impressive establishment. He had an extraordinary hunting establishment, with scores of men; dozens of highly trained birds of prey; hundreds of hunting dogs; and a large network of hunting lodges, parks, and forests. His court boasted a luxurious material culture, with rich stores of gold and silver plate, hundreds of pieces of jewellery studded with gems, and exotic and costly textiles. Though some aspects of court culture left fewer traces in the surviving records, enough survives to show the patronage of art and music, entertainment and spectacle, and books and learning. John also sponsored chivalric practices such as heraldry, and though he was a notable sexual predator, the influence of new ideas about love and romance was not entirely absent from his court. Despite John’s reputation for impiety, he carried out the religious activities expected of a king, and religion was an integral part of court life. The royal records reveal the ongoing efforts to provide the court with good and often expensive food and wine throughout the year, and John was particularly admired for his generous distribution of robes, food, and drink at his feasts. A significant portion of the court’s time was spent on the road, but this too was an important cultural site for court life and display, particularly in formal processions and royal entries, in which peacock hats, lavish decoration on horses, and lances gilded with gold might make an appearance. The constant itineration of the court meant that there was no one great palace on which John lavished resources, but he still invested heavily in his castles, palaces, and hunting lodges, and on the landscapes around them. Court culture was already highly developed in the early thirteenth century and surviving sources from other realms show this was true not only of the Plantagenet dynasty. Court culture was a source of soft power for John in advertising his wealth and his government’s effectiveness; helping him build ties with magnates, barons, and knights; reinforcing norms of hierarchy and deference; and providing the opportunity for him to win a reputation for magnificence, generosity, hospitality, and piety. Though the rise of administrative kingship during the central Middle Ages may have lessened the relative importance of traditional kinds of soft power, it also gave rulers greater resources and administrative capability to build up a magnificent court, thus increasing court life’s potential to create soft power. Indeed, the increasing magnificence of European courts from the central Middle Ages through the early modern period was closely intertwined with the continuing rise

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Conclusion  229 in government machinery and fiscal prowess. However, soft power, like hard power, required skill to use. John, aided by his able administrators, was very successful in building up an impressive court. However, he often squandered the benefits through clumsy missteps and the pursuit of self-gratification. Even had John been particularly skilful, his opponents would have challenged his attempts to build soft power by describing his efforts in an unfavourable light, insulting him, and carrying out hostile symbolic attacks, such as processing out from London during the baronial rebellion to recognize Louis, rather than him, as king. John’s failings simply made it easier for them to undermine his soft power. Power was an important product of court life, but so too was pleasure. We are too easily led by the propaganda of later kings and our own fascination with power to focus on the political purposes of court life and ignore the degree to which royal courts employed extensive resources in poor societies to satisfy the desires and pleasures of the powerful. Historians tend to think of hunting as a source of soft power, which it was, but John’s contemporaries focused on the pleasure it provided. Feasting, luxurious lifestyles, music, and entertainers were all designed in the first place to delight kings and courtiers. Most rulers probably paid attention to and valued the political benefits these activities produced, but it would be unwise to presume that power was generally a greater motive than pleasure for them. Indeed, by some of his actions, John sacrificed power for pleasure and self-gratification. Financial pressures, partially caused by John’s lavish spending on his court, caused some of his greatest problems. To the extent that court life provided him soft power, there was a trade-off, but insofar as the spending was on pleasure, court life helped create opposition for no political return. More importantly, when John shamed some of his key nobles by pursuing or having sex with their wives and daughters, he created a political firestorm. Royal and princely courts, with their rich cultural patronage, lively activities, and lavish lifestyles, can be as seductive to modern scholars as they were to contemporary courtiers, and I have by no means escaped the spell of King John’s court. It is all too easy to forget what should be remembered—that the rich cultural and social lives of premodern courts were built with revenue extracted from deeply impoverished societies. One thirteenth-century French satire has a peasant complain, upon seeing a ‘gentil home’ with a sparrowhawk on his fist, that the chicken the hawk would eat in the evening could have fed the peasant’s children. The author of this satire was unsympathetic, calling the peasant doglike for his complaining.1 Modern readers will, I hope, have more sympathy. Premodern royal and princely courts were often brilliant and effervescent cultural centres, but their splendour came at a high price for the ordinary people of the period.

