Part 7 (1/2)

All the various kinds of meal and flour were baked into cakes or loaves of different shapes. Flour was usually mixed with water to make dough: but bread made of flour and milk was also much in use. Honey was often kneaded up with cakes as a delicacy: and occasionally the roe of a salmon was similarly used. Wheaten bread was considered the best, as at present: barley-bread was poor. Yeast, or barm, or leaven was used both in baking and in brewing.

The management of Bees was universally understood, and every comfortable householder kept hives in his garden. Wild bees, too, swarmed everywhere--much more plentifully than at present, on account of the extent of woodland. Accordingly honey was very plentiful, and was used with all sorts of dishes. Often at meals each person had placed before him on the table a little dish, sometimes of silver, filled with honey; and each morsel whether of meat, fish, or bread was dipped into it before being conveyed to the mouth. Honey was the chief ingredient in the making of mead.

As the country abounded in forests, thickets, and brakes, the most common Fuel for domestic use was wood: but peat or turf was also much used, cut from a bank with a _slaan_ or turf-spade as at present. Founders and other workers in metal used wood-charcoal, of which that made from birch-wood gave the greatest heat.

Flint and steel with tinder (or _s.p.u.n.k_) were used for striking and kindling fire. The whole kindling-gear--flint, steel, and tinder--was carried in the girdle-pocket, so as to be ready to hand; and accordingly, fire struck in this way was called _tinne-cra.s.sa_, 'girdle-fire.'

For Light, dipped candles were used in the better cla.s.s of houses. Poor people used dipped rushes, which gave a feeble light and burned out quickly. In the houses of the rich they used beeswax candles, as indeed we might expect from the great abundance of bees.

Hospitality and generosity were virtues highly esteemed in ancient Ireland; in the old Irish Christian writings indeed they are everywhere praised and inculcated as religious duties; and in the secular literature they are equally prominent. The higher the rank of the person the more was expected from him, and a king should be hospitable without limit. There were all over the country Public Hostels for the free lodging and entertainment of travellers. At the head of each was an officer called a _Brewy_ or _Beetagh_, a public hospitaller or hosteller, who was held in high honour.

In order to be at all times ready to receive visitors, a brewy was bound to have three kinds of meat cooked and ready to be served up to all who came; three kinds of raw meat ready for cooking; besides animals ready for killing. In one of the law tracts a brewy is quaintly described as ”a man of three snouts”:--viz. the snout of a live hog rooting in the fields; the snout of a dead hog on the hooks cooking; and the pointed snout of a plough: meaning that he had plenty of live animals and of meat cooked and uncooked, with a plough and all other tillage appliances.

There should be a number of open roads leading to the house of a brewy, so that it might be readily accessible: and on each road a man was stationed to make sure that no traveller should pa.s.s by without calling to be entertained; besides which a light was to be kept burning on the lawn at night to guide travellers from a distance. To enable him to meet this great expense and to pay himself into the bargain, a brewy was allowed a great tract of land free.

Besides the hostels, there were the monasteries, too, where travellers were also boarded and lodged free for the time. And along with all this the people were kind and hospitable in their own houses to strangers and visitors. So we see that travellers were quite as well off then as now: indeed in one respect much better off: for whereas we have to pay a smart charge in an inn or hotel, there was in those times a hearty welcome and no charge at all.

The Irish missionaries carried this fine custom to the Continent in early ages, as they did many others: for they established free hostels in France and Germany, in places where there were no monasteries, chiefly for the use of pilgrims on their way to Rome.

CHAPTER XVI.

HOW THE PEOPLE DRESSED.

An oval face, broad above and narrow below, golden hair, fair skin, white, delicate, and well-formed hands with slender tapering fingers: these were considered as marking the type of beauty and of high family descent; they were the Marks of Aristocracy. To these natural advantages the people added by the usual artificial means. Among the higher cla.s.ses the finger-nails were kept carefully cut and rounded. It was considered shameful for a man of position to have rough unkempt nails.

Crimson-coloured finger-nails were greatly admired; and ladies sometimes dyed them this colour. Deirdre, uttering a lament for the sons of Usna, says:--”I sleep no more, and I shall not crimson my nails; no joy shall ever again come upon my mind.”

Ladies often dyed the eyebrows black with the juice of some sort of berry.

We have already seen (p. 54) that the Irish missionary monks sometimes painted or dyed their eyelids black. An entry in Cormac's Glossary plainly indicates that the blush of the cheeks was sometimes heightened by a colouring matter obtained from the alder tree: and the sprigs and berries of the elder were applied to the same purpose. Among Greek and Roman ladies the practice was very general of painting the cheeks, eyebrows, and other parts of the face.

Both men and women wore the hair long, and commonly flowing down on the back and shoulders. The hair was combed daily after a bath. The heroes of the Fena of Erin, before sitting down to their dinner after a hard day's hunting, always took a bath and carefully combed their long hair.

Among the higher cla.s.ses in very early times great care was bestowed on the hair; its regulation const.i.tuted quite an art; and it was dressed up in several ways. Very often the long hair of men, as well as of women, was elaborately curled. Conall Kernach's hair, as described in the story of Da Derga, flowed down his back, and was done up in ”hooks and plaits and swordlets.” The accuracy of this and other similar descriptions is fully borne out by the most unquestionable authority of all, namely, the figures in the early illuminated ma.n.u.scripts and on the shrines and high crosses of later ages. In nearly all the figures of the Book of Kells, for example (seventh or eighth century), the hair is combed and dressed with the utmost care, so beautifully adjusted indeed that it could have been done only by skilled professional hairdressers, and must have occupied much time. Whether in case of men or women, it hangs down both behind and at the sides, and is commonly divided the whole way, as well as all over the head, into slender fillets or locks, which sometimes hang down to the eyes in front. I do not find mentioned anywhere that the Irish dyed their hair, as was the custom among the Greeks and Romans.

The men were as particular about the beard as about the hair. The fas.h.i.+on of wearing the beard varied. Sometimes it was considered becoming to have it long and forked, and gradually narrowed to two points below.

Sometimes--as shown in many ancient figures--it falls down in a single ma.s.s; while in a few it is cut straight across at bottom not unlike a.s.syrian beards. Nearly all have a mustache, in most cases curled up and pointed at the ends as we often see now. In many the beard is carefully divided into slender twisted fillets, as described above for the hair.

Kings and chiefs had barbers in their service to attend to all this.

Razors were used made of bronze as hard as steel, as we know by finding them mentioned in Irish doc.u.ments as early as the eighth century; and many old bronze razors are now preserved in museums.

From what precedes it will be understood that combs were in general use with men as well as with women; and many specimens of combs are now found in the remains of ancient dwellings.

Bathing was very usual, at least among the upper cla.s.ses, and baths and the use of baths are constantly mentioned in the old tales and other writings. In every public hostel, in every monastery, and in every high-cla.s.s house, there was a bath, with its accompaniments. Soap was used both in bathing and was.h.i.+ng.

Woollen and linen clothes formed the dress of the great ma.s.s of the people. Both were produced at home; and in chapter xix. the modes of manufacturing them will be mentioned. Silk and satin, which were of course imported, were much worn among the higher cla.s.ses. The furs of animals, such as seals, otters, badgers, foxes, etc., were much used for capes and jackets, and for the edgings of various garments, so that skins of all the various kinds were valuable. They formed, too, an important item of everyday traffic, and they were also exported.