What are the ancient knighthoods, titles in Europe?

Dukes > Candidates > Earls > Viscounts > Barons > Knights,

In medieval Europe, the titles of dukes, marquises, burghers, viscounts, barons, and knights, were both a title and an official rank.

Adding the following:

Dukes

As early as the Roman Empire, ducal titles on the European continent were usually awarded to high-ranking commanders who had defended their territories and had distinguished themselves in military service, and were later discontinued due to major political changes. A few hundred years later, ducal titles were again seen in Germany. Around 970 A.D., German Emperor Otto I first established the title of Duke. Duchies (duchy; Grand Duchy, Archduchy) were soon established in France and other parts of continental Europe. In the United Kingdom, the duke is second only to the king or prince of the highest level of nobility, and as the head of the country of the European continent, "big duke" (i.e., Archduke, Archduke) is different. The dukedom of England appeared very late: in 1337, Edward III elevated Cornwall to the status of a duchy and conferred the title of duke on Edward, the seven-year-old "Black Prince". The Dauphin made his mark in the Hundred Years' War at the age of 16, and in 1355 he went to France and commanded with great distinction. His father rewarded him with many titles, such as Prince of Wales in 1343 and Duke of Aquitaine in 1362. In order to emphasize the special status of the Duke, in the following years, except for the Queen's spouse and the Prince, other royal relatives were not allowed to claim the title of King, but could obtain the highest title of Duke. Subsequently, Edward III and his successors founded the Duchy of Lancaster (1351), the Duchy of Clarence (1362), the Duchy of York and the Duchy of Gloucester (1385), the Duchy of Hereford (1397), the Duchy of Betford (1413) and the Duchy of Somerset (1443). The leaders of these duchies were all royal clansmen, and when they received high knighthoods, they stood out from the rest of the nobility and became powerful, laying the groundwork for future rivalry for the throne, disruption of the dynasty, and the creation of wars. Since the establishment of the Duchy of Norfolk in 1483, dukedom began to be granted to those outside the king's family, but rarely established a duchy. Moreover, the highest title was given to a commander-in-chief who had a distinguished military career. Even if a politician in the administrative world has served for many years and has a notable record, it is still difficult to be honored with this award.

On formal occasions, the Duke also wore a crimson velvet coat with four ermines on the hat. His crown has a gold ring with eight red gold leaves. The King calls the Duke "our truly trustworthy and most beloved companion."

Marquis

Marquess (also Marquis). Etymologically, it is derived from the German Markgraf [burgomaster; governor of a frontier colony; count]. The original meaning of marquis was similar to that of "square uncle", which referred to a feudal official who was in charge of a territory. In England, the Latin word "marquis" originally referred to the lords of the Welsh borders. In England, the Latin word "marquis" originally referred to the lords of the Welsh frontier, but only indicated that their territories were located close to the border, not that they were above the rank of an earl, and the meaning changed in 1385, when Robert de Vere, 9th Earl of Oxford, was made Marquis of Dublin, and in 1397, John, Earl of Somerset, was made Marquis of Dorset and Marquis of Somerset. The status and degree of honor of the Marquis is not well defined, being about halfway between a duke and an earl, and for some time was not regarded as such. During the reign of Henry VI. John de Biofort was removed from the marquisate by the king, and the House of Commons petitioned the king on this account for the restoration of Biofort's title. He himself, however, objected to begging the king, and said, "The marquisate is a new title of honor, entirely unknown to his predecessors. It should therefore be regarded with indifference, and it is not considered wise to accept it." It was not until the 15th century, after this rank had steadily maintained its position as the second rank in the peerage, that it became valued by the nobility. Marquises have always been the least numerous compared to the other four classes of nobility.

On great occasions, the Marquis also wore a red velvet coat, a hat with three and a half rows of ermine, and a crown with a silver ring with four gold leaves and four silver balls. The king addressed him as he did the duke.

