A lady in waiting. A wet-nurse.
"Never did Countess Yde, who was so good and fair, suffer that one of her three sons, for any cause whatsoever, should be suckled by waiting-woman or damosel; all three were suckled at her own breast. One day the lady went to hear mass at her chapel, and commended her three sons to one of her maidens. One of the three, awakening, wailed sore and howled; wherefore the maiden called a damosel and bade her suckle the child. Better had it been for her that she had been at Nivelles that day! The Countess came back and called the maiden: 'Tell me now wherefore this child hath wetted his chin?' 'My lady, he awoke but now; sore and loud were his cries, and I bade a damosel give him of her milk.' When the Countess heard this, all her heart shook; for the pain that she had, she fell upon a seat; sore gasped her heart under her breast, and when she would have spoken, she called herself a poor leper!"
“A Sucking-Prince,” La Chanson du Chevalier du Cygne et de Godeforoid de Bouillon (14th century).
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