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CHAP.  XIV.

    Of the Constable, and Peers of France.

Besides the great Office of Mayor of the Palace before spoken of, there was another which we must take Notice of; because it seems, in the Memory of our Forefathers, to have succeeded in Place of the former:  And that was the Office of Count of the King’s Stable; called at first, Comes stabuli; and by Corruption at last, Connestabuli.  Now all those who enjoy’d any extraordinary Honours or Employments in the King’s Court, and assisted in the Administration of the Commonwealth, were commonly called Comites, Counts; which was likewise the Custom of the Ancients, as I have in some other of my Works demonstrated.  So Cicero, in many Places, calls Callisthenes, Comitem Alexandri magni.  This Comes stabuli was in a Manner the same with the Magister Equitum among the Romans, that is, General of the Horse; to whom were subject those Keepers of the Horses commonly called Querries. Greg.  Turen lib. 5. cap. 39. says,—­“The Treasurer of Clodoveus being taken out of the City of Bourges, by Cuppan, Count of the Stable, was sent in Bonds to the Queen, &c.”  And again, cap. 48. where he speaks of Leudastes,—­“She took him (says he) into Favour, rais’d him, and made him Keeper of the best Horses; which so filled him with Pride and Vanity, that he put in for the Constableship; [Comitatum Stabuloram] and having got it, began to despise and undervalue every Body.”  From these Quotations it appears, that tho’ the Custody of the Horses was a very honourable Employment, yet ’twas much inferior to that of Constable. Aimoinus, lib. 3. cap. 43. gives the same Account of this Leudastes.—­“Being grown very intimate with the Queen, he was first made Keeper of the Horse; and afterwards obtaining the Constableship above the rest of the Keepers, he was (after the Queen’s Death) made by King Charibert, Count of Tours.”  And cap. 70. “Leudegesilus, Praefect of the King’s Horses, whom they commonly call Constable, being made General of that Expedition by the King, order’d the Engines to be drawn down &c.”  Also lib. 4. cap, 95. where he speaks of Charles the Great,—­“The same Year (says he) he sent Burchard, Comitem Stabuli sui, which we corruptly call Constabulum, with a Fleet against Corsica”—.  The Appendix to Gregory calls him, Comestabulum, lib. II. Brunechildis (says he) was brought out of the Village, ab exporre Comestabulo.