Feast of the Pheasant

The Feast of the Pheasant (French: "Banquet du Voeu du Faisan", "Banquet of the Oath of the Pheasant") was a banquet given by Philip the Good of Burgundy in 1454 in Lille. Its purpose was to promote a crusade against the Turks (which never took place). However the feast was written up in a contemporary account of how Religion, represented mounted on an elephant led by a giant saracen, came to the banquet hall to request aid from the Knights of the Golden Fleece. We are also told which music by Gilles Binchois was performed and the details of 24 musicians playing inside an enormous pie and a trick with a horse riding backwards.

The oath taken by the participants, the "Vœux du faisan" ("oath on the pheasant") was in the tradition of the "bird oaths" of Late Medieval France as popularized in the 14th century romance of the "Voeux du paon".

Bibliography

*Agathe Lafortune-Martel, (1984), "Fete noble en Bourgogne au XVe siecle: Le Banquet du Faisan (1454): Aspects politiques, sociaux et culturels" Cahiers d'etudes medievales 8 Paris: Vrin.
*Marie-Therèse Caron, Le banquet des voeux du Faisan et la fête de cour bourguignonne, Turnhout, 2003 [http://www.fcamberes.org/pdf/Resumen_M+T+Caron_fr.pdf]
*J. Huizinga, "The Autumn of the Middle Ages" (ch. 3).
*"Les historiens du "Banquet des voeux du Faisan"," Melanges d'histoire offerts a Charles Moeller, vol. I, Louvain & Paris 1914, pp

Discography

*"Le Banquet du Voeu", 1454, Music at the Court of Burgundy, Ensemble Gilles Binchois - Dominique Vellard, Virgin Classics 91441,Virgin Veritas 59043.