A new Charny book

Surprise!

Just the other day I heard from an Australian independent scholar named Ian Wilson, who with the help of Hugh Duncan is producing  a two-volume book on Charny, one volume of biography and one consisting of translations of the Livre Charny and Charny's Questions.

I thought you'd like that!

I haven't had time to read the unfinished work, but what seems to be the most important aspect is that Wilson argues that The Book of Chivalry was not written by Geoffroi Charny, but by his son, who had the same name.

More later!

Geoffroi de Charny's son, also called Geoffroi

My advice to SCA members on service

When I was asked to advise people at Winter War on service, I turned to Geoffroi de Charny's Book of Chivalry.

A review of my book Charny's Men-at-Arms: Questions Concerning the Joust, Tournaments, and War. Wheaton, IL: Freelance Academy Press, 2014. Pp. viii, 111. $24.95. ISBN: 978-1-9374390-5-7

From The Medieval Review

Muhlberger, Steven. Charny's Men-at-Arms: Questions Concerning the Joust, Tournaments, and War. Wheaton, IL: Freelance Academy Press, 2014. Pp. viii, 111. $24.95. ISBN: 978-1-9374390-5-7.

Reviewed by Peter W. Sposato

Indiana University Kokomo

psposato@iuk.edu

Charny's Men-at-Arms: Questions Concerning the Joust, Tournaments and War is the latest in a series of important contributions made by Steven Muhlberger to the historical study of medieval chivalry. Muhlberger's previous publications have focused generally on "deeds of arms" (faits d'armes), whether in the guise of "chivalric sports," such as tournaments and jousts, or the bloody business of war. [1] In Charny's Men-at-Arms, Muhlberger continues his investigation of these major chivalric themes by focusing on a series of questions composed in the early 1350s by Geoffroi de Charny, a famous fourteenth century French knight. Charny's intended audience for his Questions were the members of the French royal chivalric Order of the Star: all strenuous, professional practitioners of chivalry. [2] Charny was himself a strenuous knight, who through his personal prowess and honorable conduct both on and off the battlefield climbed, during the course of a long and distinguished career, to the upper echelons of the chivalric hierarchy in France. As Muhlberger powerfully argues, however, Charny should be seen not only as a practitioner, but also as a "theorist of the life of chivalry," a "professor and follower of chivalry...[who] set out first and foremost to praise, to define, and to teach chivalry" (9, 14). Indeed, in addition to composing The Questions Concerning the Joust, Tournaments, and War, he also wrote the Livre de chevalerie (Book of Chivalry) and the Livre Charny (Charny's Book). [3] Thus, unlike many contemporary writers on chivalry, he not only talked the talk, he decidedly walked the walk: participating in tournaments; commanding soldiers in battle; and fighting with distinction in numerous engagements during the Hundred Years War, including at the battle of Poitiers (1356) where he was killed defending the Oriflamme (the sacred battle banner of France).

Charny's Questions are therefore crucially important to our understanding of chivalric mentality and the practical application of chivalric ideas in Late Medieval France in particular, and Europe in general. Muhlberger successfully makes the case for the importance of Charny's Questions in the very first line of his introduction, writing "The Questions Concerning the Joust, Tournaments, and War is a lost classic work of European chivalry. It is the only record we have of a dramatic occasion when crucial questions on the nature of war and the proper conduct of the warrior's life--one definition of chivalry--were posed to an audience of experts, professional men-at-arms of rank and influence" (1). Indeed, Charny's Questions deal with major issues that arose in the three main contexts in which strenuous men-at-arms (i.e. men of rank and status who lived the "life of arms") operated: jousts, tournaments, and war. (14) The Questions, one hundred and thirty four in number and divided into three categories (jousts, tournaments, and war), range from the practical ("Charny asks: Knights joust with steel lances in an emprise. One knocks the other to the ground with a stroke of his lance. Will the one who has knocked the other to the ground and out of the saddle win the horse? How will it be judged by the law of arms?" [88]) to the abstract ("Charny asks: When should a battle be called a battle and why that rather than something else?" [90]). By offering such a broad array of questions, Charny highlights both the formal and the informal rules that governed chivalric conduct, while also providing historians with a sense of the motivations, ideals, and behaviors that underpinned the chivalric lifestyle.

