(By Cathy A)

A great deal of information is known about life in the middle medieval period and extensive research has been undertaken on the subject of education and yet many people assume that literacy rates were low, particularly for women.

The premise of the epistolary novel The Lily and the Lion, Book 1 in the Lions and Lilies series, supports the idea that the main characters, Catherine, a nun at Denny Abbey Cambridgeshire and Cécile, the daughter of a French aristocrat, were not only literate but also had the means to source the accoutrements required to write to each other. But was this possible? Would they have had the skills to do so and how difficult was it to obtain quills, pounce, ink and parchment?

QUILLS

The strongest quills derive from the primary flight feathers of birds such as geese, crows and eagles. Goose feathers were the most commonly used, however, the feather from a swan was best for larger lettering. Generally, the feather from the left wing was chosen it curves away from the hand providing better sight of the parchment. The tip of the feather was cut to form a nib and users each had their own individual or preferred angle.

Swan Feathers

Goose Feathers

Forming/cutting the nib

INK

Theophilus Presbyter, the pseudonymous author of the 12th century work, Schedula Diversarum Atrium, which describes various medieval arts, recorded the following recipe –

To make ink, cut for yourself some wood of the hawthorn – in April or May before they produce blossom or leaves – collect them together in small bundles and allow them to lie in the shade for two, three or four weeks until they are fairly well dried out.

Then have some wooden mallets, and with them pound these thorns on a hard piece of wood until you completely peel off the bark, which you immediately put in a barrel full of water. When you have filled two, three, four or five barrels with bark and water, allow them to stand like this for eight days until the water has drawn off all the sap of the bark. Then put this water into a very clean pot or into a cauldron, place it on the fire and heat it. From time to time, put some of this bark into the pot so that, if there is any sap left in it, it can be boiled out, and, when you have heated it for a little, take it out and put in some more.

This done, boil down what remains of the water, to a third of the original quantity, pour it from this pot into a smaller one and continue to heat it until it becomes black and begins to thicken, taking particular care that you do not add any water except that which was mixed with the sap. When you see it become thick, add a third part of pure wine, put it in two or three new pots and continue to heat it until you see that it develops a kind of skin at the top.

Then lift these pots off the fire and put them in the sun until the black ink resolves itself from the red dregs. Afterwards, take some small, carefully sewn, parchment bags like bladders, pour the pure ink into them and hang them up in the sun until it is completely dried. When it is dried, take from it as much as you want, mix it with wine over a fire, add a little iron vitriol and write. If, as a result of carelessness, the ink is not black enough, take a piece of iron, an inch thick, put it on the fire until it is red hot and then throw it into the ink.

Translated by J.G. Hawthorne, and C.S. Smith.

POUNCE

Pounce was a fine powder most often made from powdered cuttlefish bone. Controversy surrounds the use of pounce as it is described as either a medium to dry ink and/or to sprinkle on a rough writing surface to make it smooth. Pounce certainly was required to enable better contact with the parchment if it was “unsized” (did not have sufficient gelatinous material to make the surface smooth) and there is little evidence that pounce did anything to help dry wet ink.

Medieval pounce shaker – London Science Museum

PARCHMENT

The process of transforming animal skin into parchment was undertaken by a percamenarius or parchmenter. These artisans were common in the middle ages and could be located in every town and city. The preparation of parchment or vellum is a slow and complicated process and begins with the flaying of the animal, be it cow, goat or sheep.

The colour of the parchment is indicative of its origins – the colour of the wool or coat was reflected in the final colour of the parchment, be it white, tan or brown. The skin was washed at length, in cold clean water, sometimes for several days and then laid out in the sun. As it began to rot, the hair would fall out. This process was later refined by soaking the skin in vats with a mixture of water and lime, which dramatically hastened the action. The remaining hair was then scraped off with a long curved knife.