The Earl:

The earl was the earliest to appear in the 5th degree of nobility in England. Individual scholars believe that the earldom came from continental Europe, and that by as late as 900 AD in France, the earl had become a bannerman of the duke. But more scholars believe that the British Earl (Earl) and the French Earl (Count) and no succession or collateral relationship; and the title of the British Earl is the only English word in the 5 kinds of titles of nobility, is transformed from the Old English eorl; about in the late Anglo-Saxon era, due to the king's power is not strong enough, the vast area of England had been divided into a number of larger Earl's jurisdiction (great). earldom). The earldom was introduced to England in the early 11th century by the Danish king Knut, and the earls before the middle of the 11th-12th centuries were mostly lords of the realm. Before the mid-11th and 12th centuries, earls were mostly lords of the realm, and most of them governed several counties, so they were also called "earls of the square". After William, the Norman Archduke, invaded England, he feared that they were too powerful and jeopardized the unity of the king and the country, so he divided the power of the Earl of Fangbo and handed it over to his cronies. Each Earl's jurisdiction was limited to one county, and there was a very clear relationship with the king as a feudal lord and a feudal subject, and the Earl would be suppressed by the king's army if he dared to raise an army to rebel or be sanctioned by the nobles of the other nobles. The title of earldom could be inherited by the descendants, but the total number of earls could be reduced or increased due to the lack of heirs of some earls. Stephen's reign saw the creation of Geoffrey de Manville as Earl of Essex, and the number of earls climbed from the 14th century onwards, with nine counted in 1307, six remaining at the accession of Edward III in 1327, rising to twelve a decade later, and fourteen in the latter part of Edward's reign.Until the 1420s, earls, as the senior nobility, were the baron's "natural leaders" and had local responsibility for the administration of the barons and knights. However, during the political crisis of 1327, when Edward III deposed his mother, Princess Isabella of France, as regent and assumed power, the Earls acted independently as a political group with a "sense of self," and a "sense of distance" from the barons suddenly arose. After the creation of the Earldom of March by Henry III in 1328, the Earls did not have to exercise local administration.

On major formal occasions, the Earl wore a crimson velvet coat trimmed with white fur, a fedora with three strips of ermine sewn on to indicate rank, and a crown with a gilded silver ring and eight silver balls along the top edge; the King called the Earl his "truly trustworthy and lovely companion."

Viscounts:

Viscounts are the least qualified of the Peers of the House of Lords. The title of Viscount, of French origin, was originally that of a sheriff, a position below that of an earl, but which could sometimes be that of a powerful vassal. In England, John of Beaumont was created a viscount in 1440, above all barons.

The Viscount's hat had two rows and a half of ermine, and a silver ring was added to his crown, decorated with six silver balls.

Baron:

The word baron existed in Anglo-Saxon times, but there was no baronetcy, and the meaning of the word is uncertain. It seems to mean "free man" or "king's servant", but no honor. English baronets appeared in the 11th century. By the beginning of the 12th century most of the king's senior secular nobles were made barons. Among them, a small number of close relations with the royal family, more fiefdoms are called "big baron", its status between the earl and the baron. Soon after, the barons were divided, with the prominent ones being promoted to counts and the rest being equal to the common barons. Because barons made up such a high proportion of the secular aristocracy at the time, the term "baron" was long used as a collective noun for the nobility. 11th-14th centuries, baronial titles and fiefs could be passed on by blood and marriage, but could not be sold or transferred at will, and successive kings did not arbitrarily add to or deprive of titles of nobility. 1387, Richard II added the first baronial title to the baronage. Richard II made the first addition to the baronetage, and Biochambeau de Hault was created Baron Kidderminster. Over the centuries, the largest number of barons has always been at the end of the 5th degree of the peerage.

On formal occasions, the Baron wears the same coat as the Earl, with a hat trimmed with two pieces of ermine, and a crown with a light-colored silver ring adorned with six silver balls.

Knights

Legends of medieval knights are often exaggerated with all sorts of romantic reveries. Most of them come from our dissatisfaction with the status quo and imaginary: living in ancient castles, living a life of aristocratic wealth; defeating evil magicians and giants, protecting the good but ignorant peasants, and acting in the name of a noblewoman or a king. The ranger novels that turned Don Quixote upside down, or the improvisations of the Proven?al balladeers, fully explain the behavioral norms of the ideal knight. But even modern man can't always follow his conscience; let alone the past, when force of arms spoke for itself and knights often strayed from the beaten track.

First, let us define chivalry, which, by today's standards, is threefold:

One, as an integral part of the feudal system;

Two, as a separate social class;

Three, as an individual's way of behaving, his sense of honor, and his code of ethics.

Here we go back to a time when Europe was redrawing its landscape on the ruins, when the glory of Rome had passed and the morning sun of the Renaissance was yet to come.

