ing, ad recipiendum a nobis arma militaria; and
tenants of mesne lords to be knighted by whomsoever they pleased, ad
recipiendum arma de quibuscunque voluerint. Titles of Honour, p. 792.
But soon after this time, it became an established principle of our law
that no subject can confer knighthood except by the king's authority.
Thus Edward III. grants to a burgess of _Lyndia_ in Guienne (I know not
what place this is) the privilege of receiving that rank at the hands of
any knight, his want of noble birth notwithstanding. Rymer, t. v. p.
623. It seems, however, that a different law obtained in some places.
Twenty-three of the chief inhabitants of Beaucaire, partly knights,
partly burgesses, certified in 1298, that the immemorial usage of
Beaucaire and of Provence had been, for burgesses to receive knighthood
at the hands of noblemen, without the prince's permission. Vaissette,
Hist. de Languedoc, t. iii. p. 530. Burgesses, in the great commercial
towns, were considered as of a superior class to the roturiers, and
possessed a kind of demi-nobility. Charles V. appears to have conceded a
similar indulgence to the citizens of Paris. Villaret, t. x. p. 248.

[787] St. Palaye, part iii. passim.

[788] The word bachelor has been sometimes derived from bas chevalier;
in opposition to banneret. But this cannot be right. We do not find any
authority for the expression bas chevalier, nor any equivalent in Latin,
baccalaureus certainly not suggesting that sense; and it is strange that
the corruption should obliterate every trace of the original term.
Bachelor is a very old word, and is used in early French poetry for a
young man, as bachelette is for a girl. So also in Chaucer:

"A yonge Squire,
A lover, and a lusty _bachelor_."

[789] Du Cange, Dissertation 9me sur Joinville. The number of men at
arms, whom a banneret ought to command, was properly fifty. But Olivier
de la Marche speaks of twenty-five as sufficient; and it appears that,
in fact, knights-banneret often did not bring so many.

[790] Ibid. Olivier de la Marche (Collection des Memoires, t. viii. p.
337) gives a particular example of this; and makes a distinction between
the bachelor, created a banneret on account of his estate, and the
hereditary banneret, who took a public opportunity of requesting the
sovereign to unfold his family banner which he had before borne wound
round his lance. The first was said relever banniere; the second, entrer
en