242 APPENDIX 



The " Master of Game " says the menées should be 

 sounded on the return of the huntsman at the hall or 

 cellar door (p. 179). There was a curious old custom 

 which occasioned the blowing of the horn in West- 

 minster Abbey. Two menées were blown at the high 

 altar of the Abbey on the delivery there of eight 

 fallow deer which Henry III. had by charter granted 

 as a yearly gift to the Abbot of Westminster and his 

 successors. 



METYNGE, here evidently means meating or feed- 

 ing. As the "Master of Game" says : "or pasturing" 

 as if the two words were synonymous, as methige also was 

 Mid. Eng. for measure^ it might have been a deer of " high 

 measure and pasturing." But anyhow the two were 

 practically identical, for as Twici says : " Harts which 

 are of good pasture. For the head grows according to 

 the pasture ; good or otherwise." See below : Meute. 



MEUTE had several meanings in Old French venery. 



1. The "Master of Game" translated G. de F.'s 

 "grant cerf" as a hart of high feeding or pasture. But 

 he omitted to render the following passage : " Et s il est de 

 bonne rneute^ allons le laisser courre.''^ The " bonne meute " 

 is not translated by " high meating." It was an expres- 

 sion in use to indicate whether the stag was in good 

 company or not. If a warrantable stag was accom- 

 panied by one or two large stags he was termed " Un 

 cerf de bonne mute'*'' (or meute)^ but if hinds and young 

 stags (rascal) were with him he was designated as a ^^ cerf 

 de mauvaise muteT In Roy Modus we read : " La 

 premiere est de savoir s'il est de bonne ?nute.'*^ 



Perhaps meute when used in this sense was derived 

 from the old Norman word ?noeta^ màëtay from mot^ meet, 

 come together. There was also an Old Eng. word 7nctta 

 or gcmetta^ companion. 



2. Meute was also used in another sense which is 

 translated by the " Master of Game " as haunts^ probably 



