Medieval Hunting (6 page)

The dedications and introductions in medieval hunting manuals distinctly reveal the exclusive class nature of the chase. Gaston Fébus dedicated his
Livre de chasse
to Philip the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, another noted hunter and one of the uncles of the young king Charles VI.
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Edward, Duke of York, dedicated
The Master of Game
to King Henry IV's eldest son, Henry of Monmouth, Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall and Earl of Chester.
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The Shirley manuscript of
The Master of Game
concludes that ‘þis lytell tretys' should be ‘alwey to be submitted under þe correccoun of gentyle hunters', and the craft and terms are given ‘openly to þe knowledge of alle lordes, ladyes, gentylmen and wymmen'.
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In the Prologue of
The Master of Game
, Edward praises both hunting and hawking as noble pursuits, avowing ‘this book shall be all of hunting, which is so noble a game' and ‘hawking with gentle hounds and hawks for the heron and the river be noble and commendable'.
²⁰

In his introduction to the late fifteenth-century manual
The Boke of Saint Albans
, William Blades comments that the subjects of hawking, hunting and heraldry were ‘those with which, at this period, every man claiming to be “gentle” was expected to be familiar; while ignorance of their laws and language was to confess himself a “churl”'.
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The alleged authoress of this popular manual, Dame Juliana Berners, stated in her introduction to the treatise on hawking that ‘In so mach that gentill men and honest persones have greete delite in hauking . . . . Therefore thys book fowlowyng in a dew forme shewys veri knowlege of such plesure to gentill men and þ[er]sonys disposed to se itt.'
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Similarly, her introduction to the treatise on hunting reads ‘to sych gentill personys the maner of huntyng for all maner of beestys'.
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The Boke of Saint Albans
was the first hunting treatise to be printed in England and was reprinted twenty-two times between 1486 and 1615.
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Its influence upon the hunting fraternity must have been enormous. Of later date, 1575, but continuing this same tradition, George Turbervile says he wrote his book,
The Booke of Faulconrie or Hauking
‘for the Onely Delight and pleasure of all Noblemen and Gentlemen',
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and he mentions in his dedication ‘I know sundry Gentlemen (my great friends) deeply addicted to that commendable sport of hawking'.
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Even the reader is addressed by the printer as ‘Gentle Reader',
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a convention probably originally based upon the gentle status of the reading audience.

John Cummins makes the point that medieval hunting manuals written in English tend to be ‘pervaded by the procedural and linguistic snobbery' which excludes the rest of society.
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This is certainly true. In her edition of the fifteenth-century
The Tretyse off Huntyng
, which concentrates more on esoteric matters and procedure than on the practical considerations of the chase, Anne Rooney comments on the non-pragmatic aspects of the English manuals ‘Hunting to support life does not need the details with which the hunting manuals concern themselves; these are instead the features of the medieval chase which made it courtly and non-utilitarian.'
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These two opinions from eminent scholars support the view that for people of high or gentle birth, hunting, with its specialised vocabulary, symbols, motifs and above all, its social significance was an integral part of their lives. It does seems likely that this ‘procedural and linguistic snobbery' was an indication that the gentle authors, and hence their audiences, were making a strenuous attempt to make or preserve hunting and hawking as exclusive pursuits of élite groups who felt they were under some pressure from less prestigious, but socially mobile, groups. The 1390 Statute of the Realm in which Richard II decreed that hunting with hounds, ferrets and snares of various types was prohibited to those who lacked ‘lands and tenements to the value of 40s a year, or any priest or clerk if he has not preferment worth £10'
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reflects this pre-occupation of the ruling classes with maintaining the perceived status quo. The statute tells us in the clearest terms that other classes were hunting, possibly in aristocratic ways, certainly for aristocratic quarry including deer and hares, and that by so doing, the commons were challenging the ancient privilege of those whose status was based upon that most incontestable of measures, land ownership and occupation. Even the stated commonalty types of hunting, such as the use of ferrets and snares, were now to be restricted to those permitted to hunt. This was a positive and punitive attempt by the king to restrict all hunting to the ruling classes, a major misjudgement of the common Englishman's perception of his rights to hunt.

