Micrologus; Cloth of Gold

81-17 THE FIELD OF THE CLOTH OF GOLD

Throughout the month of June in the year 1520, a fabled encounter took place between the kings of England and France, Henry VIII and Francis I. This encounter has come to be known as "The Field of the Cloth of Gold." They met with their advisors and, indeed, virtually their entire courts, on a field between the English-held town of Guines and the French town of Arles. One can imagine the splendor, and also the discomfort, of hundreds of nobles and literally thousands of their retinue descending on these two unsuspecting villages in northeastern France. The name, "The Field of the Cloth of Gold," comes from the rich fabric, the silks and velvets all interwoven with apples and fleurs de lys in gold, which Francis used for the tents which were to serve as his temporary court. Ah, if only it had not rained!

The event has been characterized as chivalry's last great fling, and, indeed, the jousting between the two hale young monarchs, the feasting, and the pageantry hark back to such late medieval extravaganzas as the "Banquet of the Oath of the Pheasant," which we explored a few weeks ago on Micrologus. Among the feasts was one in which Henry and a few of his nobles were entertained by the French Queen and the French court, while simultaneously--for security reasons--Francis was entertained by the English Queen and the English court. Certainly the English musicians must have taken delight in performing for Francis a few compositions by their own sovereign, such as "En vray amoure," performed here by the New London Consort.

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While Francis was dining with the English royal family, there were seatings in many different rooms within the English palace. At one of these, the flower of French nobility was being entertained, and among this flower of French nobility was the Duc de Lorraine. It would not be surprising, therefore, to find that this next piece, also by Henry himself, was performed here, because it makes further reference to the Duc de Lorraine, "Gentil prince de renom." The performance is by the Ricercare Ensemble of Zurich.

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Henry was not the only composer at the court, and certainly not the best. That distinction would probably have been accorded either Robert Fayrfax, or William Cornysh the Younger, both of whom were prominent among the Gentlemen of Henry's Chapel Royal, and who were present at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. Representing each of them, we will hear a love song. The first is “I Love loved" by Robert Fayrfax, and the second is one of the most famous carols of the age, "Ah Robyn" by William Cornysh. Both are performed by the Hilliard Ensemble.

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At all the banqueting halls in the English palace, there was conspicuous consumption. The food was served so liberally that people choked, and in the courtyard the fountains ran with wine for five solid hours. After the banquet King Francis made the round of the hall dressed in his rich robes and kissed all the ladies, except--as one English chronicler notes about his selective gallantry--"for four or five who were old and not fair, standing together." After that, there was dancing, and what more appropriate piece could they have chosen than King Henry's own "Taunder naken"? The performance, again, is by the Ricercare Ensemble of Zurich.

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Francis must have been impressed by the English shawm players, because not so long after this event, he borrowed a shawm player from Cardinal Wolsey, who was, of course, Henry's chief advisor. Unfortunately, the man died very soon after; some said it was poison, others said it was overblowing. At any rate, Henry left for his banquet swathed in cloth of gold, studded with jewels, mostly rubies and diamonds, and at the French court he was, naturally, royally entertained. Each course of the four-hour meal was heralded by a battery of twenty-four trumpets, and while the courses were being consumed, there was softer music, too. We can imagine that this softer music might have been chansons by such composers as Claudin de Sermisy, who was there as a singer in the choir of Ste-Chapelle, which was at this time functioning as the royal choir, and Clement Janequin, who was musician to one of the French bishops. They were writing in a style which was just developing at that time and which we now call the Parisian chanson style. It is characterized by a great deal of homophonic movement--all of the parts moving at roughly the same rhythm—but within that rather confining definition, there was room for a great variety of expression, as we shall hear. The first song we will hear is "Languir me fais" by Claudin. It is a rather longing love song, set to a poem by Clement Marot, who was court poet to Francis and who was present at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. That is performed by the Monteverdi Choir of Hamburg. The second piece is "Au joly jeu," a more light-hearted love song by Janequin, performed for us by the King's Singers.

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Janequin, of course, had made a musical connection with Francis when he wrote a chanson commemorating the King's great victory over the Swiss at the Battle of Marignan, five years earlier, in 1515. That piece engendered a number of imitations, and so it is possible that, after the meal, when the company retired for dancing to a great hall hung with pink and gold, and carpeted in crimson velvet, the musicians might gladly have played a dance based on that commemorative chanson. We will hear the pavane "La Bataille" by Jacques Moderne, performed by the Capella Antiqua of Munich.

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The last great event at the Field of the Cloth of Gold was a solemn high Mass, led by Cardinal Wolsey, and attended by three kings, three queens, three cardinals, one papal legate, twenty-one bishops, and, of course, numerous nobles from both England and France. The choirs of both Henry and Francis sang, and one listener described the sound as "a heavenly hearing." Since the "elder statesman" among the singer-composers in France was Jean Mouton, it is possible that one of his motets was performed at the Mass. At any rate, "a heavenly hearing" aptly describes "Nesciens mater virgo virum," as performed here by the Early Music Consort of London, directed by David Munrow.

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Since the purpose of the Field of the Cloth of Gold was to promote a lasting bond of friendship between England and France, it must be counted a failure. Already, beforehand, Francis had tried to dupe the English into preparing less sumptuously, so that his magnificence might out-shine Henry's; and Henry, for his part, was almost late because he was having a secret meeting with Francis' arch-rival, the Emperor Charles. Even the feasts and entertainments began to pall. Said one who was there: "They were very pleasant, yet doubtless many were full weary of them at length and had a loathesomeness and disgust of them, and some of them had much rather been at home."

The last word goes to a slightly later historian, who saw a musical analogy in the inability of France and England to go beyond peaceful coexistence to true friendship:

“Betwixt great estates adjacent to one another, such jealousies use to rise that they may make peace sometimes, but never friendship: that leagues and confederations have in them the nature of harmonical accords which jar in the second interval but agree in the third.” [Edward, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, 1649 manuscript]