This review may be of interest to some
Oggins, Robin S. <i>The Kings and Their Hawks: Falconry in Medieval
England</i>. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2004. Pp. xvi, 251.
$40.00. ISBN 0300100582.
Reviewed by Amanda Luyster College of the Holy Cross
This book by Robin S. Oggins is an approachable and revealing study of
falconry and hawking in medieval England, drawing upon a wide range of
sources, preeminently archival evidence from the English kings through
Edward I but also didactic literature and romance, saints' lives, art
history, and archaeology. This book will prove useful both to those
who are scholars of English royal history and to those who are
interested in the more general cultural phenomenae of manners and the
display of status (in the tradition of Joachim Bumke and Thorstein
Veblen, both of whose scholarship Oggins cites but upon whom he is not
over-reliant).
The author begins with a general overview of the nature of falconry
and hawking and the sources which he has used. The middle chapters
treat English royal falconry through the reign of Edward I. These
chapters reveal substantial research in the Public Record Office and
the British Library in London and provide a real contribution to
scholarship on English royal households, as both the daily activities
and gradual changes in habits of kings and falconers are here
described. The final chapter, however, "Falconry in Medieval Life,"
was the one which this reviewer found most valuable. Drawing not only
from the evidence of previous chapters but from a broad range of
scholarship, the author describes the various types of individuals who
might fly hawks or falcons and the range of meanings which falconry
held in the Middle Ages. Both visual and literary sources suggest
conceptual links between falconry and nobility, worldliness, and
youth. Rich enough to encompass both positive and negative
connotations, then, the medieval practices of falconry and hawking
have also provided enough material for many decades of work by Robin
S. Oggins, who describes in his Introduction how he was assigned the
topic as a doctoral dissertation.
Despite the worth of this book, due both to its historical research
and to its construction of a readable and indeed enlightening overview
of falconry, the first chapter, "The Sources," left this reviewer
unsatisfied in one regard at least. Oggins describes in this chapter
how falconry as such was unknown in antiquity, and the earliest
identified western source to treat falconry at any length dates from
the mid-tenth century (1, although there are mentions of falconry in
western Europe from the fifth century on, 37). By the fourteenth
century, the number of western works on falconry had increased
dramatically and was directed toward a broader audience. The twelfth
century seems to have marked a transitional period of time, in which
there was a noticeable increase in extant works, probably due to
greater contact with the Islamic world (2, citing Van den Abeele). It
is in this exciting possibility to pursue relations between the
western and the Islamic world where I see an opportunity lost. I
would have hoped that the author might have addressed, at the very
least in summary form, the history of falconry in the Islamic world,
apparently the nurturing ground both of falconry as a practice and the
literature of falconry. Since so much of this book deals with
falconry as a noble art, practiced by kings, it could be revealing to
learn more about how this practice evolved in the Islamic world.
Perhaps this is an unrealistic request--but the story of falconry is
left in this chapter without any true beginning. If the beginning of
falconry as a broader medieval practice is left vague, however, the
beginning of falconry in England will be treated with due
consideration and depth in Chapter 3 (Falconry in Anglo-Saxon
England). One is reminded that, in all chapters save the final
"Falconry in Medieval Life," the focus of the author is on medieval
England, and sources from elsewhere are introduced only as needed (and
indeed, brief mentions of the Islamic world are made in other chapters
in support of other points). In addition, although this chapter
provides a review of sources, there is nothing approaching a review of
previous literature on falconry (although much is cited in the
bibliography), an addition which would have been useful, especially
when written by somebody so clearly familiar with the field.
The second chapter, "The Birds, Their Training, and the Sport of
Falconry," provides a clearly-written summary of the distinction
between hawks and falcons (physical differences which lead to distinct
methods of catching prey: falcons plummet toward their prey from a
great height, striking it heavily, whereas hawks approach their quarry
from a low altitude and fly it down with a quick burst of speed; see
10-11) and other details about the nature of the birds and their
handling. Different types of birds were considered more and less
noble; female birds were generally larger and more frequently flown.
Birds to be trained were taken from the nest, fed and cared for, then
blinded by sewing up their eyelids ("seeling"). A long process of
controlled adaptation to human sights and sounds, followed by training
to fly at lures and finally at prey, was undertaken. This chapter
concludes with an evocative description of the appeal of falconry:
"not only did falconry include fine flights, but it also involved the
exhilaration of the kill, the energy expended in retrieving the game,
the gusto of the successful venture, and the well-earned posthunt
repose" (35).
