Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello and got into the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm editor Kandis Kipson, going by staff writer Jane mcgarrath. Again,
Speaker 1: it's I think chivalry is alive and well, and we
Speaker 1: have the knights of Middle Age and medieval Europe to
Speaker 1: think for that. That's right. And uh, I guess when
Speaker 1: we're young we think about I guess the little girls
Speaker 1: at least think about meeting knights in shining armor. And
Speaker 1: we don't really know a lot except for, you know,
Speaker 1: the little we get in history class about what actual
Speaker 1: nights in the Middle Ages were like and whether or
Speaker 1: not their armor was in fact shiny. And after doing
Speaker 1: a little bit of research, I'm inclined to think it
Speaker 1: may have been, you know, buffed and polished, but I
Speaker 1: don't think it was that shiny. Yeah, probably not if
Speaker 1: they were busy in battle and didn't get to clean
Speaker 1: it that often. They kind a lot going on again,
Speaker 1: they've got their squires short. But I think we're getting
Speaker 1: ahead of ourselves. So nights, it's not just the staff
Speaker 1: of literature. They were real medieval warriors and they began
Speaker 1: their military training very young and the word night actually
Speaker 1: comes from the Anglish Saxon term for boy and knighthood,
Speaker 1: and the system of becoming a night actually began under
Speaker 1: the feudal system which was established by Charlemagne in the
Speaker 1: eighth century. That's right, and knights, especially early on but
Speaker 1: later not necessarily. They they had land that they held
Speaker 1: from the lords would sort of lease to them, and
Speaker 1: they were responsible for In order to get dubbed a knight,
Speaker 1: usually you were the son of a night or a lord,
Speaker 1: and so they weren't necessarily nobility per se, but they
Speaker 1: were pretty respected, especially when we talk about the code
Speaker 1: of chivalry that we will in a second, just the
Speaker 1: idea that they were respected people. And you know, if
Speaker 1: you ever read Cannbury Tales like most people do in
Speaker 1: high school, the prologue actually lists the night first because
Speaker 1: he was so respected, right, And part of the reason
Speaker 1: for that was that it was not a position that
Speaker 1: you inherited. It was something that you had to work for.
Speaker 1: And just to give you a little bit of background
Speaker 1: on knighthood and the reason that nights were so important,
Speaker 1: um during Charlemagne's reign, essentially there was a bunch of
Speaker 1: land and after the Roman Empire fell. Western Europe essentially
Speaker 1: had no countries and no real organization, just huge parcels
Speaker 1: of land, and there was a lot of fighting every territories,
Speaker 1: but there was nothing really productive in place to control
Speaker 1: them and and to really ration it out and to
Speaker 1: give order and to create agricultural mainstays. And so Charlemagne
Speaker 1: instituted feudalism, and he had this patch of land that
Speaker 1: sort of went from northern Spain to Italy and then
Speaker 1: France and Germany and Poland, and he would dole out
Speaker 1: portions of land to nobles and in exchange they would
Speaker 1: agree to be loyal to him and to offer him protection.
Speaker 1: Or he could give land to nights in exchange for
Speaker 1: their military service. And nights who lived on land really
Speaker 1: had a good deal going whether they lived on land
Speaker 1: owned by the king or buy a noble and exchange
Speaker 1: for food, clothing, and shelter. They would, you know, provide
Speaker 1: military service when it was necessary. And they also protected
Speaker 1: the surfs who are underneath them as well as the
Speaker 1: men who were over them in the Sars War im
Speaker 1: part of because these were the people who were growing
Speaker 1: the food that fed them. So in lieu of having
Speaker 1: an actual centralized government, This was a pretty good system
Speaker 1: and everyone was taken care of, So knighthood was important,
Speaker 1: and you really did feel like you were part of
Speaker 1: a bigger structure and that you were important to your
Speaker 1: your your land or your fife. That's right, and knights
Speaker 1: actually made up pretty well. Um. I guess we're you're
Speaker 1: gonna talk about that later with the terms in terms
Speaker 1: of the Knights templar. But actually one thing that it
Speaker 1: struck me was that even though Knights are known as
Speaker 1: professional warriors, there was this thing called scootage where Um
Speaker 1: knights could actually send out others to do their fighting
Speaker 1: for them. I guess they were just too happy back
Speaker 1: in Europe with their lands that they were running and
Speaker 1: making a pretty good living at. But if you want
Speaker 1: to go back to um where boys, how boys became
Speaker 1: a nights. It actually started about the age of seven. Beforehand,
Speaker 1: they would be raised by their moms in the household,
Speaker 1: but by the age of seven they officially became a page.
