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-Title: Woman under Monasticism
-       Chapters on Saint-Lore and Convent Life between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500
-
-Author: Lina Eckenstein
-
-Release Date: May 13, 2013 [EBook #42708]
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Woman under Monasticism, by Lina Eckenstein
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
-almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
-with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
-
-
-Title: Woman under Monasticism
-       Chapters on Saint-Lore and Convent Life between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500
-
-Author: Lina Eckenstein
-
-Release Date: May 13, 2013 [EBook #42708]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
-http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
-generously made available by The Internet Archive.)
-
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-
-
-WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM.
-
-
-
-
-  London: C. J. CLAY AND SONS,
-  CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE
-  AVE MARIA LANE.
-  Glasgow: 263, ARGYLE STREET.
-
-  Leipzig: F. A. BROCKHAUS.
-  New York: MACMILLAN AND CO.
-
-
-
-
-  WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM
-
-
-  CHAPTERS ON SAINT-LORE AND CONVENT LIFE
-  BETWEEN A.D. 500 AND A.D. 1500
-
-
-  BY LINA ECKENSTEIN.
-
-
-  'Quia vita omnium spiritualium hominum sine litteris mors est.'
-                                    ACTA MURENSIS MONASTERII.
-
-
-  CAMBRIDGE:
-  AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-  1896
-
-  [_All Rights reserved._]
-
-
-
-
-  Cambridge:
-  PRINTED BY J. & C. F. CLAY,
-  AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-
-
-
-
-  TO MY FRIENDS
-  KARL AND MARIA SHARPE PEARSON.
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE.
-
-
-The restlessness, peculiar to periods of transition, is a characteristic
-of the present age. Long-accepted standards are being questioned and
-hitherto unchallenged rules of conduct submitted to searching criticism.
-History shows us that our present social system is only a phase in human
-development, and we turn to a study of the past, confident that a clearer
-insight into the social standards and habits of life prevalent in past
-ages will aid us in a better estimation of the relative importance of
-those factors of change we find around us to-day.
-
-Monasticism during the ten centuries between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500
-exhibits phases of vital significance for the mental and moral growth of
-Western Europe. However much both the aims and the tone of life of the
-members of the different religious orders varied, monasticism generally
-favoured tendencies which were among the most peaceful and progressive of
-the Middle Ages. For women especially the convent fostered some of the
-best sides of intellectual, moral and emotional life. Besides this it was
-for several centuries a determining factor in regard to women's economic
-status.
-
-The woman-saint and the nun are however figures the importance of which
-has hitherto been little regarded. The woman-saint has met with scant
-treatment beyond that of the eulogistic but too often uncritical writer of
-devotional works; the lady abbess and the literary nun have engrossed the
-attention of few biographers. The partisan recriminations of the
-Reformation period are still widely prevalent. The saint is thrust aside
-as a representative of gross superstition, and the nun is looked upon as
-a slothful and hysterical, if not as a dissolute character. She is still
-thought of as those who broke with the Catholic Church chose to depict
-her.
-
-The fact that these women appeared in a totally different light to their
-contemporaries is generally overlooked; that the monk and the nun enjoyed
-the esteem and regard of the general public throughout a term bordering on
-a thousand years is frequently forgotten. Even at the time of the
-Reformation, when religious contentions were at their height, the nun who
-was expelled from her home appeared deserving of pity rather than of
-reproach to her more enlightened contemporaries. As part of an institution
-that had outlived its purpose she was perhaps bound to pass away. But the
-work she had done and the aims for which she had striven contributed their
-share in formulating the new standards of life. The attitude of mind which
-had been harboured and cultivated in the cloister, must be reckoned among
-the most civilizing influences which have helped to develop mental and
-moral strength in Western Europe.
-
-The social value of cloistered life in itself may be disputed. To the
-Protestant of the 16th century a profession which involved estrangement
-from family ties appeared altogether harmful. Moreover monasteries and
-religious houses were bound up in the reformer's mind with the supremacy
-of Rome from which he was striving hard to shake himself free. Wherever
-the breach with Rome was effected the old settlements were dissolved and
-their inmates were thrust back into civic life. To men this meant much,
-but it meant less to them than to women. In losing the possibility of
-religious profession at the beginning of the 16th century, women lost the
-last chance that remained to them of an activity outside the home circle.
-The subjection of women to a round of domestic duties became more complete
-when nunneries were dissolved, and marriage for generations afterwards was
-women's only recognised vocation.
-
-But even in some of these same Protestant countries where nunneries were
-summarily dissolved, the resulting complete subjection of women has in
-modern times been felt to have outlived its purpose. How far this
-subjection was a needful stage of growth which has helped to develop a
-higher standard of willing purity and faithfulness need not now be
-discussed. In certain countries, however, where the monastic system with
-all the privileges it conferred on women was swept away, we now find a
-strong public opinion against the restriction of women's activity to the
-domestic circle, and these countries were among the first to break down
-the artificial barriers imposed on woman's influence and grant her some
-share in the intellectual and political life of the community.
-
-The right to self-development and social responsibility which the woman of
-to-day so persistently asks for, is in many ways analogous to the right
-which the convent secured to womankind a thousand years ago. The woman of
-to-day, who realises that the home circle as at present constituted
-affords insufficient scope for her energies, had a precursor in the nun
-who sought a field of activity in the convent. For the nun also hesitated,
-it may be from motives which fail to appeal to us, to undertake the
-customary duties and accept the ordinary joys of life. This hesitation may
-be attributed to perversion of instinct, it can hardly in the case of the
-nun be attributed to weakness of character, for she chose a path in life
-which was neither smooth nor easy, and in this path she accomplished great
-things, many of which have still living value.
-
-It is with a view to the better appreciation of the influence and activity
-of women connected with the Christian religion that the following chapters
-have been written. They contain an enquiry into the cult of women-saints,
-and some account of the general position of woman under monasticism. These
-subjects however are so wide and the material at the disposal of the
-student is so abundant that the analysis is confined to English and German
-women.
-
-At the outset an enquiry into the position of women among the Germans of
-pre-Christian times appeared necessary, for early hagiology and the lives
-of women who embraced the religious profession after Christianity was
-first introduced, recall in various particulars the influence of woman and
-her association with the supernatural during heathen times. The legends of
-many saints contain a large element of heathen folk-tradition, together in
-some cases with a small, scarcely perceptible element of historical fact.
-In order therefore to establish the true importance of the Christian
-women, whose labour benefited their contemporaries, and who in recognition
-of their services were raised to saintship, the nature of early
-women-saints in general had to be carefully considered.
-
-In the chapters that follow, the spread of monasticism is dealt with in so
-far as it was due to the influence of women, and some of the more
-representative phases of convent life are described. Our enquiry dealing
-with monasticism only as affecting women, the larger side of a great
-subject has necessarily been ignored. There is a growing consciousness
-now-a-days of the debt of gratitude which mankind as a whole owes to the
-monastic and religious orders, but the history of these orders remains for
-the most part unwritten. At some periods of monasticism the life of men
-and that of women flow evenly side by side and can be dealt with
-separately, at others their work so unites and intermingles that it seems
-impossible to discuss the one apart from the other. Regarding some
-developments the share taken by women, important enough in itself, seemed
-to me hardly capable of being rated at its just value unless taken in
-conjunction with that of men. These developments are therefore touched
-upon briefly or passed over altogether, especially those in which the
-devotional needs of the women are interesting chiefly in the effect which
-they had in stimulating the literary productiveness of men. Other phases
-are passed over because they were the outcome of a course of development,
-the analysis of which lies beyond the scope of this work. This applies
-generally to various continental movements which are throughout treated
-briefly, and especially to convent life in the Netherlands, and to the
-later history of mysticism. The history of the beguines in the North of
-France and the Netherlands is full of interesting particulars, marked by
-the inclusion in the _Acta Sanctorum_ of women like Marie of Oignies
-([Dagger] c. 1213), Lutgardis of Tongern ([Dagger] 1246) and Christine of
-Truyen ([Dagger] 1224), whose fame rests on states of spiritual ecstasy,
-favoured and encouraged by the Dominican friars. So again the women in
-Southern Germany, who cultivated like religious moods and expressed their
-feelings in writing, were largely influenced by the Dominicans, apart from
-whom it seemed impossible to treat them. In England the analysis of
-writings such as the 'Revelations' of Juliana of Norwich and of Margery
-Kempe necessitates a full enquiry into the influence and popularity of
-Richard Rolle ([Dagger] 1349) and Walter Hylton ([Dagger] 1395).
-
-During the later Middle Ages the study of the influences at work in the
-convent is further complicated by the development of religious
-associations outside it. Pre-eminent among these stands the school of
-Deventer which gave the impulse to the production of a devotional
-literature, the purity and refinement of which has given it world-wide
-reputation. These associations were founded by men not by women, and
-though the desire to influence nuns largely moulded the men who wrote for
-and preached to them, still the share taken by women in such movements is
-entirely subordinate.
-
-It is needless to multiply instances of the chapters on convent life which
-are here omitted; in those which I place before the reader it has been my
-aim not so much to give a consecutive history of monasticism as it
-affected women, as to show how numerous are the directions in which this
-history can be pursued. Having regard to the nature of the subject I have
-addressed myself in the first place to the student, who in the references
-given will, I trust, find corroboration of my views. In quoting from early
-writings I have referred to the accounts printed in the _Acta Sanctorum
-Bollandorum_ and to the edition of Latin writings published under the
-auspices of Migne in the 'Patrologiae Cursus Completus,' except in those
-few cases where a more recent edition of the work referred to offered
-special advantages, and regarding the date of these writings I have been
-chiefly guided by A. Potthast, _Wegweiser durch die Geschichtswerke des
-europäischen Mittelalters_, 1862. In accordance with a division which has
-been adopted by some histories of art and seems to me to have much in its
-favour, I have taken Early Christian times to extend to the close of the
-10th century; I have spoken of the period between 1000 and 1250 as the
-Earlier, and of that between 1250 and 1500 as the Later Middle Ages. The
-spelling of proper names in a work which extends over many centuries has
-difficulties of its own. While observing a certain uniformity during each
-period, I have as far as possible adhered to the contemporary local form
-of each name.
-
-While addressing myself largely to the student, I have kept along lines
-which I trust may make the subject attractive to the general reader, in
-whose interest I have translated all the passages quoted. There is a
-growing consciousness now-a-days that for stability in social progress we
-need among other things a wider scope for women's activity. This scope as
-I hope to show was to some extent formerly secured to women by the
-monastic system. Perhaps some of those who are interested in the
-educational movements of to-day may care to recall the history and
-arrangements of institutions, which favoured the intellectual development
-of women in the past.
-
-I cannot conclude these prefatory remarks without a word of thanks to
-those who have aided me by criticism and revision. Besides the two friends
-to whom I have dedicated this book, I have to cordially thank Mrs R. W.
-Cracroft for the labour she has spent on the literary revision of my work
-in manuscript. To Dr H. F. Heath of Bedford College I am indebted for many
-suggestions on points of philology, and to Robert J. Parker, Esq. of
-Lincoln's Inn for advice on some points of law and of general arrangement.
-Conscious as I am of the many defects in my work, I cannot but be grateful
-to the Syndics of the University Press, for the assistance they have
-rendered me in its publication, and I trust that these defects may not
-deter readers from following me into somewhat unfrequented paths, wherein
-at any rate I have not stinted such powers of labour as are mine.
-
-LINA ECKENSTEIN.
-
-_December, 1895._
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS.
-
-
-                                                                      PAGE
-
-  PREFACE                                                              vii
-
-
-  CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY.
-
-    § 1. The Borderland of Heathendom and Christianity                   1
-
-    § 2. The Tribal Goddess as a Christian Saint                        15
-
-    § 3. Further Peculiarities of this Type of Saint                    28
-
-
-  CHAPTER II. CONVENTS AMONG THE FRANKS, A.D. 550-650.
-
-    § 1. At the Frankish Invasion                                       45
-
-    § 2. St Radegund and the Nunnery at Poitiers                        51
-
-    § 3. The Revolt of the Nuns at Poitiers. Convent Life in the North  65
-
-
-  CHAPTER III. CONVENTS AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS, A.D. 630-730.
-
-    § 1. Early Houses in Kent                                           79
-
-    § 2. The Monastery at Whitby                                        88
-
-    § 3. Ely and the influence of Bishop Wilfrith                       95
-
-    § 4. Houses in Mercia and in the South                             106
-
-
-  CHAPTER IV. ANGLO-SAXON NUNS IN CONNECTION WITH BONIFACE.
-
-    § 1. The Women corresponding with Boniface                         118
-
-    § 2. Anglo-Saxon Nuns abroad                                       134
-
-
-  CHAPTER V. CONVENTS IN SAXON LANDS BETWEEN A.D. 800-1000.
-
-    § 1. Women's Convents in Saxony                                    143
-
-    § 2. Early History of Gandersheim                                  154
-
-    § 3. The Nun Hrotsvith and her Writings                            160
-
-
-  CHAPTER VI. THE MONASTIC REVIVAL OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    § 1. The new Monastic Orders                                       184
-
-    § 2. Benedictine Convents in the Twelfth Century                   201
-
-    § 3. The Order of St Gilbert of Sempringham                        213
-
-
-  CHAPTER VII. ART INDUSTRIES IN THE NUNNERY.
-
-    § 1. Art Industries generally                                      222
-
-    § 2. Herrad and the 'Garden of Delights'                           238
-
-
-  CHAPTER VIII. PROPHECY AND PHILANTHROPY.
-
-    § 1. St Hildegard of Bingen and St Elisabeth of Schönau            256
-
-    § 2. Women-Saints connected with Charity and Philanthropy          285
-
-
-  CHAPTER IX. EARLY MYSTIC LITERATURE.
-
-    § 1. Mystic Writings for Women in England                          305
-
-    § 2. The Convent of Helfta and its Literary Nuns                   328
-
-
-  CHAPTER X. SOME ASPECTS OF THE CONVENT IN ENGLAND DURING THE
-  LATER MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    § 1. The external Relations of the Convent                         354
-
-    § 2. The internal Arrangements of the Convent                      365
-
-    § 3. The Foundation and internal Arrangements of Sion              383
-
-
-  CHAPTER XI. MONASTIC REFORM PREVIOUS TO THE REFORMATION.
-
-    § 1. Visitations of Nunneries in England                           398
-
-    § 2. Reforms in Germany                                            414
-
-
-  CHAPTER XII. THE DISSOLUTION.
-
-    § 1. The Dissolution of Nunneries in England                       432
-
-    § 2. The Memoir of Charitas Pirckheimer                            458
-
-
-  CONCLUSION                                                           477
-
-  APPENDIX. The Rhyme of Herrad                                        485
-
-  INDEX                                                                488
-
-
-
-
-ERRATA.
-
-
-  Page 23, note 1, date of St Ida in A. SS. Boll. should be _Sept. 4_
-                       instead of _June 20_.
-    "  26, line 7, read _tilth_ instead of _silk_.
-    " 162,   " 21, read _Martianus_ instead of _Marianus_.
-    " 190,   " 32, read 1240 as the date of Jacobus di Vitriaco's death.
-    " 241,   "  8, read _Bergen_ instead of _Berg_.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-
-INTRODUCTORY.
-
-    'Die mit dem goldenen Schuh und dem Geiger ist auch eine
-    Muttergottes.' _Bavarian Saying._
-
-
-§ 1. The Borderland of Heathendom and Christianity.
-
-In order to gain an insight into the causes of the rapid development of
-monasticism among the German races, it is necessary to enquire into the
-social arrangements of the period which witnessed the introduction of
-Christianity, and into those survivals of the previous period of social
-development which German Christianity absorbed. Among peoples of German
-race monastic life generally, and especially monastic life which gave
-scope for independent activity among women, had a development of its own.
-Women of the newly-converted yet still barbarian race readily gathered
-together and dwelt in religious settlements founded on their own
-initiative and ruled independently of men. A reason for this must be
-sought in the drift of contemporary life, which we shall thus have to
-discuss at some length.
-
-During the period of declining heathendom--for how long, measuring time by
-centuries, it is not yet possible to say--the drift of society had been
-towards curtailing woman's liberty of movement and interfering with her
-freedom of action. When the Germans crossed the threshold of history the
-characteristics of the father-age were already in the ascendant; the
-social era, when the growing desire for certainty of fatherhood caused
-individual women and their offspring to be brought into the possession of
-individual men, had already begun. The influence of women was more and
-more restricted owing to their domestic subjection. But traditions of a
-time when it had been otherwise still lingered.
-
-Students of primitive history are recognising, for peoples of German race
-among others, the existence of an early period of development, when women
-played a greater part in both social and tribal life. Folk-lore,
-philology, and surviving customs yield overwhelming evidence in support of
-the few historic data which point to the period, conveniently called the
-mother-age, when women held positions of authority inside the tribal group
-and directly exercised influence on the doings of the tribe[1].
-
-This period, the mother-age, is generally looked upon as an advance from
-an earlier stage of savagery, and considered to be contemporaneous with
-the beginnings of settled tribal life. It brought with it the practice of
-tilth and agriculture, and led to the domestication of some of the smaller
-animals and the invention of weaving and spinning, achievements with which
-it is recognised that women must be credited.
-
-In matters of polity and sex it established the paramount importance of
-the woman; it is she who regulates the home, who notes the changes of the
-seasons, who stores the results of experience, and treasures up the
-intellectual wealth of the community in sayings which have come down to us
-in the form of quaint maxims and old-world saws. As for family
-arrangements, it was inside the tribal group and at the tribal festival
-that sex unions were contracted; and this festival, traditions of which
-survive in many parts of Europe to this day, and which was in its earliest
-forms a period of unrestrained license for the women as well as the men,
-was presided over by the tribal mothers, an arrangement which in various
-particulars affords an explanation of many ideas associated with women in
-later times.
-
-The father-age succeeding to the mother-age in time altogether
-revolutionised the relations of the sexes; transient sex unions, formerly
-the rule, were gradually eliminated by capture and retention of wives from
-outside the tribal group. The change marks a distinct step in social
-advance. When men as heads of families succeeded to much of the influence
-women had held in the tribe, barbarous tendencies, such as blood
-sacrifice, were checked and a higher moral standard was attained. But this
-was done at the cost of her prerogative to the woman; and her social
-influence to some extent passed from her.
-
-It must be granted that the character of the mother-age in some of its
-bearings is hypothetical, but we can infer many of the social arrangements
-of the period from surviving customs and usages, and its organisation
-from the part woman played in tradition and saga, and, as we shall see
-later, from folk-traditions preserved in the legends of the saints. And
-further, unless we admit that the social arrangements of the earlier
-period differed from those of the later, we are at a loss to account for
-the veneration in which woman was held and for the influence exerted by
-her as we confront her on the threshold of written history. When once we
-grasp the essentials of these earlier arrangements, we hold the clue to
-the existence of types of character and tendencies which otherwise appear
-anomalous.
-
-For at the time when contact with Christianity brought with it the
-possibility of monastic settlements, the love of domestic life had not
-penetrated so deeply, nor were its conditions so uniformly favourable, but
-that many women were ready to break away from it. Reminiscences of an
-independence belonging to them in the past, coupled with the desire for
-leadership, made many women loth to conform to life inside the family as
-wives and mothers under conditions formulated by men. Tendencies surviving
-from the earlier period, and still unsubdued, made the advantages of
-married life weigh light in the balance against a loss of liberty. To
-conceive the force of these tendencies is to gain an insight into the
-elements which the convent forthwith absorbs.
-
-In the world outside the convent commanding figures of womankind become
-fewer with outgoing heathendom, and the part played by women becomes of
-less and less importance. There is less room left for the Gannas of
-history or for the Kriemhilds of saga, for powerful natures such as the
-Visigoth princess Brunihild, queen of the Franks, or Drahomir of
-Brandenburg, queen in Bohemia, who gratify their passion for influence
-with a recklessness which strikes terror into the breasts of their
-contemporaries. As the old chronicler of St Denis remarks, women who are
-bent on evil do worse evil than men. But in the convent the influence of
-womankind lasted longer. Spirited nuns and independent-minded abbesses
-turn to account the possibilities open to them in a way which commands
-respect and repeatedly secures superstitious reverence in the outside
-world. The influence and the powers exerted by these women, as we shall
-see further on, are altogether remarkable, especially during early
-Christian times. But we also come across frequent instances of lawlessness
-among the women who band together in the convent,--a lawlessness to which
-the arrangements of the earlier age likewise supply a clue. For that very
-love of independence, which led to beneficial results where it was coupled
-with self-control and consciousness of greater responsibility, tended in
-the direction of vagrancy and dissoluteness when it was accompanied by
-distaste for every kind of restraint.
-
-In this connection we must say a few words on the varying status of loose
-women, since the estimation in which these women were held and the
-attitude assumed towards them affected monasticism in various particulars.
-It is true that during early Christian times little heed was taken of them
-and few objections were raised to their influence, but later distinct
-efforts were made by various religious orders to prevent women from
-drifting into a class which, whatever may have been its condition in past
-times, was felt to be steadily and surely deteriorating.
-
-The distinction of women into so-called respectable and disreputable
-classes dates from before the introduction of Christianity. It arose as
-the father-age gained on the mother-age, when appropriated women were more
-and more absorbed into domesticity, while those women outside, who either
-resented or escaped subjection, found their position surrounded by
-increasing difficulties, and aspersion more and more cast on their
-independence. By accepting the distinction, the teachers of Christianity
-certainly helped to make it more definite; but for centuries the existence
-of loose women, so far from being condemned, was hardly discountenanced by
-them. The revenues which ecclesiastical courts and royal households
-derived from taxes levied on these women as a class yield proof of
-this[2]. Certainly efforts were made to set limits to their practices and
-the disorderly tendencies which in the nature of things became connected
-with them and with those with whom they habitually consorted. But this was
-done not so much to restrain them as to protect women of the other class
-from being confounded with them. Down to the time of the Reformation, the
-idea that the existence of loose women as a class should be
-discountenanced does not present itself, for they were a recognised
-feature of court life and of town life everywhere. Marshalled into bands,
-they accompanied the king and the army on their most distant expeditions,
-and stepped to the fore wherever there was question of merrymaking or
-entertainment. Indeed there is reason to believe, improbable though it may
-seem at first sight, that women of loose life, as we come across them in
-the Middle Ages, are successors to a class which had been powerful in the
-past. They are not altogether depraved and despised characters such as
-legislation founded on tenets of Roman Law chose to stamp them. For law
-and custom are often at variance regarding the rights and privileges
-belonging to them. These rights and privileges they retained in various
-particulars till the time of the Reformation, which indeed marks a turning
-point in the attitude taken by society towards women generally.
-
-Different ages have different standards of purity and faithfulness. The
-loose or unattached women of the past are of many kinds and many types; to
-apply the term prostitute to them raises a false idea of their position as
-compared with that of women in other walks of life. If we would deal with
-them as a class at all, it is only this they have in common,--that they
-are indifferent to the ties of family, and that the men who associate with
-them are not by so doing held to incur any responsibility towards them or
-towards their offspring.
-
-If we bear in mind the part these women have played and the modifications
-which their status has undergone, it will be seen that the subject is one
-which nearly affects monasticism. For the convent accepted the dislike
-women felt to domestic subjection and countenanced them in their refusal
-to undertake the duties of married life. It offered an escape from the
-tyranny of the family, but it did so on condition of such a sacrifice of
-personal independence, as in the outside world more and more involved the
-loss of good repute. On the face of it, a greater contrast than that
-between the loose woman and the nun is hard to conceive; and yet they have
-this in common, that they are both the outcome of the refusal among
-womankind to accept married relations on the basis of the subjection
-imposed by the father-age.
-
-In other respects too the earlier heathen period was not without influence
-on the incoming Christian faith, and helped to determine its conceptions
-with regard to women. In actual life the sacerdotal privileges, which
-tribal mothers had appropriated to themselves at the time of the
-introduction of Christianity, were retained by the priestess; while in the
-realm of the ideal the reverence in which tribal mothers had been held
-still lived on in the worship of the tribal mother-divinity. It is under
-this twofold aspect, as priestess and as tribal mother-goddess, that the
-power of women was brought face to face with Christianity; the priestess
-and the mother-goddess were the well-defined types of heathen womanhood
-with which the early Church was called upon to deal.
-
-We will show later on how the ideal conception prevailed, and how the
-heathen mother-goddess often assumed the garb of a Christian woman-saint,
-and as a Christian woman-saint was left to exist unmolested. Not so the
-heathen priestess and prophetess. From the first introduction of
-Christianity the holding of sacerdotal powers by women was resented both
-within and without the Church, and opprobrium was cast on the women who
-claimed to mediate between the human and the divine.
-
-At the time of the advent of Christianity the Gannas and Veledas of the
-Roman period are still a living reality; they are the 'wise women' who
-every now and then leave their retreat and appear on the stage of history.
-A prophetess in gorgeous apparel makes her entry into Verdun in the year
-547, drawing crowds about her and foretelling the future. She is in no way
-intimidated by the exorcisms of prelates, and presently leaves to betake
-herself to the court of the Frankish queen Fredegund. Again in 577 we find
-the Frankish king Guntchramm in consultation with a woman soothsayer, and
-other cases of the kind are on record[3].
-
-In the ninth century the Church more effectually exercised her influence
-in the case of the woman Thiota, who coming from Switzerland inflamed the
-minds of the folk in Mainz; for she was accused of profanity and publicly
-scourged[4]. But for all the attacks of the Church, the folk persisted in
-clinging to its priestesses and in believing them gifted with special
-powers. Grimm shows how the Christian accusers of soothsaying women made
-them into odious witches[5]; Wuttke and Weinhold, both well-known
-students of folk-lore, consider that witches were originally heathen
-priestesses[6]. The intrinsic meaning of the word _hexe_, the German
-designation for witch, points to some one who originally belonged to a
-group living in a particular manner, but whose practices made her
-obnoxious to those who had apprehended the higher moral standard of a
-later social period. But the Church failed to stamp even the witch as
-wholly despicable; for in popular estimation she always retained some of
-the attributes of the priestess, the wise woman, the _bona domina_, the
-'white witch' of tradition; so that the doctrine that the soothsaying
-woman is necessarily the associate of evil was never altogether accepted.
-Even now-a-days incidents happen occasionally in remote districts which
-show how the people still readily seek the help of women in matters of
-wisdom, of leechcraft, and of prescience. It was only under the influence
-of a scare that people, who were accustomed to consult the wise woman in
-good faith, could be brought to abhor her as a witch. It was only during
-the later Middle Ages that the undisputed and indisputable connection of
-some 'wise women' with licentious customs gave their traducers a weapon of
-which they were not slow to avail themselves, and which enabled them to
-rouse fanaticism of the worst kind against these women.
-
-The practices and popularity of witchcraft were in truth the latest
-survivals of the mother-age. The woman, who devised love-charms and brewed
-manifold remedies for impotence and for allaying the pangs of childbirth,
-who pretended to control the weather and claimed the power to turn the
-milk of a whole village blue, carried on traditions of a very primitive
-period. And her powers, as we shall see, always had a close parallel in
-those attributed to women-saints. For example St Gertrud of Nivelles has
-left a highly prized relic to womankind in the form of a cloak which is
-still hung about those who are desirous of becoming mothers[7]; and the
-hair of a saint, Mechthild, is still hung outside the church at Töss in
-Switzerland to avert the thunderstorm[8]; and again St Gunthild of
-Biberbach and others are still appealed to that they may avert the cattle
-plague[9]. What difference, it may be asked, is there between the powers
-attributed to these saints and the powers with which witches are usually
-credited? They are the obverse and reverse of woman's connection with the
-supernatural, which in the one case is interpreted by the sober mind of
-reverence, and in the other is dreaded under the perturbing influence of a
-fear encouraged, if not originated, by Christian fanatics.
-
-In the Christian Church the profession of the nun was accepted as holy,
-but an impassable gulf separated her from the priestess. During early
-Christian times we come across the injunction that women shall not serve
-at the altar[10], and that lady abbesses shall not take upon themselves
-religious duties reserved to men by the Church. When we think of women
-gathered together in a religious establishment and dependent on the
-priest outside for the performing of divine worship, their desire to
-manage things for themselves does not appear unnatural, encouraged as it
-would be by traditions of sacerdotal rights belonging to them in the past.
-And it is worthy of notice that as late as the 13th century, Brother
-Berthold, an influential preacher of south Germany, speaks ardently
-against women who would officiate at divine service and urges the mischief
-that may result from such a course.
-
-Turning to the question of how far these obvious survivals from a heathen
-age are determined by time and place, we find broad lines of difference
-between the heathen survivals of the various branches of the German race,
-and considerable diversity in the character of their early Christianity
-and their early women-saints. This diversity is attributable to the fact
-that the heathen beliefs of these various peoples were not the same at the
-time of their first contact with Christianity, and that they did not
-accept it under like circumstances.
-
-For while those branches of the race who moved in the vanguard of the
-great migration, the Vandals, the Burgundians and the Goths, readily
-embraced Christianity, it was Christianity in its Arian form. Arianism,
-which elsewhere had been branded as heresy and well-nigh stamped out,
-suddenly revived among the Germans; all the branches of the race who came
-into direct contact with peoples of civilized Latinity readily embraced
-it. Now one of the distinguishing features of Arian belief was its hatred
-of monasticism[11]. The Arian convert hunted the monk from his seclusion
-and thrust him back to the duties of civic life. It is not then among
-Germans who adopted Arian Christianity that the beginnings of convent life
-must be sought. Indeed as Germans these peoples soon passed away from the
-theatre of history; they intermarried and fell in with the habits of the
-people among whom they settled, and forfeited their German language and
-their German traditions.
-
-It was otherwise with the Franks who entered Gaul at the close of the
-fourth century, and with the Anglo-Saxons who took possession of Britain.
-The essentially warlike character of these peoples was marked by their
-worship of deities such as Wodan, a worship before which the earlier
-worship of mother-divinities was giving way. Women had already been
-brought into subjection, but they had a latent desire for independence,
-and among the Franks and Anglo-Saxons women of the newly converted race
-eagerly snatched at the possibilities opened out by convent life, and in
-their ranks history chronicles some of the earliest and most remarkable
-developments of monasticism. But the Franks and the Anglo-Saxons, in
-leaving behind the land of their origin, had left behind those hallowed
-sites on which primitive worship so essentially depends. It is in vain
-that we seek among them for a direct connection between heathen
-mother-divinity and Christian woman-saint; their mother-divinities did not
-live on in connection with the Church. It is true that the inclination to
-hold women in reverence remained, and found expression in the readiness
-with which they revered women as saints. The women-saints of the
-Anglo-Saxons and the Franks are numerous, and are nearly all known to have
-been interested in convent foundations. But the legends, which in course
-of time have crystallised round them, and the miracles attributed to them,
-though containing certain elements of heathen folk-tradition, are
-colourless and pale compared with the traditions which have been preserved
-by saint legend abroad. It is in Germany proper, where the same race has
-been in possession of the same sites for countless generations, that the
-primitive character of heathen traditions is most pronounced and has most
-directly determined and influenced the cult and the legends of
-women-saints.
-
-Besides the reminiscences of the early period which have survived in saint
-legend, traditions and customs of the same period have lived on in the
-worship of the Virgin Mary. The worship of the Virgin Mary was but
-slightly developed in Romanised Gaul and Keltic Britain, but from the
-beginning of the sixth century it is a marked feature in the popular creed
-in those countries where the German element prevailed.
-
-As Mrs Jameson says in her book on the legends of the Madonna: 'It is
-curious to observe, as the worship of the Virgin mother expanded and
-gathered in itself the relics of many an ancient faith, how the new and
-the old elements, some of them apparently most heterogeneous, became
-amalgamated and were combined into the earlier forms of art...[12].'
-
-Indeed the prominence given to the Virgin is out of all proportion to the
-meagre mention of her in the gospels. During the early Christian period
-she was largely worshipped as a patron saint in France, England and
-Germany, and her fame continued steadily increasing with the centuries
-till its climax was reached in the Middle Ages, which witnessed the
-greatest concessions made by the Church to the demands of popular faith.
-
-According to Rhys[13] many churches dedicated to Mary were built on spots
-where tradition speaks of the discovery of a wooden image, probably a
-heathen statue which was connected with her.
-
-In the seventh century Pope Sergius (687-701) expressly ordered that the
-festivals of the Virgin Mary were to take place on heathen holy days in
-order that heathen celebrations might become associated with her[14]. The
-festivals of the Virgin to this day are associated with pilgrimages, the
-taste for which to the Frenchman of the Middle Ages appeared peculiarly
-German. The chronicler Froissart, writing about 1390, remarks 'for the
-Germans are fond of performing pilgrimages and it is one of their
-customs[15].'
-
-Mary then, under her own name, or under the vaguer appellation of _Our
-Lady_ (Unser liebe frau, Notre Dame, de heilige maagd), assimilated
-surviving traditions of the heathen faith which were largely reminiscences
-of the mother-age; so that Mary became the heiress of mother-divinities,
-and her worship was associated with cave, and tree, and fountain, and
-hill-top, all sites of the primitive cult.
-
-'Often,' says Menzel[16], 'a wonder-working picture of the Madonna is
-found hung on a tree or inside a tree; hence numerous appellations like
-"Our dear Lady of the Oak," "Our dear Lady of the Linden-tree," etc. Often
-at the foot of the tree, upon which such a picture is hung, a fountain
-flows to which miraculous power is ascribed.'
-
-In the Tyrol we hear of pictures which have been discovered floating in a
-fountain or which were borne to the bank by a river[17].
-
-As proof of the Virgin Mary's connection with festivals, we find her name
-associated in Belgium with many pageants held on the first of May.
-Throughout German lands the Assumption of the Virgin comes at the harvest
-festival, and furnishes an occasion for some pilgrimage or fair which
-preserves many peculiar and perplexing traits of an earlier civilization.
-
-The harvest festival is coupled in some parts of Germany with customs
-that are of extreme antiquity. In Bavaria the festival sometimes goes by
-the name of the 'day of sacred herbs,' _kräuterweihtag_; near Würzburg it
-is called the 'day of sacred roots,' _würzelweihtag_, or 'day of
-bunch-gathering,' _büschelfrauentag_[18]. In the Tyrol the 15th of August
-is the great day of the Virgin, _grosse frauentag_, when a collection of
-herbs for medicinal purposes is made. A number of days, _frauentage_, come
-in July and August and are now connected with the Virgin, on which herbs
-are collected and offered as sacred bunches either on the altar of Our
-Lady in church and chapel, or on hill-tops which throughout Germany are
-the sites of ancient woman-worship[19]. This collecting and offering of
-herbs points to a stage even more primitive than that represented by
-offerings of grain at the harvest festival.
-
-In a few instances the worship of Mary is directly coupled with that of
-some heathen divinity. In Antwerp to this day an ancient idol of peculiar
-appearance is preserved, which women, who are desirous of becoming
-mothers, decorate with flowers at certain times of the year. Its heathen
-appellation is lost, but above it now stands a figure of the Virgin[20].
-
-Again we find the name of Mary joined to that of the heathen goddess Sif.
-In the Eiffel district, extending between the rivers Rhine, Meuse and
-Mosel, a church stands dedicated to Mariasif, the name of Mary being
-coupled with that of Sif, a woman-divinity of the German heathen pantheon,
-whom Grimm characterizes as a giver of rain[21]. The name Mariahilf, a
-similar combination, is frequently found in south Germany, the name of
-Mary as we hope to show further down being joined to that of a goddess who
-has survived in the Christian saint Hilp[22].
-
-These examples will suffice to show the close connection between the
-conceptions of heathendom and popular Christianity, and how the cloak of
-heathen association has fallen on the shoulders of the saints of the
-Christian Church. The authorities at Rome saw no occasion to take
-exception to its doing so. Pope Gregorius II. (590-604) in a letter
-addressed to Melitus of Canterbury expressly urged that the days of
-heathen festival should receive solemnity through dedication to some holy
-martyr[23]. The Christian saint whose name was substituted for that of
-some heathen divinity readily assimilated associations of the early
-period. Scriptural characters and Christian teachers were given the
-emblems of older divinities and assumed their characteristics. But the
-varying nature of the same saint in different countries has hardly
-received due attention. St Peter of the early British Church was very
-different from St Peter who in Bavaria walked the earth like clumsy
-good-natured Thor, or from St Peter who in Rome took the place of Mars as
-protector of the city. Similarly the legends currently told of the same
-saint in different countries exhibit markedly different traits.
-
-For the transition from heathendom to Christianity was the work not of
-years but of centuries; the claims made by religion changed, but the
-underlying conceptions for a long time remained unaltered. Customs which
-had once taken a divine sanction continued to be viewed under a religious
-aspect, though they were often at variance with the newly-introduced
-faith. The craving for local divinities in itself was heathen; in course
-of time the cult of the saints altogether re-moulded the Christianity of
-Christ. But the Church of Rome, far from opposing the multitude of those
-through whom the folk sought intercession with the Godhead, opened her
-arms wide to all.
-
-At the outset it lay with the local dignitary to recognise or reject the
-names which the folk held in veneration. Religious settlements and Church
-centres regulated days and seasons according to the calendar of the chief
-festivals of the year, as accepted by the Church at Rome; but the local
-dignitary was at liberty to add further names to the list at his
-discretion. For centuries there was no need of canonisation to elevate an
-individual to the rank of saint; the inscribing of his name on a local
-calendar was sufficient. Local calendars went on indefinitely swelling the
-list of saintly names till the Papal See felt called upon to
-interfere[24]. Since the year 1153 the right to declare a person a saint
-has lain altogether with the authorities at Rome[25].
-
-Considering the circumstances under which the peoples of German race
-first came into contact with Christianity, it is well to recall the fact
-that a busy Church life had grown up in many of the cities north of the
-Alps, which were centres of the Roman system of administration previous to
-the upheaval and migration of German heathen tribes, which began in the
-fourth century. Legend has preserved stories of the apostles and their
-disciples wandering northwards and founding early bishoprics along the
-Rhine, in Gaul and in Britain[26]. The massacres of Christians in the
-reign of Diocletian cannot be altogether fabulous; but after the year 313,
-when Constantine at Rome officially accepted the new faith, until the
-German invasion, the position of Christianity was well secured.
-
-A certain development of monastic life had accompanied its spread. In
-western Gaul we hear of Martin of Tours ([Dagger] 400) who, after years of
-military service and religious persecution, settled near Poitiers and drew
-about him many who joined him in a round of devotion and work. The
-monastic, or rather coenobite, settlement of his time consisted of a
-number of wattled cells or huts, surrounded by a trench or a wall of
-earth. The distinction between the earlier word, _coenobium_, and the
-later word, _monasterium_, as used in western Europe, lies in this, that
-the _coenobium_ designates the assembled worshippers alone, while the
-monastery presupposes the possession of a definite site of land[27]. In
-this sense the word monastery is as fitly applied to settlements ruled by
-women as to those ruled by men, especially during the early period when
-these settlements frequently include members of both sexes. St Martin of
-Tours is also credited with having founded congregations of religious
-women[28], but I have found nothing definite concerning them.
-
-Our knowledge of the Christian life of the British is very limited;
-presumably the religious settlement was a school both of theology and of
-learning, and no line of distinction divided the settlements of priests
-from those of monks. From Gildas, a British writer, who at the time of the
-Anglo-Saxon invasion (c. 560) wrote a stern invective against the
-irreligious ways of his countrymen, we gather that women lived under the
-direction of priests, but it is not clear whether they were vowed to
-continence[29]. But as far as I am aware, there is no evidence
-forthcoming that before the Saxon invasion women lived in separate
-religious establishments, the rule of which was in the hands of one of
-their own sex[30].
-
-The convent is of later date. During the early centuries of established
-Christianity the woman who takes the vow of continence secures the
-protection of the Church but does not necessarily leave her
-home-surroundings.
-
-Thus Ambrosius, archbishop of Milan ([Dagger] 397), one of the most
-influential supporters of early Christianity, greatly inflamed women's
-zeal for a celibate life. But in the writings of Ambrosius, which treat of
-virginity, there is no suggestion that the widow or the maiden who vows
-continence shall seek seclusion or solitude[31]. Women vowed to continence
-moved about freely, secure through their connection with the Church from
-distasteful unions which their relatives might otherwise force upon them.
-Their only distinctive mark was the use of a veil.
-
-Similarly we find Hilarius ([Dagger] 369), bishop of Poitiers, addressing
-a letter to his daughter Abra on the beauties of the unmarried state. In
-this he assures her, that if she be strong enough to renounce an earthly
-bridegroom, together with gay and splendid apparel, a priceless pearl
-shall fall to her share[32]. But in this letter also there is no
-suggestion that the woman who embraces religion should dwell apart from
-her family. It is well to bear this in mind, for after the acceptance of
-Christianity by the peoples of German race, we occasionally hear of women
-who, though vowed to religion, move about freely among their fellows; but
-Church councils and synods began to urge more and more emphatically that
-this was productive of evil, and that a woman who had taken the religious
-vow must be a member of a convent.
-
-To sum up;--the peoples of German race, at the time of their contact with
-Christianity, were in a state of social development which directly
-affected the form in which they accepted the new faith and the
-institutions to which such acceptance gave rise. Some branches of the
-race, deserting the land of their birth, came into contact with peoples
-of Latin origin, and embraced Christianity under a form which excluded
-monasticism, and soon lost their identity as Germans. Others, as the
-Franks and Anglo-Saxons, giving up the worship of their heathen gods,
-accepted orthodox Christianity, and favoured the mode of life of those who
-followed peaceful pursuits in the monastery, pursuits which their wives
-especially were eager to embrace. Again, those peoples who remained in
-possession of their earlier homes largely preserved usages dating from a
-primitive period of tribal organization, usages which affected the
-position of their women and determined the character of their
-women-saints. It is to Germany proper that we must go for the
-woman-priestess who lives on longest as the witch, and for the loose women
-who most markedly retain special rights and privileges. And it is also in
-Germany proper that we find the woman-saint who is direct successor to the
-tribal mother-goddess.
-
-
-§ 2. The Tribal Goddess as a Christian Saint.
-
-Before considering the beginnings of convent life as the work of women
-whose existence rests on a firm historic basis, we must enquire into the
-nature of women-saints. From the earliest times of established
-Christianity the lives of men and women who were credited with special
-holiness have formed a favourite theme of religious narratives, which were
-intended to keep their memory green and to impress the devout with
-thoughts of their saintliness.
-
-The Acts of the Saints, the comprehensive collection of which is now in
-course of publication under the auspices of the Bollandists, form a most
-important branch of literature. They include some of the most valuable
-material for a history of the first ten centuries of our era, and give a
-most instructive insight into the drift of Christianity in different
-epochs. The aims, experiences and sufferings of Christian heroes and
-heroines inspired the student and fired the imagination of the poet. Prose
-narrative told of their lives, poems were written in their praise, and
-hymns were composed to be sung at the celebration of their office. The
-godly gained confidence from the perusal of such compositions, and the
-people hearing them read or sung were impressed in favour of Christian
-doctrine.
-
-The number of men and women whom posterity has glorified as saints is
-legion. Besides the characters of the accepted and the apocryphal gospels,
-there are the numerous early converts to Christianity who suffered for
-their faith, and all those who during early Christian times turned their
-energies to practising and preaching the tenets of the new religion, and
-to whose memory a loving recollection paid the tribute of superstitious
-reverence. Their successors in the work of Christianity accepted them as
-patron saints and added their names to the list of those to whose memory
-special days were dedicated. Many of them are individuals whose activity
-in the cause of Christianity is well authenticated. Friends have enlarged
-on their work, contemporary history refers to their existence, and often
-they have themselves left writings, which give an insight into their
-lives. They are the early and true saints of history, on whose shoulders
-in some cases the cloak of heathen association has fallen, but without
-interfering with their great and lasting worth.
-
-But besides those who were canonised for their enthusiasm in the cause of
-early Christianity, the Acts of the Saints mention a number of men and
-women who enjoy local reverence, but of whose actual existence during
-Christian times evidence is wanting. Among them are a certain number of
-women with whom the present chapter purposes to deal, women who are
-locally worshipped as saints, and whose claims to holiness are generally
-recognised, but whose existence during Christian times is hypothetical.
-Their legends contain a small, in some cases a scarcely sensible, basis of
-historic fact, and their cult preserves traits which are pre-Christian,
-often anti-Christian, in character.
-
-The traveller Blunt, during a stay in Italy in the beginning of this
-century, was struck with the many points which modern saints and ancient
-gods have in common. He gives a description of the festival of St Agatha
-at Catania, of which he was an eye-witness, and which to this day, as I
-have been told, continues little changed. The festival, as Blunt describes
-it, opened with a horse-race, which he knew from Ovid was one of the
-spectacles of the festival of the goddess Ceres; and further he witnessed
-a mummery and the carrying about of huge torches, both of which he also
-knew formed part of the old pagan festival. But more remarkable than this
-was a great procession which began in the evening and lasted into the
-night; hundreds of citizens crowded to draw through the town a ponderous
-car, on which were placed the image of the saint and her relics, which the
-priests exhibited to the ringing of bells. Among these relics were the
-veil of Agatha, to which is ascribed the power of staying the eruption of
-Mount Aetna, and the breasts of the saint, which were torn off during her
-martyrdom[33]. Catania, Blunt knew, had always been famous for the worship
-of Ceres, and the ringing of bells and a veil were marked features of her
-festivals, the greater and the lesser Eleusinia. Menzel tells us that huge
-breasts were carried about on the occasion[34]. Further, Blunt heard that
-two festivals took place yearly in Catania in honour of Agatha; one early
-in the spring, the other in the autumn, exactly corresponding to the time
-when the greater and lesser Eleusinia were celebrated. Even the name
-Agatha seemed but a taking over into the new religion of a name sacred to
-the old. Ceres was popularly addressed as _Bona Dea_, and the name Agatha,
-which does not occur as a proper name during ancient times, seemed but a
-translation of the Latin epithet into Greek.
-
-The legend of Agatha as contained in the _Acta Sanctorum_ places her
-existence in the third century and gives full details concerning her
-parentage, her trials and her martyrdom; but I have not been able to
-ascertain when it was written. Agatha is the chief saint of the district
-all about Catania, and we are told that her fame penetrated at an early
-date into Italy and Greece[35].
-
-It is of course impossible actually to disprove the existence of a
-Christian maiden Agatha in Catania in the third century. Some may incline
-to the view that such a maiden did exist, and that a strange likeness
-between her experiences and name on the one hand, and the cult of and
-epithet applied to Ceres on the other, led to the popular worship of her
-instead of the ancient goddess. The question of her existence as a
-Christian maiden during Christian times can only be answered by a balance
-of probabilities. Our opinion of the truth or falsehood of the traditions
-concerning her rests on inference, and the conclusion at which we arrive
-upon the evidence must largely depend on the attitude of mind in which we
-approach the subject.
-
-The late Professor Robertson Smith has insisted that myths are latter-day
-inventions which profess to explain surviving peculiarities of ritual. If
-this be so, we hold in the Eleusinia a clue to the incidents of the Agatha
-legend. The story for example of her veil, which remained untouched by the
-flames when she was burnt, may be a popular myth which tries to account
-for the presence of the veil at the festival. The incident of the breasts
-torn off during martyrdom was invented to account for the presence of
-these strange symbols.
-
-Instances of this kind could be indefinitely multiplied. Let the reader,
-who wishes to pursue the subject on classic soil, examine the name, the
-legend and the emblem of St Agnes, virgin martyr of Rome, who is reputed
-to have lived in the third century and whose cult is well established in
-the fourth; let him enquire into the name, legend and associations of St
-Rosalia of Palermo, invoked as a protectress from the plague, of whom no
-mention occurs till four centuries after her reputed existence[36].
-
-I have chosen Agatha as a starting point for the present enquiry, because
-there is much evidence to hand of the prevalence of mother-deities in
-pre-Christian Sicily, and because the examination of German saint-legend
-and saint-worship leads to analogous results. In Germany too the mother
-divinity of heathendom seems to survive in the virgin saint; and in
-Germany virgin saints, in attributes, cult and name, exhibit peculiarities
-which it seems impossible to explain save on the hypothesis that
-traditions of the heathen past survive in them. So much is associated with
-them which is pre-Christian, even anti-Christian in character, that it
-seems legitimate to speak of them as pseudo-saints.
-
-I own it is not always possible to distinguish between the historical
-saint and the pseudo-saint. Sometimes data are wanting to disprove the
-statements made by the legend-writer about time and place; sometimes
-information is not forthcoming about local traditions and customs, which
-might make a suggestive trait in saint-legend stand out in its full
-meaning. In some cases also, owing to a coincidence of name, fictitious
-associations have become attached to a real personage. But these cases I
-believe are comparatively few. As a general rule it holds good that a
-historical saint will be readily associated with miraculous powers, but
-not with profane and anti-Christian usages. Where the latter occur it is
-probable that no evidence will be forthcoming of the saint's actual
-existence during Christian times. If she represents a person who ever
-existed at all, such a person must have lived in a far-distant heathen
-past, at a time which had nothing in common with Christian teaching and
-with Christian tenets.
-
-There is this further peculiarity about the woman pseudo-saint of Germany,
-that she is especially the saint of the peasantry; so that we rarely hear
-more of her than perhaps her name till centuries after her reputed
-existence. Early writers of history and biography have failed to chronicle
-her doings. Indeed we do not hear of her at all till we hear of her cult
-as one of long standing or of great importance.
-
-It is only when the worship of such saints, who in the eyes of the common
-folk are the chief glory of their respective districts, attracts the
-attention of the Church, that the legend-writer sets to work to write
-their legends. He begins by ascribing to the holder of a venerated name
-human parentage and human experiences, he collects and he blends the local
-traditions associated with the saint on a would-be historical background,
-and makes a story which frequently offers a curious mixture of the
-Christian and the profane. Usually he places the saint's existence in the
-earliest period of Christianity; sometimes at a time when Christianity was
-unknown in the neighbourhood where she is the object of reverence.
-
-Moreover all these saints are patronesses of women in their times of
-special trial. Their cult generally centres round a cave, a fountain of
-peculiar power, a tree, or some other site of primitive woman-worship.
-Frequently they are connected with some peculiar local custom which
-supplies the clue to incidents introduced by the legend-writer. And even
-when the clue is wanting, it is sometimes possible to understand one
-legend by reading it in the light of another. Obscure as the parallels are
-in some cases, in others they are strikingly clear.
-
-The recognised holiness of the woman pseudo-saint is in no way determined
-by the limit of bishopric and diocese; she is worshipped within
-geographical limits, but within limits which have not been marked out by
-the Church. It was mentioned above that separate districts of Germany, or
-rather tribes occupying such districts, clung to a belief in protective
-mother-goddesses (Gaumütter). Possibly, where the name of a pseudo-saint
-is found localised in contiguous districts, this may afford a clue to the
-migration of tribes.
-
-The _Acta Sanctorum_ give information concerning a large number of
-pseudo-saints, but this information to be read in its true light needs to
-be supplemented by further details of local veneration and cult. Such
-details are found in older books of devotion, and in modern books on
-mythology and folk-lore. Modern religious writers, who treat of these
-saints, are in the habit of leaving out or of slurring over all details
-which suggest profanity. Compared with older legends, modern accounts of
-the saints are limp and colourless, and share the weak sentimentality,
-which during the last few centuries has come to pervade the conceptions
-of Catholic Christianity as represented in pictorial art.
-
-The names of a number of women whom the people hold in veneration have
-escaped the attention of the compilers of the _Acta Sanctorum_, or else
-they have been purposely passed over because their possessors were held
-unworthy of the rank of saint. But the stories locally told of them are
-worth attention, and the more so because they throw an additional light on
-the stories of recognised saints.
-
-The larger number of recognised pseudo-saints are found in the districts
-into which Christianity spread as a religion of peace, or in remoter
-districts where the power of the Church was less immediately felt. They
-are found most often north of the Danube and east of the Rhine, especially
-in the lake districts of Bavaria and Switzerland, in the marshy wilds of
-the Low Countries, and in the remote forest regions of the Ardennes, the
-Black Forest, the Spessart or the Vosges. Where Christianity was
-established as the result of political subjection, as for example among
-the Saxons, the woman pseudo-saint is hardly found at all. Perhaps the
-heathenism of the Saxons differed from the heathenism of other German
-folk; perhaps, like the Anglo-Saxons in England, the Saxons were
-conquerors of the land they inhabited and by moving out of their old homes
-had lost their local associations and their primitive cult. But, however
-this may be, it is not where Christianity advanced at the point of the
-lance, but in the districts where its spread was due to detached efforts
-of missionaries, that the woman pseudo-saint is most frequently met with.
-
-Wandering away into forest wilds, where scattered clearings lay like
-islets in an ocean, the missionary sought a retreat remote from the
-interference of government, remote also from the interference of the
-episcopate, where he could realise his hope of living a worthier life.
-Naturally his success largely depended on his securing the goodwill of the
-people in whose neighbourhood he settled. He was obliged to adapt himself
-to their mode of thought if he would win favour for his faith, and to
-realise their views if he wished to modify them in the direction of his
-own. To bridge over the abyss which separated his standard of life from
-theirs, he was bound to defer whenever he could to their sentiments and to
-their conceptions of holiness.
-
-How far these holy men ignored, how far they countenanced, the worship of
-local divinities, necessarily remains an open question. Rightly or
-wrongly popular tradition readily coupled the names of these early
-Christians with those of its favourite women-saints.
-
-Thus Willibrord, the Anglo-Saxon missionary who settled abroad in the
-eighth century, is said to have taken up and translated relics of the
-woman-saint Cunera and to have recognised her claim to veneration; her
-cult is localised in various places near Utrecht. The life of Willibrord
-([Dagger] 739), written by Alcuin ([Dagger] 804), contains no mention of
-Cunera, for the information we have concerning Willibrord's interest in
-her is to be found in the account of her life written centuries later[37].
-This account offers such a picturesque medley of chronological
-impossibilities that the commentators of the _Acta Sanctorum_ have
-entirely recast it.
-
-The gist of the legend as told in the beginning of the 14th century is as
-follows[38]. Cunera was among the virgin companions of St Ursula, and the
-date of her murder, near Cöln, is given as 387, or as 449. Before the
-murder Cunera was borne away from Cöln by King Radbod of Friesland, who
-covered her with his cloak, an ancient symbolic form of appropriation.
-Arrived at Renen he entrusted her with the keys of his kingdom, which
-incensed his wedded wife to such an extent that she caused Cunera to be
-strangled and the body hidden away. But the site where the saint lay was
-miraculously pointed out, and the wicked queen went mad and destroyed
-herself. In vain we ask why a king of the Frisians, who persistently clung
-to their heathendom, should be interested in a Christian virgin and carry
-her off to preside over his household, and in vain we look for the
-assertion or for the proof that Cunera was a Christian at all. The _Acta
-Sanctorum_ reject the connection between Cunera and St Ursula of Cöln, but
-the writer Kist, who considers her to have been a real Christian
-individual, argues in favour of it. In the 12th century we find a certain
-Adelheid swearing to the rightfulness of her cause on the relics of St
-Cunera at Renen[39].
-
-Similarly the story goes that Agilfrid, abbot of the monastery of St Bavon
-in Flanders, afterwards bishop of Liège (765-787), about the year 754
-acquired the relics of the woman-saint Pharaildis and brought them to
-Ghent[40]. When the Northmen ravaged Flanders in 846 the bones of
-Pharaildis were among those carried away to St Omer by the Christians as
-their most valued possession, and in 939 they were brought back to
-Ghent[41].
-
-The legend of Pharaildis gives no clue to the Christian interest in her,
-nor to the veneration of her, which is localised at Ghent, Hamm,
-Steenockerzeel, and Loo. We hear that she was married against her
-inclination, that she cured her husband who was a huntsman of a wound, and
-that after his death she dwelt in solitude to an advanced age, and that
-occasionally she wrought miracles. Further, in popular belief, she crossed
-the water dryshod, she chased away geese from the corn, and she struck the
-ground and the holy fountain at Bruay welled up for the benefit of the
-harvesters--incidents which are not peculiar to her legend. The festival
-of Pharaildis is kept on different dates at Ghent, Cambray, Maastricht and
-Breda. At Ghent it is associated with a celebrated fair, the occasion for
-great rejoicings among the populace. At the church of Steenockerzeel
-stones of conical shape are kept which are carried round the altar on her
-festival[42], in the same way as stones are kept elsewhere and considered
-by some writers to be symbols of an ancient phallic cult. The legend
-explains the presence of these stones by telling how the saint one day was
-surreptitiously giving loaves to the poor, when her act would have been
-discovered but that by intercession the loaves were transformed into
-stones. This incident, the transformation of gifts secretly given to the
-poor, is introduced into the legends of other women-saints, but only in
-this case have I found it mentioned that the transformed food was
-preserved. We shall have occasion to return to Pharaildis, whose legend
-and cult offer nothing to support the view that she was an early
-Christian.
-
-There are numerous instances of a like connection between holy missionary
-and woman pseudo-saint. A fair example is yielded by Leodgar (St Léger)
-bishop of Autun ([Dagger] 678), a well-defined historical personality[43],
-whom tradition makes into a near relative of Odilia, a saint widely
-venerated, but whose reputed foundation of the monastery on the Hohenburg
-modern criticism utterly discards[44].
-
-But it is not only Christian missionaries who are associated with these
-women-saints. Quite a number of saints have been brought into connection
-with the house of the Karlings, and frequently Karl the Great himself
-figures in the stories told of them. I do not presume to decide whether
-the legendary accounts of these women are pure invention; some historic
-truth may be embodied in the stories told of them. But judging by the
-material at hand we are justified in disputing the existence of St Ida,
-who is said to have been the wife of Pippin of Landen and ancestress of
-the Karlings on the sole authority of the life of St Gertrud, her
-daughter. This work was long held to be contemporary, but its earliest
-date is now admitted to be the 11th century[45]. It is less easy to cast
-discredit on the existence of the saints Amalberga, the one a virgin
-saint, the other a widow, whom hagiologists find great difficulty in
-distinguishing. Pharaildis, mentioned above, and the saints Ermelindis,
-Reinildis and Gudila, are said to be Amalberga's daughters, but together
-with other saints of Hainault and Brabant they are very obviously
-pseudo-saints. The idea of bringing Karl the Great into some relation with
-them may have arisen from a twofold desire to justify traditions
-concerning them and to magnify the Emperor's importance.
-
-In this connection it seems worth while to quote the passage in which
-Grimm[46] describes the characteristic traits of the German goddess in his
-German Mythology, and to consider how these traits are more or less
-pronounced in the women we have called pseudo-saints.
-
-'It seems well,' he says, in the opening of his chapter on goddesses, 'to
-treat of goddesses collectively as well as individually, since a common
-conception underlies them all, which will thus stand out the more clearly.
-They are conceived essentially as divine mothers, _travelling about_ and
-_visiting mortals_, from whom mankind learn the ways and arts of
-housekeeping and tilth: _spinning_, _weaving_, _guarding the hearth_,
-_sowing_ and _reaping_' (the italics are his).
-
-The tendency of the goddess to wander from place to place is reflected in
-many women pseudo-saints who are represented in their legends as
-inhabiting at various periods of their lives different parts of the
-district in which they are the object of veneration. Verena of northern
-Switzerland dwelt first at Solothurn, where a cave, which was her
-dwelling-place, is now transformed into a chapel. Later she took boat to
-the place where the Aar, Reuss and Limmat meet, where she dwelt in
-solitude, and her memory is preserved at a spot called the cell of Verena
-(Verenazell). Later still she went to dwell at Zurzach, a place which was
-celebrated for a fair, called Verena's fair, of which more anon. All these
-places are on or near the river Aar, at no inconsiderable distance from
-each other. The legend, as told by Stadler, takes them all into account,
-explaining how Verena came to be connected with each[47].
-
-Similarly the legend of the saint Odilia[48], referred to above in
-connection with the Hohenburg, explains how the saint comes to be
-worshipped on both sides of the Rhine, a cruel father having driven her
-away from home. On the eastern side of the river there is a hill of St
-Odilia, Odilienberg, where there is a fountain which for its healing
-powers is visited twice a year and the site of which is guarded by a
-hermit. At Scherweiler there is also a site hallowed to her worship, and
-local tradition explains that she stayed there as a child; according to
-another version she was discovered floating in a wooden chest on the
-water[49]. Finally she is said to have settled on the Hohenburg west of
-the Rhine and to have founded a monastery. The critic Roth has written an
-admirable article on Odilia and the monastery of Hohenburg. He shows that
-the monastery was ancient and that at first it was dedicated to Christ and
-St Peter, though afterwards their names were supplanted by that of St
-Odilia[50]. Here, as on the other side of the Rhine, the folk celebrate
-her festival by pilgrimages to a fountain which has miraculous healing
-power, and by giving reverence to a sacred stone, on which Odilia is said
-to have knelt so long in prayer for the soul of her wicked father, that
-her knees wore holes in it[51].
-
-We hear that other saints travelled about and stayed now at one place, now
-at another. St Notburg visited different parts of the Neckar district[52],
-Godeleva of Ghistelles[53] passed some time of her life in the marshy
-district between Ostend and Bruges. This Godeleva is addressed in her
-litany as the saint of marriage; she was buried, we are told, in a cave,
-which was held holy as late as the present century. The pond, into which
-she was thrown after death, for which act no reason is given, obtained,
-and still retains, miraculous healing powers[54]. Her legend in other
-respects offers the usual traits. She is Godeleva in some parts of the
-country; in others she is Godeleina, and her life according to Potthast
-was written in the 11th century by Drago, a monk of Ghistelles.
-
-It is a curious trait in German saint-legend that the saint is often
-spoken of as coming from afar--from across the sea, from Britain, from
-Ireland, even from the Orkney Isles. It is thus with Ursula of Cöln,
-Christiane of Dendermonde (Termonde), Lucie of Sampigny and many others.
-The idea had taken root at a very early date that St Walburg, whose cult
-is widespread, was identical with a sister of the missionaries, Wilibald
-and Wunebald, who went from England to Germany under the auspices of the
-prelate Boniface in the eighth century. We shall return to her further
-on[55]. It is sufficient here to point out that there is little likeness
-between the sober-minded women-missionaries of Boniface's circle and the
-woman-saint who is localised under such different aspects, sometimes as a
-saint whose bones exude oil of miraculous power, sometimes as a valkyrie
-who anoints warriors for battle, sometimes as a witch who on the first of
-May leads forth her train to nightly riot on hill tops[56].
-
-Again the love of home industry, which Grimm claims for mother goddesses,
-is reflected in the legends of many saints, to whose real existence every
-clue is wanting. This holds good especially of spinning and of weaving.
-Lufthildis, whose date and whose very name are uncertain, is represented
-as dwelling on a hill-top near a village and marking the limits of her
-district by means of her spindle, which is preserved and can be seen to
-this day in the chapel of Luftelberg, the hill which is connected with
-her[57]. Lucie of Sampigny, to whose shrine women who are sterile make a
-pilgrimage in order to sit on the stone consecrated to her[58]; Walburg,
-referred to above; Germana, whose cult appears at Bar-sur-Aube[59]; and
-one of the numerous localised saints Gertrud[60], are all connected with
-the distaff. In the church of Frauenkirchen, which stands near the site of
-the celebrated old abbey of Lach, St Genovefa of Brabant, whose legend is
-most picturesque and who is in some degree akin to Geneviève of Paris, is
-believed to be sitting behind the altar from which the buzz of her
-spinning-wheel is audible[61].
-
-Again the protective interest in silk and agriculture, which Grimm claims
-for the German goddess, comes out in connection with the pseudo-saint. The
-harvest festival, so often associated with the Virgin Mary, is frequently
-also associated with the name of a pseudo-saint. Thus we find these saints
-represented with ears of corn, as Mary too has been represented[62]. The
-emblem of the three ears of corn was probably accepted owing to Roman
-influence. Verena of Zurzach, Notburg of Rottenburg, and Walburg, are all
-pictured holding a bunch of corn in one hand. Through the intercession of
-Walburg full barns are secured, while Notburg or Nuppurg of Rottenburg,
-one of the chief saints of Bavaria, to whose shrine many pilgrimages are
-made, holds a reaping hook as well as a bunch of corn, and throughout the
-Tyrol is looked upon as patron saint of the peasantry[63].
-
-At Meerbeck in Brabant corn is blessed before it is sown under the
-auspices of the saint Berlindis, who protects tree planting. She is a
-saint of many associations and we shall hear more of her later[64]. In
-some parts of Brabant seed sown at the time of the new moon in the month
-of June is protected by the saint Alena. We know little of Alena except
-that her arm was torn off in expiation of an unknown trespass and is kept
-as a relic in the church of Voorst, and that the archduchess Maria Anna of
-Spain sent for this relic in 1685 in the hope of securing a son by means
-of the saint's intercession[65]. To the shrine of Lufthildis corn is also
-brought as an offering to be distributed among the poor, while St Gertrud
-in Belgium protects bean and pea sowing[66].
-
-Further traits in saint worship, which suggest woman's connection with the
-beginnings of settled civilization, are found in the pseudo-saint's
-frequent association with cattle and dairy produce.
-
-Peasants, men and women, may be seen to this day touching in reverence the
-udder of the cow which a rudely cut relief in wood represents by the side
-of the saint Berlindis at Meerbeck[67]. Gunthild, the patron saint of
-Biberbach in Würtemburg[68], is represented holding in her hand a
-milk-jug, the contents of which were inexhaustible during her lifetime.
-The connection of saints with butter-making is frequent. St Radiane,
-otherwise called Radegund, is chiefly worshipped at Wellenburg near
-Augsburg, and her intercession secures milk and butter in plenty to her
-worshippers. She was torn in pieces by wolves[69].
-
-Judging by her cult and her legends the pseudo-saint practises and
-protects in endless ways the early arts of settled agriculture and
-civilization. She herds cattle, she guards flocks of sheep, she weaves and
-she spins, and she is careful of the dairy. In her representations she is
-associated with 'emblems' which point to these various interests, and we
-find her holding corn, a reaping-hook, or a spindle. Domestic animals are
-pictured by her side, most frequently sheep, geese, cows and dogs. The cat
-appears rarely[70], perhaps because it was associated with the evil side
-of woman's power. The besom too, the ancient symbol of woman's authority,
-is rarely, if ever[71], put into the saint's hands, perhaps for a similar
-reason.
-
-One other peculiarity remains to be mentioned, which also has its
-counterpart in the witches' medicinal and curative power. The
-pseudo-saint's relics (after death) exude oil which is used for medicinal
-purposes. This peculiarity is noticed of the bones of the saints
-Walburg[72], Rolendis[73], and Edigna[74], but it is also noticed in
-connection with the relics of historical saints.
-
-But over and above these traits in the character of the pseudo-saint,
-legend often points to a heathen custom in connection with her of which
-we have definite information. Tacitus tells how the image of the German
-goddess Nerthus was carried about on festive occasions in a chariot drawn
-by cows. The pseudo-saint either during her lifetime or after her death
-was often similarly conveyed. Sometimes the animals put themselves to her
-chariot of their own accord, frequently they stopped of their own accord
-at the particular spot which the saint wished to be her last
-resting-place. Legend tells us of such incidents in connection also with
-historical saints, both men and women, and we hear further that the relics
-of saints sometimes and quite suddenly became so heavy that it was
-impossible to move them, a sure sign that it was safest not to try.
-
-So far the parallels between mother-goddess and woman pseudo-saint recall
-the practices of the heathen past, without actually offending against the
-tenor of Christianity. But the pseudo-saint has other associations of
-which this cannot be said, associations which are utterly perplexing,
-unless we go back for their explanation to the ancient tribal usages when
-the meeting of the tribe was the occasion for settling matters social and
-sexual. These associations introduce us to an aspect of the cult of the
-saints which brings primitive usages into an even clearer light, and shows
-how religious associations continued independently of a change of
-religion.
-
-
-§ 3. Further Peculiarities of this Type of Saint.
-
-The Church, as mentioned above, had put every facility in the way of
-transforming heathen festivals into its own festal days. The heathen
-festival in many ways carried on the traditions of the tribal festival;
-the tribal festival was connected with the cult of tribal goddesses. If we
-bear in mind the many points mother-goddess, witch, and woman pseudo-saint
-have in common, the association of the pseudo-saint with practices of a
-profane character no longer appears wonderful. Both in the turn saint
-legend takes, and in the character of festivities associated with the
-saint's name, we discern the survival of ideas which properly belong to
-differently constituted family and social arrangements, the true meaning
-of which is all but lost.
-
-On looking through the legends of many women-saints, it is surprising how
-often we find evil practices and heathen traditions associated with them,
-practices and traditions which the legend writer naturally is often at a
-loss to explain in a manner acceptable to Christianity. Thus the father
-of St Christiane of Dendermonde is said to have set up a temple where
-girls did service to Venus[75]; doing service to Venus being the usual way
-of describing licentious pursuits.
-
-In the metrical life of Bilihild, patron saint of Würzburg and Mainz, a
-description is introduced of the marriage festival as it was celebrated by
-the Franks in the Main district about the year 600, as this account would
-have it. Dances took place and unions were contracted for the commencing
-year. The Christian woman Bilihild was present at the festival, though we
-are of course told that she found it little to her taste and determined to
-abolish it[76]. The legend of Bilihild has very primitive traits and is
-wanting in historical foundation and probability; and it is at least
-curious that her name should be coupled with a festival which Christian
-religion and morality must have condemned.
-
-Again it is curious to find how often these women-saints die a violent
-death, not for conscience sake, nor indeed for any obvious reason at all.
-Radiane of Wellenburg, as mentioned above, was torn to pieces by
-wolves[77]; Wolfsindis of Reisbach, according to one account, was tied to
-wild oxen who tore her to pieces, according to another version of her
-story she was tied to a horse's tail[78]. St Regina of Alise, in the
-bishopric of Autun, is sometimes represented surrounded by flames,
-sometimes in a steaming caldron[79] which recalls the caldron of
-regeneration of Keltic mythology.
-
-Frequently the saints are said to have been murdered like Cunera of
-Renen[80], and St Sura otherwise Soteris or Zuwarda of Dordrecht[81];
-sometimes their heads are cut off as in the case of Germana worshipped at
-Beaufort in Champagne[82]; sometimes like Godeleva they are strangled, and
-sometimes burnt; but Christianity is not the reason assigned for their
-painful deaths. For even the legend writer does not go so far as to bring
-in martyrdom at a period and in districts where suffering for the
-Christian faith is altogether out of the question.
-
-Panzer tells us about a group of three women-saints, to whom we shall
-presently return. He says in some churches masses are read for their souls
-and prayers offered for their salvation. Though reverenced by the people
-in many districts of Germany, they are as often said to have been hostile
-to Christianity as favourably disposed towards it[83].
-
-We find immoral practices and violence ascribed to some of the English
-women-saints by Capgrave in the 15th century. He says of Inthware or
-Iuthware, who perhaps belongs to Brittany, that she was accused of being a
-harlot and put to death. Similarly he says of Osman or Oswen that she was
-accused of being a witch, but when brought before a bishop she consented
-to be baptized[84]. Stanton notifies of Iuthware that her translation was
-celebrated at Shirbourne[85]. Winifred too, who is worshipped in
-Shropshire, had her head cut off and it rolled right down the hill to a
-spot where a fountain sprang up, near St Winifred's well. The head however
-was miraculously replaced, Winifred revived and lived to the end of her
-days as a nun[86]. The want of information about these women makes it
-impossible to judge how far their existence is purely legendary; certainly
-their stories are largely coloured by heathen traditions. The names
-Iuthware and Oswen are probably not Germanic; and the fact of Winifred's
-living on the confines of Wales makes it probable that she is a Keltic
-rather than a Germanic saint.
-
-In connection with the festivals of some women pseudo-saints we find
-celebrations of a decidedly uproarious character taking place at a
-comparatively recent time. The feast of St Pharaildis, called locally Fru
-Verelde, used to be the chief holiday at Ghent, and was the occasion for
-much festivity and merrymaking[87]. At Lüttich (Liège) stood a chapel
-dedicated to St Balbine, who is said to have been venerated far and wide
-in the 14th century. On her day, the first of May, there was a festival
-called Babilone at which dancing was kept up till late at night[88]. The
-festival of St Godeleva kept at Longuefort maintained even in the 18th
-century a character which led to a violent dispute between the populace
-and the Church dignitaries, who were determined to put it down[89].
-Coincident with the festival known as the day of St Berlindis, a saint
-frequently referred to as a protectress of the peasantry, there is a
-festival called the Drunken Vespers, in which as early as the 16th century
-the archbishop forbade his clergy to take part[90].