Chapter 3, "Falconry in Anglo-Saxon England," begins the close
historical work. The earliest dated reference to falconry in England
is in 745-6, and the history of royal falconry expands with the royal
administration in England (36-38). Welsh evidence of falconry is also
adduced here. The author's focus on falconry as a royal sport serves
to provide a historical backbone for this chapter and those following,
although it is also true (as Oggins notes) that humbler members of
society also flew hawks. Oggins treads carefully here: while
maintaining that falconry in England began as a royal sport and then
spread to other social classes, he notes that falconry was a way of
making a living for the poorer members of society, and hence that a
distinction remained between falconry as practiced by the upper
classes and as practiced by those who relied on it for more practical
reasons (49). In a later chapter, the author develops this thesis: in
the later Middle Ages, when merchants and townspeople and people of
various classes might know how to fly a hawk, status was determined
not by the sport itself but by what accompanied the sport: the type of
bird, the circumstances under which the bird was flown, and the terms
used to describe the bird's flight (117). Falconry could at that
point be viewed as "an aspect of the eternal war between haves and
would-bes," as the up-and-coming attempted to assume the manners of
the upper classes and the nobility attempted to maintain their
exclusivity (117).
Chapters 4, 5, and 6 treat falconry under the English kings from
William I to Edward I. Close study of the archives reveals not only
certain kings' specific predilections for falconry but also the growth
and development of entire families devoted to falconry and the royal
position of falconer, a position which many used as a stepping-stone
to higher prospects, including knighthood. The status of the falconer
under different administrations is examined, and his wages and social
conditions is recorded in minute detail. The role of falcons and
hawks in the royal economy is also carefully delineated: certain debts
were owed in hawks, for instance (60), and a group of nuns paid a
sparrowhawk to have a charter altered (68). Oggins concludes his
study with the records of Edward I, stating that falconry continued
under the English kings after Edward I, declining under Edward II but
coming into favor again under Edward III, and indeed, was practiced in
the English royal family until the seventeenth century, but the
records remaining were never again as detailed as they had been under
Edward I (108).
The visual and written sources on nonroyal falconry in the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries increase tremendously, which allows the
presence of the final chapter, Chapter 7, "Falconry in Medieval Life,"
already mentioned as the high point of the book, at least to this
reader. Here these sources on nonroyal falconry not only in England
but in western Europe are brought together to "examine why people flew
hawks and falcons, who flew them, and how the sport was viewed."
Subsections are entitled "Falconry and Medieval Social Status,"
"Women," "Townspeople," "Peasants," "Clergy," and "How Falconry was
Perceived." While many points made here have been made elsewhere,
many have not, and for sheer vibrancy and all-inclusiveness this essay
is impressive. It could easily be assigned to undergraduates or more
advanced students in a course on medieval culture or history.
Although hawking was beloved of many types of men and women, and
perches were found in many bedrooms, the upper-class character of
falconry meant that a single bird might cost a knight half his yearly
income (or more), that either one must have copious amount of leisure
time to train and tend the bird or be wealthy enough to pay someone to
do so, and that those who flew such fine birds did not do so out of
necessity. Therefore falconry as practiced by the upper classes was a
perfect example of conspicuous consumption: expensive, time-consuming,
and useless (111). The link between falconry and high status was
established by the twelfth century, when falconry was part of an
upper-class education, and it became part of the noble identity,
something aristocratic clergy were reluctant to let go and a way in
which romance heroes of unknown birth were able to demonstrate their
innate nobility (111-113). Women too, although infrequent
participants in the hunt, were often active participants in falconry.
Queens paid falconers, and women were known to fly falcons themselves.
Many women, including queens, presented themselves on their seals
with a falcon on the wrist (118).
Despite the positive connotations of high status presented by
falconry, however, the image of the man or woman with a falcon was
also used to suggest worldliness. The presence of such imagery in
depictions of the sins of avarice, gluttony, and lust in <i>Bibles
moralisees</i> and elsewhere makes use of the associations between
falcons, fine goods, and physical pursuits to cast falconry in a more
sinister light. Oggins describes images of falcons held by devils,
Jews, and the prodigal son (130). In one final twist, however, the
author includes an image of a sculpted angel from Lincoln cathedral
who holds a falcon and feeds it a large drumstick. Located directly
across from an image of Christ showing his wounds, Oggins describes
how this image should be read in the light of a fifteenth-century poem
which compares Christ showing his wounds to convert a disbelieving
public to a falconer showing a piece of raw meat to a "wild-flying
hawk" to lure it back (134, citing M. D. Anderson).
If falconry was used to connote both noble status and worldliness in
different contexts, it was also used to connote youth. The physical
nature of the sport, and the joyfulness and high energy which might
accompany it, as well as the place of falconry in the education of the
young, meant that for many falconry suggested the zest of youth (135).
The famous image of the Three Living and the Three Dead in the De
Lisle Psalter, depicted in this book as Plate 8, gains new resonance
from such knowledge: the foremost figure among the living carries a
falcon on his outstretched hand. The youth, high status, and worldly
vanity of the three thoughtless living--about to realize the
inescapable truth of mortality--are echoed and codified by the
presence of the falcon. Such realizations abound in this well-written
and enjoyable study, which presents us with a copious body of
knowledge on English royal falconry and an even richer body of insight
and possibilities for interpretation of falconry in a broader medieval
world.
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