1  Edmond Faral, ‘Des vilains ou des XXIII manières de vilains,’ Romania 48 (1922), 243–64, at 251; Crane, Animal Encounters, 121, 220n3.

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APPENDIX 1

Royal Hunting Expenses The evidence for hunting expenses is fragmentary and my estimate is based on a painstaking gathering of information across different kinds of records. I indicated in the main text that the feeding of the incomplete number of 458 dogs recorded in late spring 1213 would have cost nearly £350 a year. A number of references indicate that a common scale of pay was two pence a day for dog handlers, and seven and a half pence a day for master huntsmen.1 If one takes the seventy-one fewterers accompanying the king’s greyhounds at one point in 1212, which was not the full number of dog handlers, their total yearly pay would have been £215 19s 2d.2 Master huntsmen were paid only a halfpenny a day less than knights and their salaries would have gained them a very comfortable £11 8s ½d a year. Scattered references to eight huntsmen receiving this sum appear in John’s fourteenth year, creating a total annual sum of £91 5s, but at least eight other prominent huntsmen were active in that year, so the yearly outlay was probably twice that.3 That these costs and wages were year round, not just during hunting season, is indicated by the long-term costs of smaller individual packs. For instance, one master huntsman with seven assistants and fifty-six dogs received £51 4s 1d for fifty weeks and five days, in addition to £4 8d for the purchase of a horse and for the robes the king provided them yearly.4 Clothing was another important expense; one pipe roll entry records just under £40 being spent on robes and hoods for an unspecified number of huntsmen and 55s for tunics for eleven fewterers.5 All in all, King John may well have been spending £750 a year or more, perhaps much more, for huntsmen, dog handlers, and hounds alone, at least in his later years. The cash outlay for falconers, hawkers, their assistants, and the birds themselves is likely to have been smaller, both because it was almost certainly a smaller establishment and because some of its leading members received their rewards in land. The birds themselves were expensive; on one occasion a royal official spent 20 marks for ten goshawks and two falcons.6 As noted, the king received many birds as gifts or through proffers, which would have cut these costs, but he seems to have had his falconers and hawkers buy them surprisingly often. Wages for falconers, hawkers, and their assistants would have been the largest cost, but we have little information about this. One record shows two hawkers receiving 5½d each per day, which would have provided them a yearly income of £8 7s 3½d, less than master huntsmen, but still quite respectable.7 However, it is hard to generalize from this figure alone. Another tantalizing piece of information is that in John’s seventh year, the chief hawker, Thomas, son of Bernard, received nearly £90 to distribute to the royal

1  Misae 14J 231, 244, 246–8, 250, 254; RLC 21a, 51a, 53b, 125b–126b; NR 76; Prest Roll 7J 276. The payments differ somewhat from those under Henry I but are in the same general range; Constitutio Domus Regis, 212–15. 2  Misae 14J 243. 3  Misae 14J 231, 244, 246–8, 250, 254–5. 4  PR16J 107. 5  PR10J 97. For other examples, see PR13J 38; PR14J 58, 91; Misae 11J 141; MR 1J 92–3; RLC 104a, 104b. 6  PR13J 38. 7  Misae 14J 255.

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232  Appendix 1 hawkers in prests (advances or loans), presumably on their wages.8 What relationship this bore to the total income of the hawkers is unclear and of course these expenditures do not include the falconers, but it hints at the considerable expenditures for the men who handled the king’s birds of prey. In addition to the wages and expenses of the royal huntsmen and falconers and the direct costs of feeding their animals, there would have been many miscellaneous expenses. Horses had to be purchased for members of the hunting establishment.9 Transporting fallow deer to Normandy cost over £15 on one occasion, and during his great campaign in 1214 John spent nearly £38 bringing along one hundred dogs and the twenty-three men associated with them.10 He also spent £38 on enclosing the parks of Bolsover and Melbourne and at least £84 on building and maintaining royal mews at Winchester over several years.11 Many of the miscellaneous costs were minor, but collectively they would have added up to a substantial sum. Some reassurance that my overall estimate of roughly £1,000 a year is not a gross exaggeration is provided by sums spent in the pipe and misae rolls of John’s fourteenth year. Pipe rolls normally only contain minor, incidental hunting expenses, but this one has more information than most, and reveals expenditures of approximately £338 on hunting. The misae roll’s coverage of hunting expenses is very limited, but the overlapping misae roll of that year (which covers the regnal year from May to May rather than the fiscal year from September to September) includes over £150 of expenditures on hunting and falconry, with very little duplication from the pipe roll.12 That these two very incomplete accounts of hunting expenses total nearly £500 suggests that the figure above is at least the right order of magnitude.