Speaker 1: They would learn horsemanship, reading, writing, religion, even falconry, which
Speaker 1: was popular at the time. Yes, and they got their
Speaker 1: hunting skills. They got all their schooling skills down and
Speaker 1: I was sort of cute I'm sure it wasn't exactly
Speaker 1: cute back then, but it's cute to me to read
Speaker 1: about it. They would use wooden swords and lances to
Speaker 1: practice combats. It isn't that just kind of adorable, little page,
Speaker 1: little cute little page boy haircut out there with his
Speaker 1: wooden sword a big strong night one day. I think
Speaker 1: it's sweet. Anyway, Once they turned fourteen, the page became
Speaker 1: an esquire or squire, and um, in order to mark
Speaker 1: this passage, there was a religious ceremony and he would
Speaker 1: take a consecrated sword and he would promise to use
Speaker 1: it for honorable purposes. And this is all very sword
Speaker 1: in the stone to me, you know, I can see
Speaker 1: this happening, little warts and taking his sword from the stone,
Speaker 1: and the squire is actually on such a literary geek.
Speaker 1: But the squire is actually the second one I believe
Speaker 1: died in the Canary Tales prologue, and she gets it
Speaker 1: goes to show how UM using this this system of
Speaker 1: the page to the squire of the night is. It
Speaker 1: was very respected, yeah, and and very much instilled and
Speaker 1: the common mentality and how people conceived of the order
Speaker 1: of their lands. So the squire had a couple of
Speaker 1: different types of positions that he could fill during his
Speaker 1: training and Um, in addition to these positions, he was
Speaker 1: learning social etiquette and behavior as well as martial arts
Speaker 1: and um, there are I've got to tell you guys
Speaker 1: about these positions because they just they tickled me. A
Speaker 1: couple in particular. There is a squire of body who
Speaker 1: was a personal servant to a night or a lady.
Speaker 1: The Squire of the chamber also the chamberlain was another
Speaker 1: name for that, and he attended to the rooms in
Speaker 1: a castle. This is one of my favorite. The table
Speaker 1: or carving squire was in charge of carving meat and
Speaker 1: waiting on banquet tables. So really sort of aware, that's
Speaker 1: what it sounds like. Yeah, I kind of reminds me
Speaker 1: for of the fraternity hazing sort of situations. Yes, I'll
Speaker 1: have to ask Steward about that one later. Um. Squire
Speaker 1: of wines who managed the wine cellar not a bad position.
Speaker 1: Um at least, may the say Squire of pantry who
Speaker 1: stocked the pantry, managed supplies for the home, Squire of
Speaker 1: Arms who maintained armor and weapons, And the Squire of
Speaker 1: Honor who helped in ceremonies and feasts, and if you're
Speaker 1: like me, you're thinking that some sound a little bit
Speaker 1: more prestigious than others. So I'm wondering, honestly, if there
Speaker 1: was some sort of ranking system or depending on how
Speaker 1: well they performed just pages that determined whether they got
Speaker 1: to be a squire of body or or a meat squire. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's true, although I think no matter what position you
Speaker 1: were at, you were kind of can't wait until you
Speaker 1: turned twenty one. And uh, at the time, it wasn't
Speaker 1: about alcohol, but about being dubbed a knight. This was
Speaker 1: about the time that you would sometimes actually if squires,
Speaker 1: if there was a war going on, they went to
Speaker 1: go fight, they would serve their um their night in battle,
Speaker 1: and if they did something particularly heroic, they could be
Speaker 1: actually dubbed on on the battlefield. But usually, uh, once
Speaker 1: a night turned twenty one, back at home, they would,
Speaker 1: uh they would be dubbed officially in sort of this
Speaker 1: elaborate ceremony. You know. It often accompanied another big ceremony
Speaker 1: like a wedding or even I think Christmas or Easter
Speaker 1: feast day. Yeah, and so um it would be a
Speaker 1: major part of it. And uh, you can tell by
Speaker 1: the fact that they had these this ritual they went
Speaker 1: through the night. Before the boy would go have a
Speaker 1: ritual bath, they would have an all night prayer vigil.
