Private heralds crying Largesse at Christmas

In the old great households a nobleman or gentleman of fair estate kept his own herald, who wore his master’s coat of arms at Christmas and other solemn times and cried Largesse three times. John Aubrey noted the custom in 1678 among the manners of the days before the civil wars, when lords lived in the country like petty kings. He added that the Christmas mumming, the loaf-stealing and other sports were performed in the great hall, where the hearth stood in the middle of the floor.