-
-But by far the most striking and the most conclusive instances of the
-pseudo-saint's association with heathen survivals are afforded by St
-Verena of Switzerland and St Afra of Augsburg, whose worship and history
-we must examine more closely.
-
-Verena's association with various rites has already been referred to; she
-is represented sometimes with ears of corn, sometimes accompanied by a
-cat, and sometimes, which is even more suggestive, she is brought into
-connection with a brothel. The procession of St Verena's day from Zurzach
-to a chapel dedicated to St Maurice passed an old linden tree which, so
-the legend goes, marked the spot where the saint used to dwell. Hard by
-was a house for lepers and a house of ill fame, where on the same day the
-district bailiff (landvogt) opened the fair. He was obliged by old custom
-to pass this tree, at which a loose woman stood awaiting him, and to dance
-round the tree with her and give her money[91].
-
-The legend of St Verena written between 1005 and 1032[92] does not explain
-these associations. We are told of a woman who came from the east with the
-Theban legion, which is generally supposed to have been massacred in 287.
-She is said to have made her home now in one district now in another, and
-one modern writer goes so far as to suggest that she was zealous in
-converting the Allemans to Christianity before the coming of Irish
-missionaries.
-
-According to folk-custom in districts between the Aar and the Rhine, girls
-who have secured husbands sacrifice their little maiden caps to Verena. At
-Zurzach married couples make pilgrimages to the Verenastift in order to
-secure offspring. Several dukes of the Allemans and their wives made such
-pilgrimages in the 9th and 10th centuries. It would lead too far to
-enumerate the many directions in which Verena is associated with
-heathendom. Her day, which comes at the harvest festival, was a time of
-unrestrained license in Zurzach, a fact on which the _Acta Sanctorum_
-cast no doubt.
-
-Rochholz considers Verena to be a tribal mother of heathendom; Simrock in
-his mythology considers her to be identical with the goddess Fru Frene, in
-whom he sees a kind of German Venus[93]. Grimm tells how the version of
-the Tannhäuser saga, current in Switzerland, substitutes the name Frau
-Frene for that of Frau Venus[94]. The hero Tannhäuser, according to
-mediæval legend, wavers between a baser and a higher interpretation of
-love; the acceptance of the name Frene as representative of sensuousness
-shows the associations currently preserved in connection with this
-so-called saint.
-
-A similar association occurs in Belgium, where a saint Vreken (_Sint
-Vreke_), otherwise Vrouw Vreke, in mediæval legend is the representative
-of sensual as opposed to spiritual love. Corémans describes how in the
-version of the saga of the faithful Eckhardt (_Van het trouwen Eckhout_)
-current in Belgium, the hero wavers between spiritual love of Our Lady and
-sensual love of Vreke. Among the folk Vrouw Vreke is a powerful personage,
-for the story goes that the Kabauters, evil spirits who dwell on the
-Kabauterberg, are in her service. In the book _Reta de Limbourg_, which
-was re-written in the 17th century, the Kabauterberg becomes a Venusberg,
-and Vreke is no longer a great witch (_eene grote heks_) but a goddess
-with all the alluring charms of Venus[95]. Grimm includes a Fru Freke
-among his German goddesses[96]. She retains her old importance among the
-folk as a protective saint and presides over tree-planting[97].
-
-Like the saints Verena and Vreke, St Afra of Augsburg is associated with
-licentiousness; Wessely expressly calls her the patron saint of
-hetairism[98]. Her legend explains the connection in a peculiar manner; as
-told by Berno, abbot of Reichenau ([Dagger] 1048), it is most picturesque.
-We hear how Afra and her mother came from Cyprus, an island which
-mediæval, following the classical writers, associated with the cult of
-Venus, and how she settled at Augsburg and kept a house of ill fame with
-three companions. Here they entertained certain Church dignitaries
-(otherwise unknown to history) who persuaded the women to embrace
-Christianity and give up their evil practices. They became virtuous, and
-when persecutions against Christians were instituted they all suffered
-martyrdom; Afra was placed on a small island and burnt at the stake[99].
-The legend writer on the basis of the previous statement places the
-existence of these women in the early part of the fourth century during
-the reign of Diocletian. Curiously enough the legend of Afra is led up to
-by a description of the worship of the heathen goddess Zisa, a description
-to which Grimm attaches great importance[100]. This goddess was worshipped
-at or near Augsburg. Velserus[101], who in the 16th century compiled a
-chronicle of Augsburg, gives us a mass of information about traditions
-connected with her and her worship, as he also does about St Afra. There
-is in his mind of course no shadow of a suspicion of any connection
-between them. But he informs us that the Zizenberg, or hill of Zisa, and
-the Affenwald which he interprets as Afrawald or wood of Afra, are one and
-the same place.
-
-Berno also wrote a life of Ulrich (St Udalricus), bishop of Augsburg
-([Dagger] 973), who boldly defended the town at the time of the invasion
-of the Hungarians. In this life the bishop has a miraculous vision of St
-Afra, who takes him on a pilgrimage by night and points out the site where
-he afterwards founded a monastery, known to later ages as the monastery of
-St Ulrich and St Afra. The worship of Afra is referred to by the poet
-Fortunatus as early as the sixth century; the story of the saint's
-martyrdom is older than that of her conversion. The historian Rettberg is
-puzzled why so much stress should be laid on her evil ways[102]; but the
-historian Friedrich, regardless of perplexing associations, sees the
-beginnings of convent life for women in Augsburg in the fact of Afra and
-her companions dwelling together between their conversion and
-martyrdom[103].
-
-There are other traits in saint legend which point to the customs and
-arrangements of a more primitive period, and tempt the student to fit
-together pieces of the past and the present which appear meaningless if
-taken separately.
-
-It seems probable that in early times the term mother was applied to a
-number of women of a definite group by all the children of the group, and
-that the word had not the specialized meaning of one who had actually
-borne the children who termed her mother.
-
-The story of a number of children all being born at once by one woman is
-possibly due to a confused tradition dating from this period. In local
-saga, both in Germany and elsewhere, there are stories in which a woman
-suddenly finds herself in the possession of a number of offspring, and
-often with direful consequences to herself, because of the anger of her
-husband. The same incident has found its way into saint legend. Thus
-Notburg, patron saint of Sulz, had at a birth a number of children,
-variously quoted as nine, twelve and thirty-six. Stadler says that she is
-represented at Sulz holding eight children in her arms, a ninth one lying
-dead at her feet[104]. Lacking water to christen these children, she
-produced from the hard rock a fountain which even to the present day is
-believed to retain the power to cure disease.
-
-A similar story is told of Achachildis, popularly known as Atzin, who is
-held in veneration at Wendelstein near Schwabach. She bore her husband
-five children at once and then took a vow of continence. Her legend has
-never been written, but she enjoys a great reputation for holiness, and a
-series of pictures represent various incidents in her life[105].
-
-Images of women sheltering children, usually beneath their cloaks, are
-frequently found abroad built into the outer wall of the church, the place
-where Christian teachers felt justified in placing heathen images[106].
-Students of pictorial art will here recall the image of St Ursula at Cöln
-sheltering 11,000 virgins under her cloak.
-
-Again there are other emblems in saint worship which cannot be easily
-accounted for, such for instance as the holy combs of Verena and
-Pharaildis, which remind one of the comb with which the witch Lorelei sat
-combing her hair, or, on classic soil, of the comb of the Venus Calvata;
-or the holy slippers of St Radiane, which are preserved to this day in
-the church of Wellenburg and which, as Stadler informs us, had been
-re-soled within his time[107]. Slippers and shoes are ancient symbols of
-appropriation, and as such figure in folk-lore and at weddings in many
-countries to this day. The golden slipper was likewise a feature at the
-witches' festival, in which the youthful fiddler also figured[108]. Both
-the golden slipper and the youthful fiddler form important features in the
-legend of the saint Ontkommer or Wilgefortis. The images and legend of
-this saint are so peculiar that they claim a detailed account.
-
-It is evident from what has been said that the legends and cult of many
-women pseudo-saints have traits in common; indeed the acts ascribed to
-different saints are often exactly similar. The stories of Notburg of
-Rottenburg, of Radiane of Wellenburg, and of Gunthild of Biberbach, as
-Stadler remarks, are precisely alike; yet it is never suggested that these
-saints should be treated as one; each of them has her place in the _Acta
-Sanctorum_ and is looked upon as distinct from the others.
-
-There is, however, a set of women-saints whose images and legends have
-features so distinctive that hagiologists treat of them collectively as
-one, though they are held in veneration in districts widely remote from
-each other, and under very dissimilar names.
-
-The saint, who is venerated in the Low Countries as Ontkommer or
-Wilgefortis, is usually considered identical with the saint Kümmerniss of
-Bavaria and the Tyrol; with the saint Livrade, Liberata or Liberatrix
-venerated in some districts of France as early as the 9th century when
-Usuard, writing in the monastery of St Germain-des-Près, mentions her;
-with Gehulff of Mainz; with Hilp of the Hülfensberg at Eichsfelde; and
-with others called variously Regenfled, Regenfrith, Eutropia, etc.[109]
-The name Mariahilf, which is very common in south Germany, is probably a
-combination of the name of the Virgin Mother with that of St Hilp or St
-Gehulff.
-
-The legends of this saint, or rather of this assembly of saints, are
-characterized by Cuper in the _Acta Sanctorum_ as an endless
-labyrinth[110]. Whatever origin be ascribed to them, when once we examine
-them closely we find explanation impossible on the hypothesis that they
-relate to a single Christian woman living during Christian times.
-
-A considerable amount of information on this group of saints has lately
-been collected by Sloet, who deals also with their iconography[111]. The
-peculiarity of the images of Ontkommer or Kümmerniss consists in this,
-that she is represented as crucified, and that the lower part of her face
-is covered by a beard, and her body in some instances by long shaggy fur.
-Her legend explains the presence of the beard and fur by telling us that
-it grew to protect the maiden from the persecutions of a lover or the
-incestuous love of her father; such love is frequently mentioned in the
-legends of women pseudo-saints.
-
-The fact that Ontkommer or Kümmerniss is represented as crucified might be
-explained on the hypothesis that the common folk could not at first grasp
-the idea of a god and looked upon Christ as a woman, inventing the legend
-of the woman's persecution and miraculous protection in order to account
-for the presence of the beard. But other accessories of the
-representations of Ontkommer or Kümmerniss lead us to suppose that her
-martyrdom, like that of other saints, has a different origin and that she
-is heiress to a tribal goddess of the past[112].
-
-In many of her representations Ontkommer or Kümmerniss is seen hanging on
-the cross with only one golden slipper on, but sometimes she wears two
-slippers, and a young man is sitting below the cross playing the fiddle.
-Legend accounts for the presence of this young man in the following
-manner. He came and sat at the foot of the image and was playing on his
-fiddle, when the crucified saint suddenly awoke to life, drew off a
-slipper and flung it to him. He took it away with him, but he was accused
-of having stolen it and condemned to death. His accusers however agreed to
-his request to come with him into the presence of the holy image, to which
-he appealed. Again the crucified saint awoke to life and drew off her
-second slipper and flung it to the fiddler, whose innocence was thereby
-vindicated and he was set free. Where shall we go for a clue to this
-curious and complicated legend? Grimm tells us that a young fiddler was
-present at a festival of the witches, and that he played at the dance in
-which he was not allowed to take part. Grimm also tells us that one of the
-witches on this occasion wore only one golden slipper[113]. The
-association of Kümmerniss with a golden slipper is deep-rooted, especially
-in Bavaria, for the saying goes there that 'She with the golden slipper
-and with the youthful fiddler is also a mother of God[114].'
-
-Many years ago Menzel wrote[115]: 'Much I believe concerning this saint is
-derived from heathen conceptions.' Stories embodying heathen traditions
-are preserved in connection with this saint in districts abroad that lie
-far apart.
-
-Thus the image of her which is preserved in North Holland is said to have
-come floating down the river, like the images of the Virgin referred to
-above. At Regensburg in Bavaria an image is preserved which is said to
-have been cast into the water at Neufarn. It was carried down by the river
-and thrown on the bank, and the bishop fetched it to Regensburg on a car
-drawn by oxen. In the Tyrol the image of the saint is sometimes hung in
-the chief bed-room of the house in order to secure a fruitful marriage,
-but often too it is hung in chapel and cloister in order to protect the
-dead. Images of the saint are preserved and venerated in a great number of
-churches in Bavaria and the Tyrol, but the ideas popularly associated with
-them have raised feelings in the Church against their cult. We hear that a
-Franciscan friar in the beginning of this century destroyed one of the
-images, and that the bishop of Augsburg in 1833 attempted in one instance
-to do away with the image and the veneration of the saint, but refrained
-from carrying out his intention, being afraid of the anger of the
-people[116].
-
-It has been mentioned above that associations of a twofold character
-survive in connection with Verena and Vreke, who are to this day popularly
-reckoned as saints, but who are introduced in mediæval romance as
-representatives of earthly love as contrasted with spiritual. Associations
-of a twofold character have also been attached to the term Kümmerniss. For
-in the Tyrol Kümmerniss is venerated as a saint, but the word Kümmerniss
-in ordinary parlance is applied to immoral women[117].
-
-Other heathen survivals are found attached to the Ontkommer-Kümmerniss
-group of saints. At Luzern the festival of the saint was connected with so
-much riotous merrymaking and licentiousness that it was forbidden in 1799
-and again in 1801. The story is told of the saint under the name Liberata
-that she was one of a number of children whom her mother had at a
-birth[118].
-
-Sloet, on the authority of the philologist Kern, considers that the
-various names by which the saint is known in different districts are
-appellatives and have the same underlying meaning of one who is helpful in
-trouble. According to him this forms the connecting link between the names
-Ontkommer, Kümmerniss, Wilgefortis, Gehulff, Eutropia, etc., of which the
-form Ontkommer, philologically speaking, most clearly connotes the saint's
-character, and on this ground is declared to be the original form. The
-saint is worshipped at Steenberg in Holland under the name Ontkommer, and
-Sloet is of opinion that Holland is the cradle of the worship of the whole
-group of saints[119]. But considering what we know of other women-saints
-it seems more probable that the saints who have been collected into this
-group are the outcome of a period of social evolution, which in various
-districts led to the establishment of tribal goddesses, who by a later
-development assumed the garb of Christian women-saints.
-
-The cult of women-saints under one more aspect remains to be chronicled.
-Numerous traditions are preserved concerning the cult of holy women in
-triads, who are locally held in great veneration and variously spoken of
-as three sisters, three ladies, three Marys, three nuns, or three
-women-saints.
-
-The three holy women have a parallel in the three Fates of classic
-mythology and in the three Norns of Norse saga, and like them they
-probably date from a heathen period. Throughout Germany they frequently
-appear in folk-lore and saga, besides being venerated in many instances as
-three women-saints of the Church.
-
-In stories now current these three women are conceived sometimes as
-sisters protecting the people, sometimes as ladies guarding treasures, and
-sometimes as a group of three nuns living together and founding chapels
-and oratories, and this too in places where history knows nothing of the
-existence of any religious settlement of women.
-
-Panzer has collected a mass of information on the cult of the triad as
-saints in southern Germany[120]; Corémans says that the veneration of the
-Three Sisters (_dry-susters_) is widespread in Belgium[121], but the
-Church has sanctioned this popular cult in comparatively few instances.
-
-The story is locally current that these three women were favourably
-disposed to the people and bequeathed to them what is now communal
-property. Simrock considers that this property included sites which were
-held sacred through association with a heathen cult[122]. 'In heathen
-times,' he says, 'a sacred grove was hallowed to the sister fates which
-after the establishment of Christianity continued to be the property of
-the commune. The remembrance of these helpful women who were the old
-benefactresses of the place remained, even their association with holiness
-continued.' By these means in course of time the cult of the three
-goddesses was transformed into that of Christian saints.
-
-Besides bequeathing their property to the people it was thought that these
-three women-saints protected their agricultural and domestic interests,
-especially as affecting women. In Schlehdorf in Lower Bavaria pilgrimages
-by night were made to the shrine of the triad to avert the cattle plague;
-the shrine stood on a hill which used to be surrounded by water, and at
-one time was the site of a celebrated fair and the place chosen for
-keeping the harvest festival[123]. At Brusthem in Belgium there were three
-wells into which women who sought the aid of these holy women cast three
-things, linen-thread, a needle and some corn[124]. Again in Schildturn in
-Upper Bavaria an image of the three women-saints is preserved in the
-church which bears an inscription to the effect that through the
-intercession of these saints offspring are secured and that they are
-helpful at childbirth[125]. In the same church a wooden cradle is kept
-which women who wished to become mothers used to set rocking. A second
-cradle which is plated is kept in the sacristy, and has been substituted
-for one of real silver[126].
-
-In some districts one of these three saints is credited with special power
-over the others either for good or for evil. The story goes that one of
-the sisters was coloured black or else black and white[127].
-
-In many places where the triad is worshipped the names of the individual
-sisters are lost, while in districts far apart from one another, as the
-Tyrol, Elsass, Bavaria, their names have considerable likeness. The forms
-generally accepted, but liable to fluctuation, are St Einbeth, St Warbeth
-and St Wilbeth[128]. The Church in some instances seems to have hesitated
-about accepting these names, it may be from the underlying meaning of the
-suffix _beth_ which Grimm interprets as holy site, _ara_, _fanum_, but
-Mannhardt connects it with the word to pray (beten)[129]. Certainly the
-heathen element is strong when we get traditions of the presence of these
-women at weddings and at burials, and stories of how they went to war,
-riding on horses, and achieved even more than the men[130]. Where their
-claim to Christian reverence is admitted by the Church, the stories told
-about them have a very different ring.
-
-According to the legend which has been incorporated into the _Acta
-Sanctorum_, St Einbetta, St Verbetta, and St Villbetta were Christian
-maidens who undertook the pilgrimage to Rome with St Ursula, with whose
-legend they are thus brought into connection. The three sisters stayed
-behind at Strasburg and so escaped the massacre of the 11000 virgins[131].
-
-The tendency to group women-saints into triads is very general. Kunigund,
-Mechtund and Wibrandis are women-saints who belong to the portion of Baden
-in the diocese of Constance[132]. The locus of their cult is in separate
-villages, but they are venerated as a triad in connection with a holy well
-and lie buried together under an ancient oak[133]. We hear also of
-pilgrimages being made to the image of three holy sisters preserved at Auw
-on the Kyll in the valley of the Mosel. They are represented as sitting
-side by side on the back of an ass(?), one of them having a cloth tied
-over her eyes. The three sisters in this case are known as Irmina, Adela
-and Chlotildis, and it is said they were the daughters or sisters of King
-Dagobert[134]. Irmina and Adela are historical; they founded nunneries in
-the diocese of Trier.
-
-In another instance the sisters are called Pellmerge, Schwellmerge and
-Krischmerge, _merg_ being a popular form of the name Mary which is
-preserved in many place-names[135].
-
-I have been able to discover little reference to local veneration of
-saints in a triad in England. But there is a story that a swineherd in
-Mercia had a vision in a wood of three women who, as he believed, were the
-three Marys, and who pointed out to him the spot where he was to found a
-religious settlement, which was afterwards known as Evesham.
-
-A curious side-light is thrown on the veneration of the three women-saints
-abroad by recalling the images and inscriptions about Mothers and Matrons,
-which are preserved on altars fashioned long before the introduction of
-Christianity under heathen influence.
-
-These altars have been found in outlying parts of the Roman Empire,
-especially in the districts contiguous to the ancient boundary line which
-divided Roman territory from Germania Magna. They bear inscriptions in
-Latin to the effect that they are dedicated to Mothers and Matrons, and
-sometimes it is added that they have been set up at the command of these
-divine Mothers themselves. The words _imperio ipsarum_, 'by their own
-command,' are added to the formula of dedication, and as it seems that
-they never occur on altars set up and dedicated to specified Roman or
-Gallo-Roman divinities, they yield an interesting proof of the wide-spread
-character of the worship of tribal goddesses[136].
-
-At one time it was supposed that these altars were of Keltic origin, but
-some of the tribes mentioned in their inscriptions have been identified
-with place-names in Germany. Altars found in outlying parts of the Empire
-primarily served for the use of the soldiery, for sacrifice at the altar
-of the gods was a needful preliminary to Roman military undertakings. The
-view has been advanced that, as the altars dedicated to pagan divinities
-served for the devotions of the Roman and Gallo-Roman troops, it is
-possible that these other altars dedicated to Mothers served for the
-devotions of the German heathen soldiery, who were drafted from districts
-beyond the Rhine, and at an early date made part of the Roman legions.
-
-The parallels between the mothers of the stones and the three women-saints
-are certainly remarkable.
-
-Where a representation, generally in rude relief, occurs on the altar
-stones, the Mothers are represented in a group of three, holding as
-emblems of their power fruit, flowers, and the spindle. These recall the
-emblems both of the heathen goddess of mythology and of the pseudo-saint.
-Moreover one of the Mothers of the altars is invariably distinguished by
-some peculiarity, generally by a want of the head-dress or head-gear worn
-by the two others, perhaps indicative of her greater importance. This has
-its parallel in the peculiar power with which one member of the saint
-triad is popularly credited.
-
-The erection of the altars belongs to a time before the introduction of
-Christianity; our information about the three women-saints dates back
-earlier than the 12th century in a few cases only; it chiefly depends on
-stories locally current which have been gleaned within the last hundred
-years. If the hypothesis of the mother-age preceding the father-age holds
-good, if the divine Mothers imaged on the stones are witnesses to a
-wide-spread worship of female deities during the period of established
-Roman rule, these tales told of the triad carry us back nearly twenty
-centuries. The power ascribed to tribal goddesses in a distant heathen
-past survived in the power ascribed to Christian women-saints; the
-deep-rooted belief in protective women-divinities enduring with undying
-persistence in spite of changes of religion.
-
-In conclusion, a few words may be acceptable on the names of
-pseudo-saints, which I believe to be largely epithetic or appellative.
-Grimm holds that the names of the German goddesses were originally
-appellatives. In a few cases the name of the goddess actually becomes the
-name of a saint. Mythology and hagiology both lay claim to a Vrene and a
-Vreke; but from the nature of things these cases are rare. The conception
-of the protective divinity is ancient; her name in a philological sense is
-comparatively new.
-
-With few exceptions the names are German; sometimes in contiguous
-districts variations of the same name are preserved. The saint Lufthildis
-is sometimes Linthildis[137]; Rolendis is sometimes Dollendis[138]; Ida,
-Itta, Iduberga, Gisleberga are saints of Brabant and Flanders, whom
-hagiologists have taken great trouble to keep separate. In some cases the
-name of a real and that of a fictitious person may have become confounded.
-The names are all cognate with the word _itis_, an ancient term applied to
-the woman who exercised sacred functions.
-
-The attempt to connect the group Ontkommer-Wilgefortis by the underlying
-meaning of the several names has been mentioned. It has also been
-mentioned that this saint is sometimes spoken of as a mother of God.
-Similarly St Geneviève of Paris is worshipped as Notre-Dame-la-petite, and
-again the saint Cunera of Reenen is popularly known as Knertje, which
-signifies little lady[139].
-
-On every side the student is tempted to stray from the straightforward
-road of fact into the winding paths of speculation. The frequent
-association abroad of female deities with hill tops suggests a possible
-explanation why the word _berg_, which means remoteness and height, so
-often forms part of the name of the woman pseudo-saint, and of women's
-names generally. For the beginnings of tilth and agriculture are now
-sought not in the swampy lowlands, but on the heights where a clearance
-brought sunlight and fruitfulness. Hill tops to this day are connected
-with holy rites. Is it possible that the word _berg_, designating hill
-top, should have become an appellative for woman because the settlements
-on the hills were specially connected with her?
-
-Philology hitherto has been content to trace to a common origin words
-cognate in different languages, and on the conceptions attaching to these
-words, to build up theories about the state of civilization of various
-peoples at a period previous to their dispersion from a common home. But
-the study of local beliefs and superstitions in western Europe tends more
-and more to prove that usages pointing to a very primitive mode of life
-and to a very primitive state of civilization are indissolubly connected
-with certain sites; and that the beginnings of what we usually term
-civilization, far from being imported, have largely developed on native
-soil.
-
-Thus, at the very outset of our enquiry into saint-worship and the convent
-life of the past, we have found ourselves confronted by a class of
-women-saints who must be looked upon as survivals from heathen times, and
-who are in no way connected with the beginnings of Christianity and of
-convent life; their reputation rests on their connection with some
-hallowed site of the heathen period and the persistence of popular faith
-in them. But the feeling underlying the attribution of holiness to them,
-the desire for localized saints, yields the clue to the ready raising to
-saintship of those women who in England, in France, and in Germany, showed
-appreciation of the possibilities offered to them by Christianity, and
-founded religious settlements. In some cases superstitions of a heathen
-nature which are of value to the hagiologist, if not to the historian,
-cling to these women also, but fortunately a considerable amount of
-trustworthy material is extant about their lives. These women during the
-earliest period were zealous in the cause of Christianity, and it is to
-them that our enquiry now turns.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-
-CONVENTS AMONG THE FRANKS, A.D. 550-650.
-
-    'Sicut enim apis diversa genera florum congregabat, unde mella
-    conficiat, sic illa ab his quos invitabat spirituales studebat carpere
-    flosculos, unde boni operis fructum tam sibi quam suis sequacibus
-    exhiberet.' _The nun Baudonivia on St Radegund_ (_Vita_, c. 13).
-
-
-§ 1. At the Frankish Invasion[140].
-
-The great interest of early monastic life among the Franks lies in the
-conversion of this hardy and ferocious people to Christianity just at the
-moment of their emergence from a state of barbarism. Fierce, warlike and
-progressive, the Franks were brought face to face with cultured Latinity.
-The clerical student who claimed direct descent from the Gallo-Roman
-rhetorician, and the bishop who was in possession of the municipal
-government of the town, found themselves confronted by shaggy-haired,
-impetuous men from forest wilds. At the outset an all but immeasurable
-distance separated the social and intellectual development of the
-Gallo-Roman from that of these strangers. Compared with the cultivated man
-of letters and with the veteran, grown grey in imperial service, the
-German invader was little more than a savage; nevertheless he succeeded in
-holding his own. At first his standards of life and conduct gave way
-before those of the Gallo-Romans. The lives of early Frankish princes, as
-their contemporary, the historian Gregory of Tours, depicts them, are
-marked by ceaseless quarrels and feuds, by numberless instances of murder,
-perjury and violence. The bonds of union among them were forcibly relaxed,
-as often happens in those periods of history when restraint and
-responsibility are broken through by a sudden and overwhelming inrush of
-new ideas. A prey to intemperance and greed, the descendants of the great
-Merovech dwindled away. But other men of the same race, stronger than they
-in mind and less prone to enervating luxury, pressed in from behind. And
-after the temporary mental and moral collapse which followed upon the
-occupation of Gaul by the Franks, the race rose to new and increased
-vigour. New standards of conduct were evolved and new conceptions of
-excellence arose, through the mingling of Latin and German elements. For
-the great Roman civilization, a subject of wonder and admiration to all
-ages, was in many of its developments realized, appropriated, and
-assimilated by the converted Germans. Three hundred years after their
-appearance in Gaul, the Franks were masters of the cultivated western
-world; they had grasped the essentials of a common nationality and had
-spread abroad a system of uniform government.
-
-The Franks at first showed a marked deficiency in the virtues which pagan
-Rome had established, and to which Christianity had given a widened and
-spiritualized meaning. Temperance, habitual self-control and the
-absorption of self in the consciousness of a greater, formed no part of
-this people's character. These virtues, together with peaceableness and a
-certain simplicity of taste, laid the groundwork of the monasticism which
-preceded the invasion. Persons who were vowed to religion were averse to
-war, because it disturbed study and industry, and they shrank from luxury
-of life, because it interrupted routine by exciting their appetites. An
-even tenor of life was the golden mean they set before themselves, and in
-some degree they had realized it in Roman Gaul before the barbarian
-invasion.
-
-The Frank at first felt little tempted in the direction of monastic life.
-His fierce and warlike tendencies, love of personal predominance and
-glory, and impatience of every kind of restraint, were directly opposed to
-the uniform round of devotion and work to which the religious devotee
-conformed.
-
-The attitude of Frankish men towards monasticism was at best passive; on
-the other hand convent life from the first found sympathy among Frankish
-women. Princesses of pure German blood and of undisputed German origin
-left the royal farms, which were the court residences of the period, and
-repaired to the religious houses, to devote themselves to religion and to
-the learning of cultured Latinity. Not one of the princes of the royal
-Frankish race entered a convent of his own accord, but their wives,
-widows, and daughters readily joined houses of religion.
-
-Meekness and devotion, self-denial and subservience are not the most
-prominent features in the character of these women. The wives and
-daughters of men to whom Macaulay attributes all vices and no virtues, are
-of a temper which largely savours of the world. What distinguishes them is
-quick determination and clear-sighted appreciation of the possibilities
-opened out to them by the religious life. Fortunately the information
-which we have concerning them is not confined to the works of interested
-eulogists. Accounts of women whom posterity estimated as saints lay stress
-on those sides of their character which are in accord with virtues
-inculcated by the Church. But we have other accounts besides these about
-women who had taken the vows of religion, but whose behaviour called forth
-violent denunciations from their contemporaries. And over and above these,
-passages in profane literature are extant which curiously illustrate the
-worldly tone and temper of many women who had adopted religion as a
-profession.
-
-These women were driven to resort to convents chiefly as the result of
-their contact with a great civilization, which threw open unknown and
-tempting possibilities to men, but raised many difficulties in the way of
-women.
-
-The resources of the districts acquired by the Franks were immeasurably
-greater than those of the lands they had left. Wealth and intemperance
-readily join hands. The plurality of recognised and unrecognised wives in
-which the Frankish princes indulged resulted in great family difficulties.
-The royal farms and the ancient cities, where these petty kings resided,
-were the scenes of continual broils and squabbles in which royal wives and
-widows took the leading parts. From the chequered existence which this
-state of things implies, convent life alone afforded a permanent refuge.
-Sometimes a princess left home from a sense of the indignities she was
-made to suffer; sometimes a reverse of fortune caused her to accept,
-willingly or unwillingly, the dignified retirement of the cloister.
-
-During the centuries preceding the Frankish conquest the development of
-religious and monastic life in Gaul had been considerable, for the Church
-had practically appropriated what was left of the Roman system of
-organization, and since this system had been chiefly municipal, the
-municipal bodies were largely composed of bishops and clerks.
-
-The monastic life of men in Gaul had a number of independent centres in
-the western provinces, due to the enthusiastic zeal of St Martin of Tours
-([Dagger] 400), to whom reference has been made.
-
-In the beginning of the 6th century a settlement of nuns was founded in
-the south, where monasteries already existed, perhaps as the result of
-direct contact with the east. A rule of life was drafted for this convent
-shortly after its foundation.
-
-Caesarius, bishop of Arles (501-573), had persuaded his sister Caesaria to
-leave Marseilles, where she dwelt in a convent associated with the name of
-Cassian. His plan was that she should join him at Arles, and preside over
-the women who had gathered there to live and work under his guidance.
-
-Caesarius now marked out a scheme of life for his sister and those women
-whom she was prepared to direct. He arranged it, as he says himself,
-according to the teachings of the fathers of the Church and, after
-repeated modifications, he embodied it in a set of rules, which have come
-down to us[141]. Great clearness and directness, a high moral tone, and
-much sensible advice are contained in these precepts of Caesarius. 'Since
-the Lord,' he says, addressing himself to the women, 'has willed to
-inspire us and help us to found a monastery for you, in order that you may
-abide in this monastery, we have culled spiritual and holy injunctions for
-you from the ancient fathers; with God's help may you be sheltered, and
-dwelling in the cells of your monastery, seeking in earnest prayer the
-presence of the Son of God, may you say in faith, "we have found him whom
-we sought." Thus may you be of the number of holy virgins devoted to God,
-who wait with tapers alight and a calm conscience, calling upon the
-Lord.--Since you are aware that I have worked towards establishing this
-monastery for you, let me be one of you through the intercession of your
-prayer.'
-
-Caesarius goes on to stipulate that those who join the community, whether
-they be maidens or widows, shall enter the house once for all and renounce
-all claims to outside property. Several paragraphs of the rule are devoted
-to settling questions of property, a proof of its importance in the mind
-of Caesarius. There were to be in the house only those who of their own
-accord accepted the routine and were prepared to live on terms of
-strictest equality without property or servants of their own.
-
-Children under the age of six or seven were not to be received at all,
-'nor shall daughters of noble parentage or lowly-born girls be taken in
-readily to be brought up and educated.'
-
-This latter injunction shows how the religious at this period wished to
-keep the advantages to be derived from artistic and intellectual training
-in their own community. They had no desire for the spread of education,
-which forms so characteristic a feature of the religious establishments of
-a later date.
-
-After their safe housing the instruction of the nuns at Arles was the most
-important matter dealt with in the 'rule.' Considerable time and thought
-were devoted to the practice of chants and to choir-singing, for the art
-of music was considered especially fitted to celebrate God. In an appendix
-to the rule of Caesarius the system of singing is described as similar to
-that adopted in the coenobite settlement at Lerins[142]. Apparently
-following Keltic usage, the chant was taken up in turn by relays of the
-professed, who kept it up night and day all the year round in perpetual
-praise of the Divinity. At this period melody and pitch were the subjects
-of close study and much discussion. The great debt owed by the art of
-music to the enthusiasm of these early singers is often overlooked.
-
-The women who joined the community at Arles also learned reading and
-writing ('omnes litteras discant'). These arts were practised in classes,
-while domestic occupations, such as cooking, were performed in turns.
-Weaving, probably that of church hangings, was among the arts practised,
-and the women also spun wool and wove it into material with which they
-made garments for their own use.
-
-There are further injunctions about tending the infirm, and stern advice
-about the hatefulness of quarrels. Intercourse with the outside world is
-restricted, but is not altogether cut off.
-
-'Dinners and entertainments,' says the rule, 'shall not be provided for
-churchmen, laymen and friends, but women from other religious houses may
-be received and entertained.'
-
-In the year 506 Caesarius, the author of this rule, was present at the
-synod of Agde at which it was decreed that no nun however good in
-character should receive the veil, that is be permanently bound by a vow,
-before her fortieth year[143]. This decree, taken together with the rule,
-proves the sober and serious spirit of these early settlements and the
-purpose which their founder set before him.
-
-The teaching of Caesarius generally reflects the spirit of cautious
-reserve characteristic of the rule instituted by the great St Benedict of
-Nursia for the monks he had assembled together on Monte Casino in Central
-Italy. His efforts like those of Caesarius were directed to the creation
-of conditions favourable to the devoutly disposed, not to the leavening of
-the outside world by the spread of Christian doctrine.
-
-It was part of the plan of Caesarius to secure independence to the
-communities he had founded; for in his capacity as bishop he addressed a
-letter to Pope Hormisda ([Dagger] 523) in which he asked the Pope's
-protection for his monasteries, one of which was for men and one for
-women, against possible interference from outside. He also begged that the
-Pope would confirm the grants of property which had already been made to
-these establishments. In his reply to this letter the Pope declared that
-the power of the bishop in regard to these settlements should be limited
-to visitation[144].
-
-It must be borne in mind that Arles and the southern parts of Gaul were
-overrun by the Goths, who inclined to Arianism and opposed the Church of
-Rome. Fear of this heresy induced the prelates of the Church to favour
-Frankish rule. After the alliance of the Frankish kings with the Church
-the religious establishments in the land remained undisturbed, and
-numerous new monasteries were founded.
-
-It is evident from what we know of the nuns at Arles, and of other bands
-of women whom the Church took under her protection, that they readily
-accepted life on the conditions proffered and were content to be
-controlled and protected by men. It is only when the untamed German
-element with its craving for self-assertion came in, that difficulties
-between the bishops and heads of nunneries arose, that women of barbarian
-origin like Radegund, Chrodield, and others, appealed to the authority of
-ruling princes against the bishop, and asserted an independence not always
-in accordance with the usual conceptions of Christian virtue and
-tolerance.
-
-
-§ 2. St Radegund and the Nunnery at Poitiers.
-
-Certain settlements for women in northern France claim to have existed
-from a very early period, chiefly on the ground of their association with
-Geneviève, patron saint of Paris, and with Chrothild (Clothilde, [Dagger]
-545), wife of the first Christian king of the Franks. The legend of St
-Geneviève must be received with caution[145]; while bands of women
-certainly dwelt at Paris and elsewhere previously to the Frankish
-invasion, under the protection of the Church, it is doubtful whether they
-owed their existence to Geneviève.
-
-A fictitious glamour of sanctity has been cast by legendary lore around
-the name and the doings of Queen Chrothild, because her union with King
-Clovis, advocated by the Gallo-Roman Church party, led to his conversion
-to Christianity[146]. In the pages of Gregory's history the real Chrothild
-stands out imperious, revengeful and unscrupulous. It is quite credible
-that she did service for a time as deaconess (diacona) at the church of
-Tours, and that she founded a religious house for women at the royal farm
-Les Andelys near Rouen, but we can hardly believe that the life she lived
-there was that of a devout nun.
-
-Radegund of Poitiers and Ingetrud of Tours are the first Frankish women
-who are known to have founded and ruled over nunneries in France. Their
-activity belongs to the latter half of the 6th century, which is a date
-somewhat later than that of the official acceptance of Christianity, and
-one at which the overlordship of the Franks was already well established
-throughout France. The settlements they founded lay in close proximity to
-cities which were strongholds of Church government. Poitiers had become an
-important religious centre through the influence of St Hilary, and Tours,
-to which the shrine of St Martin attracted many travellers, was of such
-importance that it has been called the centre of religion and culture in
-France at this period.
-
-The historian Gregory, afterwards bishop of Tours, to whom we are largely
-indebted for our knowledge of this period, was personally acquainted with
-the women at Tours and at Poitiers. He probably owed his appointment to
-the bishopric of Tours in 573 to the favour he had found with
-Radegund[147]. He has treated of her in his history and has written an
-account of her burial at which he officiated[148], whilst a chapter of his
-book on the _Glory of Martyrs_ praises the fragment of the Holy
-Cross[149], which had been sent to Radegund from Constantinople and from
-which the nunnery at Poitiers took its name.
-
-Besides this information two drafts of the life of Radegund are extant,
-the one written by her devoted friend and admirer the Latin poet
-Fortunatus, afterwards bishop of Poitiers, the other by the nun
-Baudonivia, Radegund's pupil and an inmate of her nunnery[150]. Fortunatus
-has moreover celebrated his intercourse with Radegund in a number of
-verses, which throw great light on their interesting personal
-relations[151].
-
-A letter is also extant written by Radegund herself and preserved by
-Gregory in which she addresses a number of bishops on the objects of her
-nunnery. She begs the prelates of the Church to protect her institution
-after her death and, if need be, assist those who are carrying on life
-there in her spirit against hindrance from without and opposition from
-within. The letter is in the usual wordy style of the Latin of that day.
-
-'Freed from the claims of a worldly life, with divine help and holy grace,
-I,' she says, 'have willingly chosen the life of religion at the direction
-of Christ; turning my thoughts and powers towards helping others, the Lord
-assisting me that my good intentions towards them may be turned to their
-weal. With the assistance of gifts granted me by the noble lord and king
-Clothacar, I have founded a monastery (monasterium) for maidens (puellae);
-after founding it I made it a grant of all that royal liberality had
-bestowed on me; moreover to the band assembled by me with Christ's help, I
-have given the rule according to which the holy Caesaria lived, and which
-the holy president (antistes) Caesarius of Arles wisely compiled from the
-teachings of the holy fathers. With the consent of the noble bishop of
-this district and others, and at the desire of our congregation, I have
-accepted as abbess my sister, dame Agnes, whom from youth upwards I have
-loved and educated as a daughter; and next to God's will I have conformed
-to her authority. I myself, together with my sisters, have followed the
-apostolic example and have granted away by charter all our worldly
-possessions, in fearful remembrance of Ananias and Sapphira, retaining
-nought of our own. But since the events and duration of human life are
-uncertain, since also the world is drawing to its close (mundo in finem
-currente), many serving their own rather than the divine will, I myself,
-impelled by the love of God, submit to you this letter, which contains my
-request, begging you to carry it out in the name of Christ[152].'
-
-Radegund was one of an unconquered German race. Her father was Hermafried,
-leader of the Thüringians, her mother a grandniece of the great Gothic
-king, Theodoric. She was captured as a child together with her brother in
-the forest wilds of Thüringen during one of the raids made into that
-district by the Frankish kings Theuderic (Thierry) of Metz, and Clothacar
-(Clothair) of Soissons. Clothacar appropriated the children as part of his
-share of the booty and sent Radegund to a 'villa' in the neighbourhood of
-Aties, in what became later the province of Picardie, where she was
-brought up and educated. 'Besides occupations usual to those of her sex,'
-her biographer says, 'she had a knowledge of letters' (litteris est
-erudita). From Aties she vainly tried to make her escape, and at the age
-of about twelve was taken to the royal farm near Soissons and there
-married to Clothacar[153]. In the list of King Clothacar's seven
-recognised wives Radegund stands fifth[154].
-
-From the first Radegund was averse to this union. She was wedded to an
-earthly bridegroom but not therefore divided from the heavenly one[155].
-Her behaviour towards her husband as described by her biographers can
-hardly be called becoming to her station as queen. She was so devoted to
-charitable work, we are told, that she often kept the king waiting at
-meals, a source of great annoyance to him, and under some pretext she
-frequently left him at night. If a man of learning came to the court she
-would devote herself to him, entirely neglecting her duty to the
-king[156]. Quarrels between the couple were frequent, and the king
-declared that he was married to a nun rather than to a queen[157]. The
-murder of her younger brother finally turned the balance of the queen's
-feelings against the king. With fearless determination she broke down all
-barriers. She was not lacking in personal courage, and had once calmly
-confronted a popular uproar caused by her having set fire to a sacred
-grove[158]. Now, regardless of consequences, she left the court and went
-to Noyon, where she sought the protection of Bishop Medardus ([Dagger]
-545), who was influential among the many powerful prelates of his
-day[159]. But the bishop hesitated, his position was evidently not so
-assured that he could, by acceding to the queen's request, risk drawing on
-himself the king's anger[160]. However Radegund's stern admonition
-prevailed: 'If you refuse to consecrate me,' she cried, 'a lamb will be
-lost to the flock[161].' Medardus so far consented as to consecrate her a
-deaconess, a term applied at the time to those who, without belonging to
-any special order, were under the protection of the Church.
-
-In the oratory of St Jumer Radegund now offered up the embroidered clothes
-and jewelry she was wearing, her robe (indumentum), her precious stones
-(gemma), and her girdle weighty with gold. Both her biographers[162] lay
-stress on this act of self-denial, which was the more noteworthy as love
-of gorgeous apparel and jewelry was characteristic of early Frankish
-royalty. Kings and queens were content to live in rural dwellings which
-were little more than barns; life in cities was altogether uncongenial to
-them, but they made up for this by a display of sumptuous clothes as a
-mark of their rank. Already during her life with the king Radegund is
-described as longing for a hair-cloth garment as a sign of unworldliness.
-She now definitely adopted the raiment of a nun, a dress made of undyed
-wool.
-
-She subsequently wandered westwards from Noyon and came into the district
-between Tours and Poitiers, where she settled for some time at a 'villa'
-her husband had given her called Sais[163]. She entered into friendly
-relations with the recluse Jean of Chînon (Johannes Monasteriensis[164]),
-a native of Brittany, who with many other recluses like himself enjoyed
-the reputation of great holiness. Jean of Chînon is represented as
-strengthening Radegund in her resolution to devote herself to religion,
-and it is probable that he helped her with practical advice.
-
-Radegund now devoted herself to the relief of distress of every kind, her
-practical turn of mind leading her to offer help in physical as well as in
-mental cases. Her biographer tells us how--like a new Martha, with a love
-of active life--she shrank from no disease, not even from leprosy[165].
-
-When she saw how many men and women sought her relief the wish to provide
-permanently for them arose. She owned property outside Poitiers which she
-devoted to founding a settlement for women; in all probability she also
-had a house for men near it[166]. Various references to the settlement
-show that it extended over a considerable area. Like other country
-residences or 'villae,' it was surrounded by walls and had the look of a
-fortress, although situated in a peaceful district. As many as two hundred
-nuns lived here at the time of Radegund's death[167]. When the house was
-ready to receive its inmates, they entered it in a procession starting
-from Poitiers. We hear that by this time the doings of Radegund 'had so
-far increased her reputation that crowds collected on the roofs to see
-them pass.'
-
-King Clothacar, however, did not calmly submit to being deserted by his
-wife; he determined to go to Poitiers with his son to find her and to take
-her back. But the queen, firm in her resolve, declared she would sooner
-die than return to her husband. She notified this resolution to Bishop
-Germanus of Paris, who besought the king not to go to Poitiers. His
-entreaties were successful. Clothacar left his wife unmolested, and seems
-to have come to some kind of agreement with her. In her letter to the
-bishops, Radegund speaks of him as the noble lord, King Clothacar, not as
-her husband.
-
-Radegund did not herself preside over the women in her nunnery. With their
-consent the youthful Agnes, the pupil of Radegund, but by no means her
-intellectual equal, was appointed abbess. Difficulties very soon occurred
-between Radegund and the bishop of Poitiers, who was probably jealous of
-her attracting religious women from himself. Radegund is said to have
-gone to Arles in order to learn about the life of the women gathered
-together there. Against the accuracy of this statement it is urged[168]
-that a written copy of the rule, together with an eloquent exhortation to
-religious perfection and virtue, was forwarded from Arles by the Abbess
-Caesaria ([Dagger] c. 560), the second of that name.
-
-The rule was established in Poitiers in 559. In the previous year King
-Clothacar, Radegund's husband, through the death of his brothers and their
-sons, had become sole king of France[169]. His monarchy thus included the
-whole of what is now called France, the contiguous districts of Burgundy
-and Thüringen, and the lands which had been taken from the Goths in Italy
-and Spain. This great kingdom remained united for a few years only. In 561
-Clothacar died and his realm was divided by his four sons, with whose
-reigns a tempestuous period begins in the history of the Franks. During
-more than forty years the rivalry and jealousy of the monarchs, aggravated
-by the mutual hatred of the queens Brunihild and Fredegund, overwhelmed
-the country with plots, counterplots, and unceasing warfare.
-
-An eloquent appeal to the kings was called forth from the historian
-Gregory by the contemplation of this state of things. It is contained in
-the preface to the fifth book of his history. Calling upon them to desist
-from the complications of civil war, he thus addresses them:
-
-'What are you bent on? What do you ask for? Have you not all in plenty?
-There is luxury in your homes; in your storehouses wine, corn, and oil
-abound; gold and silver are heaped up in your treasuries. One thing only
-you lack; while you have not peace, you have not the grace of God. Why
-must the one snatch things from the other? Why must the one covet the
-other's goods?'
-
-Living at Poitiers Radegund was close to the scene of these turmoils. The
-cities of Tours and Poitiers had fallen to the share of Charibert. When he
-died in 562 his kingdom was divided between his three brothers by cities
-rather than by districts. Tours and Poitiers fell to Sigebert of Rheims,
-who was comparatively peace-loving among these brothers. But his brother
-Chilperic of Soissons, dissatisfied with his own share, invaded Touraine
-and Poitou and forced Poitiers to submit to him. He was subsequently made
-to give way to Sigebert, but this did not bring their feuds to an end. In
-575 Sigebert was raised on the shield and proclaimed king of Neustria (the
-western part of France), but on being lifted down from the shield he was
-forthwith assassinated. New complications resulted and new factions were
-formed. In the interest of her son, Brunihild, the powerful widow of
-Sigebert, pursued with inveterate hatred Chilperic and his wife, the
-renowned Fredegund, for she looked upon Fredegund as the assassin of
-Sigebert her husband and of Galesuith her sister.
-
-Radegund had close relations with these impetuous, headstrong and
-combative persons. King Sigebert was throughout well disposed towards her.
-
-'In order to show his love and affection for her,' says Gregory[170], 'he
-sent a deputation of ecclesiastics to the Emperor Justinus II and his wife
-Sophia at Constantinople.' The Franks entertained friendly relations with
-the imperial court, and the surviving members of Radegund's family had
-found a refuge there. In due course gifts were sent to Radegund,--a
-fragment of the Holy Cross set in gold and jewels, together with other
-relics of apostles and martyrs. These relics arrived at Tours some time
-between 566 and 573[171]. It was Radegund's wish that they should be
-fetched from Tours to her nunnery by a procession headed by the bishop of
-Poitiers. But Bishop Maroveus, who was always ready to thwart the queen,
-forthwith left for his country seat when he heard of her request[172].
-Radegund, much incensed, applied in her difficulty to King Sigebert, and
-Eufronius, bishop of Tours, was ordered to conduct the translation.
-
-Radegund's adoption of the religious profession in no way diminished her
-intercourse with the outside world or the influence she had had as queen.
-We find her described as living on terms of friendship with Queen
-Brunihild 'whom she loved dearly.' Even Queen Fredegund, Brunihild's rival
-and enemy, seems to have had some kind of intimacy with her. Fortunatus in
-one of his poems suggests that Fredegund had begged Radegund to offer
-prayers for the prosperity of her husband Chilperic.
-
-It seems that Radegund's word was generally esteemed, for in a family feud
-when a certain Gundovald claimed to be the son of Clothacar and aspired to
-the succession, we find him coupling the name of Radegund with that of
-Ingetrud in asseveration of his statements.
-
-'If you would have the truth of what I declare proven,' Gundovald
-exclaimed, 'go and enquire of Radegund of Poitiers and of Ingetrud of
-Tours; they will tell you that what I maintain is the truth[173].'
-
-In an age of endless entanglements, Radegund evidently did her best to
-mediate between contending parties. 'She was always favourable to peace
-and interested in the weal of the realm whatever changes befell,' writes
-the nun Baudonivia[174]. 'She esteemed the kings and prayed for their
-welfare, and taught us nuns always to pray for their safety. If she heard
-that they had fallen out she felt troubled: and she appealed in writing,
-sometimes to one, sometimes to another, in order that they should not
-fight and war together, but keep peaceful, so that the country might rest
-securely. Similarly she exhorted the leaders to help the great princes
-with sensible advice, in order that the common people and the lands under
-their rule might prosper.'
-
-What is here said of her peace-loving disposition is corroborated by
-traits in her character mentioned by Gregory and Fortunatus. The friendly
-intercourse between Radegund and Fortunatus necessitates a few remarks on
-the life and doings of this latter-day Roman poet before he came to
-Poitiers and entered the Church.
-
-For years Fortunatus had lived the life of a fashionable man of letters at
-Ravenna, but about the year 568 the occupation of that city by the
-Langobards forced him to leave Italy. He wandered north from court to
-court, from city to city, staying sometimes with a barbarian prince,
-sometimes with a Church-prelate, who, one and the other, were equally
-ready to entertain the cultivated southerner. In return for the
-hospitality so liberally bestowed on him he celebrated his personal
-relations to his benefactors in complimentary verses. He has good wishes
-for prelates on the occasion of their appointment, flattering words for
-kings, and pleasant greetings for friends. In some of his poems he gives
-interesting descriptions of the districts through which he has travelled,
-his account of a part of the Rhine valley being specially graphic[175]. He
-glorifies the saints of the Church in terms formerly used for celebrating
-classic divinities, and addresses Bishop Medardus of Noyon as the
-possessor of Olympus[176]. He even brings in Venus to celebrate a royal
-wedding, and lets her utter praises of the queen Brunihild[177].
-
-Besides these poetical writings Fortunatus has left prose accounts of
-several of his contemporaries. An easy-going man of pleasant disposition,
-he combined in a curious way the traditions of cultured Latinity with the
-theological bent peculiar to the Christian literature of the day. His
-poems, though somewhat wanting in ideas, show a ready power of
-versification and a great facility in putting things politely and
-pleasantly. He wrote some hymns for church celebration which became widely
-known. The one beginning 'Pange, lingua, gloriosi' was adopted into the
-Roman Liturgy for the adoration of the Cross on Good Friday, and it was
-repeatedly modified and re-written during the Middle Ages. Another hymn
-written by him is the celebrated 'Vexilla regis prodeunt,' the words of
-which are comparatively poor, but the tune, the authorship of which is
-unknown, has secured it world-wide fame[178].
-
-The relic of the Holy Cross kept at Poitiers may have inspired Fortunatus
-with the idea of composing these hymns; in a flattering epistle, written
-obviously at Radegund's request, he thanks Justinus and Sophia of
-Constantinople for the splendour of their gift to her[179].
-
-Fortunatus had come to Tours on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St Martin,
-to whose intercession he attributed the restoration of his eyesight.
-Passing through Poitiers he made the acquaintance of Radegund, who at once
-acquired a great influence over him.
-
-'Radegund wished me to stay, so I stayed,' he writes from Poitiers to some
-friends[180], and he enlarges on the superiority, intellectual and
-otherwise, of the queen, whose plain clothing and simple mode of life
-greatly impressed him. Naming Eustachia, Fabiola, Melania, and all the
-other holy women he can think of, he describes how she surpasses them all.
-'She exemplifies whatever is praiseworthy in them,' he says; 'I come
-across deeds in her such as I only read about before. Her spirit is
-clothed with flesh that has been overcome, and which while yet abiding in
-her body holds all things cheap as dross. Dwelling on earth, she has
-entered heaven, and freed from the shackles of sense, seeks companionship
-in the realms above. All pious teaching is food to her; whether taught by
-Gregory or Basil, by bold Athanasius or gentle Hilary (two who were
-companions in the light of one cause); whether thundered by Ambrose or
-flashed forth by Jerome; whether poured forth by Augustine in unceasing
-flow, by gentle Sedulius or subtle Orosius. It is as though the rule of
-Caesarius had been written for her. She feeds herself with food such as
-this and refuses to take meat unless her mind be first satisfied. I will
-not say more of what by God's witness is manifest. Let everyone who can
-send her poems by religious writers; they will be esteemed as great gifts
-though the books be small. For he who gives holy writings to her may hold
-himself as giving to the accepted temples (templa) of God.'
-
-Judging from this passage, Nisard, the modern editor of Fortunatus, thinks
-it probable that Radegund was acquainted with Greek as well as with
-Latin[181], a statement which one cannot endorse.
-
-The queen was much interested in the poet's writings. 'For many years,' he
-writes in one poem, 'I have been here composing verses at your order;
-accept these in which I address you in the terms you merit[182].'
-
-Radegund too wrote verses under Fortunatus' guidance. 'You have sent me
-great verses on small tablets,' he writes. 'You succeed in giving back
-honey to dead wax; on festal days you prepare grand entertainments, but I
-hunger more for your words than for your food. The little poems you send
-are full of pleasing earnestness; you charm our thoughts by these
-words[183].'
-
-Among the poems of Fortunatus are found two which modern criticism no
-longer hesitates in attributing to Radegund. They are epistles in verse
-written in the form of elegies, and were sent by the queen to some of her
-relatives at Constantinople. Judging by internal evidence a third poem,
-telling the story of Galesuith, Queen Brunihild's sister, who was murdered
-shortly after her marriage to King Chilperic, was composed by her also;
-though Nisard claims for her not the form of the poem but only its
-inspiration[184]. 'The cry,' he says, 'which sounds through these lines,
-is the cry of a woman. Not of a German woman only, who has in her the
-expression of tender and fiery passion, but a suggestion of the strength
-of a woman of all countries and for all time.' The lament in this poem is
-intoned by several women in turn. Whoever may have composed it, the depth
-of feeling which it displays is certainly most remarkable.
-
-One of these poems written by Radegund is addressed to her cousin
-Hermalafred, who had fled from Thüringen when Radegund was captured, and
-who had afterwards taken service in the imperial army of Justinian[185].
-Hermalafred was endeared to Radegund by the recollections of her
-childhood, and in vivid remembrance of events which had made her a captive
-she begins her letter[186] in the following strain:
-
-'Sad is condition of war! Jealous is fate of human things! How proud
-kingdoms are shattered by a sudden fall! Those long-prosperous heights
-(culmina) lie fallen, destroyed by fire in the great onset. Flickering
-tongues of flame lapped round the dwelling which before rose in royal
-splendour. Grey ashes cover the glittering roof which rose on high shining
-with burnished metal. Its rulers are captive in the enemy's power, its
-chosen bands have fallen to lowly estate. The crowd of comely servants all
-dwelling together were smitten to the dust in one day; the brilliant
-circle, the multitude of powerful dependents, no grave contains them, they
-lack the honours of death. More brilliant than the fire shone the gold of
-her hair, that of my father's sister, who lay felled to the ground, white
-as milk. Alas, for the corpses unburied that cover the battle-field, a
-whole people collected together in one burial place. Not Troy alone
-bewails her destruction, the land of Thüringen has experienced a like
-carnage. Here a matron in fetters is dragged away by her streaming hair,
-unable to bid a sad farewell to her household gods. The captive is not
-allowed to press his lips to the threshold, nor turn his face towards what
-he will never more behold. Bare feet in their tread trample in the blood
-of a husband, the loving sister passes over her brother's corpse. The
-child still hangs on its mother's lips though snatched from her embrace;
-in funeral wail no tear is shed. Less sad is the fate of the child who
-loses its life, the gasping mother has lost even the power of tears.
-Barbarian though I am, I could not surpass the weeping though my tears
-flowed for ever. Each had his sorrow, I had it all, my private grief was
-also the public grief. Fate was kind to those whom the enemy cut down; I
-alone survive to weep over the many. But not only do I sorrow for my dead
-relatives, those too I deplore whom life has preserved. Often my
-tear-stained face is at variance with my eyes; my murmurs are silenced,
-but my grief is astir. I look and long for the winds to bring me a
-message, from none of them comes there a sign. Hard fate has snatched from
-my embrace the kinsman by whose loving presence I once was cheered. Ah,
-though so far away, does not my solicitude pursue thee? has the bitterness
-of misfortune taken away thy sweet love? Recall what from thy earliest age
-upwards, O Hermalafred, I, Radegund, was ever to thee. How much thou didst
-love me when I was but an infant; O son of my father's brother, O most
-beloved among those of my kin! Thou didst supply for me the place of my
-dead father, of my esteemed mother, of a sister and of a brother. Held by
-thy gentle hand, hanging on thy sweet kisses, as a child I was soothed by
-thy tender speech. Scarce a time there was when the hour did not bring
-thee, now ages go by and I hear not a word from thee! I wrestle with the
-wild anguish that is hidden in my bosom; oh, that I could call thee back,
-friend, whenever or wherever it might be. If father, or mother, or royal
-office has hitherto held thee, though thou didst hasten now to me, thy
-coming is late. Perhaps 'tis a sign of fate that I shall soon miss thee
-altogether, dearest, for unrequited affection cannot long continue. I used
-to be anxious when one house did not shelter us; when thou wast absent, I
-thought thee gone for ever. Now the east holds thee as the west holds me;
-the ocean's waters restrain me, and thou art kept away from me by the sea
-reddened by the beams of the sun (unda rubri). The earth's expanse
-stretches between those who are dear to each other, a world divides those
-whom no distance separated before.'
-
-She goes on to speculate where her cousin may be, and she says if she were
-not held by her monastery she would go to him; storm and wind and the
-thought of shipwreck would be nothing to her. The fear of incriminating
-her, she says, was the cause of the death of her murdered brother. Would
-that she had died instead of him! She beseeches Hermalafred to send news
-of himself and of his sisters, and ends her letter with these words: 'May
-Christ grant my prayer, may this letter reach those beloved ones, so that
-a letter indited with sweet messages may come to me in return! May the
-sufferings wrought by languishing hope be alleviated by the swift advent
-of sure tidings!'
-
-This poem expresses great and lasting affection for her race. But her
-relatives were a source of continued grief to the queen. She received no
-reply to her letter to Hermalafred, and later she heard of his death. She
-received this news from his nephew Artachis, who sent her at the same time
-a present of silk, and Radegund then wrote another letter[187] which is
-addressed to Artachis and is even sadder in tone. In it she deplores the
-death of Hermalafred, and asks the boy Artachis to let her have frequent
-news of himself sent to her monastery.
-
-It is pleasant to turn from the sad side of Radegund's life which these
-poems exhibit to her friendly intercourse with Fortunatus, which was no
-doubt a source of great comfort to her during the last years of her life.
-With the exception of short intervals for journeys, the Latin poet lived
-entirely at Poitiers, where he adopted the religious profession, and dwelt
-in constant communication with Radegund and the abbess Agnes, in whose
-society he learned to forget the land of his birth. The numerous poems and
-verses which he has addressed to these ladies throw a strong light on his
-attitude towards them and their great affection for him.
-
-Radegund was wont to decorate the altar of her church with a profusion of
-flowers[188]. Again and again the poet sends her flowers, accompanying his
-gift with a few lines. With a basket of violets he sends the
-following[189]:
-
-'If the time of year had given me white lilies, or had offered me roses
-laden with perfume, I had culled them as usual in the open or in the
-ground of my small garden, and had sent them, small gifts to great ladies.
-But since I am short of the first and wanting in the second, he who offers
-violets must in love be held to bring roses. Among the odorous herbs which
-I send, these purple violets have a nobleness of their own. They shine
-tinted with purple which is regal, and unite in their petals both perfume
-and beauty. What they represent may you both exemplify, that by
-association a transient gift may gain lasting worth.'
-
-The interchange of gifts between the poet and the ladies was mutual, the
-nuns of Ste Croix lacked not the good things of this world and were
-generous in giving. Fortunatus thanks them for gifts of milk, prunes,
-eggs, and tempting dishes[190]. On one occasion they send him a meal of
-several courses, vegetables and meat, almost too much for one servant to
-carry, and he describes his greedy (gulosus) enjoyment of it in graphic
-terms[191]. Are we to take the lines literally which tell us that when
-they entertained him at dinner the table was scarcely visible for the
-roses with which it was strewn, and that the foliage and flowers spread
-about made the room into a bower of greenery[192]?
-
-Sometimes a fit of indigestion was the result of the too liberal enjoyment
-of what his friends so freely provided[193]. The poet was evidently fond
-of the pleasures of the table, and accentuates the material rather than
-the spiritual side of things. Once addressing Agnes he tells her that she
-shines in the blending of two things, she provides refreshment for the
-poet's mind and excellent food for his body[194].
-
-But the 6th century poet is generally somewhat plain-spoken on delicate
-topics. In a poem addressed to Radegund and Agnes he openly defends
-himself against the imputation that the tone of his relations to them is
-other than is signified by the terms mother and sister by which he is wont
-to address them[195]. Still these platonic relations do not preclude the
-use of expressions which border on the amorous, for he tells them that
-they each possess one half of him[196], and he calls Radegund the light of
-his eyes[197].
-
-'My dear mother, my sweet sister,' he writes, 'what shall I say, left
-alone in the absence of the love of my heart[198]?...' And again[199],
-'May a good night enfold my mother and my sister; this brings them the
-good wishes of a son and a brother. May the choir of angels visit your
-hearts and hold sweet converse with your thoughts. The time of night
-forces me to be brief in my greetings; I am sending only six lines of
-verse for you both!'
-
-The vocabulary used to denote the different kinds of human affection
-contains, no doubt, many terms common to all, and if the poems of
-Fortunatus sometimes suggest the lover, it must be remembered that as
-poems of friendship they are among the earliest of their kind. They are
-throughout elegant, graceful, and characterized by a playful tenderness
-which a translator must despair of rendering.
-
-Radegund died in the year 587, and her death was a terrible loss to the
-inmates of her settlement. Gregory, bishop of Tours, who officiated at the
-burial, gives a detailed description of it, telling how some two hundred
-women crowded round the bier, bewailing her death in such words as
-these[200]:
-
-'To whom, mother, hast thou left us orphans? To whom then shall we turn in
-our distress? We left our parents, our relatives and our homes, and we
-followed thee. What have we before us now, but tears unceasing, and grief
-that never can end? Verily, this monastery is to us more than the
-greatness of village and city.... The earth is now darkened to us, this
-place has been straitened since we no longer behold thy countenance. Woe
-unto us who are left by our holy mother! Happy those who left this world
-whilst thou wast still alive...!'
-
-The nun Baudonivia says that she cannot speak of the death of Radegund
-without sobs choking her. Her account was written some time after
-Radegund's death during the rule of the abbess Didimia to whom it is
-dedicated; Didimia probably succeeded Leubover, who witnessed the serious
-outbreak of the nuns at Poitiers. This outbreak throws an interesting
-light on the temper of professed religious women at this period, and
-illustrates how needful it was that a religious establishment should be
-ruled by a woman of character and determination at a time when the
-monastic system was only in its infancy.
-
-
-§ 3. The Revolt of the Nuns at Poitiers[201]. Convent Life in the North.
-
-The revolt of the nuns at Poitiers, which happened within a few years of
-the death of Radegund, shows more than anything else the imperious and the
-unbridled passions that were to be found at this period in a nunnery.
-Evidently the adoption of the religious profession did not deter women
-from openly rebelling against the authority of the ministers of the
-Church, and from carrying out their purpose by force of arms. The outbreak
-at Poitiers, of which Gregory has given a description, shows what proud,
-vindictive, and unrelenting characters the Frankish convent of the 6th
-century harboured.
-
-Already during Radegund's lifetime difficulties had arisen. King Chilperic
-had placed his daughter Basina in the nunnery, and after a time he asked
-that she should leave to be married. Radegund refused and her authority
-prevailed, but we shall find this Basina taking an active part in the
-rebellion. Other incidents show how difficult it was for Radegund even to
-uphold discipline. A nun escaped through a window by aid of a rope and,
-taking refuge in the basilica of St Hilary, made accusations which
-Gregory, who was summoned to enquire into the matter, declared to be
-unfounded. The fugitive repented and was permitted to return to the
-nunnery; she was hoisted up by means of ropes so that she might enter by
-the way she had gone out. She asked to be confined in a cell apart from
-the community, and there she remained in seclusion till the news of the
-rebellion encouraged her to again break loose.
-
-Agnes the abbess appointed by Radegund died in 589. The convent chose a
-certain Leubover to succeed her, but this appointment roused the ire of
-Chrodield, another inmate of the nunnery.
-
-Chrodield held herself to be the daughter of King Charibert, and relying
-on her near connection with royalty persuaded forty nuns to take an oath
-that they would help her to remove the hated Leubover and would appoint
-her, Chrodield, as abbess in her stead. Led by Chrodield who had been
-joined by her cousin Basina, the daughter of Chilperic mentioned above,
-the whole party left the nunnery. 'I am going to my royal relatives,'
-Chrodield said, 'to inform them of the contumely we have experienced. Not
-as daughters of kings are we treated but as though we were lowly
-born[202].'
-
-Leaving Poitiers the women came to Tours where Chrodield applied for
-assistance to the bishop and historian Gregory. In vain he admonished her,
-promising to speak to Bishop Maroveus of Poitiers in her behalf, and
-urging her to abide by his decision, as the penalty might be
-excommunication.
-
-The feeling of indignation in the women must have been strong, since
-nothing he could say dissuaded them from their purpose. 'Nothing shall
-prevent us from appealing to the kings,' said Chrodield, 'to them we are
-nearly related.'
-
-The women had come on foot from Poitiers to Tours, regardless of
-hardships. They had had no food and arrived at a time of year when the
-roads were deep in mud. Gregory at last persuaded them to postpone their
-departure for the court till the summer.
-
-Then Chrodield, leaving the nuns under the care of Basina, continued her
-journey to her uncle, King Guntchram of Orléans, who at the time was
-residing at Chalôns-sur-Saône. She was well received by him and came back
-to Tours there to await the convocation of bishops who were to enquire
-into the rights of her case. But she found on her return that many of her
-followers had disbanded, and some had married. The arrival too of the
-bishops was delayed, so that she felt it expedient to return with her
-followers to Poitiers where they took possession of the basilica of St
-Hilary.
-
-They now prepared for open hostility. 'We are queens,' they said, 'and we
-shall not return to the monastery unless the abbess is deposed.'
-
-At this juncture they were joined by other dissatisfied spirits,
-'murderers, adulterers, law-breakers and other wrong-doers,' as Gregory
-puts it[203]. The nun too who had previously escaped and been taken back,
-now broke loose from her cell and returned to the basilica of Hilary.
-
-The bishop of Bordeaux and his suffragan bishops of Angoulême, Perigueux,
-and Poitiers, now assembled by order of the king (Guntchram), and called
-upon the women to come into the monastery, and on their refusal the
-prelates entered the basilica of St Hilary in a body urging them to obey.
-The women refused, and the ban of excommunication was pronounced, upon
-which they and their followers attacked the prelates. In great fear the
-bishops and clergy made off helter-skelter, not even pausing to bid each
-other farewell. One deacon was so terrified that in his eagerness to get
-away he did not even ride down to the ford, but plunged with his horse
-straight into the river.
-
-King Childebert ([Dagger] 596), the son and successor of King Sigebert,
-now ordered Count Macco to put an end to the rebellion by force of arms,
-while Gondegisel, bishop of Bordeaux, sent a circular letter to his
-brethren, describing the indignity to which he had been exposed.
-Chrodield's chance of success was evidently dwindling, when she determined
-to carry her point by a bold assault, the account of which may fitly stand
-in the words of Gregory[204].
-
-'The vexations,' he says, 'which sown by the devil had sprung up in the
-monastery at Poitiers, daily increased in troublesomeness. For Chrodield,
-having collected about her, as mentioned above, a band of murderers,
-wrong-doers, law-breakers, and vagrants of all kinds, dwelt in open revolt
-and ordered her followers to break into the nunnery at night and forcibly
-to bear off the abbess. But the abbess, on hearing the noise of their
-approach, asked to be carried in front of the shrine of the Holy Cross,
-for she was suffering from a gouty foot, and thought that the Holy Cross
-would serve her as a protection in danger. The armed bands rushed in, ran
-about the monastery by the light of a torch in search of the abbess, and
-entering the oratory found her extended on the ground in front of the
-shrine of the Holy Cross. Then one of them, more audacious than the rest,
-while about to commit the impious deed of cutting her down with his sword,
-was stabbed by another, through the intercession I believe of Divine
-Providence. He fell in his own blood and did not carry out the intention
-he had impiously formed. Meanwhile the prioress Justina, together with
-other sisters, spread the altar-cover, which lay before the cross, over
-the abbess, and extinguished the altar candles. But those who rushed in
-with bared swords and lances tore her clothes, almost lacerated the hands
-of the nuns, and carried off the prioress whom they mistook for the abbess
-in the darkness, and, with her cloak dragged off and her hair coming down,
-they would have given her into custody at the basilica of St Hilary. But
-as they drew near the church, and the sky grew somewhat lighter, they saw
-she was not the abbess and told her to go back to the monastery. Coming
-back themselves they secured the real abbess, dragged her away, and placed
-her in custody near the basilica of St Hilary in a place where Basina was
-living, and placed a watch over her by the door that no one should come to
-her rescue. Then in the dark of night they returned to the monastery and
-not being able to find a light, set fire to a barrel which they took from
-the larder and which had been painted with tar and was now dry. By the
-light of the bonfire they kindled, they plundered the monastery of all its
-contents, leaving nothing but what they could not carry off. This happened
-seven days before Easter.'
-
-The bishop of Poitiers made one more attempt to interfere. He sent to
-Chrodield and asked her to set the abbess free on pain of his refusing to
-celebrate the Easter festival. 'If you do not release her,' he said, 'I
-shall bring her help with the assembled citizens.' But Chrodield
-emboldened by her success said to her followers: 'If anyone dare come to
-her rescue, slay her.'
-
-She seems now to have been in possession of the monastery; still we find
-defection among her party. Basina, who throughout had shown a changeable
-disposition, repented and went to the imprisoned Leubover, who received
-her with open arms. The bishops, mindful of the treatment they had
-received, still refused to assemble in Poitiers while the state of affairs
-continued. But Count Macco with his armed bands made an attack on the
-women and their followers, causing 'some to be beaten down, others struck
-down by spears, and those who made most strenuous opposition to be cut
-down by the sword.'
-
-Chrodield came forth from the nunnery holding on high the relic of the
-Cross; 'Do not, I charge you, use force of arms against me,' she cried, 'I
-am a queen, daughter to one king and cousin to another. Do not attack me,
-a time may come when I will take my revenge.' But no one took any notice
-of her. Her followers were dragged from the monastery and severely
-chastised. The bishops assembled and instituted a long enquiry into the
-grievances of Chrodield, and the accusations brought against Leubover by
-her. They seem to have been unfounded or insignificant. Leubover justified
-herself and returned to the monastery. Chrodield and Basina left Poitiers
-and went to the court of King Childebert.