Speaker 1: And then the next day when they went to go
Speaker 1: get dubbed, they would have to swear this oath where
Speaker 1: they were devoted to the Church, they were loyal to
Speaker 1: their lord, they defended a lady, etcetera, etcetera, and some
Speaker 1: of these other ETCeteras. Again, I just it's just so
Speaker 1: fun reading about night history. You know, whether you are
Speaker 1: a meat squire or whatever. Parts of this oath were
Speaker 1: really humorous, or at least to me today. They had
Speaker 1: to um in addition to defending ladies and being loyal
Speaker 1: to their lords and to the church, they had to
Speaker 1: be brave. They had to promise that they were going
Speaker 1: to take off their armor only when they were sleeping
Speaker 1: on They would vow never to avoid danger because they
Speaker 1: were afraid. They had to be on time, which is
Speaker 1: just good sent to really. And another one is that
Speaker 1: whenever the Night returned home, he would have to share
Speaker 1: and tell about his escapades and talk about being a
Speaker 1: literary geek. That's got the wheels in my mind turning.
Speaker 1: I was like, huh, well, I wonder if this is
Speaker 1: why the you know, oral tradition of of Nights stories
Speaker 1: is so alive, and wow, there must have been a
Speaker 1: lot of Nights stories going around if you were required
Speaker 1: to tell someone about it. Yeah, And another one I
Speaker 1: found interesting actually in the little details, was that if
Speaker 1: a Night was taken prisoner, he would have to surrender
Speaker 1: peaceably after he was really taken, and he wouldn't be
Speaker 1: allowed to fight his captors again until he got their permission,
Speaker 1: which I found really interesting. You would expect, you know,
Speaker 1: if you were taken prisoner, that you would try your
Speaker 1: best to fight your way out of it. So there's
Speaker 1: an interesting code that this, oh, this oath that they
Speaker 1: had to take, and you can imagine if every single
Speaker 1: Night is good enough to uphold the code, then things
Speaker 1: must have been you know, pretty sivels around there, and
Speaker 1: people wanted to have you know, been really proper and
Speaker 1: kind of one in one another at it seems like
Speaker 1: every now and then there's there's a bad apple that
Speaker 1: gets through, and bad Nights must have come along and
Speaker 1: done things like stalling another's armor or challenged him to
Speaker 1: a duel, and it was sort of two on one
Speaker 1: instead of you know, one on one as the action
Speaker 1: was supposed to be. So yeah, and it's interesting, I mean,
Speaker 1: most people associate this whole oath with what is now
Speaker 1: known as chivalry. I mean, if you don't sort of
Speaker 1: just talk about how opening up a car door is chivalrous,
Speaker 1: But actually the term originally originally came back to just
Speaker 1: meaning good horsemanship, which I found really interesting. Another source
Speaker 1: I found said that it meant just playing tenure of
Speaker 1: land at all, and that sort of made sense to
Speaker 1: me in terms of the word gentleman, which you know,
Speaker 1: has a similar evolution and how we think of it
Speaker 1: think of it today. You know, gentlemen are people who
Speaker 1: open doors for ladies, but back then, uh, gentleman was
Speaker 1: just sort of someone who owned lander property. So it's
Speaker 1: just interesting to look at the evolution of what these
Speaker 1: terms mean today and what they meant back then. Definitely,
Speaker 1: I think that the anymalogy of of the world um
