Books: Mediaeval Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus
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Robert Steele >> Mediaeval Lore from Bartholomew Anglicus
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Iceland is the last region in Europe in the north beyond Norway. In
the uttermost parts thereof it is always ice and frozen, and
stretcheth upon the cliff of ocean toward the north, where the sea is
frozen for great and strong cold. And Iceland hath the over Scythia in
the east side, and Norway in the south, and the Irish ocean in the
west, and the sea that is far in the north, and is called Iceland, as
it were the land of ice and of glass. For it is said that there be
mountains of snow froze as hard as ice or glass; there crystal is
found. Also in that region are white bears most great and right
fierce; that break ice and glass with their claws, and make many holes
therein, and dive there-through into the sea, and take fish under the
ice and glass, and draw them out through the same holes, and bring
them to the cliff and live thereby. The land is barren, out-take a few
places in the valleys, in the which places unneth grow oats. In the
places that men dwell in, only grow herbs, grass, and trees. And in
those places breed beasts, tame and wild. And so for the more part men
of the land live by fish and by hunting of flesh. Sheep may not live
there for cold. And therefore men of the land wear, for cold, fells
and skins of bears and of wild beasts that they take with hunting.
Other clothing may they not have, but it come of other lands. The men
are full gross of body and strong and full white, and give them to
fishing and hunting.
V
MEDIAEVAL NATURAL HISTORY--TREES
The seventeenth book of the "De Proprietatibus" deals with the
properties of plants. The sources from which Bartholomew derives his
information are Aristotle and Albertus Magnus' Gloss on the "De
Vegetalibus," Albumazar, Pliny, Isaac on Foods, Hugo, and the
Platearius. The text professes to deal with those trees and plants
alone which are mentioned in the Gloss, but many others are
incidentally mentioned, and we are thus enabled to learn the chief
food-stuffs of our ancestors. The cereals of the time are wheat,
barley, oats, and rye, just as at present; but the dinner-table of the
day had neither turnip, cabbage, nor potato, and supplied their place
with the parsnip, cole, and rape. Garlic, radishes, and lettuce were
widely used, the former being valued in proportion to its power of
overcoming any other odour. Flax seems to have been widely grown, and
rushlights were then a luxury.
The subject of trees and plants does not so readily lend itself to
fables as some other parts of natural history, but we refer the reader
to the accounts of aloes, pepper, and mandragora as a specimen of the
tales told, as our author says, "to make things dear, and of great
price."
Aloes is a tree with good savour, and breedeth in India, and sometime
a part thereof is set afire upon the altar in the stead of incense. It
is found in the great river of Babylon, that joineth with a river of
Paradise. Therefore many men trow that the aforesaid tree groweth
among the trees of Paradise, and cometh out of Paradise by some hap or
drift into [the] river of Ind. Men that dwell by that river take this
tree out of the water by nets, and keep it to the use of medicine, for
it is a good medicinal tree.
Of Cannel and of Cassia men told fables in old time, that it is found
in birds' nests, and specially in the Phoenix' nest. And may not be
found, but what falleth by its own weight, or is smitten down with
lead arrows. But these men do feign, to make things dear and of great
price; but as the sooth meaneth, cannel groweth among the Trogodites
in the little Ethiopia, and cometh by long space of the sea in ships
to the haven of Gelenites. No man hath leave to gather thereof tofore
the sun-rising, nor after the sun going down. And when it is gathered,
the priest by measure dealeth the branches and taketh thereof a part;
and so by space of time, merchants buy that other deal.
Of this tree [Bays] speaketh the Master in History, and saith that
Rebecca (Gen. xvii.) for trembling of nations she had seen in them
that perished, laid a manner laurel tree that she called Tripodem
under her head, and sat her upon boughs of an herb that hight Agnus
Castus, for to use very revelations and sights and not fantasies.
The Emperor Tiberius Caesar in thundering and lightning used a garland
of Laurel Tree on his head against dread of lightning, as it is said.
Also Plinius telleth a wonder thing, that the emperor sat by Drusilla
the empress in a certain garden, and an eagle threw from a right high
place a wonder white hen into the empress' lap whole and sound, and
the hen held in her bill a bough of laurel tree full of bays, and
Diviners took heed to the hen, and sowed the bays, and kept them
wisely, and of them came a wood, that was called Silva Triumphans, as
it were the wood of worship for victory and mastery.
The green leaves thereof, that smell full well if they be stamped,
heal stinging of bees and of wasps, and do away all swellings, and
keep books and clothes there it is among from moths and other worms,
and save them fro fretting and gnawing. The fruit of laurel trees are
called bays, and are brown or red without, and white within and
unctuous.