-
-At the next Church convocation the king tendered a request that these
-women should be freed from the ban of excommunication. Basina asked
-forgiveness and was allowed to return to the monastery. But the proud
-Chrodield declared that she would not set foot there while the abbess
-Leubover remained in authority. She maintained her independence and went
-to live in a 'villa' which the king had granted her, and from that time
-she passes from the stage of history.
-
-The revolt of the nuns at Poitiers, which for two years defied the efforts
-of churchmen and laymen, is the more noteworthy in that it does not stand
-alone. Within a year we find a similar outbreak threatening the nunnery at
-Tours where a certain Berthegund, similarly disappointed of becoming
-abbess, collected malefactors and others about her and resorted to violent
-measures. The circumstances, which are also described by Gregory, differ
-in some respects from those of the insurrection at Ste Croix[205].
-
-Ingetrud, the mother of Berthegund, had founded a nunnery at Tours close
-to the church of St Martin, and she urged her daughter, who was married,
-to come and live with her. When Berthegund did so, her husband appealed to
-Gregory, who threatened her with excommunication if she persisted in her
-resolve. She returned to her husband, but subsequently left him again and
-sent for advice to her brother who was bishop of Bordeaux. He decreed that
-she need not live with her husband if she preferred convent life. But when
-this bishop of Bordeaux died, his sister Berthegund and her mother
-Ingetrud quarrelled as to the inheritance of his property, and Ingetrud,
-much incensed against her daughter, determined at least to keep from
-Berthegund her own possessions at the nunnery and succession to her
-position there. She therefore appointed a niece of hers to succeed her as
-abbess after her death. When she died the convent of nuns looked upon this
-appointment as an infringement of their rights, but Gregory persuaded them
-to keep quiet and abide by the decision of their late abbess. Berthegund
-however would not agree to it. Against the advice of the bishop she
-appealed to the authority of King Childebert, who admitted her claim to
-the property. 'Furnished with his letter she came to the monastery and
-carried off all the moveable property, leaving nothing but its bare
-walls,' Gregory says. Afterwards she settled at Poitiers, where she spoke
-evil of her cousin the abbess of Tours, and altogether 'she did so much
-evil it were difficult to tell of it all.'
-
-From the consideration of these events in central France we turn to the
-religious foundations for women in the northern districts. With the
-beginning of the 7th century a change which directly influenced convent
-life becomes apparent in the relations between the Frankish rulers and the
-representatives of Christianity. Influential posts at court were more and
-more frequently occupied by prelates of the Church, and kings and queens
-acted more directly as patrons of churches and monasteries. Hitherto the
-centres of religious influence had been in southern and central France,
-where the Gallo-Frankish population and influence predominated, and where
-monasteries flourished close to cities which had been strongholds of the
-Roman system of administration. New religious settlements now grew up
-north of the rivers Seine and Marne, where the pure Frankish element
-prevailed and where Christianity regained its foothold owing to the
-patronage of ruling princes.
-
-Whatever had survived of Latin culture and civilisation in these districts
-had disappeared before the influence of the heathen invaders; the men
-whose work it was to re-evangelise these districts found few traces of
-Christianity. Vedast (St Vaast, [Dagger] 540), who was sent by bishop
-Remigius (St Rémy) of Rheims ([Dagger] 532) into the marshy districts of
-Flanders, found no Christians at Arras about the year 500, and only the
-ruins of one ancient church, which he rebuilt[206]. The author of the life
-of Vedast gives the ravages made in these districts by the Huns as the
-reason for the disappearance of Latin culture and of Christianity. But the
-author of the life of Eleutherius, bishop of Tournai ([Dagger] 531), holds
-that the Christians had fled from these districts to escape from the
-inroads of the heathen Franks[207].
-
-It was chiefly by the foundation of monasteries in these districts that
-Christianity gained ground during the 7th century. 'Through the
-establishment of monasteries,' says Gérard[208], 'the new social order
-gained a foothold in the old Salic lands.' Among the names of those who
-took an active part in this movement stand the following: Wandregisil (St
-Vandrille, [Dagger] 665) founder of the abbey of Fontenelle; Waneng
-([Dagger] c. 688) founder of Fécamp; Filibert ([Dagger] 684) founder of
-Jumièges; Eligius bishop of Noyon ([Dagger] 658) and Audoenus (St Ouen,
-[Dagger] 683) archbishop of Rouen. These men were in direct contact with
-the court and were much patronised by the ruling princes, especially by
-the holy queen Balthild. Early and reliable accounts concerning most of
-them are extant[209].
-
-With regard to political events the 7th century is the most obscure period
-of Frankish history, for the history of Gregory of Tours comes to an end
-in 591. Feuds and quarrels as violent as those he depicts continued, and
-important constitutional changes took place as their result. The vast
-dominions brought under Frankish rule showed signs of definitely
-crystallising into Austrasia which included the purely Frankish districts
-of the north, and Burgundy and Neustria where Gallo-Frankish elements were
-prevalent.
-
-The latter half of the life of the famous Queen Brunihild[210] takes its
-colouring from the rivalry between these kingdoms; during fifty years she
-was one of the chief actors in the drama of Frankish history. At one time
-she ruled conjointly with her son Childebert, and then as regent for her
-grandsons, over whom she domineered greatly. In the year 613, when she was
-over eighty years old, she was put to a cruel death by the nobles of
-Austrasia.
-
-The judgments passed on this queen are curiously contradictory. Pope
-Gregory ([Dagger] 604) writes to her praising her great zeal in the cause
-of religion, and thanks her for the protection she has afforded to
-Augustine on his passage through France, which he considers a means to the
-conversion of England[211]. On the other hand the author of the life of St
-Columban[212], whom she expelled from Burgundy, calls her a very
-Jezebel[213]; and the author of the life of Desiderius, who was murdered
-in 608, goes so far as to accuse her of incestuous practices because of
-her marriage with her husband's nephew[214]. Indirect evidence is in
-favour of the conclusion that Queen Brunihild disliked monasticism; she
-was by birth of course a princess of the Gothic dynasty of Spain who had
-accepted Christianity in its Arian form.
-
-During the reign of Brunihild's nephew Clothacar II ([Dagger] 628), under
-whose rule the different provinces were for a time united, a comprehensive
-and most interesting edict was issued, which affords an insight into the
-efforts made to give stability to the relations between princes and the
-representatives of religion. In this edict, under heading 18, we are told
-that 'no maidens, holy widows or religious persons who are vowed to God,
-whether they stay at home or live in monasteries, shall be enticed away,
-or appropriated, or taken in marriage by making use of a special royal
-permit (praeceptum). And if anyone surreptitiously gets hold of a permit,
-it shall have no force. And should anyone by violent or other means carry
-off any such woman and take her to wife, let him be put to death. And if
-he be married in church and the woman who is appropriated, or who is on
-the point of being appropriated, seems to be a consenting party, they
-shall be separated, sent into exile, and their possessions given to their
-natural heirs[215].'
-
-From these injunctions it can be gathered that the re-adjustment of social
-and moral relations was still in progress; women who were vowed to a
-religious life did not necessarily dwell in a religious settlement, and
-even if they did so they were not necessarily safe from being captured and
-thrown into subjection. Clothacar II had three wives at the same time and
-concubines innumerable; plurality of wives was indeed a prerogative of
-these Frankish kings.
-
-Monastic life in northern France at this period was also in process of
-development. It has been mentioned how Radegund adopted the rule of life
-framed and put into writing by Caesarius at Arles. The rule
-contemporaneously instituted by Benedict at Nursia in central Italy spread
-further and further northwards, and was advocated by prelates of the
-Romish Church. It served as the model on which to reform the life of
-existing settlements[216].
-
-During the first few centuries religious houses and communities had been
-founded here and there independently of each other, the mode of life and
-the routine observed depending in each case directly on the founder. Many
-and great were the attempts made by the advocates of convent life to
-formulate the type of an ideal existence outside the pale of social duties
-and family relations, in which piety, work and benevolence should be
-blended in just proportions. The questions how far the prelates of the
-Church should claim authority over the monastery, and what the respective
-positions of abbot or abbess and bishop should be, led to much discussion.
-
-During the period under consideration the rules drafted by different
-leaders of monastic thought were not looked upon as mutually exclusive. We
-are told in the life of Filibert ([Dagger] 684), written by a
-contemporary[217], that he made selections from 'the graces of St Basil,
-the rule of Macarius, the decrees of Benedict and the holy institutions of
-Columban.' Eligius, bishop of Noyon, says in a charter which he drafted
-for the monastery founded by him at Solemny that the inmates of the
-settlement shall follow the rules of St Benedict and of St Columban[218].
-
-Towards the close of the 6th century Columban came from Ireland into
-France and northern Italy and founded a number of religious settlements.
-What rule of life the inmates of these houses followed is not quite clear,
-probably that drafted by Columban. The convents in Elsass, Switzerland and
-Germany, which considered that they owed their foundation to Irish monks,
-were numerous and later became obnoxious to the Church in many ways. For
-in after years, when the feud arose between the Romish and the Irish
-Churches and the latter insisted on her independence, the houses founded
-by Irishmen also claimed freedom and remained separate from those which
-accepted the rule of St Benedict.
-
-The property granted to religious foundations in northern France went on
-increasing throughout the 7th century. The amount of land settled on
-churches and monasteries by princes of the Merovech dynasty was so great
-that on Roth's computation two-thirds of the soil of France was at one
-time in the hands of the representatives of religion[219]. Under the will
-of Dagobert, who first became king of Austrasia in 628 and afterwards of
-the whole of France, large tracts were given away. Through the gifts of
-this king the abbey of St Denis became the richest in France, and his
-great liberality on the one hand towards the Church, on the other towards
-the poor and pilgrims, is emphasized by his biographer. His son Chlodwig
-II, king of Neustria and Burgundy, followed in his footsteps. He was a
-prince of feeble intellect and his reign is remarkable for the power
-increasingly usurped by the house-mayor, who grasped more and more at the
-substance of royal authority while dispensing with its show.
-
-Chlodwig II was married to Balthild, who is esteemed a saint on the
-strength of the monastery she founded and of the gifts she made to the
-Church. There are two accounts of her works; the second is probably a
-re-written amplification of the first, which was drafted within a short
-period of her death[220]. As these accounts were written from the
-religious standpoint, they give scant information on the political
-activity and influence of the queen, which were considerable. They dwell
-chiefly on her gifts, and concern the latter part of her life when she was
-in constant communication with her nunnery.
-
-Balthild was of Anglo-Saxon origin, and her personality and activity form
-the connecting link between the women of France and England. It is
-supposed that she was descended from one of the noble families of Wessex,
-and she favoured all those religious settlements which were in direct
-connection with princesses of the Anglo-Saxon race.
-
-She had been captured on the north coast of France and had been brought to
-Paris as a slave by the house-mayor Erchinoald, who would have married
-her, but she escaped and hid herself. Her beauty and attractions are
-described as remarkable, and she found favour in the eyes of King Chlodwig
-II who made her his wife. The excesses of this king were so great that he
-became imbecile. Balthild with Erchinoald's help governed the kingdom
-during the remainder of her husband's life and after his death in the
-interest of her little sons. From a political point of view she is
-described as 'administering the affairs of the kingdom masculine wise and
-with great strength of mind.' She was especially energetic in opposing
-slavery and forbade the sale of Christians in any part of France. No doubt
-this was due to her own sad experience. She also abolished the poll-tax,
-which had been instituted by the Romans. The Frankish kings had carried it
-on and depended on it for part of their income. Its abolition is referred
-to as a most important and beneficial change[221].
-
-During the lifetime of Chlodwig and for some years after his death the
-rule of Balthild seems to have been comparatively peaceful. The
-house-mayor Erchinoald died in 658 and was succeeded by Ebruin, a man
-whose unbounded personal ambition again plunged the realm into endless
-quarrels. In his own interest Ebruin advocated the appointment of a
-separate king to the province Austrasia, and the second of Balthild's
-little sons was sent there with the house-mayor Wulfoald. But the rivalry
-between the two kingdoms soon added another dramatic chapter to the pages
-of Frankish history. At one time we find Ebruin ruling supreme and
-condemning his rival Leodgar, bishop of Autun, to seclusion in the
-monastery of Luxeuil. An insurrection broke out and Ebruin himself was
-tonsured and cast into Luxeuil. But his chief antagonist Leodgar was
-murdered. Ebruin was then set free and again became house-mayor to one of
-the shadow kings, _rois fainéants_, the unworthy successors of the great
-Merovech. His career throughout reflected the tumultuous temper of the
-age; he was finally assassinated in the year 680.
-
-Queen Balthild had retired from political life long before this. She left
-the court in consequence of an insurrection in Paris which led to the
-assassination of Bishop Sigoberrand, and went to live at a palace near the
-convent of Chelles, which she had founded and which she frequently
-visited. In the account of her life we read of her doing many pious
-deeds[222]. 'A fond mother, she loved the nuns like her own daughters and
-obeyed as her mother the holy abbess whom she had herself appointed; and
-in every respect she did her duty not like a mistress but like a faithful
-servant. Also with the humility of a strong mind she served as an
-example; she did service herself as cook to the nuns, she looked after
-cleanliness,--and, what can I say more,--the purest of pearls, with her
-own hands she removed filth's impurities....'
-
-At various times of her life Balthild had been in friendly intercourse
-with many of the chief prelates and religious dignitaries of the day. She
-had taken a special interest in Eligius, bishop of Noyon, who was a Frank
-by birth and the friend and adviser of King Dagobert.
-
-We hear how Eligius took a special interest in monastic life; how at Paris
-he collected together three hundred women, some of whom were slaves,
-others of noble origin; how he placed them under the guidance of one
-Aurea; and how at Noyon also he gathered together many women[223].
-
-On receiving the news that Eligius was dying, Balthild hurried with her
-sons to Noyon, but they came too late to see him. So great was her love
-for him, that she would have borne away his body to Chelles, her favourite
-settlement, but her wish was miraculously frustrated. The writer of the
-life of Eligius tells that the holy man's body became so heavy that it was
-impossible to move it.
-
-When Eligius appointed Aurea as president of his convent at Paris she was
-living in a settlement at Pavilly which had been founded by Filibert, an
-ecclesiastic also associated with Queen Balthild. On one occasion she sent
-him as an offering her royal girdle, which is described as a mass of gold
-and jewels[224]. It was on land granted to him by Balthild and her sons
-that Filibert founded Jumièges, where he collected together as many as
-nine hundred monks. At his foundation at Pavilly over three hundred women
-lived together under the abbess Ansterbert[225].
-
-It is recorded that Ansterbert and her mother Framehild were among the
-women of northern France who came under the influence of Irish teachers.
-The same is said of Fara ([Dagger] 657)[226], the reputed founder of a
-house at Brie, which was known as Faremoutiers, another settlement
-indebted to Queen Balthild's munificence. Similarly Agilbert and
-Theodohild[227] ([Dagger] c. 660) are supposed to have been taught by
-Irish teachers who had collected women about them at Jouarre on the Marne.
-This house at Jouarre attained a high standard of excellence in regard to
-education, for we are informed that Balthild summoned Berthild[228] from
-here, a woman renowned for her learning, and appointed her abbess over the
-house at Chelles.
-
-Yet another ecclesiastic must be mentioned in connection with Balthild,
-viz. Waneng, a Frank by birth. He was counsellor for some time to the
-queen who gave the cantle of Normandy, the so-called Pays de Caux, into
-his charge. He again founded a settlement for religious women at Fécamp
-which was presided over by Hildemarque.
-
-The foundation and growth of so many religious settlements within so short
-a period and situated in a comparatively small district shows that the
-taste for monastic life was rapidly developing among the Franks.
-
-'At this period in the provinces of Gaul,' says a contemporary writer,
-'large communities of monks and of virgins were formed, not only in
-cultivated districts, in villages, cities and strongholds, but also in
-uncultivated solitudes, for the purpose of living together according to
-the rule of the holy fathers Benedict and Columban[229].'
-
-This statement is taken from the life of Salaberg, a well written
-composition which conveys the impression of truthfulness. Salaberg had
-brought up her daughter Anstrud for the religious life. Her husband had
-joined the monastery at Luxeuil and she and other women were about to
-settle near it when the rumour of impending warfare drove them north
-towards Laon where they dwelt on the Mons Clavatus. This event belongs to
-the period of Queen Balthild's regency. It was while Anstrud was abbess at
-Laon that the settlement was attacked and barely escaped destruction in
-one of the wars waged by the house-mayor Ebruin. This event is described
-in a contemporary life of Anstrud[230].
-
-It is interesting to find a connection growing up at this period between
-the religious houses of northern France and the women of Anglo-Saxon
-England. We learn from the reliable information supplied by Bede that
-Englishwomen frequently went abroad and sometimes settled entirely in
-Frankish convents. We shall return to this subject later in connection
-with the princesses of Kent and East Anglia, some of whom went to France
-and there became abbesses. The house at Brie was ruled successively by
-Saethrith (St Syre), and Aethelburg (St Aubierge), daughters of kings of
-East Anglia, and Earcongotha, a daughter of the king of Kent. About the
-same time Hereswith, a princess of Northumbria, came to reside at
-Chelles[231].
-
-We do not know how far the immigration of these women was due to
-Balthild's connection with the land of her origin, nor do we hear whether
-she found solace in the society of her countrywomen during the last years
-of her life. Her death is conjectured to have taken place in 680.
-
-With it closes the period which has given the relatively largest number of
-women-saints to France, for all the women who by founding nunneries worked
-in the interests of religion have a place in the assembly of the saints.
-They were held as benefactors in the districts which witnessed their
-efforts, and the day of their death was inscribed in the local calendar.
-They have never been officially canonised, but they all figure in the
-Roman Martyrology, and the accounts which tell of their doings have been
-incorporated in the Acts of the Saints.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-
-CONVENTS AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS, A.D. 630-730.
-
-  'Ecce catervim glomerant ad bella phalanges
-  Justitiae comites et virtutum agmina sancta.'
-                                  Ealdhelm, _De laude Virginum_.
-
-
-§ 1. Early Houses in Kent.
-
-The early history of the convent life of women in Anglo-Saxon England is
-chiefly an account of foundations. Information on the establishment of
-religious settlements founded and presided over by women is plentiful, but
-well-nigh a century went by before women who had adopted religion as a
-profession gave any insight into their lives and characters through
-writings of their own. The women who founded monasteries in Anglo-Saxon
-England have generally been raised to the rank of saint.
-
-'In the large number of convents as well as in the names of female saints
-among the Anglo-Saxons,' says Lappenberg[232], 'we may recognise the same
-spirit which attracted the notice of the Roman army among the ancient
-Germans, and was manifested in the esteem and honour of women generally,
-and in the special influence exercised by the priestess.'
-
-A great proportion of the women who founded religious houses were members
-of ruling families. From the first it was usual for a princess to receive
-a grant of land from her husband on the occasion of her marriage, and this
-land together with what she inherited from her father she could dispose of
-at will. She often devoted this property to founding a religious house
-where she established her daughters, and to which she retired either
-during her husband's lifetime or after his death. The great honour paid by
-Christianity to the celibate life and the wide field of action opened to
-a princess in a religious house were strong inducements to the sisters and
-daughters of kings to take the veil.
-
-We have trustworthy information about many of the Anglo-Saxon women who
-founded and presided over religious settlements and whom posterity
-reverenced as saints; for their work has been described by writers who
-either knew them, or gained their information from those who did. But
-there are other women whose names only are mentioned in charters, or
-correspondence, or in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Historians however
-welcome such references as chronological evidence and as proofs of these
-women's real existence; without them they would have nothing to rely upon
-but accounts dating from a later period and often consisting of little
-more than a series of incidents strung together in order to explain the
-miracles with which the saints' relics were locally credited. There is a
-certain similarity between these later accounts and those we have of
-pseudo-saints, but they differ from those of an earlier date, for the
-writers of the 8th and 9th centuries were not actuated like those of a
-later period by the desire to give a miraculous rendering of fact. Bede
-([Dagger] 735) stands pre-eminent among the earlier writers, and our
-admiration for him increases as we discover his immense superiority to
-other early historians.
-
-Most of the women who were honoured as saints in England belong to the
-first hundred years after the acceptance of Christianity in these islands.
-A few other women have been revered as saints who lived in the 10th
-century and came under the influence of the monastic revival which is
-associated with the name of Dunstan ([Dagger] 988). But no woman living
-during Anglo-Norman times has been thus honoured, for the desire to raise
-women to saintship was essentially Anglo-Saxon and was strongest in the
-times which immediately followed the acceptance of Christianity.
-
-It was more than two hundred years after the Anglo-Saxons first set foot
-on British shores that they accepted Christianity. The struggles between
-them and the inhabitants of the island had ended in the recognised
-supremacy of the invaders, and bands of heathen Germans, settling at first
-near the shore, for the sake of the open country, had gradually made their
-way up the fruitful valleys and into adjoining districts till they covered
-the land with a network of settlements. After the restlessness of invasion
-and warfare the Anglo-Saxons settled down to domestic life and
-agriculture, for compared with the British they were eminently tillers of
-the soil. Under their régime the cities built by the Romans and the
-British fastnesses alike fell into decay. The Anglo-Saxons dwelt in
-villages, and the British either lived there in subservience to them or
-else retired into districts of their own which were difficult of access.
-
-The re-introduction of Christianity into these islands is associated with
-the name of Pope Gregory. Zealous and resolute in his efforts to
-strengthen the papal power by sending forth missionaries who were devoted
-to him, he watched his opportunity to gain a foothold for the faith in
-Kent.
-
-Tradition connects the first step in this direction with the name of a
-Frankish princess, and Bede in his Church History tells how the marriage
-of Berhta, daughter of King Charibert of Paris (561-567), to King
-Aethelberht of Kent (586-616) brought an ecclesiastic to Canterbury who
-took possession of the ancient British church of St Martin: this event was
-speedily followed by the arrival of other ecclesiastics from Rome, who
-travelled across France under the leadership of Augustine.
-
-At the time of Augustine's arrival the position of Kent was threatened by
-the growing supremacy of Northumbria. Through the activity both of
-Aethelfrith ([Dagger] 617) and of Eadwin his successor, the land extending
-from the Humber to the Firth of Forth had been united under one rule;
-Northumbria was taking the lead among the petty kingdoms which had been
-formed in different parts of the island. The king of Kent strengthened his
-independent position by accepting the faith which had proved propitious to
-the Franks and by entering into alliance with his neighbours across the
-Channel; and it was no doubt with a view to encouraging peaceful relations
-with the north that Aethelburg the daughter of Aethelberht and Berhta was
-given in marriage to King Eadwin of Northumbria during the reign of her
-brother Eadbald (616-640).
-
-Again the marriage of a Christian princess was made an occasion for
-extending the faith; an ecclesiastic as usual followed in her train.
-Paulinus, the Roman chaplain who came north with Aethelburg, after various
-incidents picturesquely set forth by Bede, overcame King Eadwin's
-reluctance to embrace Christianity and prevailed upon him to be baptized
-at York with other members of his household on Easter day in the year 627.
-The event was followed by an influx of Christians into that city, for
-British Christianity had receded before the heathen Angles, but it still
-had strongholds in the north and was on the alert to regain lost ground.
-The city of York, during Roman rule, had been of great importance in
-affairs of administration. The Roman Eboracum nearly died out to arise
-anew as Anglian Eoforwic. King Eadwin recognised Paulinus as bishop and a
-stone church was begun on part of the ground now occupied by the
-Minster[233].
-
-Bede loves to dwell on the story of this conversion, which was endeared to
-all devout churchmen by many associations. Eanflaed, the child of Eadwin
-and Aethelburg, whose baptism was its immediate cause, was afterwards a
-staunch supporter of Roman versus British Church tendencies. She was the
-patron of Wilfrith, in his time the most zealous advocate of the supremacy
-of Rome.
-
-Among the members of Eadwin's household who were baptized on the same
-Easter day in 627 was Hild, a girl of fourteen, who afterwards became
-abbess of Whitby. She was grand-niece to Eadwin through her father
-Hereric, who had been treacherously made away with; her mother Beorhtswith
-and her sister Hereswith were among the early converts to Christianity.
-Hereswith afterwards married a king of the Angles, and at a later period
-was living in the Frankish settlement of Chelles (Cala), where her sister
-Hild at one time thought of joining her. Nothing is known of the life of
-Hild between the ages of fourteen and thirty-four, but evidently she had
-not dwelt in obscure retirement, for the Scottish prelate Aidan in 647,
-knowing that she was living in the midlands, begged her to return to the
-north. It is a noteworthy circumstance if, in an age when marriage was the
-rule, she remained single without taking the veil, but she may have been
-associated with some religious settlement[234].
-
-It was only a few years after the acceptance of Christianity at York that
-the days of King Eadwin's reign, 'when a woman with her babe might walk
-scatheless from sea to sea,' came to an abrupt close. Eadwin was slain in
-633 at the battle of Hatfield, a victim to the jealousy of the British
-king Caedwalla, who combined with the heathen king Penda of Mercia against
-him. Queen Aethelburg with her children and Paulinus fled from York to
-the coast and went by sea to Kent, where they were welcomed by her brother
-King Eadbald and by Archbishop Honorius.
-
-At the beginning of his reign Eadbald of Kent had been in conflict with
-the Church owing to his marriage with his father's relict, a heathen wife
-whom Aethelberht had taken to himself after the death of Berhta. It is
-characteristic of the position held at first by Christian prelates in
-England that they depended entirely on the ruling prince for their
-position. Paulinus fled from York at the death of Eadwin, and Eadbald's
-adherence to heathen customs temporarily drove the Kentish prelate abroad.
-The king of Kent had, however, found it well to repudiate his heathen wife
-and to take a Christian princess of the Franks in her stead. This act
-restored him to the goodwill of his prelate, who returned to English
-shores.
-
-Eadbald had settled a piece of land at Folkestone on his daughter
-Eanswith, and there about the year 630 she founded what is held to be the
-first religious settlement for women in Anglo-Saxon England[235]. The fact
-of this foundation is undisputed, but all we know of Eanswith's life is in
-the account given of her by Capgrave, an Augustinian monk who lived in the
-15th century[236]. He tells us how she went to live at Folkestone and how
-a king of Northumbria wished to marry her, but as the king was a heathen,
-she made their union conditional on his prevailing upon his gods to
-manifest their power by miraculously lengthening a beam. In this he failed
-and consequently departed. There follows a description how Eanswith made a
-stream to flow 'againste the hylle,' from Smelton, a mile distant from
-Folkestone, possibly by means of a well-levelled water conduit. Capgrave
-also describes how she enforced the payment of tithes.
-
-Eanswith's settlement was in existence at the close of the century, when
-it was destroyed or deserted during the viking invasion. A charter of King
-Athelstane dated 927 gives the land where 'stood the monastery and abbey
-of holy virgins and where also St Eanswith lies buried' to Christ Church,
-Canterbury, the house having been destroyed by the 'Pagans[237].'
-Capgrave says that its site was swallowed by the sea, perhaps in one of
-the landslips common to the coast; the holy woman's relics were then
-transferred to the church of St Peter. A church at Folkestone is dedicated
-conjointly to St Mary and St Eanswith, and a church at Brensett in Kent is
-dedicated solely to her[238].
-
-Queen Aethelburg coming from the north also settled in Kent at a place
-called Liming[239]. Bede knows nothing of her after her departure from the
-north, and we have to depend on Canterbury traditions for information
-concerning her and the religious house she founded. Gocelin, a monk of
-Flanders who came into Kent in the 11th century, describes Queen
-Aethelburg as 'building and upraising this temple at Liming, and obtaining
-the first name there and a remarkable burial-place in the north porch
-against the south wall of the church covered with an arch[240].' Modern
-research has shown that the buildings at Liming were so arranged as to
-contain a convent of monks as well as of nuns. The church is of Roman
-masonry and may have been built out of the fragments of a villa, such as
-the Anglo-Saxons frequently adapted to purposes of their own, or it may
-have been a Roman basilica restored.
-
-Queen Aethelburg, foundress of Liming, is not usually reckoned a saint;
-she has no day[241] and collections of saints' lives generally omit her.
-The identity of name between her and Aethelburg ([Dagger] c. 676), abbess
-of Barking at a somewhat later date, has caused some confusion between
-them[242]. Gocelin mentions that both Queen Aethelburg and 'St Eadburga'
-were buried at Liming[243]. A well lying to the east of the church at
-Liming is to this day called St Ethelburga's well, and she is commonly
-held to be identical with Queen Aethelburg[244].
-
-At a somewhat later date another religious settlement for women was
-founded at Sheppey in Kent by Queen Sexburg, the wife of Earconberht of
-Kent (640-664), the successor of Eadbald. We know little of the
-circumstances of the foundation[245]. Sexburg was a princess of East
-Anglia, where Christianity had been accepted owing to the influence of
-King Eadwin of Northumbria[246] and where direct relations with France had
-been established.
-
-'For at that time,' says Bede, writing of these districts[247], 'there
-being not yet many monasteries built in the region of the Angles, many
-were wont, for the sake of the monastic mode of life, to go from Britain
-to the monasteries of the Franks and of Gaul; they also sent their
-daughters to the same to be instructed and to be wedded to the heavenly
-spouse, chiefly in the monasteries of Brie (Faremoutiers), Chelles, and
-Andelys.'
-
-Two princesses of Anglia, Saethrith and Aethelburg, who were sisters or
-half-sisters to Sexburg, remained abroad and became in succession abbesses
-of Brie as mentioned above. Sexburg's daughter Earcongotha also went
-there, and was promoted to the rank of abbess. Both Bede and the
-Anglo-Saxon Chronicle speak in praise of her. For her other daughter
-Eormenhild, who was married to Wulfhere, king of Mercia, Queen Sexburg of
-Kent founded the house at Sheppey; she herself went to live at Ely in her
-sister Aethelthrith's convent.
-
-The statement of Bede that women at this time went abroad for their
-education is borne out by the traditional records of Mildthrith, first
-abbess of a religious settlement in Thanet which rose to considerable
-importance[248]. A huge mass of legend supplements the few historical
-facts we know of Mildthrith, whose influence, judging from the numerous
-references to her and her widespread cult, was greater than that of any
-other English woman-saint. Several days in the Calendar are consecrated to
-her, and the site where her relics had been deposited was made a subject
-of controversy in the 11th century. As late as 1882 we find that some of
-her relics were brought from Deventer in Holland to Thanet, and that Pope
-Leo XIII granted a plenary indulgence on the occasion[249]. Churches in
-London, Oxford, Canterbury and other places are dedicated to St
-Mildred[250], and Capgrave, William of Malmesbury and others give details
-of her story, which runs as follows:
-
-Her mother Eormenburg, sometimes called Domneva, was married to Merewald,
-prince of Hacanos, a district in Herefordshire. King Ecgberht (664-673) of
-Kent gave her some land in Thanet as a blood-fine for the murder of her
-two young brothers, and on it she founded a monastery. She asked for as
-much land as her tame deer could run over in one course, and received over
-ten thousand acres of the best land in Kent[251].
-
-Besides Mildthrith Eormenburg had two daughters, Mildburg and Mildgith,
-and a boy, the holy child Merwin, who was translated to heaven in his
-youth. Mildburg presided over a religious house at Wenlock in Shropshire,
-and her legend contains picturesque traits but little trustworthy
-information[252]. We know even less of the other daughter Mildgith. It is
-doubtful whether she lived in Kent or in the north, but she is considered
-a saint[253]. An ancient record says that 'St Mildgith lies in Northumbria
-where her miraculous powers were often exhibited and still are,' but it
-does not point out at what place[254].
-
-According to her legend, Mildthrith, by far the best known of the sisters,
-was sent abroad to Chelles for her education, where the abbess Wilcoma
-wished her to marry her kinsman, and on the girl's refusal cast her into a
-burning furnace from which she came forth unharmed. The girl sent her
-mother a psalter she had written together with a lock of her hair. She
-made her escape and arrived in England, landing at Ebbsfleet. 'As she
-descended from the ship to the land and set her feet on a certain square
-stone the print of her feet remained on it, most life-like, she not
-thinking anything; God so accomplishing the glory of his handmaid. And
-more than that; the dust that was scrapen off thence being drunk did cure
-sundry diseases[255].' It appears that a stone to which a superstitious
-reverence was attached was walled into the Church of St Mildred in
-Thanet.
-
-Other incidents told of her influence are not without their humorous side.
-One day a bell-ringer, forgetful of his duties, had dropped asleep, when
-Mildthrith appeared to him and gave him a blow on the ear, saying,
-'Understand, fellow, that this is an oratory to pray in, not a dormitory
-to sleep in,' and so vanished.
-
-Thus writes the author of her legend. The fact remains that Mildthrith was
-presiding over a settlement in Kent towards the close of the 7th century.
-For in a charter of privileges granted between 696 and 716 by King Wihtred
-and Queen Werburg to the churches and monasteries of Kent granting them
-security against interference, her name is among those of the five lady
-abbesses who place their signatures to the document.[256] These names
-stand after those of the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of
-Rochester and are as follows; 'Mildritha, Aetheldritha, Aette, Wilnotha
-and Hereswytha.' The settlements mentioned in the body of the charter[257]
-as being subject to them are Upminstre (or Minstre) in Thanet, afterwards
-known as St Mildred's, Southminstre, a colony of Minstre, Folkestone,
-Liming and Sheppey, the foundation of which has been described.
-
-Thus at the close of the 7th century there existed in the province of Kent
-alone five religious settlements governed by abbesses who added this title
-to their signatures, or who, judging from the place given to them, ranked
-in dignity below the bishops but above the presbyters (presbyteri), whose
-names follow theirs in the list. From the wording of the charter we see
-that men who accepted the tonsure and women who received the veil were at
-this time classed together. Those who set their signatures to the charter
-agreed that neither abbot nor abbess should be appointed without the
-consent of a prelate.
-
-The charter is the more valuable as it establishes the existence of the
-Kentish convents and their connection with each other at a period when we
-have only fragmentary information about the religious houses in the south.
-We must turn to the north for fuller information as to the foundation and
-growth of religious settlements presided over by women during the early
-Christian period.
-
-
-§ 2. The Monastery at Whitby[258].
-
-A temporary collapse of the Christian faith had followed the death of King
-Eadwin of Northumbria, but the restoration of King Oswald, who was not so
-strong as his predecessor in administrative power but whose religious
-fervour was greater, had given it a new impulse and a new direction.
-
-Oswald had passed some time of his life in Iona or Hii, the great Scottish
-religious settlement and the stronghold of British Christianity in the
-Hebrides. Here he had made friends with the ecclesiastic Aidan, who became
-his staunch supporter. Soon after his accession Oswald summoned a monk
-from Iona 'to minister the word of the faith to himself and to his
-people,' and when it was found that the monk made no progress, Aidan was
-moved to go among the Angles himself. In preference to York he chose the
-island Lindisfarne for his headquarters, but he spent much of his time
-with Oswald, helping him to set the practice and teaching of religion on a
-firmer footing.
-
-It was during this part of Aidan's career that he consecrated Heiu[259],
-according to Bede 'the first woman who took the vow and the habit of a nun
-in the province of Northumbria.' Heiu presided over a congregation of
-women at Hartlepool in Durham, from which she removed to Calcaria of the
-Romans, which is perhaps identical with Healaugh near Tadcaster, where
-apparently Heiu's name is retained. Further details of her career are
-wanting.
-
-Aidan's labours were interrupted for a time. Again the fierce and
-impetuous King Penda of Mercia invaded Northumbria, and again the
-Christian Angles fled before the midland heathens. King Oswald fell in
-battle (642) and Aidan retired to his rocky island, from which he watched
-the fires kindled all over the country first by the raids of Penda, and
-afterwards by civil strife between the two provinces of Northumbria, Deira
-and Bernicia. This arose through the rival claims to the throne of Oswiu,
-Oswald's brother, and Oswin, who was King Eadwin's relative.
-
-An understanding was at length effected between them by which Oswiu
-accepted Bernicia, while Oswin took possession of Deira, and Aidan, who
-found a patron in Oswin, returned to his work.
-
-He now persuaded Hild[260], who was waiting in Anglia for an opportunity
-to cross over to France, where she purposed joining her sister, to give up
-this plan and to return to the north to share in the work in which he was
-engaged. Hild came and settled down to a monastic life with a few
-companions on the river Wear. A year later, when Heiu retired to Calcaria,
-Hild became abbess at Hartlepool. She settled there only a few years
-before the close of Aidan's career. He died in 651 shortly after his
-patron Oswin, whose murder remains the great stain on the life of his
-rival Oswiu.
-
-A 12th century monk, an inmate of the monastery of St Beeves in
-Cumberland, has written a life of St Bega, the patron saint of his
-monastery, whom he identifies on the one hand with the abbess Heiu,
-consecrated by Aidan, and on the other with Begu, a nun who had a vision
-of Hild's death at the monastery of Hackness in the year 680. His
-narrative is further embellished with local traditions about a woman Bega,
-who came from Ireland and received as a gift from the Lady Egermont the
-extensive parish and promontory of St Beeves, which to this day bear her
-name[261].
-
-There has been much speculation concerning this holy woman Bega, but it is
-probable that the writer of her life combined myths which seem to be
-Keltic with accounts of two historical persons whom Bede keeps quite
-distinct. There is no reason to doubt Bede's statements in this matter or
-in others concerning affairs in the north, for he expressly affirms that
-he 'was able to gain information not from one author only but from the
-faithful assertion of innumerable witnesses who were in a position to know
-and remember these things; besides those things,' he adds, 'which I could
-ascertain myself.' He passed his whole life studying and writing in the
-monasteries of SS. Peter and Paul, two settlements spoken of as one, near
-the mouth of the river Wear, close to where Hild had first settled. He
-went there during the lifetime of Bennet Biscop ([Dagger] 690), the
-contemporary of Hild and a shining representative of the culture the
-Anglo-Saxons attained in the 7th century.
-
-Hild settled at Hartlepool about the year 647. Eight years later Oswiu
-finally routed the army of Penda, whose attacks had been for so many years
-like a battering ram to the greatness of Northumbria. And in fulfilment of
-a vow he had made that the Christian religion should profit if God
-granted him victory, he gave Hild the charge of his daughter Aelflaed 'who
-had scarcely completed the age of one year, to be consecrated to God in
-perpetual virginity, besides bestowing on the Church twelve estates.'
-Extensive property came with the child into the care of Hild, perhaps
-including the site of Streaneshalch[262], which is better known as Whitby,
-a name given to it at a later date by the Danes. Bede says that Hild here
-undertook to construct and arrange a monastery.
-
-Bede thus expresses himself on the subject of Hild's life and influence
-during the term of over thirty years which she spent first as abbess of
-Hartlepool and then as abbess of Whitby[263]:
-
-'Moreover, Hild, the handmaid of Christ, having been appointed to govern
-that monastery (at Hartlepool), presently took care to order it in the
-regular way of life, in all respects, according as she could gain
-information from learned men. For Bishop Aidan, also, and all the
-religious men who knew her, were wont to visit her constantly, to love her
-devotedly, and to instruct her diligently, on account of her innate
-wisdom, and her delight in the service of God.
-
-'When, then, she had presided over this monastery for some years, being
-very intent on establishing the regular discipline, according as she could
-learn it from learned men, it happened that she undertook also to
-construct and arrange a monastery in the place which is called
-Streanshalch; and this work being enjoined on her, she was not remiss in
-accomplishing it. For she established this also in the same discipline of
-regular life in which she established the former monastery; and, indeed,
-taught there also the strict observance of justice, piety, and chastity,
-and of the other virtues, but mostly of peace and charity, so that, after
-the example of the primitive Church, there was therein no one rich, no one
-poor; all things were common to all, since nothing seemed to be the
-private property of any one. Moreover, her prudence was so great that not
-only did ordinary persons, but even sometimes kings and princes, seek and
-receive counsel of her in their necessities. She made those who were under
-her direction give so much time to the reading of the Divine Scriptures,
-and exercise themselves so much in works of righteousness, that very many,
-it appeared, could readily be found there, who could worthily enter upon
-the ecclesiastical grade, that is the service of the altar.'
-
-In point of fact five men who had studied in Hild's monastery were
-promoted to the episcopate. Foremost among them is John, bishop of Hexham
-(687-705) and afterwards of York ([Dagger] 721), the famous St John of
-Beverley, a canonised saint of the Church, of whose doings Bede has left
-an account. In this[264] we hear of the existence of another monastery for
-women at Watton (Vetadun) not far from Whitby, where Bishop John went to
-visit the abbess Heriburg, who was living there with her 'daughter in the
-flesh,' Cwenburg, whom she designed to make abbess in her stead. We hear
-no more about Watton till centuries later, but Bede's remark is
-interesting as showing how natural he felt it to be that the rule of a
-settlement should pass from mother to daughter.
-
-Cwenburg was suffering from a swollen arm which John tells us was very
-serious, 'since she had been bled on the fourth day of the moon,' 'when
-both the light of the moon and the tide of the ocean were on their
-increase. And what can I do for the girl if she is at death's door?' he
-exclaims. However his combined prayers and remedies, which were so often
-efficacious, helped to restore her.
-
-Aetla, another of Hild's scholarly disciples, held the see of Dorchester,
-though perhaps only temporarily during the absence of Aegilberht. A third,
-Bosa, was archbishop of York between 678 and 686; Bede speaks of him as a
-monk of Whitby, a man of great holiness and humility. Oftfor, another of
-Hild's monks, went from Whitby to Canterbury, to study 'a more perfect'
-system of discipline under Archbishop Theodore ([Dagger] 690), and
-subsequently became bishop of Worcester.
-
-The career of these men shows that the system of discipline and education
-under Hild at Whitby compared favourably with that of other settlements.
-At the outset she had followed the usages of the Scottish Church, with
-which she was familiar through her intercourse with Aidan, but when the
-claims for an independent British Church were defeated at Whitby, she
-accepted the change and adopted the Roman usage.
-
-The antagonism which had existed from the first appearance of Augustine in
-England between Roman Christianity and British Christianity as upheld by
-the Scottish and Welsh clergy took the form of open disagreement in
-Northumbria. On one side was the craving for ritual, for refinement and
-for union with Rome; on the other insistence by the Scottish clergy on
-their right to independence.
-
-Aidan had been succeeded at Lindisfarne by Finnan, owing to whose
-influence discussion was checked for the time being. But after his death
-(661) the latent antagonism came to a head over the practical difficulty
-due to the different dates at which King Oswiu and Queen Eanflaed kept
-Easter. Thus the way was cleared for the Whitby synod (664), a 'gathering
-of all orders of the Church system,' at which the respective claims of
-Roman and of British Christianity were discussed.
-
-The British interest was represented among others by Colman, Finnan's
-successor at Lindisfarne, who temporarily held the see at York, and by
-Aegilberht, bishop of Dorchester. The opposite side was taken by the
-protégé of Queen Eanflaed, Wilfrith, abbot of Ripon, whose ardour in the
-cause of Rome had been greatly augmented by going abroad with Bennet
-Biscop about the year 653. Besides these and other prelates, King Oswiu
-and his son and co-regent Ealhfrith were present at the synod. The abbess
-Hild was also there, but she took no part in the discussion.
-
-The questions raised were not of doctrine but of practice. The computation
-of Easter, the form of the tonsure, matters not of belief but of
-apparently trivial externals, were the points round which the discussion
-turned. Owing chiefly to Wilfrith's influence the decision was in favour
-of Rome, and a strong rebuff was given for a time to the claim for an
-independent British Church in the north.
-
-The choice of Whitby as the site of the synod marks the importance which
-this settlement had attained within ten years of its foundation. Those who
-have stood on the height of the cliff overlooking the North Sea and have
-let their gaze wander over the winding river course and the strand below
-can realize the lordly situation of the settlement which occupies such a
-distinguished place among the great houses and nurseries of culture at
-Hexham, Wearmouth, Jarrow, Ripon and York.
-
-The property which the monastery held in overlordship extended along the
-coast for many miles, and the settlement itself consisted of a large group
-of buildings; for there are references to the dwellings for the men, for
-the women, and to an outlying house for the sick. These dwellings were
-gathered round the ancient British Church of St Peter, which was situated
-under the shelter of the brow of the cliff where King Eadwin lay buried,
-and which continued to be the burial-place of the Northumbrian kings.
-Isolated chapels and churches with separate bands of religious votaries
-belonging to them lay in other parts of the monastic property, and were
-subject to the abbess of Whitby. We hear of a minor monastery at Easington
-(Osingadun)[265] during the rule of Aelflaed, Hild's successor, and at
-Hackness (Hacanos) on the limit of the monastic property, thirteen miles
-south of Whitby, a monastery of some importance had been founded by
-Hild[266]. Bands of men and of women dwelt here under the government of
-Frigith, and it was here that the nun Begu had a vision of Hild on the
-night of her death, when she saw her borne aloft by attendant angels[267].
-
-The name of Hild and the monastery at Whitby are further endeared to
-posterity through their connection with Caedmon, the most celebrated of
-the vernacular poets of Northumbria and the reputed author of the
-Anglo-Saxon metrical paraphrases of the Old Testament[268]. It was his
-great reputation as a singer that made Hild seek Caedmon and persuade him
-to join her community. Here the practice of reading Holy Scripture made
-him familiar with the stories of Hebrew literature in their grand and
-simple setting, and he drank of the waters of that well to which so many
-centuries of creative and representative art have gone for inspiration.
-
-Caedmon's power of song had been noticed outside the monastery.
-
-'And all concluded that a celestial gift had been granted him by the Lord.
-And they interpreted to him a certain passage of sacred history or
-doctrine, and ordered him to turn it if he could into poetical rhythm. And
-he, having undertaken it, departed, and returning in the morning brought
-back what he was ordered to do, composed in most excellent verse.
-Whereupon presently the abbess, embracing heartily the grace of God in the
-man, directed him to leave the secular habit, and to take the monastic
-vow; and having together with all her people received him into the
-monastery associated him with the company of the brethren, and ordered him
-to be instructed in the whole course of sacred history. And he converted
-into most sweet song whatever he could learn from hearing, by thinking it
-over by himself, and, as though a clean animal, by ruminating; and by
-making it resound more sweetly, made his teachers in turn his
-hearers[269].'
-
-These passages are curious as showing that a singer of national strains
-was persuaded to adapt his art to the purposes of religion. The
-development of Church music is usually held to have been distinct from
-that of folk-music, but in exceptional cases such as this, there seems to
-have been a relation between the two.
-
-Excavations recently made on several of the sites of ancient northern
-monasteries have laid bare curious and interesting remains which add
-touches of reality to what is known about the houses of the north during
-this early period[270]. In a field called Cross Close at Hartlepool near
-Durham skeletons of men and women were found, and a number of monumental
-stones of peculiar shape, some with runic inscriptions of women's names.
-Some of these names are among those of the abbesses inscribed in the
-so-called 'Book of Life of Durham,' a manuscript written in gold and
-silver lettering in the early part of the 9th century[271]. Again, an
-ancient tombstone of peculiar design was found at Healaugh; and at
-Hackness several memorial crosses are preserved, one of which bears the
-inscription of the name Aethelburg, who no doubt is the abbess of that
-name with whom Aelflaed, Hild's successor at Whitby, in 705 travelled to
-the death-bed of King Ealdfrith[272].
-
-Finally on the Whitby coast on the south side of the abbey a huge
-kitchen-midden was discovered. A short slope here leads to the edge of the
-cliff, and excavations on this slope and at its foot, which was once
-washed by the tide, have revealed the facts that the denizens of the
-original monastery were wont to throw the refuse of their kitchen over the
-cliff, and that the lighter material remained on the upper ledges, the
-heavier rolling to the bottom.
-
-Among the lighter deposits were found bones of birds, oyster, whelk and
-periwinkle shells, and two combs, one of which bears a runic inscription.
-Among the heavier deposits were bones of oxen, a few of sheep, and a large
-number of the bones and tusks of wild swine, besides several iron
-pot-hooks and other implements; a bone spindle and a divided ink-horn are
-among the objects specified. An inscribed leaden bulla found among the
-refuse is declared by experts to be earlier than the 8th century; it is
-therefore proof that these remains were deposited during the earlier
-period of the existence of Hild's monastery, possibly during her lifetime.
-
-Hild died after an illness of several years on November 17, 680. Would
-that there were more data whereby to estimate her personality! The few
-traits of her character that have been preserved, her eagerness to acquire
-knowledge, her success in imparting it to others, her recognition of the
-need of unity in the Church, the interest she took in one who could repeat
-the stories of the new faith in strains which made them intelligible to
-the people, are indicative of a strong personality and of an understanding
-which appreciated the needs of her time.
-
-Various myths, of which Bede knows nothing, have been attached to her name
-in course of time. According to a popular legend she transformed the
-snakes of the district into the ammonites familiar to visitors to those
-parts. And it is said that at certain times of the day her form can be
-seen flitting across the abbey ruins[273].
-
-At her death the rule of the settlement passed to Aelflaed, the princess
-who had been given into her care as a child. After King Oswiu's death in
-670 Queen Eanflaed joined her daughter in the monastery. The princess and
-abbess Aelflaed proved herself worthy of the influence under which she had
-grown up, and we shall find her among the persons of importance who took
-up a decided attitude in regard to the disturbances which broke out
-through the action of Bishop Wilfrith. The beginnings of these
-difficulties belong to the lifetime of Hild: we do not know that she took
-any interest in the matter, but judging from indirect evidence we should
-say that she shared in the feeling which condemned the prelate's
-anti-national and ultra-Roman tendencies.
-
-
-§ 3. Ely and the influence of Bishop Wilfrith.
-
-The further history of the monastery of Whitby and the history of the
-foundation of Ely are closely connected with the prelate Wilfrith, and for
-this reason his actions and attitude claim our attention. In him we
-recognise a direct advocate of the principle that a queen could if she
-chose leave her husband and retire to a religious settlement, and that
-such a course would secure her the favour of the Church.
-
-It has been said of him that he was the most important man in Northumbria
-for forty years after the Whitby synod[274]. He owed his education to
-Queen Eanflaed, whose attention he had attracted when quite a youth, and
-who had sent him into Kent to complete his education; there he imbibed
-strong Roman sympathies. He lived for some years in France and Italy in
-the society of Bennet Biscop, and he was already held in high esteem at
-the time of the Whitby synod, which he attended in the character of abbot
-of the monastery at Ripon, a house he had founded with the help of
-Ealhfrith.
-
-When Colman and his adherents beat a rapid retreat to the north in
-consequence of the decision of the synod, Wilfrith became bishop of York,
-an appointment which meant ecclesiastical supremacy over the whole vast
-province of Northumbria. His intellectual brilliancy gained him many
-admirers, but an innate restlessness of disposition and a wilful
-determination to support the power of Rome to the national detriment
-launched him into repeated difficulties with temporal and spiritual
-rulers. He was at the height of prosperity and popularity when Ecgfrith
-succeeded Oswiu in 670 after the death of Ealhfrith. Wilfrith had hitherto
-been on good terms with Ecgfrith, but a breach in their relations soon
-occurred, partly owing to the conduct of Ecgfrith's wife, Aethelthrith,
-whom Wilfrith supported against the king.
-
-Aethelthrith, known to a later age as Etheldred or Awdrey, was the
-daughter of King Anna of the East Angles (635-645), whose province,
-including the present shires of Norfolk and Suffolk, was removed from
-direct intercourse with others by the almost impassable reaches of the
-fens. Anglia has not left any annals of her own, and we have to depend for
-the names and dates of her kings on the slight information which other
-provinces have preserved.
-
-Written legends generally consider Anna as the father also of Sexburg, the
-foundress of Sheppey, and of Aethelburg and Saethrith, two princesses who
-had settled in France, as well as of Wihtburg, a woman-saint of whom very
-little is known, and who was associated with a religious foundation at
-East Dereham in Norfolk[275]. We further learn from legend that King Anna
-was married to Hereswith, sister of Hild of Whitby, and Aethelthrith is
-spoken of as niece to the great abbess Hild. But this connection is
-discredited by a statement in Bede which suggests that Hild's sister
-Hereswith was married not to King Anna but to his successor King
-Aethelhere (654-664). It is difficult to decide to which of the kings of
-the East Angles Hereswith was married, but Anna was certainly not her
-husband[276].
-
-The princess Aethelthrith at the time of her marriage with the king of
-Northumbria was the widow of Tunberht prince of the South-Gyrvi, or
-fen-country men. Anglia stood at this time in a relation of dependence to
-Northumbria, and in 664, four years before the Whitby synod, Aethelthrith
-a woman of over thirty was married to Ecgfrith a boy of fifteen, the
-heir-apparent to the throne of Northumbria. The marriage was no doubt
-arranged for political reasons.
-
-The consequences which followed render these facts worthy of notice. For
-Aethelthrith on her arrival in the north at once conceived a great
-admiration for the prelate Wilfrith, while she treated her husband with
-contumely. She bestowed on Wilfrith the extensive property at Hexham which
-she had received from her husband, and on which Wilfrith built the church
-which was spoken of in his days as the most wonderful building on this
-side of the Alps[277]. Judging from what Wilfrith himself told him about
-the queen's attitude Bede says 'the king knew that she loved no man more
-than Wilfrith.'
-
-The events that followed bear out this statement, for after living about
-ten years with the king, Aethelthrith left him and repaired to the
-monastery of Coldingham (Coludesburg) in Berwickshire, which had been
-founded and was ruled over by Aebbe, sister, or perhaps half-sister, of
-the kings Oswald and Oswiu[278]. King Ecgfrith may or may not have agreed
-to this step. Eddi, the friend and biographer of Wilfrith, maintains a
-judicious silence on the relations of the king and queen, while Bede
-represents[279] that Aethelthrith had always had an aversion to the
-married state and describes how he had been told by Wilfrith himself that
-Ecgfrith promised much land and money to the prelate if he persuaded the
-queen to allow him conjugal rights.
-
-At Coldingham Wilfrith gave Aethelthrith the veil; this act involved her
-breaking all marital ties. But she cannot have deemed her position secure,
-for she presently left Coldingham, which was within her husband's
-territory, and went to Ely, the island in the fens which her first husband
-Tunberht had bestowed on her.
-
-Under the date 673 stand in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle these words: 'And
-Aetheldryth began the monastery at Ely.' It was situated on a hill
-prominent above the flatness of the surrounding fen-land, which at that
-time consisted of a wilderness of marsh and water. Men and women readily
-flocked thither to live under the guidance of the queen. We hear that she
-received material aid from her cousin King Ealdwulf of Anglia, that Hunna
-acted as her chaplain, and that Bishop Wilfrith stayed with her on his
-passage from Northumbria to Rome. Thomas of Ely (fl. c. 1174) has
-embellished the account of Aethelthrith's flight and journey south by
-introducing into the story various picturesque incidents, which Bede does
-not mention. She, with her companions Sewenna and Sewara[280], was saved
-from her pursuers by water rising round a rock on which they had taken
-refuge, and she was sheltered by an ash-tree which grew in one night out
-of her pilgrim's staff and which can still be seen at a place called
-Etheldredstowe[281]. As Aethelthrith of Ely is a favourite saint of
-English legend it is interesting to find water and the tree miraculously
-associated with her.
-
-Shortly after Aethelthrith's departure Ecgfrith summoned Theodore,
-archbishop of Canterbury, to the north to divide the diocese of York into
-three separate districts. Wilfrith resented these proceedings as an
-infringement of his rights, but as he was unable to influence the king he
-determined to seek the intervention of the Pope and set out for Rome. His
-absence extended over several years.
-
-It was at this time, Bede tells us, that Aethelthrith 'having built a
-monastery at Ely began both by example and by admonition of heavenly life
-to be a virgin mother of very many virgins[282].' The particulars he gives
-of her life show that she had renounced the splendours which constituted
-so essential a feature of royalty and had willingly devoted herself to
-humility and self-denial. She wore no linen, only wool, rarely used a warm
-bath, save on the eve of great festivals, and assisted at the washing of
-others. When she fell ill of a tumour in her throat, she told the
-physician Cynefrith, who lanced it, that she looked upon it as a
-chastisement for her love of wearing necklaces in her youth. And on her
-death-bed she desired to be buried in a wooden coffin in the nun's
-ordinary cemetery.
-
-The fame of Aethelthrith spread rapidly. She was looked upon as a virgin,
-and her name with the epithet virgin was inscribed at an early date in
-both the Anglo-Saxon and Roman Calendars, and to this day it is to be
-found in the Book of Common Prayer. Later writers of her legend say that
-she lived with Ecgfrith 'not as a wyfe but as a lady,' and add as a
-fitting pendant to this story that she maintained similar relations with
-her first husband Tunberht[283]. She died in the year 679, having presided
-over her monastery only six or seven years, but during that time it had
-gained marked importance. Many women had come to live there with her, and
-among them her sister Sexburg, widow of the king of Kent, who had founded
-the monastery at Sheppey and now succeeded Aethelthrith as abbess of Ely.
-
-The chief event of Sexburg's rule at Ely was the exhumation of the bones
-of Aethelthrith in 695, which were transferred to a stone coffin of
-antique workmanship which had been opportunely, or miraculously as
-contemporaries thought, discovered at the old Roman colony of Grantchester
-near Cambridge[284]. This translation took place on the 17th of October, a
-day on which the relics were again transferred in 1106, and which is the
-date of the important fair of Ely[285].
-
-In a supplement to the History of Ely by Bentham, Essex gives an account
-of the ruins of the conventual church begun by Aethelthrith[286]. Judging
-from his investigations the church consisted of two parts, the nave and
-the choir, the windows of the nave outside being ornamented with pillars
-and arches, and the choir being arched with stone. Traces were still left
-of the apartments of the abbess from which she could enter the church in a
-private manner, and of a building opposite of equal dimensions which
-served as a dormitory for the nuns. At a little distance the remains of
-another large building were discovered, one room of which, near the
-entrance to the settlement, was a parlour for the reception of strangers,
-and the apartment over it a dormitory for the men.
-
-We know little more than the name of the next abbess of Ely. She was
-Sexburg's daughter Eormenhild, wife of King Wulfhere of Mercia, who had
-hitherto dwelt in the monastery of Sheppey. Eormenhild in her turn was
-succeeded by her daughter, the celebrated St Werburg of Chester, who was
-never married. Various stories are preserved about Werburg's influence,
-but without reference to her work at Ely. We are indebted to Gocelin for
-the oldest account of her[287]. He tells us that her uncle King Aethelraed
-of Mercia entrusted her with the care of all the monasteries in his
-kingdom, that she had founded religious houses at Trentham and at Hanbury,
-besides turning a palace at Wedon-le-Street into a monastery[288]. He
-speaks of her as a person of great cheerfulness and benevolence, and of a
-peaceful and happy disposition. Several accounts of her are extant in
-manuscripts of different dates, and as late as the 15th century her life
-was made the subject of a most graceful metrical epic by the poet Henri
-Bradshaw ([Dagger] 1513)[289].
-
-We are told that Werburg died at Trentham and that the society of that
-place wished to keep her body, but the nuns of Hanbury carried it off by
-force and enshrined it at Hanbury where the day of her deposition was
-kept[290]. During the viking invasion in 875 the body for the sake of
-safety was conveyed to Chester, of which town St Werburg then became
-patron saint. This incident gave rise at a later date to the story that
-the saint had founded the monastery and the chief church at Chester on
-land given to her by her father. Livien mentions that nine churches in
-England are dedicated to St Werburg, who appears to have been a person of
-considerable importance[291].
-
-Once more we must return to the north and to the work of Bishop Wilfrith,
-as he came into contact with various other religious women. When he
-returned to England after an absence of several years Aethelthrith was
-dead, but King Ecgfrith's hatred of him had not abated. Insulted in his
-person and nation he caused Wilfrith to be thrown into prison, offering to
-give him back part of his bishopric and other gifts if he would submit to
-royal authority and disclaim the genuineness of the document brought from
-Rome[292]. Queen Eormenburg, whom Ecgfrith had taken to wife in place of
-Aethelthrith, further embittered the king against the unlucky prelate. She
-appropriated the reliquary Wilfrith had brought from Rome and wore it as
-an ornament. For nine months the prelate was kept imprisoned, and the
-story how he regained his liberty brings us back to Aebbe, abbess at
-Coldingham, who had formerly sheltered Aethelthrith[293].
-
-According to the account of Eddi, Wilfrith's biographer, the king and
-queen of Northumbria were staying at Coldingham when the queen was
-suddenly taken ill. 'At night she was seized like the wife of Pilate by a
-devil, and worn out by many ills, hardly expected to see the day alive.'
-The abbess Aebbe went to King Ecgfrith and represented to him that the
-reason of this seizure was their treatment of Wilfrith.
-
-'And now, my son,' she said, 'do according to the bidding of your mother;
-loosen his bonds and send back to him by a trusty messenger the holy
-relics which the queen took from him and like the ark of God carried about
-with her to her harm. It were best you should have him as your bishop, but
-if you refuse, set him free and let him go with his followers from your
-kingdom wherever he list. Then by my faith you will live and your queen
-will not die; but if you refuse by God's witness you will not remain
-unpunished.'
-
-Aebbe carried her point and Wilfrith was set free. He went into Mercia
-which was at war with Northumbria, but he was not suffered to stay there,
-for Queen Ostrith, the sister of King Ecgfrith, shared her brother's
-hatred of him. Forced to fly from Mercia he went into Wessex, but King
-Centwin's wife prevented him from staying there. It is curious to note the
-hatred with which these married women pursued him while lady abbesses were
-his friends. At last he found protection among the south Saxons, who
-fifteen years before had nearly killed him, but their king Aethelwalch
-([Dagger] 686) had lately been converted to Christianity and gave him a
-friendly reception. Wilfrith is represented as joining his civilizing
-influences to those of the Irish monks who had settled on the coast. An
-interesting episode of his sojourn here was his intercourse with
-Caedwalla, afterwards king of Wessex (685-688), who at the time was living
-as an outlaw in the forests of Sussex[294].
-
-We get further glimpses of Aebbe and the settlement at Coldingham. She
-entertained a great admiration for the holy man Cuthberht ([Dagger] 687),
-one of the most attractive figures among the evangelizing prelates of the
-north, of whom Bede has left an account.
-
-Cuthberht was brought both by birth and education under Scottish
-influences. He was prior at Melrose before the Whitby synod, but after it
-came to Lindisfarne where his gentleness of temper and sweetness of
-disposition won over many to accept Roman usages. Overcome by the longing
-for solitude and contemplation which was so characteristic of many early
-Christian prelates, he dwelt as a recluse on the desert island of Farne
-from 676 to 685. There are many accounts of his life and of his
-wanderings[295].
-
-At the time when Cuthberht's fame was spreading, Aebbe of Coldingham 'sent
-to this man of God, begging him to come and condescend to edify both
-herself and the inmates of her monastery by the grace of his exhortation.
-Cuthberht accordingly went thither and tarrying for some days he expounded
-the ways of justice to all; these he not only preached, but to the same
-extent he practised[296].'
-
-It is recorded that during his stay at Coldingham Cuthberht went at night
-to pray on the deserted beach, and the seals came out of the water and
-clustered around him.
-
-The first instance mentioned by Bede of a lapse of monastic discipline was
-at Coldingham where disorders occurred during Aebbe's rule[297]. An Irish
-monk who was on a visit to the monastery had a vision of its destruction
-by fire, and when questioned about it by the abbess interpreted it as an
-impending retribution for the tenor of life of those assembled there.
-
-'For even the dwellings,' he said, 'which were built for praying and
-reading are now converted into places of revelling, drinking, conversation
-and other forbidden doings; the virgins who are vowed to God, laying aside
-all respect for their profession, whenever they have leisure spend all
-their time in weaving fine garments with which they adorn themselves like
-brides, to the detriment of their condition, and to secure the friendship
-of men outside.'
-
-Through Aebbe's efforts things somewhat improved, but after her death, the
-date of which is uncertain, the monastery really was destroyed by
-fire[298]. The story is told that Cuthberht at Lindisfarne forbade women
-to cross the threshold of his conventual church on account of the life of
-the nuns at Coldingham[299], but another version of his doings considers
-that his attitude was due to an episode with a Scottish king's daughter
-which turned him against the sex[300].
-
-Cuthberht was also the friend of Aelflaed, abbess of Whitby, who
-entertained unbounded reverence for him. On one occasion[301] she had
-fallen ill and, as she herself told the monk Herefrid, suffered so from
-cramp that she could hardly creep along. 'I would,' she said, 'I had
-something belonging to my dear Cuthberht, for I believe and trust in the
-Lord that I should soon be restored to health.'
-
-In compliance with her wish the holy man sent her a linen girdle, which
-she wore for a time and which entirely cured her. Later a nun by the help
-of the same girdle was relieved of a headache, but after that the girdle
-of miraculous power miraculously disappeared. The reason given for this
-disappearance illustrates naïvely enough how divine power was considered
-to be justified in making itself manifest with a reservation. 'If this
-girdle had remained present,' Bede argues, 'the sick would always flock to
-it; and whilst some one of these might not be worthy to be healed, its
-efficacy to cure might have been denied, whereas their own unworthiness
-was perhaps to blame. Therefore, as was said above, Heaven so dealt its
-benevolence, that, after the faith of believers had been confirmed, then
-immediately the opportunity for detraction was entirely withdrawn from the
-malice of the unrighteous.'
-
-Contemporary witnesses bear testimony to the wisdom and prudence of the
-abbess Aelflaed of Whitby, for Bede says in the life of Cuthberht that
-'she increased the lustre of her royal lineage with the higher nobility
-of a more exalted virginity'; whilst Eddi speaks of her as 'the most
-virtuous virgin who is actually a king's daughter,' and in another passage
-characterizes her as 'ever the comforter and best counsellor of the whole
-province.'
-
-We find her in Cuthberht's society on more than one occasion. Once he met
-her at the monastery of 'Osingadune' (Easington) where he went to dedicate
-the church, and while sitting by her at table he had a prophetic vision of
-the death of one of her servants[302].
-
-The abbess Aelflaed directly appealed to this prophetic insight of
-Cuthberht's when troubled in her mind about her brother King Ecgfrith,
-whose expedition against the Picts filled her with apprehension[303]. In
-the words of Bede: 'At another time, the same most reverend virgin and
-mother of Christ's virgins, Aelflaed, sent to the man of God, adjuring him
-in the name of the Lord that she might be allowed to see him, to converse
-on some pressing affairs. Cuthberht accordingly went on board ship,
-accompanied by some of the brethren, and came to the island which from its
-situation opposite to the river Coquet receives its name, and is
-celebrated for its community of monks; there it was that the aforesaid
-abbess had requested him to meet her. When she was satisfied with his
-replies to her many enquiries, on a sudden, while he was yet speaking, she
-fell at his feet and adjured him by the sacred and venerable Name of the
-Heavenly King and His angels, to tell her how long Ecgfrith, her brother,
-should live and rule over the kingdom of the Angles; "For I know," she
-said, "that you abound in the spirit of prophecy, and that you can tell me
-this, if you will." But he, trembling at her adjuration, and yet not
-wishing openly to reveal the secret which she asked for, replied, "It is
-marvellous that you, a woman wise and well-instructed in the Holy
-Scriptures, should speak of the term of human life as if it were long,
-seeing that the Psalmist says, 'Our years shall be considered as a
-spider[304],' and that Solomon warns us that, 'If a man live many years
-and have rejoiced in them all, he must remember the darksome time and the
-many days, which, when they shall come, the things passed shall be accused
-of vanity[305].' How much more then ought he, to whom only one year of
-life remains, to be considered as having lived a short time, when death
-shall stand at his gates?"
-
-'The abbess, on hearing this, lamented the dreadful prophecy with floods
-of tears, and having wiped her face, with feminine boldness she adjured
-him by the majesty of the sovereignty of God to tell her who would be the
-heir of the kingdom, since Ecgfrith had neither sons nor brothers.
-Cuthberht was silent for a short time, then he replied, "Say not that he
-is without heirs, for he shall have a successor whom you may embrace with
-sisterly affection as you do Ecgfrith himself." But she continued: "Tell
-me, I beseech you, where he is now." And he said, "You see this mighty and
-wide ocean, how it abounds with many islands. It is easy for God from one
-of these to provide a ruler for the kingdom of the Angles." Then she
-understood that he spoke of Ealdfrith (Aldfrid) who was said to be the son
-of Ecgfrith's father, and who at that time lived in exile, in the islands
-of the Scots, for the sake of studying letters.'
-
-This meeting, if we credit the historian, took place in 684, and
-Aelflaed's forebodings were realized. Ecgfrith lost his life, and part of
-his kingdom was taken by the Picts. In consequence of his defeat the
-settlement Whithern, set up as a religious outpost in the territory south
-of the Firth of Forth, was destroyed. Trumwin who had been entrusted with
-it was forced to fly. He and his friends sought refuge at Whitby where he
-remained and had much intercourse with Cuthberht and Aelflaed. Bede says
-that the abbess found 'great assistance in governing and also comfort for
-her own life' in Trumwin[306].
-
-Northumbria had now passed the zenith of her greatness as a political
-power, for the territory in the north which was lost through Ecgfrith's
-defeat was not regained, while in the south the province of Mercia began
-to shake off the Northumbrian yoke. King Ecgfrith had been succeeded by
-his half-brother Ealdfrith ([Dagger] 705) and owing to his attitude
-Wilfrith's exile came to an end. Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury, wrote
-a letter in his behalf to Ealdfrith and also one to Aelflaed of Whitby
-begging her to be at peace with him[307]. The prelate left Sussex for the
-north, where he remained for five years in undisturbed possession of his
-see[308]. But again the old quarrels revived, and Wilfrith in consequence
-of a council assembled by order of Ealdfrith at Eastrefield was robbed of
-his episcopal dignity and reduced to his abbacy at Ripon. He again
-insisted that the king and bishops should submit to the Pope, and at the
-age of well-nigh seventy he undertook another journey to Rome. But it was
-in vain he sent envoys to the king on his return. Ealdfrith was determined
-not to relent, but afterwards approaching death intimidated him. Feeling
-his end draw nigh he sent for Aelflaed of Whitby, who with the abbess
-Aethelburg (probably of Hackness) came to where he lay ill at Driffield in
-the East Riding. Aelflaed received the king's dying words, and at a
-council of prelates subsequently assembled on the river Nidd bore
-testimony that he had spoken in favour of making peace. Wilfrith regained
-part of his influence but remained in retirement at his monastery.
-
-Aelflaed outlived him and her friend Cuthberht who died in 687. It is
-probable that she assisted at the translation of Cuthberht's body in 698,
-for in the inventory of the church at Durham one of the linen cloths or
-outer envelopes of his body, which was taken from it in 1104, is described
-as 'a linen cloth of double texture which had enveloped the body of St
-Cuthbert in his grave; Elfled the abbess had wrapped him up in it[309].'
-
-Aelflaed is the last abbess of Whitby known by name. Her death is supposed
-to have taken place in 713. Her monastery, like so many houses in the
-north, which had grown to prosperity with the rising power of Northumbria,
-sank into insignificance with the decadence of that power. This decline
-was partly due to political reasons, but the dislike which the later kings
-of Northumbria felt towards monasteries may have had something to do with
-it. For as we shall see later on the example Queen Aethelthrith had set
-was probably followed by two other Northumbrian queens, Cyneburg, the wife
-of Ealhfrith, and Cuthburg, wife of Ealdfrith ([Dagger] 705), who returned
-to their own countries and there founded monasteries.
-
-
-§ 4. Houses in Mercia and in the South.
-
-From the north we turn to Mercia and Wessex, the central and south-western
-provinces of England. Mercia had clung longest to her heathen beliefs, for
-Christianity was not accepted there till after the defeat of Penda in 655
-when Northumbria gained supremacy. Penda, king of Mercia, remained
-faithful to his gods to the end himself, but his children adopted the new
-faith. His son Peada had already been baptized in Northumbria by Finnan
-who sent four ecclesiastics back with him to evangelise the Midlands, and
-Wulfhere (c. 658-675) Peada's brother and successor was married to the
-Christian princess Eormenhild of Kent, for whom Queen Sexburg had made the
-religious foundation at Sheppey. Peada had founded a religious settlement
-at Burh or Medehampstead which is better known as Peterborough, a name
-bestowed on it after its restoration in 970. The charter of the foundation
-of Burh is dated 664, and besides the signatures of Wulfhere and other
-princes and thanes it bears those of Wulfhere's sisters Cyneburg and
-Cyneswith[310].
-
-Cyneburg and Cyneswith were esteemed as saints on the strength of their
-religious foundations at Castor, a village some miles distant from
-Peterborough; the name Cyneburg is held by the local historian to survive
-in the appellations of Lady Connyburrow Walk and Coneygreve Close[311].
