A Distant Mirror_ The Calamitous 14th Century - Barbara W. Tuchman [158]
Even so, communion and confession, which were supposed to be observed every Sunday and holy day, were on the average practiced hardly more than the obligatory once a year at Easter. A simple knight, on being asked why he went not to mass, so important for the salvation of his soul, replied, “This I knew not; nay, I thought that the priests performed their mass for the offerings’ sake.” For northern France it has been estimated that about 10 percent of the population were devout observers, 10 percent negligent, and the rest wavered between regular and irregular observance.
At the moment of death, however, people took no chances: they confessed, made restitutions, endowed perpetual prayers for their souls, and often deprived their families by bequests to shrines, chapels, convents, hermits, and payments for pilgrimages by proxy.
King Charles, according to his admiring biographer Christine de Pisan, daughter of Thomas the astrologer, was zealous in piety. He made the sign of the cross as soon as he awoke and spoke his first words of the day to God in his prayers. When combed and dressed, he was brought his breviary, recited the canonical hours with his chaplain, celebrated high mass in his chapel at eight A.M. with “melodious song” and low mass afterward in his private oratory. Then he held audience for “all manner of people, rich and poor, ladies and damsels, widows and others.” On fixed days he presided over matters of state at the Council. He lived consciously with “majestic regularity” to show that the dignity of the crown must be maintained by solemn order. After midday dinner he listened to the minstrels play sweetly “to rejoice the spirit,” and then for two hours received ambassadors, princes, and knights, often such a crowd that “in his great halls one could hardly turn around.” He listened to reports of battles and adventures and news of other countries, signed letters and documents, assigned duties, and distributed and received gifts. After an hour’s rest, he spent time with the Queen and his children—a son and heir was born in 1368 and afterward a second son and two daughters—visited his gardens in summer, read and studied in winter, talked with his intimates until supper, and after the evening’s entertainment, retired. He fasted one day a week and read the Bible through each year.
Whatever his true paternity, Charles possessed to the full the Valois passion for acquisitions and luxury. He was already reconstructing Vincennes for a summer palace and would soon build or acquire three or four more. He employed the famous chef Taillevent, who served up roasted swan and peacocks reconstructed in all their feathers with gilded beaks and feet and resting on appropriate landscape made of spun sugar and painted pastry. He collected precious objects and gem-studded reliquaries to house the piece of Moses’ rod, the top of John the Baptist’s head, the flask of Virgin’s milk, Christ’s swaddling clothes, and bits and pieces of various instruments of the crucifixion including the crown of thorns and a fragment of the True Cross, all of which the royal chapel possessed. At his death he was to own 47 jeweled gold crowns and 63 complete sets of chapel furnishings including vestments, altarpieces, chalices, liturgical books, and gold crucifixes.
Thirty years old in 1368, two years older than Enguerrand de Coucy, the King was pale, thin, and grave, with a long sinuous prominent nose, sharp eyes, thin closed lips, sandy hair, and carefully controlled feelings. Through a hard school, he had learned to keep his thoughts