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The hunt was the characteristic leisure activity of the aristocratic class in the High Middle Ages, and it was both a practical pursuit and a ritual one. The hunt provided the lord with meat for his household, and it provided the young men of the household with an opportunity to develop the skills of arms — riding, swordsmanship, the use of the bow — that they would need in war. The hunt was also a ritual of aristocratic identity, an assertion of the lord’s authority over the landscape and the beasts of the chase. The literature of the period — the chansons de geste, the romances, the courtesy books — is full of references to the hunt, and the art of the period is full of depictions of the hunt in all its forms.
The standard treatment is John Cummins, “The Hound and the Hawk: The Art of Medieval Hunting” (1988). The page below uses it, and the surviving hunting treatises (the Livre de chasse of Gaston Phébus, 1387–89, the De arte bersandi of Edward, Duke of York, c. 1410) as primary material.
The Beasts of the Chase
The beasts of the chase were the various animals that were hunted by the aristocracy of the High Middle Ages. The most prized were the deer — both the red deer and the fallow deer — and the hunting of deer was reserved for the aristocracy. The boar was a more dangerous quarry, and the hunting of the boar was a test of courage and skill. The wolf was hunted as a pest, but the hunting of the wolf was also a ritual of aristocratic authority. The fox and the hare were hunted with hounds, and the coursing of the hare was a particularly aristocratic form of the hunt.
The birds of the chase were also hunted. The falcon and the hawk were used to hunt small game — the partridge, the pheasant, the quail, the duck, and other birds — and the falconer was a major figure in the aristocratic household. The falconry was a highly developed art in the medieval period, and the great treatises on falconry — the De Arte Venandi cum Avibus of Frederick II (c. 1240s), the Livre du Roy Modus of Henri de Ferrières (c. 1370s) — are major works of medieval literature.
The Methods of the Hunt
The methods of the hunt varied according to the game and the terrain. The bow and arrow was the most common weapon, and the archer would shoot from a distance. The sword and the spear were used for the close encounter, and the hunting of the boar typically involved a final confrontation with a spear. The falcon and the hawk were used for the hunting of small game, and the falconer was a major figure in the aristocratic household. The hound — the greyhound, the mastiff, the bloodhound, the talbot — was used for the tracking and the killing of the game, and the master of the hounds was a major officer of the household.
The hunt was typically a collective enterprise, involving the lord and his household — the knights, the squires, the huntsmen, the falconers, and the servants of the household. The hunt was organized by the master of the hunt, who directed the huntsmen and the hounds and who supervised the killing of the game. The hunt was a major social event, and it was a ritual of the aristocratic class that reinforced the values of courage, skill, and fellowship.
The Forest Law
The forest was a major subject of the lord’s authority, and the forest law was a special body of law that governed the use of the forest. The forest law was enforced by the forest courts, presided over by the lord or his forest officials. The forest law reserved the hunting of deer and boar for the lord, and it imposed severe penalties for poaching. The forest law also regulated the use of the forest for pannage (the right to feed pigs in the forest), estover (the right to gather wood for fuel and building), turbary (the right to cut turf for fuel), and other customary uses.
The forest was a major source of revenue for the lord. The timber and the charcoal were sold to the towns, the pannage was leased to the peasants, and the venison and the fur were consumed by the household. The forest also provided grazing for the lord’s livestock, and the forest’s products — honey, wax, mushrooms, nuts, berries — were an important part of the diet of the household.
The forest was also a place of refuge for outlaws and rebels. The legend of Robin Hood is set in the forest of Sherwood, and the legend of Hereward the Wake is set in the fenlands of eastern England. The forest was a place where the lord’s authority was weakened and where the outlaw could live in defiance of the lord’s law. The outlaw was a major figure in the literature of the period — the Robin Hood ballads, the Hereward cycle, the Fouke le Fitz Waryn romance — and the outlaw was a symbol of resistance to aristocratic authority.
The Tournament
The tournament was a major feature of aristocratic life, and it was a form of martial exercise that combined sport with social display. The tournament was at first a free-for-all, with the knights of different lords jousting against each other in a kind of mock battle. The tournament gradually became more formalized, with rules of engagement, designated lists, and judges to determine the winners. The tournament was a major source of revenue for the knights who participated in it, and it was a major source of reputation for the knights who distinguished themselves in it.
The hunt was closely tied to the heraldic system. The coat of arms — a distinctive combination of colors, charges, and ordinaries — was developed to identify the knight in battle and in the tournament, and the herald — an official charged with the regulation of the tournament and the recording of the arms — became a major figure in aristocratic life. The heraldic visitations of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries recorded the arms of the knights of the realm, and the heraldic rolls are major sources for the history of the medieval aristocracy.
The tournament was also a major social event. The tournament was a major gathering of the aristocracy of the region, and it was a major occasion for socializing, feasting, dancing, and courtship. The tournament was a ritual of the aristocratic class that reinforced the values of courage, skill, and chivalry, and it was a major part of the aristocratic life of the period.
Other Forms of Aristocratic Leisure
The hunt and the tournament were the most characteristic forms of aristocratic leisure, but they were not the only ones. The aristocratic leisure of the High Middle Ages also included falconry, horse-racing, dice-games, board-games (especially chess), music, poetry, dancing, feasting, and conversation. The aristocrat who was skilled in the various forms of leisure was admired by his peers, and the aristocrat who was deficient in these skills was ridiculed and shamed.
The chess was a major form of aristocratic leisure, and the chess game was a symbolic representation of the medieval social order. The chess game was played with pieces that represented the various ranks of medieval society — the king, the queen, the bishop, the knight, the rook (or castle), and the pawn — and the chess game was a symbolic representation of the battle between the forces of order and the forces of chaos. The chess game was a major intellectual activity of the aristocratic class, and the great chess players of the period were admired for their skill and their intelligence.
The music and poetry of the period were also major forms of aristocratic leisure. The troubadour of southern France and the trouvère of northern France composed songs of courtly love and heroic deeds that were performed in the aristocratic courts of the period. The great poets of the period — Bernart de Ventadorn, Conon de Béthune, Chrétien de Troyes, Marie de France — composed works that were performed and admired in the aristocratic courts of Europe. The music of the period was also an important part of the aristocratic life, and the aristocrat who was skilled in music and poetry was admired for his sensitivity and his refinement.
Sources
Principal sources used in this article:
- Georges Duby, The Chivalrous Society (Arnold, 1977).
Further reading:
- Robert Bartlett, England Under the Norman and Angevin Kings (2000), ch. 6.
For a recent single-volume synthesis with full scholarly apparatus, see the relevant chapter of Barbara H. Rosenwein, A Short History of the Middle Ages (University of Toronto Press, 2014).