-Cyneburg had been married to Ealhfrith, who was for some time co-regent of
-Northumbria, but little is known of him after his presence at the synod of
-Whitby in 664. The charter of the Medehampstead foundation above referred
-to establishes beyond a doubt that Cyneburg had left her husband to found
-and preside over her monastery; for she is designated as 'formerly a queen
-who had resigned her sway to preside over a monastery of maidens[312].'
-Her legend, which is not older than John of Tinmouth[313], enlarges on
-this fact, and like Aethelthrith of Ely, Cyneburg together with her sister
-Cyneswith has found a place in the Calendar as a virgin saint[314].
-
-The legend which tells of Cyneburh and Cyneswith also refers to St Tibba
-or Tilba, their kinswoman, who dwelt at Ryhall not far from Castor. The
-same day was kept in commemoration of all these three saints at
-Peterborough, to which place their bodies were transferred at an early
-date. For the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (972) says of Aelfsi, abbot of
-Peterborough: 'And he took up St Kyneburg and St Kyneswith who lay at
-Castor, and St Tibba who lay at Ryhall, and brought them to Burh, and
-offered them all to St Peter in one day.' Camden[315] speaks of Tibba as a
-'saint of inferior order, who was worshipped as another Diana by fowlers,
-a patroness of hawking,' and adds information which shows that she was
-popularly connected with heathen survivals.
-
-Mercia was the birthplace of many picturesque legends about the conversion
-of members of the ruling family and about their religious foundations.
-When once Christianity was accepted the activity which kings, queens and
-prelates displayed in its favour was great, but the historical information
-we have about them is meagre.
-
-Thus Repton (Repandune) in Derbyshire, a monastery for women, had gained
-considerable importance when the noble youth Guthlac repaired thither in
-694 to devote himself to learning under the abbess Aelfthrith[316].
-Nothing is known about the beginnings of the house, and if the abbess
-Aelfthrith founded it she has not on this account been accepted as a saint
-like the founders of other houses. This omission may however be due to the
-difficulties which arose between Aelfthrith and the prelates of Mercia. We
-do not know their nature, but in 705 a council of Mercian clergy assembled
-to consider the re-admission of Aelfthrith to Church privileges[317]. A
-letter is also extant from Bishop Waldhere of London to Archbishop
-Brihtwald of Canterbury in which he mentions that a reconciliation has
-taken place[318].
-
-The noble youth Guthlac who came to study at Repton afterwards became
-famous, and many accounts of his life have been written[319]. The earliest
-version, drafted by his friend Felix, supplies some interesting details of
-the life at Repton and the studies there[320].
-
-We are told that Guthlac's progress was wonderful. 'When he had been there
-two years he had learnt the psalms, the canticles, the hymns and prayers
-after the ecclesiastical order,' but he met with disapproval in the
-monastery by refusing to drink wine. The accounts which he read of the
-solitary life of the older monks filled him with a longing for solitude,
-and he left Repton and wandered about till he found the place of his
-heart's desire at Crowland in the fen country, where he determined to
-settle. He had received the tonsure at Repton and returned there on a
-visit before finally settling at Crowland. He did not break his connection
-with Repton, for we hear that the abbess Ecgburh who succeeded Aelfthrith
-sent him as a gift a coffin made of wood and lead, together with a linen
-winding-sheet, and asked who should be warden of the place after him, as
-though she regarded Crowland as a dependency of Repton[321].
-
-The abbess Ecgburg was the daughter of King Ealdwulf of East Anglia
-([Dagger] 714)[322], and an eloquent letter which is quoted later in my
-account of Boniface's correspondents was probably written by her[323].
-
-In connection with Guthlac's solitary life we hear of a woman Pega, who
-had also chosen a retreat in the fen country, at a place afterwards known
-as Peykirk, which is now situated on a peninsula formed by the uplands of
-Northamptonshire and connected with the mound on which Guthlac dwelt by a
-ridge of gravel, but which at that time formed an island[324]. One version
-of Guthlac's life tells how 'he had a sister called Pega whom he would not
-see in this life, to the intent that they might the rather meet in the
-life to come'; and another manuscript life says that the Evil One appeared
-to the saint in the form of Pega. Mr W. de Birch Gray who has reprinted
-these accounts notices that the tone in which Florence of Worcester speaks
-of Pega suggests that to him at least she appeared more famous than
-Guthlac[325].
-
-Different accounts of Guthlac agree that at his death his companions at
-once departed to fetch Pega. In the celebrated series of drawings of the
-12th century, which set forth the story of St Guthlac, the holy woman Pega
-is depicted twice[326]. In one picture she steps into the boat, in which
-the companion of Guthlac has come to fetch her, and in the other she is
-represented as supporting the saint, who is enveloped in his shroud.
-
-The connection between Guthlac and Pega is at least curious, and the
-authority she at once assumed is noteworthy. 'For three days' space with
-sacred hymns of praise she commended the holy man to God,' says the
-Anglo-Saxon prose version of his life[327]. And further, 'After his death
-when he had been buried twelve months God put it into the heart of the
-servant of the Lord that she should remove the brother's body to another
-tomb. She assembled thither many of the servants of God and mass-priests,
-and others of the ecclesiastical order.... She wound the holy corpse, with
-praises of Christ's honour, in the other sheet which Ecgbriht the
-anchoress formerly sent him when alive for that same service.'
-
-The Acts of the Saints give an account of St Pega or Pegia and tell us
-that she went to Rome where she died[328]. Her reputation for holiness, as
-far as it is preserved, is based chiefly on her connection with Guthlac,
-but these accounts leave room for much that must necessarily remain
-conjecture.
-
-Other women-saints who were reputed to have lived about this period, and
-who were brought into connection with the rulers of Mercia, claim a
-passing attention, although their legends written at a much later date
-supply the only information we have about them. Thus there is St
-Osith[329] of Colchester, whose legend written in the 13th century is full
-of hopeless anachronisms. The house of Augustinian canons at Chich[330] in
-the 12th century was dedicated conjointly to the saints Peter and Paul and
-to the woman-saint Osith; a canon of this house, Albericus Veerus,
-probably wrote her legend. Perhaps St Osith of Aylesbury is identical with
-her[331].
-
-Our information is equally untrustworthy concerning St Frideswith, patron
-saint of Oxford, for it dates no further back than the 12th century[332].
-The chief interest in her legend is that its author establishes a
-connection between incidents in the life of Frideswith, and the dread
-which the kings of England had of entering Oxford; a dread which as early
-as 1264 is referred to as an 'old superstition[333].'
-
-All these women are credited in their legends with founding monasteries
-and gaining local influence, and excepting in the case of St Tibba, I have
-come across no coupling of their names with profane cults. Other
-women-saints who may perhaps be classed with them, though little survives
-except their names, are St Osburg of Coventry[334], St Modwen of Strenhall
-in Staffordshire and Burton-on-Trent[335], and St Everhild of Everingham
-in Yorkshire[336].
-
-Other names which occur in local calendars will be found in the _Menology_
-of Stanton, who has compiled a very complete list of men- and women-saints
-in England and Wales from a number of local calendars.
-
-In contrast to the uncertainty which hangs about the settlements under
-woman's rule in the Midlands and around their founders, two houses founded
-in the south of England during the 7th century stand out in clear
-prominence. Barking in Essex, and Wimbourne in Dorsetshire, attained a
-considerable degree of culture, and the information which has been
-preserved concerning them is ample and trustworthy.
-
-Bede has devoted several chapters of his history to stories connected with
-Barking[337]. It owed its foundation to Earconwald sometime bishop of
-London (675-693) who, after founding a settlement at Chertsey in Surrey
-under the rule of an abbot, in 666 made a home for his sister Aethelburg
-at Barking[338] where 'he established her excellently in the regular
-discipline.' Aethelburg appears to have been an energetic person, and has
-been raised to the rank of saint[339]. Her settlement included men as well
-as women, and young children seem to have been entrusted to her care for
-their education.
-
-Bede says that 'having taken the rule of the monastery she showed herself
-worthy of her brother the bishop in all respects, both by living rightly
-herself, and by the pious and prudent course she took to rule those who
-were subject to her; this was proved by celestial miracles.'
-
-A number of these miracles are described by him with considerable power.
-Between 664 and 684, a great pestilence, the earliest on record in
-Christian times, visited England and carried off many of the inmates of
-Barking. First a boy of three years fell ill and in dying called by name
-the nun Eadgith, who presently died. Another nun called Torctgith[340]
-also had a vision of impending death. 'One night at the beginning of dawn,
-having gone forth from the chamber in which she abode, she saw plainly as
-it were a human body, which was brighter than the sun, carried up on high,
-wrapped in fine linen, and lifted apparently from the house in which the
-sisters were usually placed to die. And when she looked more intently to
-see by what means the apparition of a glorious body which she beheld was
-raised on high, she saw that it was lifted up into the upper regions as it
-were by cords brighter than gold, until being introduced into the opening
-heavens it could no longer be seen by her.'
-
-This imagery foretold the death of Abbess Aethelburg, who was carried off
-by the pestilence. She was succeeded at Barking by Hildelith, whom
-Boniface refers to as a very estimable person and who has also found a
-place among the saints[341]. Capgrave speaks of her having been educated
-in France, whence she came to Barking at the desire of Bishop Earconwald
-to help in establishing the foreign system of discipline.
-
-It was for the abbess Hildelith and her companions at Barking that the
-scholar Ealdhelm ([Dagger] 709) wrote his great treatise on Virginity, a
-long and elaborate composition which sets before these women the beauties
-of the virgin life with a mass of illustration taken from religious and
-classical literature. From the point of view of women's religious life, it
-is worth while to describe this treatise at some length, for it shows what
-a high degree of culture had been attained at Barking towards the close of
-the seventh century.
-
-Ealdhelm, born of noble parentage about the year 640, is the
-representative in southern England of the classical revival which was
-about this time engrafted on Christian teaching. He studied first at
-Malmesbury under the learned Scot Maidulf and then at Canterbury where
-Archbishop Theodore and Abbot Hadrian were attracting many students, and
-where he perfected his Latin and musical studies and acquired in some
-measure the rare and much esteemed knowledge of Greek. 'A wonder of
-erudition in liberal as well as in ecclesiastical writings,' Bede calls
-him[342]. From Canterbury he returned to Malmesbury, which owing to his
-influence attained a fame which it kept till the Middle Ages. In 705 when
-Wessex was divided into two bishoprics, Ealdhelm was made bishop of the
-see of Sherbourne.
-
-The interest Ealdhelm took in women was so great that posterity pictured
-him as continually in their society[343]. Besides his great treatise,
-passages in his other works bear witness to this interest. In a letter
-addressed to Sigegith[344], he gave advice about the baptism of a nun who
-had been received into her community while still a heathen; to another nun
-whose name is not mentioned he sent a letter together with several
-poems[345]. He composed verses in praise of a church which Bugga, a
-daughter of King Centwin (670-685), had built[346]. And besides the prose
-treatise on virginity addressed to the sisterhood of Barking, he wrote a
-long poem in heroic hexameters on the same subject called the 'Praise of
-Virgins'; it has a preface addressed to the abbess Maxima, and is followed
-by a poem on the 'Eight chief Sins,' likewise intended for the perusal of
-nuns[347].
-
-Ealdhelm opens his prose work on virginity[348] with thanks to the women
-of Barking for the writings they have sent to him. Hildelith, Justina,
-Cuthburg, Osburg, Ealdgith, Scholastica, Hidburg, Burngith, Eulalia and
-Tecla are addressed by name. He praises them as gymnosophists, as scholars
-and as fighters in the arena of discipline (c. 2). Like unto bees, he says
-(c. 4), they collect everywhere material for study.
-
-Sometimes, he says, you study the Prophets, sometimes the Books of the
-Law, 'now skilfully tracking the fourfold wording of the gospel story,
-expounded in the mystic commentaries of the Catholic fathers, and
-spiritually bared to the kernel, and disposed fitly according to the
-four-square pattern of ecclesiastical usage, namely according to the
-letter, allegory, tropology and anagogy[349]; now carefully searching into
-the writers of history and into the collections of chronographers, who
-have handed down the changing events of the past in wording that impresses
-the mind. Sometimes you carefully examine the rules of grammarians, the
-laws of accentuation measured by tone and time, fixed in poetic feet by
-marks of punctuation, that is divided into parts of verse consisting of
-two and a half and three and a half feet, and changed in endless varieties
-of metre.'
-
-Ealdhelm then enlarges on the beauties of the virgin's life, and dwells
-especially on the charms of peaceful companionship which it secures. Again
-in their dwelling and working together the women are likened to bees.
-
-The charms of the virgin's life are then set forth in language redundant
-of imagery, verbose and grandiloquent in the extreme. We are told of the
-temptations which those who have adopted a religious life must guard
-against (c. 11). There are eight sins as to which they are especially
-warned; the chief of these is pride. Women are then directed as to the
-books they should make a special subject of study, and are recommended to
-peruse the works of Cassian (who in the 5th century wrote the 'Duties of
-Monastic Life') and the 'Moralities' of Gregory the Great (which contain
-reflections suggested by the book of Job), and they are advised to study
-the Psalms to avoid unhappiness (c. 14). With the love of contrast
-peculiar to early writers, Ealdhelm shows how the women who serve God and
-those who do not are different in their bearing and outward appearance,
-and enlarges on the relative value of different estates (c. 17): virginity
-is of gold, chastity is of silver; marriage (jugalitas) is of brass; and
-again: virginity is wealth, chastity is sufficiency, marriage is poverty,
-etc.
-
-He then displays the wide range of his learning by adducing many writers
-in support of his views (c. 20-40), in passages which are elaborate and
-instructive but wearisome through their reiterations. He enumerates all
-the women famous for their religious lives. The Virgin Mary comes first
-and she is followed by many women-saints of Italy and the East, on whom
-there is in some cases much, in others little, comment. In this list we in
-vain look for the names of religious women living on this side of the
-Alps. Helen the mother of Constantine (c. 48) is referred to, but her
-British origin is not mentioned and the idea of it had probably not arisen
-in Ealdhelm's time.
-
-The writer again turns to those who are devoted to religion, and in
-passages which are full of interest as a study of the times complains of
-the personal appearance of the clergy and of those women who have chosen
-religion as a profession. These passages are among the most instructive in
-regard to women and clearly show how completely life in a nunnery at the
-beginning of the 8th century differed from what it was later on.
-
-'It shames me,' he says, 'to speak of the bold impudence of conceit and
-the fine insolence of stupidity which are found both among nuns
-(sanctimoniales) who abide under the rule of a settlement, and among the
-men of the Church who live as clergy under the rule of the Pontiff. These
-act contrary to canonical decrees and to the rule of regular life, for
-with many-coloured vestments[350] and with elegant adornments the body is
-set off and the external form decked out limb by limb. The appearance of
-the other sex agrees with it; a vest of fine linen of a violet colour is
-worn, above it a scarlet tunic with a hood, sleeves striped with silk and
-trimmed with red fur; the locks on the forehead and the temples are curled
-with a crisping iron, the dark head-veil is given up for white and
-coloured head-dresses which, with bows of ribbon sewn on, reach down to
-the ground; the nails, like those of a falcon or sparrow-hawk, are pared
-to resemble talons'.... This state of things Ealdhelm strongly condemns.
-But he adds the remark that he is addressing no one in particular,
-evidently to avoid any umbrage his women friends might take at these
-remarks. His reference to luxurious clothing does not stand alone. The
-description Bede gives of the women at Coldingham has been quoted, and
-Boniface in a letter[351] to Cuthberht of Canterbury speaks of 'the
-adornment of clothes, trimmed with wide edging of purple,' which, he says,
-is deteriorating the young men in the monasteries, and foretells the
-coming of Antichrist. Sumptuous clothes as vestments during religious
-service remained in use, but in all other respects they were condemned as
-prejudicial to the welfare of those who were vowed to religion.
-
-Ealdhelm's work on virginity closes with an affectionate greeting to his
-women friends in which he addresses them finally as 'Flowers of the
-Church, sisters of monastic life, scholarly pupils, pearls of Christ,
-jewels of Paradise, and sharers of the eternal home.'
-
-His work was greatly prized and widely read both by his own and by later
-generations. It is extant in several copies of the 8th century[352], and
-maintained its reputation throughout the Middle Ages. William of
-Malmesbury ([Dagger] 1141) in his account of Ealdhelm specifies the work
-on virginity as one 'than which nothing can be more pleasing[353].' It
-still held its own when printing was introduced, for it was published at
-Deventer in Holland in 1512, and has since been reprinted for devotional
-purposes[354].
-
-Among those on whom the book made a profound impression was Cuthburg,
-sister of King Ina of Wessex (688-725). She was at one time an inmate of
-the Barking settlement and was probably one of those to whom the work was
-addressed.
-
-Cuthburg was held as a saint for founding a settlement at Wimbourne in
-Dorset[355], where the cult of her sister Cwenburg was associated with
-hers. Cuthburg as mentioned above was said to have left her husband
-Ealdfrith of Northumbria ([Dagger] 705) from religious motives. Her being
-held in veneration as a virgin saint may be due to her name being coupled
-with that of a virgin sister[356]. Missals printed at Rouen in 1515, and
-at Paris in 1519 and 1529, have an office prescribed for Cuthburg as a
-virgin[357]. The statement that she was the mother of Osred, afterwards
-king of Northumbria (706-717), is perhaps unfounded.
-
-There is no doubt as to Ealdhelm's friendly relations both with Cuthburg
-and her husband. He dedicated his enigmas to Ealdfrith under the title
-'Adcircius[358],' and in a letter dated 705 he declares that liberty of
-election is granted to all congregations under his government including
-that called 'Wimburnia,' over which Cuthburg, the king's sister,
-presides[359]. A manuscript of the 14th century, preserved in the nunnery
-of Romsey, contains a collection of saints' lives, and gives a full
-account of a conversation Cuthburg had with her husband previous to their
-separation[360]. It further relates how she placed the basilica of her
-settlement under the protection of the Mother of God, and was herself
-buried in it. She died some time between 720 and 730, probably nearer the
-earlier date, for several abbesses are said to have ruled between her and
-Tetta. The name of Tetta has been brought into connection with a place
-named Tetbury, but we know nothing definite concerning a monastery
-there[361]. As abbess of Wimbourne she was the teacher of Lioba, called
-also Leobgith, who went abroad at the desire of Boniface as we shall see
-further on.
-
-In the life of Lioba we get a description of the settlement of
-Wimbourne[362], which may be somewhat coloured to show the result of
-Tetta's strict and beneficent rule, but which deserves attention as
-yielding a fair example of the arrangements which in the eyes of its
-author appeared desirable for a monastery of women. The author, Rudolf of
-Fulda, was a monk who wrote between 800 and 850, and who compiled his work
-from notices which Magno ([Dagger] c. 838) had collected from women pupils
-of Lioba[363].
-
-'There were two settlements at Wimbourne, formerly erected by the kings of
-the country, surrounded by strong and lofty walls and endowed with ample
-revenues. Of these one was designed for men, the other for women; but
-neither, for such was the rule of their foundation, was ever entered by
-any member of the other sex. No woman had permission to come among the
-congregation of the men, no man to enter into the dwellings of the women,
-with the exception of the priests who entered to celebrate mass and
-withdrew at once when service was over. If a woman, desirous of quitting
-the world, asked to be admitted to the sisterhood (collegium), she joined
-it on condition that she should not leave it unless a reasonable cause or
-a special occasion took her out with the leave of the abbess. The abbess
-herself, when she gave orders in affairs of the settlement or tendered
-advice, spoke through a window and there gave her decision....'
-
-Wimbourne stands last in the list of well authenticated monastic
-foundations made by women during the early Anglo-Saxon period; of such
-foundations more than twenty have been mentioned in the course of this
-chapter. Others no doubt existed at this time, but we only hear of them at
-a later date. We find among them some of the centres most influential in
-enabling the Anglo-Saxons to attain a high degree of culture within a
-hundred years of their conversion to Christianity.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-
-ANGLO-SAXON NUNS IN CONNECTION WITH BONIFACE.
-
-    'Et ut dicitur, quid dulcius est, quam habeas illum, cum quo omnia
-    possis loqui ut tecum?' _Eangith to Boniface._
-
-
-§ 1. The Women corresponding with Boniface.
-
-In the course of the 6th and 7th centuries a number of men left England
-and settled abroad among the heathen Germans, partly from a wish to gain
-new converts to the faith, partly because a change of affairs at home made
-them long for a different field of labour. Through the influx of the
-heathen Anglo-Saxons, the British Christians had been deprived of their
-influence, and when Christianity was restored it was under the auspices of
-princes who were favourably inclined towards Rome. Men who objected to the
-Roman sway sought independence among the heathens abroad in preference to
-dependence on strangers at home, and it is owing to their efforts that
-Christianity was introduced into the valleys leading up from the Rhine,
-into the lake districts of Bavaria, and into Switzerland.
-
-A century later the Church had so far extended the limits of her power
-that it was felt desirable at Rome that these Christian settlers should be
-brought into subjection. For the tenets which they held and the traditions
-which had been handed down to them differed in many ways from what Rome
-could countenance. They were liberal in tolerating heathen practices, and
-ignorant of matters of ritual and creed which were insisted on in the
-Church of Rome. The bishops, who were self-appointed, were won over by the
-promise of recognising the title to which they laid claim, but the
-difficulty remained of weaning them from their objectionable practices.
-Efforts were accordingly made to reconvert the converted districts and to
-bring some amount of pressure to bear on the clergy.
-
-The representative of this movement in South Germany was Boniface,
-otherwise called Wynfred, on whom posterity has bestowed the title Apostle
-of Germany, in recognition of his services in the twofold character of
-missionary and reformer. He was a native of Wessex, and his mission abroad
-has an interest in connection with our subject because of the friendly
-relations he entertained with many inmates of women's houses in England,
-and because he invited women as well as men to leave England and assist
-him in the work which he had undertaken.
-
-Boniface had grown up as an inmate of the settlement of Nutshalling near
-Winchester and first went abroad in 716, but proceeded no further than
-Utrecht. Conjecture has been busy over the difficulties which took him
-away, and the disappointments which brought him back. Utrecht was an old
-Roman colony which had been captured from the Franks by Adgisl, king of
-the Frisians, who gave a friendly reception there to Bishop Wilfrith in
-678. But King Radbod, his successor, was hostile to the Franks and to
-Christianity, and it was only in deference to the powerful Frankish
-house-mayor Pippin that he countenanced the settling of Willibrord, a
-pupil of Wilfrith, with eleven companions in 692. However, owing to
-Radbod's enmity the position of these monks was such that they were
-obliged to leave, and it is possible that Boniface when he went to Utrecht
-was disappointed in not finding them there.
-
-Two years later Boniface went on a pilgrimage to Rome, where the idea of
-bringing his energies to assist in the extension of Papal influence
-originated. The Pope furnished him with a letter[364] in which he is
-directed to reclaim the faithless, and armed with this he travelled in the
-districts of the Main. But as soon as the news of the death of Radbod the
-Frisian ([Dagger] 719) reached him he went to Utrecht, where Willibrord
-had returned. We do not know what afterwards prompted him to resume his
-work in Germany, but perhaps the proposal of Willibrord that he should
-settle with him altogether awakened Boniface to the fact that he was not
-working for the Pope as he proposed. His reception at Rome, where he again
-went in 722, and the declaration of faith he handed in, are in favour of
-this view. But Gregory II who was aware of the abilities of Boniface
-forgave him, and on the strength of his declaration provided him with
-further letters. One of these was addressed to the Christians of Germany,
-to the representative clergy and to the Thüringians, and another to the
-house-mayor, Karl Martel, who had succeeded Pippin; both letters commanded
-that the authority of Boniface was to be everywhere recognised.
-
-From this time for a period of over thirty years Boniface devoted his
-energies to extending, organizing and systematizing the power of Rome in
-Germany. His character appears in different lights varying with the
-standpoint from which he is regarded. Judging from his letters he is
-alternately swayed by doggedness of purpose, want of confidence in
-himself, dependence on friends, and jealous insistence on his own
-authority. He has a curious way of representing himself as persecuted when
-in fact he is the persecutor, but his power of rousing enthusiasm for his
-work and for his personality is enormous.
-
-His biographer Wilibald describes this power as already peculiar to him
-during his stay at Nutshalling, where many men sought him to profit by his
-knowledge, 'while those who on account of their fragile sex could not do
-so, and those who were not allowed to stay away from their settlements,
-moved by the spirit of divine love, sought eagerly for an account of
-him[365]....'
-
-The interest Boniface had aroused at home accompanied him on his travels.
-He remained in friendly communication with many persons in England, to
-whom he wrote and who wrote to him. Among the friends and correspondents
-whose letters are preserved are churchmen, princes, abbesses, clerics of
-various degrees, and nuns. From the point of view of this book the letters
-addressed to women are of special interest, since they bring us into
-personal contact so to speak with the abbesses and inmates of English
-convents, and we hear for the first time what they personally have to tell
-us of themselves.
-
-Among Boniface's early friends and correspondents was Eadburg[366], abbess
-of the monastery in Thanet. She was a woman of great abilities, zealous in
-the pursuit of knowledge, and her influence secured several royal charters
-for her settlement. She had probably succeeded Mildthrith, but at what
-date is not known. Her letters to Boniface unfortunately have not been
-preserved, but the letters he wrote to her are full of interesting matter.
-The earliest of these was written between 718 and 719; in it Boniface does
-not yet address her as abbess[367].
-
-In this letter Boniface in compliance with a wish Eadburg had expressed,
-describes a vision of the future life which a monk living at Mildburg's
-monastery at Wenlock had seen during a state of suspended animation.
-Boniface had first heard of this vision from the abbess Hildelith of
-Barking, and he writes a graphic and eloquent account of it, parts of
-which are put into the mouth of the monk himself. The account gives
-curious glimpses of that imagery of the future life which early Christians
-dwelt upon and elaborated more and more. Nuns at this time as well as
-later took a special interest in the subject.
-
-First the monk is carried aloft through flames which enwrap the world. He
-sees many souls for the possession of which angels and devils are
-fighting. Impersonations of his sins confront and accost him, but his
-virtues arise also and enter into conflict with the sins. The virtues are
-supported by angels and the fight ends to the monk's advantage. He also
-sees fiery waters flowing towards hell: and souls like black birds which
-hover over waters from whence proceed the wails of the damned. He sees
-Paradise, and a river of pitch over which a bridge leads to Jerusalem, and
-souls are trying to cross it. Among others suffering torments he catches
-sight of King Ceolred of Mercia. At last the angels cast the monk down
-from the height and he re-awakens to life.
-
-Such descriptions of a future life multiply as one nears the Middle Ages.
-By the side of the one which Boniface sent to Eadburg should be read
-another by him, a fragmentary one, which supplements it[368]. The
-sufferers in hell mentioned in this are Cuthburg, Ceolla and Wiala (of
-whom nothing is known), an unnamed abbot and Aethelbald, king of Mercia
-([Dagger] 756).
-
-The description of the after life given by Boniface agrees in various ways
-with one contained in the works of Bede. According to this account there
-was a man in Northumbria named Drycthelm, who died, came to life again,
-and described what he had seen of the world to come.
-
-The other letters which Boniface addressed to Eadburg are of later date
-and were written when he had settled abroad and was devoting his energies
-to converting the Hessians and Thüringians. At this time he asked her to
-send him through the priest Eoban the letters of the apostle Peter, which
-she was to write for him in gold characters. 'Often,' he says, 'gifts of
-books and vestments, the proofs of your affection, have been to me a
-consolation in misfortune. So I pray that you will continue as you have
-begun, and write for me in gold characters the epistles of my master, the
-holy apostle Peter, to the honour and reverence of holy writ before mortal
-eyes while I am preaching, and because I desire always to have before me
-the words of him who led me on my mission....' He ends his letter by again
-hoping that she will accede to his request so 'that her words may shine in
-gold to the glory of the Father in heaven[369].'
-
-The art of writing in gold on parchment was unknown to Scottish artists
-and had been introduced into England from Italy. Bishop Wilfrith owned the
-four gospels 'written in purest gold on purple-coloured parchment,' and a
-few of the purple gospels with gold writing of this period have been
-preserved. The fact that women practised the art is evident from the
-letter of Boniface. Eadburg must have had a reputation for writing, for
-Lul, one of Boniface's companions, sent her among other gifts a silver
-style (_graphium argenteum_) such as was used at the time for writing on
-wax tablets[370].
-
-Boniface received frequent gifts from friends in England. Eoban, who
-carried his letter asking Eadburg for the Epistles of St Peter, was the
-bearer of a letter to an Abbot Duddo in which Boniface reminding him of
-their old friendship asked for a copy of the Epistles of St Paul[371].
-Again Boniface wrote asking Abbot Huetberht of Wearmouth for the minor
-works (_opuscula_) of Bede[372], and Lul, who was with him, wrote to
-Dealwin to forward the minor works of Ealdhelm, bishop of Sherbourne,
-those in verse and those in prose[373].
-
-Judging from the correspondence the effective work of Boniface resulted in
-the execution of only a small part of his great schemes. His original plan
-was repeatedly modified. There is extant a letter from the Pope which
-shows that he hoped for the conversion of the heathen Saxons and
-Thüringians[374], and the idea was so far embraced by Boniface that he
-wrote a letter to the bishops, priests, abbots and abbesses in England
-asking them to pray that the Saxons might accept the faith of Christ[375].
-But the plan for their conversion was eventually abandoned.
-
-At this period belief in the efficacy of prayer was unbounded, and praying
-for the living was as much part of the work of the professed as praying
-for the dead. Settlements apparently combined for the purpose of mutually
-supporting each other by prayer. A letter is extant in the correspondence
-of Boniface in which the abbot of Glastonbury, several abbesses and other
-abbots agree to pray at certain hours for each other's settlements[376].
-
-In his times of trouble and tribulation Boniface wrote to all his friends
-asking for prayers. 'We were troubled on every side,' he wrote to the
-abbess Eadburg, quoting Scripture[377], 'without were fightings, within
-were fears.' She was to pray for him that the pagans might be snatched
-from their idolatrous customs and unbelievers brought back to the Catholic
-mother Church.
-
-Eadburg had liberally responded to his request for gifts. 'Beloved
-sister,' he wrote[378], 'with gifts of holy books you have comforted the
-exile in Germany with spiritual light! For in this dark remoteness among
-German peoples man must come to the distress of death had he not the word
-of God as a lamp unto his feet and as a light unto his paths[379]. Fully
-trusting in your love I beseech that you pray for me, for I am shaken by
-my shortcomings, that take hold of me as though I were tossed by a tempest
-on a dangerous sea.' This consciousness of his shortcomings was not wholly
-due to the failure of his plans, for Boniface at one period of his life
-was much troubled by questions of theology. The simile of being
-tempest-tossed is often used by him. In a letter addressed to an unnamed
-nun he describes his position in language similar to that in which he
-addresses Eadburg. This nun also is urged to pray for him in a letter full
-of biblical quotations[380].
-
-Among the letters to Boniface there are several from nuns and abbesses
-asking for his advice. Political difficulties and the changed attitude of
-the ruling princes of Northumbria and Mercia towards convents brought such
-hardships to those who had adopted the religious profession that many of
-them wished to leave their homes, and availed themselves of the
-possibility of doing so which was afforded by the plan of going on
-pilgrimage to Rome.
-
-The wish to behold the Eternal City had given a new direction to the love
-of wandering, so strong a trait in human nature. The motives for visiting
-Rome have been different in different periods of history. To the convert
-in the 8th and 9th centuries Rome appeared as the fountain-head of
-Christianity, the residence of Christ's representative on earth, and the
-storehouse of famous deeds and priceless relics. Architectural remains
-dating from the period of Roman rule were numerous throughout Europe and
-helped to fill the imagination of those dwelling north of the Alps with
-wonder at the possible sights and treasures which a visit to Rome itself
-might disclose. Prelates and monks undertook the journey to establish
-personal relations with the Pope and to acquire books and relics for their
-settlements, but the taste for travelling spread, and laymen and wayfarers
-of all kinds joined the bands of religious pilgrims. Even kings and
-queens, with a sudden change of feeling which the Church magnified into a
-portentous conversion, renounced the splendour of their surroundings and
-donned the pilgrim's garb in the hope of beholding the Eternal City in its
-glory.
-
-Among the letters which are preserved in the correspondence of Boniface
-there is one from Aelflaed, abbess of Whitby, in which she writes to the
-abbess Adolana (probably Adela) of Pfälzel (Palatiolum) on the Mosel near
-Trier, recommending to her care a young abbess who is on her way to Rome.
-This letter shows that Aelflaed was well versed in writing Latin. The name
-of the abbess in whose behalf the letter was penned is not known, but she
-may be identical with Wethburg, who lived and died at Rome[381].
-
-'To the holy and worshipful abbess Adolana, a greeting in the Lord of
-eternal salvation.
-
-'Since we have heard of your holiness from those who have come from your
-parts, and from widespread report, in the first place I pray for your warm
-affection, for the Lord has said: This is my command, that ye love one
-another[382].
-
-'Further we make humble request that your holy and fervent words may
-commend us worthily to God Almighty, should it not be irksome to you to
-offer devotion in return for ours; for James the Apostle has taught and
-said: Pray for one another, that ye may be saved.
-
-'Further to your great holiness and usual charity we humbly and earnestly
-commend this maiden vowed to God, a pious abbess, our dear and faithful
-daughter, who since the days of her youth, from love of Christ and for the
-honour of the apostles Peter and Paul, has been desirous of going to their
-holy threshold, but who has been kept back by us until now because we
-needed her and in order that the souls entrusted to her might profit. And
-we pray that with charity and true kindness she may be received into your
-goodwill, as well as those who are travelling with her, in order that the
-desired journey with God's help and your willing charity may at last be
-accomplished. Therefore again and again we beseech that she may be helped
-on her way with recommendations from you to the holy city Rome, by the
-help of the holy and signbearing leader (signifer) of the apostles Peter;
-and if you are present we hope and trust she may find with you whatever
-advice she requires for the journey. May divine grace watch over your
-holiness when you pray for us.'
-
-The desire to go southward was strengthened among religious women by the
-increasing difficulties of their position at home. Monastic privileges
-were no longer respected by the kings of Mercia and Northumbria, and the
-Church lacked the power of directly interfering in behalf of monks and
-nuns. There is in the correspondence a letter which Boniface wrote in his
-own name and in that of his foreign bishops to Aethelbald, king of Mercia
-(716-756); he sharply rebukes him for his immoral practices and urges on
-him the desirability of taking a lawful wife. He accuses the king of
-indulging his wicked propensities even in monasteries and with nuns and
-maidens who were vowed to God; following the example of Tacitus, he
-praises the pure morals of the heathen Germans. The passages which bear on
-the subject are worthy of perusal, for they show how uncertain was the
-position of monasteries and how keenly Boniface realized the difficulties
-of nuns. He tells the king 'that loose women, whether they be vowed to
-religion or not, conceive inferior children through their wickedness and
-frequently do away with them.' The privileges of religious houses, he
-says, were respected till the reign of King Osred (706-17) of Northumbria,
-and of King Ceolred (709-16) of Mercia, but 'these two kings have shown
-their evil disposition and have sinned in a criminal way against the
-teaching of the gospels and the doings of our Saviour. They persisted in
-vice, in the seduction of nuns and the contemptuous treatment of monastic
-rights. Condemned by the judgment of God, and hurled from the heights of
-royal authority, they were overtaken by a speedy and awful death, and are
-now cut off from eternal light, and buried in the depths of hell and in
-the abyss of the infernal regions[383].' We have seen that in the letter
-written by Boniface to Eadburg, Ceolred is described as suffering torments
-in hell, and that King Aethelbald at a later date is depicted in the same
-predicament.
-
-With his letter to Aethelbald Boniface forwarded two others to the priest
-Herefrith, probably of Lindisfarne[384], and to Ecgberht (archbishop of
-York, 732-66), requesting them to support him against Aethelbald. 'It is
-the duty of your office to see that the devil does not establish his
-kingdom in places consecrated to God,' he wrote to Ecgberht, 'that there
-be not discord instead of peace, strife instead of piety, drunkenness
-instead of sobriety, slaughter and fornication instead of charity and
-chastity[385].' Shortly afterwards he wrote to Cuthberht, archbishop of
-Canterbury (740-62), telling him of the statutes passed at the Synod of
-Soissons[386], and severely censuring the conduct of the layman, 'be he
-emperor, king or count, who snatches a monastery from bishop, abbot, or
-abbess.'
-
-These admonitions show that the position of the religious houses and that
-of their rulers depended directly on the temper of the reigning prince. In
-the correspondence there are several letters from abbesses addressed to
-Boniface bearing on this point, which give us a direct insight into the
-tone of mind of these women. Their Latin is cumbersome and faulty, and
-biblical quotations are introduced which do not seem always quite to the
-point. The writers ramble on without much regard to construction and
-style, and yet there is a genuine ring about their letters which makes the
-distress described seem very real.
-
-One of these letters was written by an abbess named Ecgburg, probably at
-an early period of Boniface's career[387]. Her reference to the remoteness
-of her settlement suggests the idea that it was Repton, and that she
-herself was identical with Ecgburg, daughter of Ealdwulf king of the East
-Angles, the abbess whom we have noticed in connection with Guthlac. If
-that be so her sister Wethburg, to whom she refers, may be identical with
-the young unnamed abbess whom Aelflaed sped on her journey to Rome.
-
-'Since a cruel and bitter death,' she writes, 'has robbed me of him, my
-brother Osher, whom I loved beyond all others, you I hold dearer than all
-other men. Not to multiply words, no day, no night passes, but I think of
-your teaching. Believe me it is on account of this that I love you, God is
-my witness. In you I confide, because you were never forgetful of the
-affection which assuredly bound you to my brother. Though inferior to him
-in knowledge and in merit, I am not unlike him in recognizing your
-goodness. Time goes by with increasing swiftness and yet the dark gloom of
-sadness leaves me not. For time as it comes brings me increase of
-indignities, as it is written "Love of man brings sorrow, but love of
-Christ gladdens the heart." More recently my equally beloved sister
-Wethburg, as though to inflict a wound and renew a pang, suddenly passed
-out of my sight, she with whom I had grown up and with whom I was nursed
-at the same breast; one mother she and I had in the Lord, and my sister
-has left me. Jesus is my witness that on all sides there is sorrow, fear,
-and the image of death[388]. I would gladly die if it so pleased God, to
-whom the unknown is manifest, for this slow death is no trifle. What was
-it I was saying? From my sister not a sudden and bitter death, but a
-bitterer separation, divides me; I believe it was for her happiness, but
-it left me unhappy, as a corpse laid low, when adopting the fashion of the
-age she went on a pilgrimage, even though she knew how much I loved and
-cherished her, whom now as I hear a prison confines at Rome. But the love
-of Christ, which is strong and powerful in her, is stronger and more
-binding than all fetters, and perfect love casteth out fear. Indeed, I
-say, he who holds the power of divination, the Ruler of high Olympus, has
-endowed you with divine wisdom, and in his law do you meditate night and
-day[389]. For it is written: "How beautiful are the feet of them that
-preach the gospel of peace, and bring tidings of good things[390]." She
-has mounted by a steep and narrow path, while I remain below, held by
-mortal flesh as by irons upon my feet. In the coming judgment full of joy
-she, like unto the Lord, will sing: "I was in prison and ye came unto
-me[391]." You also in the future life, when the twelve apostles sit on
-their twelve seats[392], will be there, and in proportion to the number of
-those whom you have won by your work, will rejoice before the tribunal of
-the eternal King, like unto a leader who is about to be crowned. But I
-living in the vale of tears as I deserve, shall be weeping for my
-offences, on account of which God holds me unfit to join the heavenly
-hosts. Therefore, believe me, the tempest-tossed mariner does not so much
-long for the haven, the thirsty fields do not long so much for rain, the
-mother on the winding shore does not so anxiously wait for her son, as I
-long to rejoice in your sight. But oppressed by sins and innumerable
-offences, I so long to be freed from imminent danger, that I am made
-desperate; adoring the footsteps of your holiness and praying to you from
-the depths of my heart as a sinner, I call to you from the ends of the
-earth, O beloved master; as my anxious heart prompts, raise me to the
-corner-stone of your prayer, for you are my hope and a strong tower
-invisible to the enemy. And I beg as consolation to my grief and as limit
-to the wave of my sorrow, that my weakness may be supported by your
-intercession as by a prop. I entreat that you will condescend to give me
-some comfort either in the form of a relic or of a few words of blessing,
-written by you, in order that through them I may hold your presence
-secure.'
-
-By the side of this letter must be quoted another written by an Abbess
-Eangith, describing similar difficulties in a similar strain[393]. We do
-not know over which settlement Eangith presided, but her name and that of
-her daughter Heaburg of whom she speaks are inscribed in the Durham 'Liber
-Vitae[394].'
-
-'Beloved brother in the spirit rather than in the flesh,' she writes, 'you
-are magnified by the abundance of spiritual graces, and to you alone, with
-God as our sole witness, we wish to make known what you see here spread
-out before you and blotted by our tears: we are borne down by an
-accumulation of miseries as by a weight and a pressing burden, and also by
-the tumult of political affairs. As the foaming masses of the ocean when
-the force of the winds and the raging fury of the tempest lash up the
-great sea, carry in and carry out again the heaving billows dashing over
-rocks, so that the keels of the boats are turned upwards and the mast of
-the ship is pressed downwards, so do the ships of our souls groan under
-the great press of our miseries and the great mass of our misfortunes. By
-the voice of truth has it been said of the heavenly house: "The rain
-descended and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that
-house[395]," etc.
-
-'First and before all noteworthy of the things that affect us from
-without, must be mentioned the multitude of our offences and our want of
-full and complete faith, due not so much to care for our own souls but,
-what is worse and more oppressive, to care for the souls of those of
-either sex and of every age which have been entrusted to us. For this care
-involves ministering to many minds and to various dispositions, and
-afterwards giving account before the supreme tribunal of Christ both for
-obvious sins in deeds and words, and for secret thoughts which men ignore
-and God alone witnesseth; with a simple sword against a double-edged one,
-with ten thousand to meet twenty thousand warriors[396]. In addition to
-this care of souls we have difficulties in our domestic affairs, and
-various disagreements which the jealous enemy of all good has sown,
-namely, he who fills the impure hearts of men with malice and scatters it
-everywhere, but chiefly in the settlements of monks and nuns; but it is
-said "the mighty shall be mightily tormented[397]." Moreover the poverty
-and scantiness of our temporal possessions oppress us, and the smallness
-of the cultivated part of our estate; and the hostility of the king, for
-we are accused before him by those who envy us, as a wise man has said:
-"the bewitching of vanity obscureth good things[398]." Similarly we are
-oppressed by service due to the king and the queen, to bishop and prefect,
-officers and attendants. It would take long to enumerate those things
-which can be more easily imagined than described.
-
-'To all these evils is added the loss of friends, connections, and
-relatives by alliance and by blood. I[399] have neither son nor brother,
-neither father nor father's brother, none but an only daughter who is
-bereft of all that was dear to her; and a sister who is old, and the son
-of our brother, who too is unhappy in his mind, for our king holds his
-family connections in great contempt. There is no one else for us to rely
-on; God has removed them all by one chance or another. Some have died in
-their native land, and their bodies lie in the grimy dust of the earth to
-rise again on the day of doom, when the Master's trumpet shall sound, and
-the whole race of man shall come forth from dark tombs to give account of
-themselves; when their spirits, borne upwards in angels' arms, shall abide
-with Christ; when all sorrow shall end, and envy be worn out, and grief
-and mourning shall vanish in sight of the saints. Again others have left
-their native shores, and trusted themselves to the wide seas, and have
-sought the threshold of the holy apostles Peter and Paul and of all those
-martyrs, virgins and confessors, whose number God alone knows.
-
-'For these and other like causes, hardly to be enumerated in one day
-though July and August lengthen the days of summer, we are weary of our
-present life and hardly care to continue it. Every man uncertain of his
-purpose and distrustful of his own counsel, seeks a faithful friend whose
-advice he follows since he distrusts his own; and such faith has he in him
-that he lays before him and reveals to him every secret of his heart. As
-has been said, what is sweeter than having someone with whom one can
-converse as with oneself? Therefore on account of the pressing miseries we
-have now insisted on to the full, we needs must find a true friend, one
-whom we can trust more than ourselves; who will treat our grief, our
-miseries and our poverty as his own, who will sympathize with us, comfort
-us, support us by his words, and raise us up by wise counsel. Long have we
-sought him. And we believe that in you we have found the friend whom we
-longed for, whom we wished for, whom we desired.
-
-'Would that God had granted to us that, as Habakkuk the prophet was sped
-with food into the lion's den to the seer Daniel[400], or that as Philip
-one of the seven deacons was sped to the eunuch[401], we also were sped
-and could come to the land and to the district where you dwell; or that it
-were possible for us to hear living words from your lips. 'How sweet are
-thy words unto my palate, O Lord, sweeter than honey to my mouth[402].'
-
-'But since this is not vouchsafed to us and we are divided from you by a
-wide expanse of land and of sea and by the boundaries of many provinces,
-because of our faith in you referred to above we will tell you, brother
-Boniface, that for a long time we have entertained the design like so many
-of our friends, relatives and others, of visiting Rome, the mistress of
-the world, there to seek forgiveness of our sins as many others have done
-and are now doing; so especially I (wish to do) since I am advanced in
-age, and have erred more than others. Wala, at one time my abbess and
-spiritual mother, was acquainted with my wish and my intention. My only
-daughter at present is young, and cannot share my desire. But because we
-know how many there are who scoff at this wish and deprecate this desire,
-and support their view by adducing what the canons of the synods enjoin,
-that wherever anyone has settled and taken his vow, there shall he remain
-and there serve God; for we all live in different ways and God's purposes
-are unknown, as the prophet says: 'Thy righteousness is like the great
-mountains, thy judgments are a great deep, O Lord[403]'; and because His
-sacred will and desire in these things is hidden,--therefore we two, both
-of us in our difficulty, call on you earnestly and reverently: be you to
-us as Aaron, a mountain of strength, let your prayer be our help, swing
-the censer of prayer with incense in sight of the Divine, and let the
-lifting up of your hands be as the evening sacrifice[404]. Indeed we trust
-in God and beg of your goodness that by supplication of mouth and inward
-prayer it may be revealed to you what seems for us wise and useful:
-whether we are to live at home or go forth on pilgrimage. Also we beg of
-your goodness to send back your answer across the sea, and reply to what
-we have scratched on these leaves in rustic style and with unpolished
-wording. We have scant faith in those who glory in appearance and not in
-heart[405], but faith in your love, your charity in God and your
-goodness.'
-
-It is not known whether Eangith carried out her intention and went to
-Rome.
-
-Boniface had another correspondence with an abbess named Bugga, but though
-Eangith states that her daughter Heaburg was sometimes called by that
-name, it is not probable that they were the same, for Boniface writing to
-Bugga makes no mention of Eangith's plan, which he would hardly have
-omitted to do if Heaburg had been his correspondent[406].
-
-Bugga was afterwards abbess of a monastery in Kent. She too sent gifts to
-Boniface, and later entertained the idea of going to Rome. In early days
-the prelate wrote to her telling her how he had been mercifully led
-through unknown countries, how 'the Pontiff of the glorious see' Gregory
-II had inclined to him, and how he had cast down 'the enemy of the
-Catholic Church, Radbod,' the Frisian.
-
-In reply she assures him of her continued affection and makes some remarks
-on books they have exchanged. The Passions of the Martyrs which he has
-asked for she has not yet procured, but she will forward them as soon as
-she can. 'But you, my friend,' she writes, 'send me as a consolation what
-you promised in your kind letter, your extracts from the holy writings.
-And I beseech you to offer the oblation of the holy mass for one of my
-relatives whom I loved beyond all others. I send you by the bearer of this
-letter fifty gold coins (solidi) and an altar cloth, better gifts I cannot
-procure. They are truly signs of a great affection though of insignificant
-appearance[407].'
-
-Bugga does not style herself abbess, but Boniface addresses her as such in
-acknowledging the receipt of her gifts and advising her about going to
-Rome. On another occasion he wrote to express concern at her troubles,
-which he heard from many people had not diminished since she retired from
-rule for the sake of quiet[408]. The letter in which he advises her about
-going to Rome is worth quoting[409].
-
-'Be it made known to you, dearest sister,' he writes, 'regarding the
-advice which you asked for in your letter, that I do not presume to forbid
-you the pilgrim's journey, neither would I directly advise it. I will
-explain why. If you gave up the charge you had of the servants of God, of
-his virgins (ancillae), and your own monastic life, for the purpose of
-securing quiet and the thought of God, in what way are you now bound to
-obey the words and the will of seculars with toil and wearing anxiety?
-Still if you cannot find peace of mind in your home in secular life among
-seculars it seems right that you should seek in a pilgrimage freedom for
-contemplation, especially since you wish it and can arrange it; just in
-the way our sister Wethburg did. She told me in her letter that she had
-found the quiet she longed for near the threshold of St Peter. In
-reference to your wish she sent me a message, for I had written to her
-about you, saying that you must wait till the attacks, hostility and
-menaces of the Saracens who have lately reached the Roman States have
-subsided, and that God willing she would then send you a letter of
-invitation. I too think this best. Prepare yourself for the journey, but
-wait for word from her, and then do as God in his grace commands. As to
-the collection of extracts for which you ask, be considerate to my
-shortcomings. Pressing work and continuous travelling prevent my
-furnishing you with what you desire. As soon as I can I will forward them
-to please you.
-
-'We thank you for the gifts and vestments which you have sent, and pray to
-God Almighty, to put aside a gift for you in return with the angels and
-archangels in the heights of heaven. And I beseech you in the name of God,
-dear sister, yea mother and sweet lady, that you diligently pray for me.
-For many troubles beset me through my shortcomings, and I am more
-distressed by uncertainty of mind than by bodily work. Rest assured that
-our old trust in each other will never fail us.'
-
-Bugga carried out her intention and went to Rome, where she met Boniface,
-who was the Pope's guest about the year 737. He had achieved a signal
-success in reconverting the Hessians, and was now appointed to constitute
-bishoprics in Bavaria and to hold councils of Church dignitaries at
-regular intervals[410]. At Rome Bugga and Boniface walked and talked
-together, and visited the churches of the holy apostles. A letter from
-Aethelberht II, king of Kent, to Boniface refers to their meeting[411].
-Bugga had come back to her old monastery and had given the king a
-description of her visit. She attained a considerable age, for she was
-advanced in years before her pilgrimage, and about twenty years later
-Bregwin, archbishop of Canterbury (759-765), wrote to Lul informing him of
-her death[412].
-
-Boniface made provision at Rome for the women in whom he was interested. A
-certain deacon Gemmulus writes to him from Rome to inform him[413] that
-'the sisters and maidens of God who have reached the threshold of the
-apostles' are there being cared for by himself and others as Boniface has
-desired.
-
-The readiness with which Anglo-Saxon nuns went abroad eventually led to a
-state of things which cast discredit on religion. Boniface addressed the
-following remarks on these pilgrimages to Cuthberht of Canterbury in the
-letter written after the synod of Soissons[414].
-
-'I will not withhold from your holiness,' he says, '... that it were a
-good thing and besides honour and a credit to your Church and a palliation
-of evils, if the synod and your princes forbade women, and those who have
-taken the veil, to travel and stay abroad as they do, coming and going in
-the Roman states. They come in great numbers and few return undefiled. For
-there are very few districts of Lombardy in which there is not some woman
-of Anglian origin living a loose life among the Franks and the Gauls. This
-is a scandal and disgrace to your whole Church....'
-
-The difficulty of exercising more control over those who chose to leave
-their settlements was only partly met by stricter rules of supervision.
-For there were no means of keeping back monk or nun who was tired of
-living the monastic life. In the 9th century Hatto bishop of Basel
-([Dagger] 836) wrote to the bishop of Toul enjoining that no one should be
-suffered to undertake a pilgrimage to Rome without leave, and provisions
-of a much later date order that houses shall not take in and harbour
-inmates from other settlements.
-
-In this connection it is interesting to find Lul, who had settled abroad
-with Boniface, excommunicating an abbess Suitha because she had allowed
-two nuns to go into a distant district for some secular purpose without
-previously asking permission from her bishop[415]. The women who settled
-in Germany under Boniface were brought under much stricter control than
-had till then been customary in either France or England.
-
-
-§ 2. Anglo-Saxon Nuns abroad.
-
-Among the women who came to Germany and settled there at the request of
-Boniface was Lioba, otherwise Leobgith, who had been educated at Wimbourne
-in Dorset, at no very great distance from Nutshalling where Boniface
-dwelt, and who left England between 739 and 748. She was related to him
-through her mother Aebbe, and a simple and modest little letter is extant
-in which she writes to Boniface and refers to her father's death six years
-ago; she is her parents' only child, she says, and would recall her mother
-and herself to the prelate's memory.
-
-'This too I ask for,' she writes in this letter, 'correct the rusticity of
-my style and do not neglect to send me a few words in proof of your
-goodwill. I have composed the few verses which I enclose according to the
-rules of poetic versification, not from pride but from a desire to
-cultivate the beginnings of learning, and now I am longing for your help.
-I was taught by Eadburg who unceasingly devotes herself to this divine
-art.' And she adds four lines of verse addressed to God Almighty as an
-example of what she can do[416].
-
-As mentioned above we are indebted for an account of Lioba's life to the
-monk Rudolf of Fulda ([Dagger] 865). From this we learn that Lioba at a
-tender age had been given into the care of the abbess Tetta at
-Wimbourne[417]. 'She grew up, so carefully tended by the abbess and the
-sisters, that she cared for naught but the monastery and the study of holy
-writ. She was never pleased by irreverent jokes, nor did she care for the
-other maidens' senseless amusements; her mind was fixed on the love of
-Christ, and she was ever ready to listen to the word of God, or to read
-it, and to commit to memory what she heard and read to her own practical
-advantage. In eating and drinking she was so moderate that she despised
-the allurements of a great entertainment and felt content with what was
-put before her, never asking for more. When she was not reading, she was
-working with her hands, for she had learnt that those who do not work have
-no right to eat.'
-
-She was moreover of prepossessing appearance and of engaging manners, and
-secured the goodwill of the abbess and the affection of the inmates of the
-settlement. A dream of hers is described by her biographer in which she
-saw a purple thread of indefinite length issuing from her mouth. An aged
-sister whom she consulted about it, interpreted the dream as a sign of
-coming influence.
-
-To Lioba, Tecla and Cynehild, Boniface addressed a letter from abroad,
-asking in the usual way for the support of their prayers[418]. Lioba's
-biographer tells us that when Boniface thought of establishing religious
-settlements, 'wishing that the order of either sex should exist according
-to rule,' he arranged that Sturmi, who had settled at Fulda, should go to
-Italy and there visit St Benedict's monastery at Monte Casino, and he
-'sent envoys with letters to the abbess Tetta (of Wimbourne) begging her
-as a comfort in his labour, and as a help in his mission, to send over the
-virgin Lioba, whose reputation for holiness and virtuous teaching had
-penetrated across wide lands and filled the hearts of many with praise of
-her[419].'
-
-This request shows that Boniface thought highly of the course of life and
-occupations practised in English nunneries and that he considered English
-women especially suited to manage the settlements under his care. In a
-letter written from Rome about 738 Boniface refers to the sisters and
-brothers who are living under him in Germany[420]. Parties of English men
-and women joined him at different times. One travelled under the priest
-Wiehtberht, who sent a letter to the monks of Glastonbury to inform them
-of his safe arrival and honourable reception by Boniface, and he requests
-that Tetta of Wimbourne may be told of this[421]. Perhaps Lioba, who was
-Tetta's pupil, was one of the party who travelled to Germany with
-Wiehtberht.
-
-'In pursuance of his plan,' says Lioba's life[422], 'Boniface now arranged
-monastic routine and life according to accepted rule, and set Sturmi as
-abbot over the monks and the virgin Lioba as spiritual mother over the
-nuns, and gave into her care a monastery at the place called Bischofsheim,
-where a considerable number of servants of God were collected together,
-who now followed the example of their blessed teacher, were instructed in
-divine knowledge and so profited by her teaching that several of them in
-their turn became teachers elsewhere; for few monasteries of women
-(monasteria foeminarum) existed in those districts where Lioba's pupils
-were not sought as teachers. She (Lioba) was a woman of great power and of
-such strength of purpose that she thought no more of her fatherland and of
-her relations but devoted all her energies to what she had undertaken,
-that she might be blameless before God, and a model in behaviour and
-discipline to all those who were under her. She never taught what she did
-not practise. And there was neither conceit nor domineering in her
-attitude; she was affable and kindly without exception towards everyone.
-She was as beautiful as an angel; her talk was agreeable, her intellect
-was clear; her abilities were great; she was a Catholic in faith; she was
-moderate in her expectations and wide in her affections. She always showed
-a cheerful face but she was never drawn into hilarity. No one ever heard a
-word of abuse (maledictionem) pass her lips, and the sun never went down
-on her anger. In eating and drinking she was liberal to others but
-moderate herself, and the cup out of which she usually drank was called by
-the sisters 'the little one of our beloved' (dilectae parvus) on account
-of its smallness. She was so bent on reading that she never laid aside
-her book except to pray or to strengthen her slight frame with food and
-sleep. From childhood upwards she had studied grammar and the other
-liberal arts, and hoped by perseverance to attain a perfect knowledge of
-religion, for she was well aware that the gifts of nature are doubled by
-study. She zealously read the books of the Old and New Testaments, and
-committed their divine precepts to memory; but she further added to the
-rich store of her knowledge by reading the writings of the holy Fathers,
-the canonical decrees, and the laws of the Church (totiusque ecclesiastici
-ordinis jura). In all her actions she showed great discretion, and thought
-over the outcome of an undertaking beforehand so that she might not
-afterwards repent of it. She was aware that inclination is necessary for
-prayer and for study, and she was therefore moderate in holding vigils.
-She always took a rest after dinner, and so did the sisters under her,
-especially in summer time, and she would not suffer others to stay up too
-long, for she maintained that the mind is keener for study after sleep.'
-
-Boniface, writing to Lioba while she was abbess at Bischofsheim, sanctions
-her taking a girl into the settlement for purposes of instruction.
-Bischofsheim was on the Tauber a tributary of the river Main, and
-Boniface, who dwelt at Mainz, frequently conferred with her there. Lioba
-went to stay with Boniface at Mainz in 757 before he went among the
-Frisians[423]; he presented her with his cloak and begged her to remain
-true to her work whatever might befall him. Shortly after he set out on
-his expedition he was attacked and killed by heathens. His corpse was
-brought back and buried at Fulda, and Lioba went to pray at his grave, a
-privilege granted to no other woman.
-
-Lioba was also in contact with temporal rulers. Karl the Great gave her
-presents and Queen Hildegard ([Dagger] 783) was so captivated with her
-that she tried to persuade her to come and live with her. 'Princes loved
-her,' her biographer tells us, 'noblemen received her, and bishops gladly
-entertained her and conversed with her on the scriptures and on the
-institutions of religion, for she was familiar with many writings and
-careful in giving advice.' She had the supervision of other settlements
-besides her own and travelled about a good deal. After Boniface's death
-she kept on friendly terms with Lul who had succeeded him as bishop of
-Mainz (757-786), and it was with his consent that she finally resigned
-her responsibilities and her post as abbess at Bischofsheim and went to
-dwell at Schornsheim near Mainz with a few companions. At the request of
-Queen Hildegard she once more travelled to Aachen where Karl the Great was
-keeping court. But she was old, the fatigues of the journey were too much
-for her, and she died shortly after her return in 780. Boniface had
-expressed a wish that they should share the same resting-place and her
-body was accordingly taken to Fulda, but the monks there, for some unknown
-reason, preferred burying her in another part of their church.
-
-It is noteworthy that the women who by the appointment of Boniface
-directed convent life in Germany, remained throughout in a state of
-dependence[424], while the men, noticeably Sturmi ([Dagger] 779) whom he
-had made abbot at Fulda, cast off their connection with the bishop, and
-maintained the independence of their monasteries. Throughout his life
-Sturmi showed a bold and determined spirit, but he was not therefore less
-interesting to the nuns of Boniface's circle. His pupil and successor
-Eigil wrote an account of his life at the request of the nun Angiltrud,
-who is also supposed to have come from England to Germany[425].
-
-We know little concerning the other Anglo-Saxon women who settled abroad,
-for there are no contemporary accounts of them. The 'Passion of Boniface,'
-written at Mainz between 1000 and 1050, tells us that as Lioba settled at
-Bischofsheim so Tecla settled at Kizzingen, where 'she shone like a light
-in a dark place[426].' No doubt this Tecla is identical with the nun of
-that name whom Boniface speaks of in his letter to Lioba[427]. She has a
-place among the saints[428], but it seems doubtful whether she founded the
-monastery at Kizzingen or the one at Oxenfurt.
-
-The names of several other women are given by Othlon, a monk of St Emmeran
-in Bavaria, who in consequence of a quarrel fled from his monastery and
-sought refuge at Fulda. While there, between 1062 and 1066, he re-wrote
-and amplified Wilibald's life of Boniface. In this account he gives a list
-of the men who came into Germany from England, the correctness of which
-has been called in question. He then enumerates the women who came abroad
-and mentions 'an aunt of Lul called Chunihilt[429] and her daughter
-Berthgit[430], Chunitrud and Tecla, Lioba, and Waltpurgis the sister of
-Wilibald and Wunebald[431].' The only mention of Waltpurgis is her name,
-but he describes where the other women settled, some in the district of
-the Main, others in Bavaria.
-
-This woman Waltpurgis has been the subject of many conjectures; writers
-generally do not hesitate to affirm that the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald is identical with the saint who was so widely reverenced. But St
-Waltpurgis, popularly called Walburg, is associated with customs and
-traditions which so clearly bear a heathen and profane character in the
-Netherlands and in North Germany, that it seems improbable that these
-associations should have clustered round the name of a Christian woman and
-a nun[432].
-
-In face of the existing evidence one of two conclusions must be adopted.
-Either the sister of Wunebald and Wilibald really bore the name
-Waltpurgis, and the monk Wolfhard who wrote an account of a saint of that
-name whose relics were venerated at Eichstätt (between 882 and 912) took
-advantage of the coincidence of name and claimed that the Walburg, who
-bears the character of a pseudo-saint, and the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald were identical; or else, desirous to account for the veneration
-of relics which were commonly connected with the name Walburg, he found it
-natural and reasonable to hold that Walburg had belonged to the circle of
-Boniface, and identified her with the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald[433].
-
-Nothing is preserved concerning this sister except a reference to her
-existence, which is contained in the accounts of the acts of Wilibald and
-Wunebald written by a nun at Heidenheim, whose name also is not
-recorded[434]. These accounts offer many points of interest. The nun who
-wrote them was of Anglo-Saxon origin; her style is highly involved and
-often falls short of the rules of grammar, but she had possession of
-interesting information, and she was determined to impart it. It has been
-noticed that her writing varies according to whether she is setting down
-facts or dilating on them; for she is concise enough when it is a question
-of facts only, but when it comes to description she falls into the spirit
-of Anglo-Saxon literature and introduces alliteration into her Latin and
-launches forth into panegyric. She came from England to Germany, as she
-tells us, shortly before the death of Wunebald (c. 765), and experiences
-of an unpleasant nature led her to expect that her writings would not pass
-without criticism.
-
-'I am but a woman,' she says[435], 'weak on account of the frailty of my
-sex, neither supported by the prerogative of wisdom nor sustained by the
-consciousness of great power, yet impelled by earnestness of purpose,' and
-she sets to work to give a description of the life of Wilibald and the
-journey which he made to Palestine, parts of which she took down from his
-dictation, for at the close of her account she says that she wrote it from
-Wilibald's narrative in the monastery of Heidenheim in the presence of
-deacons and of some of Wilibald's pupils who were witnesses to the fact.
-'This I say,' she adds, 'that no one may again declare this to be
-nonsense.'
-
-The account she gives of Wilibald's experiences contains one of the
-earliest descriptions written in northern Europe of a journey to
-Palestine, and modern writers have commented on it as a curious literary
-monument of the time. Interest in descriptions of the Holy Land was
-increasing. Besides early references to such journeys in the letters of St
-Jerome who described how Paula went from Rome to Jerusalem and settled
-there in the 4th century, we hear how Adamnan came to the court of King
-Ealdfrith of Northumbria about the year 701 and laid before him his book
-on Holy Places[436] which he had taken down from the narrative of bishop
-Arculf who had made the pilgrimage, but of whom we know nothing more. But
-Adamnan's account is bald and its interest is poor compared to this
-description of the adventures of Wilibald and of what he saw on his
-travels.
-
-The nun prefaces her account of the journey by telling us of Wilibald's
-origin. She describes how he fell ill as a child, how his parents vowed
-him to a religious life if he were spared, and how in conformity with
-their promise they took him to the abbey of Waltham at the age of five,
-where Wilibald continued studying till manhood. We are not told to what
-his love of travel was due. He determined to go south and persuaded his
-father and his brother Wunebald to accompany him. We hear how they and
-their companions took boat and arrived at Rouen, how they travelled on
-till they reached Lucca where the father fell ill and died, and how the
-brothers pursued their journey to Rome where they spent the winter. We
-hear how the heat and bad air of summer drove them away from Rome and how,
-while Wunebald remained in Italy, Wilibald with a few companions pushed on
-by way of Naples and Reggio and reached Catania in Sicily, where he took
-boat for Ephesus and Syria. We get a good deal of information by the way
-on saints and on relics, and hear of the veil of St Agatha which stayed
-the eruptions of Mount Aetna, and of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. The
-travellers experienced all kinds of hardships; thrice they were cast into
-prison and liberated before their feet trod on holy ground. Then they
-visited Nazareth and Chana; they gazed upon Lake Tiberias, they bathed in
-the river Jordan, and finally they reached Jerusalem where they made a
-long stay, broken however by several long expeditions. Each site is
-described in turn, and its connection with scriptural history is pointed
-out. We hear a good deal about Jerusalem, about Mount Sion, the site of
-the Ascension of the Virgin, and about the site of the Nativity at
-Bethlehem. It was 'once a cave, now it is a square house cut into the
-rock,' over which a little chapel is built. We also hear of various
-monasteries where the travellers stayed in coming and going. Finally they
-travelled to Tyre, where they took boat to Constantinople. There they made
-a lengthy stay and then journeyed on to Italy and visited the Isle of
-Lipari, where Wilibald desired to get a glimpse of the crater, which is
-designated as hell, the thought of which called forth a fine piece of
-description from the nun.
-
-'And when they arrived there they left the boat to see what sort of a hell
-it was. Wilibald especially was curious about what was inside the crater,
-and would have climbed the summit of the mountain to the opening; but he
-was prevented by cinders which rose from the black gulf and had sunk
-again; as snow settles falling from the sky and the heavenly heights in
-white thick masses, so these cinders lay heaped on the summit of the
-mountain and prevented Wilibald's ascent. But he saw a blackness and a
-terrible column of flame projected upwards with a noise like thunder from
-the pit, and he saw the flame and the smoky vapour rising to an
-immeasurable height. He also beheld pumice-stone which writers use[437]
-thrown up from the crater with the flame, and it fell into the sea and was
-again cast up on the shore; men there gathered it up to bring it away.'
-
-When Wilibald and his companion Tidberht reached Rome they had been absent
-seven years, and their travels had made them personages of such interest
-that the Pope interviewed them. Wilibald at the Pope's suggestion agreed
-to join Boniface in Germany. Wunebald, the brother whom he had left in
-Italy, had met Boniface in Rome in 738 and had travelled back with him.
-Wilibald also settled in Germany and was made bishop of the new see of
-Eichstätt. Here he came across the nun, who was so fired by his account of
-his travels that she undertook to record them.
-
-After she had finished this work she was moved to write a short account of
-the life of Wunebald[438]. It is written in a similar style and contains
-valuable historical information, but it has not the special interest of
-the other account. Wunebald on coming into Germany had first stayed at
-Mainz, then he travelled about with Boniface, and finally he settled at
-Heidenheim where he made a clearance in the midst of a wooded wilderness
-and dwelt there with a few younger men. He was active in opposing
-idolatrous customs, but does not appear to have been satisfied with his
-work. He died about the year 765, and his brother Wilibald, bishop of
-Eichstätt, and his sister, of whom mention is now made for the first time,
-came to his monastery to assist at the translation of his corpse. The
-sister took charge of his settlement, apparently for a time only, for the
-monastery at Heidenheim continued to be under the rule of an abbot and
-there is no evidence that women belonged to it.
-
-It was from this sister that the nun received her information about
-Wunebald. The theory has been put forward that she was the same person as
-a nun who came to Heidenheim and was there miraculously cured. However
-that may be, this literary nun is the last Anglo-Saxon woman of whom we
-have definite information who came abroad in connection with Boniface. Her
-name is lost, it is as the anonymous nun of Heidenheim that she has come
-down to posterity.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V.
-
-CONVENTS IN SAXON LANDS BETWEEN A.D. 800-1000.
-
-    'Nec scientia scibilis Deum offendit, sed injustitia scientis.'
-    _Hrotsvith._
-
-
-§ 1. Women's Convents in Saxony.
-
-Some account has been given in the preceding chapters of the form which
-monastic settlements of women took among the Franks and the Anglo-Saxons
-during the first centuries after the acceptance of Christianity. Features
-similar to those which appear in France and England characterised the
-first period of monastic development among the continental Saxons, the
-last branch of the German race to accept Christianity as a nation. Here
-also we find highborn and influential women as abbesses at the head of
-establishments which were important centres of contemporary culture.
-
-The convent in Saxon lands, as elsewhere, was a place of residence and a
-training school for women of the ruling classes. Girls came there to be
-educated, and either considered the convent as their permanent home or
-left it to be married; the widow frequently returned to it later in life.
-But some of the Saxon settlements of women gained an additional importance
-in the 10th and 11th centuries owing to their close connection with the
-political affairs and interests of the time. The abbess was frequently a
-member of the royal or imperial family. In one case she was appointed as
-the guardian of the Emperor, in another she became representative of the
-Emperor during his absence in Italy.
-
-The story of the spread of monastic life into Saxony is closely connected
-with the history of the conquest of the country and the subsequent growth
-of national independence. The Saxons occupied the districts of northern
-Germany, Westphalia, Eastphalia and Engern, of which Westphalia bordered
-on lands occupied by the Franks. Between the 6th and the 9th centuries the
-Franks had sometimes fought against the Saxons and had sometimes made
-common cause with them against their mutual enemies the people of
-Thüringen. But the Saxons were warlike and ferocious, insensible to the
-influence of Christianity, and ready at any moment to begin hostilities.
-They became more and more dreaded by the Franks, who looked upon them as
-dangerous neighbours, and who attacked them whenever opportunity offered.
-Karl the Great ([Dagger] 814), king of the Franks, and Roman Emperor of
-the German nation, received the war against the Saxons as part of his
-heritage, but repeated inroads into Saxony and a cruelty bordering on
-vindictiveness were needed before he could speak of the conquest of the
-Saxons as an accomplished fact. In 785, after a prolonged struggle,
-Widukind, the Saxon leader in whom the spirit of Arminius lived, was
-finally defeated; and he and his followers accepted Christianity as part
-of their subjection.
-
-The Frankish Emperor and the Church now united in extending a uniform
-system of government over the lands of the Saxons. The count (_graf_ or
-_comes_) was made responsible for the maintenance of peace in the separate
-district (_gau_ or _pagus_) entrusted to him, and bishoprics were founded
-as dependencies of the ancient archiepiscopal sees of Cöln and Mainz. At
-the same time colonies of monks migrated into the conquered districts from
-the west and south. Their settlements developed rapidly, owing to the
-favour which monastic life found with the newly converted Saxons.
-
-The subjection of the Saxons was not however of long duration. The
-supremacy of the Western Empire culminated under the rule of Karl the
-Great; the union under one rule of many peoples who were in different
-stages of civilization was only possible at all through the rare
-combination of commanding qualities in this emperor; at his death the
-empire at once began to crumble away. This brought a returning sense of
-self-confidence to those peoples on whom the yoke of subjection had been
-forcibly thrust. Fifty years after Karl's death a warlike chief of the old
-type was established among the Saxons as duke (_herzog_ or _dux_); a
-hundred years later and a Saxon duke was chosen king of the Germans by the
-united votes of Frankish and Saxon nobles. The supreme authority now
-passed from the Franks to the Saxons; a change which the Saxon historian
-of the 10th century associated with the transference of the relics of St
-Vitus from France to Saxon soil[439]. The present age seeks the
-explanation of the removal of the centre of authority in less romantic
-causes, and finds it in the altogether extraordinary aptitude which the
-Saxons showed for assimilating new elements of civilization, and for
-appropriating or remodelling to their own use institutions of rule and
-government into which they breathed a spirit peculiarly their own.
