Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 2.djvu/201

Rh Pierre," an incident in the romance of Meliadus de Leonnoys . These hangings were suspended from hooks fixed in the wall, an arrangement very perceptible in our illustration, and were taken down and carried with the owner when he removed from one residence to another. Towards the end of the fifteenth century we find numerous instances of the chamber being entirely hung with tapestry, or stamped and gilded leather; at this period the principal seat on the dais is in the form of a long high-backed couch with elbows, covered with embroidered silks, although wooden forms still appear, appropriated to guests of inferior rank . It is possible the same sort of couch was in use much earlier, and it may have been identical with the "lit" or bed mentioned by the old romancers. In the tale of "La Mule sanz Frain," the lady of the castle receives Sir Gawain seated on a magnificent bed or couch under a canopy, and places him by her side

Le Grand d'Aussy says, the custom of eating on a sort of couch, after the fashion of the ancients, still subsisted in the twelfth century; his statements are generally well founded, and entitled to respect, but it may be questioned whether the practice existed in England after the Norman Conquest, or indeed, for some time before that event. We find no instances of it in Saxon manuscripts: on the Bayeux tapestry there is a representation of a feast, but the guests are seated in the ordinary way; and Le Grand himself has cited an incident to prove that it was not known among the Normans. Robert duke of Normandy, father of the Conqueror, made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem; when at Constantinople he was much surprised to see the emperor and his attendants take their repast on the ground, having neither tables nor forms. This was merely the oriental custom, but the duke, finding it inconvenient, had a table and seats made after the French fashion, and they appeared so convenient to the emperor and his subjects, that they adopted and learned to make them. In some Saxon drawings, the dining-table is oval-shaped or