The social food traditions may be roughly divided into two main categories. In one hand, feasting – being any kind of celebratory meal– is generally led to profusion and overabundance. On the other hand, fasting is based on restrictions and restraint since it is a self-deprivation for mostly religious motives. The tension between feasting and fasting was challenging in the Middle Ages, which is a reality about food and its representations. Moreover, both feasting and fasting could be a situation of social distinction and political action: since the most splendid banquets and the most extreme fasts are summoned to define an elite position or a power issue.1
In the Christian doctrine and practices that were dominant in the medieval West, fasting was implemented during some periods of the week (On Fridays, sometimes also on Wednesdays and Saturdays), but also in some of the periods of the year (most importantly during Lent, the 40-days period before Easter). It can be established for personal reasons as well, such as penance or a feel of belonging to specific categories (such as monks and nuns).2 It was not defined as a complete food deprivation, but as an abstinence from certain foodstuffs considered “fat” – mostly meat and, sometimes, other products derived from land animals such as eggs, cheese, and several kinds of animal fat –. Conversely, all fruits and vegetables, cereals, and plants but also all kinds of fish were seen as “lean”. This division left a large place for interpretation and distinctive behaviors. As the Middle Ages went on, the development of high sea fishing and the creation of ponds allowed the lay and ecclesiastical elite to have their tables furnished with a rich and varied fare, even in times of fast – for instance, it implied some sea mammals flesh such as whales and dolphins, considered as a fish at that moment. Halfway between “proper meat” and fish, the flesh of birds had an ambiguous status, particularly because the “Rule of St. Benedict” did not forbid it.3 Excavations at the La Charité-sur-Loire’s priory in central France revealed that the monks had access to no less than 27 different species of wild and domestic birds.4 Indeed, the official “lean” tables of the Church could be sumptuous!
Just as fasting, feasting had its own order and its right time. Banquets were normally organized for a reason. For example, it could happen at the great moments of the life cycle (such as christening, a wedding or a funeral), but also during a main religious feast, an arrival of a prestigious guest, the end of a military campaign or any other difficult task: all these occasions were opportunities for celebrate, which normally included a festive meal and/or a drinking party. Feasts were occasionally useful for show off social superiority – through the conspicuous consumption of rare and costly drinks and preparations – but also because they involved complex logistics that went far beyond the necessity to provide prestigious foodstuffs. Indeed, feasts also mobilized a numerous specialized number of staff (servants, cooks, entertainers…).5 It could only be organized in proper settings, where the profusion and originality of a lord’s generosity and superiority could be better shown.
The three main places this kind of social distinction was established were the kitchen, the hall and the lord’s (or lady’s) chamber. Kitchens were not ordinary in Middle Ages, either in towns or on the countryside: having a separate room reserved – quite often – for cooking was seen as a sign of wealth and prestige.6 The exact form and structure of the halls could be diverse. Yet, from the freestanding wooden rectangular buildings of Anglo-Saxon archaeology – best described in the eighth century poem Beowulf – the most frequent settings for banquets were long upper-floor galleries of early Renaissance castles, wide refectories of Benedictine abbeys and remained halls, especially during the whole medieval period.7 Their lords would reunite their families, friends, and followers, providing them generous food servings and – mostly alcoholic – drinks. In the eleventh century, lords and ladies also liked to entertain their guests in their “private” chambers: more informal but politically no less important kinds of dining could be served. The kind of meal served was not the same for everyone: if there was generous servings of meat and wine as well as a big quantity of people8 (then the quality of the food was the chambers’ hallmark, which was richer in imported products and consumed by a smaller number of eaters (sugar-based confectionery or spiced wines, for example).9
As a place for conspicuous consumption and the spectacular staging of social and political superiority, feasting was also an essential political institution. The medieval government was often conducted by few people who willingly collaborated along with a ruler who needed to attach them to his service through the public honorable food and drink dispensation. For a medieval king, feasting with his men – especially his warriors – was a way to obtain their fidelity and establish relations of trust, intimacy and friendship as well as creating a form of dependence: each lord in his castle could reproduce this tradition with his own men. Moreover, when it comes to itinerant monarchies, the kings’ journey through their kingdoms would always include feasts: thus did a Carolingian emperor, a Capetian king or a Norman duke which got them to be known by their most powerful subjects, creating personal bonds that only a shared meal could provide. Each bishop, each abbot, each local lord could boast of having sat at the ruler’s table, shared his food, and drank his wine. When interpersonal links were at the core of politics at the time, feasts were the opportunity where power was performed.
This is why medieval feasting may be described as a ritual or a political liturgy. It recalls, in a certain way, the most topical of food liturgies: the eucharist one. Medieval political feasting was both horizontal (because the participants partook the same food and drink) and vertical (expressing hierarchy, fidelity, and the ability to feed people). It is important to remember that the word “lord” – rather it describes a God or a worldly ruler – derives from the Old English term “hlaford” (meaning the “loaf-warden,” the “bread-keeper”).10
References
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- Gaillard, M., ed., 2014: L’empreinte chrétienne en Gaule du IVe au IXe siècle, Turnhout.
- Gautier, A, 2006: Le festin dans l’Angleterre anglo-saxonne, Ve-XIe siècle, Rennes.
- Gautier, A., 2009: Alimentations médiévales, Ve-XVIe siècle, Paris.
- Gautier, A., 2016: “Festin et politique : servir la table royale dans le haut Moyen Âge”, in: Settimane di Spoleto LXIII, 2016, 907-937.
- Gautier, A., 2021: “Jeûnes et festins en Europe occidentale, VIIe-XIIe siècle”, in: Quellier, ed., 2021, 427-445.
- Harper-Bill, C. & Harvey, R., ed., 1192: Medieval Knighthood IV, Papers form the fifth Strawberry Hill Conference 1990, Woodbridge.
- Lambert T. & Leggett S., 2022: Food and Power in Early Medieval England: Rethinking Feorm, Anglo-Saxon England, 1-47, URL: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/anglo-saxon-england/article/food-and-power-in-early-medieval-england-rethinking-feorm/92CCDA9706D8F0858B0DE4CB4D51FB72
- Laurioux B., 2005: Une histoire culinaire du Moyen Âge, Paris.
- Montanari, M., 1994: The Culture of Food, Oxford.
- Montanari, M., 2015: Mangiare da cristiani: Diete, digiuni, banchetti. Storie di una cultura, Milano.
- Quellier, F., ed., 2021: Histoire de l’alimentation. De la Préhistoire à nos jours, Paris.
- Raga, E., 2014: “L’influence chrétienne sur le modèle alimentaire classique : la question de l’alternance entre banquets, nutrition et jeûne”, in: Gaillard, ed., 2014, 61-87.
- Settimane di Spoleto LXIII, 2016: L’Alimentazione nell’alto medioevo: pratiche, simboli, ideologie, Spoleto, CISAM (Settimane di Studio LXIII).
- Thompson, M., 1995: The Medieval Hall. The Basis of Secular Domestic Life, 600-1600 AD, Aldershot.
- Williams, A., 1992: “A Bell-House and a Burh-Geat: Lordly Residences in England Before the Norman Conquest”, in: Harper-Bill & Harvey ed., 1992, 221-240.
