Knighthood, Chivalry & Tournament
Glossary of Terms

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‘À bonne usance’ also ‘à butin’: ‘for my own good use.’ A cry uttered by soldiers as they searched for spoils of war while an enemy fled.

‘À logis, ployez les banniers’: Words used by heralds to signify the end of a tournament--‘to your homes--furl your banners.’

À la toille: A joust held on either side of a barrier. Prior to the early 15th century, jousts were conducted in the open rather than on either side of a low wall, which made the event much more dangerous. The first reference found in chronicles is found in a pas d’armes held by Pierre de Bauffremont c. 1442, described in Engerrand de Monstrelet's Chronique. See Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #16 for a reprint of this encounter. Also known as the tilt.

À outrance: (Fr. "with utmost hostility") Indicates a combat of war, not fought for pleasure. Wars would be fought à outrance, as might an emprise, but a friendly passage at arms, such as a pas d’armes, would be fought for pleasure, à plaisir. In an à outrance encounter, the potential for injury or death was higher, as the opponent was viewed more as an enemy than as a friendly opponent. Jousts of War would be fought in this manner, whereas a Joust of Peace would be fought à plaisir.

À plaisir: (Fr. "for pleasure") Used to denote a friendly combat, a combat between martial peers. A Joust of Peace would be fought thus, whereas an emprise or a war would be fought à outrance.

À prix d’une esquilette: (Fr. "equal shares") The spoils of war won during a campaign, part of the payment received by a man-at-arms during the 14th century.

Abbey: Society of monks or nuns governed by an abbot or for women, an abbess, and by extension the buildings themselves. Abbeys gathered unto themselves large tracts of land as wealthy men became monks, but the constant struggle between the secular authority and the church resulted in many confiscations.

Abbot: A "chief monk" in the head of a monastary or an abbey.

Accolade: Ceremony conferring the honor of knighthood. Generally the most important element of the accolade historically was the girding on of the sword, the giving of the military belt that signified the "coming of age" in a martial sense. See also Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #5 for more knighting ceremonies.

Accoutrement: All the pieces of a knight’s office: his sword, symbolizing justice and mercy; his spurs, chain of fealty, and military belt.

Acre: A port city on the Bay of Haifa in the eastern Mediterranean, a critical city in the Holy Lands, seized by Christian armies in 1104, but retaken by Saladin in 1187, recaptured by Richard I in 1191, finally falling to the Saracens for the last time in 1291.

Admiral: Derived from an old Saracen term ‘emir,’ meaning prince. Sometime during the late 13th century it became used as naval term of rank as leader for a fleet of ships—possibly ‘prince of the sea.’

Adoubement: The girding of the military belt, the most important element of a knighting ceremony. See also accolade and Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #5.

Adventurous Shield: A shield in the White Abbey, destined for Galahad, the perfect knight in Arthurian legend.

Agincourt, Battle of: 25 October 1415. The monumental battle between Henry V and the French forces arrayed against him, slaying three French dukes, the constable of France, nine counts, 90 lords and more than 5,000 knights. The battle crushed the French resistance to Henry’s renewed claim to the French throne, resulting in the Treaty of Troyes, 1420, in which Henry was betrothed to Catherine and thus their heir of France. It was this battle that Shakespeare immortalized in his "Saint Crispen’s Day" speech in Henry V.

Albion: Britain.

Albuquerque: Spanish castle built by Alfonso Sanches during the very early 14th century. It is situated on a commanding pinnacle of rock, overlooking rich countryside. It was beseiged many times during the conflict between Castile and Portugal.

Alexander: A late 14th century English prose work in which Alexander the Great encounters an Amazon queen, battles Darius and later marries his daughter Roxana, and accounts for his death by poison at age 33. Also an incomplete High German courtly epic by Rudolf von Ems, where he is depicted as the ideal medieval ruler—brave, just, and generous.