8  Prest Roll 7J 272, 274–5. 9  For instance, Misae 14J 252, 254. 10  PR3J 101–2; RLC 206b. 11  PR2J 7–8, 189, 191; PR3J 101, 103; PR4J 68; PR5J 139; PR11J 163, 178; PR16J 126–7. 12  Misae 14J 231–69.

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Bibliography 1.  Archival and Manuscript Sources British Library, London Royal MS 3 B X Gervase of Chichester Royal MS 7 C XIV Peter of Cornwall

National Archives, London C 47/3/46/4 DL 10/58 SC 1/1/4

2.  Primary Sources ‘Abstract of a Shorter Chronicle of Battle.’ In Chronicon Monasterii de Bello, ed. J. S. Brewer. London, 1846. Adam of Eynsham. Magna Vita Sancti Hugonis: The Life of St. Hugh of Lincoln, ed. Decima  L.  Douie and David Hugh Farmer. Repr. with corrections. Ed. 2 vols. Oxford, 1985. Alexander Neckam. De Naturis Rerum Libri Duo: With the Poem of the Same Author, De Laudibus Divinæ Sapientiæ, ed. Thomas Wright. London, 1863. Alexander Neckam. Alexandri Neckam Sacerdos ad Altare, ed. Christopher James McDonough. Turnhout, 2010. Ambroise. The History of the Holy War: Ambroise’s Estoire de la guerre sainte, ed. Marianne Ailes and Malcolm Barber. 2 vols. Woodbridge, 2003. Anonymous of Béthune. Histoire des ducs de Normandie et des rois d’Angleterre, ed. Francisque Michel. Paris, 1840. Anonymous of Béthune. ‘Chronique des rois de France.’ In Receuil de Historiens de Gaule et de France, ed. Martin Bouquet and Léopold Delisle, 750–75. Paris, 1904. Baldwin, John W., ed. Les Registres de Philippe Auguste. Paris, 1992. Bazire, Joyce, ed. The Metrical Life of St. Robert of Knaresborough. London, 1953. Bernard Itier. The Chronicle and Historical Notes of Bernard Itier, ed. Andrew  W.  Lewis. Oxford, 2012. Bisson, Thomas  N., ed. Fiscal Accounts of Catalonia under the Early Count-Kings (1151–1213). 2 vols. Berkeley, CA, 1984. Blake, E. O., ed. Liber Eliensis. London, 1962. Brown, Andrew, and Graeme Small, eds. Court and Society in the Burgundian Low Countries c. 1420–1520. Manchester, 2007. Carlin, Martha, and David Crouch, eds. Lost Letters of Medieval Life: English Society, 1200–1250. Philadelphia, PA, 2013. Cazel, Fred  A., ed. Roll of Divers Accounts for the Early Years of the Reign of Henry  III. London, 1982.

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Index Note: Figures are indicated by an italic ‘f ’, respectively, following the page number. For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. access to the king  155–6, 159–60, 173–4 Adam le Harpur  80–1 Adam of Dore  168 Adam Pictor  80 adventus; see royal entry, the Áed Méith Ó Néill, king of Tir Eoghain  194 Alan of Galloway  185–7 Alexander II of Scotland  93–4, 102 Alexander Cytharista  80–1 Alexander Neckam  50–1, 130, 134 almsgiving  110–14, 118–20, 223–5 Ambrose/Ambroise 85–6 Angers 180–1 Angevin Empire  11–12 Aragon, royal court of  213 Arnulf of Aukland  179–80 Art at court  79–80, 101–2 Aubrey de Vere, earl of Oxford  57–8, 71 Baldwin, archbishop of Canterbury  188–9 Baldwin V, count of Hainaut  214–15 Bali 4 banners  89–90, 101–2 Battle Abbey  113–14 Beaulieu Abbey  108, 112–13, 122 beds and bedcovers  57 Berengaria of Navarre  95 Bertran de Born  47–8 Berwick-upon-Tweed 181–2 Beverley  179, 181–2 birds of prey  25–8, 31–2, 40–1, 50–1, 230 as gifts  41, 198–9 expenses associated with  231–2 importation of  27–8, 82–3 knowledge of, and status  38–9 Blanche of Castile  212–13 Bolsover  28–30, 232 books 84–6 Bordeaux (Gascon) wines  134–6 Brian de Lisle  43, 71, 87, 115, 143–4, 209 Brill 113–14

