i
A HISTORY
OF
DOMESTIC MANNERS AND SENTIMENTS
IN ENGLAND
During the Middle Ages.
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iii
A HISTORY
OF
DOMESTIC MANNERS
AND
SENTIMENTS
IN ENGLAND
During the Middle Ages.
By THOMAS WRIGHT, Esq., M.A., F.S.A.,
Hon. M.R.S.L., &c.;
Corresponding Member of the Imperial Institute of France
(Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres).
WITH
Illustrations from the Illuminations in Contemporary Manuscripts
and other Sources,
DRAWN & ENGRAVED BY F. W. FAIRHOLT, Esq., F.S.A.
LONDON:
CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY.
1862.iv
LONDON:
PRINTED BY JAMES S. VIRTUE,
CITY ROAD.
v
TO
THE LADY LONDESBOROUGH,
THIS
Volume is Dedicated
AS
A TESTIMONY OF
VERY SINCERE RESPECT,
BY
vivii
To the LADY LONDESBOROUGH.
Dear Lady Londesborough,
The object of the following pages is to supply what appeared tobe a want in our popular literature. We have histories of England, andhistories of the Middle Ages, but none of them give us a sufficient pictureof the domestic manners and sentiments of our forefathers at differentperiods, a knowledge of which, I need hardly insist, is necessary to enableus to appreciate rightly the motives with which people acted, and thespirit which guided them. The subject, too, must have an interest formany classes of readers, who will be glad to learn something of themanners of former days, if it were only to see the contrast with thoseof our own time, and to discover in them the origin of many of thecharacteristics of modern society. Copious and valuable books have beenpublished in our language on the history of costume, on that of domesticarchitecture, on military antiquities, on the history of religious rites andceremonies, and on other kindred subjects, which enable the artist toclothe his personages correctly; but these would form, after all, but thedisjointed skeleton of a picture, without that further, and perhaps moreimportant, sort of information which is furnished in the following pages,and which will enable him to give life to his composition. I have n