Speaker 1: definitely sheds light on what the knights did and how
Speaker 1: the tradition continues today, even though there weren't exactly medieval
Speaker 1: warriors prancing around modern day England. But at this point
Speaker 1: the knight was officially called a sir and he could
Speaker 1: own land and hire his own soldiers. And you may
Speaker 1: be wondering, well, what did a knight do when there
Speaker 1: weren't any battles to fight in, And the answer is
Speaker 1: pretty simple. They participated in tournaments, said that their skills
Speaker 1: didn't go to waste, and it's right. And um, one
Speaker 1: of my favorite I think is jails. Oh yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: I'm from Maryland. The case he didn't know and jaelsting
Speaker 1: is actually our official sport. I don't know how that happened,
Speaker 1: but but it's very bizarre, but I mean, I love
Speaker 1: it and jousting. If you've ever seen something like a
Speaker 1: night's sale, obviously, uh with heath Ledger, it was sort
Speaker 1: of always it was a one on one thing where
Speaker 1: knights would go up against each other mounted on horses
Speaker 1: and they would basically rush at each other with long,
Speaker 1: dull headed lances, and so they would keep them out
Speaker 1: in front of them so that they would try to
Speaker 1: hit the other person as they went by, and you
Speaker 1: win about through about three lances, and you would get
Speaker 1: points based on if you broke your lance on the
Speaker 1: other person where it hit, etcetera. And after three lances
Speaker 1: they would get off and start fighting if they wanted
Speaker 1: to with swords actually, and the Church I guess was
Speaker 1: okay with jausting because it was not quite as dangerous
Speaker 1: as another popular tournament, and that was the melee, and
Speaker 1: that was sort of a free for all battle. Imagine
Speaker 1: a really big group of nights and um, you're in
Speaker 1: this big huddle of nights and you eyeball a competitor.
Speaker 1: You choose one other person, you start fighting wance. You
Speaker 1: defeat that person and he's down, either he's down dead
Speaker 1: or he's down passed out. You move on to the
Speaker 1: next person. So it's a one on one fight, but
Speaker 1: in the context of a larger group and the premises
Speaker 1: last man standing winds and the Church really did not
Speaker 1: like this one makes a lot of people really did die,
Speaker 1: and I just you know, for the sake of entertainment,
Speaker 1: just seemed rather controversial. So and also, you know, from
Speaker 1: my modern perspective, it doesn't seem very shivalrous to us
Speaker 1: perform like this in front of a lady you were
Speaker 1: trying to impress by killing other people. That's alas I
Speaker 1: have an anachronistic point of years, so I could see
Speaker 1: that although um, one advantage to fighting these games is
Speaker 1: that you couldn't make a lot of money. That was
Speaker 1: one motivation that they had, in addition to like getting
Speaker 1: honor and practicing your skills. But they could actually get
Speaker 1: money by the fact, at least in jousting, when someone lost,
Speaker 1: they had to turn over their horse and their armor
Speaker 1: to the winner, and they could buy back those things
Speaker 1: from the winner. And so the if you were a
Speaker 1: common winner you were good at jousting, you could make
Speaker 1: a good load of money. And that was good years
Speaker 1: because all of your nightly accouterments were rather expensive, particularly armor.