Bury St Edmunds, monastery of  36–7, 73, 120, 159–60, 190–1 Byzantium, imperial court of  218–19 Canterbury, Christ Church  188–9, 201, 221–2 castles and palaces  154–62, 181–3 Catalonia; see Aragon Cathal Crodberg Ó Conchobair, king of Connacht 217–18 cattle 83–4 cheetahs 216 chess 87–8 chivalry  88–94, 101–2 Chysi stultus  82 Cinque Ports  221–2 Cistercians  108, 118–19, 159–60, 190–1 civilising process  3–4, 220–1 Clarendon 36 Clipston 113–14 comfort  76–7, 159 comportment  193, 208 Constance, queen of Sicily  178 Constitutio Domus Regis 18–19 Corfe Castle  31–2, 55–6, 158–61, 160f coronations  63, 68–9, 111, 140, 221–2 courtly love  94–5, 101–2 cranes  32–3, 50–1, 150–1, 220 crowns 62–3 cuisine 130–3 Daniel of Beccles, Urbanus Magnus 141–3, 220–1 Daniel Pincerna  144n.109 Dartmoor 33–4 deer  33–4, 41–3, 51 transportation of  28, 42–3, 232 Dogge Pecelance, Dogge Rastell, and Dogge de Marisco 51–2 Dover 191–2 dubbing ceremonies  93–4 Dublin 140

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266 Index Edward I  17–18, 161–2 El-Adil 72–3 Eleanor, queen of Castile  56 Eleanor of Aquitaine  7–8, 19–20, 84–5, 219 Eleanor of Brittany  58–9 Elias de Pontibus  72 Elias, Norbert, see civilising process Ely, Isle of  168–9 emotions  5–6, 192–3, 198, 208–10 Engelard de Cigogné  144n.109 entertainers  82, 101–2, 104–5, 223–5 etiquette  5–6, 141–3, 216–17 Eustace, bishop of Ely  42–3 Evreux  124, 149–50 exotic animals  82–4, 104 expenses of royal court  8–9, 204, 230 for feasts  141 for hunting  30–2, 231–2 for jewellery and gems  60–3 for textiles and robes  55–8, 223–5 for wine  133 falconers and hawkers  27–8, 30–1, 231–2 falconry  25–8, 32–3, 38–9, 205 costs of  231–2 gender and  40–1 falcons, see birds of prey Faversham, church of  192–3 feasts  68–9, 136–41, 223–5 distribution of robes at  57–8, 71, 138–9, 148–9 etiquette at  141–3 massacre at (alleged)  124, 149–50 pleasure and  150–2 religious aspects of  112 service at  140 soft power and  143–50 Ferrand, count of Flanders  72–3, 185–6, 191–2, 202–3 fish, fishponds, and seafood  128–9, 137–9, 143–4, 156–7, 163–4 Fontainebleau  133, 221–2 food, cooking, and wine  126–36, 150–2 forest landscapes  167–8, 182–3; see also royal forests Frederick I Barbarossa  161–2 court of  213–14 Frederick II, court of  215–16 Freemantle  21–2, 36, 157–8 fruit 129 Fulk fitz Warin  87–8, 97 fur  56–9, 75–7 game, see venison games and gambling  87–8, 101–2, 104 gems  60–1, 63–4, 68, 75, 90–1 alleged powers of  64–5

