Lessons in Good Behaviour for Medieval and Tudor children

'In bed if thou fall harboured to be
With fellow, master or highte degree
Thou shalt enquire by courtesy
In what part of the bed he will lie.
Be honest and lie thou far him from
Thou art not wise but thou do so.'
  The Boke of Curtasye ed, J.O. Halliwell, Percy Soc. Tracts Vol. 4 1849 (c. 1430-40)

This sounds like a delicate warning about sexual molestation which books of manners give no advice on but which was probably a common problem in the promiscuous living conditions of medieval Europe.
Sharing a bed with a stranger was quite normal both in private houses and crowded inns.  The 5th Earl of Northumberland's Gentlemen and Children of the Chapel, for instance, are descriped in the household accounts of Henry VIII as normally sleeping two gentlemen or three children to a bed.
(EETS Vol. 32, Extracts from the Household books of the Earl of Northumberland..c. 1510-11)

Four children of Sir Thomas Lucy III, 1619.  National Trust

Some of the general advice to children in the books of courtesy of the Middle Ages and Tudor times has been popular with parents and teachers from time immemorial, and brings these long ago children vividly to life:

'Child I warn thee in all wise
That thou tell troth and make no lies.....
Child, climb thou not over house nor wall
Forno fruit, birds nor ball
And, child, cast no stones over mens houses
Nor cast stones at no glass windows.
       EETS vol. 32 Symon's lesson of wysdome for all maner chyldren

Several books of courtesy suggest that under fourteens were more mature than most boys that age are now:

And son of one thing I the warn
And on my blessing take good heed
Beware of using of the tavern
And also the dice I thee forbid
And flee all lecherie in will or deed'
  How the wise man taught his son, ca. 430,  EETS vol. 32

'....ye shall nhot you excuse
From breecheles feast (beating) and I may you espy
Playing at any game of Ribaldry
  Caxton, advice to Lytle John ca. 1477-8, ed. F.J. Furnivall, EETS extra series 5, 1868

O Little childe Eschewe thou ever game
For that hath brought many one to shame
As dicing, and carding And such other plays
Which many undoeth as we see nowadays.'
'Tale a Toppe, if though would playe
And not at the hasadrye'
   F.S. Seagar The schoole of vertue...1557 EETS Vol. 32

And be ware and wyse how that thou lokys
Ouer any brynk, well or brokys...
For many chyld without drede
Is dede or dysseyuyd throw ywell hede...
And but thou do thou shat fare the worse
And therto be bete on the bare ers....'
   Symon's lesson of wysdome EETS Vol. 32

As might be expected in a society where the church was very much a part of everyday life, most books of manners impress on children the importance of observing their religious duties.  Symonds in his Lesson of Wysdome says:
  'For make no crying, Japes nor plays
In holy church on holy days.

Symonds also advises, with an eye to the child's future career:
'And lerne as fast as thou may and can
For owre byschope is an old man
And therefor thou most lern fadst
If thou wolt be bysshop when he is past...
  Symon's lesson of wysdome...EETS Vol. 32
 

Table Manners

'Grace being said low curtesy make thou
Saying "much good may it do you"
Of stature then if thou be able
It shall become thee to serve at the table...'
   Seagar, The Schools of Vertue,  ed. F. J. Furnivall,  Early English Text Society Vol. 32

Table manners are dealt with in a lot of detail on books of courtesy, both eating at table and serving since this was one of the  principal duties of a page.  Relationships were very formal.  Coming into the dining hall the page should:

'Say first "good speed" And all that be before
You in this stead salute with humble Face
Start not Rudely; come In an easy pace
Hold up your head, and kneel but on one knee
To your sovereign or lotd, whoever he be...'
    The Babees Book, c. 1475, EETS Vol. 32

Here are some instructions for children serving their parents at table:

'Don't fill the dishes so full as to spill on your parents' dress or they'll be angry.  Have spare trenchers ready for guests.  See that there's plenty of everything wanted.  Empty the bones from the voiders often.  Be at hand if anyone calls.  When they have finished clear the table.  First cover the salt...Put a voider on the table to take the trenchers and napkins.  Sweep the crumbe together into a voider.  Set a clean trencher before everyone.  Then set fruit and cheese on the table with biscuites or caraway seeds.  Serve wine, ale or beer, but wine is best.  When your parents have finished clear the table and fold up the cloth.  Then spread a clean towel, bring basin and ewer, and when your parents are ready to wash take up the water.  Don't be rash and pour out more water than necessary.  Then clear the table so that they may rise.  All things done don't forget thy duty, before the table make a low curtesy.'
   The Babees Book EETS Vol. 32

On table manners Seager also gives the advice so popular with the Victorians:

'Silence is metest
In a child at the table.'

The 14th century Lytylle Childrenes Lytil Boke  gives advice on table manners which make medieval children sound remarkably like modern ones:

'Don't pick your ears or nose, or drink with your mouth full, or cram it full.'
      ETS Vol. 32

Perhaps 'Don't pick your teeth with your knife' is no longer necessary.
The author continues:

'Don't spit over on on the table, that's not proper...don't rush at the cheese or throw your bones on the floor...take salt with your knife....'

Trenchers in early, times and poorer households, would be flat hunks of bread though by the Renaissance plates were in use. Forks were also introduced from Italy then; previously everyone ate with their fingers, a knife and maybe a spoon.  It is interesting to see that, contrary to popular belief, the bones were not thrown into the rushes strewn to cover the floor in polite society but put into big dishes or voiders.  Everyone, including children, drank wine., ale or beer, not because they were a nation of alcoholics but because fermented drinks were more wholesome that the water.  Tea and coffee, of course, were still unheard of in Europe.   Salt was kept in a large, lidded container and added to food to make it taste better.

