Wine, Women, and Song | Page 6

of pronouncing
judgment upon wine or women than upon a problem of divinity or logic.
The conditions of medieval learning made it necessary to study
different sciences in different parts of Europe; and a fixed habit of
unrest, which seems to have pervaded society after the period of the

Crusades, encouraged vagabondage in all classes. The extent to which
travelling was carried in the Middle Ages for purposes of pilgrimage
and commerce, out of pure curiosity or love of knowledge, for the
bettering of trade in handicrafts or for self-improvement in the sciences,
has only of late years been estimated at a just calculation. "The
scholars," wrote a monk of Froidmont in the twelfth century, "are wont
to roam around the world and visit all its cities, till much learning
makes them mad; for in Paris they seek liberal arts, in Orleans authors,
at Salerno gallipots, at Toledo demons, and in no place decent
manners."
These pilgrims to the shrines of knowledge formed a class apart. They
were distinguished from the secular and religious clergy, inasmuch as
they had taken no orders, or only minor orders, held no benefice or cure,
and had entered into no conventual community. They were still more
sharply distinguished from the laity, whom they scorned as brutes, and
with whom they seem to have lived on terms of mutual hostility. One
of these vagabond gownsmen would scarcely condescend to drink with
a townsman:[6]--
"In aeterno igni
Cruciantur rustici, qui non sunt tam digni
Quod
bibisse noverint bonum vinum vini."
"Aestimetur laicus ut brutus,
Nam ad artem surdus est et mutus."
"Litteratos convocat decus virginale,
Laicorum execrat pectus
bestiale."
In a parody of the Mass, which is called Officium Lusorum, and in
which the prayers are offered to Bacchus, we find this devout
collect:[7]--"Omnipotens sempiterne deus, qui inter rusticos et clericos
magnam discordiam seminasti, praesta quaesumus de laboribus eorum
vivere, de mulieribus ipsorum vero et de morte deciorum semper
gaudere."
The English version of this ribald prayer is even more explicit. It runs
thus:--"Deus qui multitudinem rusticorum ad servitium clericorum

venire fecisti et militum et inter nos et ipsos discordiam seminasti."
It is open to doubt whether the milites or soldiers were included with
the rustics in that laity, for which the students felt so bitter a contempt.
But the tenor of some poems on love, especially the Dispute of Phyllis
and Flora, shows that the student claimed a certain superiority over the
soldier. This antagonism between clerk and rustic was heartily
reciprocated. In a song on taverns the student is warned that he may
meet with rough treatment from the
clodhopper:[8]--
"O clerici dilecti,
Discite vitare
Tabernam horribilem,
Qui cupitis
regnare;
Nec audeant vos rustici
Plagis verberare!
"Rusticus dum se
Sentit ebriatum,
Clericum non reputat
Militem
armatum.
Vere plane consulo
Ut abstineatis,
Nec unquam cum
rusticis
Tabernam ineatis."
The affinities of the Wandering Students were rather with the Church
than with laymen of any degree. They piqued themselves upon their
title of Clerici_, and added the epithet of _Vagi. We shall see in the
sequel that they stood in a peculiar relation of dependence upon
ecclesiastical society.
According to tendencies prevalent in the Middle Ages, they became a
sort of guild, and proclaimed themselves with pride an Order. Nothing
is more clearly marked in their poetry than the esprit de corps, which
animates them with a cordial sense of brotherhood.[9] The same
tendencies which prompted their association required that they should
have a patron saint. But as the confraternity was anything but religious,
this saint, or rather this eponymous hero, had to be a Rabelaisian
character. He was called Golias, and his flock received the generic
name of Goliardi. Golias was father and master; the Goliardi were his
family, his sons, and pupils. Familia Goliae, Magister Golias_, _Pueri
Goliae_, _Discipulus Goliae, are phrases to be culled from the rubrics
of their literature.
Much has been conjectured regarding these names and titles. Was

Golias a real person? Did he give his own name to the Goliardi; or was
he invented after the Goliardi had already acquired their designation?
In either case, ought we to connect both words with the Latin gula, and
so regard the Goliardi as notable gluttons; or with the Provençal
goliar_, _gualiar_, _gualiardor, which carry a significance of deceit?
Had Golias anything to do with Goliath of the Bible, the great
Philistine, who in the present day would more properly be chosen as
the hero of those classes which the students held in horror?
It is not easy to answer these questions. All we know for certain is, that
the term Goliardus was in common medieval use, and was employed as
a synonym for Wandering Scholar in ecclesiastical documents. _Vagi
scholares aut Goliardi--joculatores, goliardi seu bufones--goliardia vel
histrionatus--vagi scholares qui goliardi vel histriones alio nomine
appellantur--clerici ribaudi, maxime qui dicuntur de familia Goliae_: so
run the acts of several Church Councils.[10] The word