-
-The history of the attainment to political supremacy by the Saxons helps
-us to understand the spirit which animated the Church and monastic
-institutions of the time. The bishoprics which Frankish overlordship had
-established were soon in the hands of men who were Saxons by birth, and a
-similar appropriation took place in regard to monastic settlements.
-Corvei, a religious colony founded on Saxon soil by monks from La Corbie
-in northern France, a lifetime after the conversion numbered Saxon nobles
-among its inmates. Settlements of women were also founded and rapidly
-gained importance, especially in the eastern districts where they rivalled
-the episcopal sees in wealth and influence.
-
-A reason for the favour with which monastic life was regarded during the
-period of political subjection lay in the practical advantages which these
-settlements offered. The nobleman who turned monk was freed from the
-obligations thrust upon him by the new régime; he was exempt from fighting
-under the standard of his conqueror, and the property which he bestowed on
-the religious settlement was in a way withdrawn from the enemy. But when
-the people regained their independence the popularity of the convent still
-remained. For the Saxons were quick in realizing the advantages of a close
-union between religion and the state, and the most powerful and
-progressive families of the land vied with each other in founding and
-endowing religious settlements.
-
-The political interest of the period centres in the career of Liudolf, who
-was styled duke by his people, but count by the Emperor. Liudolf rapidly
-rose to greatness and became the progenitor of a family which has given
-Germany many remarkable men and her first line of kings. His son Otto
-([Dagger] 912) was renowned like his father for personal valour, and
-success in every way favoured the undertakings of his grandson Heinrich
-the Fowler ([Dagger] 936), first king of the Saxon line. Heinrich became
-the favourite hero of the national poet on account of the triumphs he
-gained over the Slavs and Magyars, who at this time threatened the lands
-occupied by Germans at every point between the Baltic and the Adriatic.
-Again Heinrich's successes were reflected in those of his son Otto I
-([Dagger] 973), surnamed the Great, who added the lustre of imperial
-dignity to his father's firmly established kingship. Emulating the fame of
-Karl the Great, Otto was crowned emperor by the Pope in Rome. During the
-reign of his son, Otto II ([Dagger] 982), and of his grandson, Otto III
-([Dagger] 1002), the Saxon court remained the meeting-place of
-representatives of the civilized world. It was there that envoys were
-received from England and Italy, and it was from thence that messengers
-were sent out to Constantinople and Cordova. The elective crown of the
-German Empire remained hereditary in the Saxon dynasty for over a hundred
-years, and it is with this period that the Germans associate the first
-development of their national life on national soil.[440]
-
-At this time the kingdoms founded in other parts of Europe by peoples of
-the German race were much enfeebled. During the 9th and 10th centuries the
-Frankish princes were wanting in that unity of purpose which alone could
-prevent the appropriation of fruitful tracts of their territory by the
-vikings. In England a period of returning difficulties had followed the
-reign of King Aelfraed, so brilliant in many ways. The personal valour of
-his children, the intrepid Lady Aethelflaed ([Dagger] 918) and King
-Eadward ([Dagger] 925) her brother, had not stayed the social changes
-which prepared the way for the rule of the Dane. It is in Saxony only that
-we find the concentration and consolidation of power which make the
-advance and attitude of a nation conspicuous in history. The sword was
-here wielded to good purpose and likewise the pen. The bishoprics of
-Hildesheim, Halberstadt, and Magdeburg had become centres of artistic
-activity, and the monastery of Corvei rivalled the time-honoured
-settlements of St Gallen and Fulda in intellectual importance. The Saxon
-historian Widukind ([Dagger] after 973) was at work in Corvei in the 10th
-century; this author is for Saxon history what Gregory is for Frankish and
-Bede for Anglo-Saxon history. Monasteries for women, especially those of
-Herford, Gandersheim, and Quedlinburg, had rapidly developed and exerted a
-social and intellectual influence such as has rarely fallen to the lot of
-women's religious settlements in the course of history.
-
-The first religious house for women of which we have definite information
-is Herford, which was situated close to Corvei in Westphalia and had
-originally been founded as a dependency of it. Two small settlements for
-women existed at an early period in Eastphalia, but our knowledge of them
-is slight. The story is told that the heathen Saxon Hessi, having been
-defeated by Karl the Great in 775, went to live in the monastery of Fulda,
-and left his daughter Gisela in possession of his property, which she
-devoted to founding two little monasteries (monasteriola) for her
-daughters. This information is preserved in an account of Liutberg, a
-Saxon girl of noble parentage who was brought up in one of these little
-monasteries, but afterwards left it, as she preferred to dwell as a
-recluse in a neighbouring cell. Here she was visited by Theotgrim, bishop
-of Halberstadt ([Dagger] 840), and by the writer to whom we owe our
-account of her[441]. Wendhausen, one of the little monasteries spoken of
-in this account, was in existence a century later, for an attempt was then
-made to transfer its inmates to Quedlinburg. The fame of Liutberg's
-virtues was great during her lifetime but apparently did not secure her
-recognition as a saint. The cell in which she had lived was afterwards
-granted to Quedlinburg by charter (958).
-
-We have abundant information about Herford, the dependency of Corvei. In
-838 a certain Tetta was abbess, who came from Soissons and regulated the
-settlement at Herford on the plan of the house she had left[442]. The
-Saxon element asserted itself here also. In 854 the abbess was Addila, who
-was of Saxon parentage and probably the widow of a Saxon nobleman. Again
-in 858 we hear of another abbess, Hadewy, probably the niece of Warin, who
-was abbot of Corvei and a relation of Duke Liudolf. During her rule the
-relics of the woman-saint Pusinna were sent to Herford by the Saxon
-nobleman Kobbo as a gift to his sister the abbess Hadewy. The Saxons had
-no traditions or relics of early Christians who had lived among them, and
-so they were obliged to import relics to form a centre for their worship.
-King and bishop alike set an extraordinary value on relics and paid
-exorbitant prices for them. So great an importance was attached to the
-arrival of the relics of Pusinna at Herford that a contemporary monk wrote
-a detailed account of the event[443]. But it is characteristic of the
-author's disposition that he tells us nothing of the life and the works
-of Pusinna, who but for this account is unknown to history.
-
-A side-light is thrown on the material prosperity and the national
-sympathies of the settlements of Corvei and Herford in 889. Egilmar,
-bishop of Osnabrück (885-906), lodged a complaint with the Pope,
-contending that these settlements, besides appropriating other rights,
-drew so many tithes from his diocese that his income was reduced to a
-quarter of what it should be. But Egilmar got scant reward for his pains,
-no doubt because those in authority at Corvei and Herford were family
-connections of Duke Liudolf, whom it was felt dangerous to cross. For the
-Saxon duke had gained in influence as the Franks relaxed their hold on
-Saxon affairs, and while he nominally remained a dependent, pressure from
-outside was not brought to bear on him. In refusing to interfere in
-Egilmar's behalf, which would have involved his coming into conflict with
-Liudolf, the Pope was acting in accordance with the policy which the
-Franks pursued in Saxon lands[444].
-
-At an early date the abbey of Herford was renowned as an educational
-centre, and it long maintained its reputation. Hathumod, a daughter of
-Duke Liudolf, was educated there previous to becoming abbess at
-Gandersheim, as we shall see later on. A hundred years later Queen
-Mathilde ([Dagger] 968) of the race of the warrior Widukind, and wife of
-Heinrich the Fowler, was brought up at Herford, her grandmother being
-abbess at the time.
-
-The foundation of Gandersheim in Eastphalia followed upon that of Herford.
-Gandersheim was founded by Duke Liudolf and remained the favourite
-settlement of the women of his family; we shall return to it later on. Two
-other important abbeys ruled by women in connection with royalty were
-Essen and Quedlinburg. Essen was founded by Altfrid, bishop of Hildesheim
-(847-874), a Saxon by birth[445], and Quedlinburg at the instigation of
-Queen Mathilde, who as mentioned above had been educated at Herford. For
-centuries the abbess of Quedlinburg remained a person of marked
-importance, in her influence both on politics and on matters social and
-literary. Essen and Quedlinburg afterwards became centres of art industry;
-all these early monastic foundations maintained their importance down to
-the time of the Reformation.
-
-The favour found by these institutions is explained when we come to
-consider the uncertainty of the times and the changeful political events
-which accompanied the growth of Saxon independence. The age, judged by a
-later standard, may well be called an age of violence. For the country was
-in the hands of a number of overlords who were frequently at war together,
-and who dwelt in isolated castles in a thickly wooded district in which
-only a patch here and there had been brought under cultivation.
-
-The monotony of life in the castles or burghs of this period can hardly be
-exaggerated. Means of communication were few and occasions for it were
-rare. When the master and his men were absent, engaged in some private
-broil, or else summoned by the arrière-ban to attend the duke or the king,
-weeks and months would go by without a reminder of the existence of the
-world outside; weeks and months when the arrival of a traveller offered
-the one welcome diversion. The young nobleman followed his father to camp
-and to court, where he tasted of the experiences of life; the young
-noblewoman stayed at home, cut off from intercourse with those of her age
-and standing, and from every possibility of widening her mental horizon.
-
-It is with the daughters of these families that the religious house first
-found favour. Settlements such as Herford, Gandersheim, Essen, and
-Quedlinburg offered the companionship of equals, and gave a domestic and
-intellectual training which was the best of its kind. Later ages were wont
-to look upon the standard of education attained at Gandersheim and
-Quedlinburg as exemplary. The word college (collegium), which early
-writers often apply to these settlements in its modern sense of a learning
-and a teaching body, aptly designates their character. For the religious
-settlement was an endowed college where girls were received to be trained,
-and where women who wished to devote themselves to learning and the arts
-permanently resided.
-
-The age at which girls were received in these settlements can be
-determined by inference only; some were given into their care as children,
-others joined them later in life. Probably here as elsewhere girls came at
-about the age of seven, and remained till the age of fourteen, when they
-left if marriage was to be their destiny. The responsibilities of married
-and of unmarried life were undertaken at this period by persons of extreme
-youth. Hathumod was made abbess of Gandersheim when she was between twelve
-and thirteen years of age; and Mathilde, as abbess of Quedlinburg, at the
-age of twelve received her dying grandmother's injunctions together with
-valuable documents[446], but in her case the chronicler notes that she had
-developed early[447].
-
-It remains an open question at what period in history the inmates of these
-settlements took vows. Fritsch, who has written a detailed history of the
-abbey of Quedlinburg, holds that its inmates never took a permanent vow,
-since not a single case of the defection of a nun is on record[448], but
-this view is disproved by accounts of consecrations during the early
-period in other houses. Luther at the time of the Reformation noted that
-the nuns of Quedlinburg were bound by no vow[449]. Probably the inmates
-took vows at first, and the custom afterwards lapsed. Harenberg, to whom
-we owe many learned dissertations on Gandersheim, says that the women
-there lived at first according to the rule of St Benedict; but after the
-12th century became Austin canonesses[450]. Engelhausen, a writer of the
-15th century, speaking of the inmates of Saxon houses generally, says that
-they lived as Austin canonesses[451]. Early writers in speaking of the
-inmates of Saxon convents use the familiar terms nuns (sanctimoniales) and
-virgins (virgines); the term canoness (canonissa), which designates a
-woman who took residence without a permanent vow, came into general use
-only at a later date[452]. It seems simplest therefore throughout to
-retain the familiar term nun when speaking of the inmates of Saxon
-settlements, though it must be understood with a reservation, for we are
-not certain of the exact meaning of the word at different periods.
-
-Engelhausen, the writer referred to above, adds that abbeys for women in
-Saxony were founded 'in order to help the noblemen who fought for the
-faith of Christ and were killed by the heathens; so that their daughters
-might not be reduced to begging (mendicare) but might live in these
-monasteries (monasteria), and when they had attained a marriageable age,
-might leave to be married.'
-
-The range of subjects taught in the Saxon nunnery was wide. It included
-the study of religious as well as of classical writers. Spinning, weaving,
-and embroidery were also taught and practised. We shall see later on that
-the nuns assembled at Quedlinburg wove large and elaborate hangings.
-Reference is also made to the study of law, and it is said that Gerberg
-II, abbess at Gandersheim ([Dagger] 1001), instructed her niece Sophie in
-convent discipline and in common law. An early chronicle in the vernacular
-says that the princess Sophie, a woman of determined character, so
-mastered these subjects that she was able to enter into disputation with
-learned men and successfully opposed them[453].
-
-Where the inmate of a convent was consecrated to the office of nun, this
-was done by the bishop of the diocese; but a curious story is told in
-connection with the consecration of the above-named princess Sophie[454].
-Sophie was the daughter of the emperor Otto II, and had been educated at
-Gandersheim, but she refused to be consecrated by the bishop of
-Hildesheim, who usually performed this office at the convent, and declared
-that she must have the archbishop of Mainz, whose dignity was more in
-keeping with her station. The compromise that both prelates should assist
-at the consecration was at last agreed upon. But Sophie was not satisfied.
-She left Gandersheim for the court of her brother, and only returned at
-the death of the abbess, whom she succeeded. Endless quarrels occurred
-during the term of her rule. On one occasion she allowed her nieces,
-Sophie and Ida, who were consecrated nuns, to depart on a visit to her
-friend the archbishop of Mainz, but when they sent word from Mainz that
-they did not intend to return to Gandersheim, she applied to her old enemy
-the bishop of Hildesheim, and forced him to interfere with the archbishop
-and bring back her nuns. They returned, but only for a time, for they were
-appointed abbesses at other convents.
-
-It is interesting to note how large a number of princesses of the ruling
-dynasty were unmarried, and remained in convents. Five daughters of Duke
-Liudolf spent their lives at Gandersheim, of whom only one as far as we
-know had been betrothed. At a later period Mathilde, the only daughter of
-Otto I, was from her cradle upwards appointed to become abbess of
-Quedlinburg; and her cousin Gerberg, daughter of Heinrich, duke of the
-Bavarians ([Dagger] 955), was abbess of Gandersheim. In the next
-generation Mathilde, daughter of Prince Liudolf ([Dagger] 957), was abbess
-at Essen ([Dagger] 1011), and her two cousins, Adelheid and Sophie, the
-daughters of Otto II, embraced the religious profession at the wish, it is
-said, of their mother. Adelheid was abbess at Quedlinburg (999-1040), and
-Sophie, the princess alluded to above, was abbess at Gandersheim
-(1001-1039). When Sophie died her sister Adelheid planned to unite in
-herself the rule of both houses, but death put a stop to her
-ambition[455]. The princess Mathilde, another daughter of Otto II, had
-married Ezo, son of the Palgrave of Lothringen, to whom she bore seven
-daughters; six of these embraced convent life and in course of time
-attained to the rank of abbess[456].
-
-These details are not without significance. They suggest that it was
-probably for the interest of the royal family that its princesses should
-remain in the convent in preference to contracting matrimonial alliances
-which might involve their relatives in political difficulties. On the
-other hand they suggest that life in these settlements must have been
-congenial in more ways than one.
-
-As abbess of one of the royal houses the princess certainly held a place
-of authority second to that of no woman in the land. To gather together a
-few items of this power: she held the abbey of the king and from the king,
-which precluded a dependent relation on lords spiritual or temporal, and
-made her abbey what is termed a free abbey (_freies reichstift_). Her
-rights of overlordship sometimes extended over many miles, and the
-property of Gandersheim is described as enormous[457].
-
-As holding the place of a feudal lord the abbess had the right of ban; she
-issued the summons when war had been declared and sent her contingent of
-armed knights into the field; and she also issued the summons to attend in
-her courts, where judgment was given by her proctor (_vogt_). In short she
-had the duties and privileges of a baron who held his property of the
-king, and as such she was summoned to the Imperial Diet (_reichstag_). She
-may have attended in person during early times, the fact appears
-doubtful; but in the 16th century she was only represented there[458].
-
-Similar rights and privileges devolved on those abbesses in England who
-were baronesses in title of the land they held. But these abbesses never
-secured some of the rights enjoyed by their sisters in Saxony, for example
-the right of striking coin which the abbess of Quedlinburg secured under
-Otto I[459]. Coins also are extant which were struck by abbesses of
-Gandersheim, whose portraits they bear[460].
-
-In addition to these advantages of position, the abbesses of the chief
-Saxon houses in the 10th and 11th centuries were in direct contact with
-the court and with politics. During the minority of Otto III, who was
-three years old when his father died in Italy (983), his mother Adelheid
-together with his aunt Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg, practically ruled
-the empire. Later when this emperor went to Italy for a prolonged stay in
-997 the management of affairs was given to the abbess Mathilde, who is
-praised for the determined measures she took to oppose the invading Wends.
-In 999 she summoned a diet at Dornberg on her own authority[461].
-
-The so-called free abbeys were under the obligation of entertaining the
-king and his retinue in return for privileges granted to them, and as the
-king had no fixed place of residence he stayed at his various palaces
-(palatia) in turn, and usually spent holiday time at one of the religious
-centres. Frequent royal visits to Quedlinburg are on record; the court was
-also entertained at Gandersheim. These visits brought a store of political
-information to the abbess of which she made use in her own way. Thus
-Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg, is thought to have supplied the annalist
-of Quedlinburg with the information which gives his chronicle its special
-value, and she was so far interested in the history of her own time that
-Widukind forwarded his history of the Saxons to her book by book for
-approval[462]. The abbess Gerberg of Gandersheim was similarly in contact
-with politics. As we shall see she supplied the nun Hrotsvith with the
-materials for writing the history of Otto the Great.
-
-
-§ 2. Early History of Gandersheim[463].
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the foundation and early history of
-Gandersheim, one of the earliest and wealthiest of Saxon houses, which
-claims our attention as the home of the nun Hrotsvith. It was situated on
-low-lying ground near the river Ganda in Eastphalia and was surrounded by
-the wooded heights of the Harz mountains. It owed its foundation to
-Liudolf himself, the great Saxon duke and the progenitor of the royal
-house of Saxony. At the close of a successful political career, Liudolf
-was persuaded by his wife Oda to devote some of his wealth and his
-influence to founding a settlement for women in Eastphalia, where his
-property chiefly lay.
-
-Oda was partly of Frankish origin, which may account for her seeking the
-aggrandisement of her family in a religious foundation at a time when
-there were very few in Saxon lands. It is noteworthy that this foundation
-was to be for women and that all the daughters of Liudolf and Oda went to
-live there. Information about the early history of Gandersheim is
-abundant. There are extant a life of Hathumod, its first abbess, which was
-written by her friend the monk Agius ([Dagger] 874), and an elegy on her
-death in which Agius tries to comfort her nuns for the loss they have
-sustained; both these compositions are written in a very attractive
-style[464]. A century later the nun Hrotsvith was busy at Gandersheim
-describing the early history of the settlement in a poem in which she
-celebrates both it and the family of its founder[465]. In many ways this
-is the most beautiful and finished of the nun's compositions; a work which
-reflects credit alike on her powers as a poetess, and on the settlement
-with which her name and fame are indissolubly linked.
-
-From these accounts we gather that Oda's mother, Ada, had already had a
-vision of the future greatness of her family. Hrotsvith tells how St John
-the Baptist appeared to her clad in a garment made of camel's hair of
-bright yellow, his lovely face of shining whiteness, with a small beard
-and black hair. In giving these details of the saint's appearance the nun
-was doubtless describing a picture she had before her at Gandersheim.
-
-It was in 852 that a plan was formed for transferring a small congregation
-of women, who had been living at Brunshausen, to some property on the
-river Ganda. A suitable site had to be sought and a fitting centre of
-worship provided. Liudolf and Oda undertook a journey to Rome and
-submitted their scheme to Pope Sergius II (844-847), begging him for a
-gift of relics. They received from him the bodies of the saints Anastasius
-and Innocentius, which they carried back with them to Saxony.
-
-On the night before All Saints' Day a swineherd in Liudolf's employ had a
-vision of lights falling from heaven and hanging in the air, which was
-interpreted as a heavenly indication of the site of the settlement. A
-clearance was accordingly made in the densely wooded district and a chapel
-was built.
-
-It was at this time that Hathumod, the eldest daughter of Liudolf, was
-living in Herford. From childhood her bent had been serious, and her
-friend Agius tells us that 'of her own free will she desired to be
-admitted to serious studies to which others are driven even by
-force[466].' She left her father's residence for Herford, where she was so
-happy that in after years she often longed to be back there. In 852 at the
-age of twelve she was taken away to Gandersheim to preside over the new
-settlement. This settlement was to be an improvement on existing
-institutions of the kind, for Agius tells us that its members were not
-allowed to have separate cells or to keep servants. They slept in
-tenements (villula) in the neighbourhood till their 'spiritual mother' was
-able to provide them with a suitable dwelling. Curious side-lights are
-thrown on other religious institutions by the following remarks of Agius
-on the nuns of Hathumod's convent: 'They shared everything,' he says[467];
-'their clothes were alike, neither too rich nor too poor, nor entirely of
-wool. The sisters were not allowed to dine out with relatives and friends,
-or to converse with them without leave. They were not allowed like other
-nuns (sanctimoniales) to leave the monastery to stay with relatives or
-visit dependent estates (possessiones subjectae). And they were forbidden
-to eat except at the common table at the appointed times except in cases
-of sickness. At the same hour and in the same place they partook of the
-same kind of food. They slept together and came together to celebrate the
-canonical hours (ad canonicos cursus orandi). And they set to work
-together whenever work had to be done.'
-
-Agius draws a beautiful picture of the gentleness and dignified bearing of
-Hathumod, who was at once strong and sensitive. She was always greatly
-cheered by signs of goodness in others, and she was as much grieved by an
-offence of a member of the community as if she had committed it herself.
-Agius tells us that she was slow in making friends but that she clung
-faithfully through life to those she had made.
-
-Her literary acquirements were considerable. 'No one could have shown
-greater quickness of perception, or a stronger power of understanding in
-listening to or in expounding the scriptures,' he says[468], and the
-scriptures always remained her favourite reading.
-
-It is difficult to form an idea of the standard of life in these religious
-settlements. The age was rough and barbarous in many ways, but the
-surroundings of the Saxon dukes did not lack a certain splendour, and
-traces of it would no doubt be found in the homes they made for their
-daughters. In these early accounts nothing transpires about their
-possessions in books and furniture, but it is incidentally mentioned that
-the abbess Hathumod owned a crystal vessel in the form of a dove, which
-contained relics and hung suspended by her bedside[469].
-
-The plan was formed to build a stone church for Gandersheim, an unusual
-and difficult undertaking. No suitable stone, however, could be found till
-one day, as Hathumod was praying in the chapel, she was divinely moved to
-walk forth and follow a dove which was awaiting her outside. The bird led
-the way to a spot where the underwood was removed and masses of stone
-which could be successfully dealt with were laid bare. 'It is the spot
-barren through its huge masses of stone, as we know it now-a-days,'
-Hrotsvith the nun wrote a hundred years later[470].
-
-The densely-wooded character of the neighbourhood is frequently referred
-to by early and later writers. Lingering superstitions peopled the forest
-with heathen fantasies, with 'fauns and spirits,' as Hrotsvith designates
-them. The settlement lay in the midst of the forest and was at all times
-difficult of access, but especially so in winter when the ground was
-covered with snow. In the introduction to her history of Otto the Great
-Hrotsvith likens her perplexity and fear in entering on so vast a subject
-to the state of mind of one who has to cross the forest in mid winter, a
-simile doubtless suggested by the surroundings of the convent[471]. Her
-feelings, she says, were those of 'someone who is ignorant of the vast
-expanse of the forest which lies before him, all the paths of which are
-hidden by a thick covering of snow; he is guided by no one and keeps true
-to his direction only by noticing the marks pointed out to him; sometimes
-he goes astray, unexpectedly he again strikes the right path, and having
-penetrated half way through the dense interlacing trees and brushwood he
-longs for rest and stops and would proceed no farther, were he not
-overtaken by some one, or unexpectedly guided by the footprints of those
-who have gone before.'
-
-Neither Liudolf the founder of Gandersheim nor his daughter Hathumod lived
-to see the stone church completed. He died in 866, and the abbess in 874
-at the age of thirty-two. She was surrounded by her nuns, among whom were
-several of her sisters, and her mother Oda, who had also come to live at
-Gandersheim. The monk Agius, who was a frequent visitor at the home, was
-often with her during her last illness, and after her death he composed an
-elegy in dialogue to comfort the nuns under the loss they had sustained.
-This poem is full of sweetness and delicacy of feeling, and is said to
-have been written on the model of the eclogues of Virgil. Alternate verses
-are put into the mouths of the nuns and of Agius; they describe their
-sorrow, and he dwells on the thoughts which might be a consolation to
-them. It opens in this strain:
-
-'Sad were the words we exchanged, I and those holy and worthy sisters who
-watched the dying moments of the sainted abbess Hathumod. I had been asked
-to address them, but somehow their recent grief made it impossible for
-them to listen to me, for they were bowed down by sorrow. The thoughts
-which I then expressed I have now put into verse and have added somewhat
-to them. For they (the sisters) asked me to address them in writing, since
-it would comfort them to have before their eyes, and to dwell upon, the
-words which I then spoke in sadness. Yielding to their wish and
-entreaties, I have attempted to express the thoughts which follow. Thou, O
-reader, understand that I am conversing with them, and follow us if thou
-wilt in our lament.'
-
-He then directly addresses the nuns and continues: 'Certainly we should
-weep for one who died before her time in the bloom of youth. Yet grief
-also has its limits; your sorrowful weeping should be within bounds. 'Tis
-natural you should be unhappy, still reason commands moderation in all
-things, and I therefore entreat you, O beloved and holy sisters, to stay
-your weeping and your tears. Spare your energies, spare your eyesight
-which you are wearing out by excess of grief. "Moderation in all things"
-has been said wisely and has been said well, and God Himself commands that
-it should be so.' The nuns make reply in the following words: 'What you
-put before us is certainly true. We know full well that God forbids
-excess, but our grief seems not excessive, for it falls so far short of
-what her merit claims. We can never put into words the wealth of goodness
-which we have lost in her. She was as a sister to us, as a mother, as a
-teacher, this our abbess under whose guidance we lived. We who were her
-handmaids and so far beneath her shared her life as her equals; for one
-will guided us, our wishes were the same, our pursuits alike. Shall we not
-grieve and weep and lament from our hearts for her who made our joy and
-was our glory, and in whom we have lost our happiness? There can be no
-excess of tears, of weeping and of grief, for in them only we find solace
-now that we shall never more behold her sweet face.' Agius replies: 'I
-doubt not that your grief is well founded, or that your tears rightly
-flow. But weeping will not undo you altogether, for the body has powers of
-endurance; you must bear this great anguish, for it has come to you
-through the will of God. Believe me, you are not alone in this grief, I
-too am oppressed by it, I too am suffering, and I cannot sufficiently
-express to you how much I also have lost in her. You know full well how
-great was her love for me, and how she cherished me while she lived. You
-know how anxious she was to see me when she fell ill, with what gladness
-she received me, and how she spoke to me on her deathbed. The words she
-spoke at the last were truly elevating, and ever and anon she uttered my
-name.' Agius tries to comfort himself with dwelling on Hathumod's
-gentleness and sweetness, and urges the nuns as they loved their abbess in
-the flesh now to continue loving her in the spirit. This alone, he says,
-will help the work to grow and increase which she began and loved. 'To
-dwell on grief,' he says, 'brings weeping and weakness; to dwell on love
-cheers and brings strength. The spirit of your abbess is still among you,
-it was that which you most loved in her, and it is that which you have not
-lost.'
-
-There is a curiously modern ring in much that the monk urges. His poem
-sets forth how the nuns at last took heart, and requested Agius to visit
-them again and help them with his advice, which he promised to do.
-
-On her deathbed Hathumod in talking to Agius compared her monastery to a
-plant of delicate growth and deplored that no royal charter sanctioning
-its privileges had as yet been obtained[472]. This charter and further
-privileges were secured to the settlement during the abbacy of Gerberg I
-(874-897), sister and successor of Hathumod, a woman of determined
-character and full of enthusiasm for the settlement. She was betrothed at
-one time to a certain Bernhard, against whose will she came to live at
-Gandersheim, and refused to leave it. He had been summoned to war, and
-departed declaring that she should not remain in the convent after his
-return. But opportunely for her wishes he was killed and she remained at
-Gandersheim. She ruled as abbess more than twenty years and advanced the
-interests of the settlement in many ways. The stone church which had been
-begun during Hathumod's rule was completed during that of Gerberg and was
-consecrated in 881, on All Saints' Day. The bishop of Hildesheim
-officiated at the ceremony of consecration, many visitors came to assist,
-and the assembled nuns for the first time took part in the singing of
-divine service.
-
-The abbess Gerberg was succeeded by her sister Christine, who ruled from
-897 to 919. Köpke, one of the chief modern historians of this period,
-considers that these three sisters, Hathumod, Gerberg and Christine,
-abbesses of Gandersheim, were among the most zealous advocates of culture
-and civilizing influences in Saxony during the 9th century[473]. The
-settlement became a centre of interest to the whole ducal family. After
-the death of Liudolf his widow Oda, who is said to have attained the age
-of one hundred and seven years, dwelt there altogether. She outlived her
-son, Duke Otto, who died in 912 and was buried at Gandersheim, and it is
-said that she lived to hear of the birth of her great-grandson Otto (913),
-who was destined to become king and emperor.
-
-After the death of the abbess Christine the settlement of Gandersheim
-drifts for a time into the background; Quedlinburg, founded by Heinrich I
-at the instigation of his wife Mathilde, takes its place in ducal and
-royal favour. Scant notices are preserved of the abbesses who ruled
-during the first half of the 10th century. We hear of the abbess Hrotsvith
-([Dagger] 927) that she was distinguished like her namesake of later date
-for literary acquirements[474], and that she wrote treatises on logic and
-rhetoric which are lost. And 'what is more,' says an early writer[475],
-'she forced the devil to return a bond signed with blood by which a youth
-had pledged away his soul.'
-
-Her writings may have perished in the fire which ravaged the settlement
-without permanently interfering with its prosperity during the rule of
-Gerberg II (959-1001). Contemporary writers concur in praise of the
-learning, the powers of management and the educational influence of this
-princess, who was the daughter of Heinrich, duke of the Bavarians
-([Dagger] 955). Heinrich for many years was the enemy and rival of his
-brother Otto I; and the final reconciliation and lasting friendship
-between these princes formed an important episode in the history of the
-time. We do not know what prompted Gerberg to embrace convent life;
-perhaps she became a nun at the wish of her father. She was appointed
-abbess at the age of nineteen when her father was dead and her mother
-Judith was ruling in Bavaria in the interests of her young son. Gerberg
-ruled at Gandersheim for forty-two years; she has a special claim on our
-interest because she was the friend, teacher, and patron of the nun
-Hrotsvith.
-
-
-§ 3. The Nun Hrotsvith and her Writings[476].
-
-The nun Hrotsvith occupies a unique position in monastic life and among
-unmarried women generally. 'This fruitful poetic talent,' says the writer
-Ebert, 'which lacks not the inspiration and the courage of genius to enter
-upon new ground, evinces how the Saxon element was chosen to guide the
-German nation in the domain of art.' The literary work of Hrotsvith can be
-grouped under three headings. To the first belongs the writing of metrical
-legends which were intended for the perusal and the edification of inmates
-of convents; to the second, the composition of seven dramas written in the
-style of Terence; and to the third, the writing of contemporary history
-in metrical form. Each kind of work has merits of its own and deserves
-attention. But while Hrotsvith as a legend writer ranks with other writers
-of the age, and as a historical writer is classed by the modern historian
-Giesebrecht with Widukind and Ruotger, as a writer of Latin drama she
-stands entirely alone. We have no other dramatic compositions except hers
-between the comedies of classic times and the miracle plays, which at
-first consisted only of a few scenes with bald dialogue.
-
-It can be gathered from Hrotsvith's writings that she was born about the
-year 932; and the fact of her entering a nunnery is proof of her gentle
-birth. It is uncertain when she came to Gandersheim, probably at a very
-early age. She owed her education there partly to Rikkardis, to whom she
-refers in her writings, but chiefly to the abbess Gerberg, who, she says,
-was somewhat younger than herself.
-
-Judging from Hrotsvith's writings she worked diligently and soon attracted
-attention beyond the limits of her convent. The following facts in regard
-to time are of importance. The first of her two sets of legends was put
-together and dedicated to Gerberg as abbess, that is after the year 959;
-she wrote and submitted part if not the whole of her history of Otto the
-Great to Wilhelm, archbishop of Mainz, before the year 968, in which the
-prelate died. How the composition of her dramas is related in point of
-time to that of the legends and the historical poems cannot be definitely
-decided; probably the dramas were written in the middle period of
-Hrotsvith's life. For the legends bear marks of being the outcome of early
-effort, while the historical poems, especially the one which tells of the
-early history of Gandersheim, were written in the full consciousness of
-power. We do not know the date of Hrotsvith's death; an early chronicle
-says that she wrote a history of the three Emperors Otto, in which case
-she must have lived till 1002, that being the year of Otto III's death.
-But the annalist to whom we owe this remark may have been misinformed;
-only a part of the history of the first emperor is extant, and we cannot
-argue from any references in her other works that she wrote a continuation
-of it[477]. The nun and her writings soon ceased to attract attention, and
-there are few references to her in any writings for nearly five hundred
-years. At the beginning of the 16th century, however, the humanist Conrad
-Celtes came across a copy of her dramas, which seemed to him so remarkable
-that he had them printed. And since then they have repeatedly been
-published, and excellent translations have been made of them into German
-and French[478].
-
-In the introduction to her plays Hrotsvith appeals to the judgment of
-powerful patrons, but she does not give their names; in her history, as
-mentioned above, she asks for criticism from Wilhelm, archbishop of Mainz,
-who was the illegitimate son of Otto I, and a leading prelate of the time.
-This exhausts what we know of friends outside the convent; probably the
-abbess Gerberg was the chief critic throughout and had more influence on
-her than any other. It was she who introduced Hrotsvith to the works,
-classical and other, which she had herself studied under learned men, and
-she was always ready to encourage her able pupil and supply her with
-materials to work upon.
-
-The library at Gandersheim, to which Hrotsvith had access, contained the
-writings of a number of classical and theological authors. Among the
-classical writers with whom the nun is thought to have been directly
-acquainted were Virgil, Lucan, Horace, Ovid, Terence, and perhaps Plautus;
-among the Christian writers Prudentius, Sedulius, Fortunatus, Marianus
-Capella, and Boethius[479]. Ebert, who has analysed the sources from which
-Hrotsvith drew the subject matter of her legends and dramas, considers
-that at this time Greek authors were read at Gandersheim in Latin
-translations only. Another writer, arguing from the fact that the nun
-frequently uses words of Greek origin, considers that she had some
-knowledge of Greek[480]. This latter opinion has little in its favour.
-However we know that Greek teachers were summoned from Constantinople to
-instruct Hedwig, Gerberg's sister, who was to have married the Emperor
-Constantine. The match fell through, but the Saxon royal family aimed
-steadily at securing an alliance with the court of Constantinople, and
-ultimately attained this object by the marriage of Otto II to the Greek
-princess Theofanu (971).
-
-After Hrotsvith had mastered the contents of the library at Gandersheim
-she was moved to try her hand at writing Latin verse; she cast into
-metrical form the account of the birth and life of the Virgin Mary
-contained in a gospel which in some manuscripts is ascribed to St James,
-the brother of Christ[481]. The story is well told, and the incidents
-described follow each other naturally; the poem exceeds nine hundred lines
-in length. She supplements the original text with some amplifications of a
-descriptive nature and a panegyric on Christ, with which she closes the
-poem.
-
-The diffidence Hrotsvith felt at first in writing is described in the
-introduction which she prefixed to the complete collection of her
-legendary poems and addressed to a wider public[482].
-
-'Unknown to others and secretly, so to speak, I worked by myself'; she
-says, 'sometimes I composed, sometimes I destroyed what I had written to
-the best of my abilities and yet badly; I dealt with material taken from
-writings with which I became acquainted within the precincts of our
-monastery of Gandersheim through the help of our learned and kindly
-teacher Rikkardis, afterwards through that of others who taught in her
-place, and finally through that of the high-born abbess Gerberg, under
-whom I am living at present, who is younger than I am in years but more
-advanced in learning as befits one of royal lineage, and who has
-introduced me to various authors whom she has herself studied with the
-help of learned men. Writing verse appears a difficult and arduous task
-especially for one of my sex, but trusting to the help of divine grace
-more than to my own powers, I have fitted the stories of this book to
-dactylic measures as best I could, for fear that the abilities that have
-been implanted in me should be dulled and wasted by neglect; for I prefer
-that these abilities should in some way ring the divine praises in support
-of devotion; the result may not be in proportion to the trouble taken and
-yet it may be to the profit of some.'
-
-The nun is filled with the consciousness that her undertaking is no mean
-one. 'Full well I know,' she says, addressing the Virgin, 'that the task
-of proclaiming thy merits exceeds my feeble strength, for the whole world
-could not celebrate worthily that which is a theme of praise among the
-angels.' The poem on the life of the Virgin is written in leonine
-hexameters, that is with rhymes at the middle and the end of the line.
-This form of verse was sometimes used at that period, and Hrotsvith
-especially in her later historical poems handled it with considerable
-skill.
-
-Hrotsvith afterwards added to the account of the Virgin a poem of a
-hundred and fifty lines on the Ascension of Christ[483]. In this, as she
-tells us, she adapted an account written by John the Bishop, which had
-been translated from Greek into Latin.
-
-This poem also is simple and dignified, and gives proof of considerable
-power of expression on the part of the nun. Her vocabulary however has
-certain peculiarities, for she is fond of diminutives, a tendency which in
-the eyes of her editor is peculiarly feminine[484].
-
-The poem on the Ascension closes with the following characteristic lines:
-'Whoever reads this let him exclaim in a forbearing spirit: Holy King,
-spare and have mercy on the suppliant Hrotsvith and suffer that she who
-here has been celebrating thy glorious deeds may persevere further in holy
-song on things divine!'
-
-The next subject which engrossed the nun's attention was the history of
-Gongolf[485], a huntsman and warrior of Burgundy, who lived in the time of
-King Pipin. He was credited with performing wonders such as calling up a
-fountain; he was a pious Christian and was put to a cruel death by his
-faithless wife and her lover. This poem is over five hundred lines in
-length and contains some fine descriptive passages. The version of the
-story Hrotsvith made use of being lost, we cannot tell how far she drew
-upon her own powers of narrative[486].
-
-But the next legend she wrote left full scope for originality of
-treatment. It describes the experiences and martyrdom of Pelagius, a youth
-who had been recently (925) put to death by the Saracens at Cordova in
-Spain; the event, as she herself informs us, had been described to
-Hrotsvith by an eye-witness. The story opens with an enthusiastic
-description of the beauties of Cordova. Pelagius, the son of a king of
-Galicia, persuaded his father to leave him as hostage with the Caliph. But
-the Caliph, enamoured by the youth's physical beauty, persecuted him with
-attentions, and meeting with contempt ordered him to be cast down from the
-city walls. The young man remained unharmed, and was then beheaded and his
-head and body thrown into the river. Fishermen picked them up and carried
-them to a monastery, where their identity was ascertained by casting the
-head in the fire, which left it untouched. The head and body were then
-given solemn burial.
-
-The next legend has repeatedly been commented on as the earliest account
-in verse of a pact with the devil and as a precursor of the many versions
-of the legend of Faust[488]. The 'Lapse and conversion of Theophilus[489]'
-may have had special attractions for Hrotsvith since the incident of the
-devil forced to return his bond was connected, as mentioned above, with
-her namesake Hrotsvith, abbess of Gandersheim. The story of Theophilus
-which Hrotsvith expanded and put into verse had recently been translated
-from Greek into Latin, as Ebert has shown. The story runs as follows.
-
-Theophilus, nephew of a bishop of Cilesia (of uncertain date), had been
-educated in the seven liberal arts, but he held himself unworthy of
-succeeding his uncle, and considered the office of 'vice-domus' more
-suited to his powers. His popularity however drew on him the hatred of the
-newly appointed bishop, who robbed him of his post. Thirsting for revenge
-the young man went for advice to a certain Hebrew, 'who by magic art
-turned away many of the faithful,' and who led him at night through the
-town to a dark place 'full of phantasms that stood in white clothes
-holding torches in their hands' (line 99). Their demon king was at first
-indignant that a Christian claimed his assistance and jeered at the
-Christians' ways, but at last he promised to help Theophilus on condition
-that he should sign an agreement by which he pledged himself to be one of
-the ghastly crew to all eternity. The young man agreed to the condition,
-and on his return home was favourably received by the bishop and
-reinstated in his dignity. But his peace of mind had deserted him; again
-and again he was seized by qualms of conscience and affrighted by
-agonising visions of eternal suffering which he forcibly describes in a
-monologue. At last he sought to escape from his contract by praying to the
-Virgin Queen of heaven in her temple, and for forty days consecutively
-prayed to her to intercede in his favour with God. The Virgin at last
-appeared to him, told him that he was free and handed him the fatal
-document. On a festal day he confessed his wrong-doing before all the
-people and burnt the parchment in their presence. In the very act of doing
-so he appeared as a changed man before their eyes and was instantly
-overtaken by death.
-
-To this legend Hrotsvith attached a little prayer of eight lines which is
-a grace for use at meals. This prayer is in no way connected with the
-legend, and its presence here indicates that the legends were originally
-intended to be read aloud during meals in the refectory, and the reading
-to be closed with a prayer.
-
-Having written so far Hrotsvith collected her legendary poems together
-with the poem on the Virgin and dedicated them in the form of a little
-book to her teacher, the abbess Gerberg. Evidently the stories attracted
-attention beyond the limits of the convent, and Hrotsvith was encouraged
-to continue in the path she had chosen. Accordingly she wrote a second set
-of legends, in composing which she was mindful of a wider public and that
-not exclusively of her own sex. For in the opening lines of the first of
-these legends which treats of the conversion of Proterius by Basilius,
-bishop of Caesarea, she begs that those who peruse this story 'will not on
-account of her sex despise the woman who draws these strains from a
-fragile reed[490].'
-
-The story of this conversion, like that of Theophilus, treats of a pact
-with the evil one, but with a difference. For in the one story the man
-signs away his soul to regain his position, in the other he subscribes the
-fatal bond for the purpose of securing the hand of the bishop's daughter.
-The bishop however intercedes with God in his behalf and regains his
-liberty for him. The poem is neither so complete nor so striking as that
-of Theophilus.
-
-Two more legends are grouped with it. One of them describes the Passion of
-Dionysius[491], who suffered martyrdom at Paris, and who at an early date
-was held identical with Dionysius the Areopagite. The hand of this saint
-had been given as a relic to King Heinrich the Fowler, and had been
-deposited by him at Quedlinburg--an incident which made the saint's name
-familiar in Saxon lands.
-
-The passion of Dionysius is described according to a prose account written
-by Hilduin ([Dagger] 814), but Hrotsvith abbreviated and altered it[492].
-She describes how Dionysius witnessed an eclipse of the sun at Memphis at
-the time when Christ was put to death, how he returned to Athens and there
-waited to hear something of the new god. The apostle Paul arrived and
-preached, and Dionysius followed him to Rome. From Rome he was despatched
-into Gaul to preach the new faith, and while there he was first cast into
-the flames which did not burn him, and then thrown before wild beasts
-which refused to touch him. He was finally beheaded during the
-persecutions under Diocletian. In this poem there is an especially fine
-passage in which we hear how Dionysius after being beheaded rose to life
-and took up his head, which he carried away down the hill to the spot
-where he wished to be buried,--a story similar to that told of many
-saints.
-
-The last legend which Hrotsvith wrote treats of the Passion of St Agnes, a
-virgin saint of Rome, whose fortitude in tribulation and stedfast
-adherence to Christianity and to the vow she had taken made her story
-especially suitable for a convent of nuns[493]. The story has often been
-put into writing from the 4th century downwards; Hrotsvith took her
-account from that ascribed to Ambrosius ([Dagger] 397), which she followed
-closely. She prefaces it with an address to maidens vowed to God, who are
-exhorted to remain steadfast in their purpose. Like most of these
-legendary tales it is between four and five hundred lines in length.
-
-Throughout her legends Hrotsvith, as she herself says in a few remarks
-which stand at the conclusion of the legends, was bent on keeping close to
-the original accounts from which she worked. 'I have taken the material
-for this book, like that for the one preceding it, from ancient books
-compiled by authentic authors (certis nominibus), the story of Pelagius
-alone is excepted.... If mistakes have crept into my accounts, it is not
-because I have intentionally erred but because I have unwittingly copied
-mistakes made by others[494].'
-
-Ebert, commenting on the spirit of the legends generally, remarks on the
-masterly way in which the nun has dealt with her material, on her skill in
-supplying gaps left by earlier writers, on her deft handling of rhyme and
-rhythm, on the right feeling which guides her throughout her work, and on
-the completeness of each of her legends as a whole[495].
-
-The lines in which the second set of legends are dedicated to Gerberg bear
-witness to the pleasure Hrotsvith derived from her work. 'To thee, lady
-Gerberg,' she says, 'I dedicate these stories, adding new to earlier ones,
-as a sinner who deserves benevolent indulgence. Rejoicing I sing to the
-accompaniment with dactylic measures; do not despise them because they
-are bad, but praise in your gentle heart the workings of God[496].'
-
-Having so far worked along accepted lines and achieved success therein,
-the nun of Gandersheim was moved to strike out a new path. Conscious of
-her powers and conscious of a need of her time, filled with admiration for
-the dramatic powers of classical writers while disapproving of their
-tendencies, she set to work to compose a series of plays on the model of
-Terence, in which she dramatised incidents and experiences calculated to
-have an elevating influence on her fellow-nuns.
-
-How she came to write plays at all and what determined her in the choice
-of her subject, she has described in passages which are worth quoting in
-full. They show that she was not wanting either in spirit or in
-determination, and that her conviction that the classical form of drama
-was without equal strengthened her in her resolve to make use of that form
-as the vehicle for stories of an altogether different tenor. The interest
-of the plays of Terence invariably turns on the seduction of women and
-exposure of the frailty of the sex; the nun of Gandersheim determined to
-set forth woman's stedfast adherence to a vow once taken and her firm
-resistance to temptation. Whatever may be thought of these compositions,
-the merit of originality can hardly be denied to them. They were intended
-for perusal only, but there is nothing in the dialogue or mechanism that
-makes a dramatic representation of them impossible.
-
-'There are many Christians,' says the nun[497], 'from whom we cannot claim
-to be excepted, who because of the charm of finished diction prefer
-heathen literature with its hollowness to our religious books; there are
-others who hold by the scripture and despise what is heathen, and yet
-eagerly peruse the poetic creations of Terence; while delighting in his
-flow of language, they are all polluted by the godless contents of his
-works. Therefore I "the well known mouthpiece of Gandersheim" have not
-hesitated in taking this poet's style as a model, and while others honour
-him by perusing his dramas, I have attempted, in the very way in which he
-treats of unchaste love among evil women, to celebrate according to my
-ability the praiseworthy chasteness of godlike maidens.
-
-'In doing so, I have often hesitated with a blush on my cheeks through
-modesty, because the nature of the work obliged me to concentrate my
-attention on and apply my mind to the wicked passion of illicit love and
-to the tempting talk of the amorous, against which we at other times close
-our ears. But if I had hesitated on account of my blushes I could not have
-carried out my purpose, or have set forth the praise of innocence to the
-fulness of my ability. For in proportion as the blandishments of lovers
-are enticing, so much greater is the glory of our helper in heaven, so
-much more glorious the triumph of those who prevail, especially where
-woman's weakness triumphs and man's shameless strength is made to succumb.
-Certainly some will allege that my language is much inferior, much poorer,
-and very unlike that of him whom I try to imitate. It is so, I agree with
-them. And yet I refuse to be reproached on this account as though I had
-meant to class myself with those who in their knowledge are so far above
-my insufficiency. I am not even so boastful as to class myself with the
-least of their pupils; all I am bent on is, however insufficiently, to
-turn the power of mind given to me to the use of Him who gave it. I am not
-so far enamoured of myself that I should cease from fear of criticism to
-proclaim the power of Christ which works in the saints in whatever way He
-grants it. If anyone is pleased with my work I shall rejoice, but if on
-account of my unpolished language it pleases no one, what I have done yet
-remains a satisfaction to myself, for while in other writings I have
-worked, however insufficiently, only in heroic strophe (heroico strophio),
-here I have combined this with dramatic form, while avoiding the dangerous
-allurements of the heathen.'
-
-Those passages in which Hrotsvith speaks of her modest hesitation are
-especially worthy of notice and will not fail to appeal to those women
-now-a-days, who, hoping to gain a clearer insight into the difficulties
-with which their sex has to contend, feel it needful to face facts from
-which their sensibilities naturally shrink. They will appreciate the
-conflicting feelings with which the nun of Gandersheim, well-nigh a
-thousand years ago, entered upon her task, and admire the spirit in which
-she met her difficulties and the courage with which she carried out her
-purpose, in spite of her consciousness of shortcomings and derogatory
-criticism.
-
-As she points out, the keynote of her dramas one and all is to insist on
-the beauties of a steadfast adherence to chastity as opposed to the frenzy
-and the vagaries of passion. In doing so she is giving expression to the
-ideas of contemporary Christian teaching, which saw in passion, not the
-inborn force that can be applied to good or evil purpose, not the storage
-of strength which works for social advantage or disadvantage, but simply a
-tendency in human nature which manifests itself in lack of self-restraint,
-and the disturbing element which interferes with the attainment of
-calmness and candour.
-
-As Hudson, one of the few English writers who has treated of this nun and
-her writings[498], remarks: 'It is on the literary side alone that
-Hrotsvitha belongs to the classic school. The spirit and essence of her
-work belong entirely to the middle ages; for beneath the rigid garb of a
-dead language beats the warm heart of a new era. Everything in her plays
-that is not formal but essential, everything that is original and
-individual, belongs wholly to the christianised Germany of the 10th
-century. Everywhere we can trace the influence of the atmosphere in which
-she lived; every thought and every motive is coloured by the spiritual
-conditions of her time. The keynote of all her works is the conflict of
-Christianity with paganism; and it is worthy of remark that in
-Hrotsvitha's hands Christianity is throughout represented by the purity
-and gentleness of woman while paganism is embodied in what she describes
-as 'the vigour of men (virile robur).'
-
-For the nun does not disparage marriage, far from it; nor does she
-inculcate a doctrine of general celibacy. It is not a question with her of
-giving up a lesser joy for a greater, but simply of the way to remain true
-to the higher standard, which in accordance with the teaching of her age
-she identified with a life of chastity. Her position may appear untenable;
-confusion of thought is a reproach which a later age readily casts on an
-earlier. But underneath what may seem unreasonable there is the aspiration
-for self-control. It is this aspiration which gives a wide and an abiding
-interest to her plays. For she is not hampered by narrowness of thought or
-by pettiness of spirit. Her horizon is limited, we grant; but she fills it
-entirely and she fills it well.
-
-Passing from these generalities to the plays themselves, we find ourselves
-in a variety of surroundings and in contact with a wide range of
-personalities. The transition period from heathendom to Christianity
-supplies in most cases the mental and moral conflicts round which centres
-the interest of these plays.
-
-The plays are six in number, and the one that stands first is divided into
-two separate parts. Their character varies considerably. There is the
-heroic, the romantic, the comic and the unrelieved tragic element, and
-the two plays that stand last contain long disquisitions on scholastic
-learning. A short analysis of their contents will give the reader an idea
-of the manner in which Hrotsvith makes her conceptions and her purpose
-evident.
-
-'Gallicanus,' the play that stands first[499], is in some ways the most
-striking of all. A complex theme is ably dealt with and the incidents
-follow each other rapidly; the scene lies alternately in Rome and on the
-battle-field. The Emperor Constantine is bent on opposing the incursions
-of the Scythians, and his general Gallicanus claims the hand of the
-emperor's daughter Constantia as a reward for undertaking so dangerous an
-expedition. Constantia is a convert to Christianity, Gallicanus is a
-heathen. In an interview with her father the girl declares she will sooner
-die than be united to a heathen, but with a mixture of shrewdness and
-confidence in her faith she agrees to marry him on his return on condition
-that the Christians John and Paul shall accompany him on his expedition,
-and that his daughters shall meanwhile be given into her keeping. The
-manner in which she receives the girls is at once proud and dignified.
-'Welcome my sisters, Attica and Artemia,' she exclaims; 'stand, do not
-kneel, rather greet me with a kiss of affection.' There is no development
-of character in the course of the play, for Hrotsvith is chiefly bent on
-depicting states of mind under given conditions. The characters in
-themselves are forcibly drawn: witness the emperor's affection for his
-daughter, the general's strength and determination, Constantia's dignified
-bearing and the gentleness of the Christian teachers. The sequel of events
-bears out Constantia's anticipations. The daughters of Gallicanus are
-easily swayed in favour of Christianity and their father is converted. For
-Gallicanus is hard pressed by the Scythians on the battle-field and
-despairs of success, when the Christian teachers urge him to call upon
-their God for help. He does so, overcomes the Scythians and takes their
-leader Bradan prisoner. In recognition of his victory he is rewarded by a
-triumphal entry into Rome. But he is now a convert to Christianity; he
-describes to the emperor how Christ Himself and the heavenly host fought
-on his side, and he approaches Constantia and his daughters and thus
-addresses them: 'I greet you, holy maidens; abide in the fear of God and
-keep inviolate your virgin crown that the eternal King may receive you in
-His embrace.' Constantia replies: 'We serve Him the more readily if thou
-dost not oppose us.' Gallicanus: 'I would not discourage, prevent or
-thwart your wishes, I respect them, so far that I would not now constrain
-thee, beloved Constantia, whom I have secured at the risk of my life.' But
-he admits that his resolve costs him much, and he decides to seek solace
-in solitude for his grief at having lost so great a prize.
-
-The sequel to this play is short, and describes the martyrdom of the
-Christian teachers, John and Paul, who had accompanied Gallicanus on his
-expedition. Gallicanus is no more, the Emperor Constantius is dead, and
-Julian the Apostate reigns in his stead and cruelly persecutes the
-Christians. No woman appears in this part of the play. We first witness
-the martyrdom of the Christians who are put to death by Terentian, one of
-the emperor's generals. Terentian's son is then seized by a terrible
-illness, and his unhappy father goes to the grave of the martyrs, where he
-becomes a convert to Christianity and prays for their intercession with
-God in behalf of his son. His prayer finds fulfilment and the boy is
-restored to health. Hrotsvith took this story from the Acts and the
-Passion of the saints John and Paul, but, as Ebert has shown, the
-development is entirely her own[500]. Though working on the model of
-Terence the nun is quite indifferent to unities of time and place, and
-sacrifices everything to the exigencies of the plot, so that the
-transition from scene to scene is often sudden and abrupt.
-
-The next play is 'Dulcetius, or the sufferings of the maidens Agape,
-Chionia and Irene[501].' It dramatises a story which was familiar in
-western Europe from an early date; Ealdhelm mentions it in his poem on
-Virginity. Its popularity is no doubt due to the juxtaposition of entirely
-divergent elements, the pathos of martyrdom being in close company with
-scenes of broad humour.
-
-During the persecutions under Diocletian three youthful sisters are
-brought before the emperor, who thus addresses the eldest:
-
-'_Diocletian._ The noble stock from which you spring and your extreme
-beauty demand that you should be connected with our court through marriage
-with high officials. This we incline to vouchsafe you if you agree to
-disown Christ and offer sacrifice to our most ancient gods.
-
-_Agape._ O spare yourself this trouble, do not think of giving us in
-marriage. Nought can compel us to disown the name of Christ, or to debase
-our purity of heart.
-
-_Diocletian._ What is the object of this madness?
-
-_Agape._ What sign of madness do you see in us?
-
-_Diocletian._ A great and obvious one.
-
-_Agape._ In what?
-
-_Diocletian._ In this, that casting from yourselves the observance of the
-ancient faith, you follow this new foolish Christian teaching.
-
-_Agape._ Blasphemer, fear the power of God Almighty, threatening
-danger....
-
-_Diocletian._ To whom?
-
-_Agape._ To you and to the realm you govern.
-
-_Diocletian._ The girl is crazy, let her be removed.'
-
-He then interviews the other two, but with similar results; threats are of
-no avail and the girls are handed over to the general Dulcetius to be
-summarily dealt with. Dulcetius, however, is so powerfully impressed by
-their beauty, that he orders them to be placed in a chamber beyond the
-kitchen, hoping to take advantage of their helplessness and induce them to
-gratify his passion. He repairs at night to the chamber in spite of the
-warning of his soldiers, when a spell falls on him, he misses the room,
-and his reason so utterly forsakes him that he proceeds to fondle and
-caress the pots and pans which he seizes upon in his excitement. The girls
-are watching him from the next room through a chink in the wall and make
-merry over his madness.
-
-'_Agape._ What is he about?
-
-_Hirena._ Why, the fool is out of his mind, he fancies he has got hold of
-us.
-
-_Agape._ What is he doing?
-
-_Hirena._ Now he presses the kettle to his heart, now he clasps the pots
-and pans and presses his lips to them.
-
-_Chionia._ How ludicrous!
-
-_Hirena._ His face, his hands, his clothes are all black and sooty; the
-soot which clings to him makes him look like an Ethiopian.
-
-_Agape._ Very fitting that he should be so in body, since the devil has
-possession of his mind.
-
-_Hirena._ Look, he is going. Let us wait to see what the soldiers who are
-waiting outside will do when they see him.'
-
-The soldiers fail to recognise their leader, they take to their heels.
-Dulcetius repairs to the palace, where the gatekeeper scoffs at his
-appearance and refuses him admittance, in spite of his insisting on his
-identity and speaking of himself as dressed in splendid attire. At last
-his wife who has heard of his madness comes forth to meet him. The spell
-is broken and he discovers that he has been the laughing-stock of the
-maidens. He then orders them to be exposed naked in the market-place as a
-punishment. But a divine power causes their garments to cling to them,
-while Dulcetius falls so fast asleep that it is impossible to rouse him.
-The Emperor Diocletian therefore entrusts the accomplishment of the
-maidens' martyrdom to Sisinnius. Two of the girls are cast into the
-flames, but their souls pass away to heaven while their bodies remain
-without apparent hurt. The third sister is threatened with shameful
-treatment, but before it is carried out she is miraculously borne away to
-a hill-top. At first the soldiers attempt in vain to approach her, but at
-last they succeed in killing her with arrows. The youthful, girlish traits
-which appear in both the mirth and the sorrow of the three sisters are
-well developed, and form a vivid contrast to the unrelieved brutality of
-Dulcetius and Sisinnius.
-
-Quite a different range of ideas is brought before the reader in the next
-play, 'Calimachus,' which is Hrotsvith's nearest approach to a love
-tragedy[502]. She took its subject from an apocryphal account of the
-apostles, but as Ebert remarks she handles her material with considerable
-freedom[503]. The opening scene shows her power of immediately presenting
-a situation. The scene is laid in the house of Andronicus, a wealthy
-Ephesian. The youth Calimachus and his friends enter.
-
-'_Calimachus._ A few words with you, friends!
-
-_Friends._ We will converse with thee as long as thou pleasest.
-
-_Calimachus._ If you do not mind, we will converse apart.
-
-_Friends._ Thou biddest, we comply.
-
-_Calimachus._ Let us repair to a secluded spot, that we may not be
-interrupted in our converse.'
-
-They go and Calimachus explains how a heavy misfortune has befallen him;
-they urge him to unbosom himself. He confesses he is in love with a most
-beauteous, most adorable being, it is a woman, the wife of Andronicus;
-what shall he do to secure her favour? His friends declare his passion
-hopeless, Drusiana is a Christian and has moreover taken the vow of
-chastity; 'I ask for help, you give me despair,' Calimachus exclaims. In
-the next scene he confronts Drusiana and declares his passion. Drusiana
-repudiates his advances but she is intimidated by his threats, and gives
-utterance to her fears in a monologue in which she declares that she would
-rather die than yield to him. Sudden death cuts her down; and the apostle
-John is called in by her husband and undertakes to give her Christian
-burial. But the youth Calimachus is not cured of his passion. At the
-instigation of his companion, Fortunatus, he goes with him by night to the
-vault where she lies and would embrace the corpse, but a serpent of
-terrible aspect surprises the two young men and kills them. In the
-following scene the apostle is leading Andronicus to the vault: when they
-enter they come upon the serpent lying by the side of the youths. The
-apostle then explains to Andronicus what has happened and gives proof of
-his great power by awakening Calimachus from the dead. The young man
-confesses his evil intentions and explains how he came there at the
-suggestion of his companion. The apostle then recalls Drusiana to life,
-and she begs that Fortunatus also may be restored, but the apostle refuses
-on account of the man's wickedness. Drusiana herself then intercedes in
-his behalf and prays to God for his restoration. Her wish is fulfilled,
-Fortunatus comes back to life, but he declares he would sooner have died
-than have seen Drusiana happy and his friend a convert to Christianity.
-The wounds which the serpent had inflicted at once begin to swell, and he
-expires before their eyes, and the apostle explains that his jealousy has
-sent him to hell. A great deal of action is crowded into this play and we
-are abruptly carried on from scene to scene. It closes with some pious
-reflections on the part of the apostle.
-
-There is considerable diversity of opinion among modern writers on the
-merits of the dramas we have discussed hitherto, but all concur in praise
-of the play called 'Abraham,' which dramatises the oft repeated story of a
-woman who yields to temptation and is reclaimed from her wicked ways. The
-interest in this play never flags and the scenes are worked out with a
-breadth of conception which gives the impression of assured strength[504].
-
-Hrotsvith took the subject of this drama from an account, written in the
-6th century by Ephrem, of the life of his friend, the hermit Abraham. The
-story was written originally in Greek and is preserved in that language;
-the translation into Latin used by Hrotsvith is lost[505]. The plot of the
-drama is as follows:
-
-The devout hermit Abraham consults his friend the hermit Ephrem as to what
-he shall do with his niece, Maria, who is left to his care, and together
-they decide that she shall come and live in a cell near her uncle. Abraham
-throughout speaks directly and to the point, while Ephrem's talk is full
-of mystic allusions. He talks to the maiden of the beauties of the
-religious vocation and assures her that her name, Maria, signifies 'star
-of the sea,' and that she is therefore intended for great things. The
-maiden is surprised at his words and naïvely remarks that it would be a
-great thing 'to equal the lustre of the stars.' She comes to dwell in a
-cell close to that of the two hermits, but after a time she is enticed
-away and disappears from the sight of her uncle, who is deeply grieved at
-her loss. For several years he hears nothing from her; at last a friend
-comes and tells him that the girl has been seen in the city, and is there
-living in a house of ill fame. The old man at once decides to go forth to
-seek his niece and to reclaim her. He dons shoes, a traveller's dress and
-a large hat, and takes with him money, since that only can give him access
-to her. The scene then shifts from the sylvan solitude to the house where
-Maria is living. Abraham arrives and is received by the tavern-keeper,
-whom he asks for a night's lodging, offering him his 'solidus' and
-requesting to see the woman the fame of whose beauty has spread. This
-scene and the one that follows bring the situation before the reader
-admirably. Abraham is served with a meal and Maria enters, at sight of
-whose levity he scarce represses his tears. She entertains him, and he
-feigns a gaiety corresponding to hers, the tavern-keeper being present. Of
-a sudden she is overcome by the thought of the past, but he keeps up his
-assumed character. At last supper is over, and they retire into the
-adjoining chamber. The moment for disclosure has come, and Hrotsvith is
-seen at her best.
-
-'_Abraham._ Close fast the door, that no one enter and disturb us.
-
-_Maria._ Be not concerned, I have done so; no one will find it easy to get
-in.
-
-_Abraham._ The time has come; away, deceitful clothes, that I may be
-recognised. Oh, my adopted daughter, joy of my soul, Maria, dost thou not
-know the aged man who was to thee a parent, who vowed thee to the heavenly
-king?
-
-_Maria._ Oh woe is me! It is my father, my teacher Abraham, who speaks.
-
-_Abraham._ What then has come to thee, my daughter?
-
-_Maria._ Ah, wretchedness!
-
-_Abraham._ Who was it that deceived thee? Who allured thee?
-
-_Maria._ He who was the undoing of our first parents.
-
-_Abraham._ Where is the noble life thou once wast wont to lead?
-
-_Maria._ Lost, lost for ever!
-
-_Abraham._ Where is thy virgin modesty, thy wondrous self-restraint?
-
-_Maria._ Gone from me altogether.
-
-_Abraham._ If thou dost not return to thine own self, what reward in the
-life to come canst thou expect for fasting, prayer, and watching, since
-fallen as from heaven's heights thou now art sunk in hellish depths?
-
-_Maria._ Woe, woe is me!
-
-_Abraham._ Why didst thou thus deceive me? why turn from me? Why didst
-thou not make known to me thy wretchedness, that I and my beloved Ephrem
-might work for thy repentance?
-
-_Maria._ Once fallen into sinfulness, I dared not face you who are holy.
-
-_Abraham._ But is there any one entirely faultless, except the Virgin's
-Son?
-
-_Maria._ Nay, no one.
-
-_Abraham._ 'Tis human to be frail, but to persist in wickedness is of the
-devil. Not he who falls of a sudden is condemned, but he who, having
-fallen, does not strive forthwith to rise again.
-
-_Maria._ Woe unto me, wretch that I am!
-
-  (_She sinks to the ground._)
-
-_Abraham._ Why dost thou sink? why lie upon the ground? Arise and ponder
-what I am saying.
-
-_Maria._ Fear casts me down, I cannot bear the weight of thy paternal
-admonition.
-
-_Abraham._ Dwell only on my love and thrust aside thy fear.
-
-_Maria._ I cannot.
-
-_Abraham._ Think, was it not for thee I left my little hermitage, and so
-far set aside the rule by which I lived that I, an aged hermit, became a
-visitor to wantonness, and keeping silence as to my intent spoke words in
-jest that I might not be recognised? Why then with head bent low gaze on
-the ground? Why hesitate to give answer to my questions?
-
-_Maria._ The accusations of my conscience bear me down, I dare not raise
-my eyes to heaven, nor enter into converse with thee.
-
-_Abraham._ Be not afraid, my daughter, do not despair; rise from this
-depth of misery and fix thy mind on trust in God.
-
-_Maria._ My sins in their excess have brought me to depths of desperation.
-
-_Abraham._ I know thy sins are great, but greater than aught else is
-Heaven's power of grace. Put by thy grief and do not hesitate to spend the
-time vouchsafed to thee in living in repentance; divine grace overflows,
-and overflowing washes out the horrors of wrong-doing.
-
-_Maria._ If I could entertain the hope of grace I should not be found
-wanting in repentance.
-
-_Abraham._ Think of the weariness that I have suffered for thee; leave
-this unprofitable despair, nought in this world is so misleading. He who
-despairs of God's willingness to have compassion, 'tis he who sins
-hopelessly; for as a spark struck from a stone can never set aflame the
-ocean, so the bitterness of sin must ever fail to rouse sweet and divine
-compassion.
-
-_Maria._ I know the power of grace divine, and yet the thought of how I
-have failed fills me with dread; I never can sufficiently atone.
-
-_Abraham._ Thy feeble trust in Him is a reproach to me! But come, return
-with me to where we lived, and there resume the life which thou didst
-leave.
-
-_Maria._ I would not disobey thee; if it be thy bidding, readily I yield.
-
-_Abraham._ Now I see my daughter such as I would have her; I hope still to
-hold thee dearest among all.
-
-_Maria._ I own a little wealth in gold and clothing; I abide by thy
-decision what shall be done with it.
-
-_Abraham._ What came to thee in evil, with evil cast it from thee.
-
-_Maria._ I think it might be given to the poor; or offered at the holy
-altars.
-
-_Abraham._ I doubt if wealth acquired in wickedness is acceptable to God.
-
-_Maria._ Besides this there is nothing of which the thought need trouble
-us.
-
-_Abraham._ The dawn is breaking, the daylight shining, let us now depart.
-
-_Maria._ Lead thou the way, dear father, a good shepherd to the sheep that
-went astray. As thou leadest, so I follow, guided by thy footsteps!
-
-_Abraham._ Nay, I shall walk, my horse shall bear thee, for this stony
-road might cut thy tender feet.
-
-_Maria._ Oh, that I ever left thee! Can I ever thank thee enough that, not
-by intimidation and fear, but by gentle persuasion alone, unworthy though
-I am, thou hast led me to repentance?
-
-_Abraham._ Nought do I ask of thee but this, be now devoted to God for the
-remainder of thy life.
-
-_Maria._ Readily I promise, earnestly will I persevere, and though the
-power fail me, my will shall never fail.
-
-_Abraham._ It is agreed then--as ardently as before to vanity, be thou now
-devoted to the will divine.
-
-_Maria._ Thy merits be my surety that the divine will shall be
-accomplished.
-
-_Abraham._ Now let us hasten our departure.
-
-_Maria._ Yea, hasten; for I loathe to tarry here.'
-
-They return to the hermitage together, and Maria resumes her former mode
-of life in hope of redeeming the past. The drama closes with a scene
-between Abraham and Ephrem, who discourse on the beneficent change which
-familiar surroundings are already working in Maria; the angels sing
-rejoicing at the conversion of the sinner, says Abraham; and Ephrem adds
-that the repentance of the iniquitous causes greater joy in heaven than
-the perseverance of the just.
-
-This play, currently known as 'Abraham,' but which would be more fitly
-named 'Maria,' marks the climax of Hrotsvith's power. In form it preserves
-the simple directness of the classic model, in conception it embodies the
-moral ideals of Christian teaching.
-
-The last two plays of Hrotsvith are chiefly of historical interest for the
-learned disquisitions they contain; their dramatic value is comparatively
-small, and many of the scenes are in a way repetitions of scenes in other
-plays. In 'Paphnutius' we again have the story of a penitent woman, the
-hetaira Thais, who lived in the 6th century, but whose conversion has
-little of the interest which attaches to that of Maria. In 'Sapientia' we
-have a succession of scenes of martyrdom which recall those of the play
-'Dulcetius.' The Lady Sapientia and her three daughters Fides, Spes and
-Caritas are put to death by order of the Emperor Hadrian, but the horrors
-of the situation are relieved by no minor incidents. The learned
-disquisitions in these plays are however extremely curious because they
-show on the one hand what store Hrotsvith set on learning, and on the
-other they give an idea of the method of study pursued at Gandersheim in
-those days.
-
-The play 'Paphnutius[506]' opens with passages which Hrotsvith probably
-adapted from two works of Boëthius: 'On the teaching of Aristotle,' and
-'On the study of music[507].' The philosopher Paphnutius dilates to his
-assembled pupils on man as the microcosm (minor mundus) who reflects in
-himself the world, which is the macrocosm (major mundus), and then
-explains that there is antagonism in the world, which is striving for
-concord in accordance with the rules of harmony. He explains how a similar
-antagonism exists in man and is represented by body and soul, which can
-also be brought into agreement. These thoughts, he says, have been
-suggested to him by the life of the hetaira Thais whose body and soul are
-ever at variance. Paphnutius further enlarges on the higher course of
-study known as the 'quadrivium' which includes arithmetic, geometry, music
-and astronomy[508], and discourses about music and the influence of
-harmony. His pupils, however, object to being taken along such devious
-paths and having such knotty questions propounded to them, and at last
-they quote Scripture in defence of their ignorance, saying that God has
-chosen the foolish that he may confound the wise. This rouses indignation
-in Paphnutius, who declares that 'he who advocates falsehood, be he a fool
-or a learned man, deserves to be confounded by God.' And he further utters
-words which are not devoid of a deeper significance: 'It is not the
-knowledge that man can grasp which is offensive to God, but the conceit of
-the learned.'
-
-The learned disquisitions of the play 'Sapientia' are presented in a form
-still less attractive[509]. The Lady Sapientia, who speaks of herself as
-one of noble stock, and as the descendant of Greek princes, dilates on the
-relative value of numbers[510] to the emperor Hadrian till he tires of it
-and commands her to be gone.
-
-It is sometimes alleged that these two later plays were the productions of
-earlier years, and that the nun added them to her other more finished
-productions in order to equal the number of the plays of Terence. However
-this may be, they were probably the two plays which she submitted to the
-criticism of three outside but now unknown patrons with a letter in which
-she states that she has taken threads and pieces from the garment of
-philosophy to add to the worth of her work. We render this letter in full,
-since it throws an interesting light on what Hrotsvith thought of her own
-powers. If it brought advice which led to the composition of the other
-plays, we must commend the judgment of those who counselled her. But it is
-just possible that the approval which was accorded to the legends was
-denied to the plays,--the absence of the name of the abbess Gerberg in
-connection with them is remarkable,--and that, after writing a number of
-dramas which found no appreciation, Hrotsvith was moved to compose
-'Paphnutius' and 'Sapientia,' introducing learned disquisitions in hope of
-giving them a more solid value.
