Medieval Society

The Knightly Ethic

Here we enter into that curious area known as "chivalry." The word does not mean merely politeness, which is about all that's left to the word nowadays. Nor does it mean a cartoonish Sir Galahad who is chivalrous because he's nice to ladies.

The word derives from cheval, which is French for horse. To be chivalrous literally meant to behave as a horseman, which is to say as a knight. There are some characteristics that we can identify as belonging to chivalry. We get these both from literature and from observation of individual knights in the historical record.

Stated very generally, the knightly ethic in earlier centuries was rough-and-ready. It dealt mainly with how one behaved on the battlefield. Starting in the twelfth century, two layers were added and blended into this ethic. One concerned how the knight should behave at court (this is where behavior towards women comes in). The other concerned how the knight should behave with respect to the Church. Troubador poetry, the Crusades, and a richer court life all contributed to developing these additional layers, and none of that can be dated to the centuries before 1100.

The key words or concepts that I'll treat with here are: courtesy, glory, honor, liberality, loyalty, and prowess. It is also important to recognize that these values applied only to the noble knights, and that the ethics were intended to govern relationships between knights, and had nothing at all to say about relations of knights with commoners.

Courtesy

To be courteous means to behave as if one were at court, to be courtly. This was an ideal to be better than was usual with knights. In the beginning, it had nothing whatever to do with behavior toward ladies or with what we call manners.

Originally, courtesy meant the special consideration one knight showed to another. For example, a knight should always give his noble opponent an even chance, never attacking one who was unarmed.

If you defeat a knight, you don't kill him; rather, you release him on his parole, his sworn word, with a promise to pay a ransom. This practice enabled many a knight errant to earn his keep at tournaments.

The courteous knight honored brave opponents, recognizing prowess and courage. If a knight captured a great lord, he was expected to treat the man according to his rank. When the English captured King Jean at the Battle of Poitiers, they put him up in fine London quarters, allowed him to attend court functions, and permitted French visitors. That was courteous.

Only later, from the 12th century on, courtesy was extended to the ladies and was expanded to the ethic of courtly love. We often use the word chivalry to mean only this, but the word chivalry is merely the French word for "knight" or "knighthood" and embraces all the qualities of that rank.

Still later, the impulse of courtly love led to acquisition of the gentle arts, such as singing, dancing and poetry. By the late Middle Ages, we begin to see the transformation of the European aristocracy from knights to gentlemen; that is, a shift from an emphasis on warfare and its attendant skills and virtues, to an emphasis on peaceful pursuits.

Glory

Glory is akin to our notion of fame, but it has a distinctly martial tone to it. Glory meant prestige, for one's self and for one's family, but that prestige was won through deeds done in combat. Glory could also be won by pious donations or other public acts, but warfare was by far the most important source.

Glory was the public testimony of one's prowess. Glory could be won at tournaments or in war; the more prestigious the event, the more opportunity for winning glory. The phrase itself is telling: glory was a prize won on the battlefield, like plunder.

It was therefore important for a knight to have opportunities for winning glory. The battle itself might go either way, but the individual knight would be satisfied only if he had his chance at glory. This was one more factor in undermining discipline on the battlefield.

Fighting for glory did not preclude taking every opportunity for making a profit. Indeed, carrying off great piles of loot was itself a glorious act. Plunder showed the depths of the enemy's defeat, and at the same time enabled the knight to distribute gifts to his followers and comrades.

How did a knight become famous?

Through story and song. This meant through the troubadors and minstrels who wandered from court to court. Also through word of mouth among his peers. But if he wanted lasting fame, then only story and song would do.

By the high Middle Ages the written word was another source of lasting glory, and biographies were commissioned, often by sons for their illustrious fathers.

Honor

A knight's honor was the measure of his standing among his peers; it was also what set him apart from the common rabble around him. It marked the gentle man from the common man.

The knight's honor was as real as his castles and he would defend both to the last drop of blood. Honor was perhaps more important, for a castle could be rebuilt, but a stain on one's honor was difficult to remove.