It is said that a hind taught first the virtue of diptannus, for she
eateth this herb that she may calve easilier and sooner; and if she be
hurt with an arrow, she seeketh this herb and eateth it, which putteth
the iron out of the wound.
And ash hath so great virtue that serpents come not in shadow thereof
in the morning nor at even. And if a serpent be set within a fire and
ash leaves, he will flee into the fire sooner than into the leaves.
Beans be damned by Pythagoras' sentence, for it is said, that by oft
use thereof the wits are dulled and cause many dreams. Or else as
other men mean, for dead men's souls be therein. Therefore Varro saith
that the bishop should not eat beans. And many medley beans with bread
corn, to make the bread more heavy.
The stalk [of wheat] is called Stipula as ustipula, and hath that name
of usta, burnt. For when it is gathered some of the straw is burnt to
help and amend the land. And some is kept to fodder of beasts, and is
called Palea: for it is first meat that is laid tofore beasts, namely
in some countries as in Tuscany. As Pliny saith, if the seed be
touched with tallow or grease it is spoilt and lost. Among the best
wheat sometimes grow ill weeds and venomous, as cockle and other such,
also there it is said, of corrupt dew that cleaveth to the leaves
cometh corruption in corn, and maketh it as it were red or rusty.
Among all manner corn, wheat beareth the prize, and to mankind nothing
is more friendly, nothing more nourishing.
Flax groweth in even stalks, and bears yellow flowers or blue, and
after cometh hops, and therein is the seed, and when the hop beginneth
to wax, then the flax is drawn up and gathered all whole, and is then
lined, and afterward made to knots and little bundles, and so laid in
water, and lieth there long time. And then it is taken out of the
water, and laid abroad till it be dried, and twined and wend in the
sun, and then bound in pretty niches and bundles. And afterward
knocked, beaten, and brayed, and carfled, rodded and gnodded, ribbed
and heckled, and at the last spun. Then the thread is sod and
bleached, and bucked, and oft laid to drying, wetted and washed, and
sprinkled with water until that it be white, after divers working and
travail.
Flax is needful to divers uses. For thereof is made clothing to wear,
and sails to sail, and nets to fish and to hunt, and thread to sew,
ropes to bind, and strings to shoot, bonds to bind, lines to mete and
to measure, and sheets to rest in, and sacks, bags, and purses, to put
and to keep things in. And so none herb is so needful, to so many
divers uses to mankind, as is the flax.
Ryndes thereof [_i.e._ of Mandragora] sodden in wine cause sleep,
and abate all manner of soreness, and so that time a man feeleth
unneth though he be cut, but yet Mandragora must be warily used: for
it slayeth if men take much thereof.... They that dig Mandragora be
busy to beware of contrary winds while they dig, and make three
circles about with a sword, and abide with the digging unto the sun
going down, and trow so to have the herb with the chief virtues.
Papyrus is a manner rush, that is dried to kindle fire and lanterns,
and hight the feeding of fire. And this herb is put to burn in
prickets and in tapers. The rind is stripped off unto the pith, and is
so dried, and a little is left of the rind on the one side, to sustain
the tender pith; and the less is left of the rind, the more clear the
pith burneth in a lamp, and is the sooner kindled. And about Memphis
and in Ind be such great rushes, that they make boats thereof, as the
Gloss saith. And Alexander's Story saith the same.
And of rushes are charters made, in the which were epistles written,
and sent by messengers. Also of rushes be made paniers, boxes, and
cases, and baskets to keep letters and other things in. And also they
make thereof paper to write with.
Pepper is the seed or the fruit of a tree that groweth in the south
side of the hill Caucasus, in the strong heat of the sun. And serpents
keep the woods that pepper groweth in. And when the woods of pepper
are ripe, men of that country set them on fire, and chase away the
serpents by violence of fire. And by such burning the grain of pepper
that was white by kind, is made black and rively.
Woods be wild places, waste and desolate, that many trees grow in
without fruit, and also few having fruit. In these woods be oft wild
beasts and fowls, therein grow herbs, grass leas, and pasture, and
namely medicinal herbs in woods be found. In summer woods are beautied
with boughs and branches, with herbs and grass. In woods is place of
deceit and hunting. For therein wild beasts are hunted, and watches
and deceits are ordained and set of hounds and of hunters. There is
place of hiding and of lurking, for oft in woods thieves are hid, and
oft in their awaits and deceits passing men come, and are spoiled and
robbed, and oft slain. And so for many and divers ways and uncertain,
strange men oft err and go out of the way, and take uncertain ways,
and the way that is unknown tofore the way that is known, and come oft
to the place there thieves lie in await, and not without peril.