Equally important is the reformative nature of Charny's Questions, which Muhlberger highlights and deftly places into the larger historical context, namely the efforts of King Jean II of France to restore order in his kingdom and to turn the tide of the Hundred Years War. Muhlberger argues the ultimate purpose of Charny's Questions, given the strong reform currents found therein and the timing of their composition, was to buttress such royal initiatives and, importantly, future royal legislation "on matters of arms" (22). No doubt Charny envisioned the Questions as a means to reform and reinvigorate his fellow men-at-arms who had thus far failed to fulfill the sacred function associated with their divine ordo: to protect the French people through their prowess and bravery. Given the clear importance of this work, it is striking that Muhlberger provides in Charny's Men-at-Arms the first and only complete translation of the Questions into English. [4]

Muhlberger has done both scholars and students a great service by adeptly translating the Questions, but Charny's Men-at-Arms is much more than a simple translation: it is also an informed and insightful historical study of the Questions, of the values and attitudes that underpinned them, of the larger historical context in which they were composed, and of their intended audience. Indeed, Muhlberger's study penetrates far beneath the surface of these questions to shed considerable light on the author, the cultural milieu that shaped him, and the social circles in which he operated. Muhlberger's analysis is concise and intelligent, providing insight into Charny's Questions as they relate to a multitude of significant topics, including the nature of chivalry, the laws of war, royal ordinances on war (like King Jean II's Reglement pour le gens de guerre [issued April 30, 1351]), and theoretical treatises on war (like those of Giovanni Legnano and Honore Bouvet). Similarly insightful is Muhlberger's analysis of Charny's Questions relating to "chivalric sport" (Chapter 3: "Charny's Jousters and Tourneyers"), the practical and legal concerns about chivalric conduct in war (Chapter 5: "What Men-at-Arms Worried About"), and honor (Chapter 6: "Honor and the Lore of Chivalry"). Considering the complexity of these topics and the quagmire of scholarship associated with them, Muhlberger deserves praise for adding a great deal to the discussion. Finally, readers, especially students, will also appreciate Muhlberger's efforts to make sense of Charny's tricky terminology (Chapter 4).

There can be little doubt that Charny was a prominent practitioner and theorist of chivalry in his own time and that his writings are crucial to our modern understanding of the dominant ideology that shaped the mentality and lifestyle of the medieval warrior elite. Therefore, it is all the more remarkable that Charny's Questions, which "can be read as a reflection of the priorities and opinions of one of the most experienced and renowned warriors of his time," has been largely neglected by other scholars (23). Fortunately, such an important work on medieval chivalry has been very well served by Muhlberger's translation and study. Indeed, Charny's Men-at-Arms makes an important contribution to the historical study of medieval chivalry, chivalric sports, and warfare. Muhlberger's analysis is succinct and approachable, making it accessible to students, while still providing enough scholarly rigor and insight to earn the approbation of seasoned historians. Charny's Men-at-Arms will undoubtedly facilitate considerable discussion and future research.

------ Notes: 1. Prominent among Muhlberger's other publications on chivalry are: Jousts and Tournaments: Charny and the Rules for Chivalric Sport in Fourteenth-Century France (Union City, CA: Chivalry Bookshelf, 2002); Deeds of Arms: Formal Combats in the Late Fourteenth Century (Union City, CA: Chivalry Bookshelf, 2005); Royal Jousts at the End of the Fourteenth Century (Wheaton, IL: Freelance Academy Press, 2012); The Combat of the Thirty (Wheaton, IL: Freelance Academy Press, 2013); The Twelve of England (Wheaton, IL: Freelance Academy Press, 2013).

2. Other important studies of Charny include: Craig Taylor, Chivalry and the Ideals of Knighthood in France during the Hundred Years War (Cambridge University Press, 2013); Richard Kaeuper, Chivalry and Violence in Medieval Europe (Oxford University Press, 1999); idem, Holy Warriors: The Religious Ideology of Chivalry (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009); idem and Elspeth Kennedy, The Book of Chivalry of Geoffroi de Charny: Text, Context, and Translation (University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996).

