History of Banquet

A
banquet
is a large meal or feast, complete with main and desserts .It usually serves a
purpose such as a charitable gathering, a ceremony, or acceleration and is often
preceded or followed by speeches in honour of someone .The idea of banqueting
is ancient (see Sellisternium , Belshazzar's Feast ,and Mead halls)In the sixteenth
century a banquet was very different from our modern perception and stems from
the medieval 'ceremony of the void'. After dinner the guests would stand and drink
sweet wine and
spices while the table was cleared, or voided (Later in the seventeenth
century void would be replaced with the French dessert). During the
sixteenth century, guests would no longer stand
in the great chamber whilst the table was cleared and the room prepared for
entertainment, but would retire to the parlour or banqueting room .As the idea of
banqueting developed, it could take place at any time during the day and have
much more in common with the later practice of taking tea. Banqueting rooms
varied greatly from house to house, but were generally on an intimate scale either
in a garden room or inside such as the small banqueting turrets in Longleat
House. Today banquets serve many purposes from training sessions, to formal
business dinners. Business banquets are a popular way to strengthen bonds
between businessmen and their partners. It is common that a banquet is organized
at the end of an academic conference. Aluauis one variety of banquets originally
used in Hawaii. The Mongol provincial government in China levies a tax on
banquets

Renaissance Banquet
During the Renaissance, as in ages past, food was a matter for social class, as well as
region and season. The Renaissance uplifted Europes culinary arts, especially in Italy,
evident in the banquets of Romes papal court, the Venice of the doges and perhaps most
elegantly in the Florence of the Medici. That familys epicurean tastes were transferred to
France when Caterina de Medici married King Henry II, bringing with her the cooks and
recipes that reputedly put the haute in cuisine. But perhaps the most significant Italian
contribution to European cooking, if indirect, was Christopher Columbuss discovery of
America. From the mid-fourteenth century to the early seventeenth century, the idea of
banquets as a particular form of festivity flourished in Renaissance Europe. It began as a
specifically secular celebration. In medieval times the word feast primarily referred to
religious celebrations or special days in the church calendar; but also denoting a sumptuous
meal. As a lavish, ceremonial meal in honor of an individual or occasion, the new banquet
observed no periodicity and its consumption tended toward a demonstration of wealth and
power. It was distinguished not only by extravagance and ostentation scale but also by its
use of symbolism. In the sixteenth century a banquet could also refer to the less
ostentatious; though no less lavish in relative terms. Annual ceremonial dinners of
confreries or guilds, groups of men linked through craft or their parish were held on a
relevant saints day.