Dramaturg Information

The Medieval Castle

The Medieval Castle Year

Medieval Mummers Plays

The Dereck - Marget - Gerard Back Story

Sites with Information on Medieval Customs

Medieval-Weddings.net

Fast and Feast: Food in Medieval Society

The Cambridge History of English and American Literature

The Medieval Castle

The primary function of the medieval castle was to dominate. It was not, as is commonly believed, a refuge in which men cowered behind walls. There were indeed occasions when men were forced to defend themselves behind cover, but the object of building a castle was not to retreat from conflict but to control it. Medieval soldiers did not sit in the barracks twiddling their thumbs. They were out patrolling, looking for trouble and frequently making it.

The great days of the medieval castle were between the years 900 and 1500. In six hundred years the castle evolved from an earth and wood construction to a highly sophisticated stone building which incorporated all the military lore which had been accumulated. It had everything from dungeons in which prisoners could be interrogated under torture to machicolations through which quicklime and incendiary missiles could be directed on to the attacker.

The widespread belief that in peacetime a castle was merely a stage for courtly love, stately banquets, and considerable boredom is very wide of the mark. Today's peaceful scene of deserted rooms and attractive gardens would have been divided between commissariat, ordnance factory, barrack square and proving ground. It would have been at least as noisy as a modern factory; communication would be by shouting, and men who were not hammering would probably be chopping. The ubiquitous smith would be shoeing horses or repairing armor and weapons; his contribution to the general clatter would be particularly noticeable.

Attacks on stone castles were made in four ways: missiles, arrows and slung stones devastated the battlements; climbers would try to scale the walls; starvation would weaken the defenders physically and morally; and sappers would undermine the structure. Despite his slowness, the most dangerous of all the attackers was the sapper or miner. Miners would tunnel from a considerable distance, carefully concealing the entrance and removing the soil under cover of darkness. The underground miner was not an easy opponent to tackle; fighting underground in a dark and contained space is an unpredictable activity and losses could be great.

Source: The Medieval Castle, Philip Warner, Classic Penguin 2001

WANT TO LEARN MORE? The Medieval Castle The influence of the castle, both on the course of history and on the lives of the people who lived in them, has never been fully explored-until now. This fascinating book examines the evolution of the medieval castle, from the rigid social structure of its society to the types of weapons, training, and tactics employed during wartime.

 

The Medieval Castle Year

WINTER was the season from Michaelmas (September 29) to Christmas when wheat and rye were sown. At Michaelmas, villagers opened the hedges to allow cattle to graze on the stubble of harvests  and plowing began on previously fallow fields. Castle stewards totaled up their accounts, marking the end of one fiscal year and the start of another. November was the "blood month" - slaughter time - beginning with the ancient feast of All Hallows. Martinmas or St. Martins Day (November 11) marked the feast of the plowman, celebrated with cakes, pastries and frumenty, a pudding made of wheat boiled with milk, currants, raisins and spices. From Christmas Eve to Epiphany or Twelfth Day (January 6), the fields were drowned with rain or bound with frost.

The Christmas holidays brought conviviality and a suspension of everyday standards of behavior and status. On Christmas Eve, the Yule log - a giant section of tree trunk that filled the hearth - was brought in and kept burning throughout the twelve nights. Lords provided their tenants with the Christmas meal in the manor hall (prepared from the year-end duties of bread, hens and ale they paid to the Lord and provided they brought their own dishes, cups, napkins and fuel for cooking). The twelve days of Christmas also brought the appearance of the mummers, bands of masked entertainers who paraded the streets and visited houses to dance and perform plays. One of the most common of these mummer's plays involved a champion who was slain but brought back to life by a doctor's magic pill or potion. New Years, like Christmas, was an occasion for celebration and gift giving.

SPRING was the time from the end of the Christmas holidays to Easter when oats, peas, beans and barley were the principal crops. Plow Monday, the first Monday after Epiphany was marked with special ceremonies including a plow race beginning at sunrise. However, it was not until Candlemas (February 2) that most real tillage was resumed. Easter, like Christmas was a day of exchanges between lord and tenant - tenants brought eggs and the lord gave them dinner. The week that followed was celebrated with games. Easter week ended with Hocktide, a two day festival.