The earliest barbarian upheavals were over, and the Franks, Celts, and Vandals were establishing their own states. The Teutonic conquests swept across northwestern Europe, their warriors were almost exclusively foot soldiers, and from the writings of Tacitus, it can be found that the Germanic tribes of the time had very solemn rites of passage. All the men of the tribe came together, and the young men of the right age were given a spear and a shield by the chief of the tribe or by their fathers, and were formally made warriors. Such ceremonies were common among the Gauls of the time. The Franks followed these traditions, and from Charlemagne, to Louis the Pious, to Charles the Bold, they were all presented with a sword at their bar mitzvah. We can assume that this was a precursor to the knightly ordination ceremony.

It is well known that the Carolingian dynasty was the first to adopt the system of territories and cognacs. Charlemagne spent his life conquering the north and south, but lacked sufficient funds to maintain a large army. So he divided the conquered lands into small parcels and gave them, along with the peasants on them, to his many followers. This was the feudal system, where those who owned estates also owned power. Of course, there was a contract between the king and the lords: the king offered protection to the lords, and in return the lords had to pay annual taxes and serve regularly. The land was still owned by the king, and the lords only had the right to use it. Charlemagne was powerful enough to intimidate, but his descendants failed to maintain the centripetal force, and Louis the Pious made a great mistake: he divided the country equally among his hostile descendants. So after his death, the huge empire failed to survive the bottleneck and was divided into three. So fiefdoms of various sizes became relatively independent kingdoms, and the nobles' cognacs became hereditary and inalienable.

At that time, Europe was frequently invaded by foreign peoples, with Muslims in the south, Vikings in the north, and Magyars (the predecessors of the Hungarians) in the east constantly invading the border. In the eleventh century, the children of the nobility between the Lore River and the Rhine River, far from the laborers, had to be trained in fighting skills and horsemanship from an early age. There is no doubt that the first cavalrymen and knights were nobles and wealthy. They were the only ones who could afford to buy expensive equipment: three or four rotating horses for themselves, each of which ate a lot of grain and was a great expense, especially at a time when agricultural production was not well developed; armor had to be tailored in blacksmiths' stores, and there was also the equipment for the retinue. Generally speaking, the military equipment of a single person cost about 20 bulls, i.e., at least 10 calves for plowing the fields of a farmer's family. Such an expense could not be borne by civilians. The warrior class on horseback was also the aristocracy, and the superiority of their birth was inevitably accompanied by contempt for the lower classes, who found **** the same hobby: war. Similar to the Roman era, the nobility of the Middle Ages formed the heavily armored cavalry that became the mainstay of the armies of that era.

In the time of Philip VI, there was a saying: "In order to avoid the impending catastrophe, the people divided themselves into three categories: the first were those who prayed to God; the second were those who did business and cultivated the land; and the third were the knights, who were created to protect the first two categories of people from injustice and harm. This was a typical division of the Western social structure in the Middle Ages, and the word knight comes from Charlemagne's collection of decrees of the Capitularies, the Caballarii, which originally meant jockeys.

In 1066, William the Conqueror set foot in Britain. The results of the Battle of Hastings, related to this article are mainly three: to the British Isles brought a relatively advanced feudal system; the small round shield of the Sarmatian style was eliminated, the Norman soldiers will be Kite Shield (Kite Shield on the rounded bottom of the point of the long shield) knotted together in rows, which can be effective in defending against bow and arrow fire, which makes the fraternity and mutual assistance became the eleventh century became an important part of the training of the knights; the Normans independent cavalry troops played a large role, and the English language came to use the term Knight, referring to a warrior mounted on a horse. By the middle of the eleventh century, the knightly class was officially formed.

As a system of military mobilization, the feudal system was more conducive to defense than offense, and nobles everywhere were obliged to attend to the king at all times. For this reason, various countries issued decrees to penalize knights who failed to respond to the call to arms in a timely manner. In England, from the time of Henry II, the term Escuage, or exemption from tax for military service, was introduced. The obligation of feudal lords also changed somewhat, as long as they paid the central tax, without having to personally wield the sword in the battlefield. In the years of Edward III, Henry V and VI, when wars were frequent, these payments were used to pay for the huge military expenditures. This reform proceeded slowly through the thirteenth and fourth centuries, when mercenaries began to make up an increasing proportion of the armies of European countries, and the relative structure of the armies changed. Where once it was difficult to mix the influence of the king in the territory of the crusaders - they were led only by the Church - now the mercenaries fought hard for their lord, for money or to go to the East and become a new aristocracy. Naturally, veterans who joined the crusade and returned successfully could be paid better.