-
-The letter runs as follows:
-
-'To you, learned men[511], who abide in wisdom and are unenvious of
-another's progress and well-disposed towards him as befits the truly
-learned, I, Hrotsvith, though I am unlearned and lacking in thoroughness,
-address myself; I wish you health and unbroken prosperity. I cannot
-sufficiently admire your great condescension, and sufficiently thank you
-for the help of your liberal generosity and for your kindness towards me;
-you, who have been trained in the study of philosophy and have perfected
-yourselves in the pursuit of knowledge, have held my writings, those of a
-lowly woman, worthy of admiration, and have praised with brotherly
-affection the power which works in me. You have declared that there is in
-me a certain knowledge of that learning (scientiam artium) the essence of
-which is beyond my woman's understanding. Till now I have dared to show my
-rude productions only to a few of my nearest friends, and my work along
-these lines would probably have ceased, for there were few who understood
-my intentions, and fewer who could point out to me in what I had failed,
-and who urged me to persevere. But now that threefold approval comes to me
-from you I take confidence and feel strengthened by your encouragement to
-devote my energies to work where God permits, and to submit this work to
-the criticism of those who are learned. And yet I am divided between joy
-and fear, which contend within me; for in my heart I rejoice, praising
-God through whose grace alone I have become what I am; and yet I am
-fearful of appearing greater than I am, being perplexed by two things both
-of which are wrong, namely the neglect of talents vouchsafed to one by
-God, and the pretence to talents one has not. I cannot deny that through
-the help of the Creator I have acquired some amount of knowledge, for I am
-a creature capable of learning, but I acknowledge there is ignorance in
-me. For I am divinely gifted with abilities, but were it not for the
-untiring zeal of my teachers, they would have remained undeveloped and
-unused through my want of energy (pigritia). Lest this gift of God in me
-should be wasted through neglect I have sought to pluck threads and pieces
-from the garments of philosophy, and have introduced them into my
-afore-mentioned work (praefato opusculo), so that my own moderate
-knowledge may be enhanced by the addition of their greater worth, and God,
-who grants power, may be praised by so much the more as a woman's power is
-held to be inferior. This is the object of my writing, this alone the
-purpose of my exertions, for I do not conceal from myself that I am
-ignorant, and had it depended on myself alone, I should know nothing. But
-as you urge me on by the possibility of your approval and by your request
-proffered to me in writing, I now submit to your criticism this little
-work which I wrote with the intention of sending it to you but which I
-have hitherto kept concealed on account of its demerits, hoping you will
-study it with the intention of improving it as though it were your own
-work. And when you have altered it to a correct standard, send it back to
-me so that I may profit by your teaching in those points in which I may
-have largely failed.'
-
-The productions of Hrotsvith in the domain of contemporary history consist
-of a poem on the emperor Otto the Great, and a history of the monastery of
-Gandersheim. The history of Otto is thought to have been over sixteen
-hundred lines in length[512], but only a fragment of about nine hundred
-lines is preserved. The nun received the materials for this history
-chiefly if not exclusively by word of mouth from the abbess Gerberg, whose
-family feeling it seems to reflect in various particulars, for among other
-distinctive traits, the quarrel between the father of Gerberg and his
-brother the emperor is passed over; it is rather a history of the members
-of the ruling family than a description of contemporary events[513]. This
-detracts from its historic, though hardly from its poetical value, which
-is considerable. Some of the episodes, such as that of the imprisonment
-and flight of Queen Adelheid in Italy, are admirably told. Adelheid was
-the widow of the king of the Langobards, and was afterwards married to
-Otto I. Her flight and imprisonment in Italy previous to her second
-marriage are unrecorded except by Hrotsvith.
-
-The last work of the nun was probably that on the foundation and early
-history of Gandersheim, in which, as in the history of Otto, Hrotsvith
-enlarges more on persons than on events, and gives a detailed account of
-Duke Liudolf, his wife and daughters. Many details referred to above, in
-our chapter on the early history of the settlement, are taken from this
-account, which is in many ways the most finished and beautiful of
-Hrotsvith's compositions.
-
-The interest in Hrotsvith's writings lay dormant for several centuries. It
-was revived at the close of the 15th century when the learned abbot
-Tritheim wrote of her, and the poet Celtes caused her dramas to appear in
-print. During the last thirty years many writers have treated of her, an
-appreciative and attractive account of her was written by Köpke[514], and
-different views have been expressed as to her merits as a poet, a
-dramatist and a historian[515]. Whatever place be ultimately assigned to
-Hrotsvith, the reader of her writings cannot fail to be attracted by her
-modesty, her perseverance, her loftiness of thought, and the directness of
-purpose which underlies all her work. She stands nearly alone in Saxony,
-and by her very solitariness increases our respect for her powers, and for
-the system of education which made the development of these powers
-possible.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-
-THE MONASTIC REVIVAL OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    'Pulchritudo certe mentis et nutrimentum virtutum est cordis munditia,
-    cui visio Dei spiritualiter promittitur; ad quam munditiam nullus nisi
-    per magnam cordis custodiam perducitur.' _Anselm to the Abbess of St
-    Mary's._
-
-
-§ 1. The new Monastic Orders.
-
-In this chapter I intend to give a description of the different monastic
-orders which were founded between the 10th and the 12th centuries, and to
-enter at some length into the reasons for their progress. A mass of
-heterogeneous information must be passed in rapid review with occasional
-digressions on outside matters, for it is only possible to understand the
-rapid progress of monasticism by recalling the relation in which it stood
-to other social developments.
-
-As we cross the borderland which divides the centuries before the year
-1000 from the period that follows, we become aware of great changes which
-about this time take definite shape throughout all social institutions. In
-the various strata of society occupations were becoming more clearly
-differentiated than they had ever been before, while those who were
-devoted to peaceful pursuits, whether in lay or religious circles, were
-now combined together for mutual support and encouragement.
-
-In connection with religion we find the representatives of the Church and
-of monasticism becoming more and more conscious of differences that were
-growing up between them. Monasticism from its very beginning practically
-lay outside the established order of the Church, but this had not
-prevented bishop and abbot from working side by side and mutually
-supporting each other; nay, it even happened sometimes that one person
-combined in himself the two offices of abbot and bishop. But as early
-Christian times passed into the Middle Ages, prelates ceased to agree with
-headquarters at Rome in accepting monasticism as the means of securing a
-foothold for religion. The Church was now well established throughout
-western Europe, and her ministers were by no means prepared to side
-unconditionally with the Pope when he fell out with temporal rulers. The
-monastic orders on the contrary generally did side with him, and by
-locally furthering his interests, they became strongholds of his power.
-
-The 12th century has been called the golden age of monasticism, because it
-witnessed the increased prosperity of existing monasteries and the
-foundation of a number of new monastic and religious orders. A wave of
-enthusiasm for the life of the religious settlement, and for the manifold
-occupations which this life now embraced, passed over western Europe,
-emanating chiefly from France, the country which took the lead in culture
-and in civilizing influences.
-
-The 12th century, as it was the golden age of monasticism, was also the
-golden age of chivalry; the cloister and the court were the representative
-centres of civilized life. Under the influence of the system of mutual
-responsibility called feudalism, the knight by doughty deed and unwavering
-allegiance to his lord, his lady and his cause, gave a new meaning to
-service; while the monk, devoted to less hazardous pursuits, gave a
-hitherto unknown sanctification to toil. The knight, the lady, the
-court-chaplain and the court-poet cultivated the bearings and the
-formalities of polite intercourse which formed the background of the age
-of romance, while in the cloister the monk and the nun gave a new meaning
-to religious devotion and enthusiasm by turning their activity into
-channels which first made possible the approximation of class to class.
-
-This period knew little of townships as centres of intellectual activity,
-and their social importance remained far below that of cloister and court.
-The townsmen, whose possession of town land constituted them burghers, had
-won for themselves recognition as an independent body by buying immunities
-and privileges from bishop and king. But the struggle between them and the
-newer gilds, into which those who were below them in rank and wealth,
-formed themselves, was only beginning; the success of these newer gilds in
-securing a share in the government marks the rise of the township.
-
-The diversity of occupation in the different kinds of gilds was
-anticipated by a similar diversity of occupation in the different monastic
-orders. The great characteristic of the monastic revival of the Middle
-Ages lay in the manifold and distinct spheres of activity which life
-offered inside the religious community. The studious, the educational, the
-philanthropic, and the agricultural element, all to some extent made part
-of the old monastic system. But through the foundation of a number of
-different orders which from the outset had separate aims, tastes which
-were widely dissimilar, and temperaments that were markedly diverse, met
-with encouragement in the religious settlement. The scholar, the artist,
-the recluse, the farmer, each found a career open to him; while men and
-women were prompted to undertake duties within and without the religious
-settlement which make their activity comparable to that of the relieving
-officer, the poor-law guardian and the district nurse of a later age.
-
-To gain a clear idea of the purposes which the new monastic and religious
-orders set before them, it will be best to treat of them severally in the
-chronological order of their foundation. Two lines of development are to
-be observed. There are the strictly monastic orders which sprang from the
-order of St Benedict, which they developed and amplified. These included
-the orders of Clugni, Citeaux, Chartreuse, and Grandmont, of which the
-last two took no account of women. On the other side stand the religious
-orders which are the outcome of distinctions drawn between different kinds
-of canons, when the settlements of regular canons take a distinctly
-monastic colouring. Among these the Premonstrant and the Austin orders are
-the most important, the members of which, from the clothes they wore, were
-in England called respectively White and Black Canons.
-
-The importance of canonical orders, so far as women are concerned, lies in
-the fact that the 12th century witnessed the foundation of a number of
-religious settlements for both sexes, in which the men lived as canons and
-the women as nuns. The Premonstrant began as a combined order; the orders
-of Fontevraud and of St Gilbert of Sempringham were of a similar kind.
-Bearing these distinctions in mind, we begin our enquiry with an analysis
-of the Cluniac and the Cistercian orders, which have their root directly
-in the monasticism of St Benedict.
-
-As remarks in the previous chapters of this work will have shown,
-monasteries had sprung up during early Christian times independently of
-each other following a diversity of rules promulgated by various teachers,
-which had gradually been given up in favour of the rule of St Benedict. At
-the beginning of the 9th century this rule was largely prevalent in
-monasteries abroad, owing to councils held under the auspices of Karl the
-Great ([Dagger] 814)[516], and in England it gained ground through the
-efforts of Aethelwold, abbot of Abingdon and bishop of Winchester
-([Dagger] 984). Some obscurity hangs about the subject, for a certain
-number of houses abroad, and among them some of the oldest and wealthiest,
-clung to the prerogative of independence and refused to accept St
-Benedict's rule, while in England, where this rule was certainly accepted
-in the 11th century, great diversity of routine either remained or else
-developed inside the different houses. This is evident from the account
-which Matthew Paris ([Dagger] 1259), a monk of St Albans, gives of the
-visitation of houses in the year 1232[517].
-
-The order of Clugni[518] owes its origin to the desire of obviating a
-difficulty. As time wore on the rule of St Benedict had betrayed a
-weakness in failing to maintain any connection between separate
-monasteries. As there was no reciprocal responsibility between Benedictine
-settlements, a lay nobleman had frequently been appointed abbot through
-princely interference, and had installed himself in the monastery with his
-family, his servants and his retinue, to the detriment of the monastic
-property, and to the relaxation of discipline among the monks. The evil
-was most conspicuous abroad in the eastern districts of France and the
-western districts of Germany, and in 910 the order of Clugni was founded
-in Burgundy as a means of remedying it.
-
-At first the order of Clugni was the object of great enthusiasm, and it
-was raised to eminence by a series of remarkable and energetic men.
-Powerful patrons were secured to it, master-minds found protection in its
-shelter. The peculiarities of its organisation consisted in the two rules
-that the abbot of the Cluniac house should be chosen during the lifetime
-of his predecessor, and that the abbots of different houses should meet
-periodically at a synod at which the abbot of Clugni should preside. The
-Pope's sanction having been obtained, the order remained throughout in
-close contact with Rome. In Germany especially this connection was
-prominent, and became an important political factor in the 11th century
-when the Cluniac houses directly supported the claim of Rome in the
-struggle between Pope and Emperor.
-
-The order of Clugni took slight cognizance of women, and the nunneries of
-the order were few and comparatively unimportant. A reason for this may be
-found in the nature of the order's origin, for the settlements of nuns had
-not been interfered with like the settlements of monks during the 9th and
-10th centuries by the appointment of lay superiors, and were untouched by
-the consequent evils. If this be so the falling away from discipline,
-which called for correction in many houses of men, may justly be referred
-to a change thrust on them from without, not born from within.
-
-In England the order of Clugni was not officially introduced till after
-the Norman Conquest, and then under circumstances which set a peculiar
-stamp on it. The seed which each order scattered broadcast over the
-different countries was the same, but the nature of the soil in which it
-took root, and the climate under which it developed, modified the
-direction of its growth.
-
-During the 9th and 10th centuries England had been the scene of great
-social and political changes. The powerful kings who arose in Wessex and
-eventually claimed supremacy over all the provinces were unable to assert
-their authority to the extent of making the eastern provinces sink all
-provincial differences and jealousies, and join in organised resistance to
-the Danes. From the 9th century onwards, the entire seaboard of England,
-from Northumberland to the mouth of the Severn, had been exposed to the
-depredations of this people. Having once gained a foothold on the eastern
-coasts they quickly contracted alliances and adapted themselves to English
-customs, thus making their ultimate success secure.
-
-The heathen invaders were naturally indifferent to the teachings of the
-Christian Church, and to the privileges of monasteries, and the scant
-annals of the period written before Knut of Denmark became king of England
-in 1016, give accounts of the destruction of many settlements. Some were
-attacked and laid waste, and others were deserted by their inmates. To
-realise the collapse of Christian institutions about this time, one must
-read the address which Wulfstan, archbishop of York (1002-1023), wrote to
-rouse the English to consciousness of the indignities to which their
-religion was exposed[519]. But the collapse was only temporary, bishoprics
-and abbacies stood firm enough to command the attention of the invader,
-and as the heathenism of the Dane yielded without a blow to the teaching
-of Christ, the settlements that were in the hands of abbot and monk rose
-anew.
-
-However, it was only after the establishment of William of Normandy in
-England (1066) that the conditions of life became settled, and that the
-tide turned in favour of monasticism; that is to say in favour of the
-monastic life of men, but not of women. Various reasons have been alleged
-for this difference: that the better position of the wife under Danish
-rule made women loth to remain in the convent, or that the spread of the
-system of feudal tenure excluded women from holding property which they
-could devote to the advantage of their sex. So much is certain, that
-during the reign of William many Benedictine houses for monks were founded
-or restored, but we do not hear of one for nuns.
-
-In the wake of the Norman baron, the Norman prelate had entered this
-country, bringing with him an interest in the order of Clugni. It was
-William of Warren, son-in-law of the Conqueror, and earl of Surrey, who
-first brought over Cluniac monks, whom he settled at Lewes in Sussex. He
-did so at the suggestion of Lanfranc, a Norman monk of Italian origin, who
-had become archbishop of Canterbury (1070-1089). Before the close of
-William's reign Cluniac monks had met with patrons to build them four
-monasteries on English soil besides the house at Lewes.
-
-The Norman barons continued to make liberal endowments to the order, but
-its popularity remained comparatively small, partly owing to the
-distinctly foreign character which it continued to bear[520]. Thus we find
-that after the accession of Henry II (1154), whose reign was marked by a
-rise in English national feeling, only one Cluniac house was added to
-those already in existence.
-
-From the order of Clugni we pass to that of Citeaux[521], the foundation
-of which comes next in point of time, but which owed its existence to a
-different cause, and was characterised by widely dissimilar developments.
-
-The story of the foundation of the order has been fully told by men who
-were under the influence of the movement; the facts only of the foundation
-need be mentioned here. It originated in France when Robert, abbot of
-Molêmes, roused by the remonstrances of one Stephen Harding, an English
-monk living in his convent, left his home with a band of followers in
-1098, in search of a retreat where they might carry out the rule of St
-Benedict in a worthier spirit. They found this retreat at Citeaux. From
-Citeaux and its daughter-house Clairvaux, founded in 1113 by the
-energetic Bernard, those influences went forth which made the Cistercian
-order representative of the most strenuous devotion to toil and the most
-exalted religious aspirations. While the order of Clugni in the 10th
-century secured the outward conditions favourable to a life of routine,
-devoting this routine chiefly to literary and artistic pursuits, the
-reform of Citeaux exerted a much wider influence. It at once gained
-extensive local and national sympathy, by cultivating land and by
-favouring every kind of outdoor pursuit.
-
-The agricultural activity of the Cistercian has called forth much
-enthusiastic comment. Janauschek, a modern student of the order, describes
-in eloquent terms how they turned woods into fields, how they constructed
-water-conduits and water-mills, how they cultivated gardens, orchards, and
-vineyards, how successful they were in rearing cattle, in breeding horses,
-in keeping bees, in regulating fishing, and how they made glass and
-procured the precious metals[522].
-
-A comparison of their temper and that of the Cluniacs offers many
-interesting points; a comparison which is facilitated by a dialogue
-written by a Cistercian monk between 1154 and 1174 to exalt the merits of
-his order compared with those of the order of Clugni[523]. For while the
-Cluniac delighted in luxurious surroundings, the Cistercian affected a
-simple mode of life which added to the wealth placed at his disposal by
-his untiring industry. While the Cluniac delighted in costly church
-decorations, in sumptuous vestments and in richly illuminated books of
-service, the Cistercian declared such pomp prejudicial to devotion, and
-sought to elevate the soul not so much by copying and ornamenting old
-books as by writing new ones; not so much by decorating a time-honoured
-edifice as by rearing a new and beautiful building.
-
-Perhaps the nature of these occupations yields a reason why the Cistercian
-order at first found no place for women. At an early date Cardinal de
-Vitry (Jacobus di Vitriaco, [Dagger] 1144), writing about the Cistercian
-movement, says that 'the weaker sex at the rise of the order could not
-aspire to conform to such severe rules, nor to rise to such a pitch of
-excellence[524].' In the dialogue referred to above, the Cluniac expresses
-wonder that women should enter the Cistercian order at all.
-
-The first Cistercian nunneries were founded at Tart in Langres and at
-Montreuil-les-Dames near Laon[525]. Hermann of Laon (c. 1150) describes
-'how the religious of Montreuil sewed and span, and went into the woods
-where they grubbed up briars and thorns,'--an occupation which goes far to
-equalise their activity with that of the monks[526]. In Switzerland and
-Germany there is said to have been a pronounced difference in the
-character of Cistercian nunneries, due to the various conditions of their
-foundation. Some were aristocratic in tone, while others consisted of
-women of the middle class, who banded together and placed themselves under
-the bishop of the diocese, following of their own accord the rules
-accepted by the monks of Citeaux[527].
-
-In Spain a curious development of the order of Citeaux is recorded,
-fraught with peculiarities which recall earlier developments.
-
-In 1187 Alfonso VIII, king of Leon and Castille, founded an abbacy for
-nuns of the order of Citeaux at Las Huelgas near Burgos, the abbess of
-which was declared head over twelve other nunneries. In the following year
-the king sent the bishop of Siguenza to the general chapter at Citeaux to
-obtain leave for the abbesses of his kingdom to hold a general chapter
-among themselves. This was granted. At the first chapter at Burgos the
-bishops of Burgos, Siguenza and Placenza were assembled together with six
-abbots and seven abbesses, each abbess being entitled to bring with her
-six servants and five horses. The power of the abbess of Las Huelgas
-continued to increase. In the year 1210 she had taken upon herself the
-discharge of sacerdotal functions. In the year 1260 she refused to receive
-the abbot of Citeaux, whereupon she was excommunicated. After the year
-1507 the abbess was no longer appointed for life, but for a term of three
-years only. Chapters continued to be held under her auspices at Burgos
-till the Council of Trent in 1545, which forbade women to leave their
-enclosures[528].
-
-The date of the first arrival of monks of Citeaux in England was 1128,
-when William Giffard, bishop of Winchester ([Dagger] 1129), in early days
-a partisan of Anselm against Henry I, founded Waverley in Surrey for
-them[529]. Shortly afterwards Walter Espec, the most powerful baron in
-northern England, granted them land at Rievaulx in Yorkshire[530]. About
-the same time the foundation at Fountains repeated the story of Citeaux. A
-small band of monks, burning with the desire to simplify conventual life,
-left York and retired into the wooded solitude of Fountains, whence they
-sent to Bernard at Clairvaux asking for his advice[531].
-
-These events fall within the reign of Henry I (1100-1135), the
-peacefulness of which greatly furthered the development of monastic life.
-The pursuits to which the Cistercians were devoted in England were similar
-to those they carried on abroad. Here also their agricultural successes
-were great, for they ditched, ridged and drained, wet land, they marled
-stiff soils and clayed poor ones. The land granted to them, especially in
-the northern counties, was none of the best, but they succeeded in turning
-wildernesses into fruitful land, and by so doing won great admiration.
-Similarly the churches built in this country under the auspices of these
-monks bear witness to great purity of taste and ardent imagination. The
-churches built by them were all dedicated to the Virgin Mary, who was the
-patron saint of the order.
-
-All these early settlements of the Cistercian order were for monks, not
-for nuns, for Cistercian nunneries in England were founded comparatively
-late and remained poor and unimportant. If we look upon the Cistercians as
-farmers, builders and writers, this fact is partly explained. But there
-are other reasons which suggest why the number of Cistercian nunneries was
-at first small, and why the Cistercian synod shrank from accepting control
-over them.
-
-Convents of women had hitherto been recruited by the daughters of the
-landed gentry, and their tone was aristocratic; but a desire for the
-religious life had now penetrated into the lower strata of society. Orders
-of combined canons and nuns were founded which paid special attention to
-women of the lower classes, but they encountered certain difficulties in
-dealing with them. It is just possible on the one hand that the combined
-orders forestalled the Cistercians in the inducements they held out; on
-the other, that the experience of the combined orders made the Cistercians
-cautious about admitting women.
-
-Consideration of these facts brings us back to a whole group of phenomena
-to which reference was made in a previous chapter, viz. the disorderly
-tendencies which had become apparent in connection with loose women, the
-greater opprobrium cast on these women as time went on, and the increasing
-difficulties they had to contend with. The founders of the orders of
-combined canons and nuns tried to save women from drifting into and
-swelling a class, the existence of which was felt to be injurious to
-social life, by preaching against a dissolute life and by receiving all
-persons into their settlements regardless of their antecedents.
-
-The earliest and in many ways the most interesting of these combined
-orders is that founded by Robert ([Dagger] 1117) of Arbrissel, a village
-in Brittany. Robert had begun life in the Church, but he left the clerical
-calling on account of his great desire to minister to the needs of the
-lower classes, and as a wandering preacher he gained considerable
-renown[532]. Men and women alike were roused by his words to reform their
-course of life, and they followed him about till he determined to secure
-for them a permanent abode. This he found in an outlying district at
-Fontevraud. He organised his followers into bands and apportioned to each
-its task. The men were divided into clerics, who performed religious
-service, and lay brothers, who did outdoor work. 'They were to use gentle
-talk, not to swear, and all to be joined in brotherly affection.' It
-appears that the women were all professed nuns[533]; unceasing toil was to
-be their portion, for they were to hold the industrious and hardworking
-Martha as their model and take small account of such virtues as belonged
-to Mary.
-
-From every side workers flocked to the settlements, for Robert opened his
-arms to all. We are told that 'men of all conditions came, women arrived,
-such as were poor as well as those of gentle birth; widows and virgins,
-aged men and youths, women of loose life as well as those who held aloof
-from men.' At first there was a difficulty in providing for the numerous
-settlers, but their labours brought profit, and gifts in kind poured in
-from outsiders, a proof that in the eyes of the world the settlements
-supplied an obvious need. Branch establishments were founded and
-prospered, so that in one cloister there were as many as three hundred
-women, in another one hundred, and in another sixty. Robert returned to
-his missionary work, after having appointed Hersende of Champagne as lady
-superior of the whole vast settlement. Her appointment was decisive for
-the system of government,--Fontevraud remained under the rule of an
-abbess. It was for her successor, Petronille, that the life of the founder
-Robert was written soon after his death, by Baldric, bishop of Dol
-([Dagger] 1130). Baldric repeatedly insists on the fact that no one was
-refused admission to these settlements. 'The poor were received, the
-feeble were not refused, nor women of evil life, nor sinners, neither
-lepers nor the helpless.' We are told that Robert attracted nearly three
-thousand men and women to the settlements; the nuns (ancillae Christi) in
-particular wept at his death.
-
-The fact that Robert had the welfare of women especially at heart is
-further borne out by a separate account of the last years of his life,
-written by one Andrea, probably his pupil. Andrea tells how Robert at the
-approach of death assembled the canons or clerics of the settlement around
-him and addressed them saying: 'Know that whatever I have wrought in this
-world I have wrought as a help to nuns.' Fontevraud occupied a high
-standing, and we shall find that nuns were brought thence into England
-when the nunnery of Amesbury was reformed in the reign of King John. The
-order of Fontevraud made great progress in the course of the 12th century,
-and next to it in point of time stands the foundation of the order of
-Prémontré[534]. Fontevraud lies in the north-west of France, Prémontré in
-the east, and the efforts of Robert have here a counterpart in those of
-Norbert ([Dagger] 1134), who worked on similar lines. Norbert also left
-the clerical calling to work as a missionary in north-western Germany,
-especially in Westphalia, and he also succeeded in rousing his listeners
-to a consciousness of their ungodly mode of life. With a view to reform he
-sought to give a changed tone to canonical life and founded a religious
-settlement in the forest of Coucy, which he afterwards called Prémontré
-from the belief that the Virgin had pointed it out to him. His efforts
-were likewise crowned with success, for many settlements were forthwith
-founded on the plan of that of Prémontré. Hermann of Laon, the
-contemporary of Norbert, praises him warmly and remarks that women of all
-classes flocked to his settlements, and were admitted into the communities
-by adopting the cloistered life. The statement is made, but may be
-exaggerated, that ten thousand women joined the order during Norbert's
-lifetime.
-
-Norbert differed greatly in character from Robert; his personal ambition
-was greater, and his restless temperament eventually drew him into
-political life. He died in 1134, and in 1137 the chapter at Prémontré
-decided that the women should be expelled from all the settlements that
-had inmates of both sexes, and that no nuns should henceforth be admitted
-to settlements ruled by men. The reasons which led to this resolution are
-not recorded. The nuns thus rendered homeless are said to have banded
-together and dwelt in settlements which were afterwards numbered among
-Cistercian houses, thus causing a sudden increase of nunneries of this
-order. However a certain number of Premonstrant houses, occupied solely by
-nuns and ruled by a lady superior, existed previous to the decree of 1137.
-These remained unmolested, and others were added to them in course of
-time[535]. It can be gathered from a bull of 1344 that there were at that
-time over thirteen hundred settlements of Premonstrant or White Canons in
-existence in Europe, besides the outlying settlements of lay brothers, and
-about four hundred settlements of nuns[536]. The settlements of White
-Canons in England amounted to about thirty-five and were founded after the
-sexes had been separated. There were also two settlements of Premonstrant
-nuns in England[537].
-
-A third order of canons and nuns, which in various ways is akin to the
-orders of Fontevraud and Prémontré previously founded abroad, was founded
-at the beginning of the 12th century in England by Gilbert of Sempringham.
-But as the material for study of this order is copious, and as it marks a
-distinct development in the history of women's convent life in England, it
-will be discussed in detail later[538].
-
-The canons who belonged to the combined orders were regular canons, that
-is they owned no individual property, and further differed from secular
-canons in holding themselves exempt from performing spiritual functions
-for the laity. Erasmus at a later date remarked that 'their life is half
-way between that of monks and that of those who are called secular
-canons[539].'
-
-As to the distinction between the two kinds, it appears that bands of
-canons who may fitly be termed regular had existed from an early period;
-but the subject is shrouded in some obscurity[540]. In the 11th century
-mention of them becomes frequent, especially in France, and at the
-beginning of the 12th century their position was defined by a decree
-published by Pope Innocent II at the Lateran Council (1139)[541]. By this
-decree all those canons who did not perform spiritual functions for the
-laity were designated as regular and were called upon to live according to
-the rule of life laid down by St Augustine in his Epistle, number 109. The
-terms Austin canon and regular canon were henceforth applied
-indiscriminately, but many independent settlements of unrecognised canons
-of an earlier date have since been included under this term.
-
-A few words are here needed in explanation of the term canoness or Austin
-canoness, which is used in diverse ways, but is generally applied to women
-of some substance, who entered a religious community and lived under a
-rule, but who were under no perpetual vow, that is, they observed
-obedience and celibacy as long as they remained in the house but were at
-liberty to return to the world. These stipulations do not imply that a
-woman on entering a convent renounced all rights of property, an
-assumption on the strength of which the Church historian Rohrbacher
-interprets as applying to canonesses the entire chapter of directions
-promulgated at Aachen in 816, in the interest of women living the
-religious life[542]. But the terms used in these provisions are the
-ordinary ones applied to abbess and nun[543]. Helyot, who has a wider
-outlook, and who speaking of the canon explains how this term was at first
-applied to all living _in canone_, points out that uncertainty hangs about
-many early settlements of women abroad, the members of which were in the
-true sense professed[544]. It seems probable that they at first observed
-the rule of St Benedict, and afterwards departed from it, as has been
-pointed out above in connection with Saxon convents.
-
-The tenor of the provisions made at Aachen shows that the monastic life of
-women in a number of early settlements abroad rested on a peculiar basis,
-and points to the fact that the inmates of settlements founded at an
-early date were in some measure justified when they declared later that
-they had always held certain liberties, and insisted on a distinction
-between themselves and other nuns. The position of the inmates of some of
-these houses continued different from that of the members of other
-nunneries till the time of the Reformation. In England, however, this
-difference does not seem to have existed. The inmates of the few Austin
-nunneries, of which there were fifteen at the dissolution, though they are
-frequently spoken of as canonesses in the charters that are secured by
-them, appear to have lived a life in no way different from that of other
-nuns, while they were in residence, but it may be they absented themselves
-more frequently.
-
-When once their position was defined the spread of the Austin Canons was
-rapid; they combined the learning of the Benedictine with the devotional
-zeal of the Cistercian, and ingratiated themselves with high and low. Of
-all the settlements of the Austin Canons abroad that of St Victor in Paris
-stands first in importance. It became a retreat for some of the master
-minds of the age[545], and its influence on English thinkers was
-especially great[546]. Austin Canons came from France into England as
-early as 1108. At first their activity here was chiefly philanthropic,
-they founded hospitals and served in them; but they soon embraced a
-variety of interests. In the words of Kate Norgate speaking with reference
-to England[547]: 'The scheme of Austin Canons was a compromise between the
-old-fashioned system of canons and that of monkish confraternities; but a
-compromise leaning strongly towards the monastic side, tending more and
-more towards it with every fresh development, and distinguished chiefly by
-a certain elasticity of organisation which gave scope to an almost
-unlimited variety in the adjustment of the relations between the active
-and the contemplative life of the members of the order, thus enabling it
-to adapt itself to the most dissimilar temperaments and to the most
-diverse spheres of activity.'
-
-Their educational system also met with such success that before the close
-of the reign of Henry I two members of the fraternity had been promoted to
-the episcopate and one to the primacy. In the remarks of contemporary
-writers on religious settlements, it is curious to note in what a
-different estimation regular canons and monks are held by those who
-shared the interests of court circles. For the courtier, as we shall
-presently see, sympathised with the canon but abused and ridiculed the
-monk.
-
-Throughout the early Christian ages the idea had been steadily gaining
-ground that the professed religious should eschew contact with the outside
-world, and it was more and more urged that the moral and mental welfare of
-monk and nun was furthered by their confining their activity within the
-convent precincts. Greater seclusion was first enforced among women; for
-in the combined orders the nuns remained inside the monastery, and were
-removed from contact with the world, while the canons were but little
-restricted in their movements. How soon habitual seclusion from the world
-became obligatory it is of course very difficult to determine, but there
-is extant a highly interesting pamphlet, written about the year 1190 by
-the monk Idung of the Benedictine monastery of St Emmeran in Bavaria,
-which shows that professed religious women in the district he was
-acquainted with went about as freely as the monks, and did not even wear a
-distinctive dress. The pamphlet[548] is the more interesting as Idung was
-evidently distressed by the behaviour of the nuns, but failed to find an
-authority on which to oppose their actions. He admits that the rule as
-drafted by St Benedict is intended alike for men and women, and that there
-are no directions to be found in it about confining nuns in particular,
-and in fact the rule allowed monks and nuns to go abroad freely as long as
-their superior approved. Idung then sets forth with many arguments that
-nuns are the frailer vessel; and he illustrates this point by a mass of
-examples adduced from classical and Biblical literature. He proves to
-himself the advisability of nuns being confined, but he is at a loss where
-to go for the means of confining them. And he ends his pamphlet with the
-advice that as it is impossible to interfere with the liberty of nuns, it
-should at least be obligatory for them when away from home to wear clothes
-which would make their vocation obvious.
-
-No doubt the view held by this monk was shared by others, and public
-opinion fell in with it, and insisted on the advantages of seclusion. Many
-Benedictine houses owned outlying manors which were often at a
-considerable distance, and the management of which required a good deal of
-moving about on the part of the monks and nuns who were told off for the
-purpose. We shall see later that those who had taken the religious vow had
-pleasure as their object as much as business in going about; but
-complaints about the Benedictines of either sex are few compared with
-those raised against the Cistercian monks. For the Cistercians in their
-capacity of producers visited fairs and markets and, where occasion
-offered, were ready to drive a bargain, which was especially objected to
-by the ministers of the Church, who declared that the Cistercians lowered
-the religious profession in general estimation. Consequently orders which
-worked on opposite lines enjoyed greater favour with the priesthood; such
-as the monastic order of Grandmont, which originally demanded of its
-members that they should not quit their settlement and forbade their
-owning any animals except bees; and the order of Chartreuse, which
-confined each monk to his cell, that is, to a set of rooms with a garden
-adjoining[549]. But these orders did not secure many votaries owing to
-their severity and narrowness.
-
-Thus at the close of the 12th century a number of new religious orders had
-been founded which spread from one country to another by means of an
-effective system of organization, raising enthusiasm for the peaceful
-pursuits of convent life among all classes of society. The reason of their
-success lay partly in their identifying themselves with the ideal
-aspirations of the age, partly in the political unrest of the time which
-favoured the development of independent institutions, but chiefly in the
-diversity of occupation which the professed religious life now offered.
-The success obtained by the monastic orders however did not fail to rouse
-apprehension among the representatives of the established Church, and it
-seems well in conclusion to turn and recall some of the remarks passed on
-the new orders by contemporary writers who moved in the court of Henry II
-(1154-89).
-
-It has been pointed out how the sympathies of court circles at this period
-in England were with the Church as represented by the priesthood; courtier
-and priest were at one in their antagonism against monks, but in sympathy
-with the canons. Conspicuous among these men stands Gerald Barri (c.
-1147-c. 1220), a Welshman of high abilities and at one time court chaplain
-to the king. He hated all monkish orders equally, and for the delectation
-of some friends whom he entertained at Oxford he compiled a collection of
-monkish scandals known as 'The Mirror of the Church[550],' in which he
-represents the Cluniac monk as married to Luxury, and the Cistercian monk
-to Avarice; but, in spite of this, incidental remarks in the stories he
-tells give a high opinion of the Cistercian's industry, hospitality and
-unbounded charity. Gerald mentions as a subject for ridicule that the
-Cistercian monk lived not on rent, but on the produce of his labour, an
-unaristocratic proceeding which was characteristic of the order. Gerald's
-attitude is reflected in that of Ralph de Glanvil ([Dagger] 1190),
-justiciar of England during the reign of Henry II, a clever and versatile
-man of whom we know, through his friend Map, that he disliked all the
-monkish orders. But his enthusiasm for religious settlements was not
-inconsiderable, and several settlements of the Premonstrant or White
-Canons were founded by him.
-
-The student of the period is familiar with the likes and dislikes of
-Walter Map ([Dagger] c. 1210), great among poets and writers of the age,
-who disliked all monks, but especially the Cistercians[551]. His friend
-Gerald tells how this hatred had originated in the encroachments made by
-the monks of Newenham on the rights and property of the church he held at
-Westbury. For the perseverance with which Cistercian monks appropriated
-all available territory and interfered with the rights of church and
-chapel, made them generally odious to the ministers of the Church; their
-encroachments were an increasing grievance. John of Salisbury, afterwards
-bishop of Chartres ([Dagger] after 1180), directly censured as pernicious
-the means taken by the monks to extend their power. He tells us they
-procured from Rome exemption from diocesan jurisdiction, they appropriated
-the right of confession, they performed burial rites; in short they
-usurped the keys of the Church[552]. By the side of these remarks it is
-interesting to recall the opinion of the monkish historian, William of
-Malmesbury, who a generation earlier had declared that the Cistercian
-monks had found the surest road to heaven.
-
-All these writers, though lavish in their criticisms on monks, tell us
-hardly anything against nuns. The order of St Gilbert for canons and nuns
-alone calls forth some remarks derogatory to the women. Nigel Wirecker,
-himself a monk, giving vent to his embittered spirit against Church and
-monkish institutions generally in the satire of Brunellus, launches into a
-fierce attack against the tone which then prevailed in women's
-settlements[553]. He does not think it right that women whose antecedents
-are of the worst kind should adopt the religious profession and that as a
-means of preserving chastity they should systematically enjoin hatred of
-men.
-
-A similar reference is contained in the poem in Norman French called the
-'Order of Fair Ease,' which is a production of the 13th century, and which
-caricatures the different religious orders by feigning an order that
-unites the characteristic vices of all[554]. It is chiefly curious in the
-emphasis it lays on the exclusiveness of monasteries generally,
-representing them as reserved for the aristocracy. It contains little on
-nunneries and only a few remarks which are derogatory to the combined
-order of Sempringham.
-
-These remarks were obviously called forth by the fact that the combined
-orders in particular admitted women from different ranks of life. For
-generally nunneries and their inmates enjoyed favour with churchman and
-courtier, whose contempt for the monk does not extend to the nun. In the
-correspondence of Thomas Beket, John of Salisbury, Peter of Blois and
-others there are letters to nuns of various houses which show that these
-men had friends and relatives among the inmates of nunneries. Indeed where
-members of the same family adopted the religious profession, the son
-habitually entered the Church while the daughter entered a nunnery. A
-sister of Thomas Beket was abbess at Barking, and various princesses of
-the royal house were abbesses of nunneries, as we shall presently see.
-They included Mary, daughter of Stephen (Romsey); a natural daughter of
-Henry II (Barking), and Matilda, daughter of Edward I (Amesbury); Queen
-Eleanor wife of Henry III also took the veil at Amesbury.
-
-
-§ 2. Benedictine Convents in the Twelfth Century.
-
-From this general review of the different orders we pass on to the state
-of nunneries in England during the 12th century, and to those incidents in
-their history which give some insight into their constitution.
-
-Attention is first claimed by the old Benedictine settlements which still
-continued in prosperity and independence. Of these houses only those which
-were in connection with the royal house of Wessex remained at the close of
-the 10th century; those of the northern and midland districts had
-disappeared. Some were deserted, others had been laid waste during the
-Danish invasions; it has been observed that with the return of
-tranquillity under Danish rule, not one of the houses for women was
-restored. Secular monks or laymen took possession of them, and when they
-were expelled, the Church claimed the land, or the settlement was restored
-to the use of monks. Some of the great houses founded and ruled by women
-in the past were thus appropriated to men. Whitby and Ely rose in renewed
-splendour under the rule of abbots; Repton, Wimbourne and numerous other
-nunneries became the property of monks.
-
-Various reasons have been given for the comparatively low ebb at which
-women's professed religious life remained for a time. Insecurity during
-times of warfare, and displacement of the centres of authority, supply
-obvious reasons for desertion and decay. A story is preserved showing how
-interference from without led to the disbanding of a nunnery. The Danish
-earl Swegen ([Dagger] 1052), son of Earl Godwin, took away (vi abstractam)
-the abbess Eadgifu of Leominster in Herefordshire in 1048, and kept her
-with him for a whole year as his wife. The archbishop of Canterbury and
-the bishop of Worcester threatened him with excommunication, whereupon he
-sent her home, avenging himself by seizing lands of the monastery of
-Worcester. He then fled from England and was outlawed, but at a later
-period he is said to have wanted the abbess back. The result is not
-recorded, for Leominster as a women's settlement ceased to exist about
-this time[555]. There is no need to imagine a formal dissolution of the
-settlement. The voluntary or involuntary absence of the abbess in times of
-warfare supplies quite a sufficient reason for the disbanding of the nuns.
-
-About the same time a similar fate befell the monastery of
-Berkley-on-Severn, in spite of the heroic behaviour of its abbess. The
-story is told by Walter Map how it was attacked and plundered at the
-instigation of Earl Godwin ([Dagger] 1053) and how in spite of the stand
-made by the abbess, a 'strong and determined' woman, the men who took
-possession of it turned it into a 'pantheon, a very temple of
-harlotry[556].' Berkley also ceased to exist[557].
-
-The monasteries ruled by women, which survived the political changes due
-to the Danish invasion and the Norman Conquest, had been in connection
-with women of the house of Cerdic; with hardly an exception they were
-situated in the province of Wessex within the comparatively small area
-of Dorset, Wilts, and Hampshire. Chief among them were Shaftesbury,
-Amesbury, Wilton (or Ellandune), Romsey, and St Mary Winchester (or
-Nunnaminster). With these must be classed Barking in Essex, one of the
-oldest settlements in the land, which had been deserted at one time but
-was refounded by King Edgar, and which together with the Wessex nunneries,
-carried on a line of uninterrupted traditions from the 9th century to the
-time of the dissolution.
-
-The manors owned by these settlements at the time of the Conquest lay in
-different shires, often at a considerable distance from the monastery
-itself.
-
-From the account of survey in the Domesday book we gather that Shaftesbury
-had possessions in Sussex, Wiltshire, Dorset, and Hampshire[558], and that
-Nunnaminster owned manors in Hampshire, Berkshire, and Wiltshire[559].
-Barking, the chief property of which lay in Essex, also held manors in
-Surrey, Middlesex, Berkshire, and Bedfordshire[560].
-
-These monasteries were abbacies, as indeed were all houses for nuns
-founded before the Conquest. The abbess, like the abbot, had the power of
-a bishop within the limits of her own house and bore a crozier as a sign
-of her rank. Moreover the abbesses of Shaftesbury, Wilton, Barking, and
-Nunnaminster 'were of such quality that they held of the king by an entire
-barony,' and by right of tenure had the privilege at a later date of being
-summoned to parliament, though this lapsed on account of their sex[561].
-
-The abbess as well as the abbot had a twofold income; she drew
-spiritualities from the churches which were in her keeping, and
-temporalities by means of her position as landlord and landowner. The
-abbess of Shaftesbury, who went by the title of abbess of St Edward, had
-in her gift several prebends, or portions of the appropriated tithes or
-lands for secular priests. In the reign of Henry I she found seven knights
-for the king's service, and had writs regularly directed to her to send
-her quota of soldiers into the field in proportion to her knights' fees;
-she held her own courts for pleas of debts, etc., the perquisites of which
-belonged to her[562].
-
-To look through the cartularies of some of the old monasteries, is to
-realise how complex were the duties which devolved on the ruler of one of
-these settlements, and they corroborate the truth of the remark that the
-first requirement for a good abbot was that he should have a head for
-business. Outlying manors were in the hands of bailiffs who managed them,
-and the house kept a clerk who looked after its affairs in the spiritual
-courts; for the management and protection of the rights and privileges of
-the property claimed unceasing care.
-
-The Benedictine abbesses do not seem to have been wanting in business and
-managing capacity. At the time of the dissolution the oldest nunneries in
-the land with few exceptions were also the wealthiest. The wealth of some
-was notorious. A saying was current in the western provinces that if the
-abbot of Glastonbury were to marry the abbess of Shaftesbury, their heir
-would have more land than the king of England[563]. The reason of this
-wealth lies partly in the fact that property had been settled on them at a
-time when land was held as a comparatively cheap commodity; but it speaks
-well for the managing capacities of those in authority that the high
-standing was maintained. The rulers prevented their property from being
-wasted or alienated during the 12th and 13th centuries, when the vigour or
-decline of an institution so largely depended on the capacity of the
-individual representing it, and they continued faithful to their
-traditions by effecting a compromise during the 14th and 15th centuries,
-when the increased powers of the Church and the consolidation of the
-monarchical power threatened destruction to institutions of the kind.
-
-It is worthy of attention that while all nunneries founded during
-Anglo-Saxon times were abbacies, those founded after the Conquest were
-generally priories. Sixty-four Benedictine nunneries date their foundation
-from after the Conquest, only three of which were abbacies[564]. The
-Benedictine prioress was in many cases subject to an abbot; her authority
-varied with the conditions of her appointment, but in all cases she was
-below the abbess in rank. The explanation is to be sought in the system of
-feudal tenure. Women no longer held property, nunneries were founded and
-endowed by local barons or by abbots. Where power from the preceding
-period devolved on the woman in authority, she retained it; but where new
-appointments were made the current tendency was in favour of curtailing
-her power.
-
-Similarly all the Cistercian nunneries in England, which numbered
-thirty-six at the dissolution, were without exception priories. The power
-of women professing the order abroad and the influence of the Cistercian
-abbesses in Spain and France have been mentioned--facts which preclude the
-idea of there being anything in the intrinsic nature of the order contrary
-to the holding of power by women. The form the settlement took in each
-country was determined by the prevailing drift of the time, and in England
-during the 11th and 12th centuries it was in favour of less independence
-for women.
-
-Various incidents in the history of nunneries illustrate the comparatively
-dependent position of these settlements after the Conquest. At first
-Sheppey had been an abbacy. It had been deserted during the viking period;
-and at the instigation of the archbishop of Canterbury about the year 1130
-nuns were brought there from Sittingbourne and the house was restored as a
-priory.
-
-Amesbury again, one of the oldest and wealthiest abbeys in the land for
-women, was dissolved and restored as a priory, dependent on the abbess of
-Fontevraud. This change of constitution presents some interesting
-features. The lives of the women assembled there in the 12th century were
-of a highly reprehensible character; the abbess was accused of
-incontinence and her evil ways were followed by the nuns. There was no way
-out of the difficulty short of removing the women in a body, and to
-accomplish this was evidently no easy undertaking. Several charters of the
-time of King John and bearing his signature are in existence. The abbess,
-whose name is not on record, retired into private life on a pension of ten
-marks, and the thirty nuns of her convent were placed in other nunneries.
-A prioress and twenty-four nuns were then brought over from Fontevraud and
-established at Amesbury, which became for a time a cell to the foreign
-house[565]. This connection with France, at a time when familiarity with
-French formed part of a polite education, caused Amesbury to become the
-chosen retreat of royal princesses. During the wars with France under the
-Edwards, when many priories and cells were cut off from their foreign
-connection, Amesbury regained its old standing as an abbacy.
-
-Several of the Benedictine nunneries founded after the Conquest owed
-their foundation to abbacies of men. Some were directly dependent cells,
-like Sopwell in Hertfordshire, a nunnery founded by the abbot of St
-Albans, who held the privilege of appointing its prioress. So absolute was
-this power that when the nuns appointed a prioress of their own choice in
-1330, she was deposed by the abbot of St Albans, who appointed another
-person in her stead[566]. Similarly the nunnery at Kilburn was a cell to
-Westminster, its prioress being appointed by the abbot of
-Westminster[567]. But as a general rule the priories were so constituted
-that the nuns might appoint a prioress subject to the approval of the
-patron of their house, and she was then consecrated to her office by the
-bishop.
-
-Various incidents show how jealously each house guarded its privileges and
-how needful this was, considering the changes that were apt to occur, for
-the charters of each religious house were the sole guarantee of its
-continued existence. From time to time they were renewed and confirmed,
-and if the representative of the house was not on the alert, he might
-awake to find his privileges encroached upon. In regard to the changes
-which were liable to occur the following incident deserves mention. In the
-year 1192 the archbishop of York formed the plan of subjecting the nunnery
-of St Clement's at York[568], a priory founded by his predecessor
-Thurstan, to the newly-founded abbacy for women at Godstow. Godstow was
-one of the few women's abbacies founded after the Conquest, and owed its
-wealth and influence chiefly to its connection with the family of Fair
-Rosamond, at one time the mistress of Henry II, who spent the latter part
-of her life there. But the nuns of St Clement's, who had always been free,
-would not obey the abbess of Godstow, and they saved themselves from the
-archbishop's interference by appealing directly to the Court of Rome.
-
-A curious incident occurred during the reign of Henry III in connection
-with Stanford, a nunnery in Northamptonshire. Stanford was a priory
-dependent on the abbot of Peterborough who had founded it. It appears that
-the prioress and her convent, in soliciting confirmation of their
-privileges from Rome, employed a certain proctor, who, besides the desired
-confirmation, procured the insertion of several additional articles into
-the document, one of which was permission for the nuns to choose their own
-prioress, and another a release from certain payments. When the abbot of
-Peterborough became aware of these facts he threatened to complain to the
-Pope, whereupon the prioress with the nuns' approval carried all their
-charters and records of privileges to the archbishop of Canterbury,
-alleging that the proctor had acted against their order. They renounced
-all claim to privileges secretly obtained, and besought the primate to
-represent their conduct favourably to the Pope and to make peace between
-them and their patrons[569].
-
-Both these incidents occurred in connection with Benedictine nunneries.
-The difficulties which occurred in Cistercian nunneries are less easy to
-estimate, as they were not daughter-houses to men's Cistercian abbacies,
-but in many cases held their privileges by a bull obtained directly from
-the Pope. Thus Sinningthwaite in Yorkshire[570], founded in 1160, held a
-bull from Alexander III which exempted the nuns from paying tithes on the
-lands they farmed, such exemption being the peculiar privilege of many
-Cistercian settlements. Other bulls secured by Cistercian nunneries in
-England are printed by Dugdale[571].
-
-A few incidents are recorded in connection with some of the royal
-princesses, which illustrate the attitude commonly assumed towards
-professed nuns, and give us an idea of the estimation in which convents
-were held. Queen Margaret of Scotland we are told desired to become a nun;
-her mother and her sister Christina both took the veil, and her daughters,
-the princesses Matilda and Mary, lived at Romsey for some years with their
-aunt Christina. As Pope Innocent IV canonised (1250) Queen Margaret of
-Scotland a few words must be devoted to her.
-
-Her father Edward, the son of Edmund Ironside ([Dagger] 1016), had found
-refuge at the Scottish court when he came from abroad with his wife Agatha
-and their children, a son and two daughters. Of these daughters, Christina
-became a nun; but Margaret was either persuaded or constrained to marry
-King Malcolm in 1070, and having undertaken the duties of so august a
-station as that of queen, she devoted her energies to introducing reforms
-into Scotland and to raising the standard of industrial art. We possess a
-beautiful description of her life, probably written by her chaplain
-Turgot[572], and her zeal and high principles are further evidenced by
-her letters, some of which are addressed to the primate Lanfranc.
-
-Margaret's two daughters, Matilda and Mary, were brought up in the
-convent, but it is not known when they came to Romsey in Wessex; indeed
-their connection with Wessex offers some chronological difficulties. Their
-mother's sister Christina became a professed nun at Romsey in 1086[573];
-she may have lived before in a nunnery in the north of England[574], and
-there advocated her niece Matilda's acceptance of the religious profession
-as a protection against the Normans. If this is not the case it is
-difficult to fix the date of King Malcolm's scorn for her proposal that
-Matilda should become a nun[575]. King Malcolm was killed fighting against
-William Rufus in 1093, Queen Margaret died a few days afterwards, and the
-princesses Matilda and Mary, of whom the former was about thirteen, from
-that time till 1100 dwelt at Romsey in the south of England. In the year
-1100, after the violent death of Rufus, Henry, the younger of his
-brothers, laid claim to the English crown. A union with a princess, who on
-the mother's side was of the house of Cerdic, appeared in every way
-desirable. According to the statement of William of Malmesbury ([Dagger]
-c. 1142) Henry was persuaded by his friends, and especially by his
-prelates, to marry Matilda. 'She had worn the veil to avoid ignoble
-marriages,' says William, who lived close to the locality and was nearly a
-contemporary, 'and when the king wished to marry her, witnesses were
-brought to say she had worn it without profession[576].' This is borne out
-by the historian Orderic Vitalis ([Dagger] 1142), whose information
-however is derived at second hand, for he enlarges on the princesses' stay
-with the nuns at Romsey, and on the instruction they received in letters
-and good manners, but he does not say that they were actually
-professed[577].
-
-The fullest account of the event is given by Eadmer ([Dagger] 1124), who
-was nearly connected with the primate Anselm, and he naturally puts the
-most favourable construction on Matilda's conduct. According to him she
-wished to leave the convent and went before Anselm to plead her cause.
-
-'I do not deny having worn the veil,' the princess said. 'When I was a
-child my aunt Christina, whom you know to be a determined woman, in order
-to protect me against the violence of the Normans, put a piece of black
-cloth on my head, and when I removed it gave me blows and bad language. So
-I trembling and indignant wore the veil in her presence. But as soon as I
-could get out of her sight I snatched it off and trampled it
-underfoot[578].' In a lively way she goes on to describe how her father
-seeing the veil on her head became angry and tore it off, saying he had no
-intention other than that she should be married. Anselm, before complying
-with the wish of the princess, convened a chapter at Lambeth, but after
-hearing their decision, he declared Matilda free and united her in
-marriage to the king.
-
-Anselm's behaviour is doubtless faithfully represented by Eadmer.
-Curiously enough later historians, Robert of Gloucester, Matthew Paris and
-Rudbone ([Dagger] c. 1234), represent Matilda as unwilling to leave the
-cloister to be married; and in one of these accounts she is described as
-growing angry, and pronouncing a curse on the possible offspring of the
-union. Walter Map goes so far as to say that the king took to wife a
-veiled and professed nun, Rome neither assenting nor dissenting, but
-remaining passive.
-
-Perhaps the validity of the union was afterwards for political reasons
-called in question. At any rate Mary, Matilda's sister, also left the
-convent to be married to Eustace, Count of Boulogne, without objection
-being raised.
-
-That Matilda did not object to leaving the cloister, we have conclusive
-proof in her great and continued affection for Anselm as shown in her
-letters to him. These letters and the charitable deeds of the queen, throw
-light on the Latinity of the Romsey pupil and on the tastes she had
-imbibed there.
-
-We shall have occasion to return to Matilda again in connection with the
-philanthropic movement of the age, and we shall find her founding the
-hospital of St Giles in the soke of Aldgate, and bringing the first Austin
-Canons from France into England[579].
-
-All her life she retained a taste for scholarly pursuits, and patronised
-scholars and men of letters. Her correspondence with the primate
-Anselm[580] yields proof of her own studies and the freedom with which she
-wrote Latin.
-
-In one of these letters, written shortly after her marriage (bk 3. 55),
-Matilda urges the primate in strong terms to abstain from the severe
-fasting he practises, quoting from Cicero 'on Old Age,' and arguing that
-as the mind needs food and drink, so does the body; she at the same time
-admits the Scriptures enjoin the duty of fasting, and Pythagoras, Socrates
-and others urge the need of frugality. Anselm in his answer incidentally
-mentions having joined her to the king in lawful wedlock.
-
-Matilda's next letters are less fraught with learning, and in unaffected
-terms express grief at Anselm's voluntary exile, which was the outcome of
-his quarrel with the king. She is saddened by his absence and longs for
-his return (3. 93); she would act as intercessor between him and her
-husband (3. 96), and she writes to the Pope on Anselm's behalf (3. 99).
-The queen both read and admired Anselm's writings, and compares his style
-to that of Cicero, Quintilian, Jerome, Gregory and others (3. 119) with
-whom her reading at Romsey may have made her acquainted.
-
-Anselm is not slow in answering that the king's continued bitterness is to
-him a source of grief, and in expressing the desire that the queen may
-turn his heart. It is good of her to wish for his return, which, however,
-does not depend on himself; besides 'surely she wishes him to act in
-accordance with his conscience.' In one of these letters he accuses the
-queen of disposing otherwise than she ought of the churches which are in
-her keeping (3. 57, 81, 97, 107, 120, 128).
-
-Anselm's continued absence from Canterbury, which was due to the quarrel
-about investiture, was felt to be a national calamity, and many letters
-passed between him and those among the Church dignitaries who sided with
-him against the king.
-
-Among Anselm's correspondents were several abbesses of Wessex settlements,
-who seem to have been in no way prejudiced against him on account of the
-approval he gave to Matilda's leaving the cloister. He writes in a
-friendly strain to another Matilda, abbess of St Mary's, Winchester
-(Winton), thanking her for her prayers, urging her to cultivate purity of
-heart and beauty of mind as an encouragement to virtue, and begging her to
-show obedience to Osmund (bishop of Winchester) in affairs temporal and
-spiritual (3. 30). To Adeliz, also abbess at St Mary's (3. 70), he writes
-to say she must not be sorry that William Giffard has left his appointment
-as bishop of Winchester, for his going is a reason for rejoicing among his
-friends, as it proves his steadfastness in religious matters. He also
-writes to Eulalia, abbess (of Shaftesbury), who was anxious for him to
-come back, and begs her to pray that his return may prosper (3. 125).
-
-The references to the Benedictine nunneries of Wessex contained in this
-correspondence are supplemented by information from other sources.
-
-In the early part of the 12th century a girl named Eva was brought up at a
-convent, but which she left to go to Anjou, since she preferred the life
-of a recluse there to the career which was open to her in the English
-nunnery. Her life abroad has been described in verse by Hilarius ([Dagger]
-c. 1124) who is the earliest known Englishman who wrote religious plays.
-After studying under Abelard Hilarius had taken up his abode at Angers,
-near the place where Eva dwelt, and was much impressed by her piety and
-devotions[581].
-
-From his poem we gather that Eva had been given into the care of the nuns
-at St Mary's, Winchester (Winton), a place which he designates as 'good
-and renowned.' The girl's progress in learning was the subject of wonder
-to the abbess and her companions, but when Eva reached the age at which
-her enrolment as a member of the community was close at hand, 'she turned'
-in the words of the poet, 'from success as though it had been a sinful
-trespass,' and left the nunnery to go abroad.
-
-Her admirer Hilarius has celebrated other women who were devoted to
-religious pursuits. He addresses one of them as 'Bona,' and praises her
-for caring little for the religious garb unless good works accompany it.
-The meaning of her name and that of other religious women whom Hilarius
-also addresses, such as 'Superba,' and 'Rosa,' gives him an opportunity
-for compliments on the virtues these names suggest. His poems, though
-insignificant in themselves, add touches to our knowledge of women who
-adopted the religious profession.
-
-In the wars which ensued after the death of Henry I (1134) the nunneries
-of Wessex witnessed the climax and the end of the struggle. The Empress
-Matilda, daughter of Henry I and Queen Matilda, who claimed the crown on
-the strength of her descent, finding the sympathies of London divided,
-approached Winchester, and was received by two convents of monks and the
-convent of nuns who came forth to meet her. The Empress for a time resided
-at St Mary's Abbey, and there received a visit from Theobald, archbishop
-of Canterbury[582]. During the fighting which followed the nunnery of
-Wherwell was burnt[583], and perhaps St Mary's Abbey at Winchester was
-destroyed[584]. Matilda finally yielded to Stephen, and left England on
-condition that her son Henry should succeed to the crown.
-
-The nunnery of Romsey continued its connection with royalty, and we find
-the daughter of Stephen, Mary of Blois, established there as abbess
-previous to her marriage. Her case again throws curious side-lights on the
-foundation of convents and the possibilities open to women who adopted the
-religious profession.
-
-The princess Mary had come over from St Sulpice in France with seven nuns
-to Stratford at Bow (otherwise St Leonard's, Bromley in Middlesex), when
-the manor of Lillechurch in Kent was granted to the nunnery there by King
-Stephen for her own and her companions' maintenance[585]. But these women,
-as the charter has it, because of the 'harshness of the rule and their
-different habits' could not and would not stay at Stratford, and with the
-convent's approval they left it and removed to Lillechurch, which was
-constituted by charter a priory for them. Mary removed later to Romsey
-where she became abbess some time before 1159[586], for in that year her
-brother William, the sole surviving heir of Stephen, died, so that she was
-left heiress to the county of Boulogne. She was thereupon brought out of
-the convent at the instigation of Henry II, and married to Matthew, son of
-the Count of Flanders, who through her became Count of Boulogne. Thomas
-Beket, who was then chancellor, not primate, was incensed at this unlawful
-proceeding, and intervened as a protector of monastic rule, but the only
-result of his interference was to draw on himself the hatred of Count
-Matthew[587]. It is said that Mary returned to Romsey twelve years later.
-Her daughters were, however, legitimised in 1189 and both of them married.
-
-Various letters found here and there in the correspondence of this period
-show how women vowed to religion retained their connection with the outer
-world. Among the letters of Thomas Beket there is one in which he tells
-his 'daughter' Idonea to transcribe the letter he is forwarding, and lay
-it before the archbishop of York in the presence of witnesses[588]. It
-has been mentioned that a sister of Thomas Beket was in 1173 abbess at
-Barking.
-
-Again, among the letters of Peter of Blois ([Dagger] c. 1200), chaplain to
-Henry II, are several addressed to women who had adopted the religious
-profession. Anselma 'a virgin' is urged to remain true to her calling;
-Christina, his 'sister,' is exhorted to virtue, and Adelitia 'a nun' is
-sent a discourse on the beauties of the unmarried life[589].
-
-
-§ 3. The Order of St Gilbert of Sempringham[590].
-
-The study of the order of St Gilbert, which is of English origin, shows
-how in this country also sympathy with convent life was spreading during
-the 12th century, and how, owing to the protection afforded to peaceful
-and domestic pursuits by the religious houses, many girls and women of the
-middle classes became nuns. From an intellectual point of view the order
-of St Gilbert has little to recommend it, for we know of no men or women
-belonging to the order who distinguished themselves in learning,
-literature or art. As a previous chapter has indicated, its purpose was
-chiefly to prevent women from drifting into the unattached and homeless
-class, the existence of which was beginning to be recognised as
-prejudicial to society.
-
-The material for the study of the order is abundant. We have several
-accounts of the life and work of Gilbert, besides minute injunctions he
-drafted to regulate the life of his communities, and there are references
-to him in contemporary literature. The success of his efforts, like that
-of the men who founded combined orders of canons and nuns abroad, was due
-to the admission of women into his settlements regardless of their class
-and antecedents. Like Robert of Arbrissel his interest centred in women,
-but he differed from him in giving the supreme authority of his
-settlements into the hands of men. For the settlements which afterwards
-became double originated in Gilbert's wish to provide for women who
-sought him as their spiritual adviser. It was only in consequence of the
-difficulties he encountered that canons were added to the settlements.
-
-Helyot likens the order of St Gilbert to that of Norbert, the founder of
-the order of Prémontré[591], but here too there are marked points of
-difference, for in disposition and character Gilbert was as unlike Norbert
-as he was to Robert; he had neither the masterfulness of the one nor the
-clear-sighted determination of the other. The reason of his popularity
-lies more in his gentleness and persuasiveness, and these qualities made
-him especially attractive to women.
-
-Gilbert was a native of Lincolnshire, born about 1083, the son of a
-wealthy Norman baron and an English woman of low rank. His ungainly
-appearance and want of courtly bearing rendered him unfit for knightly
-service. He was sent to France for his education and there attained some
-reputation as a teacher. After his return home he devoted his energies to
-teaching boys and girls in the neighbourhood. His father bestowed on him
-two livings, one of which was at Sempringham. His chief characteristic was
-pity for the lowly and humble, and this attracted the attention among
-others of Robert Bloet, bishop of Lincoln ([Dagger] 1123). For a time
-Gilbert acted as a clerk in Bloet's house, and after his death remained
-with his successor Alexander ([Dagger] 1148) in a like capacity. With
-Alexander he consulted about permanently providing for those of the lower
-classes whom his liberality was attracting to Sempringham.
-
-The first step taken by Gilbert was to erect suitable dwellings round the
-church of St Andrew at Sempringham for seven women whom he had taught and
-who had devoted themselves to religion under his guidance, and as they
-were not to leave their dwelling place, lay sisters were appointed to wait
-on them. He also provided dwellings at Sempringham for the poor, the
-infirm, for lepers, and orphans.
-
-The order of Gilbert is held to have been established before 1135, the
-year of King Henry I's death[592]. The author of his life in Dugdale
-likens Gilbert's progress at this time to the chariot of Aminadab; to it
-clung clerics and laymen, literate and illiterate women, and it was drawn
-by Master Gilbert himself.
-
-Gilbert had entered into friendly relations with the Cistercian monks who
-were then gaining ground in Yorkshire, and William, first abbot of
-Rievaulx ([Dagger] 1145-6), was among them. He had a good deal to do with
-Ailred ([Dagger] 1166), a notable north-country man who came from Scotland
-to live at Rievaulx, and afterwards became abbot successively of Revesby
-and Rievaulx.
-
-At this time there were no nunneries in the north of England, for the
-great settlements of the early English period had passed away and no new
-houses for women had been founded. The numbers of those who flocked to
-Gilbert were so great that he felt called upon to give them a more
-definite organisation. His friendship with Cistercian monks no doubt
-turned his eyes to Citeaux, and the wish arose in him to affiliate his
-convents to the Cistercian order. Having placed his congregations under
-the care of the Cistercians, he set out for Citeaux about 1146.
-
-But his hopes were not fulfilled. At Citeaux he met Pope Eugenius III
-([Dagger] 1153) and other leading men. He cemented his friendship with
-Bernard of Clairvaux and entered into friendly relations with Malachy,
-bishop of Armagh ([Dagger] 1148), who had introduced the Cistercian order
-into Ireland. But the assembly at Citeaux came to the conclusion that they
-would not preside over another religious order, especially not over one
-for women[593], and Gilbert was urged to remain at the head of his
-communities and Bernard and Malachy presented him with an abbot's staff.
-
-He returned to England, burdened with a responsibility from which he would
-gladly have been free, and obliged to frame a definite rule of life for
-his followers. As one account puts it, 'he now studied the rules of all
-religious orders and culled from each its flowers.' The outcome of his
-efforts was the elaborate set of injunctions which now lie before us.
-
-From these injunctions we can see how Gilbert's original plan had
-expanded, for his settlements consisted of bands of canons, lay-brethren,
-nuns, and lay-sisters. One set of rules is drafted for the canons who
-observed the rule of St Augustine and performed religious service for the
-double community, and a separate set for the laymen who acted as servants.
-And similarly there is one set of rules for the nuns who lived by the rule
-of St Benedict, and another for their servants the lay-sisters.
-
-These rules suggest many points of similarity to the combined settlements
-of canons and nuns previously founded abroad, but there are also some
-differences.
-
-In the Gilbertine settlements the dwellings of the men and women were
-contiguous, and the convent precincts and the church were divided between
-them. The men's dwelling was under the rule of a prior, but three
-prioresses ruled conjointly in the women's house. The arrangements in both
-convents were alike, and the duties of prior and prioress similar, but in
-all matters of importance the chief authority belonged to the prior who
-was at the head of the whole settlement. The property owned by Gilbertine
-settlements apparently consisted largely of sheep, and among the men we
-note a number of shepherds and a 'procurator' who bought and sold the
-animals. The ewes were regularly milked and the wool was either used in
-the house for making clothes, or sold. The lay-sisters were appointed to
-spin and weave and the nuns to cut out and make the garments.
-
-There was one cellar and one kitchen for the whole settlement, for the
-cellaress in the women's house acted as caterer both for the canons and
-the nuns. Domestic duties fell to the share of the women. They cooked the
-canons' food as well as their own and handed the meals into the men's
-quarters through a hole in the wall with a turn-table, through which the
-plates and dishes were returned to them. They also made clothes for the
-whole establishment.
-
-At the daily chapter held in the women's house the prioresses presided in
-turn, with a companion on either side. The cellaress reported to the
-prioress, who settled the allowances and gave out the food. She received
-information also from the 'scrutatrices,' the nuns whose duty it was to go
-the round of the house and report disorders, and according to whose
-reports she imposed the various penances.
-
-We also hear in the women's house of a librarian ('precentrix[594]'), who
-had the keys of the book-case ('armarium'), which was kept locked except
-during reading time when the nuns were allowed the use of the books. There
-was to be no quarrelling over the books; the nun like the canon was
-directed to take the one allotted to her and not to appropriate that given
-to another. Simplicity of life was studied. Pictures and sculpture were
-declared superfluous and the crosses used were to be of painted wood. Only
-books for choir use were to be written in the convent, but while this
-holds good alike for the women and for the men, there is this further
-prohibition with regard to the nuns, that talking in Latin was to be
-avoided. 'Altogether,' says the rule[595], 'we forbid the use of the
-Latin tongue unless under special circumstances.'
-
-The cooking was done by the nuns in turn for a week at a time in
-compliance with a regulation contained in the rule of St Benedict. The
-librarian also had her week of cooking, and when she was on duty in the
-kitchen, gave up her keys to another nun. We hear also of the mistress
-appointed to teach the novices, and of the portress who guarded the
-approaches to the house.
-
-The injunctions drafted for the canons and the lay members of the
-settlement are equally explicit. Directions are also given about tending
-the sick, who were to be treated with tenderness and care.
-
-Girls were admitted into the company of the nuns at the age of twelve, but
-several years passed before they could be enrolled among the novices. At
-the age of twenty the alternative was put before the novice of joining the
-nuns or the lay-sisters. If she decided in favour of the latter she could
-not afterwards be promoted to the rank of nun; she was bound to observe
-chastity and obedience while she remained in the house, but she was not
-consecrated. A certain amount of knowledge of the hymns, psalms and books
-of service was required from the novice before she could make profession.
-
-The scheme of life worked out by Gilbert met with success and numerous
-patrons were found to endow settlements on the plan of that at
-Sempringham. As the chronicler says, 'many wealthy and highborn
-Englishmen, counts and barons, seeing and approving of the undertaking the
-Lord had initiated and holding that good would come of it, bestowed many
-properties ('fundos et praedia') on the holy father (Gilbert) and began to
-construct on their own account numerous monasteries in various districts.'
-
-The greater number of these settlements were situated in Lincolnshire and
-Yorkshire, but judging by the extant charters the conditions and purposes
-of their foundations were not always the same. Sometimes the grant is made
-conjointly to men and women, sometimes reference is made to the prior
-only. In the earlier charters the women are especially noticed, in the
-later ones more account is taken of the men. As time went on the order
-gradually ceased to have any attraction for women, and at the time of the
-dissolution several foundations originally made for men and women were
-occupied only by canons.
-
-Gilbert himself did not accept a position of authority in his order but
-became a canon at Bullington, one of its settlements. He appears to have
-been influential in wider circles and we find him several times at court.
-King Henry II visited him, and both the king and Queen Eleanor made grants
-of land to the order. Henry regarded Gilbert with so much favour that when
-he was summoned before the King's Court in London on the charge of having
-supported Beket in his exile, the king sent a message from abroad ordering
-his case to be reserved for royal judgment, which practically meant his
-acquittal[596].
-
-Rapidly as the number of Gilbertine houses increased, the order did not
-remain entirely free from trouble, for even in Gilbert's lifetime
-distressing incidents happened which justified to some extent the scornful
-remarks of contemporary writers. One of these difficulties arose sometime
-between 1153 and 1166 in connection with a girl at Watton. A full account
-of the affair was written and forwarded to Gilbert by Ailred, abbot of
-Rievaulx[597]. This account illustrates pointedly the readiness of the age
-to accept a miraculous rendering of fact, and gives a curious insight into
-the temper of a community of nuns. Indeed such violence of conduct, and
-details of such behaviour as are here described show that the barbarity of
-the age, which so often strikes us in connection with camp and court, was
-reflected in the monastery.
-
-Watton was among the older Gilbertine houses and had been founded before
-1148 by a nobleman Eustace Fitz-John on property which had belonged to a
-nunnery during the early English period[598]. The settlement was among the
-larger Gilbertine houses; it owned property to the extent of twenty acres.
