Jean, Sieur de Joinville, Life of St. Louis, from Edith Wedgewood, trans. The Memoirs of the Lord of Joinville

LET US return to our story, and say as follows: that after these events, the King held a great court at Saumur in Anjou. I was there, and can bear you witness that it was the finest that ever I saw. For there ate at the King's table, beside him, the Count of Poitiers, whom he had newly knighted on a Saint John's Day; and next him sat Count John of Dreux, whom likewise he had newly knighted. Next to the Count of Dreux, sat the Count of La Marche, and next him, the good Count Peter of Brittany; and in front of the King's table, in a line with the Count of Dreux, sat my lord the King of Navarre, in a coat and mantle of samite, richly adorned with belt and clasp and circlet of gold; and I carved before him. Before the King, his brother the Count of Artois was trencher bearer, and the good Count, John of Soissons, carved. To guard the table, there was my Lord Humbert of Beaujeu, (who afterwards became Constable of France), and my Lord Enguerrand of Coucy, and my Lord Archibald of Bourbon. Forming a bodyguard behind these three barons were a good thirty of their knights, in coats of cloth of silk, and behind the knights a great crowd of serjeants clad in taffety stamped with the Count of Poitier's arms. The King had donned a coat of sky-blue satin, and a surcoat and mantle of scarlet satin lined with ermine, and on his head a cotton bonnet, which became him very ill, he being in those days a young man.

   The King held this feast in the halls of Saumur, which were built, they say, by the great King Henry of England, to hold his great feasts. The halls are built after the fashion of the cloisters of the White Monks; but I trow there are no others so large by far. I will tell you, why: for along the wall of the cloister where the King was dining, and he was surrounded by knights and serjeants who took up a great deal of room, there was a table at which were seated thirty other persons, bishops and archbishops; and again, beyond the bishops and at the same table, was seated Blanche the Queen Mother, at the opposite end of the cloister to where the King sat. The Count of Boulogne, (who afterwards was King of Portugal) waited on the Queen, together with the good Count of St. Pol, and a German lad, eighteen years of age, who was said to be the son of Saint Elizabeth of Thuringia. It was said of him, that Queen Blanche used to kiss his forehead out of piety, because she heard that his mother had often kissed him there. At the end of the cloister, on the other side, were the kitchens, the butteries, the pantries, and the storerooms; and from this cloister they set bread and wine and meat before the King and Queen. And in all the other wings, and in the centre plot there feasted a vast number of knights, more than I can tell. Many people say, that they never saw before at any feast so many surcoats and other garments of cloth-of-gold as were there; and that there must have been full three thousand knights in the place.  (38-40; for the whole text, see the University of Virginia E-Text edition of Wedgewood's translation)