The Crusades marked the dawn of a golden age of chivalric culture, and the Crusaders were considered the perfect knights. Retrieving the Holy Land from the infidels and protecting helpless pilgrims was seen as the highest vocation of a knight. In return, churches flocked to put the Knights under their protection, making them transnational organizations. They were promised ecclesiastical property and all sorts of religious privileges, and exempted crusading knights from penance. One-tenth of the income from church lands was used to pay the Knights for the protection of pilgrims to the Holy Land. In 1099, Jerusalem was captured, but the Holy Land and the Latin countries to the east were still surrounded by Arabs and Turks. The need for a standing army became more and more urgent, and special military regulations were laid down, which became the so-called Fourth Dogma of perpetual warfare against the infidels. Groups of crusaders were formed, and religion gilded the Templars and Knights of the Hospital with an aura of exaltation.

Like the canons, the Knights' rules were equally binding on each member. The beliefs and dogma unite knights of different origins and backgrounds in camaraderie with each other, sharing the same position and purpose. It also dictates their loyalty to their faith, respect for their lords, caution with their words, justice and tolerance on the battlefield, and adherence to the principles of honor and humility.

And so the independence of chivalry from the feudal system arose, and there are many similarities between the rules of the Order of the Crusaders and the canons. It was at this point that the Christian virtues of chivalry took shape. The Crusaders had in them both the piety of the monks and the grandeur of the nobility. Generally speaking, a broken nobleman who had lost his domain or the son of a lineage who had not gained the right to inheritance had only two suitable outlets: the clergy or the military, the latter obviously having a greater appeal. The fervor for the liberation of the Holy Land and the great benefits promised by the Church were irresistible, and many civilians sold their family assets to buy equipment just to go to the East. So these professional soldiers joined the guards of the great nobles and went to the East with the king or emperor, aspiring to the rich spoils of war, or the rich ransom money.

These soldiers wore simple garments, lived a life of puritanical monkhood, were renamed after patron saints, fought under the command of the great nobles, were bound by canon law, and were enriched by donations. Knights who voluntarily devoted themselves to this cause became perfect models, and so did Frederick I the Red Bearded, Richard I the Lion-Hearted and Philip II Augustus, the latter posthumously canonized as a saint after his death, although they all killed many of their followers while at home. These crusader groups were the precursors of the later English Knights of the Gard, the Knights of the Golden Fleece of Burgundy, the Knights of the Annuniziata of Savoy, the French Knights of St. Michael and the Knights of the Holy Spirit.

In the 14th and 15th centuries, the armies of Europe were organized in much the same way; below the king were the governors and marshals, whose powers were sometimes independent and sometimes crossed. Below them was the Herald, who served as adjutant, clerk, and staff officer, and, as the name suggests, was often sent to the other side's camps to issue letters of war or demand a truce, and was responsible for counting his own casualties after the battle, making him an all-powerful position. The following combat units are divided into squadrons, led by nobles or knights. Generally speaking, knights are divided into two ranks, one is called Banneret, which is known as Knight, the name comes from their rectangular banner, and is the main force in combat. Apprentice knights are called Bachelor, or apprentice soldiers, and form smaller ranks to follow the main force, as they need to gain experience and master more combat skills. The banners of the trainee knights are also rectangular, but split at the end to form a swallowtail. When they had considerable merit, they could request a promotion from the commander. So the commander cut the swallowtail off their flag and upgraded them to knights.

All knights of both kinds were escorted by their squires, who carried long triangular spear banners on the tips of their mounted lances. These flags are uniform in size and painted with the family's coat of arms. Accordingly, there were two classes of knights, and two classes of squires. Squire referred to the older squires, who participated in battles along with their masters, while Page was the equivalent of an orderly, mostly children trained as knights, and at that time, every castle was a knight's school. After completing their training as youths, these squires could become full-fledged knights-in-training after a bar mitzvah. Some could not afford the high expenses of knighthood and spent their lives as squires, but of course, the sons of powerful princes and great nobles were knights for life.

With promotion naturally came demotion, but it was extremely rare. As of 1793, there had been three instances of demotion in England*** How serious was evident in 1621 when Sir Francis Michell was stripped of his knighthood dumpling, which took place in Westminster Hall. His spurs were withdrawn and his sword-belt cut off, which was a singular disgrace.

In contrast to this is the ceremony of naming knights, of which there are often two kinds. The first, simpler and more common, took place in times of war: the candidate knelt on one knee before the head of the army or a knight of honor, the officiating officer touched his shoulder three times with the back of his sword, presented a motto, and the ceremony was complete. In this way a group of knights arose after each major battle from the 11th to the 16th centuries, and the simple form became more accepted and was widely practiced in all times of peace.