Therefore be oft knots made on trees and in bushes, in boughs and in
branches of trees, in token and mark of the highway, to show the
certain and sure way to wayfaring men; but oft the thieves in turning
and meeting of ways, change such knots and signs, and beguile many
men, and bring them out of the right way by false tokens and signs.
It hath many hard twigs and branches with knots, and therewith often
children are chastised and beaten on the bare buttocks and loins. And
of the boughs and branches thereof are besoms made to sweep and to
clean houses of dust and of other uncleanness. Wild men of woods and
forests use that seed in stead of bread. And this tree hath much sour
juice, and somewhat biting. And men use therefore in springing time
and in harvest to slit the rinds, and to gather the humour that cometh
out thereof, and drink it in stead of wine.
Hards is the cleansing of hemp or of flax. For with much breaking,
heckling, and rubbing, hards are departed fro the substance of hemp
and of flax, and is great when it is departed, and more knotty, short,
and rough. And is therefore not full able to be spun for thread
thereof to be made, nathless thereof is thread spun that is full
great, uneven, and full of knobs, and thereof are made bonds and
bindings, and matches or candles; for it is full dry and taketh soon
fire and burneth.
A board hight table, and is areared and set upon feet, and compassed
with a list about. And, in another manner, table is a playing board,
that men play on at the dice and other games; and this manner of table
is double, and arrayed with divers colours. In the third manner it is
a thin plank and plane, and therein are letters writ with colours, and
sometimes small shingles are planed and made somedeal hollow in either
side, and filled full of wax, black, green, or red, to write therein.
Boards and tables garnish houses, nathless when they be set in solar
floors, they serve all men and beasts that are therein. Then they be
dressed, hewed, and planed, and made convenable to use of ships, of
bridges, of hulks, and coffers, and many other needful things of
building. Also in shipbreach men flee to a board, and are oft saved in
peril.
Roofs are trees areared and stretched fro the walls up to the top of
the house, and bear up the covering thereof. And stand wide beneath,
and come together upwards, and so they nigh nearer and nearer, and are
joined either to other in the top of the house. It holdeth up heling,
slates, shingle, and laths. The lath is long and somewhat broad, and
plain and thin, and is nailed thwart over to the rafters, and thereon
hang slates, tiles, and shingles. The rafters are strong and square,
and hewn plain And are made fair within with fair joists and boards.
A vineyard is busily tilthed and kept, and purged and cleaned of
superfluities, and oft visited and overseen of the earth tilthers and
keepers of vines, that it be not apaired neither destroyed with
beasts, and is closed about with walls and with hedges, and a wait is
there set in a high place to keep the vineyard that the fruit be not
destroyed. And is left in winter without keeper or waiter, but in
harvest time many come and haunt the vineyard. In winter the vineyard
is full pale, and waxeth green and bloometh in springing time and in
summer, and smelleth full sweet, and is pleasant with fruit in harvest
time. The smell of the vineyard that bloometh is contrary to all
venomous things, and therefore when the vineyard bloometh, adders and
serpents flee, and toads also, and may not sustain and suffer the
noble savour thereof.
Foxes lurk and hide themselves under vine leaves, and gnaw covetously
and fret the grapes of the vineyard, and namely when the keepers and
wards be negligent and reckless, and it profiteth not that some unwise
men do, that close within the vineyard hounds, that are adversaries to
foxes. For few hounds, so closed, waste and destroy more grapes than
many foxes should destroy that come and eat thereof thievishly.
Therefore wise wardens of vineyards be full busy to keep, that no
swine nor tame hounds nor foxes come in to the vineyard. From fretting
and gnawing of flies and of other worms, a vineyard may not be kept
nor saved, but by His succour and help that all thing hath and
pursueth in His power and might, and keepeth and saveth all lordly and
mighty.
The worthiness and praising of wine might not Bacchus himself describe
at the full, though he were alive. For among all liquors and juice of
trees, wine beareth the prize, for passing all liquors, wine
moderately drunk most comforteth the body, and gladdeth the heart, and
saveth wounds and evils. Wine strengtheneth all the members of the
body, and giveth to each might and strength, and deed and working of
the soul showeth and declareth the goodness of wine. And wine breedeth
in the soul forgetting of anguish, of sorrow, and of woe, and
suffereth not the soul to feel anguish and woe. Wine sharpeth the wit
and maketh it cunning to enquire things that are hard and subtle, and
maketh the soul bold and hardy, and so the passing nobility of wine is
known. And use of wine accordeth to all men's ages and times and
countries, if it be taken in due manner, and as his disposition asketh
that drinketh it.