Geoffrey, archbishop of York  118–21, 179, 181–2 Geoffrey de Mandeville  47, 98, 101, 170–1 Geoffrey fitz Peter, earl of Essex  41–2, 87, 140, 143–4, 173, 205–6 Geoffrey of Vinsauf  85–6 Geoffrey Salsarius (sauce maker)  131–2 Geoffrey son of William Piculf  82 Gerald of Wales  84–5 gift exchange, purposes of  42–3, 75, 84, 194–9 gifts  173, 186–7 John’s handling of  119–20, 207 of exotic animals  83–4 of food  143–5 of hunting animals and deer  41–2, 83–4 of robes and other luxuries  71–3 Gloucester  128–9, 179–80 Gosewin le Born  72 Guildford 148–9 Hainaut, princely court of  214–15 Håkon IV of Norway  27–8, 216–17 Haltwhistle 153 Havering 33–4 hawks, see birds of prey Henry I  33–4, 82n.24 court of  18–19, 225–6 Henry II  65, 80, 116–17, 161–3 court of  7–8, 73–4, 84–5, 126, 219, 225–6 during the 1173—4 revolt  39–40, 178 itineration of  16–18, 169–71, 174 symbolic communication and  145–6, 190, 192–3 Henry III  17–18, 27–8, 74–5, 195–7, 204, 209 piety of  122 Westminster Abbey and  79–80, 122 Henry VI, emperor  178, 190 Henry, Count Palatine  72–3 Henry de Ferrers  144n.109 Henry de Mare  96 Henry fitz Count  71, 87n.44 Henry fitz Hervey of Ravensworth  173 Henry of Champagne  178 Henry of Hereford  80–1 Henry of St Helena  62–3 Henry the Young King  46 Heraclius, patriarch of Jerusalem  190–1, 194 heraldry  92–3, 102–3 Hereford Castle  80, 159–60 hermits and hermitages  113–15, 146, 156–7, 163–4 honour  99, 193–4 horses  27, 33–4, 89–90, 175 as gifts  41, 195–6, 198–9 tackle and harnesses of  175–6, 179–81, 217–18

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Index  267 hounds, see hunting dogs Hubert de Burgh  63–4, 195–6 Hubert Walter, archbishop of Canterbury  41–2, 61, 148–50, 205–6 Hugh, bishop of Durham  188–9 Hugh de Boves  72 Hugh de Mortimer  42–3 Hugh de Neville  18, 87, 143–4, 202n.78, 209 feast of  137–8, 173 inventories of royal plate and  60, 73 participation in revolt by  98n.104, 185 receipt of robes by  57–8, 71 Hugh of Avalon, bishop of Lincoln  64–5, 108, 116–20, 189–90 humour 209–10 hunting 221–2 compared to tournaments and warfare  45–8 contestation of soft power and  44–9 pleasure and  49–53 rituals of  35–6, 38–9, 44–5 soft power and  37–44 spectators and  36–7 types of  32–4 hunting dogs  26–8, 30–1, 33–5, 41, 52 expenses for  231–2 hunting establishment costs of  30–2, 231–2 size of  25–8 huntsmen  27, 51–2, 231–2 Ingelran de Pratell  87n.44 Innocent III  10–11, 68n.80, 118–19 interdict  112, 118–19 Ipomedon  45–6, 80–1 Ireland 28–30 Isabella, countess of Gloucester and first wife of King John  58–9, 64–5, 101 Isabella of Angoulême, queen of England  18, 23–4, 84–5, 86n.38, 95n.83, 175–6 clothing of  58–9 crowning of  68–9 gift of cattle to  83–4 household of  19–20 hunting, falconry and  32–3, 34f, 36, 40–1 John’s relationship with  94–5 regalia of  62–3 seals of  34f, 62–3, 69 Islamic court culture  219 Italian Renaissance  220–1, 223–5 Itineration  17–18, 110–11, 169–74, 180–1, 222–3 hunting and  28, 29f, 43–4 soft power and  172–4, 181 Jacob de Templo  80–1 Jakelin the viel player  80–1

jewellery  60–1, 63–4, 66, 71–3, 222–5 John, King ability of, to wield soft power  13–14, 103–4, 146, 148–50, 202–10 baronial rebellion against  10–11, 47–9, 184–7 John’s sexual activities and  96–101, 105–6 books of  86 chivalry and  88–94, 102–3 clothing of  59, 63, 74–5 expenses of court of; see expenses of royal court foreign supporters of  185–7 games and gambling of  87–8 general political abilities of  1, 10–14 historiography of  1–2, 105–6 household knights of  185 hunting, love of  2–3, 25–6, 32–3, 49–50 jewellery and gems, love of  54, 61 massacre by (alleged)  124, 149–50 music, appreciation of  81–2, 101–2 personal religion of  108–15, 118–22 regalia of  62–3, 68–71 relations of, with the elites  12, 185–7, 197–8 reputation of  1, 94–101, 105–6 sacral kingship and  118–21 seals of  69, 70f, 91–3, 92f sexual activities of  94–102, 105–6, 119 structure of court of  16–20 successes of  10–11 symbolic communication and  146, 190–4 tournaments and  46–7 wine and  133–6 John Bataille  80–2 John Bucuinte  87 John de Grey  144n.109 John fitz Hugh  55–6, 144n.109, 179–80 John of Salisbury  22–3, 68n.80, 102–4, 147–8 on hunting  38, 44–5, 50 John Russell  140 John Stultus  51–2, 82 Kingshaugh 158–9 Knaresborough Castle  155–6 La Rochelle  175 landscapes  156–8, 162–9 Laudes regiae  69n.87, 80–1, 85–6, 111–12 learning at court  84–7, 101–2 Limerick 128 linens; see table linens lions  82–3, 92–3, 102, 104 Loches 157–8 London  178–9, 182 Louis VII of France  38–9, 151 Louis VIII of France  10–11, 66, 182, 212–13 Ludgershall Castle  36–7, 94–5, 126, 164, 165f

