Noble Venery: Hunting and the Aristocratic Imagination in Late Medieval English Literature Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Ryan Russell Judkins, M.A. Graduate Program in English The Ohio State University 2012 Dissertation Committee: Richard Firth Green, Advisor Lisa J. Kiser Ethan Knapp Copyright by Ryan Russell Judkins 2012 Abstract As Johan Huizinga and, more recently, Pierre Bourdieu have argued, what we do and the games we play influence how we act and think. Similarly, as George Lakoff and Mark Johnson have concluded, the metaphors that we use display our conceptual structures. Taking these two points as a basis, this thesis examines hunting, the major leisure pursuit of the aristocracy, in medieval English literature. Many have concluded that hunting was just a general courtly pastime of no particular interest, especially for literary scholars, while others have struggled to analyze it because it was so prevalent and so wide-ranging, and thus presents an immense body of literature. In response, this dissertation defines the concept of "venery" and then argues that venery was, along with chivalry and love, one of the three major foci of aristocratic culture, and that medieval authors played extensively upon it rhetorically. Through an often dialectical consideration of a wide range of late medieval Anglo-French literature, this thesis first argues that venery both arose from and fundamentally influenced the aristocratic habitus and imagination, in large part because hunting was a central component of the aristocratic education. Then, it analyzes how the courtly par-force hunt particularly embodied this process and shifted over time to respond to various social changes. The dissertation then turns to a consideration of how Chaucer in Troilus and Criseyde and the anonymous author of the Alliterative Morte Arthure employ veneric themes rhetorically in attempts to influence their aristocratic audiences' perceptions of love and of chivalry. In the process, they reveal the fundamental importance of venery on the aristocratic comprehension of chivalry and love and more broadly on the aristocratic imagination. An understanding of venery is thus essential to an appreciation of medieval courtly literature and an understanding of the cultural assumptions of the medieval nobility. ii Dedication To my parents and grandparents. Nani gigantum humeris insidentes. iii Acknowledgements I owe many debts to The Ohio State University and to her faculty that I hope one day to repay. First among them are those to my advisor and mentors. Richard Firth Green directed my work with good-humored grace, unflagging support, and insightful commentary. As both my dissertation advisor and as my supervisor at the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies from 2007 to 2009, he has taught me more than perhaps he knows. Lisa J. Kiser first encouraged me to pursue medieval hunting as a topic when I stumbled across it in 2006, and her continuing support and vigorous critiques have been essential. Ethan Knapp's lucid advice first guided me during my Master's program and has continued to penetrate to the heart of matters. I am grateful to have had them as my thesis committee. Lister Matheson, my undergraduate advisor at Michigan State University, first introduced me to the pleasure and vibrancy of medieval literature. Though he may be gone, I will always hear Chaucer with the ghost of a Scots burr. My thanks go also to Robin S. Oggins, who kindly offered his comments on an early draft of what became the second chapter and allowed me to see one of his works in progress. I sincerely appreciate the work of the editors and anonymous readers of the Journal of English and Germanic Philology, who helped me to refine that same chapter. The useful feedback of audiences at, particularly, the International Congress on Medieval Studies at Western Michigan University, the International Medieval Congress at the University of Leeds, and the 2007 Vagantes Conference, hosted at Loyola University in Chicago, also has been very welcome. Joe Dorrian, a licensed Ohio falconer, has been both friendly and vastly informative, particularly during hawking trips on campus and in the surrounding area. Chad Judkins and Ariella Schrieber have been priceless sounding boards. Erika Ernst was more than patient with me as I wrote. Any mistakes that I have made lie entirely on my own shoulders. iv Vita 2005................................................B.A. English, s.c.l., Michigan State University 2005................................................B.A. Ancient Studies, s.c.l., Michigan State University 2007................................................M.A. English, The Ohio State University 2005................................................University Fellow, The Ohio State University 2007................................................Summer Fellow, Department of English, The Ohio State University 2008................................................Graduate Administrative Associate, NEH Seminar, dir. John N. King, The Ohio State University 2007-09...........................................Graduate Administrative Associate, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, The Ohio State University 2006-11...........................................Graduate Teaching Associate, Department of English, The Ohio State University Fields of Study Major Field: English Graduate Certificate in Medieval and Renaissance Studies v Table of Contents Abstract................................................................................................................................ii Dedication...........................................................................................................................iii Acknowledgements.............................................................................................................iv Vita.......................................................................................................................................v Introduction: Hunting, Habitus, and Conceptual Metaphor.................................................1 Chapter 1: Venery in Noble Life........................................................................................16 Chapter 2: The Courtly Hunt and Social Metaphor...........................................................57 Chapter 3: Courtship and Falconry in Troilus and Criseyde..............................................92 Chapter 4: Warfare and Venery in the Alliterative Morte Arthure...................................140 Conclusion: “Tales of Hunting To Tell”...........................................................................186 References........................................................................................................................190 vi Introduction: Hunting, Habitus, and Conceptual Metaphor “Je Gaston, par la grace de Dieu, surnommé Febus, comte de Foys, seigneur de Bearn, qui tout mon temps me suis delité par espicial en trois choses, l'une est en armes, l'autre est en amours, and l'autre si est en chasce.”1 (I am Gaston, by the grace of God, surnamed Febus, count of Foix, lord of Bearn, who for my entire life have delighted in particular in three things: one is in arms, another is in love, and the other is in the hunt.) The Count of Foix summarizes his three major passions with this biographical statement that opens Livre de Chasse, the famous hunting manual he finished in 1389, and which Edward of Norwich, the second Duke of York, adapted into English twenty years later as Master of Game.2 The two versions remain the best known of any of the late-medieval hunting books. Gaston leaves the first two pursuits (arms and love) to more learned masters, but declares that no one surpasses his knowledge of hunting, and he presents a rousing argument in support of it, outlining its various forms and facets and stating that hunters live more joyfully than any other men. He even goes so far as to say that hunters commit no sins (since they are never idle) and so they go “tout droit en paradis” (straight 1 Gaston Phébus, Livre de Chasse: édité avec introduction, glossaire, et reproduction des 87 miniatures du manuscrit 616 de la Bibliothèque nationale de Paris, ed. Gunnar Tilander (Karlshamn: Johanssons Boktryckeri, 1971), 51. Hereafter, Livre de Chasse. My translations unless otherwise indicated. 2 All citations to Master of Game are taken from James I. McNelis III, “The Uncollated Manuscripts of The Master of Game: Towards a New Edition” (PhD diss., Univ. of Washington, 1996). Hereafter, Master of Game. 1 to heaven) when they die.3 This opening statement will inevitably strike a modern audience as rather unusual. No one would deny that chivalry and love were two pillars of aristocratic culture, but one might suppose that Gaston was being somewhat biased by ranking hunting with two more important topics. A more thorough consideration of aristocratic pursuits, however, negates such an impression, which arises more from modern critical prejudice than from medieval reality.4 Going back to at least the twelfth century and up through at least the fifteenth, a vast amount of evidence shows that the aristocracy valued chivalry, love, and, indeed, hunting as a triad of ideal pursuits. From the beginning of the Anglo-Norman aristocracy, hunting ability was a defining characteristic. William the Conqueror, the Petersborough Chronicle declares in anger at his policies,