Caxton gives similar advice to Lyttle John:

'Blow not in your drink nor in your potage (soup)
Nor farse (fill) your dish too full of bread
Bear not your knife towards your visage (face)
...Claw not your visage touch not your head
With your bare hand sitting at table...
Lean not upon the table for that rude is
And if I shall to you plainly say
Over the table ye shall not spittle convey.

He adds that famous saying:
'manners make man.'
   Caxton's Book of Curtesy c. 1488  EETS extra series Vol. 3

The Babees Book gives advice which is a lovely mixture of the outdated and the modern:

'lan a clean trencher before you, and eat your broth with a spoon, don;'t sup it up.  Don't leave your spoon in your dish.  Don't lean on the table or dirty the cloth.  Don't hang your head over your dish, or et with a full mouth, or pick your nose, teeth and anils...Don't dip your meat into the salt cellar, or put your knife in your mouth...Eat properly.
     EETS Vol. 32.

Dining at home 17th century Roxburghe Ballads, ed. J.O. Collier 1847

Contemporary accounts of life in the courts of nobles and princes show it to have been colourful, rich and highly formalised, like a splendid pageant.  On the other hand, as these books of advice indicate, it was also crude and dirty.  The medieval and Renaissance page must have moved from one extreme to the other, as his parents did, and although here and there we may see similarities, would have been much rougher and tougher than the modern child of equivalent background.  It is easy forget when reading such familiar advice on how to behave at table that these children soon grew into powerful, ruthless over-mighty subjects who frequently plunged the country into chaos over their quarrels, and were the leaders of the private armies the king drew on for his foreign wars.  The niceties of the chivalric code might make life more pleasant when they were at peace, but the real business of boys, when they grew up, was fighting.   Edward the Black Prince went on his first campaign with his father Edward III at the age of 15, as a squire, having attended numerous tournaments and mock fights from an early age.  He saw no important fighting on this occasion, but the following year, 1346, he played an important part in the Battle of Crecy and was knighted.  Knighthoods were normally granted to several of the most deserving squires after a victorious battle.

Life as a Page

'......And teach him to harp
With his nails sharp
Before me to carve
And of the cup serve...'
    Caxton's Book of Curteseye, c. 1488, ed. F.J. Furnival. EETS extra series vol. 3 1868

The education of upper class boys was mainly intended to fit them for leadership, particularly in war. Consequently great emphasis was placed on physical sports, hunting and fighting.  Gradually more scholarly subjects and skills such as music, dancing and poetry were gradually added to the curriculum as they were seen to be useful for the advancement of a gentleman's career in more peaceful times.

Dutch family group, 1655, Michiel Nouts, National Gallery

In the early 14th century poem Ipomydone there is a description of a child's education:
'Tholomew a clerk he took,
That taught the child upon the book
Both to sing and to read;
And after he taught him other deed.
Afterward, to serve in hall
Both to great and to small;
Before the king meat to carve
High and low fare to serve
Both of hounds' and hawks' game
After, he taught him all; and same
In sea, in field and also in river
In wood to chase the wild deer
And in filed to ride a stead
That all men had joy of his deed,'
            Life of Ipomydone, Harleian MS 52, in Strutt, Sports and Pastimes of the People of England
            Vol. 1, 1810.

The life of a lord's page is fairly well documented in the many books of manners written to guide little boys on the thorny path from snivelling infant to noble squire with his first proper sword, at about age fourteen.
These are fun for what they say by implication about behaviour.  This for example, is advice for coping with a runny nose.

'Blow not your nose on the napkin
where you should wipe your hand
But cleanse it with your handkercher'
    Hugh Rhodes, Booke of Nurture and Schoole of Good Manners, 1577.  EETS original series vol. 32

William Caxton, who introduced printing to England,  advised his son, 'Lytle John':

'If thy nose thou cleanse, as may befall,
Look thy hand thou cleanse withall
Ptivily with skirt do it away
Or else through thy tepet (tabard) that is so gay'
  ...........
'Kemp your head and look you keep it clean
Your ears twain suffer not foul to be
In your visage wait no spot be seen
Purge your nose, let no man in it see
the file matter it is none honesty
Nor with your bare hand no filth from it fetch
For that is foul and an uncourteous teach
Your hands wash it is an unwholesome thing
Your nails look they be not jetty black...'
    Caxton: The Boke of Curtasye, ed. J.O. Halliwell, Percy Soc. Tracts Vol. 4, 1849

Here is John Russell's rules for the pages he had to train from Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, Henry V's brother:

'Don't claw your head and back as ager a flea, or stroke and pick your hair as if after a louse.  See that your eyes are not blinking and watery.  Don't pick your nose or let it drip.  Don't sniff or blow it too loud lest your sovereign hear. Don't twist your neck.  Don't put your hands in your breeches to scratch your private parts nor pick or fiddle or shrug.  Don't rub your hands, pick your ears, retch or spit too far, or laugh loudly,,,Don't squirt or spout with your mouth, gape, pout or lick your tongue in the dish.  Don't sigh or cough before your sovereign.  Don't hiccup or belch or groan. Don't straddle your legs or rub with your body.  Good son, don't pick, grind or gnash your teeth or cast stinking breath on your sovereign, and always beware of farting...a man might find many other improprieties not named here...'
    John Russell, The Boke of Nurtur Folowynng Englondis Gise c. 1447. EETS Vol 32.

   
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