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268 Index Madog ap Gruffydd, prince of Powys  72 Magna Carta  1, 105–6, 184, 186–7, 194, 204 feast associated with  146 hunting and forests and  48–9, 205 manners; see etiquette Marbod, bishop of Rennes  64–5 Markward, drummer of the count of Holland 81–2 Marlborough  126, 163–4, 197–8 Material culture, importance of  77–8 Matilda, empress  62–3 Matilda, daughter of Robert fitz Walter  97–8 Matilda de Briouze  83–4, 194–5 Melbourne  28–30, 232 Music at court  80–2 Newcastle-upon-Tyne 179–80 Nigel of Whiteacre  22–3 Normandy  112–14, 119–20 loss of, in 1204  1, 185 Norway, royal court of  216–17 Odiham Castle  164–6, 166f Osbert Giffard, illegitimate son of King John 97–8 Otto, Emperor  62–3, 72–3, 143–4, 179 Otto of Bamberg  74–5 Oxford 138–9 Pagan of Chaworth  87n.44 palaces; see castles and palaces park breaking  48–9 parks  28–30, 156–8, 162–7, 232 Peter de Maulay  72, 160–1, 209 Peter of Blois  22–3, 126, 151, 169–70 Peter of Stokes  72 Peter of Wakefield  146, 193 Peterborough 168–9 Philip II Augustus  119, 124, 191–2, 201–2 court of  212–13 John’s loss of Normandy, Maine, and Anjou to  1, 11–12 royal entries and  178–9 plate, gold and silver  60, 63–4, 66, 74–6 at feasts,  67, 138–41 gifts of  71–3 pleasure and self-gratification  14–16, 103–4, 182–3, 230 food, feasting and  150–2 hunting and  49–53 luxury and  75–7 piety and  109–10, 121–3 Poitier 158–9 power; see soft power processions 176–83

proskynesis 218–19 prostitution 96 Ramsey 168–9 Ranulf, earl of Chester  41–2, 87, 144n.109, 207 Reading Abbey  86, 110–11, 113–14 Reginald, bishop of Bath  188–9 Reginald of Cornhill  61, 67, 133–4, 144n.109 Reimbald, master, cook  132 relics  110–11, 113–14 Renaud, count of Boulogne  185–7 Richard I  61–3, 95, 124, 161–2, 168, 198–9 clothes, horse, and saddle of  69–70, 175–6 court of  225–6 entry of, into Messina  179 feasts of  65, 136–7, 145, 151 relic obtained by  113–14 slaying of boar by  39 symbolic communication and  145, 188–90, 193 Richard de Camville  207 Richard Marsh  85–6 Richard of Chilham, illegitimate son of King John  58n.25, 97 Richard of Cornwall  58n.25 ritual  4–5, 13, 187–8; see also symbolic communication Robert de Dreux  43, 160–1 Robert de Harcourt  144n.109 Robert de Leveland  93–4 Robert de Ros  42–3, 144n.109 Robert de Saintes  80–1 Robert de Vieuxpont  201 Robert fitz Walter  47, 97–8, 100, 149, 170–1 Matilda, daughter of  97–8 Robert of Béthune  191–2, 197–8, 202–3, 208–9 Robert of Burgate  87 Robert of Knaresborough  115 Robert of Turhnam  71 Robert Pictor  80 Robert Tresgoz  144n.109 robes, distribution of  57–8, 71–5, 148–9, 223–5 Roger, master cook  132 Rǫgnvaldr, king of Man  185–6 Roland the Farter  82 Rouen Cathedral  112–13, 122 royal administration  2, 19, 186–7 and growth of royal courts  227 sacral kingship and  116–17 soft power and  199–202 royal, imperial, and princely courts comparisons between  212–27 critics of  22–3, 205; see also John of Salisbury, Peter of Blois, Walter Map historiography of  1–8, 14–15