Of course, there were more elaborate ceremonies, and in 15th-century England, knights had to be given their titles by their lords: the master of ceremonies touched the back of the neck and shoulders with the back of his sword, and then swore an oath of fidelity and honor in the name of the patron saint (St. George for the English, St. Andrew for the Scots). The celebrant then sings, "Avencez, Rise Sir so-and-so," generally the knight's Christian name." The whole ceremony is over. It is followed by different celebrations, such as the king's feast, with the conferring of cloak, armor, and spurs; or the ecclesiastical mode, in which each brother of the order blesses the newcomer, gives the Bible and the cross, and the newcomer himself expresses his renunciation of the honors of the world and of the common names, and so on.

The latter ceremony of investiture was gradually combined with other great ceremonies, as, for instance, in England, where the investiture of knights was often accompanied by royal festivities. The so-called Knights of the Bath were those knights who were ennobled at the king's coronation, a regulation which began with Henry IV, and the Order of the Bath was not established until the coronation of Charles II; these knights were also known as the Knights of the Spurs, because they were given spurs of gold and silver.

The divine essence and quintessence of chivalry in general combined the aristocratic bearing of the time, Christian virtues, and respect for ladies. The ideal knight was not only powerful, but also absolutely loyal, generous, and forgiving. Like the heroes of the epics, he served the good people with his arm, and protected pilgrims going to the East by practicing chivalry in the name of the Church.

After the Crusades, chivalry gradually lost its religious overtones and came to represent merely the honor of the aristocracy. This spirit, passed down from generation to generation, was celebrated during the Hundred Years' War between Britain and France, with knights on both sides observing the ancient rituals. Occasional jousts and parades were interspersed with bloody battles, and in practice such occasions were rare. In England, the tournaments were completely abolished after the death of Edward I. In France, a terrible accident occurred: on July 1, 1559, during a match between Henry II and the Earl of Montgomery, the sheath on the head of the spear suddenly fell off. As Nostradamus had predicted, the king was stabbed through the brain. The Church then issued an injunction banning all competitions in marksmanship for two centuries.

No matter the glories achieved by the knights, war has always been an unfruitful blood-red flower. The collision of state apparatuses caused widespread economic decline, and it was only the lower classes of commoners who really suffered. So there were peasant revolts in both countries, especially in England and in Flanders, the center of the war, where they had good reason to protest against tyranny and injustice, and where the nation's taxes and resources were spent on the war games and lavish pandering of the aristocracy. That's why Gautier insists that the golden age of chivalric culture was in the twelfth century; after all, fighting and slaying heretics was more legendary to Europeans.

With the fall of Acre, the last Latin kingdom in the East was wiped out, and the Eight Crusades finally ended in failure. Regardless of the huge impact it had on later generations, chivalry lived on. The drive to serve the king was exhausted by the Hundred Years' War, and both sides, from the nobility to the poor, were tired of the repeated tug-of-war. So the bards of southern France wound up chivalry one last time - Romanticism.

The love theme in Romantic literature made chivalry greatly deviate from its original purpose, and was influenced by the idea that the ideal knight should be loyal to the ideal woman. Note that the ideal woman for him is y loved but unavailable. It doesn't matter that they may have only met once or never even spoken a word. Showing one's infatuation by falling in love in a purely spiritual way, the ideal lover is a saintly maiden to be worshipped rather than an object of profane play. The story of Don Giacometti is not funny. The story of Gekkoed is not funny. Such an idol has to be referred to in reality, mostly as the wife of another knight. The greatest achievement of bending over the noblewoman was the establishment of monogamy in Europe. Instead of focusing on force as their predecessors had done, the knights of this era began to cultivate a variety of higher passions, and as the Renaissance movement flourished, they became the archetypal class of gentlemen.

Ideals are ideals, and reality is reality. The actual situation is more or less skewed, the feudal system is the soil of the roots of the culture of chivalry, greatly limiting all kinds of excessive demands on knights, pick up two specific examples below.

