IIn this series:
Christmas is upon us. A busy season of preparations for table and hall even more so. So then, let us go hunt our wild boar starting deep in the thickets of history. In Medieval and Tudor times the well-appointed table must feature the boar’s head at its center.
- The Wild Boar from Valhalla to Christmas Kitchen.
- Catering the Medieval and Tudor Christmas Feasts.
- Ordering the Medieval and Tudor Household for Christmas.
- Feasting in the Great Hall on Christmas Day!
- Celebrating the Days of Christmas Before the New Year.
Christmas is upon us. A busy season of preparations for table and hall even more so. So then, let us go hunt our wild boar starting deep in the thickets of history. In Medieval and Tudor times the well-appointed table must feature the boar’s head at its center.
The Eddas and Sagas of the Norse Men are filled with
references to the wild boar. They were
deeply impressed by its courage and ferocity.
A boar’s head was mounted above the main gate to Valhalla, great hall of
Odin.
The dwarves of Svartálfaheimr gave the Norse sun god, Frey,
the golden-bristled boar Gullinbursti (golden-bristled),[1]
a personification of the sun that carried his chariot through the sky instead
of the flying steeds of his cousin Apollo.
He seems to have skipped the chariot, at times, and ridden directly on
the boar’s (i.e. sun’s) back. It is this
pedigree that placed the wild boar at the center of the table for pre-Christian
Norse celebrations of the winter solstice.
Those fallen in battle feasted in Valhalla after an heroic death
treated to the flesh of the boar Saehrimner.[2] Saehrimner came back to life each day to
serve as the main course for these hoards, having returned from reliving their
glorious feats. The beast, cooked by Andhrimner,
in the great kettle Eldhrimner,[3]
in the kitchens of the great hall, was a symbol of plenty. Frey and his sister Freya were the gods of
plenty, as well, in later variations on the Norse myths.
Wild boar was a favorite dish among mortal men, as
well. Aware of its role at Valhalla, it
was also a dish especially to honor heroism, the highest warrior values. While the Norman contingent of the Norse
races adopted Christianity earnestly and earlier than most, they still remained
every bit as dedicated to their warrior
values. They were fierce warriors and
pious Christians. The boar remained the
dish of honor meant only to be placed before spotless warriors.
The ancient English, too, greatly honored the boar, but the
details are not as clear. The 1st
Century A.D. Iceni frequently featured wild boar on their coins. Rollo, the Norse chieftain who had been
exiled from Norway, in the 9th century, spent considerable time in
Scotland and Saxon England before he received the French region we now call
“Normandy” in exchange for an end to raiding and fealty to the French crown. Other Norse groups also spent much of their
time in England. The Saxon infatuation with
the wild boar began at least as early as
this.
Edward the Confessor is said to have hunted wild boar in the
royal forest of Bernwood. William the
Conqueror established draconian penalties for the unauthorized killing of a
boar.[4]
Perhaps the earliest record of the boar being served as a
ceremonial dish is of the English King Henry II personally serving the boar’s
head to his son, Henry Fitzhenry, on a platter, in 1170, on the occasion of
naming him “co-regent”. It was a
traditional act honoring a cherished son and spotless warrior. The two remained Normans — Norse men.
By Tudor times, when we begin to find documents that
describe the already historical importance of the boar for upper class
Christmas dinners, and the traditions that went with them, its population was
small. Only a few English forests
existed in which to hunt it. Wild boar
was not readily available. The tusked
beast on the Christmas platters of those
who could afford it may well have been shipped from Scotland or Europe.
In fact, the popular English text of the time on hunting the
boar — The Arte of Venerie (1575), alternately attributed to George
Tuberville and George Gascoigne — was actually a translation of Jacques du
Fouilloux’s 1568 La Venerie. Even
the specialized terms of the boar hunt are translations from Fouilloux’s work
suggesting that there were no social boar hunts any longer in England. It would
appear that an English nobleman who wished still to hunt the boar, as a rite of
passage, generally did so in Europe.