This notion of hunting as the exclusive preserve of the aristocracy persisted for several centuries, even in England, arguably one of the more ‘democratic' European nations.
The Institucion of a Gentleman
, an anonymous tract published in 1568, makes this very point:

There is a saying among hunters that he cannot be a gentlemen which loveth not hawking and hunting, which I have heard old woodmen [yeomen foresters] well allow as an approved sentence among them. The like saying is that he cannot be a gentleman which loveth not a dog.
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In 1653 Izaak Walton included a commendation of hunting in
The Complete Angler
‘Hunting is a game for princes and noble persons; it hath been highly prized in all ages.' Interestingly, Walton then cites the medieval conventional justifications, or functions, of the chase, demonstrating the entrenched attitudes and continuity of aristocratic mores:

Hunting trains up the younger nobility to the use of manly exercises in their riper age. What more manly exercise than hunting the Wild Boar, the Stag, the Buck, the Fox, or the Hare? How doth it preserve health, and increase strength and activity!
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For the English gentry, hunting and hawking methodology remained largely unchanged well into the seventeenth century. This is evidenced by the remarkable, possibly unique, cycle of wall paintings in the Turret Room at Madingley Hall near Cambridge, dated to between 1605 and 1633. The murals probably depict current practices and consist of bear hunting, boar hunting and hawking, plus two panels of decorative work, almost certainly commissioned by Sir Edward Hynde, the owner between these dates and a known enthusiast for hawking and animal-baiting.
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In both the bear and boar hunting scenes, gentleman-hunters on horseback and more plainly dressed servants on foot use spears to slay the beasts which are being attacked by mastiffs and greyhounds. Bear-baiting was a popular entertainment and this particular bear provided the quarry for an unusual day's hunting. By this date, wild boar were long extinct in England and park-bred animals were used for hunting. The hawking mural illustrates a classic scene: hounds put up a partridge for a mounted falconer (incomplete) while a gentleman on horseback flies his bird at a mallard on the river.

The aristocratic involvement in hunting is, of course, indisputable. The textual evidence is not only provided by the hunting manuals; the hunting theme also commonly occurs in romantic and imaginative European literature. Its symbolism, the imagery of hunting and the hunting motif, all appear frequently in late medieval romances, narratives and stories. The hunt is often used as a vehicle for a hero on a journey or quest, the flight of the animal leading him to the next stage of an adventure.
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This usage of hunting, one of the main activities of the upper classes, is hardly surprising as authorship of romantic and imaginative literature was almost invariably aristocratic and the intended and actual audience courtly, noble or of gentle birth. The invariably aristocratic authors included the material of a pastime which was familiar to their predominantly élite audience, weaving the theme of the hunt, with its recognisable progression and procedures, in with the less tangible topics of love, magic and religion. The chase as a narrative agent in aristocratic romances was thus infinitely flexible to the subject matter and apposite to a courtly audience.

Even the patron saint of hunting was portrayed as a member of the nobility, emphasising the exclusive nature of hunting. The legend of the conversion of St Eustace, or Eustachius, to Christianity was well-known and a subject illustrated by several medieval and Renaissance painters, including Pisanello and Dürer. The story of Eustace is told in the
Golden Legend
and, briefly, is as follows. Placidus was a member of a distinguished Roman family and an officer of the Emperor Trajan, well known for his charitable works. While out hunting, he was transfixed by the vision of a stag at bay, a fine hart, supporting a glowing cross and an image of Christ between its antlers. Through the hart, or the image, Christ then spoke to Placidus:

O Placidus, why are you pursuing me? For your sake I have appeared to you in this animal. I am the Christ whom you worship without knowing it. Your alms have risen before me, and for this purpose I have come, that through this which you hunted, I myself might hunt you.

The religious symbolism of the vision is interesting as the hunted beast can be compared to Christ who, in a role-reversal of hunter and prey, is actually hunting the pagan Placidus in order to convert him.