3. In addition to the facing page translation listed above (op. cit., n. 2), see also the slimmed down version: Kaeuper and Kennedy, A Knight's Own Book of Chivalry: Geoffroi de Charny (University of Pennsylvania, 2005).

4. The questions concerning tournaments and jousts were translated and studied in Muhlberger's Jousts and Tournaments: Charny and the Rules for Chivalric Sport in Fourteenth-Century France (op. cit., n. 1).

Buy these books!

I recently got a royalty statement from my main publisher, Freelance Academy Press, and I'm sad to say that sales of been rather anemic the last six months. I know there are more people who are interested in this material than have heard about it. Also FAP does a classy job of printing and binding and illustrating these volumes. Finally, the price is right. The books are about a third the price of some of the other similar works put out by mainstream publishers. So I'm going to do my bit to get the word out, something that everybody who publishes these days is told they have to do. ,

FAP carries three recent books by me. All of them concern "deeds of arms" or chivalric sports and warfare in the late 14th century. All of them include translations of accounts from that period plus my own analysis of the material. I think I am quite a good writer so a lot of people should find my approach easy to understand and even entertaining.

First, there is "Royal Jousts". This book describes famous jousts of the 14th century as described by people who took part in them. This is the time when the kings of France and England competed not just on the battlefield but also in their sponsorship of chivalric sports. The best part of the book is the description of the jousts at St. Inglevert in the 1390s. It's famously described by Froissart, but other people wrote up the event too. I've included those other descriptions. If you are curious about what jousting meant to knights of the time, this is your book.

 Second is "the Combat of the Thirty." This is a famous incident of 1350s in which Breton – French men at arms fought English and mercenary men at arms for the fun of it. Each group controlled a strategic castle, but the war itself had bogged down. Out of boredom or other calculations, the captains of these garrisons decided to fight "30 against 30 with no one running away." Some people at the time thought it was a foolish pointless fight, while others thought it showed a true knightly spirit, unlike for instance the French cavalry who had run away from the battle of Crecy. There may have been some doubt too about whether the winning tactic was a fair one or not. Modern reenactors love to reenact this one. If you have friends who love the Hundred Years War, get them this book.

The third book is "Charny's men-at-arms." Geoffroi de Charny is the famous knight of the 1350s, among other things the first owner of the shroud of Turin. He was a trusted advisor of King John II of France and took part in John's efforts to revitalize chivalry in his kingdom. One project that Geoffroi de Charny participated in was an effort to revive knowledge of the "law of arms" that governed the relations between knights and knights (or "men at arms"). With the King's encouragement, Charny put together a list of questions about how the law of arms applied to jousting tournaments and warfare. Interestingly, he did not include or record any answers to those questions. So "Charny's questions"as they are usually called doesn't give us a codified legal document, but rather a list of things that practical warriors worried about – ransoms, who was qualified to fight in tournaments, and various questions of honour.

Let me also urge you to suggest to your local public library or academic library that they buy them books for their collections. These are not just books for scholars. Scholars will like them, but so will people of a variety of back grounds interested in some of the most colourful aspects of the Middle Ages.

Buy these books at Freelance Academy Press.

Charny and the Shroud

A detailed article about the context that could have led to the creation of the Shroud of Turin.

At last, a book

Faithful readers will recognize this as the infamous book on Charny's questions that I've been slugging away at, with some interruptions from other work since the millennium was young. Really young!

If you don't know the book, it is an investigation of a list of questions put forward by a 14th century French knight Geoffroi de Charny to his fellow aristocratic warriors, presumably to educate them in their duty and privileges as warriors. Because there are no answers given, Charny's questions are an unresolvable puzzle and maybe for this reason there have been few detailed looks at the questions and their purposes. Also, no one I know has translated all the questions before now.

Like historical puzzles? Wonder about what chivalry meant to those who fought in the Hundred Years War?  Is your curiosity piqued by the phrase "who gets the horse?"

Now all this can be yours – the answers, I mean, if you are willing to stick out your neck and propose some yourself.

Here's a link to the publisher.

If you are close with the dollar, you might try poking around this blog for some of my reflections on Charny's questions over the years.