Liberality

Knightly society was a gift-giving society. A lord was expected to give gifts to his followers. These were not only gifts in our sense, but gifts in the sense of honors shown, privileges granted, and wartime plunder shared. Vassals gave gifts to their lords, upon the occasion of visits, upon marriages and knighting ceremonies, at tournaments, and so on. There were also symbolic gifts that recognized and reiterated the lord-vassal relationship: a piece of earth and two horses every year, or some such.

Gifts were exchanged to seal alliances and friendships. Gifts were exchanged among friends. Gifts were sent to accompany embassies and messengers. And all were scaled to suit the honor and nobility of the recipient.

Most knights had no use for a man who lived within his means, for that implied a miserly accounting. The nobility liked to imagine that they were above such matters and that a preoccupation with such mean concerns was characteristic of merchants and townsmen.

Since gifts were a recognition of friendship and nobility, how could a true knight quibble over cost? No, knights admired the man who had bankrupted himself with giving, for that was the true spirit of liberality. As the historian Sidney Painter said, "Long after prowess and loyalty had lost their peculiar applicability to men of high birth, a complete disregard of caution in the use of money was considered the mark of a nobleman." The biographer of William Marshal (13th century) put it this way: "gentillesse is reared in the house of largesse."

Loyalty

Loyalty to one's lord came before everything. A man could be forgiven much, but to betray one's sworn lord was the worst crime a knight could commit.

Everything in knightly society depended upon the reliability of a knight's sworn oath. That's why the giving of an oath was considered sufficient evidence in a court of law. When a lord made war on one of his vassals, or a vassal rebelled against his lord, one reason nearly always cited was that the other party had broken faith--had betrayed the trust.

The language indicates how deeply this sentiment ran in knightly society. Among the various terms used to describe the followers of a lord was vassi dominici--the vassals of the lord. The French word was mesnie and an older Latin word was comitatus. We can translate these words as "the boys", or "gang" or "band". But another term used was truste--that is to say, "the trusted ones".

In a society that was illiterate, as knightly society was, written contracts counted for nothing. The saying ran that, "with pen and ink, one can say anything." Only an oath taken before peers was worth anything. Still, when we look at the historical record, we see betrayals on every hand. Does this mean that all the sworn trusts were a sham? Not at all, for our own society depends on written contracts, notwithstanding the fact that such contracts are sometimes broken. Moreover, oaths kept were usually not worth recording, for that was the norm.

Prowess

To be preux was the bedrock of the night. Courage was part of this, but it really concerned very practical considerations, like a knowledge of and skill with arms. All the other aspects might be weak, but without prowess a knight was merely a pretender.

A true knight was a good judge of weapons. He could use above all the sword, the shield and the lance, although the mace was also popular, in various forms. To maintain this skill required constant practice.

The knight was also knowledgeable about armor. He had his preference as to design, various types, and even manufacturers. Regional styles developed, so that, by the end of the Middle Ages, armor was distinctly Italian or French or English.

To wield these weapons and bear the armor required tremendous physical strength. There were no weight training programs, only practice in the sense of scrimmaging: the repeated actual use of arms.

Thus, when no wars were afoot, knights held games known as tournaments. They also went hunting, which provided practice in riding, use of spears, teamwork, and which also simply afforded physical exercise. And, of course, they participated in wars, either their own or those of their lords.

A 15thc source, writing of M. Boucicaut, the Marshal of France, said that the knight could turn a somersault when fully armed (except for his helmet), and when completely armed could vault onto a horse or climb the underside of a scaling ladder using his hands alone. And 15thc armor was heavy indeed.

The true knight could not fear pain or death, or at least could not show his fear or allow it to interfere with his function as a warrior. Bravery meant above all placing one's own body in jeopardy for the sake of one's lord. It meant charging into a mass of armed men even though outnumbered, trusting in God and one's right arm.

It did not mean having to fight peasants, however; bravery only covered fighting one's equals. In fact, attacking peasants was not combat at all, properly speaking. If peasants got in the way, they should get back out of the way; if they resisted, then they should be killed. Killing peasants brought neither glory nor shame.

All men--that is, all knights--wished to be esteemed men of prowess. "Be preux" said the lord when dubbing a new knight, by which he meant the new knight should exhibit the qualities listed above.