Placidus was at once converted to Christianity and changed his name to Eustachius, afterwards modernised to Eustace.
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Some time later, Eustace, his wife and two sons, were put to death as Christians under Hadrian in
AD
118. His feast day in the Roman Catholic calendar is 20 September.
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A similar visionary conversion story applies to the equivalent of St Eustace in Germany, St Hubert of Tongres. He too was an aristocrat, said to have been a nobleman of Aquitaine and employed at the Court of Pepin of Heristal. Bishop Hubert converted many heathens to Christianity and performed several miracles. He died in
AD
727 and his relics were enshrined in the ninth century in St Hubert's Abbey in the Ardennes. The feast of St Hubert is 3 November.
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The Vision of Saint Eustace
was painted by Pisanello between 1438 and 1442, not as an altarpiece or mere narrative of the religious event but to demonstrate to his patron his remarkable skill in depicting animals, particularly those associated with aristocratic hunting. It appears from the style and pose of some of the animals that Pisanello's painting was informed by personal knowledge of the illuminations in
Livre de chasse
, and other key hunting treatises.
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For example, the bear at the upper right-hand side of the painting appears to have been derived directly from the animal being hunted by Gaston Fébus in MS fr. 616 and also closely resembles the bears which appear earlier in the same manuscript.
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Significantly,
Le Livre du roy Modus et de la royne Ratio
describes the vision of St Eustace in detail and links the ten tines of the hart to the Ten Commandments. Copies of
Roy Modus
and
Livre de chasse
were in plentiful supply at this time and were known in Italy.
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Pisanello was a meticulous observer and painter of animals so it appears inevitable that he used such canonical manuscript illustrations as a basis for his hunting studies.

The rank and high status of Eustace is firmly established and maintained by Pisanello in three ways. Firstly, by the quarry, a magnificent hart; other noble quarry also feature in the picture, another hart, a hind, a fallow buck, a doe, a hare (being coursed by a greyhound) and a brown bear. Secondly, by the aristocratic method of hunting: on horseback with hounds, several specific types of which are shown including two greyhounds or gazehounds, two scenting or running hounds which were particularly useful in hunting stags, two alaunts and two spaniels, usually used for flushing small game, partridge and quail.
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Thirdly, by the dress of Placidus: a golden fur-trimmed jacket and a extravagant blue headdress, the height of fifteenth-century court fashion. He carries a decorated hunting horn with gilded mounts and wears long rowelled gilded spurs, the latter denoting his knightly rank. Pisanello has painted not a Roman centurion but a fifteenth-century Renaissance prince, out hunting alone with his hounds.
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In reality, solitary hunting of this variety did not, and practically could not, occur. However, here the rest of the hunt, comprising other noble hunters, professional hunters and hunt servants was irrelevant to the main subject of the painting. Pisanello may well have been depicting his patron as St Eustace, but the patron and exact date of this small panel painting remain unknown.
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The symbolism and icons of hunting and aristocratic love have long fascinated scholars of Middle English and European literature; much has been written on this very complex and esoteric subject. Romances and imaginative literature are brimful of imagery for the initiated. So, for example, the hart can represent a lover, his lady, desire, thoughts, longevity, and even, as has been shown, Christ himself.
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The imagery of animals very much depended upon the situation or need. The coney or rabbit was associated with women and the hound with men, a clear and erotic connection which can be seen in a number of manuscripts.
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However, it is the exclusive nature of aristocratic hunting and aristocratic love which is under discussion here, and Michael Camille's masterly interpretation of an illuminated page of a late thirteenth-century French songbook or
Chansonnier
illustrates this point superbly. The page of music, words and visual scenes is of a complex motet for three voices by Pierre de la Croix concerning love's sorrows and delays. The illustrations relate to each voice, the
triplum
,
duplum
and
tenor
. The hunting/love motifs are explicit and Camille comments ‘The lady fondles her own smirking rabbit and her lord's thigh while he strokes his puppy and places his white-gloved hand on the lady's shoulder'.
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The
bas-de-page
illustration is of stag-hunting, featuring an archer, hound and mounted hunter, viewed by another grinning rabbit. Obviously, to read such a complicated picture with its multilayered and hidden messages successfully, the medieval audience would have been expected to be educated and well-versed in such interpretations. This view is borne out by the comments of the medieval musical theorist Johanees de Grocheo, who claimed that such motets could not be appreciated by the common people, but were ‘for the learned' and ‘those seeking subtleties in the arts'.
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