SUMMER began with the May-day celebrations at the end of Easter week and continued to Lammas (August 1). In June, after sheep-shearing, the feast of the summer solstice - Midsummer - was celebrated (June 24). Often a wheel was set afire and rolled down a hill to signify that the sun had reached its highest point and was turning back. Lammas marked the end of the hay harvest.

AUTUMN the harvest season from Lammas to Michaelmas. At the end of the harvest, the tenants came to the lord's court to sing at the harvest feast - to "sing harvest home."

Source: Life in A Medieval Castle, Joseph & Frances Gies, Harper & Row 1974

WANT TO LEARN MORE? Life in a Medieval Castle The Gieses approach the castle as the center of medieval life and offer a book that helps set the record straight and keeps the romance too. They allow medieval man and woman to speak for themselves through selections from past journals, songs and account books. An easy, enlightening and enjoyable read.

 

Medieval Mummers Plays

Mummers plays are short dramas with rhymed texts, traditionally performed in association with certain annual festivals - mostly at Christmas, but in certain regions on Halloween, All Souls' Day, New Years, Plough Monday or Easter. The term mummer is synonymous with masker, and is derived from the Danish, mumme, or Dutch, momme. Although Medieval mummers are well documented - they went about and performed in masks (often simple but increasingly elaborate as time went on) - it is not clear that they actually performed the dramas now known as mummers plays as the written record of these plays does not first appear until several centuries later.

There are three main types of mummers's play; the most prominent being the Hero/Combat play. It starts with an introductory prologue and is followed by challenges and a sword fight between the hero and an antagonist. One of them - not always the villain - is "slain" and a quack doctor is brought in to perform a cure and the dead man is miraculously revived. This is usually achieved with a degree of comedy and may be the major scene of the play. To finish, a number of other characters may enter, often including Lucifer or Beelzebub, and the whole affair often ends with a seasonal song. The plays may be a memory of a much older ritual evoking the death of the old year and the birth of the new one. The script is usually only a few minutes long and is performed by village locals going from house to house.

The medieval mummer relied heavily on costumes and makeup for characterization. Costumes were often symbolic or fantastic, ranging from rags to the most lavish of attire, all in an aim to please the audience. The productions were often gaudy and anachronistic, such as devil costumes using grotesque animal heads and bodies to excite and shock the audiences. The performances were aided by music; the acting guilds often included a large company of flutes and trumpets to expand the theatrics and popularity of their shows.

CLICK HERE to see the text of a mummer's play, used as the basis for the play in The Golden Dream.

WANT TO LEARN MORE? All Silver and No Brass - An Irish Christmas Mumming A study of the folklore and oral history of mumming within a small community. Those who remember describe what one might experience when celebrating a typical evening of the old tradition. The book is a highly readable and insightful study of Irish folklife and a fine presentation of mumming's memory culture.

 

The Dereck - Marget - Gerard Back Story

King Dereck's lust for Marget and his actions resulting in the death of her husband Gerard are borrowed from the Bible story of King David and Bathsheba.

"It happened, late one afternoon, when David arose from his couch and was walking upon the roof of the king's house, that he saw from the roof a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful. And David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, "Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" So David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her .... And the woman conceived; and she sent and told David, "I am with child." (2 Samuel 11:2-5 RSV)

Bathsheba's husband was Uriah, a loyal soldier of King David. When attempts failed to make it appear that Uriah was the father of the child (2 Samuel 11:6-13 RSV), David plotted to make her a widow so that he could take her as his own wife. Uriah was even used to deliver his own death warrant:

"In the morning David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, "Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, that he may be struck down, and die." And as Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant men. And the men of the city came out and fought with Joab; and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite was slain also." (2 Samuel 11:14-17 RSV)

In "The Golden Dream", Dereck does not impregnate Marget, but the motivations and the results are the same.

WANT TO LEARN MORE? David & Bathsheba This film is a visual delight. The cinematography by Leon Shamroy, along with the massive sets, luxurious costumes and dramatic score by Alfred Newman (all were Oscar nominated) make this a fabulous "sword and sandals" epic; it also boasts one of the best dance sequences on film, by the brilliant Jack Cole. Gregory Peck is handsome beyond words as King David, with his partner in sin Bathsheba, played by the stunning Susan Hayward.