Osprey - General Military - Knight - The Warrior and ... - Brego-weard

KNIGHT
Devotional works were
not all serious. As in the
Luttrell psalter (shown
here), illustrators might
include all manner of
humorous elements on the
margins of their works, like
these acrobats. (Bridgeman
Art Library)
192
times in the days of his youth' to go to the Holy Sepulchre his office and duties had
never given him leave to do so and, being now in his seventies, he was no longer
able to travel so far. The Pope gave him the absolution he sought providing that Sir
Robert made financial donations to his preferred churches equal to the amount he
would have spent travelling to the Holy Land, a not insubstantial sum.
Even in its piety, however, knighthood did not forget either its status or its calling.
The buildings created by the donations of knightly families were invariably decorated
with their heraldry, and their effigies, clad in the armour that marked them as
warriors, often dominated the chapels they had commissioned lor the repose of their
souls. In the second inventory of goods and chattels left at Wigmore Castle and the
nearby monastery, taken by the officers of Edward II in 1324 after the failed rebellion
of its owner Roger Mortimer, there was a substantial collection ol religious and
liturgical items, including two psalters, of which one was partly in French, a portable
altar 'of marble' (which might make one question how portable it actually was),
several boxes for the Eucharist, and crucifixes and images of the Virgin Mary and
saints in wood and ivory. There were also several sets of priests' vestments and altar
cloths, including one decorated with the Mortimer arms, another with those of
Joinville — the arms of Roger's wife's family — and a third bearing the arms of
Gloucester, Hereford and Ferrers (other key local magnates in the region), showing
the desire of noble families to display their political connections in as public a way
as possible, even in the House of God.
In the same way, books were more than vehicles for learning. They were labour-
intensive, high-value items. The finest of them, such as the Morgan picture bible or the
Luttrell psalter, were large in size and lavishly illustrated. Each was as much a symbol
of status as it was a practical text, something to be displayed to guests and enjoyed as
art in itself. The Luttrell psalter is dominated by the image of Sir Geoffrey Luttrell,
his wife and daughter-in-law, a statement of the power and social position he held.
It is littered with images of the life of the noble and his estate, from feasting to
ploughing, and with images amusing and ludicrous.
The same is true for the Tred Richer Heurej du Due de Berry, a 15th-century book
of hours exquisitely illustrated by the Limbourg brothers from Nijmegen. The main
section, a liturgical calendar incorporating key festivals, saints' days and the signs of
the zodiac, also has a series of incredibly fine and detailed landscapes depicting a
chateau and its estates during the month in question. The illustrations serve no practical
purpose; they can only have been intended to entertain and to be marvelled at.
The same was true of the many practical texts that we find amongst the collections
of knights. Books on animal husbandry, estate management and hunting were
increasingly common, but this reflects a greater interest in books and a desire to make