118 KNIGHTHOOD woods and rivers," or in other words the rules and prac tices of hunting and hawking. When he was between fifteen and sixteen he became a squire. But no sudden or great alteration was made in his mode of life. He con tinued to wait at dinner with the pages, although in a manner more dignified according to the notions of the age. He not only served but carved and helped the dishes, proffered the first or principal cup of wine to his master and his guests, and carried to them the basin, ewer, or napkin when they washed their hands before and after meat. He assisted in clearing the hall for dancing or minstrelsy, and laid the tables for chess or draughts, and he also shared in the pastimes for which he had made preparation. He brought his master the "vin de coucher" at night, and made his early refection ready for him in the morning. But his military exercises and athletic sports occupied an always increasing portion of the day. He accustomed himself to ride the " great horse," to tilt at the quintain, to wield the sword and battle-axe, to swim and climb, to run and leap, and to bear the weight and overcome the embarrassments of armour. He inured him self to the vicissitudes of heat and cold, and voluntarily suffered the pains or inconveniences of hunger and thirst, fatigue, and sleeplessness. It was then too that he chose his " lady-love," whom he was expected to regard with an adoration at once earnest, respectful, and the more meri torious if concealed. And when it was considered that he had made sufficient advancement in his military accom plishments, he took his sword to the priest, who laid it on the altar, blessed it, and returned it to him. 1 Afterwards he either remained with his early master, relegating most of his domestic duties to his younger companions, or he entered the service of some valiant and adventurous lord or knight of his own selection. He now became a " squire of the body," and truly an "armiger" or "scutifer," for he bore the shield and armour of his leader to the field, and, what was a task of no small difficulty and hazard, cased and secured him in his panoply of war before assisting him to mount his courser or charger. It was his function also to display and guard in battle the banner of the baron or banneret or the pennon of the knight he served, to raise him from the ground if he were unhorsed, to supply him with another or his own horse if his was disabled or killed, to receive and keep any prisoners he might take, to fight by his side if he was unequally matched, to rescue him if captured, to bear him to a place of safety if wounded, and to bury him honourably when dead. And after he had worthily and bravely borne himself for six or seven years as a squire, the time came when it was fitting that he should be made a knight. Modes of Two modes of conferring knighthood appear to have confer- prevailed from a very early period in all countries where knWit chivalry was known. In both of them the essential hooTl portion seems to have been the accolade. But while in the one the accolade constituted the whole or nearly the whole of the ceremony, in the other it was surrounded with many additional observances. As soon as we have any historical evidence of their separate and distinct existence, we discover them as severally appropriated, the first to time of war and the second to time of peace. 2 1 Sainte Palaye, Memoires, vol. i. p. 11 sq. : "C est peut-etre a cette ceremonie et non a celles de la chevalerie qu on doit rapporter ce qui se lit dans nos Mstoriens de la premiere et de la seconde race au sujet des premieres armes que les Eois et les Princes remettoient avec solemnite au jeunes Princes leurs enfans." 2 There are several obscure points as to the relation of the longer and shorter ceremonies, as well as the origin and original relation of their several parts. There is nothing to show whence came "dubbing " or the "accolade." It seems certain that the word "dub" means to strike, and the usage is as old as the knighting of Henry by William the Conqueror (supra, pp. Ill, 112). So, too, in the empire a dubbed In one of the oldest records of chivalry quoted by Selden, under the heading of "Comment on doitfaire et creer ung Chivalier," it is stated that, " quant ung Escuier que a longement voyage et este en plusiers faicts d armes et que a de quoy entretenir son estate et qu il est de grant maison et rich et qu il se trouve en un battaile on recounter il doit adviser le chiefe de 1 anno ou vaillant chivalier. Alors doit venir devant luy et demander chivalier au noin de Dieu et de Sainct George donnez moy le ordre et le dit chivalier cu chiefe de guerre doit tirer 1 espee nue vers le diet demaundeur et doit dire en frappant trois fois sur iceuly : Je te fais chivalier au nom de Dieu et de nion seigneur Sainct George, pour la foy et justice loyalment garder et 1 eglise, femes, vesves, et orphelins defender." 3 But the words of creation were various as well as the words of the exhortation. Sometimes the first were " avaucez chevalier au nom de Dieu," or " au nom de Dieu, Saint Michel, et Saint George je te fais chevalier"; and the second "soyez preux, hardi, et loyal," "be a good knight in the name of God"; or " soyez bon chevalier," or "be a good knight," merely. In this form a number of knights were made before and after almost every battle between the llth and the IGth centuries, and its advantages on the score of both convenience and economy gradually led to its general adoption both in time of peace and time of war. On extraordinary occasions indeed the more elaborate ritual continued to be observed. But recourse was had to it so rarely that among us about the beginning of the 15th century it came to be exclusively appropriated to a special kind of knighthood. When Segar, garter king of arms, wrote in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, this had been accomplished with such completeness that he does not even mention that there were two ways of creating knights bachelors. " He that is to be made a knight," he says, " is striken by the prince with a sword drawn upon his back or shoulder, the prince saying, Soys Chevalier, and in times past was added Saint George. And when the knight rises the prince sayeth Avencez. This is the manner of dubbing knights at this present, and that term dubbing was the old term in this point, not creating. This sort of knights are by the heralds called knights bachelors." 4 In our days when a knight is personally made he kneels before the sovereign, who lays a sword drawn, ordinarily the sword of state, on either of hid shoulders, and says, " Bise," calling him by his Christian name with the addition of " Sir " before it. 5 Very different were the solemnities which attended the creation of a knight when the complete procedure was observed. " The ceremonies and circumstances at the giving this dignity," says Selden, "in the elder time were of two kinds especially, which we may call courtly and sacred. The courtly were the feasts held at the creation, giving of robes, arms, spurs, and the like, whence in the stories of other nations so in those of ours armis militaribus donare or cingulo militari, and such more phrases are the same with militem facere or to make a knight. The sacred were the holy devotions and knight is " ritter geschlagen." The " accolade " may etyrnologically refer to the embrace, accompanied by a blow with the hand, charac teristic of the longer form of knighting. The derivation of " adouber," corresponding to " ub," from " adoptare," which is given by Du Cange, and would connect the ceremony with "adoptio per arnia," is certainly inaccurate. The investiture with arms, which formed a part of the longer form of knighting, and which we have seen to rest on very ancient usage, may originally have had a distinct meaning. We have observed that Lanfranc invested Henry I. with arms, while William "dubbed him to rider." If there was a difference in the meaning of the two ceremonies, the difficulty as to the knighting of Earl Harold (supra, p. 112) is at least partly removed. 3 Titles of Honor , p. 455 ; ib., 365. 4 Segar, Honor Civil and Militari/, p. 74. 5 Nicolas, nriti.th Orders of Knighthood, p. vii.
