Subject: noble knight-nobleman

Culture: Valois French nobility

Setting: Wars of Religion, France mid-late 16thc

Event Photos

* Nye 1993 p16

"In its very earliest incarnation, from the ninth to perhaps the twelfth century, 'honneur' was not a quality one possessed, but referred to a noble man's biens (worldly goods) in the form of fiefs or benefices. The reverence or respect he enjoyed in the world depended on these 'marks and attributes of his dignity.' A man's wife was one of these possessions, and the term appears to have acknowledged her only in that capacity.

"By the sixteenth century honor attaches more closely to the noble individual himself, to this reputation, beauty, and personal character. It was a 'natural' quality of noblesse, however, because it slipped away from those who sought it, while adhering to those, secure in their nonchalance, who appeared least concerned with it. By this time the words honte and honteux had developed from the same root, meaning, essentially, 'modest' or 'chaste,' and applying to women for the first time as individuals. It is clear that honneur/honte have not yet been organized in a binary meaning 'honor' and 'shame.'

"The Littré of 1863, drawing its examples from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, recognizes 'honor' as applying wholly to personal characteristics, including virtue, courage, and the desire for distinction, terms reflecting largely aristocratic preoccupations. The point d'honneur, which governed personal combat, resolved disputes pertaining to the possession of these qualities. The obligation for a man to defend a woman's chastity is assumed, and honor and shame have now become a binary, the latter meaning 'dishonor' and 'humiliation', or the fear of that condition. It is clear that both sexes may possess and lose honor, but a woman's honor is included within the larger sphere of a man's, which is it is his duty to superintend."

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