generally in an iron grate[1] in the centre of the room, under an opening, or louvre[2], in the roof for the escape of smoke. These grates were sometimes of vast dimensions. There is yet extant an order by King John for the erection of two furnaces in his kitchens at Marlborough and Ludgershall, each to be sufficiently large to roast two or three oxen[3]. Contemporary writers tell us that John was a bon-vivant and something more, although it may be doubted if the best specimen of the cuisine of his time would tempt a modern gourmet.
The method of roasting at these grates is shewn in the Bayeux tapestry; the spit seems to have revolved above the fire[4]. The profuse hospitality of the old time, when guests were often numbered by hundreds, rendered it necessary on great occasions to construct temporary kitchens. At the coronation of Edward the First, one of extraordinary size was built at Westminster, and from the builder's account, which is still preserved, we gain the unpleasant information that the boiled meats placed before the king's guests were prepared in leaden vessels[5]; no Accum had then arisen to detect "death in the pot." The ancient batterie de cuisine was by no means extensive; a writer of the thirteenth century has enumerated the articles considered necessary in his time; among them the ladle, peculiar ensign of the cook,
"The cook is yscaldit for al his longe ladil,"
occupies a conspicuous place[6], as well as the pestle and mortar.
It is not necessary to lead the reader through all the offices nearly allied to the kitchen; a good larder in ancient days was doubtless a pleasant apartment, especially a royal one, when the king held his Cour-plenière, crammed with herons, cranes, swans, and venison, in picturesque confusion, with lampreys and salmon from the Severn, and some exquisite morsels of blubber from the whale and porpoise.
- ↑ Caminum ferreum. Fire-places against the wall are sometimes represented in the little paintings which occur in the Kalendars of Missals, under the winter months. Among other drawings in which it occurs we may refer to a curious miniature in a French missal of the fifteenth century, representing the master of the house seated at dinner on a form with a long rail at the back, to which is suspended a circular wicker fire-screen, exactly resembling those now in use. Douce MS., 80. fo. 1. It is clear from existing remains that flues were constructed in the 14th and 15th centuries, if not earlier.
- ↑ Also called a ventaille. See Rot. Claus., p. 576.
- ↑ Ibid., p. 52.
- ↑ A very early representation of "boiling the pot" is engraved by Strutt. Horda &c., vol. i. pl. xvii. fig. 1.
- ↑ Rot. Pip. 1. Edw. I.
- ↑ Alex. Necham, "De nominibus utensilium," Cotton MS. Titus D xx.