Once the skin was hair free it washed once more, placed onto a frame and stretched. The frame itself had adjustable pegs and strings to hold the skin. Smooth stones were used to press against the skin, which was looped over the frame and secured with a cord or string. The other end of the cord was anchored into a slot held by a peg. This process continued right round the edge of the frame, with the whole thing resembling something like a trampoline.

Hot water was used to keep the parchment wet and then a curved knife, or lunellum, used to scrape both sides of the material. The skin was then stretched again, as before, with the cord and strings adjusted one by one. The hair or coat side of the skin, known as the grain, required additional scrapping to ensure it became a satisfactory writing surface. When the pegs were removed the parchment was dried and rolled for storage. It is believed that sheets of parchment were sold by the dozen.

Quills and ink were relatively cheap and easy to source, whereas the labour intensive parchment would have been much more expensive to procure. But it was readily available and affordable for the aristocracy and members of the clergy. Many merchants were also utilising the product to record transactions and maintain ledgers. Ian Mortimer states that in the fourteenth century ‘the proceedings of every manor court are recorded in detail, and so are the extent and customs of almost every manor. Every Bishop keeps a register. Every great estate and major landowner employs a series of clerks. Every judge has his clerical staff, and so does every sheriff, escheator and coroner. Most wealthy merchants keep accounts of some sort. All the professional men in a city – physicians, lawyers, scriveners, surgeons, and schoolmasters can read and write and maybe as many as twenty percent of other tradesmen are also literate.’[1]

But what about women? How many women were literate in the same period?

Ian Mortimer suggest that, ‘A surprising number of townswomen are literate. Nunneries might be poor in their endowments but they are keen on their schools, and they educate as many girls as boys.[1]’

Martyn Whittock writes, ‘As literacy increased it was reflected in a growing number of women who could read. Even the religiously conservative Thomas More ensured his daughters received a humanist education. Such attitudes were most likely to be found amongst a small group of the elite families and this had, to some extent, been true throughout the Middle Ages. Diane Watt[2] has recently argued that women in the period 1100 to 1500 contributed (as patrons, readers, audiences and subjects) both to the production of texts and their meanings, whether these were written by men or by women.[3]’

Christine de Pizan, an influential Italian author (b. 1364) argued that it was extremely important for mothers to arrange for their daughters to be taught how to read and write. Several other famous female writers in this period include Marie de France (b. 1160) a French medieval poet and Margery Kemps with her autobiographical work, The Book of Margery Kemps, thought to be the first of its kind.

Christine de Pizan

Many women in the middle to late medieval period could read and write, had been provided with education and had the ability to correspond with others, compose poems and stories and then record them.

In order for a medieval epistolary novel such as The Lily and the Lion to work, Catherine T Wilson and I deliberately placed our main characters, Catherine and Cécile into circumstances that would allow for such a premise to function successfully. As a member of the French aristocracy, Cécile has received an education and has access to parchment, quill, pounce and ink. Catherine received her education whilst in residence at Denny Abbey. Once removed from that situation, she was supplied with the equipment to correspond with Cecile by her wealthy protector.

Very little has changed in 650 odd years. Just like Catherine and Cécile, their modern-day counterparts, Cathy T and Cathy A, love to share news of their families, their joys and sadness, the triumphs and frustrations with added lashings of gossip. It just took a little longer for Catherine and Cécile’s letters to arrive.

[1] Mortimer, Ian – The Time Travellers Guide to Medieval England, Vintage, 2009

[2] Watt, Diane – Medieval Women’s Writing: Works by and for Women in England, 100-1500, Polity, 2007.

[3] Whittock, Martyn – Life in the Middle Ages, Robinson, 2009

The Lily and the Lion – 1st Place Chanticleer Chatelaine Award – 2014

The Order of the Lily – 1st Place Chanticleer Chatelaine Award – 2015

The Gilded Crown – 1st Place Chanticleer Chaucer Award – 2016

The Traitor’s Noose – Grand Prize WINNER Chanticleer Chaucer Award – 2017