When it comes to respect for women, the rise of Christianity more or less raised the status of women, but as Gautier says, the feudal system tied land to a woman as part of the deal, to be sold by her parents or guardians. Theoretically, knights had a duty and responsibility to protect lone widows and orphans. But that was all. In practice, this protection was sold like a commodity. Lesser lords often sold their daughters in marriage for greater gain. Such mercenary contracts are found everywhere, and while we are shocked at the explicitness of the language in them, we are even more shocked at the prevalence of the phenomenon. Such arranged marriages, or contract marriages, portend misfortune after marriage, and domestic violence is commonplace. It was not their wives to whom the knights owed their allegiance. Gautier's La Chevaleries records the story of La Tour Landry, a knight of Champagne, who, after witnessing his friend beat up his wife in the street, went home and concluded to his daughter: "Pride and insolence are not part of the marriage contract." This phenomenon was not only a result of the self-discipline that was demanded everywhere in those days, but also the evils of arranged marriages.

While upper-class noblewomen were punched and kicked, young children were subjected to monstrous treatment, and John Symth chronicles the history of an ancient family in Berkeley, where between 1288 and 1500 there were a total of five arranged marriages, with the average age of the couple being just 11 years old. Lord Thomas of that family was only 5 years old when he became a knight in 1476.The marriage took place at the age of 6. Viscount Mautice was only 7 years old when he became a knight in 1338.These were due to the early death of the father, and there is no doubt that if a relative of the paternal line had been in the guardianship of the family, there would have been a high fee charged, and even an annexation of the territory. Becoming a knight on the other hand symbolized adulthood, but the legal age to become a knight at the time was 21 at the earliest. great nobles like the Berkeley family stole the honor to avoid orphan guardianship, but young children would have to take on the family business prematurely. symth mentioned more than once that this was inhumane and abusive to the orphans.

Meanwhile, economic reasons caused a certain decline in the romantic component of chivalric culture. In the case of the Berkeley family, from the mid-13th century onward, the knights were not only courtiers and warriors, but also plain country gentlemen who sold fruit from the castle gardens, while the housewives made their rounds collecting ground rent.

In addition, the Escuage, which we mentioned above, was exempt from taxes, and neither tenants nor nobles were exempt. So in the first half of the 13th century, many small lords joined the army to escape the high taxes, and by chivalric moral standards, they were supposed to be fighting for honor and to show loyalty. In any case, this provided the crown with a steady source of income and soldiers. Wealthy commoners and squires coveted the opportunity to improve their social status, so they purchased their own equipment and joined the ranks, and also had the opportunity to be promoted to knighthood because of their war service, thus reducing the aristocratic color of the knightly culture. Of course, these episodes were also adapted by the bards of Provence and became a good subject for romantic novels. The poor aristocrats of the family could not become knights, so they could only complain that the door of honor was actually open to the newcomers, without considering that their own ancestors were only professional illiterates.

So the military romance of the battlefield faded, and there were no more dueling in the halls, and the knights shrank from their observation posts to speculate on the strength of their opponents, instead of being at the forefront of the raiding party as their predecessors had been. The Hundred Years' War brought with it a new way of fighting, with archers dominating the battlefield and a portion of the knights reduced to mercenaries.

The urgency of battle did away with the superfluous adornment of the cavalry and the pre-war mobilization, which was restricted to the nobility. Prominent commanders on both sides, such as Robert Knolles of the British army, had ambiguous origins, being knighted but ennobled as Sir rather than hereditary Lord, and Du Guesclin, commander-in-chief of the French army, waited a long time for a knighthood because he came from a bankrupt, low-ranking aristocratic family. Edward III not only provoked the war, but also completely banned the competition of horsemanship, while John of France vigorously advocated it, and the high and the low were soon divided. The French on the eve of the Battle of Crecy sent to the opponent full of chivalry letter of war (of course, in the knowledge of their own absolute superiority in the case of troops), while the British but the use of the armistice gap quietly out of the Jedi, worthy of their inheritance from the pirate forefathers of the true color. The Hundred Years' War, which ended hastily, also signaled the end of the age of knights.

Chivalry prevailed in that era, so far away from modern man. That kind of reserve and condescension carries a bit of excitement, a bit of magic, for the bumbling us. It is difficult to grasp the essence of chivalry because it is impossible to dissolve oneself into the past. Even in those great days it was inevitably limited by the social consciousness of the time. Just as the high prosperity of the Greco-Roman era was based on slavery, the loyalty and self-discipline promoted by the chivalric civilization has quietly faded, as the development of modern civilization requires the constant breaking of restrictions. Indeed, the most important essences failed to reach their zenith even in the heyday of the Middle Ages; as a movement that combined religion with life, chivalry did not do so more successfully than the Puritans. But those noble qualities, humility, tolerance, honesty, and justice, will survive as a spiritual legacy through the baptism of war, the rust of peace, and the transient and impermanent changes in human society.