Tournament (medieval)

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This article is about the tournaments of the Middle Ages. For tournaments in general,
see tournament.

Depiction of mounted combat in a tournament from the Codex Manesse (early 14th century)

A tournament, or tourney (from Old French torneiement, tornei),[a] was

a chivalrous competition or mock fight in the Middle Ages and Renaissance (12th to
16th centuries). It is one type of hastilude.
 Contents

 1Terminology
 2Origins
 3During the High Middle Ages
o 3.1Melee
o 3.2Popularity
o 3.3Jousting
o 3.4Equipment
 4Tournaments during the Late Middle Ages
 5See also
 6Notes
 7References
 8Bibliography
 9External links

Terminology[edit]
Further information: Hastilude

Old French tournment was in use in the 12th century, from a verb tornoier, ultimately

Latin tornare "to turn". The same word also gave rise to tornei (modern English tourney,
modern French tournoi). The French terms were adopted in English (via Anglo-Norman)
by 1300.
The Old French verb in origin meant "to joust, tilt", but it came to refer to the knightly
tournament more generally, while joster "approach, meet" became the technical term for
jousting specifically (also adopted in English before 1300).
By the end of the 12th century, tornement and Latinized torneamentum had become the
generic term for all kinds of knightly hastiludes or martial displays. Roger of
Hoveden writing in the late 12th century defined torneamentum as "military exercises
carried out, not in the knight's spirit of hostility (nullo interveniente odio), but solely for
practice and the display of prowess (pro solo exercitio, atque ostentatione virium)."[1]
The application of the term tournament to competition in games of skill or sports in
general dates to the mid-18th century.

Origins[edit]
Medieval equestrian warfare, and equestrian practice, did hark back to Roman antiquity,
just as the notion of chivalry harked back to the rank of equites in Roman times. There
may be an element of continuity connecting the medieval tournament to the hippika
gymnasia of the Roman cavalry, but due to the sparsity of written records during the 5th
to 8th centuries this is difficult to establish. It is known that such cavalry games were
central to military training in the Carolingian Empire, with records of Louis and Charles'
military games at Worms in 843. At this event, recorded by Nithard, the initial chasing
and fleeing was followed by a general mêlée of all combatants.
Documentation of equestrian practice during the 9th to 10th centuries is still sparse, but
it is clear that the tournament, properly so called, is a development of the High Middle
Ages. This is recognized by medieval sources; a chronicler of Tours in the late 12th
century attributes the "invention" of the knightly tournament to an Angevin baron,
Geoffroi de Preulli, who supposedly died in 1066. In 16th-century
German historiography, the setting down of the first tournament laws is attributed
to Henry the Fowler (r. 919–936); this tradition is cited by Georg Rüxner in
his Thurnierbuch of c. 1530 as well as by Paulus Hector Mair in his De Arte Athletica (c.
1544/5).[2]
The earliest known use of the word "tournament" comes from the peace legislation
by Count Baldwin III of Hainaut for the town of Valenciennes, dated to 1114. It refers to
the keepers of the peace in the town leaving it 'for the purpose of frequenting javelin
sports, tournaments and such like.'
A pattern of regular tournament meetings across northern France is evident in sources
for the life of Charles, Count of Flanders (1119–27). The sources of the 1160s and
1170s portray the event in the developed form it maintained into the fourteenth century.