The word seneschal ( ) can have several different meanings, all of which reflect certain types of supervising or administering in a historic context. Most commonly, a seneschal was a senior position filled by a court appointment within a royal, ducal, or noble household during the Middle Ages and early Modern period – historically a steward or majordomo of a medieval great house.[
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target="_blank" rel="nofollow"> Oxford University Press: Seneschal[ Encyclopaedia Perthensis; or Universal Dictionary of the Arts Volume 20 (1816), p. 437] In a medieval royal household, a seneschal was in charge of domestic arrangements and the administration of servants,[ The Free Dictionary: Seneschal.] which, in the medieval period particularly, meant the seneschal might oversee hundreds of laborers, servants and their associated responsibilities, and have a great deal of power in the community, at a time when much of the local economy was often based on the wealth and responsibilities of such a household.
A second meaning is more specific, and concerns the late medieval and early modern nation of France, wherein the seneschal () was also a royal officer in charge of justice and control of the administration of certain southern provinces called seneschalties, holding a role equivalent to a northern French bailiff ( bailli).
In the United Kingdom the modern meaning of seneschal is primarily as an ecclesiastical term, referring to a cathedral official.[ "seneschal" Via the Free Dictionary. Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 HarperCollins Publishers]
Origin
The
Medieval Latin discifer (dish-bearer) was an officer in the household of later Anglo-Saxon kings, and it is sometimes translated by historians as seneschal, although the term was not used in England before the
Norman Conquest.
The term, first attested in 1350–1400,
The scholae in the late Roman Empire referred to the imperial guard, divided into senior ( seniores) and junior ( juniores) units. The captain of the guard was known as comes scholarum.[Leo Wiener, Commentary to the Germanic Laws and Mediaeval Documents (Harvard UP, 1915; reprint Union, NJ: Lawbook Exchange, 1999), 33–34.] When Germanic tribes took over the Empire, the scholae were merged or replaced with the Germanic king's warband (cf. Vulgar Latin *dructis, OHG truht, Old English dryht) whose members also had duties in their lord's household like a royal retinue.[D. H. Green, Language and history in the early Germanic world (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1998), 110–112.] The king's chief warbandman and retainer (cf. Old Saxon druhting, OHG truhting, truhtigomo Old English dryhtguma, dryhtealdor), from the 5th century on, personally attended on the king, as specifically stated in the Codex Theodosianus of 413 ( Cod. Theod. VI. 13. 1; known as comes scholae).[Wiener, 34.] The warband, once sedentary, became first the king's royal household, and then his great officers of state, and in both cases the seneschal is synonymous with steward.
Medieval Europe
France
In late medieval and early modern France, the seneschal was originally a royal steward overseeing the entire country but developed into an agent of the
French monarchy charged with administration of a
seneschalty (), one of the districts of the crown lands in Gascony, Aquitaine,
Languedoc and
Normandy.
Henry Hallam states that the first seneschals to govern in this manner did so by an 1190 edict of Philip II. The seneschals also served as the chief justice of the royal courts of appeal in their areas and were occasionally seconded by vice-seneschals.
The equivalent post throughout most of northern France was the bailiff ( bailli), who oversaw a bailiwick ( bailliage).
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William de Gometz was Seneschal of France .
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Osbern the Steward was seneschal to two dukes of Normandy.
Under rulers of England
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Bertram de Criol, then member of the King's Council, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, Constable of Dover Castle, and Keeper of the Archbishopric of Canterbury, and shortly to become Constable of the Tower of London, is referred to as "our Seneschal" in Letters of King Henry III of December 1239.
[T. Stapleton (ed.), De Antiquis Legibus Liber. Cronica Maiorum et Vicecomitum Londiniarum, Camden Society, Series I no. 34 (London 1846), Appendix, pp. 237-38.]
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Sir William Felton, an English knight, was appointed seneschal of Poitou in 1360.
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Sir Thomas Felton, an English knight, was appointed seneschal of Aquitaine in 1362 and seneschal of Bordeaux in 1372.
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Sir John Chandos, an English knight, was appointed seneschal of Poitou in 1369.
Anglo-Saxon England
In Anglo-Saxon England dish-bearers (in
Medieval Latin discifer or
dapifer) were nobles who served at royal feasts. The term is often translated by historians as "seneschal".
Gwynedd
The title of Seneschal was used in the Kingdom of Gwynedd during the medieval ages. Documented in the 12th century were the Stewards (Seneschal) of King Owain Gwynedd, those being Hwfa ap Cynddelw and Llywarch ap Bran, both of the Fifteen Tribes of Wales.
Isle of Man
The Seneschal of Tynwald is an administrative role to the Parliament of the Isle of Man, part of the staff of the Clerk of Tynwald’s Office. The Seneschal role was formed in 2006 and is part of the Tynwald Corporate Services Office. The Seneschal manages the Messengers and Gardyn Coadee.
Sark
The Seneschal of Sark presides over the Court of the Seneschal, which hears civil and some criminal cases.
Papacy
Formerly, officers known as Seneschal Dapifers were involved in the ceremony of the papal conclave during the election of a new Pope, to see to mealtimes for the cardinal electors while ensuring secrecy. Cardinals regularly had meals sent in from their homes with much pageantry accompanying the conveyance of food:
These ceremonies have not been observed since the nineteenth century.
In the Knights Templar, seneschal was the title used by the second-in-command of the Order after the Grand Master.
See also
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Grand maître de France – the Great Officer of the Crown of France in charge of the Royal Household (the "Maison du Roi")
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Marshal
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Majordomo
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Sheriff, another Germanic-rooted title of command over a jurisdiction, derived from "shire" and "reeve".
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Sir Kay, a legendary seneschal in the court of King Arthur.
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Barons Dunboyne, Seneschal of Tipperary, Ireland.
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Kingdom of Alba Seneschals, Scottish Butler
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