Amongst the special treasures to be found there, mention is made of four figure-pictures, one of which is said to have been of Roman workmanship, and round in form--certainly, as far as is known, a rarity at that time. We also find a record of finely wrought embroideries and tapestries on the walls, and of windows painted either with armorial bearings and figures, or with simple foliage like the delicate ivy and hawthorn to be seen enriching the pages of Books of Hours of the fourteenth century. Special mention is made of a window, evidently over the altar in the private Chapel, in which was represented the Crucifixion. In the large hall were tables on trestles, easily removed before the dance began or minstrels or jugglers displayed their skill, dressers to hold the gold and silver plate and from which to serve the banquet, and settles with footboards so necessary when the rushes were only renewed at lengthy intervals. But if the hall was somewhat sparsely furnished, its ceiling and walls (the latter on occasions hung with embroideries carried from castle to castle as the Countess journeyed) were made bright with colour, and beautiful with design. How bright, and how beautiful, we can infer almost with certainty from examples in the Castle of Chillon of thirteenth and fourteenth century decoration lately rescued from under a coat of whitewash,[28] and from the comparison made by Brunetto Latini (1230-1294), in his _Tesoro_, of the Italian with the French feudal castle, in which he says of the one that it is only built for war, with ditches, palisades, and high towers and walls, and of the other that it lies in the midst of meadows and gardens, _with large painted chambers_.
[28] _Chillon_, Albert Naef, Genève, 1908.
Mahaut’s cousin, the cold and impersonal Philip le Bel, was on the throne. For the most part war had ceased in the land, but still there was war in high places, for Philip, avaricious by nature, and finding himself a king under altering conditions--the Papacy fallen into disregard, the Nobility weakened, and the Nation growing, but without any adequate provision made to meet the needs of this growth--left no stone unturned to supply this want and gratify his greed. On the question of the subsidies of the clergy and the relation between things spiritual and temporal, he quarrelled with the Pope, Boniface the Eighth, and brought about the removal of the Holy See from Rome to Avignon. He robbed and ruined the Templars, and despoiled the Jews and Lombards, the financiers of the day. With him no trickery was too base, no cruelty too cold-blooded. Gold was his God. Dante, who was his contemporary, refers (_Purg._ vii. 109) to “his wicked and foul life” (_la vita sua viziata e lorda_), and (_Par._ xix. 118) to his “debasement of the coinage” (_falseggiando la moneta_), as well as to his self-seeking greed. Such, with the added glamour of art and learning, was the courtly atmosphere of the Time. The bourgeoisie, encouraged by the king who sought to aggrandise the monarchy at the expense of the nobles, was growing rich, and politically gaining in power, and Philip ere long discovered that he had helped merely to change the centre of power, and not to crush it.