Alexandre, Roman de: An Old French epic after which the unique 12 syllable verse form was named ‘alexandrine.’ The work went through many hands, evolving during two centuries.

Alexiad: The 12th century account of the Byzantine princess Anna Comnena, wherein the earliest reliable reference to tourney-like games is found. The following quotation is from a French Crusader heard at court to say:

"I am a pure Frank and of noble birth. One thing I know: at a crossroads in the country where I was born in an ancient shrine; to this anyone who wishes to engage in single combat goes, prepared to fight; there he prays to God for help and he stays awaiting the man who will dare to answer his challenge. At that crossroads have I often spent time, waiting and longing for the man who would fight, but there was never a one who dared."

Alleron: The wing-tip of a hawk.

Allure: Walkway along the ramparts of a castle.

Almain: Germany

Almerie: A pantry or buttery.

Alms: Monetary penance. Usually a priest hearing confession of a member of the nobility would assign a small value in alms to be paid to the poor.

Alms House: Originally an a house attached to an abbey were alms and food were distributed, they eventually became hospitals.

Almoner: Member of the priest’s staff in court or in a castle, responsible for offerings to the poor. The almoner gathered leftovers from the table, made gifts of cloth and tallow to the poor.

Ambler: A saddle horse, distinct form a courser, destrier or warhorse.

Amorette: A love-knot interlaced like a rosette.

Anoint: The holy element of a coronation ceremony where holy oils were applied to the heir's body (usually the head) to seal the divine nature of the kingship.

• 15th century coronation ceremony

Antioch, Battle of: 28 June 1098. The most famous battle of the first crusade, the beseiged crusaders, inside of Antioch, sallied forth arranged into six divisions, defeating their Saracen attackers in a brutal engagement, were the heavy cavalry of the knights, using cohesion in a frontal charge, shattered the bulk of Kerbogha’s army. Present at the battle was Godrey de Bouillon, one of the nine worthies.

Appatis: An agreement between the local citizenry of a defeated region and the occupying soldiery. Essentially a payment system that under the laws of war forbade theft and mistreatment of the locals so long as the appatisized country paid the ransom.

Apprentice: The first rung on the guild structure ladder. An apprentice served his master for numerous years, generally seven or more, to work of the debt of his training. Following a successful apprenticeship, the apprentice became a journeyman, eventually working to try to become a Master of his craft.

Arch-Duke: Title for the dukes of Austria, Lorraine, and Brabant, There is an informal SCA meaning for this term usually construed to mean a ‘duke’ who was reigned more than five times.

Argent: Heraldic for silver or white, a metal, along with gold (or).

Arma Patrina: (Latin): Squires who had either grown too old to qualify for knighthood or who had forgone the expense of knighthood but who were allowed to carry a lance and shield even though these were generally restricted by the customs of war to the chivalry.

Armiger: The Norman predecessor of what came to be known as squire, young men who were in training to be knights, a term popular during the 13th century. See also Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #8.

Arming Squire: The squire whose duties included accompanying his knight to war, caring for his gear, and helping him to put on his armour. Generally a five year apprenticeship from age 13 to 18. Sometimes the arming squires would accompany their knight as part of his lance, or household unit. These duties are distinguished from the squire of the table, whose duties were generally held to dressing the knight and serving at table, functions for younger squires and sometimes by pages. There is not always a clear distinction between the two. See also Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #8.

Armorica: Ancient name ‘on the sea’ in the Breton language, often confused with Amonica in Northern Wales. Geoffrey of Monmouth made this error, placing the events of King Arthur on the continent rather than in Wales, where they make more sense.

Armory: A place for storing weapons and armour. Sometimes this can mean a royal storehouse, as in the Royal Armouries in the Tower of London or in Gratz, Austria, or more generally any storehouse in a castle or stronghold. It can also mean a workshop in which arms are made or repaired, and lastly, the correct term for all things relating to a herald. In modern usage armories repair and build firearms.

