exprr*ly ordained that the floret-nor 

 knights, by girding them with sword, and^. 

 Uam i and thii U*t part of the ceremony is Ac- 

 tcnbrd as customary, 4ato titdrm, iicut connetudinit 

 M(, mom* coUtpho. 



Such is the Mihstance and general bearing and weight 

 of the facts on which the opinion it grounded, that chi- 

 valry existed prior to the time of Charlemagne; that it 

 was mderd gradually rendered more perfect in its cerc- 

 but that its principle and characteristics were in 

 before the reign of that monarch. But, on 

 g what has been advanced, it will be found to 

 prove merely, that military investiture, a custom existing 

 in a rude form among the Germans at the time of Taci- 

 tus, and necessarily arising out of the nate and circum- 

 stances of society, gradually assumed more splendour, 

 and was attended with additional ceremonies, all indica- 

 tive of the admission of the person invested, into the 

 rank of military men. But the principal circumstance 

 we shall look for in vain ; there it no proof that other 

 duties than those of a purely military character, and of 

 these, only such as the sovereign called for, were under- 

 taken by those who were so invested. 



If chivalry existed prior to the regular and full esta- 

 blishment and operation of the feudal system, and was 

 derived, in its perfect state, from the Scandinavians, we 

 should be able to trace it in England before the con- 

 quest. On the continent, it may be difficult to deter- 

 mine, whether it owed its origin to the feudal system, 

 or how far that system, co-operating with other antece- 

 dent or cotcmporary causes, modified and perfected it ; 

 because it is not easy to fix the time when the feudal 

 system was in full and regular operation there : but it is 

 well known that in England this system did not exist 

 till the conquest, and that it was introduced and esta- 

 blished by William. It is therefore necessary to exa- 

 mine those instances of investiture of which history in- 

 forms us before the conquest, in order that it may be de- 

 termined whether they were purely military, or whether 

 in their nature and object they resembled the ceremonies, 

 and were intended to impose the obligations and duties 

 of chivalry. There are only two instances in the Anglo- 

 Saxon period of the English history of investiture. The 

 must ancient occurs in the time of Alfred, and is related 

 by William of Malmesbury : that monarch, struck with 

 the appearancr and character of Athelstan, made him a 

 mi/ft before the prescribed and usual age, by investing 

 him with a purple garment, a belt adorned with gems, 

 and a Saxon sword with a golden scabbard. In this ac- 

 count there are certainly no traces of chivalry. The in- 

 vestiture was purely military ; it had not even many of 

 the ceremonies of chivalry, and docs not appear to have 

 imposed any of its peculiar duties. The other instance 

 occurred subsequently, in the time of Edward the Con- 

 fessor, and is recorded much more fully by Ingulphus. 

 In giving an account of Hereward, who had distinguish- 

 ed himself by his prowess and his victories, he says, that 

 as, notwithstanding the military command he possessed, 

 he had not yet been legally bound with the belt, ac- 

 cording to the established custom, he resolved to under- 

 go that ceremony | for it was the custom of the English, 

 (add* Ingulphus,) that whoever meant to be li-gally 

 MOM c i sled to warfare, should, on the eve of the day 

 appointed for his consecration, confess all his sins to 

 one priest; and afterwards spend the night in the 

 church, in prayer and mortification ; on the morrow, af- 

 ter hiving attended mais, he should offer his sword on 

 the altar, and the gospel being read, the priest should 

 place th* sword, hiving blest it, on the neck of the tol- 



CHIVALRY. 



might 



dier (milet) bestowing on him at the same time, his be- Chivalry, 

 nrdictitui." Ingulphus concludes this account with ob- V ~"~Y^ ' 

 serving, that the Normans abominating this mode of 

 consecrating a miles, considered the person so consecrated 

 not as a legitimate miles, but as a degenerated and sloth- 

 ful knight. The part of the ceremony which the Nor- 

 mans objected to, was that which vested the power of 

 making a miles with the priesthood, not the forms which 

 were passed through ; and accordingly soon after the esta- 

 blishment of the Norman power in England, the pri- 

 vilege of making knight* was virtually, though not ex- 

 prrksly taken from that order. 



The instance quoted from Ingulphus, is by no means 

 sufficient to prove the existence of chivalry in England 

 bi-f ri.- the Conquest. The ceremonies, indeed, are simi- 

 lar, but there is no mention of the duties imposed by chi- 

 valry ; and what is still more decisive of the question, 

 Ingulphus expressly points out the object and effect of 

 the consecration, viz. that the person so consecrated, 

 might legitimately engage in warfare. Here, then, we 

 have only military investiture, but no traces of the spirit 

 and genius of chivalry. That high regard for their ho- 

 nour, and that refined and enthusiastic gallantry which 

 may be traced in the manners of the Scandinavian na- 

 tions, was not yet expressly and solemnly incorporated 

 with the love of military enterprise, so common and so 

 necessary to all barbarous nations. The opinion that Chivalry 

 chivalry took its rise from the Crusades, is advanced by a supposed 

 friend of Bishop Hurd's, in his Letters on Chivalry and V 

 Romance ; and, although no attempt is made to support ^ ^^ 

 it, by the evidence of cotemporary authors, yet the inge- (a dei. 

 nuity with which it is maintained, by means of presump- 

 tive evidence, renders it deserving of some notice. 



The advocate of this opinion supposes, that the rest- 

 less spirit of the vassals of the Gothic princi-s, which 

 had been checked and retarded by the Crusades, broke 

 out, when they were no longer engaged in them, in all 

 the extravagancies of knight errantry. That the war- 

 like and restless genius of the feudatories took this turn, 

 he ascribes to the military fame they had acquired in the 

 Holy Land, and the love and passion of enterprise with 

 which the Crusades had inspired them. " Tlu-ir late 

 expeditions had given them a turn for roving in quest of 

 adventures ; and their religious zeal had infused high no- 

 tions of piety, justice, and chastity." 



" The scene of action being now more confined, they 

 turned themselves from the ntorlfi't debute to private and 

 personal animosities. Chivalry was employed in rescu- 

 ing humble and faithful vassals from the oppression of 

 petty lords ; their women from savage lust ; and the 

 hoary heads of hermits (a species of eastern monks much 

 reverenced in the Holy Land,) from rapine and out- 

 rage. 



" In the mean time, the courts of the feudal sove- 

 reigns grew magnificent and polite ; and, as the military 

 constitution still subsisted, military merit was to be up- 

 held ; but wanting its old objects, it naturally softened 

 into' the fictitious images and courtly exercises of war, 

 in justs and tournaments, where the honour of the ladiet 

 supplied the place of zeal for the holy sepulchre ; and 

 thus the courtesy of elegant love, but of a wild and fa- 

 natic species, as being engrafted on spiritual enthusiasm, 

 came to mix itself with the other characters of the knight- 

 crrants." 



But this opinion, however plausible, will not bear the 

 ten cither of argument or authority. Bishop Hurd just- 

 ly remarks, " that unless the seeds of that spirit, which 

 appeared in the Crusades, had been plentifully sown, 

 and indeed grown up to some maturity in the feudal time* 



