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.
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