Speaker 1: And when armor originated, it was back in ancient room
Speaker 1: and they actually used leather, and leather was very expensive
Speaker 1: to use, you know, as a full body protective covering,
Speaker 1: but it was malleable, so it was really cool because
Speaker 1: you could shape that and then you boil it and
Speaker 1: water oil and it hardens in place, and you've got
Speaker 1: something that very resistant to all sorts of points and
Speaker 1: tips and piercings coming at you. And um, so the
Speaker 1: middle aged nights use leather's armor, and then I continue
Speaker 1: to evolve into um chain mail, for instance, that was
Speaker 1: another Roman idea originally, and these were small interwoven steel
Speaker 1: rings and there were two predominant types. One was butted mail,
Speaker 1: where the rings were really really close together, and the
Speaker 1: other was riveted mail, where the rings were actually connected
Speaker 1: with rivets. And this was chaper than armor, but unlike
Speaker 1: armor and leather armor, it was really vulnerable to piercings
Speaker 1: and it was pretty heavy too. And it's funny slip
Speaker 1: back at part of the training for becoming a night
Speaker 1: was that you would practice walking around wearing chain mail,
Speaker 1: so you're gladdy. You get used to the way, sort
Speaker 1: of like today, I think that there's some military personnel
Speaker 1: who trained with their backpacks on their gear, or you know,
Speaker 1: if you're going to hike the Appalachian Trail, you probabice
Speaker 1: walking around with your packs. You get used to the weights. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes sense. And it's interesting to see how armor
Speaker 1: changes as um weapons change as they advance, because you know,
Speaker 1: you look at whate sorry, leather and um chain mail
Speaker 1: like you're saying canvas, and they are you know, they
Speaker 1: do protect against cuts and scrapes. But when you know,
Speaker 1: people started developing crossbows, for instance, this would not protect
Speaker 1: them and so they had to start turning to more
Speaker 1: solid metal pieces of armor. And so you know, these
Speaker 1: solid metal pieces. They're so difficult. Sometimes they heard that
Speaker 1: they weighed up to sixty pounds. They were super hot. Uh,
Speaker 1: they would often take an hour to put on. Need
Speaker 1: help to do that. On top of it, as weapons
Speaker 1: advanced even further, you see, uh the introduction of gunpowder.
Speaker 1: They finally made its way from from Asia to Europe.
Speaker 1: And once that was introduced, it was like, what's the
Speaker 1: point anymore? Imer point? But the funny thing about armor
Speaker 1: too is that it really didn't protect your entire body,
Speaker 1: so you had to wear chain me all, especially in
Speaker 1: places like your under arms and where your joints came together,
Speaker 1: like your knees, so that you had some protection there
Speaker 1: because the plates didn't fit that tightly. And contrary to
Speaker 1: popular belief, it wasn't too hard to move around in
Speaker 1: Like you weren't stiff, it was just really heavy. That
Speaker 1: would have been the challenge. I can see that. And
Speaker 1: so nights continued to serve you out throughout the Middle
Speaker 1: Ages and throughout medieval Europe, you know, under the feudal system.
Speaker 1: And then they actually served um a more I guess
Speaker 1: national or international relay since Europe at this point was
Speaker 1: breaking apart into different nations. Purpose and that was protecting
Speaker 1: pilgrims who were traveling to the Holy Land during the
Speaker 1: Crusade and caring for sick pilgrims and um. These are
Speaker 1: are groups like the Knights Templar and the Knights hospital
Speaker 1: Ers and the Teutonic Knights. These still exist today as
Speaker 1: cherishable societies. Yeah, it's interesting. One of the most beloved
Speaker 1: orders of Knights was actually the Templars candas mentioned, and
Speaker 1: this is one unlike the others, that doesn't exist today,
Speaker 1: And it wasn't really interesting story because they were beloved
Speaker 1: at the time. Give you some background on it. They
Speaker 1: were founded about the eleven hundreds, like you said, to
Speaker 1: protect pilgrims going to the Holy Land at the time. Um,
Speaker 1: And if you listen to our Crusades podcast you know
Speaker 1: more about why they're doing that. So what was interesting
Speaker 1: about this order in other orders like it, was that
Speaker 1: it was both a military uh sort of purpose and
Speaker 1: they were religious men. It was basically religious order where
Speaker 1: they were monks and they were supposed to live a
Speaker 1: modest life, and they didn't always do that. They they,
Speaker 1: like other orders, got proud and greedy, and so there's
Speaker 1: lots of controversy around them. All the time, but this
Speaker 1: particular order got accused in the early fourteenth century. I
Speaker 1: believe of um lots of abuses in terms of UM,
Speaker 1: both monetary abuses like they were mishandling charity that they got, etcetera, etcetera,
Speaker 1: but people who are also upset that they were heretics,
Speaker 1: that they weren't holding mass correctly, that they were actually
Speaker 1: worshiping idols, and there was homosexual behavior going on between
Speaker 1: them as well, which the Church would not have liked.