Red wine that is temperate in its qualities, and is drunk temperately
and in due manner, helpeth kind and gendreth good blood, and maketh
savour in meat and in drink, and exciteth desire and appetite, and
comforteth the virtue of life and of kind, and helpeth the stomach to
have appetite, and to have and to make good digestion. And quencheth
thirst, and changeth the passions of the soul and thoughts out of evil
into good. For it turneth the soul out of cruelness into mildness, out
of covetousness into largeness, out of pride into meekness, and out of
dread into boldness. And shortly to speak, wine drunk measurably is
health of body and of soul.
And nothing is worse passing out of measure. And so Andronides, a
clear man of wit and of wisdom, wrote to the great Alexander, to
restrain wine kind in drinking, and said in this manner:--"King, have
mind that thou drinkest blood of the earth, for wine drinking
untemperately is to mankind heavy and venomous." And if Alexander had
done by his counsel, truly he had not slain his own friend in
drunkenness. If wine be often taken, anon by drunkenness it quencheth
the sight of reason, and comforteth beastly madness, and so the body
abideth as it were a ship in the sea without stern and without
lodesman, and as chivalry without prince or duke.
VI
MEDIAEVAL NATURAL HISTORY--BIRDS AND FISHES
In following out his plan of describing the productions of each
element before considering the next in order, Bartholomew was led to
consider air and its products early in his scheme. Accordingly his
twelfth book is devoted to birds, and his thirteenth to the
inhabitants of the waters. There is hardly any reason in these books
for omitting any part more than another except space, but the editor
hopes that those chosen will put the reader in possession of a key to
the more common allusions in pre-Restoration literature.
When the editor spoke of the wholesale way in which our author is
conveyed by Elizabethan poets, he had in mind this and the following
chapters. A single example will show this. Let the reader compare the
account of the peacock with the following stanza from Chester's
"Love's Martyr":
"The proud sun-braving peacocke with his feathers,
Walkes all along, thinking himself a king,
And with his voice prognosticates all weathers,
Although, God knows, but badly he doth sing;
But when he looks downe to his base blacke feete,
He droopes and is asham'd of things unmeet."
Our author's knowledge of birds is largely derived--the authentic from
Aristotle; the legendary from the Fathers, Ambrose, Austin, Basil, and
Gregory,--the Gloss,--and from Pliny. Some of these legends seem to be
pointed at in the Hebrew Scriptures. Thus Ps. ciii. 5, "Thy youth is
renewed like the eagle's," either gave rise to, or refers to, the
tradition quoted in our account of the eagle: and likewise Job
xxxviii. 41, and Ps. cxlvii. 9, seem to be responsible for the
tradition in the account of the raven. It would be interesting to
learn whether any independent traditions of this nature exist.
It is worth pointing out that our author has contributed to the "Gesta
Romanorum" several stories. The "wild tale," as Warton calls it, of
the elephant and the maidens, as well as the story of "the storke
wreker of avouterie" mentioned by Chaucer in the "Assemblie of
Foules," and derived from Neckham, and the similar tale of the
lioness, obtained their wide circulation through the popularity of
Bartholomew's book. It would be an interesting task to trace these
tales to their origin, but this is neither the place nor the time to
do so; and the editor similarly leaves to lovers of Shakespeare the
pleasure of proving to themselves his intimate acquaintance with the
book.
In the part of the chapter quoted from the thirteenth book, the editor
has tried to get together some of those stories which impressed
people's minds most. Such a one is the tale of the remora. We remember
Jonson's use of it in the "Poetaster":
"Death, I am seized here
By a land remora; I cannot stir
Nor move, but as he pleases."
Other tales remind us of Olaus Magnus, and some of them are plainly
Eastern.
Now it pertaineth to speak of birds and fowls, and in particular and
first of the eagle, which hath principality among fowls. Among all
manner kinds of divers fowls, the eagle is the more liberal and free
of heart. For the prey that she taketh, but it be for great hunger,
she eateth not alone, but putteth it forth in common to fowls that
follow her. But first she taketh her own portion and part. And
therefore oft other fowls follow the eagle for hope and trust to have
some part of her prey. But when the prey that is taken is not
sufficient to herself, then as a king that taketh heed to a community,
she taketh the bird that is next to her, and giveth it among the
others, and serveth them therewith.
Austin saith, and Plinius also, that in age the eagle hath darkness
and dimness in eyen, and heaviness in wings. And against this
disadvantage she is taught by kind to seek a well of springing water,
and then she flieth up into the air as far as she may, till she be
full hot by heat of the air, and by travail of flight, and so then by
heat the pores are opened and the feathers chafed, and she falleth
suddenly in to the well, and there the feathers are changed, and the
dimness of her eyes is wiped away and purged, and she taketh again her
might and strength.
