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The word seneschal (/ ˈ s ɛ n ə ʃ əl /) 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 ...
[2] The Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources (DMLBS) defines discifer as dish-bearer or sewer, [a] [4] and dapifer as an attendant at meals, a sewer or a steward. [5] Historians often translate discifer as seneschal, [6] but Gautier objects that the word seneschal is not recorded in England before the Norman Conquest. [2]
The Society as a whole, each kingdom, and each local group within a kingdom, all have a standard group of officers with titles loosely based on medieval equivalents. [25] Seneschal: The seneschal acts as the administrative head, or president of the group. Every local group is required to have a local seneschal who reports to the kingdom's ...
The seneschal came also to act as a business manager, coordinating between the receivers of various landholdings and the chamber, camera or treasury, and the chancellory or chapel. When the counts of Anjou began acquiring large territorial holdings outside of their traditional patrimony, their rule became more and more absentee.
Here, at the rate of two daily sessions, worked the seneschal, appointed by the king, the juge-mage or lieutenant general, a senior lieutenant, a civil and criminal lieutenant, advisors and many subordinates, clerks, and others. The prisons, where the executioners operated — the last of whom was Jean Rascat (1759-1846) — were located in the ...
The seneschal managed the household, coordinating between the receivers of various landholdings and the chamber, treasury, and the chancellory or chapel. The seneschals of Normandy, like those appointed in Gascony, Poitou, and Anjou had custody of demesne fortresses, the regional treasuries, and presidency of the highest court of regional custom.
The seneschal administered the coronation ceremony, oversaw the Haute Cour in the king's absence, administered royal castles, and managed the royal finances and revenue. The seneschal's power was over only viscounts and not castellans, and the constable was still superior to the seneschal due in part to the kingdom's constant state of war. [3]
Ministerials were found holding the four great offices necessary to run a great household: seneschal, butler, marshal and chamberlain. They were vidames (vice dominus, or runners of estates) or castellans, having both military and administrative responsibilities.