Indentures mention is made of "j. barell ferrat' pro armaturis Regis mundaiidis, j. grate do acere pro armaturis Regis nunulandis."
The Marescallia or Marshalsea occurs next to the Hall, and its contents were limited to gyves and other appliances of a prison, one of the proper functions of the Marshal having been the punishment of offenders. The Marshalsea Tower, or Peverells Tower, still exists. We here find a pair of "boefs," or, as written in another indenture, "de beoves ad prisonas mancipandos." The word occurs also as "boves, "in the French documents "beofs—boefs." This was doubtless a collistrirgium, a yoke for the neck, a kind of pillory. Its name must be derived from its resemblance to the yoke for oxen, sometimes called an oxe-bow.[1] Plautus uses the word Boiæe, signifying fetters for the neck of a prisoner; it occurs likewise frequently in mediaeval writers, and in old French Bides has the same meaning.[2] In regard to the "paria fergiarum," or, as in another indenture, "fugearum," it appears by the French documents that they were gyves, fetters for the legs, but the term has not been found elsewhere.
The limits of our present purpose will not admit of the endeavour fully to explain the numerous archaisms and technical terms occurring in these documents. In the inventory of the Forge, especially, there are some terms of the craft which we must leave to those who may be conversant with such details. It is singular to observe that no stores are mentioned indicating that any provision of food was made for the inmates of the castle, with the exception only of honey, of which a considerable quantity appears amongst the contents of the Great Tower, in every indenture which has been examined. It was probably used for making mead. There was a windmill, and hand-mills, but we find no store of any grain or other provisions.
The most curious portion of the indentures under consideration is that occurring under the head of the "Domus Armorura," — the old Arsenal, in which even in the times of Elizabeth her chaplain Darell saw arms so ancient that they had been commonly regarded as Roman. Amongst the munitions enumerated in the foregoing documents we are struck by the variety of crossbows and missiles appertaining to the more simple mode of warfare practised in earlier times. It may safely be assumed that gunpowder was used in the campaign of Edward III. in 1346, as has been shown by the Rev. Joseph Hunter in a valuable memoir communicated to the Society of Antiquaries.[3] The earliest of these documents, however, which I have had the opportunity of examining, in which any allusion occurs to this important change in mediaeval warfare, is found in the indenture between William Latimer and Andrew Guldefurd, late constable of Dover Castle, dated April 1, 46 Edw. III. (1372.) We here find amongst the munitions of the fortress — "cc. garbas sagittarura. vj. gonnes."
Amongst numerous items in the Arsenal deserving of consideration, there are two to which I must briefly advert. One of these is the mention of a kind of head-piece, as far as I am aware hitherto unnoticed, — " xij.
- ↑ " Boia, quasi jugura bovis." Isidorus. Palsgrave gives the term " Oxe bowe that gothe about his necke, Collier de beuf." Eclaireissement de la langue Fi'ancoyse.
- ↑ See Ducange, under Boia, Boga, Bodia, &c.; and his Dissertation xx. on Joinville, where he shows that the old French Buies were identical with Boiæ. Villaneus terms them Bove.
- ↑ Archæologia, vol. xxxii. p. 379.