Charny's answer

People who know my scholarly work on the writings of Geoffroi de Charny, a fourteenth century knight, may associate me with "Charny's questions," a set of hypothetical problems related to "the law of arms" meant to be analyzed by knights, squires and "men at arms" so that they would be better prepared to relate with other aristocratic warriors.

Charny's questions are unanswered.

But if you want his answer to the problems of the life of arms, consider this from Charny's Book of Chivalry:

[T]hose who have the will to achieve great worth [who] because of their great desire to reach and attain that high honor … do not care what suffering they have to endure, but turn everything into great enjoyment. Indeed, it is a fine thing to perform great deeds, for those who rise to great achievement cannot rightly grow tired or sated with it; so the more they achieve, the less they feel they have achieved; this stems from the delight they take in striving constantly to reach greater heights. And great good comes from performing these deeds, for the more one does, the less one is proud of oneself, and it always seems that there is so much left to do.

Charny's answer?

Charny's Men at Arms -- the cover

Charny as arbitrator under the "droit d'armes"

Back in 1992, the renowned military historian Philippe Contamine wrote an article of Geoffroi de Charny for the festschrift (celebratory collection) dedicated to Georges Duby.  I just found this little nugget in the article (my rough translation):

At that time [Charny] was recognized as an expert in the conflicts that can arise between people in arms about ransom and loot: an act of Philippe de Valois in April 1347 sets out how Aimery de Rochechouart, chevalier , was retained, he and the men of his company having "all costs and expenses and everything which appertained to their profession" from Savary de Vivonne, Lord of Tours. However, during the taking and plundering of Poitiers by the English of the Earl of Derby in October 1345, Aimery and his people were captured. He himself was ransomed for  4000 crowns of gold, a sum to which were added expenses of 2000 crowns. He  thought he should be able to demand the 6000 crowns from Savary de Vivonne, who refused. The King with the consent of both parties, appointed arbitrators  for  the dispute concerning the "droit d’armes," namely Guillaume Flote, seigneur de Revel, and Geoffroy de Charny. They discharged Savary de Vivonne any fault, however, requiring him to pay to pay 2000 crowns (the costs) to Aimery de Rochechouart.

I also found out today that if you type enough French into MS Word, it starts giving you French spellings, French quotation marks, etc.

That beautiful destrier, again

I am trying to put the finishing touches on my translation of Charny's Questions, and once again I have come up against the case of the beautiful destrier -- Tourney Question 8.  I have had real experts look at this and they are baffled, and suggest that there is a transcription error.   Therefore I am putting out this call to anyone who has access to Jean Rossbach's edition (in the Free University of Brussels library, or to the main mss., which are at Paris and Brussels.  Your help in checking the text would be much appreciated.

Anyone who has sufficient confidence in their mastery of Middle French can contact me directly and I will send you the French text and my current translation, and you too can have a go at it.

Four Wordles (word clouds) based on my translation of Charny's Questions

Wordles or word clouds are graphic arrangements of words indicating by the size of each word how often it appears in a text.  How much can you read into that?  Well, at the least it may alert you to something you might otherwise overlook.

In all of these "Charny" and "asks" are among the largest terms.  That is because each of the 130 or so questions begins "Charny asks."

Jousting questions:

Proper size:
http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/4699960/Charny%27s_Questions_on_Jousting

Tourney questions:

Proper size:

http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/4699970/Charny%27s_Questions_on_Tournaments

War questions:

Proper size:

http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/1287540/Charny%27s_Questions_on_War

All together:

Proper size:

http://www.wordle.net/show/wrdl/4699987/Charny%27s_Questions

Have fun!

Le Saint Suaire et la collégiale de Lirey (Aube) by Alain Hourseau

A forthcoming book on Charny, his family and the Shroud of Turin. If your French is weak, Google Translate works pretty well on this description.

http://alain.hourseau.free.fr/livre-7.html

Thanks to my audience

In North Bay, Ontario, you can fill a room late Friday afternoon, late in dreary November, with faculty members, students, non-university community members and a dean or two, to listen to a paper on the fears and insecurities of 14th century men-at-arms.

Who knew?