Arms: Weapons or armour, or a heraldic device.

Arsouf, Battle of: Richard the Lionheart and Saladin fought this important battle in 1191, as Richard needed a port to conduct his operations at sea.

Art of Courtly Love, The: Written by Andreas Cappallanus between 1174 and 1186 for Marie de Champagne. The work speaks of the relations between the sexes, parodying Ovid’s Art of Love. He provided 31 rules for loving, Amongst his dialogues and advice, he offered the following:

1. Marriage is no real excuse for not loving.
2. He who is not jealous cannot love.
5. That which a lover takes against the will of his beloved has no relish.
11. It is not proper to love any woman whom one would be ashamed to seek to marry.
12. A true lover does not desire to embrace anyone in love except his beloved.
13. When made public love rarely endures.
15. Every lover regularly turns pale in the presence of his beloved.
24. Every act of a lover ends in the thought of his beloved.
26. Love can deny nothing to love.
27. A lover can never have enough of the solaces of his love.
28. Nothing forbids one woman from being loved by two men or one man by two women.

Certainly these rules strike us as odd today; their impact on the morality of the 12th century was even more risqué. The Courts of Love held by Countess Marie, the countesses of Norbonne and Flanders and Eleanor of Aquitaine were renowned for their amusements; indeed the ideals of courtly love, while extreme, bore a mark in the chivlaric ideals later expressed in the romances, which in their turn, impacted on the expectations society held for knightly conduct.

Artillery: Technically the use of heavy missiles, during the bulk of the Middle Ages the role of artillery was confined to use in the siege. During the 14th century, however, the English under the generalship of Edward III experimented with combined arms using artillery in the form of archers, infantry and cavalry with devastating effect. Cannons were known as early as 1300, their presence is noted in many sieges, such as at Harfleur and Edward’s siege of Calais in 1346, but until the early 16th century they had little effect on the battlefield proper. During the 18th century the devastating effect of artillery gave it the nickname it still carries to the current day, ‘Queen of the Battlefield.’

Arpent: A unit of measure mentioned in the Star’s charter--‘knights of the star shall never flee more than 40 arpents from a battle....’ Arrière-Guard: The rear-guard in a 14th century army. The leading division was known as the avant-guard

Arrow-slit: The narrow opening in a castle wall, a window, through which archers could shoot but still have substantial cover. The inside of the opening was often tapered to allow the archer a larger field of fire.

Assassins: A radical sect of Muslim shi-ites organized in the late 11th century to fight the opponents of Ismali by any means possible. Known to fortify themselves for their work using Hashishin--‘hashish’, they came to be known in French as assassins, and the name became synomynous with plotted murder. The followers had a stronghold near Antioch under the leadership of Sinan Ibn Salman Ibn Muhummad, called Rashid ad-Din, the Old Man of the Mountain. In 1192 they murdered Conrad of Montferrat, supposedly at the behest of Richard Lionheart, but this charge was disproved. See also Chronique: The Journal of Chivalry #9.

Ascalon, Battle of: 14 August 1099. Open field encounter between El-Afdal of Egypt and the crusaders of Duke Godfrey de Bouillon. Godfrey’s genius for maneuver rocked the Saracen army, forcing it back onto itself, into the sea, and up into sycamore trees where many of them were burned to death. A huge amount of booty was taken from the Saracen baggage train, including the vizier’s banner, sword and armour. Scabbling over the booty kept the crusaders from seizing the town of Ascalon, but it earned a poor renown for the Egyptians that was recovered only at the Battle of Ramelah a few years later.

Atteint: A common 15th century term used to determine a hit in a joust.

Avalon, Isle of: Associated with the Isle of Man in the Irish Sea, the isle is often associated with Glastonbury, where the body of King Arthur was said to rest.

Avant-Guard: The first division in a 14th century army, also known as the ‘vanguard’. The rear-guard was known as the arrière-guard.

Azure: Heraldic for ‘blue.’