The eagle's feathers done and set among feathers of wings of other
birds corrupteth and fretteth them. As strings made of wolf-gut done
and put into a lute or in an harp among strings made of sheep-gut do
destroy, and fret, and corrupt the strings made of sheep-gut, if it so
be that they be set among them, as in a lute or in an harp, as Pliny
saith.
Among all fowls, in the eagle the virtue of sight is most mighty and
strong. For in the eagle the spirit of sight is most temperate and
most sharp in act and deed of seeing and beholding the sun in the
roundness of its circle without blemishing of eyen. And the sharpness
of her sight is not rebounded again with clearness of light of the
sun, nother disperpled. There is one manner eagle that is full sharp
of sight, and she taketh her own birds in her claws, and maketh them
to look even on the sun, and that ere their wings be full grown, and
except they look stiffly and steadfastly against the sun, she beateth
them, and setteth them even tofore the sun. And if any eye of any of
her birds watereth in looking on the sun she slayeth him, as though he
went out of kind, or else driveth him out of the nest and despiseth
him, and setteth not by him.
The goshawk is a royal fowl, and is armed more with boldness than with
claws, and as much as kind taketh from her in quantity of body, it
rewardeth her with boldness of heart. And two kinds there be of such
fowls, for some are tame and some are wild. And she that is tame
taketh wild fowls and taketh them to her own lord, and she that is
wild taketh tame fowls. And this hawk is of a disdainful kind. For if
she fail by any hap of the prey that she reseth to, that day unneth
she cometh unto her lord's hand. And she must have ordinate diet,
nother too scarce, ne too full. For by too much meat she waxeth
ramaious or slow, and disdaineth to come to reclaim. And if the meat
be too scarce then she faileth, and is feeble and unmighty to take her
prey. Also the eyen of such birds should oft be seled and closed, or
hid, that she bate not too oft from his hand that beareth her, when
she seeth a bird that she desireth to take; and also her legs must be
fastened with gesses, that she shall not fly freely to every bird. And
they be borne on the left hand, that they may somewhat take of the
right hand, and be fed therewith.
And so such tame hawks be kept in mews, that they may be discharged of
old feathers and hard, and be so renewed in fairness of youth. Also
men give them meat of some manner of flesh, which is some-deal
venomous, that they may the sooner change their feathers. And smoke
grieveth such hawks and doth them harm. And therefore their mews must
be far from smoky places, that their bodies be not grieved with
bitterness of smoke, nor their feathers infect with blackness of
smoke. They should be fed with fresh flesh and bloody, and men should
use to give them to eat the hearts of fowls that they take. All the
while they are alive and are strong and mighty to take their prey,
they are beloved of their lords, and borne on hands, and set on
perches, and stroked on the breast and on the tail, and made plain and
smooth, and are nourished with great business and diligence. But when
they are dead, all men hold them unprofitable and nothing worth, and
be not eaten, but rather thrown out on dunghills.
The properties of bees are wonderful noble and worthy. For bees have
one common kind as children, and dwell in one habitation, and are
closed within one gate: one travail is common to them all, one meat is
common to them all, one common working, one common use, one fruit and
flight is common to them all, and one generation is common to them
all.
Also maidenhood of body without wem is common to them all, and so is
birth also. For they are not medlied with service of Venus, nother
resolved with lechery, nother bruised with sorrow of birth of
children. And yet they bring forth most swarms of children.
Bees make among them a king, and ordain among them common people. And
though they be put and set under a king, yet they are free and love
their king that they make, by kind love, and defend him with full
great defence, and hold [it] honour and worship to perish and be spilt
for their king, and do their king so great worship that none of them
dare go out of their house, nor to get meat, but if the king pass out
and take the principality of flight. And bees chose to their king him
that is most worthy and noble in highness and fairness, and most clear
in mildness, for that is chief virtue in a king. For though their king
have a sting yet he useth it not in wreck. And also bees that are
unobedient to the king, they deem themselves by their own doom for to
die by the wound of their own sting. And of a swarm of bees is none
idle. Some fight, as it were in battle, in the field against other
bees, some are busy about meat, and some watch the coming of showers.
And some behold concourse and meting of dues, and some make wax of
flowers, and some make cells now round, now square with wonder binding
and joining, and evenness. And yet nevertheless, among so diverse
works none of them doth espy nor wait to take out of other's travail,
neither taketh wrongfully, neither stealeth meat, but each seeketh and
gathereth by his own flight and travail among herbs and flowers that
are good and convenable.
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