Manners, Customs, and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance PeriodJacob, P. L.
History
Manners, Customs, and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period
Jacob, P. L.
Clothing and dress; Manners and customs; Middle Ages; Renaissance
The _dorures_ consisted of jellies of all sorts and colours; swans,
peacocks, bitterns, and herons, on gala feasts, were served in full
feather on a raised platform in the middle of the table, and hence the
name of "raised dishes." As for the side-dishes, properly so called, the
long list collected in the "Ménagier" shows us that they were served at
table indiscriminately, for stuffed chickens at times followed hashed
porpoise in sauce, lark pies succeeded lamb sausages, and pike's-eggs
fritters appeared after orange preserve.
At a later period the luxury of side-dishes consisted in the quantity and
in the variety of the pastry; Rabelais names sixteen different sorts at
one repast; Taillevent mentions pastry called _covered pastry,
Bourbonnaise pastry, double-faced pastry, pear pastry_, and _apple
pastry_; Platina speaks of the _white pastry_ with quince, elder flowers,
rice, roses, chestnuts, &c. The fashion of having pastry is, however, of
very ancient date, for in the book of the "Proverbs" of the thirteenth
century, we find that the pies of Dourlens and the pastry of Chartres were
then in great celebrity.
[Illustration: Fig. 124.--The Table of a Baron, as laid out in the
Thirteenth Century.--Miniature from the "Histoire de St. Graal"
(Manuscript from the Imperial Library, Paris).]
In a charter of Robert le Bouillon, Bishop of Amiens, in 1311, mention is
made of a cake composed of puff flaky paste; these cakes, however, are
less ancient than the firm pastry called bean cake, or king's cake, which,
from the earliest days of monarchy, appeared on all the tables, not only
at the feast of the Epiphany, but also on every festive occasion.
Amongst the dry and sweet pastries from the small oven which appeared at
the _issue de table_, the first to be noticed were those made of almonds,
nuts, &c., and such choice morsels, which were very expensive; then came
the cream or cheesecakes, the _petits choux_, made of butter and eggs; the
_échaudés_, of which the people were very fond, and St. Louis even
allowed the bakers to cook them on Sundays and feast days for the poor;
wafers, which are older than the thirteenth century; and lastly the
_oublies_, which, under the names of _nieules, esterets_, and
_supplications_, gave rise to such an extensive trade that a corporation
was established in Paris, called the _oublayeurs, oublayers,_ or
_oublieux_, whose statutes directed that none should be admitted to
exercise the trade unless he was able to make in one day 500 large
_oublies_, 300 _supplications_, and 200 _esterets_.
Repasts and Feasts.
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