OUP CORRECTED AUTOPAGE PROOFS – FINAL, 24/09/20, SPi

Index  269 in the central Middle Ages  7–16 in the early Middle Ages  5–7 in the late Middle Ages and early modern period  4–5, 220–7 growth of, over time  226–7 royal entry, the  176–83, 222–3 royal forests  25–6, 31–2, 38–9, 48–9, 168, 205 royal records  2, 20–2 royal regalia  62–3, 68–71, 77–8 royal residences and hunting  28–30, 29f royal seals  62–3, 69, 70f, 91–3, 92f

Thomas Becket  44–5, 48–9, 65, 117–18, 142–3 Thomas de Samford  144n.109 Thomas Esturmy  144n.109 Thomas of Galloway  185–6 tournaments 45–7 treasure  61–2, 197–8 Treville, royal forest of  168 Tristan  35–6, 38–9 alleged sword of  62–3, 90–1, 102

sacral kingship  13, 109, 111–21 Saer de Quincy  87, 205–6 St Augustine’s, Canterbury  175, 190–3 Sampson, abbot of Bury St Edmunds  36–7 Savary de Mauleon  47–8 Scarborough Castle  154–5 scarlet cloth  56–9 sex  94–102, 104–6 Siberton 31 silks  55–9, 63–4, 69–70, 89–91, 120 Simon de Pateshull  144n.109 Simon of Cambrai  82 Simon of Kyme  87 soft power  9–14, 101–2, 180–1, 229–30 administrative kingship and  13, 199–202 contestation of  12–13, 44–9, 73–5, 102–3, 147–50, 181–2, 229–30 feasting and  143–7 hunting and  37–44 itineration and  172–4, 181 John’s skill at handling  13–14, 103–4, 146, 148–50, 202–10 luxuries and  65–7 piety and  109–10, 121–3 spices  130–3, 136, 139 Stephen Langton  10–11, 42–3, 112, 118–19, 190–1 supplication 188–91 Susanna, mistress of King John  94–5 Sverre, king of Norway  216–17 symbolic communication  5–6, 145–6, 187–94, 200–2

Wales, royal or princely courts of  217–18, 227 wall hangings  57 Walter de Baillolet  72, 175 Walter de Beauchamp  72 Walter de Grey  85–6 Walter de Lacy  42–3 Walter Map  16–18, 22–3, 169–70 wardrobe  19–20, 78 Warin fitz Gerald  73, 144n.109 weapons and armour  62–3, 89–91, 101–2, 180–1 Westminster Abbey  79–80, 122, 222 Westminster Palace  138–9, 153, 178 wetlands 164–9 William II Rufus court of  73–4 William I, king of Scotland  108 daughters of  58–9, 98–9 William Briwerre  87n.44, 170–1 William de Briouze  41, 83–4, 194–5, 201–2 William de Ferrers, earl of Derby  87, 140 William de Saint-Mère-Église  85–6 William de Tancarville  145–6 William de Warenne, earl of Surrey  97–100 unnamed sister of  97–100 William, earl of Gloucester  64–5 William Longsword, earl of Salisbury  71, 87, 97–8, 143–4, 185 William Marshal  63–4, 71 King John and  87n.44, 140, 143–4, 174, 205–8 William of Cornhill, bishop of Coventry  42–3 William of Wrotham  85–6, 185 William Piculf  82 William Scissor  71, 138–9 Winchester Cathedral  112 Winchester Palace  138–9, 232 Windsor Castle  159–60, 222 wine  133–6, 139, 143–4 Woodstock  36, 162–3 Worcester Cathedral  120, 179

table linens  138–41 tabulas 87 tents and pavilions  66, 161–2 Terric the Teuton  40–1 Tewkesbury 163–4 textiles and clothing  26–31, 76–8, 175–6, 179–81, 231 and status  65–7

venison  37–8, 41–3, 127, 139 Vielet the viel player  80–1

York 179–80