-
-The girl had been placed under the care of the nuns of Watton at the
-suggestion of Murdach, abbot of Fountains ([Dagger] 1153), and had given
-endless trouble by her unbecoming levity and hopeless laziness. 'She is
-corrected by word of mouth but without result, she is urged by blows but
-there is no improvement,' writes Ailred, who speaks of her as a nun
-without telling us that she had actually made profession.
-
-She made the acquaintance of one of the lay-brothers who were engaged in
-repairing the women's dwelling. The two contrived to meet frequently out
-of doors until at last the nun's condition became obvious. Her fellow-nuns
-were so incensed at this discovery that they treated her with barbarous
-cruelty and would have put her to death had not the prioress intervened
-and had her chained and imprisoned. The anger of the nuns now turned
-against the lay-brother who had brought disgrace on their convent, and
-with a mixture of cunning and deceit they managed to discover him and have
-him terribly mutilated. 'I do not praise the deed, but the zeal,' says
-Ailred; 'I do not approve of bloodshed, but for all that I praise the
-virgins' hatred of such wickedness.' The esprit de corps among the nuns
-and their indignation evidently went far in his eyes to excuse behaviour
-which he would not describe as he did if he had not felt it altogether
-reprehensible.
-
-Meanwhile the nun overcome by contrition was awaiting her delivery in
-prison; there she had visions of abbot Murdach who had died some years
-before. He first rebuked her, but then miraculously relieved her of her
-burden and restored her to her normal condition. The nuns though greatly
-surprised were convinced of the truth of the statement concerning the
-miraculous doings of Murdach because they found the nun's chains loosened.
-The prior of Watton sent for Ailred to enquire more closely into the
-matter. Ailred came, collected all possible evidence, and was convinced
-that there had been divine intervention on the girl's behalf. He wrote an
-account of what had happened to Gilbert, with these words as preface: 'to
-know of the Lord's miracles and of his proofs of divine love and to be
-silent about them were sacrilege.' What became of the girl we are not
-told. For trespasses such as hers the rule of Gilbert decreed life-long
-incarceration, but the canon for a like trespass suffered no punishment
-beyond being expelled from the settlement.
-
-The old age of Gilbert was further troubled by the evil conduct of two
-men, Gerard a smith, and Ogger a carpenter. He had taken them into the
-order out of charity, but they greatly abused his kindness, appropriated
-the revenues of the order, and encouraged dishonesty and sexual
-irregularities. Their behaviour was productive of such results that it
-called forth a letter from Beket to Gilbert in which he says 'the greater
-our love, the more we are troubled and perturbed by hearing of things
-happening in your order, which are a grievance not only before the eyes of
-men but before the eyes of God.'
-
-However letters in defence of Gilbert were written by Roger archbishop of
-York ([Dagger] 1181), Henry bishop of Winchester ([Dagger] 1171) and
-William bishop of Norwich ([Dagger] 1174), who treat the occurrence as a
-misfortune and praise the order generally in the warmest terms. Praise
-from other quarters is not wanting, which shows that Gilbert's work was
-considered remarkable, especially with regard to the influence he had over
-women. William of Newburgh wrote of him: 'As far as this is concerned, in
-my opinion he holds the palm above all others whom we know to have devoted
-their energies to the control and government of religious women[599].'
-
-Gilbert lived to an advanced age. Walter Map, writing between 1182 and
-1189, speaks of him as over a hundred and well-nigh blind. He was buried
-at Sempringham, where his tomb became the goal of many pilgrimages and the
-scene of many miracles. He was canonised a saint of the Church by Pope
-Innocent II in 1202. One of the accounts of his life, written shortly
-after his death, says that the order at that time numbered thirteen
-conventual churches and contained seven hundred men and fifteen hundred
-women.
-
-The East Riding Antiquarian Society has recently begun excavating on the
-site of Watton Priory, one of the oldest Gilbertine settlements, and has
-ascertained many particulars about the inner arrangements of this
-house[600]. It has found that the church, built on the foundations of a
-Norman church which had been destroyed by fire in 1167, was divided
-throughout its entire length by a substantial partition wall nearly five
-feet thick. The church served for both sexes of the community, which were
-kept separate by this partition. In some places remains of this wall were
-found up to the height of four feet; this was part of the solid foundation
-upon which, above the height of the eye, was erected an open arcade which
-made it possible for the whole community to hear the sermon preached on
-festal days from the pulpit. The parts into which the church was divided
-were of unequal size. Dr Cox, the president of the Society, who read a
-paper on the Gilbertine statutes, said that the full complement of the
-double house at Watton consisted of a hundred and forty women and seventy
-men, and that the larger part of the church was appropriated to the women
-and the smaller to the men.
-
-It was further shown by the excavations that the dividing wall had in one
-place an archway, covering the door which was opened for the great
-processions of both sexes which took place on the fourteen great
-festivals of the year and at funerals. Remains were also found of an
-opening in the wall with a turn-table, so arranged that articles could be
-passed through without either sex seeing the other. Through this the
-chalice, when the canons' mass was over, would be passed back and restored
-to the custody of the nuns; no doubt this was constructed on the same plan
-as the opening through which the food was passed.
-
-The cloister of the nuns lay on the north side of the transept and must
-have been about a hundred feet square, an alley of ten feet wide
-surrounding it. It is thought that the stone of which the house was built
-must have been brought up the Humber from Whitby. An early writer tells us
-that the nuns' dwelling at Watton was connected by an underground passage
-with the holy well at Kilnwick, and that the nuns by means of these waters
-performed wonderful cures[601].
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-
-ART INDUSTRIES IN THE NUNNERY.
-
-  'Spernere mundum, spernere nullum, spernere sese,
-  Spernere sperni se, quatuor haec bona sunt.' _Herrad._
-
-
-§ 1. Art Industries generally.
-
-From consideration of the nuns of different orders we turn to enquire more
-closely into the general occupations and productive capacities of nuns
-during early Christian times and the Middle Ages. It seems worth while
-collecting the information scattered here and there on the work done by
-these women, since the grouping together of various notices gives some,
-though necessarily an incomplete, idea of the pursuits to which nuns were
-devoted when not engaged in religious service. The work done, as we shall
-see, includes art productions of every kind, weaving, embroidery, painting
-and illuminating as well as writing, which during the period under
-consideration must be looked upon as an art.
-
-From the first monastic life had been dominated by the idea that idleness
-is at the root of all evil. In a well ordered religious house the times
-for work and for leisure, for eating, sleeping and for attendance at
-divine service were fixed by custom and were enforced by routine; we shall
-treat later of the way in which the day was divided by the canonical
-hours. The purpose of the ordinary settlement, beyond observing the hours,
-was to educate girls, to train novices and to provide suitable occupation
-for the nuns of the convent. In all houses reading and copying books of
-devotion was included among the occupations, and in some, the cultivation
-of art in one or more of its branches. Between the 8th and the 14th
-century religious settlements were the centres of production in
-handicrafts and in art industry; to study the art of this period, it is
-necessary to study the productions of the monasteries.
-
-A sense of joint ownership united the members of each of the religious
-settlements, and this was especially true of the older Benedictine houses
-which have fitly been likened to small republics. To the convent inmate
-the monastery was the centre of his interests and affections, and the
-house's possessions were in a sense his own. He was proud of them and
-proud if he could add to their store. Increased communication with the
-south and the east brought books, materials and other beautiful objects
-which the inmates of the religious settlement zealously copied and
-multiplied. During times of political and social unrest, while states were
-in their making, the goldsmith, the scribe, the illuminator, and the
-embroiderer, all found protection and leisure in the religious house. The
-so-called dark ages, the centuries between 800 and 1200, cease to be dark
-as soon as one enquires into the contents of monastic libraries, and the
-monotony of convent routine ceases to appear monotonous on entering one of
-the old treasuries and reflecting on the aims and aspirations which were
-devoted to producing this wealth in design and ornamentation, the bare
-fragmentary remains of which are to us of to-day a source of unending
-delight and wonder.
-
-Some of the houses ruled by women like so many of those ruled by men
-became important centres of culture, where the industrial arts were
-cultivated, and where books were prized, stored and multiplied. Nuns as
-well as monks were busy transcribing manuscripts, a task as absorbing as
-it was laborious, for the difficulties in the way of learning to write can
-hardly be overestimated considering the awkwardness of writing materials
-and the labour involved in fabricating parchment, ink and pigment. But as
-the old writer with a play on the words _armarium_, book-case, and
-_armatorium_, armoury, remarks, 'a monastery without its book-case is what
-a castle is without its armoury.' And all houses, whether for monks or
-nuns, took rank as centres of culture in proportion to their wealth in
-books.
-
-Of the books over which the early scribe spent so much time and trouble,
-comparatively speaking only a few survive. All books are worn out by use,
-especially books of devotion; many were destroyed when printing came in
-and parchment was handy to the book-binder; many when the Reformation
-destroyed convents. The early scribe usually omitted to add his name to
-the book he was copying. In the books which are preserved the names of men
-scribes are few, and the names of women scribes fewer still, though they
-do occasionally occur. Wattenbach, a student of manuscripts and of the
-mediæval art of writing, has collected a number of names of women whom he
-has found mentioned as scribes. He gives them, adding the remark that
-other books no doubt were written by nuns where mention of the fact is
-omitted[602].
-
-It will be profitable to recall these names and examine the references to
-work done by nuns as calligraphists and miniature painters, for here and
-there women attained great proficiency in these arts. The amount of
-writing done in women's houses compared with that done by men was no doubt
-small, for it was not in this direction that the industry of the nun lay.
-But what remains shows that where scope to activity was given talents of
-no mean kind were developed.
-
-In some departments of art industry, especially in weaving church
-hangings, and embroidering altar cloths and church vestments, nuns greatly
-distinguished themselves. In his comprehensive work on church furniture
-Bock is eloquent on the industry of nuns. He first praises their early
-proficiency in the art of weaving and passes on to the art of embroidery.
-'This art also,' he says, 'was chiefly cultivated in religious houses by
-pious nuns up to the 12th century. The inmates of women's establishments
-were especially devoted to working decorations for the altar. Their
-peaceful seclusion was spent in prayer and in doing embroidery. What work
-could seem worthier and nobler than artistic work intended for the
-decoration of the altar? It is in the nunnery that the art of design as
-well as the technique of weaving were brought to their highest
-perfection[603].'
-
-Owing to the perishable material of this work the amount which was done of
-course far exceeded what has been preserved. We often come across remarks
-on such work, rarely across remains of it, and we are obliged to take on
-trust the praise bestowed by early writers as so little exists by which we
-can judge for ourselves. But enough remains to bear out the praise which
-contemporaries bestow on the beauties of hangings and vestments
-manufactured by nuns, and to give us the highest opinion of their industry
-and their artistic skill.
-
-Among women generally embroidery has always had votaries, and in the
-nunnery it found a new development. During early Christian ages nuns
-worked large hangings for decorating the basilica walls, and short
-hangings for the square altar; and when the Gothic style took the place of
-the earlier Byzantine in architecture, rendering such hangings
-superfluous, they devoted their energies to working church vestments and
-furniture.
-
-The proficiency acquired by the girl in the convent was not lost if she
-returned to the world. We hear a good deal of badges and standards worked
-by ladies at baronial courts during the age of romance, and their work was
-no doubt influenced by what had been evolved in church decoration.
-
-In studying the art industry of the convent, we needs must treat of work
-produced with the brush and the pen side by side with work produced with
-the needle. At two periods in history, the 8th and 13th centuries, England
-takes the lead in art industry, and at both periods there is reference to
-excellent work done by nuns.
-
-A former chapter has mentioned how Eadburg, the friend of Boniface, was at
-work in her monastery in Thanet in the 8th century, transcribing
-scriptural writings on parchment in gold lettering, an art in which she
-excelled[604]. Among the gifts sent to Boniface by lady abbesses in
-England vestments and altar-cloths are mentioned which had without a doubt
-been worked in the houses over which these ladies presided if not actually
-made by themselves[605].
-
-The importance and the symbolical meaning which early Christians attached
-to death supplies the reason why the abbess of Repton in Mercia sent a
-winding-sheet to St Guthlac during his lifetime[606]. Cuthberht of
-Lindisfarne was wrapped in a shroud which his friend Aelflaed, abbess of
-Whitby, had sent[607]. Both were of linen, for early Christians, who were
-content to wear rough woollen clothes during their lifetime, thought it
-permissible to be buried in linen and silk. Thus we read that Aethelthrith
-the abbess of Ely sent to Cuthberht a present of silk stuffs which she
-decorated with gold and jewels and which were shown at his resting-place
-at Durham till the 12th century[608]. The silk robe on which the body of
-Wilfrith ([Dagger] 709) had been laid was sent as a present to an abbess
-Cynethrith[609].
-
-About this time silk, which had been rarely seen north of the Alps, was
-frequently sent from the east and was greatly prized. It has been
-mentioned in a previous chapter how Radegund at Poitiers received a gift
-of silk from a relation in Constantinople[610], and among the charges
-brought by the turbulent Chrodield against the abbess Leubover was that
-she had appropriated part of an altar-cloth to make a robe for her niece.
-Caesarius of Arles in his rule for women forbade their working embroidery
-except for purposes of church decoration. Repeated complaints were made
-during the early ages in England against nuns for wearing embroidery and
-silks. The council of Cloveshoe of the year 747 censures the undue
-attention given to dress. 'Time shall be devoted more to reading books and
-to chanting psalms than to weaving and decorating (plectendis) clothes
-with various colours in unprofitable richness[611].' But to control the
-standard of clothes remained a standing difficulty in all convents, and
-especially in those of women[612].
-
-Apart from personal decoration the arts of weaving and embroidering were
-encouraged in every way. 'Towards the 10th century the art of making large
-hangings had so far progressed in England,' says Bock, 'that large scenes
-with many figures were represented[613].'
-
-Inside the cloister and out of it the art flourished, and the mention of
-gifts of hangings becomes frequent. Thus Ealdhelm in his 'Praise of
-Virginity' (c. 7) speaks of hangings made by the nuns, while reference is
-made to secular women at the time of the Conquest who did remarkable work.
-Among them were Alwid and Liwid who practised the air of embroidery and
-taught it[614]. Emma, otherwise Aelfgifu ([Dagger] 1052), after her
-marriage to King Knut, made a gift of hangings and vestments to the abbey
-of Ely, some of which were embroidered with gold and jewels on silk,
-others of green and purple colour were of such splendour that their like
-could not be found elsewhere in England[615]. Again, Aelflaed, the wife of
-Edward the Confessor ([Dagger] 1066), made hangings with pictures of the
-apostles for Frithstan of Winchester.
-
-'We know,' says Michel in his work on silk and the use of it in
-embroidery[616], 'that the women of England, long before the Conquest,
-worked assiduously at weaving and embroidering, and that they were as
-distinguished in this branch of art as men were in others.' Unfortunately
-no specimens of the work done in religious settlements during this early
-period have been preserved, so far as I am aware. We do not know what
-artist designed and executed the famous Bayeux tapestry which is worked in
-woollen cross-stitch on a strip of linen; but it was certainly not the
-work of nuns.
-
-The references to weaving and embroidering during the later period are
-fewer, but a certain amount of the work done in England has been
-preserved, though the clue as to where and by whom it was done is
-generally wanting. While weaving and embroidery were throughout important
-branches of home industry, art-needlework seems to have owed its higher
-development to nuns.
-
-In connection with the prioress Christina of Mergate we hear that she had
-worked three mitres and several pairs of sandals in wonderful work (operis
-mirifici) as a present for Pope Hadrian IV ([Dagger] 1159), who was of
-English origin, and perhaps known to her. Her work was carried to Rome by
-the abbot of St Albans, who had affronted Hadrian in early days and wished
-to propitiate him; we hear that the Pope was so delighted with the work
-that he could not refuse the present[617].
-
-England was, indeed, at this time famous for its embroidery, and her
-products were much admired abroad. In the words of Prof. Middleton:
-
-'Another minor branch of art, in which England during the 13th century far
-surpassed the rest of the world, was the art of embroidering delicate
-pictures in silk, especially for ecclesiastical vestments. The most famous
-embroidered vestments now preserved in various places in Italy are the
-handiwork of English embroiderers between 1250 and 1300, though their
-authorship is not as a rule recognized by their present possessors. The
-embroidered miniatures on these marvellous pieces of needlework resemble
-closely in style the illuminations in fine Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the
-13th century and in many cases have obviously been copied from manuscript
-miniatures[618].'
-
-A conclusion to be possibly drawn from this is that some of the early work
-which has come back to this country from Italy may in reality be English.
-There is no doubt it is curiously like the work done in England[619]. In a
-footnote to the above passage Prof. Middleton points out that the Popes of
-the period, on sending the pall to a newly elected English archbishop,
-suggested that they would like in return embroidered vestments of English
-work, 'opus anglicum,' a term at one time applied to work done in a
-special style[620]. Its peculiarity seems to have consisted in the working
-of figures in coloured floss silk on a piece of material, generally linen;
-on this the silk was worked in close-lying chain stitches, which,
-following the contours of face and drapery, entirely covered the material
-just as the strokes of a brush in a miniature cover the parchment. The
-background to these figures was also covered with coloured floss silk, but
-this was not worked in chain stitch but in various styles of straight
-close-lying stitches in diaper pattern. Prof. Middleton, in the passage
-quoted above, says that the embroiderer copied the miniature painter; in
-composing scenes and arranging figures this would of course be the case.
-But considering the styles of some of the backgrounds, it seems possible
-that in his turn the miniature painter borrowed from the embroiderer, by
-taking the idea of filling up the background to his figures with lines and
-diagonal patterns, which lines and patterns had been suggested to the
-embroiderer by the texture of the stuff he was covering. Gold and silver
-threads were liberally used in the 'opus anglicum[621],' and even jewels
-may have been introduced[622]. The general effect was that of a shining,
-glossy picture, and the care and industry needed to produce it exceeded
-even that required in miniatures.
-
-The English monk Matthew Paris ([Dagger] 1259) describes an incident
-illustrating at once the excellence of the embroidery done in England and
-the rapacity of Pope Innocent IV. The Pope he tells us was struck by the
-splendour of the embroidery worn by the English clergy who came to Rome in
-the year 1246, and asked where it was made. 'In England,' he was told. He
-replied, 'England is really a storehouse of delight; truly it is an
-inexhaustible fountain, and where there is so much, much can be taken.'
-And he sent letters to the abbots of the Cistercian houses in England,
-ordering them to forward to him gold embroidery of this kind, 'as though
-they could get it for nothing.' Curiously enough it was supplied to them
-by London merchants[623].
-
-A certain number of pieces of early English embroidery now form part of
-the collection of art-needlework on view at South Kensington. Among them
-is a cope, nine feet seven by four feet eight; it is considered a splendid
-example of the 'opus anglicum,' and as is suggested 'may have been worked
-by the nuns of some convent which stood in or near Coventry[624].' There
-was no nunnery in Coventry in the Middle Ages, the nearest nunnery of
-importance would be the one at Wroxhall. 'This handsome cope,' says Dr
-Rock, 'so very remarkable on account of its comparative perfect
-preservation, is one of the most beautiful among the several liturgic
-vestments of the olden period anywhere to be now found in
-Christendom[625].' It is made of linen entirely covered with embroidery in
-floss silk. The space is divided up into barbed interlacing quatrefoils,
-of which in the present state of the cope there are fifteen. These enclose
-pictures representing Michael overcoming Satan, the Crucifixion, the risen
-Christ, Christ crowned as King, Christ in the garden, the death of the
-Virgin, her burial, and single figures of the apostles which are placed in
-the quatrefoils along the lower edge of the cope. Among them are St
-Philip, St Bartholomew, St Peter and St Andrew. Other pictures of the
-apostles are wanting, for the lower edge in some places is cut away. The
-faces, hands and coloured draperies of these figures are worked in
-coloured floss silk in the way described above, and the background of all
-the quatrefoils is in diaper pattern, worked in short straight stitches in
-a dark green colour. The spaces between the quatrefoils were filled with
-crimson silk which has faded to a rich brown, and in each of these spaces
-stands a winged angel, those nearest Christ standing on a wheel. Their
-faces and draperies are worked in similar style to those of the other
-figures, and the dividing bands which mark off the quatrefoils are worked
-in a variety of stitches; sometimes loose threads are laid on and sewn
-over, sometimes gold thread is worked in. In spite of many colours having
-faded the effect of the work is splendid; no textile fabric of any period
-exceeds it in evenness and finish, to say nothing of beauty of design.
-
-The edge of the cope in one place is mended by cutting and sewing
-together. A band of embroidery which represents a succession of armorial
-bearings worked in small cross-stitch is carried right round it. This band
-is considered to be fifty years later in date than the cope, and is
-somewhat different in style. Its addition suggests that some accident
-happened to the cope, perhaps by fire, and that a piece had to be cut away
-and a new finish given to the edge.
-
-At the time of the dissolution this cope was in the possession of the nuns
-of Sion, a house founded under peculiar circumstances as late as the 15th
-century. Its inmates left England in a body and carried the cope away with
-them in their wanderings. They finally settled at Lisbon, where the house
-continued to be recruited by English women. At the beginning of this
-century they returned to England, and the cope was acquired by the Museum
-authorities.
-
-In looking at this piece of work it is distressing to think of the way in
-which the property of monasteries in England was appropriated, scattered,
-and destroyed at the dissolution. In no European country was the heirloom
-of mediæval art so uniformly effaced and defaced. The old inventories give
-some idea of the art treasures that had accumulated in monasteries in the
-course of centuries, but very few fragments were saved from the rapacity
-of Henry VIII and his agents.
-
-From England we pass to Germany to consider the remains of decorative work
-done by nuns in various departments of art between the 8th and the 14th
-centuries. Influence from two sides gave a new direction to art-industry;
-on one side was the influence of Roman art due to contact with France; on
-the other the influence of Byzantine art due to intercourse with the East.
-
-A high standard of work was soon attained in France; and at Bourges, early
-in the 7th century, we hear of the abbess Eustadiola making many gifts to
-her settlement, vases of gold and silver ornamented with jewels, crosses,
-candelabra and chalices. 'Also she made holy vestments,' says her
-biographer[626], 'and decked the altar with costly hangings which with her
-own hands and through the help of her women she embellished with
-embroidery and with gold fringes; besides the hangings with which she
-decorated the walls.'
-
-This active interest spread from France into the convents of the Low
-Countries during the 8th century, in one of which the sisters Harlind and
-Reinhild did excellent work, which is highly praised. They were
-contemporaries of Boniface and Willibrord, who visited and consecrated
-them in their settlement at Maaseyck.
-
-There is extant an account, written between 850 and 880, of the education
-they received and the work to which they were devoted[627]. We learn from
-this account that Harlind and Reinhild showed a serious disposition at a
-youthful age, and that their parents were persuaded to send them to the
-religious house for women at Valenciennes on the river Schelde, where, in
-the words of the 9th century writer, 'they were instructed in reading, in
-chanting (modulatione), in singing the psalms and also in what now-a-days
-is deemed wonderful, in writing and in painting (scribendo atque
-pingendo), a task laborious even to men. Likewise they were carefully
-trained in every department of work such as is done by women's hands, in
-various designs, in different styles; so that they attained a high
-standard of excellence in spinning, weaving, designing, sewing, and
-embroidering with gold and jewels on silk[627].'
-
-When their education was finished the girls returned to their parents, but
-they found no scope for their energies at home and decided to devote
-themselves to religion. Their parents agreed to found a settlement for
-them at Maaseyck, where at first they had twelve women with them. But many
-noble as well as freeborn girls placed a black veil on their heads, as the
-biographer says, and came to them hoping to be taken into the settlement.
-
-We hardly need to be told that these gifted sisters abhorred idleness and
-were devoted to work. Their energies were given to weaving, embroidering
-and writing. Among other things they had woven with their own hands short
-curtains, intended no doubt for the altar, which were splendidly
-embroidered with a variety of designs[628]. These, in the words of their
-biographer, 'the holy women embroidered with God and his saints ornate
-with gold and jewels, and left them behind them in their house. The four
-gospels, which contain the words and actions of Jesus Christ our Lord,
-they transcribed with commendable zeal. Likewise a book of psalms, such as
-we call a psalter, they worked (stylo texuerunt), as well as many other
-holy writings, which to this day remain in that same place, and are
-resplendent in new and shining gold, and glowing with jewels, so that the
-work might almost have been done to-day.'
-
-Thus writes the 9th century chronicler. It seems from a remark made by
-Stadler that some of the vestments they made were sent as a present to
-Boniface, and samples of their work, it is not stated of what kind, are
-preserved to this day in the little church of Maaseyck[629].
-
-A previous chapter has dealt with the rapid development of women's houses
-in Saxony in the 10th and 11th centuries. References to the encouragement
-of art in these convents are numerous; they became storehouses of wealth,
-partly through gifts bestowed on them by their abbesses and partly owing
-to the industry of the nuns. The marriage of Otto II with a Greek princess
-brought Greek decorative work into fashion, and workmen came from Greece
-into Germany, where they were patronised by bishops and lady abbesses.
-
-Thus at Essen, one of the great Saxon abbacies for women, the art treasury
-to this day contains the celebrated bronze candelabra made at the command
-of the abbess Mathilde ([Dagger] 1011)[630], and a golden crucifix of
-Greek workmanship of great beauty which, as its inscription says, was the
-gift of the abbess Theofanu (1039-1054)[631]. This abbess was the
-granddaughter of Otto II and his Greek wife, and her appointment to the
-abbacy marks a great advance in the prosperity of the house. The treasury
-at Essen also contains a Bible cover carved in ivory, which represents the
-abbess Theofanu depositing a book at the feet of the Virgin[632].
-
-An account of the great power and wealth of the abbey at Quedlinburg has
-already been given. Its treasury (zither) still contains many interesting
-specimens of early art industry collected in the days of its
-prosperity[633]. The splendid cloak worked with figures from the
-Apocalypse belonging to Otto III was probably made under the direction of
-his aunt Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg ([Dagger] 999). Somewhat later we
-hear of another sumptuous cloak which the Empress Kunigund ([Dagger] 1040)
-had made for her husband Heinrich II, and of the wonderful embroidery done
-in gold on purple by Heinrich's sister Gisela ([Dagger] 1037), the wife of
-Stephen, king of Hungary, which seems to have been embroidered in
-imitation of a painting on stuff preserved at a Benedictine convent near
-Raab. To the present day this embroidery forms part of the Hungarian
-coronation robes[634]. It is not directly stated where this work was made,
-but the general excellence of the work done by nuns[635], and the
-connection of Saxon princesses with convents, suggest the possibility that
-the work was done in convents.
-
-One of these Saxon princesses, Hedwig ([Dagger] 994), sister of the abbess
-Gerberg and duchess of Swabia, gave the monks of St Gallen some vestments
-which she had embroidered herself[636]. Among them was a white stole
-(stola) on which were worked in gold a series of pictures representing the
-'Marriage of Philology to Mercury,' a subject taken from a story by
-Martianus Capella, a writer of the 5th century, whose works were much read
-in nunneries. The story was afterwards translated into German by Notker
-([Dagger] 1022), a monk of St Gallen.
-
-A peculiar interest attaches to Agnes, abbess of Quedlinburg (1184-1203).
-She encouraged art industry in all its branches and under her the nuns
-made large curtains for church decoration. Some of these are still in
-existence, and Kugler, the art student, considers them as of great value
-in the study of the art industry of that period. Agnes herself wrote an
-account of the property she bequeathed to the monastery, and in it she
-mentions a golden cup, several silken covers (dorsalia), and
-hangings[637]. Her chronicler credits her with writing and illuminating
-with her own hands books for divine service; and a copy of the gospels,
-said to have been written by her, is still preserved[638]. But the great
-work of her life was the manufacture of wall-hangings, which she and her
-nuns worked together. One set was intended for the Pope, but was never
-forwarded to him. Like the vestments made by Hedwig, the subject taken for
-them was the 'Marriage of Philology to Mercury.'
-
-One curtain still exists measuring twenty-four feet by twenty; it is of a
-coarse woollen material, into which large figures are woven, which Kugler
-thinks must have been designed by two different hands. 'While some of the
-work,' he says[639], 'is in no way superior to other pictorial
-representations of the time, and only here and there in details shows
-superior skill, other parts though retaining the peculiar style of
-Byzantine art, show a grace and dignity in the arrangement of the figures,
-and a perfection in the drawing of drapery, which in works of such an
-early period arouse admiration in the beholder.' In his handbook on
-painting Kugler further says that we probably have in them the nearest
-approach of the art of the time to full perfection.
-
-In describing the curtain he tells us of a manly bearded figure with
-raised hand, probably intended for the writer Martianus himself; near him
-stands Mercury half covered by a well-draped toga, a very youthful figure
-in accordance with the author's description. These and other figures hold
-scrolls on which their names are woven, but owing to the worn state of the
-hanging some of the names are gone and some are illegible. Three female
-figures are designated as 'Manticen,'--whom Mercury would have married had
-she not preferred Apollo; 'Sichem,'--a name standing for Psyche, whom
-Cupid had already enticed away according to Martianus; and 'Sophia,'--whom
-Mercury likewise desired to marry but in vain. All these figures are
-described by Kugler as splendid, especially that of 'Sichem' whose pose
-and drapery he pronounces most beautiful.
-
-A crowned figure of a man comes next, with a scroll bearing the words
-'happy in wealth' (qua felix copia talis), whom Kugler supposes to be
-Hymenaeus, and a man and woman joining hands, who are designated as
-Mercury and Philology. Similar allegorical figures fill the other parts of
-the curtain. In Kugler's estimation the figures of 'Prudentia' and
-'Fortitudo' are strikingly grand; while others, 'Justitia,' 'Temperantia,'
-and 'Philologia' with her mother 'Pronesis,' are of inferior design.
-
-There is another set of hangings preserved at Halberstadt, which, if the
-remark of an early chronicler may be believed, was also the work of the
-abbess Agnes and her nuns[640]. Kugler however, apparently unacquainted
-with this statement, places these hangings at a somewhat earlier date,
-since they are of less finished workmanship, but he admits that 'in spite
-of their faded colours and their roughness of design, a certain severe
-dignity cannot be denied to these figures which with wide-open eyes stare
-at the beholder[641].'
-
-We have a description of these curtains from Büsching, who travelled in
-quest of monastic treasures in the beginning of this century[642]. They
-measure three-and-a-half by fifteen feet. On the centre piece a king
-(God?) is represented on a throne, with one hand raised, the other holding
-a sceptre; Cato and Seneca, each bearing a written scroll, sit on either
-side. Next to them come six apostles, sitting two and two under a canopy,
-each bearing a scroll with his name--another instance of how readily art
-in the 12th century grouped together figures of Christian and classical
-origin, where it was an object to unite the conceptions of religion and
-philosophy; then Christ, pictured under a rainbow arch, which is supported
-by angels. On Christ's further side come the other six apostles similarly
-arranged, and then follow scenes illustrating Old Testament history, such
-as Jacob's dream; Abraham visited by angels; the sacrifice of Isaac;--in
-these scenes the figures are comparatively small and of inferior design to
-the larger ones. Judging from Büsching's description, the style of the
-tapestry is the same as that of the manuscript illustrations of the time.
-The background is uniformly of one colour, and the contours of the figures
-and their draperies are in thick brown outline, the intervening spaces
-being filled with different colours. Kugler compares the pictorial effect
-of these hangings with that of the miniatures contemporaneously painted in
-the abbey of Hohenburg under the abbess Herrad, of whose work we shall
-speak presently. They recall the dignified and somewhat sombre character
-of Byzantine art.
-
-There is plenty of information from the Continent to show that nuns
-belonging to houses of different religious orders were equally industrious
-at the loom and with the needle.
-
-Thus at Göss, formerly a Benedictine nunnery near Loeben in Steier, the
-church still treasures a complete set of vestments, 'ornatus integer,'
-worked by the nuns between 1275 and 1300 during the rule of 'abbatissa
-Chunegundis.' Bock describes them as most curious and beautiful, worked on
-linen with coloured silks in a design of fantastic animals and
-flowers[643].
-
-Again at Wienhausen near Celle several ancient wall-hangings are preserved
-which were woven by the nuns of the Cistercian settlement there, and show
-their industry and skill, and the readiness with which secular subjects
-were treated in the convent. On one which dates from the 14th century the
-story of Tristan and Isold is represented; on another hunting scenes; and
-on a third the figures of the prophets[644].
-
-At Heiningen near Wolfenbüttel, a house of Austin nuns, the inmates wove
-hangings with allegorical figures which are still in existence. At Lüne,
-Wende, Erfurt and at the Cistercian house of Ebsdorf wall-hangings were
-made which are still preserved, and show the ability of the nuns who
-worked at the loom between the 13th and 15th centuries[645]. We are
-indebted to Bock for a comprehensive treatise on church decoration and
-vestments. He also made a large collection of specimens of such work, but
-it has apparently been scattered. Some part of it has been acquired by the
-authorities at the South Kensington Museum where it is at present on view.
-
-From these examples of art-needlework and tapestry, we must turn to the
-art of writing and decorating books. We hear of a woman calligraphist in
-connection with one of the ancient monasteries in Bavaria, the fame of
-whose industry was carried on through centuries[646]. The monastery of
-Wessobrunn had been founded in the 8th century; it included a community of
-nuns as well as of monks, the dwelling allotted to the nuns being spoken
-of as the Parthenon, a term sometimes applied to a religious house for
-women in these districts. In the words of the monkish historian who wrote
-about 1513: 'the dwellings of the monks were where they are now, but those
-of the nuns where the parish church now stands.' Here between the years
-1057 and 1130 Diemud the nun was active as a scribe, the amount of whose
-work in the estimation of many 'exceeded what could be done by several
-men.' She had become a professed nun at an early age and 'was most skilful
-in the art of writing; for while she is not known to have composed any
-work of her own, yet she wrote with her own hand many volumes in a most
-beautiful and legible character both for divine service and for the
-library of the monastery, which volumes are enumerated in a list written
-by herself in a certain _plenarius_.' This list which is extant includes
-works to the number of forty-five, which were highly prized during the
-nun's lifetime and had a considerable market value. We find in the list 'a
-Missal with Gradual and Sequences' given to the bishop of Trier, and a
-'book of Offices with the Baptismal Service,' given to the bishop of
-Augsburg. A 'bibliotheca,' that is, a Bible, in two volumes, written by
-Diemud, was given by the monastery of Wessobrunn in exchange for an estate
-at Peissenburg. Besides these works the list mentions another Bible in
-three volumes, books containing the gospels and lessons, writings of
-Gregory and Augustine, and the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius. In
-course of time these books were scattered, lists of those which remained
-at Wessobrunn being made from time to time. At the sequestration of the
-monastery at the beginning of the 19th century only fifteen volumes
-written by Diemud remained, which were taken to Munich. They are said to
-be of rare beauty, distinguished by highly ornate initial letters and by
-small writing which is most elegant[647]. An example of this writing was
-reproduced by Hefner in the hope that it might lead to the identification
-of other books written by Diemud which may have found their way into other
-libraries and be still in existence.
-
-Contemporaneously with Diemud we find another Bavarian nun, Leukardis,
-active as a scribe at Mallersdorf; she is said to have been of Scottish
-origin and she knew Scotch (or Irish?), Greek, Latin, and German, and did
-so much good work that the monk Laiupold, who was also devoted to writing,
-established an anniversary in her memory[648].
-
-The nuns of Admunt in Bavaria are also spoken of as devoted to
-transcribing, and Wattenbach comments on the neat and elegant way in which
-they mended the parchment leaves of their manuscripts with coloured silken
-thread[649].
-
-Again a manuscript written for Marbach about the year 1149 by Gutta von
-Schwarzenthan is described as splendid. It contains the martyrology of
-Usuard, the Rule of St Augustine with the comments of Hugo of St Victor,
-the constitutions of Marbach and a homily for every day in the year[650].
-We hear of Emo, abbot of Wittewierum (1204-34), a Premonstrant house which
-contained men and women, that 'not only did he zealously encourage his
-canons (clericis) to write, acting as their instructor, but taking count
-of the diligence of the female sex he set women who were clever at writing
-to practise the art assiduously[651].' Wattenbach considers that nuns
-were especially clever in copying books for choir use, and in decorating
-them.
-
-These notices must suffice. They prove that women leading cloistered lives
-took an active interest in art-industry in all its branches and that
-productiveness in their houses was controlled by the same causes which led
-to the development and decay of art-industry in the houses of men.
-Excellent work was done in Benedictine houses during early Christian
-times, that is between the 8th and the 11th centuries; the revival of
-monastic life in the Middle Ages gave a new impulse to art-industry and
-the highest degree of excellence was reached in the first half of the 14th
-century. After that there are signs of a steadily accelerated decline. The
-reason of this, as a later chapter will show, lies chiefly in the changed
-conditions of life outside the convent, which made it easier for artisans
-in the townships to practise those arts and crafts which had hitherto been
-practised in religious settlements. Writing, decorating, and
-book-binding[652], as well as weaving and embroidering[653], were taken up
-by secular workers and were practised by them on a far larger scale; the
-spread of education in lay circles and the greater luxury in home
-surroundings having created a new taste and a new market for artistic
-productions. The taste of this wider public naturally influenced the
-character of the work which was produced; cheapness and splendour, if
-possible the combination of the two, were the qualities chiefly aimed at.
-These are valuable qualities no doubt in their way, but insistence on them
-had a discouraging effect on the productiveness of the convent. During the
-14th and 15th centuries convents gave up their artistic pursuits. The
-self-denying industry and unobtrusive earnestness which set the stamp of
-excellence on the productions of the old hand-worker were no more, for the
-spirit which looked upon the production of things beautiful as a matter of
-religion had died out.
-
-
-§ 2. Herrad and the 'Garden of Delights.'
-
-A work produced at Hohenburg, a nunnery in Elsass, in the 12th century
-confirms the belief that given favourable conditions it is possible for
-women to produce good work and to help to accumulate knowledge. Herrad,
-the abbess of this house, conceived the idea of compiling for the use of
-her nuns an encyclopædic work which should embody, in pictures and in
-words, the knowledge of her age. The importance of this work has long
-survived the attainment of its original purpose, for with its hundreds of
-illustrations and its copious text it has afforded a wealth of information
-on the customs, manners, conceptions and mode of life of the 12th century,
-to which many students of archæology, art and philology have gone for
-instruction and for the illustration of their own books. 'Few illuminated
-manuscripts had acquired a fame so well deserved as the "Garden of
-Delights," the _Hortus Deliciarum_, of Herrad,' says the editor of the
-great collection of reproductions of the pictures which illustrated her
-work[654]. For the work itself is no more. The MS. was destroyed in the
-fire which broke out in the library of Strasburg when that city was
-bombarded by the Germans in 1870, and with it perished a complete copy of
-the text. Our knowledge of the work is therefore limited to the remarks of
-those who had studied it and to those portions of it which had been copied
-or transcribed previous to its destruction. The 'Society for the
-Preservation of the Monuments of Elsass' is at present collecting and
-publishing a reproduction of all existing tracings and copies of the
-pictures or of parts of them, and this collection already numbers nearly
-two hundred. They are mere fragments of course of the work itself, and yet
-they are of the highest interest. For Herrad's 'Garden of Delights' with
-its apt illustrations gave a complete picture of life in its domestic and
-out-of-door aspects as it presented itself in the 12th century. It showed
-what conceptions and ideas were then attractive to nuns and their
-estimation of knowledge, and it has given greater insight than any other
-production into the talents, the enthusiasm and the industry which were
-found at this period in a nunnery.
-
-The religious settlement at Hohenburg[655] was an ancient foundation
-situated on the flat summit of a spur of the Vosges mountains, which here
-rise abruptly to a height of over two thousand five hundred feet from the
-wide expanse of the valley of the Rhine below. The wooded heights on
-either side of the Rhine were the favourite haunts of missionaries in
-early times, who settled there and appropriated sites in close proximity
-to the castles or strongholds of the landed gentry. At one time there were
-as many as sixty religious settlements in the Rhine valley between Basel
-and Mainz and over a hundred castles or burgs. The nunnery of Hohenburg
-was of high rank among these religious settlements owing to its extensive
-property and to its commanding situation. The summit of the hill was
-surrounded by an ancient wall dating from pre-Christian times which is
-still known as the heathen wall; it enclosed a wide clearance of fields
-and meadows, and the numerous buildings of the convent settlement. This
-height was the goal of numerous pilgrimages and had various associations
-dating from heathen times. It is at the present day a favourite health
-resort on account of its aspect and romantic surroundings.
-
-From historical information recently collected by Roth[656] we gather that
-a religious settlement of women existed on the Hohenburg as early as the
-9th century. Judith, the wife of Ludwig the Pious ([Dagger] 1840), took
-some interest in it. Legendary lore has spun many webs about the religious
-settlements in the Rhine district including that of Hohenburg, and the
-majority of modern historians have taken no trouble to unravel them.
-Legend[657] tells us that a holy maiden St Odilia fled from the
-persecution of a cruel father and came to the Hohenburg, where she settled
-and gathered many women about her. Various stories more or less fanciful
-are told of her. She was cured of blindness and baptized by Archbishop
-Hildulf of Trier and Bishop Erhard of Regensburg--who are unknown to
-history; she was carried down the river in a chest and educated at the
-convent of Beaume or Palma; and she has been given as a relative to St
-Leodgar bishop of Autun ([Dagger] 678) and as a daughter to Eticho duke of
-the Allemanni. Besides these stories we find the name Odilia locally
-associated with a cave, a well, three linden-trees and a stone of peculiar
-shape which are obviously heathen survivals, and encourage the view that
-Odilia is the representative of some pre-Christian divinity. Roth has
-shown that the name Odilia is nowhere on record in these districts before
-the 10th century, and it occurs in connection with Hohenburg only in the
-11th century, that is three or four hundred years after the saint's
-reputed foundation of the house. When Pope Leo IX (1048-1054), who was an
-Alsatian, visited his home he was presented with a rhymed 'responsarium'
-on the local saints of the district. Among them was Odilia, who at that
-time was directly associated with the nunnery. A hundred years later when
-the convent was better known through the influence and activity of its
-abbesses Relind and Herrad, St Odilia was looked upon as the daughter of
-Duke Eticho and the founder of the house--this will be shown from pictures
-preserved in Herrad's work. But evidently this abbess had no knowledge of
-the saint's blindness and sufferings, nor of her connection with St
-Leodgar and other prelates, which are all described in her legend written
-another hundred years later.
-
-In the year 1154 Relind[658], abbess of Berg, a nunnery near Neuburg on
-the Danube, was appointed abbess at Hohenburg in accordance with the wish,
-it is said, of the emperor Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190). Her influence
-was most beneficial; many daughters of the surrounding gentry came to
-study under her, and among them Herrad of the family of Landsperg. The
-term nun must be applied to these women with a reservation; some writers
-speak of them as Austin canonesses on account of the liberties they
-enjoyed. In Herrad's 'Garden' the picture of her nuns represents them
-wearing clothes that differ little from those worn by women in other walks
-of life. Their dresses are of different colours, their cloaks are
-generally brown, and their veils are always brilliantly coloured, some
-red, some purple[659]. The only detail of dress which they have in common
-is a white turban or head-dress, over which the veil is thrown. They wear
-no wimples. The establishment of the house under Herrad's rule consisted
-of forty-seven nuns and thirteen novices (or lay sisters?) who are
-represented as wearing clothes similar to those of the nuns.
-
-Herrad's admission to the house furthered its prosperity in every way, for
-besides literary and artistic abilities she had considerable powers of
-management. She succeeded Relind as abbess in 1167, and in 1181 she
-founded a settlement of Austin canons at Truttenhausen, and later another
-at St Gorgon, both of which are situated not far below the summit of the
-hill. The canons of these settlements took it in turn to read mass in the
-women's chapel. Roth speaks of other improvements which Herrad carried out
-with the help of her diocesan, the bishop of Strasburg.
-
-The consecration of a church at Niedermünster, situated below the
-Hohenburg, also falls within the term of Herrad's rule. A second nunnery
-was founded there as a dependency, which was separated from the parent
-house probably during Herrad's lifetime, owing to the efforts of the
-abbess Edelind (1195-1200), who according to Gérard was also of the family
-of Landsperg[660]. The claim of this abbess to the attention of posterity
-rests on her having been the possessor of a still extant chased case
-several feet high, which she had made to hold a fragment of the Holy Cross
-which a camel was alleged to have brought to Niedermünster of its own
-accord in the time of Karl the Great. This case is covered with many
-figures worked in relief and is praised by art students as a curious
-example of early metal work[661].
-
-The history of Hohenburg and Niedermünster in the sequel offers much that
-is interesting. For while the nuns at Niedermünster accepted the rule of
-St Benedict, the nuns on the Hohenburg persisted in their independent
-course. At Niedermünster a stone monument is still to be seen which
-experts declare to be 13th century work, and which gives a clue to the
-association of St Odilia with Leodgar, to whom the church at Niedermünster
-was dedicated. Three sides of this monument are covered with figures. On
-one stands St Leodgar; on the next St Odilia with long tresses, and Duke
-Eticho; on the third the Virgin, also with long tresses, and below her the
-abbesses Relind and Herrad holding a book. Both these abbesses are
-designated by name, and wear convent garb and wimples utterly different
-from the clothes worn by them in the pictures of Herrad's book[662].
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the great work of Herrad's life, to
-which she herself gave the title of the 'Garden of Delights.' It consisted
-of 324 parchment leaves of folio size, which contained an account of the
-history of the world founded on the Biblical narrative, with many
-digressions into the realm of philosophy, moral speculation, and
-contemporary knowledge--and with numerous pictures in illustration of it.
-
-The book was so arranged that the pictures stood alongside of the text;
-and the pages of the work which were devoted to illustrations were in most
-cases divided into three sections by lines across, so that the pictures
-stood one above the other. The figures in each picture were about four
-inches high. There were, however, a certain number of full-page
-illustrations with larger figures, and it is among these that the greatest
-proofs are given of Herrad's imaginative powers and the range of her
-intellectual abilities.
-
-Engelhardt, to whom we are indebted for the fullest description of the
-'Garden of Delights,' made tracings of a number of pictures and copied
-their colouring[663]. He comments on the brilliant smoothness and finish
-of the original miniature paintings. Only the silver, he says, was
-tarnished; the gold was undimmed and all the colours preserved their full
-brilliancy, when he had the work before him in the early part of this
-century. According to him the method of painting was as follows. First the
-figures were drawn in dark outline, then the colouring was filled in bit
-by bit; shadows and high lights were next laid on, and then the dark
-outlines were again gone over.
-
-The question has naturally arisen whether Herrad did the whole of the work
-herself. The text which stood at the beginning and at the end of it
-referred to her as its sole author. Students are generally agreed that the
-outline drawing and the writing were entirely her work, but the colours
-may or may not have been laid on by her. For the work was wonderfully
-complete in plan and execution--the conception of one mind, which laboured
-with unceasing perseverance to realize the conception it had formed.
-
-The style in which the pictures were drawn has likewise been the occasion
-of much comment. We are here on the border-land between the conventional
-Byzantine and the realistic Gothic styles. 'We see very clearly,' says
-Woltman[664], 'how the new ideas which scholastic learning and poetry had
-generated required new modes of expression, and led to conceptions for
-which the older art yielded no models and which had to be taken from real
-life.' In most cases Herrad no doubt had a model before her and adhered to
-the traditional rendering, but where the model was wanting she may have
-drawn on her powers of imagination and supplied details from her
-surroundings. Thus incidents of Biblical history are represented by her in
-a manner familiar to the student of early Christian art. A grave and
-serious dignity which recalls the wall mosaics at Ravenna characterizes
-the figures of God, Christ, Mary, and the angels; Engelhardt has pointed
-out the close similarity of Herrad's picture of the Annunciation to that
-contained in a Greek MS. of the 9th century[665]. But in other cases
-Herrad either composed herself or else drew from models which were nearer
-to her in time and place. Thus the picture of the sun-god Apollo
-represents him in a heavy mediaeval cart drawn by four horses, and the men
-and women in many pictures are dressed in the fashion of the time. The
-pictures drawn from real life especially delight the archæological
-student. A water-mill grinding corn, men at the plough, soldiers on the
-march and fighting, are drawn with minute exactness and with considerable
-skill. Some of these scenes are powerfully realistic in spite of a certain
-awkwardness in the figures; for example, that of a traveller who is
-waylaid by robbers, coupled with the story of the good Samaritan, which is
-illustrated by a series of pictures. In the first of these a man is
-depicted lying by the roadside; in the second we see him on a horse which
-is led by the Samaritan, and in the third he has arrived at the inn and is
-being lifted down from the horse.
-
-Herrad executed her work between 1160 and 1170, but additional entries
-were made as late as 1190. This period falls in the reign of the emperor
-Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190), which followed upon that of the luckless
-Konrad III, and was one of comparative quiet and prosperity in Germany.
-The power of the Pope had passed its climax, there was schism in the
-Papacy, which was greatly aggravated by the line of conduct Friedrich
-adopted, but the scene of their struggle had shifted to the cities of
-northern Italy. We shall see later on that political changes were watched
-with much interest in some nunneries, and that the conduct of the Emperor,
-the Pope, and the bishops was keenly criticised among nuns. It is
-difficult to tell how far events affected Herrad. The prose narrative
-which her work contained, as far as we know, has perished and we have no
-definite clue to her interpretation of contemporary affairs, but probably
-she was content to devote her energies to rearranging and interpreting the
-intellectual wealth of the age without entering into party conflicts. The
-illustrations of the 'Garden of Delights' which have been preserved are
-invaluable for the study of contemporary life, but they contain no
-information as to contemporary events.
-
-The study and enjoyment of the work in its original form were facilitated
-by the addition to the picture of the name of every person and every
-implement in Latin or in German, sometimes in both; and in many cases an
-explanatory sentence or a moral maxim was introduced into the picture, so
-that the nun who studied the work naturally picked up Latin words and
-sentences. Through the industry of Engelhardt all these sentences and
-words have been preserved, and the coupling of implements with their
-names forms a valuable addition to our knowledge of terms as applied in
-early mediaeval times. The book also originally contained a continuous
-history in Latin for more advanced students, but unfortunately that is
-lost. Engelhardt says that it described the history of the world from the
-Creation to the coming of Antichrist, with many extracts from various
-writers. He enumerates twenty writers from whose works Herrad quotes.
-Among them are Eusebius Pamphili ([Dagger] c. 350), Jerome ([Dagger] 420),
-Isidor of Seville ([Dagger] 636), Bede ([Dagger] 735), Frechulf ([Dagger]
-838), and others who were her contemporaries, such as Petrus Lombardus
-([Dagger] 1164) and Petrus Comestor ([Dagger] 1198). When quoting from
-secular writers the abbess invariably made mention of the fact. In one
-instance she remarked that 'all these things have been described by
-philosophers by aid of their worldly wisdom (per mundanam sapientiam), but
-this was the product of the Holy Spirit also.'
-
-The attitude which Herrad assumed towards learning generally can be
-studied in the pictures which deal with abstract conceptions. They are
-usually of folio size and contain illustrations which are instructive to
-the student of mediaeval scholasticism. Two pictures introduced into the
-history of the Tower of Babel which illustrate the falling away from true
-faith deserve especial attention. The one is a representation of the 'Nine
-Muses'; on it female heads of quaint dignity in medallions are arranged in
-a circle. The other represents the 'Seven Liberal Arts,' in accordance
-with the mediaeval interpretation of the teaching of Aristotle[666]. On it
-Philosophy, a female figure, is seated in the centre of the picture
-wearing a crown with three heads. These heads are designated as 'ethica,
-logica, phisica'; by means of these three branches of learning philosophy
-adds to her powers of insight. Socrates and Plato, who are designated as
-'philosophers,' sit below, and from the figure of Philosophy 'seven
-streams of wisdom flow which are turned into liberal arts' as the text
-explains. These arts are personified as female figures in 12th century
-dress, and are so arranged that each figure stands in a separate division
-forming a circle round Philosophy and the philosophers. The Liberal Arts
-are robed in different colours, and each holds an emblem of her power.
-'Grammar,' dressed in dark red, has a book and a birch rod; 'Geometry,' in
-light red, has a measuring rod and a compass; 'Arithmetic,' in light blue,
-holds a string of alternate white and black beads; 'Music,' dressed in
-purple, has a lyre, a zither and a hurdy-gurdy; 'Astronomy,' in dark
-green, holds a measure and looks up at the stars; 'Rhetoric,' in dark
-blue, has a stilus and a writing-tablet (tabula); and 'Dialectic,' in
-light green, holds the head of a howling dog. Each figure is encircled by
-a sentence explaining the special nature of her power. In the lower part
-of the picture are four men, seated at desks, with books, pens and
-penknives, engaged in reading and writing. These are the 'poets or magi,
-who are filled with a worldly spirit'; black birds appear to be whispering
-in their ears.
-
-The whole of this picture is doubtless traditional; its admission into the
-work shows that Herrad's conception of 'profane' learning was one of
-distinct appreciation. The idea conveyed by means of the pictures to the
-young women students was by no means superficial or derogatory to
-learning. On the contrary, we see them under the influence of a teacher
-through whom their respectful attitude towards the means and modes of
-knowledge was assured.
-
-Another picture of folio size, called 'The Ladder to Perfection,' shows
-that Herrad accepted a critical attitude towards the members of religion.
-A ladder is drawn diagonally across the page and a number of figures are
-seen ascending it on their way towards heaven. The highest rung has been
-reached by Christian love (Caritas) personified as a woman to whom a crown
-is proffered from heaven. Below her stand the representatives of different
-branches of the religious profession and laymen arranged in order of
-excellence, and with each is given a picture of the temptation which
-prevents him from ascending further up the ladder. Among these the hermit
-(heremita) stands highest, but he is held back by the charms of his
-garden. Below him stands the recluse (inclusus), whose temptation is
-slothfulness, which is represented by a bed. Then comes the monk
-(monachus), who leans towards a mass of gold; 'he is typical of all false
-monks,' says Herrad, 'whose heart is drawn from duties by the sight of
-money, and who cannot rise above greed.' The nun (sanctimonialis) and the
-cleric (clericus) have reached the same rung on the ladder. She is the
-representative of false nuns who yield to the temptation of persuasion and
-gifts, and return to their parents, never attaining the crown of life; he
-is drawn away by the allurements of the table, and by a woman (amica) who
-stands below. There are also figures of a lay woman and a soldier who are
-respectively attracted by the charms of a city and of war. They are
-absorbed by vanities, and we are told 'rarely reach the crown of life
-through contemplation.' The picture is further crowded with demons who are
-attacking and angels who are defending the people on the ladder. The devil
-lurks below in the form of a dragon ready to seize upon those who fall.
-
-In further illustration of Herrad's attitude towards the clergy,
-Engelhardt cites a passage from her work in which she severely censures
-the customs which the clergy tolerate in church on festal days. In company
-with laymen and loose women they eat and drink, and indulge in jokes and
-games which invariably end in uproariousness. 'How worthy of praise,' she
-exclaims, 'if the spiritual princes of the Church (principes ecclesiae
-spirituales) restored the evangelical teaching of early times in the place
-of such customs[667].'
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the pictures which illustrate the
-Biblical narrative in a number of scenes containing a store of imagery and
-a wealth of design. We cannot but admire the ready brush of the abbess and
-the courage with which she grappled with difficulties, drawing with equal
-skill human figures and divine personifications, dramatic incidents and
-allegorical combinations.
-
-The pictures which illustrated the Creation were led up to by a number of
-diagrams and digressions on astronomy and geography, with lists of
-technical terms in Latin and their German equivalents. Among these was a
-picture of the signs of the zodiac and a 'computus' or table for
-determining the festal days of the year. The desire to fix the date of
-incidents of Old and New Testament history absorbed much attention at this
-period, and Herrad's table of computation was looked upon as so important
-that it was recently used by Piper as the starting-point for an
-investigation on the Calendar generally[668]. In Herrad's table the date
-of Easter was worked out for a cycle of 532 years, that is from 1175 till
-1706; leap-years were marked, and the day of the week on which Christmas
-fell was given for the whole period.
-
-The history of the Biblical narrative opens with a picture illustrating
-the creation of the animals. The lion, the elephant, the unicorn and the
-giraffe are most fantastic, but the ox, the ass, the horse, the domestic
-fowl, the sylvan animals of northern latitudes, and fish, are drawn with
-tolerable correctness. God is represented in classical robes moving slowly
-across a wave of the waters. In another picture He is depicted in a
-simpler manner seated and fashioning the small figure of Adam, which He
-holds between His knees. Again He is seen breathing life into Adam's
-nostrils, and then holding in His hand a rib out of which projects the
-head of Eve, while Adam is lying asleep on the ground. There is a series
-of pictures illustrating the temptation and expulsion from Paradise. A
-full-sized one gives the Tree of Life, which has many ramifications out of
-which human faces are peeping. Adam and Eve are throughout pictured as of
-the same height and are several times drawn in the nude. There is a very
-graceful picture in which Adam is seen delving while Eve spins.
-
-Poems on the First Man and on the Fall accompanied by musical notation are
-here introduced. The poems are preserved, the music is apparently lost; it
-is not stated whether Herrad wrote the music herself.
-
-The story of Noah and his sleeping in the vineyard, and the building of
-the Tower of Babel, are illustrated by scenes details of which are
-presumably drawn from real life. Here we see wooden vats and buckets, the
-various implements used in the vintage, pictures of masons at work dressed
-in short kirtles, and the various implements and arrangements for
-building.
-
-After the pictures on secular learning above referred to the thread of
-Biblical narrative is resumed, and there are many scenes from the lives of
-the patriarchs, such as Jacob giving his blessing, a picture of Jacob's
-dream, Pharaoh seated on his throne with sumptuous surroundings, and the
-passage over the Red Sea, in which the soldiers are clad in chain-mail and
-march with standards borne aloft. Soldiers similarly accoutred are drawn
-in one picture fighting under the leadership of Joshua; in another picture
-they are seen attacking a city, a scene taken from the story of the
-assault of Dan. The adoration of the golden calf gave occasion for a
-picture which also illustrates contemporary manners. Men and women dressed
-in the costume of the day are seen joining hands in a ring and dancing
-round the idol. We also have pictures of the Holy Ark and of the
-Tabernacle; the seven-branched candlestick is most elaborately drawn, and
-the twelve tribes of Israel are grouped in medallions around it.
-
-The next remarkable picture is the burial of Moses. In a solitary rocky
-surrounding God lays the patriarch in his grave, while a demon holds him
-by the legs and is pushed away by an angel. The demon was obviously a
-living reality to Herrad, and he frequently appears in her pictures with
-his wide mouth, long nose, pointed ears and green-coloured body, a figure
-grotesque rather than terrible. When the moment of death is represented he
-invariably puts in an appearance and claims the soul, which in one case
-escapes from the dying person's mouth in the shape of a small black demon.
-In another picture the soul is wrapped in swaddling clothes and is borne
-aloft by angels. This was a pre-Christian conception, that life is a small
-living thing which dwells inside a human being and escapes at death. On
-classic soil one comes across escaping life represented as a babe; in
-German folk-lore it is often a mouse or a toad.
-
-The story of Goliath and of David is also illustrated. David is a
-diminutive figure wearing a kirtle, Goliath is huge and clad in
-chain-mail. Another picture represents David playing on the harp. There
-were also a number of scenes from the books of Kings, of Job, and of
-Tobit; none of these have as yet been reproduced. A picture of the
-prophets has, however, been published, in which a number of figures of
-different ages are depicted in different attitudes standing side by side.
-One of the most curious and dramatic pictures is the full-page
-illustration of Jonah being cast up by the fish. The fish is a carp of
-huge size, but it is designated as a whale.
-
-The New Testament pictures follow on the Old Testament, but between them
-stand several which illustrate their unity. One is an allegorical figure
-with two heads, the one the head of Moses, the other that of Christ. There
-is also a picture in folio size of the mystic family of Christ. At the
-bottom is Abraham, who holds the mystic vine which grows upwards and
-divides into beautiful twisted ramifications forming circles, and in these
-are arranged the heads of patriarchs, kings, and groups of other members
-of Christ's family. A picture of Leviathan is extremely curious. He is
-depicted floating below. God stands above with a rod and line, and uses
-the cross as a fish-hook, dragging out of the huge creature's mouth the
-heads of the prophets which are strung together in a row.
-
-The history of Christ was led up to by an account of the birth of John the
-Baptist. The Nativity was celebrated by several poems, the words of which
-have come down to us; the music which accompanied them is apparently lost.
-Among the most realistic pictures preserved is that of the 'Murder of the
-Innocents'; agony is characteristically expressed in the attitude and
-faces of the mothers who watch the soldiers fulfilling their task.
-
-Other pictures, copies of which have been preserved, illustrate the
-arrival of the three kings and Christ's baptism. In this latter picture
-the Jordan is personified as a river-god sitting in the water; the doors
-of heaven above are wide open and a dove drawn in the accepted style is
-descending. Christ's parables gave the abbess many occasions for depicting
-scenes taken from real life, many of which in their simplicity are truly
-delightful. Biblical stories were supplemented by incidents taken from
-legendary history, which were likewise accompanied by pictures, few of
-which seem to have been preserved. The story of the healing power of the
-statue of Christ, the legend of the Vernacle, and the story of the True
-Cross were all illustrated. There was Adam planting the Tree of Life, King
-Solomon fetching its wood to Jerusalem and making a bridge over the river
-with it, and the Queen of Sheba coming on a visit and hesitating to cross
-the bridge.
-
-The pictures of the story of the Agony, the Resurrection, and the Acts of
-the Apostles met with great praise from all who saw them. There were
-folio-sized pictures setting forth the Universality of the Church, and the
-Contending of Virtues and Vices[669]. Of this latter series several
-pictures have just appeared in reproduction; some are arranged in pairs,
-facing each other. The chief Vices, each with a band of attendants, are
-depicted confronting and then overcome by the chief Virtues; all are
-represented as women. Thus Pride, 'Superbia,' seated on horseback on a
-lion's skin and brandishing a spear, is leading a band of women, who are
-clad in chain-mail with robes flowing about their feet and carrying
-spears, against a band of Virtues similarly attired but carrying swords. A
-most interesting picture is that of Luxury, 'Luxuria,' who is seen with
-fourteen attendant Vices riding in a sumptuous four-wheeled car; Luxury is
-in front throwing violets. She is confronted by a band of Virtues led by
-Temperance, 'Temperantia,' who are in front of the horses and hold up
-their hands in reprobation. On the next picture the car of Luxury is
-smashed, the horses are overturned, and she herself is under the wheels.
-Of her attendants 'Voluptas' has cast aside her rings and ornaments and is
-caught in a briar-bush, 'Amor' has thrown away bow and quiver, and
-'Avaritia' is seizing upon what the others have dropped. On another
-picture Liberality, 'Largitas,' has stripped Rapine and Avarice, and has
-transfixed Avarice with a spear.
-
-Some of the pictures which illustrate Solomon in his glory and Solomon's
-Vanity of Vanities have also been preserved. Among them is Solomon lying
-on a sumptuous couch and surrounded by his warriors. A representation of
-two mannikins occurs among the Vanities; these mannikins were moved by
-threads, exactly like a modern toy. The pictures illustrating the
-experiences of the Church, the position of her members from Pope to
-cleric, the means of repentance, and the coming of Antichrist, all roused
-the enthusiasm of those who saw them; none of these have till now been
-reproduced. Gérard, who was probably the last to see and handle the work
-of Herrad, was especially struck by the pictures of the Last Judgment and
-of Heaven and Hell. His descriptions of them were lying in the library at
-the time of the bombardment, and were only rescued by the devotion of a
-friend[670]. On the strength of these pictures he numbers Herrad among the
-most imaginative painters the world has known. Engelhardt also was greatly
-struck by them. He describes a picture of Hell in the following terms (p.
-51):
-
-'A mass of rocks was arranged so as to make a framework to this picture,
-in the chasms of which rocks flames were flaring and the condemned were
-seen suffering torments. Rivers of flame divided the inner part of the
-picture into four divisions. In the lowest of these, at the bottom of
-Hell, sat Lucifer or Satan in chains holding Antichrist in his lap. Next
-to him a demon carried along a covetous monk, whose punishment was then
-represented: he lay on his back without clothes and a demon poured molten
-gold into his mouth. In the second division counting from below two
-boiling caldrons hung suspended: in the one were Jews, in the other
-soldiers (the text says 'milites vel armati'). Demons stood by holding men
-of either kind ready to add them to those already in the caldrons; other
-demons were stirring the caldrons with forks. In front of the Jews'
-caldron a demon was depicted holding a naked sinner to whom he
-administered punishment by beating him. In the division above this a
-usurer had hot gold poured into his hand; a slanderer was made to lick a
-toad; an eaves-dropper had his ears pinched; a vain woman was assisted at
-her toilet by demons (they seemed to be lacing her); the woman who had
-murdered her child was forced to devour it. The following peculiar picture
-filled the highest division: a rope was drawn through chasms in the rocks
-so as to form a swing; on this a grinning demon sat swinging. At the ends
-of the rope which hung on the other side of the rocks two sinners were
-hanging bound head and foot so as to balance each other; demons held them
-by the hair. Another sinner hung suspended by his feet, with a block of
-stone hanging from his neck on which a demon was swinging. Sensual
-pleasures personified were wound around and bitten by snakes, and a man
-who had committed suicide was depicted plunging a knife into his own
-body.'
-
-These pictures illustrated with forcible directness conceptions which were
-current throughout the religious world and served as a means of teaching
-the lesson of reward and punishment in the world to come. Later on in
-treating of mysticism we shall again see these conceptions stimulating the
-imaginative powers of women living in convents.
-
-Copies of the last pages of the 'Garden of Delights,' which are devoted to
-a representation of the Hohenburg and of its convent of women, have
-fortunately been preserved. Here we see the settlement as it presented
-itself to Herrad and the thoughts she associated with it. The picture is
-the size of two folio pages. High above in the centre stands Christ in
-front of the convent church, holding in His right hand a golden staff
-which is touched by the Virgin and St Peter, and the end of which is
-supported by Duke Eticho, whom Herrad looked upon as the father of St
-Odilia. St John the Baptist and St Odilia are seen standing on the other
-side of Christ. A green hill is represented below roughly studded with
-bushes or brambles,--this is the hill of the Hohenburg. On one slope of it
-Duke Eticho is seated, and he hands the golden key of the convent to St
-Odilia, who advances towards him followed by a band of women. Relind,
-Herrad's teacher and predecessor, also stands on the hill with her hand
-resting on a cross on which are inscribed verses addressed to the nuns.
-The fact that she restored the church and the discipline at Hohenburg,
-which had fallen entirely into decay, is commemorated in a sentence which
-is placed on the other side of her. Over against her stands Herrad
-herself, who also holds verses addressed to the nuns. And between these
-two abbesses all the members of Herrad's congregation are drawn, six rows
-of women's heads placed one above the other. There is no attempt at
-portraiture, but the name of each nun and each novice is added to her
-picture. Among these names are those of families of the surrounding landed
-gentry, from which we gather that the nunnery was chiefly for the upper
-classes. The nuns in the picture address lines to Christ begging Him to
-number them among the elect.
-
-Such in rough outline was the 'Garden of Delights,' the loss of which is
-greatly to be deplored, both from the point of view of culture in general,
-and from that of women in particular. But even in its fragments the work
-is a thing to dwell upon, a monument which bears the stamp of wide
-knowledge and lofty thought. It shows how Herrad found her life's interest
-in educating the young women given into her care, how anxious she was that
-they should be right-minded in all things, and how she strove to make
-their studies delightful to them. The tone which she took towards her
-congregation is apparent from the words in which she directly addressed
-them. For besides occasional admonitory words, two long poems, one at the
-beginning, the other at the end of the work, are devoted to the admonition
-of the nuns. Herrad's poems are composed in different metres; some have
-the dignity of the hexameter, some the easier flow of shorter-lined
-dactylic verse. The poems addressed to her nuns are of the latter kind.
-Their incisive rhythm and ringing rhyme, in which their value chiefly
-lies, make a translation difficult. Still a version of the first of these
-poems in English prose will help to give the reader some idea of the tone
-of the abbess; the form of address is necessarily determined by the mode
-of expression of the 12th century, the meaning of the original is by no
-means always clear.
-
-This is: 'The rhyme of Herrad, the abbess, in which she lovingly greets
-the young maidens (virgunculas) of the Hohenburg and invites them to their
-weal to faith and love of the true Bridegroom.
-
-'Hail, cohort of Hohenburg virgins, white as the lily and loving the Son
-of God, Herrad, your most devoted, your most faithful mother and
-handmaiden sings you this song. She greets you times countless and daily
-prays that in glad victory you may triumph over things that pass. O,
-mirror of many things, spurn, spurn those of time, and garner virtues,
-Band of the true Bridegroom. Press on in the struggle to scatter the dread
-foe, the King of Kings aids you for His desire is towards you. He Himself
-strengthens your soul against Satan; He Himself will grant the glory of
-His kingdom after victory. Delights await you, riches are destined for
-you, the court of heaven proffers you countless joys. Christ prepares
-espousals wondrous in delights, and you may look for this prince if you
-preserve your chastity. Mean time put around you noble circlets (?) and
-make your faces to shine fair, freed from mental strife. Christ hates spot
-or stain, He abhors time-worn lines (of vice); He desires beauteous
-virgins and drives forth women who are unchaste. With a dove-like faith
-call upon that your Bridegroom, that your beauty may become an unbroken
-glory. Living without guile, be admonished by praisegiving, so that you
-may complete your best works of ascent. Do not hesitate amidst the
-doubtful currents of the world, the truthful God holds out rewards after
-danger. Suffer hardships now, despising the world's prosperity, be now
-fellow of the cross, hereafter sharer of the kingdom. Steer across the
-ocean freighted with holiness, till you leave the bark and land in Sion.
-May Sion's heavenly castle with its beauteous halls be your home when the
-term of life is past. May there the virgin Ruler, Mary's Son, receive you
-in His embrace and lift you up from sadness. Setting aside all the wiles
-of the mean tempter, you will be abundantly glad, sweetly rejoicing. The
-shining Star of the Sea, the one virgin Mother will join you to her Son in
-bond eternal. And by your prayer do not cease to draw me with you to the
-sweetest Bridegroom, the Son of the Virgin. As He will be partner of your
-victory and of your great glory, He will draw you from earthly things.
-Farewell, chaste band, you my exceeding joy, live without offence, ever
-love Christ. May this book prove useful and delightful to you, may you
-never cease to ponder it in your breast. May forgetfulness not seize you
-like the ostrich (more Struthineo)[671], and may you not leave the way
-before you have attained. Amen.'
-
-This address in verse was followed by these lines in prose--'Herrad, who
-through the grace of God is abbess of the church on the Hohenburg, here
-addresses the sweet maidens of Christ who are working as though in the
-vineyard of the Lord; may He grant grace and glory unto them.--I was
-thinking of your happiness when like a bee guided by the inspiring God I
-drew from many flowers of sacred and philosophic writing this book called
-the 'Garden of Delights'; and I have put it together to the praise of
-Christ and the Church, and to your enjoyment, as though into a sweet
-honeycomb. Therefore you must diligently seek your salvation in it and
-strengthen your weary spirit with its sweet honey drops; always be bent
-on love of your Bridegroom and fortified by spiritual joys, and you will
-safely pass through what is transitory, and secure great and lasting
-happiness. Through your love of Christ, help me who am climbing along a
-dangerous uncertain path by your fruitful prayer when I pass away from
-this earth's experiences. Amen.'
-
-Thus far we have followed Herrad in her work and in her relations towards
-her nuns; the question naturally arises, What inner experiences prompted
-her to her great undertaking and in what spirit did she carry it through?
-It has been noticed that a sombreness is characteristic of certain parts
-of the work, and is peculiar to some of her poems also. Two short verses
-which occur in the work seem to reflect her mental state. The one urges
-great liberality of mind. It discusses the basis of purity, and comes to
-the conclusion that purity depends less on actions than on the spirit in
-which they are done. The other follows the mind through its several stages
-of development and deserves to be chronicled among the words of wisdom. It
-runs as follows: 'Despise the world, despise nothing, despise thyself,
-despise despising thyself,--these are four good things.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-
-PROPHECY AND PHILANTHROPY.
-
-    'Pauper homo magnam stultitiam habet quando vestimenta sua scissa
-    sunt, semper in alium aspiciens, considerans quem colorem vestimentum
-    illius habeat, nec suum a sorde abluit.' _Hildegard._
-
-
-§ 1. St Hildegard of Bingen[672] and St Elisabeth of Schönau[673].
-
-From the peaceful pursuits of mediaeval nuns we turn to some of the women
-who were interested in the problems of the day, and whose minds were
-agitated by current difficulties which they sought to solve in their own
-way. In Germany in the early Middle Ages the struggle between Pope and
-Emperor, and the interference in temporal matters of prelates in their
-character as dependents of the Pope, gave rise to a prolonged struggle.
