If a knight die in war ordained by the church, as in the case of war against the unbelievers or of the faith, and is not otherwise in mortal sin, his soul goes straight to paradise.
HONORÉ BOUVET, THE TREE OF BATTLES, 1387
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You don’t want to go to hell. If you end up there, you will find yourself wearing armour that you cannot take off, for it will be nailed onto you. You will be forced to take lots of baths, and to make matters worse, the water will be sulphurous and foul. Nor will you have amorous young women to embrace when you get out; instead, lustful toads will force themselves on you. There are steps you can take to avoid this fate.
Pious donations
It is too much to hope that you will have been consistently good and virtuous throughout your knightly career. You will probably regret, for example, the way in which you have assisted in the destruction of churches and monasteries in the course of your campaigns. You may have done your best to hear mass; perhaps you had papal permission to have a portable altar, and it is likely that you will have given alms when the opportunity arose. You need, however, to do more. A good way to avoid a painful and unpleasant afterlife is to ensure that you have lots of masses said for you after your death. You could follow the example of Jean de Grailly, the Captal de Buch. His will specified that 50,000 masses were to be said for him in the year following his death. He gave 1,000 écus to the house of the Franciscans at Bordeaux, and in all his various pious donations totalled 40,000 écus.
There are many examples of pious donations. Boucicaut gave to the chapter of St Martin of Tours, and in 1406 founded a hospital at Sainte-Catherine-de-Fierbois. Robert Knollys founded a college of clergy at Pontefract, probably because his wife came from there. He also put funds towards the rebuilding of Rochester Bridge. Walter Mauny gave to the London Charterhouse. Ralph, Lord Basset of Drayton gave £250 to the priory of Canwell, so that there could be five more monks there; he also arranged for the foundation of four chantries. In Italy in 1364 the German mercenary Albert Bylandt built the convent of San Antonio in Vicenza, where he was buried with his wife Aquilia.
Even if you do not make such expensive arrangements, you need to ensure that your will provides for a good funeral, and a proper number of prayers to be said for you. In his will of 1385, John Devereux set out his wishes, which included paying the poor to pray for him:
My body is to be buried in the church of the Grey Friars in London, and I will that six tapers in the form of a cross be placed upon my hearse, and that six men clothed in white bear six torches, and that each of them receive 40d. for his pains; also to every poor man at my burial one penny to pray for my soul, and for all Christian souls; to the Grey Friars for my burial there 40 marks, and I will that as soon as possible after my death one thousand masses be said for my soul, and for the souls of my father and mother.
A painted alabaster carving from the tomb of Ferdinand Antequera, king of Aragon, showing part of his funeral procession. (Musée du Louvre, Paris. Photo Art Archive, London)
Bertrand du Guesclin, in his will, arranged for a mass to be said every day for him in the Breton town of Dinan, and for pilgrims to go on his behalf to two shrines in Brittany. You will find that religious houses are eager to receive your money; in Lucca in Italy in 1346 there was an unseemly dispute between two churches over which of them should say masses for the German Johann von Geispolzheim.
Your tomb
You will almost certainly be much more concerned about having a large number of masses said for your soul, than you will be about the quality of your tomb. Nevertheless, a good tomb will help to ensure that you are remembered and honoured by future generations. A relatively cheap option is to have a memorial brass; these are a very popular form of monument, especially in England. There are workshops in London that specialize in making them, and you can be sure that you will be shown smartly attired in the very latest style of armour. One problem is that brasses tend to be rather stylized; one knight looks very much like another. A full-sized effigy is a far grander way of doing things; you might think of having one in alabaster, painted to look lifelike. This is what Walter Mauny wanted:
I will that a tomb of alabaster, with my image as a knight, and my arms thereon, shall be made for me, like that of Sir John Beauchamp, in St Paul’s, in London.
A canopied tomb looks particularly good, if you and your family can afford it. If you are really fortunate, someone else may want to pay. The Florentines were keen to have a grand tomb for John Hawkwood, but Richard II foiled their plan when he demanded that the body should be brought back to England. The Florentines had to settle instead for a splendid fresco in the cathedral to commemorate Hawkwood.
Two English brasses, showing Matthew de Swetenham, and John de Creke. (Left: Victoria & Albert Museum, London; right: Westley Waterless, Cambridgeshire/Monumental Brass Society)
Two German tombstones, one of Gunther von Schwarzburg, who was elected as German king in 1349 and died in the same year, and the other of Albert von Hohenlohe. (From A. Parmentier, Album Historique, Paris 1895)
Resurrection
You ought to try to make sure that you are buried all in one piece. In 1299 Pope Boniface VIII prohibited the burying of different body parts in different places, but it was difficult to enforce this, and 50 years later Clement V allowed the practice once again. There are all sorts of theological difficulties involved if a body is not whole. The theologian Thomas of Chobham put one of the problems like this:
Certain people object that if Christ was resurrected in glory and His whole body was glorified, how is it that the Church claims that Christ’s foreskin, cut off at the time of his circumcision, still remains on earth?
There are cases of notable warriors being buried in separate bits. Remember Robert Bruce, whose heart was taken off to Spain on crusade by James Douglas. Douglas was killed fighting, but fortunately Bruce’s heart was found on the battlefield and taken back to Scotland. However, it was buried at Melrose Abbey, not with the rest of Bruce’s body at Dunfermline. It will surely cause a lot of unnecessary work when it comes to the Resurrection if you have to be reassembled from a number of locations, and there is even a danger that you may end up incomplete.
Memoirs
One way in which you can ensure that your knightly deeds will be remembered by posterity is to have a book written about you. If you are fortunate enough to meet Jean Froissart, he might include stories about you in his chronicles. Alternatively, you could follow the example of Pedro IV of Aragon and write an autobiography, though it is unlikely that you will have the time for this. Ulrich von Liechtenstein also wrote up part of his own career, though it is hard to know how seriously to take his adventures as a tournament hero dressed as a woman.
The French are particularly keen on having very long books to glorify their careers. Boucicaut’s Life was written during his lifetime, primarily in order to justify his actions as governor of Genoa, but also to set out all his achievements up to 1409. Bertrand du Guesclin’s life is celebrated by an enormous work in bad verse by Jean Cuvelier. There are also plans for a large book by Jean Cabaret d’Orville on Louis de Bourbon. For some reason the English have not gone in for long works of this sort; all that they can offer is a brief verse life of the Black Prince by the Chandos Herald. Nor do the Germans or Italians indulge in lengthy biographies.
If you do well, being a knight can offer you magnificent possibilities for fame and fortune. It is even possible, if you are really successful, that your deeds may be celebrated in books written in the distant future, perhaps even in the 21st century.
SOME FINAL TIPS
Train hard. Climbing up the reverse side of ladders is a good form of exercise.
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Get knighted on the battlefield; it’s much simpler that way.
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Buy your armour in Milan.
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Keep your legs straight when you ride.
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Keep your eye on the target, not on the tip of your lance.
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Do not make unnecessary or dangerous vows.
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Find a sensible girl to adore.
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Do not crusade against the Mamluks or the Turks.
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Get off your horse to fight battles.
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If you want a souvenir from your travels, think about bringing back a leopard.
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Keep away from guns; they may explode in your face.
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Have as little to do with peasants as possible.
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Do not dress up in flammable fancy dress.
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Do not be too greedy in setting ransom demands.
Sir John Chandos at the head of his troops (and shortly before he was killed after tripping over his surcoat). (From a translation of Froissart by T. Johnes, 1839)