Harting provides a citation I borrow here to show that Shakespeare
himself verifies the situation. ‘In olden times the enclosure in which the
Boars used to be fattened was termed a "Boar-frank." Shakespeare uses
the word in the Second Part of Henry IV.:
Doth the old boar feed in the old
frank?’[5]
The Bard’s works show that he was intimately familiar with the
methods of all of the noble hunting sports of his time — but not boar
hunting. When the boar's domain is not myth or escutcheon, it is mentioned as an
animal kept in a fattening-pen.
By the reign of Charles I, a population of boar was imported
into England in an attempt to reintroduce the royal beast. The population grew rapidly and wild boars
were soon considered a dangerous nuisance.
The nuisance was ended, for all practical purposes, when the last of
that population was killed during the English Civil War.[6]
[1] Guerber,
H. A. Myths of the Norsemen from the Eddas and Sagas (1908). 66.
And now, strange to tell, from the roaring fire
Came the golden-haired Gullinbörst,
To serve as a charger the sun-god Frey,
Sure, of all wild boars this the first.
The
Dwarf, Oehlenschläger (Pigott's tr.).
[2]
Ibid., 20.
All the chosen guests of Odin
Daily ply the trade of war;
From the fields of festal fight
Swift they ride in gleaming arms,
And gaily, at the board of gods,
Quaff the cup of sparkling ale
And eat Saehrimni's vaunted flesh.
Vasthrudni's-mal
(W. Taylor's tr.).
[4] Harting, James Edmund, “The Survival and Destruction of British Animals”, Edinburgh Review, Volume 188 (1898). 221-251@234.
[5] Harting,
James
Edmund, British Animals Extinct within Historic Times
(1880). 96. The citation is 2 Henry
IV, II.ii.
Also at Virtual Grub Street:
- Zombie Apocalypse & Trick-or-Treating: Halloween through History. October 30, 2019. 'Looking closely, however, we see that this Shakespeare quote has moved the “puling” (which it was actually called) back one day to Hallowmas, All Hallows Day, rather than All Souls. Far more important, he has actually referred to puling as a special kind of speech spoken by beggars on Hallowmas Day.'
-
Malvolio’s Crow's Feet and “the new Mappe”. October 14, 2019. “Percy Allen’s candidate is not mentioned by any of these parties. The traditionalists, of course, could not consider it possible because it would suggest far too early a date for the play.”
- Who Saved Southampton from the Ax? September 2, 2019. “One of the popular mysteries of the final years of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I is why the Queen executed her favorite, the Earl of Essex, for treason, and left his accomplice, the Earl of Southampton, to languish as a prisoner in The Tower until King James I ascended the throne.”
- What Color Were Shakespeare’s Potatoes? July 27, 2019. “By the year 1599-1600, when Shakespeare’s play would seem to have been written, the potato was available in London. It was considered a delectable treat and an aphrodisiac.”
- Check out the Medieval Topics Article Index for many more articles about this fascinating time.
- Check out the English Renaissance Article Index for many more articles and reviews about this fascinating time and about the Shakespeare Authorship Question.
- Zombie Apocalypse & Trick-or-Treating: Halloween through History. October 30, 2019. 'Looking closely, however, we see that this Shakespeare quote has moved the “puling” (which it was actually called) back one day to Hallowmas, All Hallows Day, rather than All Souls. Far more important, he has actually referred to puling as a special kind of speech spoken by beggars on Hallowmas Day.'
- Malvolio’s Crow's Feet and “the new Mappe”. October 14, 2019. “Percy Allen’s candidate is not mentioned by any of these parties. The traditionalists, of course, could not consider it possible because it would suggest far too early a date for the play.”
- Who Saved Southampton from the Ax? September 2, 2019. “One of the popular mysteries of the final years of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I is why the Queen executed her favorite, the Earl of Essex, for treason, and left his accomplice, the Earl of Southampton, to languish as a prisoner in The Tower until King James I ascended the throne.”
- What Color Were Shakespeare’s Potatoes? July 27, 2019. “By the year 1599-1600, when Shakespeare’s play would seem to have been written, the potato was available in London. It was considered a delectable treat and an aphrodisiac.”
- Check out the Medieval Topics Article Index for many more articles about this fascinating time.
- Check out the English Renaissance Article Index for many more articles and reviews about this fascinating time and about the Shakespeare Authorship Question.
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