Thanks for coming, people.

Image:  Someone else's seminar, in Hong Kong.  They had a bigger audience.

Muhlberger speaks on Captivity and Ransom: Friday, November 25, 4 pm

The quest for answers to Charny's Questions

I  have just posted the current draft of my  translation of Geoffroi de Charny’s Questions concerning the joust, tournaments, and war.  It is in the form of a blog entitled Charny’s Questions and it is located at http://charnyqs.blogspot.com/.

I have made the questions available in hopes that other scholars will know of parallels to individual questions or even solutions to some of the legal problems raised by Charny.   Indeed, I have found or been sent a few already, and will be putting them in the comment section of the appropriate question.  If you have something relevant, please do likewise.

I must say that I am only interested in material that originates in primary sources or in a detailed discussion in secondary treatments (few and far between!).  I learned a long time ago that it is quite easy to come up with a plausible answer to most of these questions, indeed more than one.  As Charny said repeatedly, “there are many good reasons offered on either side.”  It’s a fun game to spin your own answers, especially around a campfire at a medieval re-creation, drink in hand, but that’s not  what the blog is for.

Anyone is welcome to read the translation -- which, I warn you, is not quite done and has a few irresolvable problems -- but it is copyrighted.  Please do not publish; if you are a scholar you might even hesitate to quote what is still a working document.

I should end this by thanking the various people who have helped with the most intractable problems of translation.  I am very grateful, and you will all be thanked by name when I publish the final version. 

That beautiful destrier

In Charny's Questions on Tournaments, there is a case proposed to Charny's audience about a knight who brings a beautiful destrier to a tournament and decides not to ride it. An unarmed man gets on the destrier and rides out past the lists and all over the field, until some other tourneyers drag him to the goal post, knock him off, and take the destrier as a prize. The knight who brought the destrier to the tourney objects. Who is right?

At least, that's how I (and some others) think the question should be interpreted. Grammatically the question is such a puzzle that it stops learned philologists and scholars of medieval French in their tracks, and leads them to propose desperate measures, for instance, that there are words missing, either from the edition or from the original text in the manuscripts. I can well believe they are right about this, but it leaves me in an awkward position to explain how I arrived at my published translation, when I do publish one. At least I will know that had I spent my life studying Old and Middle French, I'd be in much the same situation.

I am deeply grateful to all the people who wrinkled their skulls over this problem to help me out. Generosity still reigns in medieval studies.

Image: Not exactly the destrier visualized by Charny.

Muhlberger speaks at Kalamazoo, May 14, 2011: Charny's Honor

A week from Saturday I will be delivering a paper on "Honor in the Writings of Geoffroi de Charny" at the International Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo MI.

That's Session 453 in Bernhard 208, at 1:30 pm.

Charny on retreating and surrendering -- my attempt to understand him

An excerpt from work in progress:

Scenarios involving retreating or surrendering or both appear in a conservative estimate in eleven of Charny's questions on war. It is clear from several of them that anything resembling running away might be interpreted as blameworthy. Question W30 says :

There is a battle …in which many men-at-arms of the defeated party depart and go away. Some consider that these have gone on their honor without being defeated; and many others consider that those who have gone are defeated. How can this be?

Judgments vary, but elsewhere we see that if the judgment was adverse, if one was thought to have been "fleeing" to one's "dishonor," it was so serious that some might think it would wipe out a lifetime of renown (W39). What distinguished dishonorable flight from the "safe and honorable withdrawal" which Charny thought all good men-at-arms needed to learn to execute? Of course we have no correct answer to this, just indications about how serious the dilemma was. For instance, in W31 we have a story that shows what problems arise when good military practice and the perception that one is fleeing conflict:

A captain of men-at-arms rides out in the field and orders some of his scouts to see the situation of his enemies who are in the field; and there are a sufficient number of these scouts. And at the approach of their enemies one party of their enemies pursues them faster than they can go; and the scouts retreat from their enemies and are able to retreat without loss. So there are some of the scouts who turn back and meet their enemies, and perform arms like good people should; and others retreat to their captain and make their report. Which of these are to be more valued and praised: those who went back to their lord or those who are captured?