Speaker 1: So at this time, it was actually the king, King
Speaker 1: Philip the fourth of France who really had um had
Speaker 1: his eye out on on them and wanted them to
Speaker 1: be taken out and um. Recent documents released by the
Speaker 1: Vatican actually a couple of years ago, it's very interesting
Speaker 1: show that the Pope at the time actually absolved them
Speaker 1: of their charges and didn't he didn't believe that they
Speaker 1: were heretics. But the King Philip of France UM supposedly
Speaker 1: owed them a lot of money, and that's really why
Speaker 1: they wanted him. They wanted he wanted the whole order gone,
Speaker 1: and so they were tried, they were tortured, and they're
Speaker 1: eventually burned at the stake. And it's really sad, mysterious story. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that is. It's really haunting, especially if you think about
Speaker 1: all the hard work that goes into becoming a knight
Speaker 1: and you know how you do Valie to uphold this oath.
Speaker 1: And I'm sure that once you sort of developed into
Speaker 1: your own separate order of Night, you have an entirely
Speaker 1: different code of ethics that you're also upholdings, and so so
Speaker 1: it seems like you would have to be really committed
Speaker 1: to uphold all of these principles. And I'm sure it
Speaker 1: must have been very hard on the group when they
Speaker 1: were when they were taken apart, and you know, even
Speaker 1: harder when they were executed. But that's another point. So today,
Speaker 1: um if you're not a member of one of the
Speaker 1: charity groups that originated in these different orders of Nights,
Speaker 1: you might be able to attain night hud by two
Speaker 1: different means, one of which is a martial arts achievement.
Speaker 1: And almost like if you were to practice crowd or
Speaker 1: another form of martial arts that originated in um Asia,
Speaker 1: you'd be given different colors of belts for the level
Speaker 1: of martial arts that that you attain, and the same
Speaker 1: is true in different schools around England where um and
Speaker 1: around other parts of Europe to where you can earn
Speaker 1: recognition for demonstrations and you may be asked to perform
Speaker 1: a different affairs and festivals to show your prowess. And
Speaker 1: the other way you can become a night is a
Speaker 1: member of Royalty bestows that honor upon you. And it's
Speaker 1: so fun to see the different people who come up
Speaker 1: for nighthood, be they oh, gosh, someone who's made a
Speaker 1: contribution to the business world, or the political world, or
Speaker 1: the music world, like Sir Elton John and I think
Speaker 1: he's my favorite nighte if I can say, gosh, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna stick up for Alton with little kicky sunglasses and
Speaker 1: carrying gosh. I just love him so. And they're a
Speaker 1: member of the Order of the Garter, which I found
Speaker 1: really interesting that this was one of the original orders.
Speaker 1: It was established at least in thirteen forty six. Uh,
Speaker 1: you might be wondering whether called the Order of the Garter.
Speaker 1: It is an interesting name and one source I found
Speaker 1: said that the theory is that Edward the Third, who
Speaker 1: started the Order, was really interested in the Arthur's round
Speaker 1: Table and that whole legend. He wanted to revive it
Speaker 1: and he chose a name because of embarrassing incident where
Speaker 1: Edward was at a party and he was dancing with
Speaker 1: a girl and the girl actually lost her garter and
Speaker 1: fell on the floor, and in order to quell the
Speaker 1: sort of embarrassment, he put it on his leg and
Speaker 1: he said, shame to him who thinks evil of it.
Speaker 1: So this sort of idea, you know, don't think evil
Speaker 1: of others. Um, he was really proud of and that's
Speaker 1: why he named it the Order of the Garter. How
Speaker 1: about that? That's the sweet story. I like that. So
Speaker 1: clearly there are a lot of different tales and legends
Speaker 1: surrounding the Order of Knights, and many more nights specifically
Speaker 1: for you to learn about, so be sure to read
Speaker 1: all about knights and castles and maybe even article on
Speaker 1: dragons on how stuff works dot com. For more on
Speaker 1: this and thousands of other topics, visit how stuff works
Speaker 1: dot com. Let us know what you think, Send an
Speaker 1: email to podcast at how stuff works dot com. M