70 The Banquet 



II. The eleventh meat-course was of roasted kids. The fish- 



392 (cf. Squyr of Lowe Degre 756) : 'Item de vins doucetes, comme de 

 vin de Grece, Ipocras, Montrose, Rumney [Roumania], Vernage, Mal- 

 voisin, Osey [Alsace], clarrey et pyement.' The vines of the Cinque Terra 

 grow in some cases against perpendicular rocks, and must be reached 

 by means of ladders or ropes (Baedeker, Oheritalien, i8th ed., p. 512).. 

 Fra Salimbene, writing late in the 13th century, speaks of Chiavari, 26 

 miles from Corniglia in the direction of Genoa, as being not far from 

 the place where an abundance of vemaccia was produced — a wine so 

 good that to it might well be applied the lines of a certain goliard (Mow. 

 Germ. Hist. Script. 32. 572, cf. 642), thus translated by Coulton (From 

 St. Francis to Dante, p. 209) : 



O precious juice of the vine, what gift hath life like thine? 



If two sorts come to the feast, then fill me a cup of the best! 



Small is the profit to me if I suck down less than three; 



Sweet is the fourth full bowl, and deep is the calm of my soul ; 



But the fifth cup sets me adaze, and my memory all in a maze; 



With the sixth I desire no more, but sprawl full length on the floor. 



According to Gower (Conf. Am. 6. 218-9), vernage and piment were the 

 standard of sweetness in wines. According to an account alluded to by 

 Dante (Purg. 24. 24), Pope Martin IV died of eating too many eels, 

 either drowned or cooked in vernaccia. Benvenuto Rambaldi, a commen- 

 tator on the passage, informs us : *La vernaccia e un ottimo vino, che 

 viene dai monti di Genova' ; similarly Buti : 'Vernaccia e vino che nasce 

 ne la riviera di Genova, millior vino che si trova.' Chaucer refers to it as 

 an aphrodisiac (Merchant's Tale 563-4; the scene is in Pavia) : 



He drinketh ipocras, clarree, and vernage. 



Of spyces bote, t' encresen his corage. 



What wine could better suit our monk as a present to his friend's beau- 

 teous and revelous wife? It was sweet, and it was strong. 



As the best of wines (see Buti, above), it must have been, one would 

 think, costly; yet the monk is represented as bringing a jubbe of it, and 

 a jubbe of malmsey, when the New Eng. Diet, defines a jubbe as 'a large 

 vessel for liquor.' This must certainly be true of those that held four 

 gallons (according to the quotation in the New Eng. Diet.) ; but was this 

 the only sort, the only size? Levins, in 1570, defines it as cantharus, 

 scyphus, and the Middle English Destruction of Troy (11,940) speaks 

 of 'jobbes of gold,' in conjunction with gems and jewels. Even the jubbe 

 of the Miller's Tale (441-3) held only ale enough for a day, presumably 

 for one person; here Hertzberg translates 'jubbe' by 'Krug,' and in 

 the Shipman's Tale by 'Flaschchen.' It is easy to see, then, that the 

 'bottazzi (botacii),' 'fiaschi,' of the chroniclers, gilded and enameled 

 though they were, may very well be represented by Chaucer's jubbes, and 

 that it would not be strange if Chaucer remembered them when he was 

 sketching the portrait of the free-living and free-handed monk. 



^" Alip. : e sei bronzini. 



I 