The scouts who turn back and fight are doing something good and praiseworthy; yet Charny thought that the scouts who returned were also doing something valuable, and were obedient to their captain to boot. Perhaps Charny anticipated a reflexive endorsement of warriors who "perform arms like good people should." This is consistent with scenarios discussed in W7 and W8, where what might seem sensible course of action is contrasted with conventional belligerent courage. In the first we see a captain, the principal leader of one side in a hypothetical war, who

 is defeated but remains on the field so long that he sees and understands that he is unable to recover his fortunes or the day; and the battle has been very well fought. Which is the better thing for him to do: remain and take his chances, or leave so that he can recoup? And if he leaves, should he thereby lose his honor?

We may think that it hardly makes sense that the captain should sacrifice his rights and his person after one serious defeat; and we've seen that Charny did not reject the possibility of honorable retreat. Then we remember that King John refused to leave the field at Poitiers in 1356, even though he understood that the day was lost. This gives the scenario in question W7 a real piquancy. Question W7 also prepares us for the dilemma of the bodyguards in the next question who seriously contemplate abandoning their lord to return to fight in a lost battle. There are good reasons for them to remain with the captain, yet they hesitate:

Which is the better thing to do: lead their master to safety, and in that case, either go with him, or send him outside of the melee alone, and tell him to save himself if he is able? There is a great risk that he will not be able to save himself; and by returning into the battle they take the risk of death or capture. Since they have agreed to be men in his retinue, will they be blamed if they go with him? Which is better, to go or to stay?

Neither avoiding the presumed shame of abandoning their employer, their "master," nor the danger of returning to a hopeless situation are unquestionably preferable to the criticism they might attract for leaving the field. Even if we guess that Charny might have a clear preference himself, he expected debate. This is confirmed by other scenarios, which show that there was an entire terminology of warfare, which was meant among other things to clarify what was honorable behavior. One of the questions I would most like answered, were that possible, is W37:

Since I have heard it said that one is able to leave and retreat (retraire) from a battle from the defeated side (la part desconfite), if he has acted in seven ways without being killed or taken, without being reproached. How can this be and what are the seven ways?

It would certainly be very illuminating to have Charny's list of seven mitigating circumstances, and his comments on them, given that he was twice captured and must have twice surrendered himself, even though he did not consider this something that could be done lightly (W79). Unless Charny is disingenuously preparing to present a list of his own as something he heard from others, the list of seven implies serious discussion, perhaps long debate, that unfortunately never found the pen to write it down.

How Charny uses the term "honor" in his Book of Chivalry

An excerpt from something I am tinkering with:

Charny most often uses the term to mean "military achievement that leads to higher status or reputation," or occasionally "military effectiveness." Recall that Charny's three books all treat the life of arms as an ascent from the least difficult to the more difficult, and in his most developed presentation of this argument in the Book of Chivalry, he shows the life of arms as an ascent from one type of honor or honorable achievement to greater honor associated with more difficult challenges:

When God by his grace grants [aspirant men-at-arms] frequent success in jousting, they enjoy it, and their desire to bear arms increases. Then after jousting, they learn about the practice of arms in tournaments, and it becomes apparent to them and they recognize that tournaments bring greater honor than jousting for those who perform well there. Then they set out to bear arms in tournaments as often as they can. ..Their knowledge increases until they see and recognize that the men-at-arms who are good in war are more highly prized and honored than any other men-at-arms. It therefore seems to them from their own observation that they should immediately take up the practice of arms in war and in order to achieve the highest honor in prowess, for they cannot attain this by any other form of armed combat.¹

In that passage we see honor as, first, something that is given to worthy men-at-arms by those who recognize their worth, second, as something which is gained by those who strive for it, and third, as something that derives ultimately from God. Honor can also refer to military effectiveness, or the success that comes in warfare to those who "learn the true way to practice the military arms until they, on every occasion, know how to strive towards the most honorable course of action, whether in relation to deeds of arms in relation to other forms of behavior appropriate to their rank."² All of these usages of honor have a close direct connection to skill, courage and success in combat, and it is such usages that dominate the Book of Chivalry.

1 BoC, 101-3.

2 Ibid., 101.