Minstrels and Minstrelsy in Late Medieval England
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A01=Richard Rastall
A02=Andrew Taylor
Age Group_Uncategorized
Age Group_Uncategorized
Agincourt campaign in 1415
Aristocratic Households
Author_Andrew Taylor
Author_Richard Rastall
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Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=AVC
Category=HBJD1
Category=HBLC
Category=HBLC1
Category=NHDJ
Civic Processions
Civic Servants
COP=United Kingdom
Delivery_Delivery within 10-20 working days
Edward I
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_music
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Financial Records
Henry V
Language_English
Middle Ages
PA=Available
Parish Celebrations
Price_€50 to €100
PS=Active
Royal Households
softlaunch
Product details
- ISBN 9781837650392
- Weight: 772g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 04 Apr 2023
- Publisher: Boydell & Brewer Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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A major new study piecing together the intriguing but fragmentary evidence surrounding the lives of minstrels to highlight how these seemingly peripheral figures were keenly involved with all aspects of late medieval communities.
Minstrels were a common sight and sound in the late Middle Ages. Aristocrats, knights and ladies heard them on great occasions (such as Edward I's wedding feast for his daughter Elizabeth in 1296) and in quieter moments in their chambers; town-dwellers heard and saw them in civic processions (when their sound drew attention to the spectacle); and even in the countryside people heard them at weddings, church-ales and other parish celebrations. But who were the minstrels, and what did they do? How did they live, and how easily did they make a living? How did they perform, and in what conditions? The evidence is intriguing but fragmentary, including literary and iconographic sources and, most importantly, the financial records of royal and aristocratic households and of towns. These offer many insights, although they are often hard to fit into any coherent picture of the minstrels' lives and their place in society. It is easy to see the minstrels as peripheral figures, entertainers who had no central place in the medieval world. Yet they were full members of it, interacting with the ordinary people around them, as well as with the ruling classes: carrying letters and important verbal messages, some lending huge sums of money to the king (to finance Henry V's Agincourt campaign in 1415, for instance), some regular and necessary civic servants, some committing crimes or suffering the crimes of others. In this book Rastall and Taylor bring to bear the available evidence to enlarge and enrich our view of the minstrel in late medieval society.
RICHARD RASTALL is Emeritus Professor of Historical Musicology at The University of Leeds and a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries. ANDREW TAYLOR is Professor of English at the University of Ottawa.