-Much criticism, reflection and speculative energy were brought to bear on
-the relations between monarchical and ecclesiastical power, on the duties
-of the ministers of the Church, and on the Pope's efficiency in
-controlling them. It is at least curious to find among the voices that are
-raised in criticism and protest, those of two nuns, who in consideration
-of the services they have rendered to the faith are estimated as saints.
-The present chapter proposes to deal in outline with the writings of St
-Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1178) and of St Elisabeth of Schönau (c.
-1129-1165). These two women differed somewhat in their points of view, but
-they were equally zealous in supporting the Pope's authority, and were
-equally inspired by the belief that the Church could and should maintain
-a lofty and universal standing and act as a regenerator to society. The
-exhortations of these women were very popular, and in the year 1158, when
-they were in the full exercise of their power, the annalist wrote, 'in
-these days God made manifest His power through the frail sex, in the two
-maidens Hildegard and Elisabeth, whom He filled with a prophetic spirit,
-making many kinds of visions apparent to them through His messages, which
-are to be seen in writing[674].'
-
-The attitude of these women and the tone of their writings were the direct
-outcome of contemporary events. They were deeply moved by the instability
-of social conditions and shared the belief of other great reformers of the
-age, that what was needed to remedy social evils was a livelier faith in
-the truths of religion and a higher standard of morality in conduct.
-
-The 12th century is the age when national feeling in the different
-countries of Europe first asserted itself strongly, and when consciousness
-of solidarity within made possible the apprehension of ideas which lie
-beyond the pale of immediate personal and national advantage. The
-conception of knighthood, hitherto determined only by land ownership and
-loyalty to a lord, was given a new interpretation, and the order of
-Knights Templars was founded, which held knighthood to be based upon
-devotion to the cause of religion and loyalty to the Saviour. Similarly
-love of war, which till then had expended itself in self-protective and
-aggressive warfare, was turned into a new channel, and the thought of the
-Crusade roused peoples of different nationalities to fight side by side,
-inspired by a common cause and actuated by a common interest. The
-authority of the Pope as a temporal ruler had reached its climax, and
-there were threatening signs of its decline, but when this power, like the
-conception of knighthood, received the new interpretation, its importance
-had never been more distinctly emphasized.
-
-The Popes who ruled between 900 and 1000 had been absorbed by party
-squabbles in Rome and had done little to raise the dignity of their office
-in other lands. But a change had come through Hildebrand, who nominally
-served, but practically ruled, five Popes before he himself sat in the
-chair of St Peter as Gregory VII (1073-1085). Owing to his influence the
-papal power rapidly increased and took a universal colouring, for, by
-identifying himself with all the wider and higher interests of humanity,
-the Pope succeeded in winning for himself the recognition of his supreme
-authority in matters both spiritual and temporal. There was something
-grand and inspiring in this conception of the Pope as the universal
-peace-maker, and of Rome as the central and supreme court of appeal of the
-civilized world, but it could not last. In proportion as national life in
-the different countries struggled into being, this overlordship of the
-Pope was felt to weigh heavily and to hamper development, and criticisms
-arose concerning his right to interfere in matters that did not appertain
-directly to the Church. At the time we are speaking of--the second half of
-the 12th century--there were indications of a distinction drawn between
-'sacerdotium' and 'imperium,' between priestly and imperial status
-considered as the rightful basis of power, with a consequent loss of
-prestige to the Church. The position of the Papacy was moreover seriously
-affected by continued schism. As a check to this loss of prestige, those
-who were in favour of papal supremacy urged that the Church must be
-strengthened in its members, and they sought an increase of influence in a
-reform of the life of the clergy generally.
-
-It has been mentioned above how from the 10th century onwards a direct
-connection had grown up between the Pope and the monastic centres, and how
-the founders of new religious orders had by a like direct connection
-secured a safeguard against wilful interference with their prerogatives by
-prince and prelate. Outside Italy it was in the monastery that the Pope
-throughout the 12th century found his chief advocates, that his spiritual
-supremacy was most earnestly emphasized, and that the belief was fostered
-that through his influence a re-organization of society could be obtained.
-
-In this connection no figure of the age is more remarkable than that of
-Bernard of Clairvaux[675] ([Dagger] 1153), 'the simple monk, clad in plain
-clothes, weakened by fasting,' whose power is felt in religious and lay
-circles alike. The secret of Bernard's influence lay in the fact that he
-was in one direction the mouthpiece of the ideal aspirations of his
-age--he emphasized the spiritual side of religion and insisted on the
-great social and moral advantages to be obtained by accepting spiritual
-direction as a guide in practical matters. By doing so he at once
-increased the reverence felt for religion and gave it a practical value.
-His very success commands admiration, repellent as his narrowness appears
-in some particulars. It is true that he diminished schism by persuading
-King Louis VI of France to recognise Pope Innocent II (1130-43), that he
-won over the German Emperor Lothar ([Dagger] 1137) to the same course; it
-is true that he founded the order of the Knights Templars, gave a new
-impulse to the order of Citeaux, and preached the Crusade; but it was he
-who declared the writings of Abelard ([Dagger] 1142) false, and who had
-Arnold of Brescia expelled from Paris on the charge of heresy.
-
-Socially and politically speaking the state of affairs in the German
-Empire during the first half of the 12th century had taken a deplorable
-turn through the choice of Konrad ([Dagger] 1152) as emperor. His
-vacillating policy left party hatred rampant between the rival houses of
-Welf (Guelph) and Hohenstaufen. On the slightest provocation this hatred
-broke out in warfare; it was checking all possibility of material progress
-and prosperity when the thought of a crusade offered a welcome diversion
-to these turbulent elements. For the first crusade few recruits had been
-drawn from any districts except the northern provinces of France, but the
-second assumed very different proportions. As early as 1145 Pope Eugenius
-was granting indulgences to those who joined it, while Bernard took up the
-idea and preached it with great success all along the Rhine. Disastrous as
-the undertaking itself proved to those who took part in it, its immediate
-effects on the countries from which the crusaders were drawn were most
-beneficial. After speaking of the terrible contentions which for years had
-set the ruling powers in Poland, Saxony and Bohemia at strife, Bishop Otto
-III of Freising ([Dagger] 1158) continues in this strain: 'Suddenly,
-through the counsel of the Most High, a speedy change was effected; and in
-a short time the turmoils of war were quieted, the whole earth seemed
-restored to peace, and unnumbered bands from France and from Germany
-received the Cross and departed to fight against its enemies.'
-
-When these crusaders had been sped on their way--a motley crowd in which
-figured emperor and king, adventurous knight, venturesome woman, and
-vagrants of every kind and of both sexes--Pope Eugenius, whose position at
-Rome was insecure and who had been staying at Clairvaux with Bernard,
-journeyed to Trier at the request of the archbishop to meet in council the
-prelates of the neighbouring districts. Among them was Heinrich,
-archbishop of Mainz (1142-53), who together with Wibald, abbot of Corvei,
-had been appointed representative of the emperor during his absence. It
-was on this occasion that some of Hildegard's writings were first
-submitted to the Pope, probably at the request of Archbishop Heinrich.
-Judging from what Hildegard says herself, Heinrich and the church at Mainz
-had accepted her writings, saying that 'they had come through God and
-through that power of prophecy by which the prophets had anciently
-written[676].'
-
-These writings were exhortations to faith and piety set forth in the form
-of revelations. Hildegard had been at work on them for the past six years,
-and they form the first part of the book 'Scivias' (that is 'Sci vias,'
-Know the ways[677]), as it now lies before us. The life of Hildegard,
-written shortly after her death, tells us that Bernard 'with the consent
-of others urged the Pope that he should not suffer so obvious a light to
-be obscured by silence, but should confirm it by authority[678].'
-
-The time was ripe for the kind of literature which comes under the heading
-of prophecies. At the time of the Second Crusade leaflets containing one
-of the so-called Sibylline prophecies had had a wide circulation and had
-greatly inflamed men's minds as to coming events[679]. Simultaneously with
-Hildegard the abbot Giovanni Gioachimo ([Dagger] after 1215) foretold
-coming events, so that later writers often cited Hildegard and Joachim
-side by side. There was something earnest and yet undefined, something
-fiery and suggestive in these writings, which appealed to the restless
-imagination of the age, for they were largely founded on the Apocalypse,
-and like the Apocalypse admitted of many interpretations. Their very
-vagueness repels the exact thinker, but attracts the mind that is
-conscious of quickened sensibilities and roused emotions, without being
-able to guide them into practical channels.
-
-Bernard of Clairvaux unhesitatingly accepted the divine origin of
-Hildegard's writings, and in a letter to her, which seems to have been
-written while the Pope's decision was pending, he addressed her in most
-respectful terms[680]: 'They tell us that you understand the secrets of
-heaven and grasp that which is above human ken through the help of the
-Holy Spirit,' he wrote among other things. 'Therefore we beg and entreat
-you to remember us before God and also those who are joined to us in
-spiritual union. For the spirit in you joining itself unto God, we
-believe that you can in great measure help and sustain us.'
-Hildegard--with a mixture of self-assurance, and eagerness to justify that
-assurance, which is thoroughly characteristic of her--replied to Bernard
-in ecstatic terms[681], praised him for having preached the Cross and
-spoke of him as the eagle who gazes into the sun.
-
-The correspondence[682] of Hildegard is voluminous, for from the time when
-her writings first gained approval from the Pope, many lay princes and
-dignitaries of the Church, bishops and abbots, abbesses and nuns, wrote to
-her, generally asking for her good opinion or for advice, but sometimes
-propounding questions of speculative interest, to which Hildegard in reply
-sent sometimes a few sentences, sometimes a long disquisition. It is
-largely owing to this correspondence that the fame of the abbess has
-spread beyond the confines of Germany. Linde, one of the few modern
-students who has treated of Hildegard, enumerates many manuscript copies
-of these letters which are preserved in the libraries of German cities, in
-Paris, London and Oxford. The genuineness of the letters has been
-questioned on the ground that all those addressed to Hildegard are
-curiously alike, but Linde, after examining a number of manuscript copies,
-came to the conclusion that the letters were genuine[683]. In their
-present arrangement the letters do not stand in chronological order but
-according to the rank of the correspondents, so that those written by
-Popes to Hildegard with their replies stand first, then come those written
-by archbishops, bishops, emperors, and so on. With few exceptions there is
-only one letter from each correspondent, an arrangement which suggests the
-work of a scribe, who for the sake of uniformity may in some instances
-have selected from or summarized his material. The letters printed by
-Migne are a hundred and forty-five in number, but Linde refers to a few
-more in his list with the remark that parts of the correspondence exist
-separately and are sometimes cited as separate works[684].
-
-These letters of Hildegard's, as well as her other writings, contain many
-references to herself; she never fails to inform us of the circumstances
-which led her to begin a work. She tells us that she was middle-aged when
-she first wrote an account of her visions, but that she had been subject
-to these visions from her earliest childhood, and that the mental agonies
-she went through before she sought relief in writing were ever present to
-her mind.
-
-Moreover we are in possession of an account of her life written between
-1181 and 1191, of which the first part is by Godefrid, who introduces
-extracts from the book 'Scivias.' The second and third parts are by
-Theodor, who uses an autobiography of Hildegard of which we have no other
-mention. It appears from the Acts of Inquisition of the year 1233 which
-were drafted to establish Hildegard's claim to canonization, that both
-these monks had stayed with Hildegard.
-
-Summarizing the contents of these different accounts and the information
-which the voluminous writings of the abbess supply, we gather that
-Hildegard, at the time when the Pope's attention was first drawn to her,
-was between forty and fifty years of age; that she was a daughter of one
-of the landed gentry, and that she had been given into the care of the
-nuns of Disibodenberg at the age of seven and had made profession at
-fourteen. Disibodenberg[685], situated on the river Nahe, was a monastery
-of some importance and has preserved annals extending from 831 to 1200
-which contain useful contributions to contemporary history. The house was
-under the rule of an abbot, but a convent of nuns had been lately added to
-it when Hildegard came there; this convent was under the rule of the
-'magistra' Jutta, sister of Meginhard, Count of Sponheim. From Jutta
-Hildegard received her training, which included a knowledge of books of
-devotion, scripture and music. Apparently she could not write German[686],
-and in Latin her acquaintance with grammatical inflection and construction
-was limited[687], so that when she began to write she availed herself of
-the help of a monk and afterwards of that of some nuns of her convent who
-helped her to polish (limare) her sentences.
-
-During the years she spent at Disibodenberg she seems to have been devoted
-to nursing[688], and the consecration of a chapel in the infirmary about
-this time leaves us to infer that there were in this monastery special
-conveniences for the sick[689]. In the year 1136 she succeeded Jutta as
-lady superior, and at once formed the plan of leaving Disibodenberg and
-settling some distance away on the Rupertsberg near Bingen on the Rhine,
-in a convent foundation of her own. But at first Kuno ([Dagger] 1155),
-abbot of Disibodenberg, opposed her going and cast doubts on the vision in
-which she declared she was divinely directed to do so[690], while many who
-did not belong to the monastery, and among them the parents of girls who
-had been given into her care, disapproved of their daughters being taken
-to a distant and desolate neighbourhood[691]. But Hildegard persisted, for
-the accommodation at the monastery was insufficient for herself and her
-numerous pupils, and besides as abbess at the Rupertsberg she would have a
-very different standing. She fell ill, and then, chiefly through the
-intercession of friends outside who made grants of land and helped her
-towards the erection of new buildings, the abbot was brought to agree to
-her wishes. Among others Heinrich, archbishop of Mainz, advocated her
-going, and about the year 1147 she removed to the new settlement with
-eighteen young women. We have a description of the influence she exerted
-over these girls, her spiritual daughters, when they were still at
-Disibodenberg. In the new home Hildegard adopted the rule of St Benedict,
-but she met with opposition, for some of the young women objected to the
-greater restrictions put upon them by the new rule, and the abbess needed
-the help and support of the better and wiser ones amongst them to overcome
-the difficulty. After the labour of moving Hildegard fell ill and lay
-prostrate for several years, till she was strengthened and restored by
-visions of the work that still lay before her.
-
-The Acts of Inquisition tell us that there was accommodation on the
-Rupertsberg for fifty professed nuns (dominae), seven poor women and two
-priests[692], but the independence of the nunnery was not easily secured
-and Hildegard repeatedly travelled to Disibodenberg to settle matters. The
-men's convent continued to supply priests to the women on the Rupertsberg,
-but as late as 1170 difficulties occurred in regard to their appointment,
-and we find Hildegard writing to Pope Alexander begging him to admonish
-the abbot of Disibodenberg in her behalf[693].
-
-A considerable portion of 'Scivias' was written before Hildegard removed
-to the Rupertsberg. She has described in the introduction to the book how
-she was led to write it[694].
-
-'It was in my forty-third year, when I was trembling in fearful
-anticipation of a celestial vision, that I beheld a great brightness
-through which a voice from heaven addressed me: "O fragile child of earth,
-ash of ashes, dust of dust, express and write that which thou seest and
-hearest. Thou art timid, timid in speech, artless in explaining, unlearned
-in writing, but express and write not according to art but according to
-natural ability, not under the guidance of human composition but under the
-guidance of that which thou seest and hearest in God's heaven above; what
-thus thou hearest proclaim, like a listener who understanding the words of
-his teacher, as this teacher wills and indicates, so gives expression to
-his words according to the power of his speech. Thus thou, O child of
-earth, proclaim what thou seest and hearest, and put it in writing, not as
-thou or others will it, but as He wills who knows, sees and disposes of
-all in the depths of His mysteries." Again I heard a voice from heaven,
-saying: "Speak these wonderful things, write them in thy unlearned way,
-proclaim them." And it happened in the year 1141 of Christ's incarnation,
-when I was forty-two years and seven months old, that a fiery light of
-great brilliancy streaming down from heaven entirely flooded my brain, my
-heart and my breast, like a flame that flickers not but gives glowing
-warmth, as the sun warms that on which he sheds his rays. Then of a sudden
-I had the power of explaining Scripture, that is the Psalter, the Gospels
-and the other Catholic books both of the Old and of the New Testament
-(Psalterium, Evangeliorum et aliorum catholicorum tam Veteris quam Novi
-Testamenti volumina), though I did not understand the inflections of
-words, their division into syllables, their cases and tenses. I had been
-conscious from earliest girlhood of a power of insight, and visions of
-hidden and wonderful things, ever since the age of five years, then and
-ever since. But I did not mention it save to a few religious persons who
-followed the like observances with myself; I kept it hidden by silence
-until God in His grace willed to have it made manifest.'
-
-In this strain she tells how her visions came to her, not when she was
-asleep or when she was dreaming or in any way excited, but in the most
-serious of moods. They had for years perturbed her, and she had shrunk
-from putting them into writing, when a sudden illness came upon her and
-made her alter her mind. Then in her own words, 'a noble high-born girl
-and the man whom I had secretly sought and consulted, were witnesses to
-how I set my hand to the task'--that is to the composition of 'Scivias.'
-
-It would lead us too far to give a summary of the contents of this
-extraordinary book; it is divided into three parts, the first containing
-the account of six, the second of seven, and the third of thirteen
-visions, all of which seem to have taken place in the following way.
-Hildegard is confronted by a bright light, which radiates over some
-wonderful piece of imagery, a mountain, an abyss, some beast, man, or
-building, or part of the firmament, which, with the figures that throng
-around, she minutely describes, and then she gives an explanation of the
-allegorical meaning of this picture vouchsafed to her from God in heaven.
-The real and the unreal alike supply material for these visions, which
-show great powers of imagination; in their allegorical application they
-dwell upon the Creed, the Scriptures, the Incarnation, the Trinity, and
-life hereafter, and other questions of doctrinal and theological interest.
-The descriptions are highly coloured throughout, but their application is
-often very obscure. A translation of the opening passages of one of the
-visions, which turns on the protection afforded to the faithful against
-the wiles of the devil, will give some idea of the character of their
-imagery[695].
-
-'Then I saw a shining light, wide and high as a mountain, which spreading
-upwards flashed into many tongues of fire (linguas). And outside it stood
-a number of men clad in white, in front of whom, like a veil, transparent
-crystal extended from their breasts downwards to their feet. But before
-this band, in their pathway, lay a dragon (vermis) of huge size and
-length, of such terrible and threatening aspect as cannot be expressed. On
-his left was as it were a market-place where the riches of this world lay
-heaped, wealth delightful to the eye, where buying and selling went on;
-some people passed by this place in a great hurry without buying, while
-others drew near slowly and stayed to buy and sell. The dragon was black
-and hairy, and covered with venomous excrescences, of which five kinds
-extended from his head over his body to his feet in the shape of rings;
-one was green, one white, one red, one yellow, one black, and all were
-equally charged with deadly venom. His head was broken, causing his left
-jaw to hang down. His eyes were red and flashed fire; his ears were round
-and furred; his nostrils and mouth were those of a dragon (vipera), he had
-the hands of a man, the feet of a dragon, and below a short horrible tail.
-And his neck, hands and feet were bound by a chain and this chain was
-fixed to the abyss, and held him so fast that he could not move away to
-suit his wicked will. From his mouth poured forth four streams of flame,
-of which one rose aloft, a second spread towards the children of this
-world, a third towards the company of just men, the last towards the
-abyss. The flames which rose aloft threatened those who aspired to heaven,
-who move in three ranks, one touching the sky, the other betwixt heaven
-and earth, the third close to earth, and all were crying, "We are striving
-to reach heaven." But some of them, although touched by the flames, fell
-not, others barely kept their footing, yet others falling again to earth,
-gathered themselves up and went forth anew.--The flames which spread
-towards the children of this world reached some and burnt them to utter
-blackness, of others they took hold, turning them hither and thither; yet
-others burst away, and striving towards those who were nearing heaven
-shouted out aloud: "Ye faithful ones, give us help!" But some remained as
-though spell-bound.--The flames which ran to the company of the just
-covered some with blackness; the company of the just moved in six ranks,
-and those whom the cruel flames wounded not were tainted by the poison of
-the dragon which issued from the green, white, red, yellow, and black
-parts of its body.--The flames which sought the abyss carried various
-punishments to those who had not been cleansed by baptism, who ignored the
-true faith and worshipped Satan instead of God. And I further saw arrows
-pouring from the dragon's mouth, black smoke issuing from his body,
-steaming liquid bubbling from his sides, and excretions going out from the
-lower part of his body, like to frogs that are disastrous to man, and
-which bring infection to many. And a black mist with foul odour going
-forth contaminated all.
-
-'But lo and behold the men shining in brilliancy advanced towards this
-dragon to fight and vex it, whom it could harm neither by fire nor by
-poison. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me: "God, who disposes
-all in wisdom, summons His faithful band to the glory of their heritage;
-the old deceiver lies in wait and tries his evil powers, but he is
-overcome, his presumption is defeated; they attain their heavenly
-heritage, and he suffers eternal disgrace. Therefore dost thou behold a
-shining light, wide and high as a mountain, flashing upwards into many
-tongues of fire, which is the justice of God, as it glows in the faith of
-believers, setting forth the breadth of His holiness, the height of His
-glory, by which glory are declared the wondrous powers of the divine
-Spirit."'
-
-All the visions of the first two parts of the book are written in this
-vague indefinite strain, but in the third Hildegard, conscious of the
-evils that had come upon the Church through the schism in the Papacy,
-became more outspoken in her views, and enlarged on the true faith being
-shaken, on Holy Scripture being disregarded, and on the great works of
-learned men being neglected. She says definitely that there can be no life
-where the head is severed from the limbs; and such, in her estimation, is
-the condition of the Church while schism continues. In common with a
-current view, she expected that things would go from bad to worse till the
-coming of Antichrist, whose appearance and influence she describes in
-eloquent and impressive imagery[696]. The apprehensive tone of these
-descriptions is in agreement with the growing consciousness of wickedness
-and personal responsibility, which assumed such proportions during the
-latter half of the 12th century, and made the minds of many prepared for
-the altruistic doctrines spread abroad by the orders of friars.
-
-The last vision of the book 'Scivias' lays stress upon the final
-revolution and reconciliation which will follow the reign of Antichrist
-and the times of trouble, and in this vision occur passages in dialogue,
-cast into dramatic form and called a symphony (symphonia), which rank
-among the finest productions of their kind[697]. The subject of this
-improvised drama is 'the Progress of the Soul on her way to heaven.' It
-opens with a lament of those Souls who are still confined in the body,
-whereupon one Faithful Soul (Fidelis anima), who is set free, raises her
-voice in supplication, calling on the Virtues or Divine Powers (Virtutes)
-for assistance. They respond and promise help, when Divine Knowledge
-(Scientia Dei) raises her voice and adds to the consciousness of
-helplessness in the Faithful Soul, who is now importuned on one side by
-Pride or the Devil (Diabolus) and on the other by Humility (Humilitas),
-both of whom are striving to gain possession of her. But the Virtues urge
-her to hold by Humility and the Devil is put to flight, whereupon the
-Virtues guide the Faithful Soul upwards to Heaven where she is finally
-received by Victory (Victoria). The whole ends with a hymn in praise of
-Christ which is sung by the Virtues.
-
-It is probable that only the first and second parts of the work 'Scivias'
-were laid before the Pope in 1146. He wrote to Hildegard as abbess of the
-Rupertsberg, and the letter is short and curt[698]. He refers to her
-wonderful powers and then continues: 'We congratulate ourselves in this
-grace of God, and we congratulate thee, but we would have thee reminded
-that God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the lowly. Take good
-care of this grace which is within thee in order that what thou art
-spiritually (in spiritu) urged to proclaim, thou mayest proclaim with
-caution.' And he adds words to the effect that he confirms the settlement
-she has founded.
-
-The whole of the lengthy reply[699] which Hildegard sent to this letter
-was written in an admonitory tone, for she considered herself the chosen
-mouthpiece of God though characterizing herself as a poor lowly woman.
-'The light stays with me and glows in my soul as it has done since my
-childhood,' she says to the Pope, 'therefore I send thee these words, a
-true admonition from God.' A mass of imagery follows, powerful and direct,
-but not always clear in its application.
-
-In one place she writes: 'A jewel lies on the road, a bear comes, and
-deeming it beautiful puts out his paw and would treasure it in his bosom'
-(the bear is the German Emperor)[700]. 'But suddenly an eagle snatches the
-jewel, wraps it in the covering of his wings and bears it upwards to the
-royal palace' (the eagle represents the Pope, the palace the kingdom of
-Christ). 'The jewel gives out much light before the king, so that he
-rejoices and out of love of the jewel gives to the eagle golden shoes'
-(the insignia of papal authority), 'and praises him for his goodness. Now
-do thou, who art sitting in the place of Christ in care of the Church,
-choose the better part; be as the eagle overcoming the bear, that with the
-souls entrusted to thee thou mayest decorate the palace of the Church; so
-that with golden shoes thou mayest rise aloft and be removed from thine
-enemies.'
-
-Other images follow. It is told how the valleys overtop the hills and then
-the hills overtop the valleys, with the obvious application that no order
-is maintained in the Church, since the lower clergy presume upon and the
-higher abuse their powers; each one neglecting to do his duty, and class
-being envious of class. 'The poor man is very foolish who, when he knows
-that his garment is soiled, looks at others and reflects on the appearance
-of their clothes, instead of washing and cleaning his own.... Therefore,
-do thou, great shepherd called upon to follow Christ, supply a light to
-the hills, a rod to the valleys. Give to the teachers precepts, bring unto
-the lowly discipline.' And further, 'Make all things pure and have thine
-eyes everywhere.'
-
-After settling near Bingen Hildegard completed the book 'Scivias' and then
-engaged on the compilation of two books on medicine, one of which has
-never been published[701]. The other is usually called 'Physica'; its
-amplified title runs, 'On the nature of man, of the various elements and
-of various creatures and plants, and on the way in which they are useful
-to man[702].' This book, of which the printing press issued several
-editions in the 16th century, has been characterised by the scientist
-Virchow as an early 'materia medica, curiously complete considering the
-age to which it belongs[703].' Haeser, in his history of medicine, also
-points out the importance of the work, saying that 'it contains
-descriptions of the medicinal properties of the best-known animals, plants
-and minerals, together with directions how to improve accepted remedies
-against illness in man and beast[704].' He considers that the book has an
-historical value because it is an independent German treatise based
-chiefly on popular experience, for no writer except Isidor of Seville
-([Dagger] 636) is made use of in it. In this connection it has been
-further commented on by Jessen[705].
-
-The book consists of a collection of terse bits of description, of
-sensible advice, and of old-world superstitions. It is so arranged that a
-description is given first of plants (230 in number), and then of elements
-(14), trees (60), stones (26), fishes (37), birds (72), animals (43), and
-lastly of metals (8). The German term for each object is given and its
-health-giving or obnoxious properties are mentioned. Thus the description
-of the mulberry tree is followed by the information that a decoction of
-its leaves forms an efficacious remedy in cases of skin disease, and after
-the description of prunes comes the information that they are good for a
-dry cough. When treating of the pig Hildegard states that pork is
-indigestible and should be avoided in cases of sickness. While some
-descriptions are excellent and obviously based on direct observation, as
-for example that of the properties of soda, others are entirely
-fabulous, such as that of the unicorn. We get the savour of primitive
-leechcraft in the statements that carrying about a dead frog is good for
-the gout, that drinking water out of a cypress bowl rids one of devils and
-fantasies, and that eating raven's flesh should be avoided since it
-encourages thieving propensities. In regard to diagnosis of disease
-Hildegard's ideas are necessarily vague. The illnesses referred to are
-chiefly indigestion, fevers, coughs, delusions and leprosy. Several kinds
-of leprosy are distinguished, and the chief remedies prescribed are baths
-in decoctions of leaves and other less savoury preparations.
-
-In the light of information such as is contained in this book, the
-wonderful cures which Hildegard and many other early saints are said to
-have effected take a new meaning. It is generally allowed that the fame of
-monasteries as curative centres is founded on a basis of fact which
-consists in their healthy situation, abundance of pure water, and regular
-diet. But evidently there is more than this. When we look through the
-'Physica,' compiled under Hildegard's direction if not directly by her, we
-feel that, if we could only see behind the veil of the miraculous through
-which all religious writers persist in looking at the alleviation of
-physical and mental suffering, we should be brought face to face with much
-judicious treatment and with the application of a considerable amount of
-medicinal knowledge.
-
-During the early part of her stay on the Rupertsberg Hildegard also wrote
-a book of Latin texts for hymns (before 1153) which are accompanied by
-musical notation[706],--certain 'Expositions of the Gospels' (before 1157)
-for the use of her nuns, which have not been printed[707],--an explanation
-'of the rule of St Benedict[708],'--and another 'of the symbol of St
-Athanasius[709].' In the opening sentences of this last work she describes
-the difficulties she had to contend with in founding the nunnery, and
-admonishes the nuns to guard against division and discord when she is no
-more. Another work entitled 'Vitae meritorum,' consisting of moral
-admonitions, was written between 1158 and 1162, but has not been
-printed[710]. A series of questions was forwarded to her by Guibert of
-Gembloux and was the occasion of a lengthy reply, sent to him in the form
-of a letter[711]. Hildegard also either invented or perpetuated in writing
-a glossary of words of a secret language, each term accompanied by its
-equivalent in Latin or in German, sometimes in both. Scholars look upon
-this work as containing words invented by members of the convent to be
-used in the presence of strangers for the purpose of secret
-communication[712].
-
-These writings give proof of Hildegard's active interest in her convent,
-though at the same time she remained keenly alive to events outside. The
-choice of Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190) as successor to Konrad proved
-favourable in many respects to German lands, but the position of the
-Papacy was further jeopardised when Friedrich fell out with Pope Hadrian
-(1154-59). After the death of this Pope Friedrich did not support his
-legitimate successor Alexander III (1159-81), but the successive
-Antipopes, Victor IV ([Dagger] 1164), Paschalis III ([Dagger] 1168) and
-Calixtus III (resigned 1178). The cities of northern Italy tried to secure
-autonomy, and plotted against the Emperor. Again and again their rebellion
-obliged him to cross the Alps and devote himself to their subjection,
-while several of his powerful German prelates at home, by no means
-convinced of the rightfulness of his cause, sided with Pope Alexander,
-some secretly, some openly, against the Antipope and the Emperor.
-Hildegard joined this party and charged the Emperor with being partly
-responsible for the continued schism and for the diminished authority of
-the Church. With these views she wrote a letter full of adulation to
-Eberhard, archbishop of Salzburg (1147-1164), who adhered to
-Alexander[713], and sent dark forebodings of impending disaster to Arnold,
-archbishop of Mainz (1153-1160[714]). It would lead too far to dwell upon
-the numerous letters written during these years by the abbess who,
-believing herself to possess a miraculous insight into things, wrote
-sometimes in a threatening, sometimes in an admonitory, and sometimes in
-an encouraging strain. The outside world generally, including many clever
-and cultivated men, held her to be divinely enlightened. Arnold II,
-archbishop of Cöln (1151-1156), wrote to entreat her to send him her
-writings whatever their state[715]. The abbot of Elwangen wrote saying
-that she could 'speak of the present, uncover the past, and foresee the
-future[716],' and the provost and clergy of Trier wrote to consult her in
-their trouble, and declared her 'filled by the Holy Ghost and acquainted
-with things which are hidden from mankind generally[717].'
-
-Many powerful prelates, abbots and abbesses sought confirmation of their
-views or advice in tribulation from the learned abbess. Her fame spread
-beyond the confines of Germany, for we find the patriarch of Jerusalem
-addressing a letter to her, in which he said that he was living in sad
-straits and begged for her prayers, and Hildegard, evidently influenced by
-his exalted position, urging him to remain steadfast and assuring him that
-while his faith is firm he need not despair[718].
-
-Among the letters which refer to convent matters we note one addressed to
-Heinrich, the archbishop of Mainz. In early days he had supported
-Hildegard, but at a later date he advocated against her wish the promotion
-of one of her nuns to the post of abbess in another convent, thus drawing
-on himself Hildegard's scorn and anger. The nun was Hiltrud of Sponheim,
-who had helped Hildegard to put 'Scivias' into writing and whose loss was
-a serious matter to her. She vented her anger by attacking the bishop and
-threatening him with ruin. 'The rod you raise is not raised in the
-interest of God,' she wrote to him[719], and ended her letter with these
-words: 'your days are numbered, remember how Nebuchadnezzar fell and lost
-his crown. Many others who presumed that they would attain to heaven have
-likewise fallen.' In point of fact Heinrich was soon afterwards charged
-with wasting the goods of the Church, was deposed and died in exile.
-
-Another nun, who had also helped Hildegard with her writing and left her
-against her wish, was Richardis, sister of Hartwich, bishop of Bremen
-(1148-1168). The correspondence includes a letter from Hartwich to
-Hildegard, telling her that his sister died shortly after accepting her
-post as abbess, that she always regretted having left Hildegard and would
-have returned to her if she had lived. Hildegard in reply speaks warmly of
-the virtues of Richardis, and says that she finds comfort in the thought
-that God has removed her from the vanities of this world[720].
-
-Abbesses of many convents, convinced of Hildegard's being divinely
-inspired, wrote to her for advice concerning personal matters. Thus the
-abbess of Altwick near Utrecht asked if she were justified in resigning
-her post and becoming a recluse, and Hildegard in reply urged her not to
-yield to temptation but to remain in charge of her flock[721]. The abbess
-Sophie of Kizzingen had the same wish but was likewise advised to
-persevere in her vocation[722]. Among numerous other letters from the
-superiors of convents there is one from the abbess Adelheid of Gandersheim
-([Dagger] 1184) who had been educated by Hildegard and who wrote begging
-for news and saying that she was shortly coming on a visit[723].
-
-Among the letters bearing on Hildegard's religious attitude is one
-addressed to Philip von Heinsberg, an earnest adherent of Pope Alexander.
-He afterwards became archbishop of Cöln, and Hildegard wrote warning him
-of the dangers to be apprehended from a sect of heretics, doubtless the
-so-called Cathari, of whom more later[724]. This sect were at the time in
-possession of a well-planned organization in the Rhine districts, and
-aroused serious apprehension in religious circles. The archbishop of Cöln,
-Reinald von Dassel (1159-1167), disputed with them; Ekbert, a monk of
-Schönau to whom we shall return, directly attacked their doctrines, and in
-1163 a number of them were burnt to death at Cöln. It is interesting to
-note what fears they inspired and how their doctrines were interpreted. In
-the eyes of Hildegard there is no doubt as to their being altogether evil.
-
-The situation of the Rupertsberg near the Rhine, the highway of
-communication in those days, kept Hildegard in touch with the outside
-world. She received many visitors and took frequent journeys. We hear of
-her going to Cöln, Trier, Würzburg, Bamberg and to many monasteries in the
-neighbourhood, but the story that she went as far as Paris and Tours is
-unfounded--the result of a misinterpreted passage in the account of her
-life[725]. Personal acquaintance with Hildegard seems only to have
-confirmed the belief in her superior abilities and her direct converse
-with the Godhead--a curious illustration of the credulity of the age, with
-its craving for signs and wonders.
-
-Her clear-sightedness and consciousness of prophetic power increased with
-age, and there is the strongest evidence of them in her last important
-work, which bears the title of 'The Book of Divine doings[726].' It was
-written between 1163 and 1170, 'when the apostolic see was most seriously
-oppressed,' and for imaginativeness, breadth of knowledge and power of
-generalization ranks highest among Hildegard's works.
-
-The leading idea of this book is to establish parallels, sometimes between
-things divine and human, sometimes between the physical and the spiritual
-world, sometimes between the facts of the Biblical narrative and their
-allegorical meaning, with a view to glorifying God in His works. It
-contains vivid bits of description, valuable glimpses of contemporary
-scientific knowledge, and occasional brilliant similes, but the
-conceptions among which it moves are so entirely those of a past age that
-it is often difficult to grasp their import.
-
-Thus in the first vision there is the description of the creation of man
-in the image and the likeness of God, which is supposed to account for the
-complexity of the human being. In another vision the heavenly spheres are
-set forth according to the accepted astronomical theory, and their
-movements within each other and mutual interdependence are described. In
-each of these spheres resides a spiritual influence, such as divine grace,
-good works, or repentance, and as the heavenly spheres influence each
-other, so these spiritual influences control and determine the nature of
-man. Many of the parallels are extremely curious, such as those between
-things physical and physiological, in which the external influences of
-wind, weather and the constellations are treated in connection with the
-humours of the human body. For the humours in the human body are so
-disposed that their undue pressure on heart, lungs or liver upsets the
-balance of the constitution and produces stomachic disorders, fevers,
-pleurisy, leprosy, etc., thus showing that these illnesses are indirectly
-the outcome of physical surroundings.
-
-The learned abbess also draws parallels between the configuration of the
-surface of the earth with its heights and depths, and human nature with
-its heights of virtue and depths of vice[727]. Forced as some of these
-comparisons appear to modern ideas, the language in which they are given
-shows considerable appreciation of phenomena in nature. Hildegard
-amplifies her book by disquisitions on passages in Job, the Psalms, St
-John, and the Apocalypse, which bear on the relation of light to life, of
-the spirit to the word, and of mental to physical darkness. The moments
-of the Creation are explained in their allegorical application, and give
-rise to comparisons such as this[728]: that the firmament of faith, like
-the firmament of nature, is illumined by two kinds of light; the greater
-light, like that of day, comes through prelates and spiritual teachers,
-the lesser light, like that of night, through kings and secular princes.
-In another passage man is likened to the soul and woman to the body, for
-the soul is of heaven and the body of earth, and their combination makes
-human life possible[729]. The wickedness which preceded the Flood, the
-falling away from the true faith, and the manner in which God chastised
-man by means of water and fire, are described in very impressive language,
-and together with a description of the Plagues of Egypt, lead up to the
-last vision, which enlarges on the evils of the time and on coming events.
-Here again as in 'Scivias' we have a description of impending changes, of
-threatening disaster, and of the results of the coming of Antichrist; it
-is perhaps as emphatic in the way of prophecy as anything that has ever
-been written. Contemporaries were powerfully impressed by this part of the
-book; even to later ages it appeared truly remarkable. Again and again in
-times of trouble and difficulty men have gone to it and found
-corroboration of the changes which were taking place around them. The
-reader can judge for himself how men's minds at the time of the
-Reformation were likely to be affected by the perusal of passages such as
-those which follow, in which the collapse of the German Empire--that is
-the Roman Empire of the German nation--and the Papacy, and their falling
-asunder had been described three hundred years before by the abbess of the
-Rupertsberg[730].
-
-'In the days to come the Emperors of the Roman See, forfeiting the power
-by which they had up to that time firmly upheld the Roman Empire, will
-become feeble in all their glory, so that the empire that has been given
-into their hands by divine power will gradually become enfeebled and fail,
-until they themselves, becoming sordid, feeble, servile and criminal in
-their practices, will be altogether useless, and yet they will claim to be
-respected by the people; but being indifferent to the people's welfare,
-they cannot be respected or held high. Then the kings and princes of the
-various peoples, who before were subject to the Roman Empire, will cut
-themselves off from it and refuse to be ruled by it. And thus the Roman
-Empire will sink to decay. For each clan and each people will set up a
-king unto themselves whom they will respect, alleging that the greatness
-of the Roman Empire was previously more an encumbrance to them than an
-advantage. But after the Imperial sceptre in this way has been divided,
-never to be restored, then the dignity of the Apostolic See (infula) will
-be impaired also. For neither princes nor other men, of the religious or
-the lay orders, will uphold any religion in the name of the Apostolic See,
-and they will violate the dignity of that name. They will appoint unto
-themselves other teachers and archbishops under some other name in the
-various districts, so that the Apostolic See (apostolicus), impaired in
-its standing through collapse of its dignity, will barely maintain its
-hold on Rome and on a few adjoining districts. This will come about partly
-through the irruptions of war, partly through the common consent and unity
-of religious and lay folk, who will demand of each secular prince that he
-fortify and rule his kingdom and his people, and of whatever archbishop or
-other spiritual teacher who is appointed that he exert discipline over
-those who are subject to him, lest they again experience the evils which
-by divine decree they experienced once before.'
-
-Various interpretations have in the course of time been given to
-Hildegard's prophecies, and a number of pamphlets, some consisting of
-amplified passages of her works, some entirely spurious, have circulated
-under her name. In the 13th century she was held to have indicated the
-threatened downfall of the Dominican friars[731], and even in England in
-the 'Creed of Piers Ploughman' we are called to 'hearken to
-Hildegard[732].' At the time of the Reformation the attention genuine
-passages from her writings attracted was very considerable, and again in
-the 17th century they were interpreted as foretelling the downfall of the
-Jesuits[733]. Even in the course of the present century, passages taken
-from Hildegard's writings have been explained as foretelling the revolt of
-Belgium[734].
-
-Hildegard lived to the advanced age of eighty-two. Her last writings,
-which were purely legendary, were a life of St Rupert, the patron saint
-of her nunnery[735], and a life of St Disibodus, patron saint of the
-monastery she had left[736]. As for Disibodus Wattenbach says that 'there
-is no mention of him previous to the 12th century[737].' Indeed Grimm has
-explained the name 'Disiboden' as a height hallowed to holy women (idisi),
-in which case, if an early Christian dwelt there at all, he must have
-taken his name from the height. In 1178 Hildegard passed away after a
-short illness, and soon after her death an enquiry was instituted with a
-view to her official canonization. In spite of renewed efforts this was
-not accomplished, but her name was placed on the Roman Martyrology and she
-is reckoned among the accepted saints of the Church[738].
-
-Surely it is curious that no attempt has hitherto been made to submit the
-writings and influence of Hildegard to a detailed critical examination.
-The few accounts which tell of her, such as that of Schmelzeis[739], are
-dictated solely by the wish to show how divine grace was made manifest in
-her. The reprint of her chief works and a descriptive account of the
-extant manuscript copies of her writings, and of genuine and
-supposititious works[740], have now brought the material for such an
-enquiry within reach of the student, and made it possible to obtain an
-analysis of the aims and character of a woman whose influence and
-popularity were far-reaching, and on whom later ages in recognition of her
-powers have bestowed the epithet of the 'Sibyl of the Rhine[741].'
-
-It remains to cast a glance at the writings of Elisabeth, the nun at
-Schönau, who contemporaneously with Hildegard was held to be divinely
-inspired, and who, 'while Hildegard acted as adviser to Emperor and Pope,
-in humbler wise influenced the clergy and the people[742].' In later ages
-the names of Hildegard and Elisabeth were frequently coupled together, and
-their efforts to rouse the representatives of the Church to greater
-consciousness of their responsibilities were looked upon as a proof of
-God's wish to restore the supreme influence of the Church. The nun
-Elisabeth dwelt in the women's convent which was attached to the
-Benedictine monastery of Schönau in the diocese of Trier. She went there
-in 1141 at a youthful age, and in 1157 she became lady superior
-(magistra). Her brother Ekbert ([Dagger] 1184) while a canon at Bonn
-frequently visited her, and it was through her persuasion that he finally
-became a monk at Schönau. He was a writer of some importance, well known
-for his exhortations against the heretic Cathari; he had been educated
-with Reinald von Dassel, afterwards archbishop of Cöln, and with him
-adhered to the cause of the Emperor and the Antipope Victor. Elisabeth was
-inspired by similar political sympathies. For unlike Hildegard, who was an
-ardent supporter of Pope Alexander, Elisabeth was favourably inclined
-towards his opponent Pope Victor--a preference which laid her open to
-calumny.
-
-The 'Visions' of Elisabeth came to her between 1152 and 1160, and we are
-told that they were sent her in the first place for her own comfort,
-direction and enlightenment. They are grouped together in three books, but
-there is a later work entitled 'On the ways of God,' which is sometimes
-referred to as a fourth book of the visions[743]. She also wrote
-'Revelations on the holy band of Virgins at Cöln.' Her collected works
-fill the smaller half of a moderately sized volume.
-
-It is supposed that Elisabeth was helped by her fellow-nuns to put the
-visions of the first books into writing, and that her brother Ekbert
-assisted in their circulation. The manuscript from which they were
-published contains an introduction by Ekbert written after he had become
-abbot at Schönau (1167), in which he says he has collected (conscripsi)
-these writings and other things that have reference to them, and that he
-has translated into Latin what happened to be in German[744].
-
-The first book of the 'Visions' contains short accounts of how on certain
-festal days during religious service Elisabeth, who was delicate and apt
-to get excited at the mention of certain saints, asserts she saw them
-before her bodily. It is described how she was liable at any time to fall
-into trances, in which she lost consciousness of what happened around her.
-In the second and third books the accounts of the visions are fuller and
-more elaborate; they contain interesting bits of imagery and symbolism,
-and give us occasional glimpses of the daily life in the convent. It is
-curious to note how the fancied visions of the nun were in various
-particulars accepted by her contemporaries as manifestations of the divine
-will. The party in the Church, who were desirous of establishing the
-'Assumption of the Virgin' as a recognised festival, greeted Elisabeth's
-vision of this incident[745] with enthusiasm. Other festivals of the
-Church, for example that of Corpus Christi, owed their general acceptance
-to inspired visions of nuns. For the emotional yearning of the age found
-relief in representations of religious ideas, and the Church readily
-ministered to the desire by elaborating the cult of relics and
-saint-worship.
-
-It is thought that Elisabeth's book 'On the ways of God[746]' was written
-after she became acquainted with the 'Scivias' of Hildegard, and her title
-looks like an imitation[747]. This work consists also of visions, but
-these are given in the form of admonitions (sermones) addressed to
-different classes of society; the work is wonderfully complete in plan and
-execution. In simple and direct language men are urged to mend their ways,
-and to listen to the admonitions which the Angel of the Lord has
-vouchsafed to them through the mouth of the nun.
-
-In this book Elisabeth sees the summit of a lofty mountain, on which
-stands a man whose face is luminous, whose eyes shine like stars and from
-whose mouth goes forth a sword. She sees three paths leading up this hill;
-one is blue, another green, and the third purple. The blue path indicates
-the use of contemplation, the green of action, and the purple of
-martyrdom. But afterwards other paths appear which also lead up the hill
-towards heaven: these are the paths of married people (conjugatorum), of
-celibates (continentium), of prelates (prelatorum), of widows
-(viduatorum), of hermits (heremitarum), of young people (adolescentum et
-juvenum) and of children (infantum).
-
-'I was resting on my bed but not asleep,' says Elisabeth, speaking of
-those who have chosen a life of contemplation[748], 'when the Angel
-(spiritus) of the Lord visited me of a sudden and inspired me to speak as
-follows: "Give heed, you, who have renounced worldly pleasures and who
-have chosen to follow in the footsteps of Him who has summoned you into
-His beauteous light and who Himself calls you His chosen sons, appointing
-you to the end of time to judge the tribes of Israel. Consider among
-yourselves in what way you should live in humility, obedience, love, and
-without murmuring, without disparagement, jealousy and pride, and take
-heed that you keep yourselves from other vices! Love one another, that
-your Father in heaven be not blasphemed in you and be not roused to anger
-at your leaving your path, the path of contemplation!" Then the Angel
-(angelus) of the Lord followed up his utterances by saying: "If there be
-among you wranglings, quarrels, disparagements, complaints, anger, hatred
-and jealousy, spiritual pride (extollencia oculorum), desire for
-advancement, boasting, ribaldry, gluttony, laziness, incontinence,
-idleness and such like, in all of which you walk on, sons of this world,
-what place do you give to divine contemplation?" And again he spoke and
-said: "This exhortation of God is addressed to you who have chosen to
-serve God whether in the clerical or in the monastic profession. You have
-chosen the best part, but take heed lest it slip from you. Studiously
-avoid the sinfulness of those who outwardly bear the semblance of
-religion, but shame its worth by their actions. With their lips they
-honour God; by their ways they blaspheme Him. Some of them strive for
-knowledge of the law, but they know not how to apply it. They turn their
-back on truth, and yet they boast of moving in the path of contemplation.
-They make the law of God and their advocacy of it serve their pride,
-avarice and desires, and from those who dwell in Jesus Christ they boldly
-snatch wealth and honours, and cherish their foulness. The sanctuary of
-God, and places to be hallowed by angels, they visit with pride and
-pollution, and raise the adorable treasures of Christ's sacrament in
-irreverent ministration with impure hearts. They jeer at him who rebukes
-them and sadden him with contempt and persecution. Those among them who
-are less wicked, are yet hateful before the Lord. For they walk about with
-the semblance of humility, but their hearts are far removed from it. They
-multiply words, but of what use are these when in their hearts they oppose
-God, neglect brotherly love, envy and disparage others, and wrangle about
-position? They profess contempt of the world, but worship that which is of
-the world, strut about boldly, and yield to every gust of their desires.
-They have cast aside the customs of their fathers; they engage in the
-business of this world and fill the Church with wranglings. Thus religion
-suffers contempt, and faith is divided. But why should I enlarge on such
-doings, saith the Lord? A shout is raised against them, but they listen
-not and repudiate my voice of admonition in contempt...."'
-
-And it is not only those of the religious profession whom the nun
-admonishes. The address to married people[749] is especially interesting,
-not only on account of her conception of the mutual obligations of husband
-and wife, claiming obedience from the wife and respect for his wife's
-feelings from the husband, but because she vehemently attacks women's love
-of dress and men's love of indulgence. The Angel of God informs Elisabeth
-that now-a-days men in large numbers degrade their desires to the level of
-women's folly, and are foolish enough to adapt themselves to women's
-stupidity. 'The love of dress, which thou dost hate and despise in the
-women of the world who come to thee, has grown apace on earth, and has
-become a madness, and brings down the wrath of God. They delight in
-walking about, their steps hampered by the mass of their garments, and
-they try to wear out to no profit what the poor sorely need. O
-wretchedness, O blindness!'
-
-It is in the course of this exhortation that Elisabeth consults the Angel
-about the heretic Cathari[750], who she states are said to reject marriage
-while teaching at the same time that only those marriages are valid where
-both parties have preserved their virginity. The Angel cannot deny that
-such marriages are most acceptable to God, but declares that they are
-rare. Yet he announces that the leaders of that sect are of Satan. 'Then,'
-the nun continues, 'I said, "Lord, what and of what kind is their faith?"
-He answered: "Their faith is contemptible, their works are worse." And I
-said: "Yet they have the appearance of just men and are praised as men of
-good works." "Truly," he replied, "they put on an appearance of just and
-innocent living, through which they attract and convert many, and yet
-inwardly they are full of the worst madness."' Considering that nothing is
-known of these early dissenters except what their opponents have
-preserved, these remarks are interesting as showing that though Hildegard
-treated the Cathari with unhesitating contempt Elisabeth was perplexed
-about them.
-
-Another exhortation addressed to the ministers of the Church is eloquent
-in its attacks on the overbearing conduct of the clergy, and on the way
-they neglect their flocks. Widows are then admonished to cultivate peace
-of mind and to reflect only on spiritual joys, and hermits are urged not
-to carry their self-denying practices to extremes, since immoderate
-fasting is productive of no good results. The book seems originally to
-have ended here, for the last two exhortations are evidently the result of
-an afterthought. In the first of these young people are recommended to
-cultivate seriousness of mind, and the second treats of young children,
-but only in a vague way, for their parents are said to be chiefly
-responsible for their behaviour. The book ends with a paragraph to the
-effect that the angel appeared and addressed the bishops of Trier, Cöln
-and Mainz telling them to amend their ways and accept the contents of the
-book. 'Read them, and hearken to their divine admonitions,' it says[751],
-'and receive them with an equable mind. Do not think they be the
-fabrications of a woman, for they are not; they have come through God, the
-Almighty Father, who is the source and origin of all goodness.'
-
-It must have been some time after she had begun to write visions that
-Elisabeth wrote the following letter to Hildegard. It is preserved in the
-third book of her visions, and also in the correspondence of Hildegard,
-together with the reply sent to it[752].
-
-'What you said had been revealed to you concerning me, I now write to
-confirm; a cloud of distrust has come over my mind owing to the foolish
-sayings of some people who are ever talking of me; they are not true. The
-talk of the people I can easily bear, but not of those who wear clerical
-garb, they bitterly oppress my spirit. For goaded on, at whose instigation
-I know not, they ridicule the grace of God that is within me, and do not
-hesitate rashly to condemn what they do not understand. I hear that
-certain letters written in their spirit are circulating under my name.
-They accuse me of having prophesied concerning the Day of Judgment, which
-I surely never have presumed to do, as knowledge of its advent is denied
-to mortal man.' She goes on to explain how the angel of God had repeatedly
-appeared to her, saying that the time for contrition and repentance had
-come, and how she had spoken of this to others. But now a letter is
-circulated, full of threats against the abbot. In her distress she begs
-that Hildegard will accept this explanation, offer prayers in her behalf
-and write her some words of consolation.
-
-In her reply to this letter Hildegard admits Elisabeth's power of
-prophecy. She also is a trumpet through which the blasts of divine
-admonition become audible. Another letter addressed to Hildegard by
-Elisabeth shows that they remained in communication[753], though their
-different church and political sympathies naturally precluded a closer
-connection.
-
-The last book Elisabeth wrote added greatly to her fame. It consists of
-'Revelations on the holy band of virgins of Cöln[754],' the companions and
-fellow-martyrs of St Ursula, the origin of which legend is shrouded in
-some obscurity[755]. The story current in Elisabeth's time in various
-versions states that in the 3rd century Ursula, a British princess, went
-on pilgrimage to Rome with 11,000 virgin companions, and that on their
-journey homewards these virgins together with many followers were murdered
-at Cöln, either by the Huns or some other heathen tribes. The name Ursula,
-however, does not occur in any of the ancient martyrologies, and therefore
-may be a latter-day addition to the story, while the extraordinary number
-of her companions is held to have originated through misreading an
-inscription which refers to eleven martyred virgins (XI M. V.). History
-speaks of virgin martyrs at Cöln at an early date.
-
-In 1156 a quantity of bones were found in an ancient cemetery outside
-Cöln, and this led to the revival of the story, which now assumed gigantic
-proportions. The relics of one of the virgins named Cordula were brought
-to Schönau by Ekbert. Elisabeth's imagination was roused, the progress of
-St Ursula, various incidents of her journey and the character of many of
-her companions, were made manifest to her in a series of visions by St
-Verena, also one of the band, who repeatedly appeared to Elisabeth and
-divinely enlightened her on various points in dispute. With the help of
-this saint Elisabeth felt enabled to explain how Pope Cyriacus (otherwise
-unknown to history) came to be of the party; how it was that archbishops,
-cardinals and a king of England accompanied these women, and what caused
-one of the band to bury, with some of the dead, tablets inscribed with
-their names, which tablets had come to light at Cöln. The whole account,
-which Elisabeth promulgated in good faith, and which her contemporaries
-had no hesitation in accepting as genuine, forms a most interesting
-example of mediaeval religious romance. It teems with chronological and
-historical impossibilities: apart from these it bears the stamp of
-truthfulness. It is pure romance, but it is romance set forth in a spirit
-of conviction and with a circumstantiality of detail thoroughly convincing
-to the uncritical mind.
-
-Throughout the Rhine district these visions were greeted with acclamation.
-They were welcome for two reasons; they increased the interest and traffic
-in the relics at Cöln, and they fell in with current traditions and
-encouraged the revived local worship of the three women-saints. The names
-of these were now connected with that of St Ursula[756], and the legend of
-St Ursula became the centre of many floating traditions, and has
-proportionately attracted the attention of the hagiologist and the
-folk-lore student. Eleven thousand became the accepted number of Ursula's
-followers and the compilers of the _Acta Sanctorum_ have actually
-succeeded in making out a list containing over seven hundred names[757].
-
-In literature the version of the legend as told by Elisabeth was accepted
-in preference to earlier versions, and became popular not only in Germany,
-but also in England and France, especially in Normandy. In England both
-the legend and the visions were known as early as 1181 through Roger, a
-monk of the Cistercian abbey at Forde in Devonshire. It is thought that he
-came into personal contact with Elisabeth at Schönau, and references are
-sometimes made to him as the compiler of the 'Visions' and as the author
-of the legend of the band of 11,000 virgins[758].
-
-Elisabeth died in 1164 at the early age of thirty-six, and her brother
-Ekbert, who was staying with her at the time, wrote a full account of the
-last days of her life to three nuns of the convent of St Thomas at
-Andernach[759]. In this letter he describes Elisabeth's thoughtful care
-and tenderness to her companions on her deathbed, and says that she was
-more than a sister to him and that his grief is proportionally greater.
-Like Hildegard Elisabeth has never been officially canonized, but her name
-also was inscribed in the Roman Martyrology compiled by Gregory VIII, by
-which she became a recognised saint of the Church[760].
-
-A later age witnessed other notable nuns who were divinely inspired and
-who were acknowledged to be so by their contemporaries, but, as we shall
-see later, their communings with God and the saints were chiefly directed
-to intensifying mystic and devotional feelings in themselves. They have
-neither the hold on outside events nor the wide outlook which give such a
-deep interest to the writings of St Hildegard of Bingen and St Elisabeth
-of Schönau.
-
-
-§ 2. Women-Saints connected with Charity and Philanthropy.
-
-The last section showed how earnestly the religious teachers of the 12th
-century advocated a stricter practice of the precepts of religion. The
-practical outcome of this advocacy was an increased consciousness among
-those of the upper and authoritative classes of society of the needs and
-sufferings of humbler folk, and an extraordinary development of pity and
-tenderness for suffering generally. It can be noticed that everywhere
-there sprang into life the desire to help those who were in distress, and
-to cultivate that love and sympathy which is indifferent to rank, degree
-and antecedents, and especially so with regard to the diseased, despised
-and shunned.
-
-The representative figures of this movement during the 13th century are St
-Francis of Assisi ([Dagger] 1226) and St Elisabeth of Thüringen ([Dagger]
-1231), whose fame will abide wherever the precepts of Christianity in the
-direction of unselfishness and charitable zeal are cherished. The tendency
-to renounce all worldly possessions, which was a feature of the 13th
-century, culminated in them, and their example was followed by many men
-and women who on account of their altruistic sympathies are numbered among
-the saints. Since the practical outcome of their efforts carries in itself
-the beginnings of our modern charitable institutions of hospital,
-almshouse and infirmary, their work is well worth a somewhat detailed
-account, but such an account must necessarily be preceded by a few general
-remarks on the development of charitable zeal in the course of history.
-
-From the earliest period Christian teachers had championed the cause of
-the poor and afflicted, and had upheld the sanctity of human life as such,
-whether in the aged, the crippled, or the unborn. Moreover the Church
-throughout ministered to poverty by almsgiving, and looked upon the
-destitute as having a special claim on her care. At two distinct periods
-in history these self-imposed duties were specially requisite--at the
-breaking up of the Roman Empire, and at the collapse of the feudal
-system. For under the Roman social system slavery had been a safeguard
-against vagrancy, but when slavery was discontinued the class of homeless
-outcasts became numerous. And again under the feudal system men belonged
-to the soil they were born on, but in proportion as serfdom ceased,
-beggars, and especially the diseased, increased to a great extent. In both
-instances efforts to stay the consequent evils to society were made by all
-professing Christians, but the attitudes of the 5th and the 12th centuries
-have distinct points of difference which it is well to bear in mind.
-
-Glancing back along the vistas of time to the 5th century we find Severin
-bishop of Noricum ([Dagger] 482) instituting a regular and far-reaching
-system of charitable relief which has been described by his disciple
-Eugippius[761]. In connection with Magnericus of Trier ([Dagger] 596), the
-famous opposer of idolatrous practices, the newly-developed virtues of
-this period are thus summed up by his biographer, the monk Eberwein
-([Dagger] 1047)[762]: 'With him (Magnericus) the hungry found bread, the
-traveller found shelter, the naked found clothing, the weary found rest,
-and the stranger found hopefulness.' We see that the efforts of these men
-were directed to ministering to poverty but not to disease, for the
-prevalent attitude of Christian society towards disease continued for some
-centuries strongly self-preservative. The poor were fed, but the diseased
-were shunned, especially those who were visibly disfigured, and who
-included the vast class of those who from the 11th century were currently
-spoken of as lepers (leprosi).
-
-The homogeneity of the disease _lepra_ in this application has been called
-into question, and it has been shown that the 'lepers' of the Middle Ages
-included those suffering from cutaneous eruption brought on by St
-Anthony's fire, from gangrene of the limbs, such as comes through
-protracted use of bread containing rye spurred or diseased with ergot, and
-from other diseases which produce visible disfigurement. Scant provision
-was made for such people during early Christian ages, and lepers were
-numbered among social outcasts, not from fear of contagion--that was a
-comparatively late idea--but simply from a wish on the part of society to
-be spared a sorry sight. The diseased member of a family was a visible
-burden to his relations, and finding himself despised and shunned by his
-associates he took refuge with outlaws, who herded together and lived in
-a state of filth, misery and moral degradation terrible to recall.
-
-It is in the treatment of these unfortunate people that the 12th century
-witnessed a revolution. The efforts of a few large-souled individuals
-overcame the general disgust felt towards disease, the restraints of a
-more barbarous age were broken through, the way to deal with the evil was
-pointed out, and gradually its mitigation was accomplished. The task these
-people set themselves, as so often happens in the course of social reform,
-absorbed them so entirely that they thought no sacrifice too great when it
-was a question of carrying out their ideas. It seems therefore rather
-gratuitous on the part of the modern scientist to say that a 'halo of
-morbid exaggeration surrounded the idea of leprosy in the mediaeval
-religious mind. We live in a time of saner and better proportioned
-sentiment,' etc.[763] In point of fact an evil is removed only by putting
-it for a time into strong relief, when it comes to be rightly dealt with
-and so is gradually checked. In early Christian times nothing was done for
-diseased people and lepers, but in the 12th and 13th centuries first
-individuals, then the masses, became interested in them. It mattered
-little that vagrants of the worst kind felt encouraged to call themselves
-lepers because as such they could excite more pity, could gain admission
-into hospitals, or were allowed to solicit alms under royal patronage. The
-movement once set going in the right direction steadily did its work: and
-the class of lepers so prominent in the 11th and 12th centuries were
-rapidly disappearing by the end of the 13th[764].
-
-From the earliest period monasteries and church centres offered some
-alleviation for the sick and distressed, but their resources were at first
-intended for the relief of those who belonged to the settlement. The
-peaceful pursuits and regular occupations of the monk naturally prolonged
-his term of life, and as Christianity set great store by a peaceful and
-happy death, when feebleness and sickness crept on the member of a convent
-he was relieved from his duties and tended in an outhouse by a brother
-told off for the purpose. The guest-house of the settlement, called
-_hospitalis_, generally stood near this outhouse for the sick, but
-sometimes it was identical with it, and the pilgrims and travellers who
-were ill were nursed with the convent inmates. While these combined houses
-for guests and invalids, attached to convents, were numerous from the
-first, the foundation of shelters intended primarily for strangers took
-place comparatively late. Among them must be numbered the shelters
-designated as hospitals (hospitales), founded in outlying districts for
-the reception of pilgrims (pro susceptione peregrinorum) such as the Pope
-urged Karl the Great ([Dagger] 814) to keep up in the Alps[765]. Pilgrims
-were always an object of solicitude to the Church, and it was in their
-interest that the earliest independent road-side shelters and hospitals in
-cities were founded. These shelters and hospitals often consisted of no
-more than the protection of a roof, and the proctor, or brothers and
-sisters who voluntarily took charge of the house, secured the needful
-sustenance for themselves and those seeking their aid by going about
-begging.
-
-The impulse to found these rests or hospitals naturally emanated from
-Rome, from a very early date the site of pilgrimages, but a new impulse
-was given to the movement by the foundation of two important guest-houses
-at Jerusalem in the 11th century, when that city also was a frequent
-resort of pilgrims. Of these two guest-houses or hospitals[766], one was
-intended for men and placed under the management of men, the other was for
-women and placed under the management of women. They were arranged
-according to an elaborate system which is interesting in many ways. The
-men were divided into three classes--the knights who looked after the
-interests of the house, the priests who attended to the sick, and the
-lay-brothers who assisted in the same work. The knights formed themselves
-into the religious order of St John, from the name of the church near
-which their headquarters lay. Similarly the women's house, which was near
-the chapel of St Mary Magdalen, consisted of ladies, nuns and lay
-servants. The fact that St John and St Mary Magdalen were so often adopted
-as patron saints of similar houses elsewhere was due to the chance
-connection of these saints with the hospitals at Jerusalem.
-
-Looking after pilgrims and nursing the sick constituted the chief work of
-the order at Jerusalem, but after the conquest of that city in 1187, when
-the knights removed to Malta and the ladies to Spain, the care of those
-not belonging to their body ceased to hold the foremost place. But the
-existence of the hospitals at Jerusalem and the attention they had
-attracted in the different countries of Europe, where grants of land had
-been made for their support, indirectly stimulated efforts in favour of
-the foundation of similar shelters or hospitals.
-
-The first idea of independent hospitals came into England from Rome, when
-Archbishop Lanfranc ([Dagger] 1089), a native of Italy, founded two
-hospitals in the true sense of the word, one inside, one outside
-Canterbury. The one situated inside the city walls is described by the
-historian Eadmer ([Dagger] 1124) in the following terms[767]. 'He divided
-it into two parts; men who were sick in various ways inhabited the one,
-women the other part. He gave to them clothes of his own and daily
-sustenance; and ordered that there should be servants and masters who were
-to take care they should want nothing; the men had no access to the women,
-nor the women to the men.' A chapel was built on the other side of the way
-and given into the care of canons, who were to attend to the spiritual
-needs of the sick and to see to their burial after death.
-
-The other hospital founded by Lanfranc was at Herbaltown, in the woods of
-Blean, a mile away from Canterbury; it was for those who were afflicted
-with scrofula (regia valetudine fluentibus), and who at a later date, in
-the confirming charter of Henry II, are styled lepers (leprosi)[768].
-
-These accounts of Lanfranc's foundations are especially interesting as
-they give us some of the earliest well-authenticated indications of a
-changed attitude towards lepers, and anticipate the efforts made in their
-behalf in the 12th century by the founders of the orders of combined
-canons and nuns, and in the 13th century by a number of women who on this
-account are numbered among the saints. These women, as we shall see, not
-only felt interested in these unfortunate beings but unhesitatingly tended
-them with their own hands. They knew nothing of the disgust usually felt
-towards wretchedness and poverty, and found their life's happiness in
-vanquishing sordidness and filth. In the eyes of some of their
-contemporaries they were chiefly bent on seeking sorry sights and coveting
-painful experiences, but, apart from the appreciation they found among
-those to whom they directly ministered, others were generous enough to
-recognise the heroism of their efforts.
-
-Among these women must be numbered Matilda ([Dagger] 1118) the wife of
-Henry I of England, the daughter of St Margaret and the sister of St David
-of Scotland, whose education and marriage have been discussed above in
-connection with Romsey. Highly as Matilda was esteemed by her
-contemporaries, she has never been accepted as a saint, and no day is
-given to her in the Calendar. This omission is perhaps due to the fact
-that she left her nunnery against the wishes of some of the clergy,
-perhaps owing to her husband's quarrels with the Pope, for Matilda was
-beloved by high and low and early writers are unanimous in praise of her.
-Map speaks of her as the holy queen Matilda (sanctae Matildis
-reginae)[769].
-
-This estimate is based on the fact that Matilda was so moved by pity
-towards lepers that she overcame the repugnance commonly felt towards
-them. A well-authenticated story is told of how her brother David, coming
-into her apartment, found it full of lepers. She proceeded to lay aside
-her robe and with a towel girt about her washed and dried their feet and
-then kissed them, and when her brother objected she replied that in
-kissing the feet of lepers she was kissing the feet of the Eternal King.
-Ailred of Rievaux recounts the story, which he had from David, who
-repeatedly spoke of it to him[770].
-
-This generous disposition is borne out by the fact that soon after her
-marriage Matilda founded the hospital of St Giles in the East for the
-maintenance of forty lepers, a chaplain, a clerk and a messenger[771]. It
-was commonly known for a long time afterwards as the hospital of Matilda.
-It was founded in 1101, and Matthew Paris saw it a hundred and fifty years
-later and made a sketch of it which is still extant[772]. With the
-exception of the house founded by Lanfranc in Herbaltown, the inmates of
-which were not styled lepers at the time, the hospital of St Giles, the
-foundation of 'good Queen Maud,' was the first institution of its kind in
-England and for a long time remained quite the most important.
-
-But we must study the records of foreign countries to find the majority of
-those women who were actively beneficent to the sick, and who for this
-reason are officially accepted as saints. Probably leprosy, or the
-diseases collected under this designation, showed greater virulence on the
-Continent than they ever did in England, and the miseries of those who
-were repulsively disfigured were extreme, when in the first half of the
-13th century a small group of women personally related to each other took
-pity on them. The field of their labours was in Central and South Germany
-and the adjoining countries, which were at that time brought under German
-influence.
-
-All the women who were actuated by this new philanthropic spirit were
-members, either by birth or marriage, of the powerful and influential
-family of the Counts of Andechs and Meran[773]. The scientist Virchow has
-remarked that this family, which was once most prosperous and widely
-spread, practically extinguished itself through its extreme ascetic
-tendencies[774]. Its men joined the Crusades, and any who returned
-dedicated their sons to the celibacy of the bishopric and their daughters
-to that of the cloister; and in this way the family ceased to exist after
-a few generations.
-
-Whence the first impulse towards charitable deeds came to them we know
-not, but we find them sometimes taking the initiative in philanthropic
-enterprises, and sometimes uniting their efforts to those of others who
-were working on similar lines to their own. Some members of the family
-acted as patrons to the Cistercian order,--others invited and encouraged
-the settlement of the Teutonic or Red Cross Knights in their lands. Others
-again were strongly attracted by the teachings of the Dominican and
-Franciscan friars, who were very influential in the first half of the 13th
-century. Various tendencies were represented in the different countries of
-Europe by the followers of St Francis of Assisi. This divergence arose
-partly because the rule of life promulgated in 1209 was supplanted by
-another in 1221, and partly from the varied interests of each country. In
-South Germany it was the influence of the Franciscans which primarily
-encouraged charitable zeal and self-denial.
-
-Hedwig, daughter of Count Berthold, of the family of Andechs and Meran,
-first claims our attention on account of her charitable deeds. She married
-Heinrich the Bearded ([Dagger] 1238), first duke of Silesia, Poland and
-Croatia. These districts were occupied by people of the Slav race, and it
-was at this time that they were first brought into contact with German
-influence and civilization. Christianity had been introduced in the 12th
-century, but there were very few churches, and the conditions of life
-were unsettled and insecure owing to the continued feuds of the barons.
-Heinrich checked internal dissensions with a high hand; he was zealous in
-introducing German law and in encouraging German immigration, and in this
-way gave solidarity to this part of the Empire. His marriage with the
-daughter of a family which was among the wealthiest and most influential
-in South Germany is a proof of his German sympathies.
-
-Hedwig is the recognised patron saint of Silesia. Grünhagen says[775]: 'If
-we call to mind how far the numerous churches and charitable foundations
-which are referred to the Duchess Hedwig influenced civilization at that
-period, how the monks and nuns whom Hedwig summoned spread German culture
-in these districts; if we further remember how powerfully at that time the
-example of unselfish piety and sympathy, emanating from the throne, took
-hold of the mind of the people; we shall be obliged to accept as well
-founded the veneration Hedwig generally enjoyed, although we may not feel
-attracted by the traits of exaggerated asceticism insisted on by her
-legend.'
-
-Hedwig[776] was born in 1174 and sent for her education to Kizzingen, an
-ancient convent foundation situated in Franken on property belonging to
-her family. In 1186, when not yet thirteen, she was taken from the convent
-to be married. She brought with her into Silesia a dower of thirty
-thousand marks, which was forthwith devoted to religious and charitable
-purposes, for Hedwig appears throughout to have been filled by the belief,
-which she shared with her husband, that religious settlements and colonies
-were alone capable of introducing culture and establishing civilization in
-the land.
-
-The monastic orders had only recently gained a foothold in these
-districts. In 1139 a band of Benedictine monks had settled near Breslau,
-the centre of the country, and in 1175 at the instigation of Boleslaus,
-the father of Hedwig's husband, some Cistercians had come to Leubus. These
-Cistercians were now helpful in constructing a nunnery at Trebnitz near
-Breslau, which Hedwig founded soon after her marriage. She summoned
-thither nuns from the Cistercian nunnery at Bamberg, where her sister
-Mathilde, afterwards abbess of Kizzingen, was being educated, and
-entrusted the rule of the new convent to Pietrussa ([Dagger] 1214), a nun
-from the convent of Kizzingen. The abbess and convent of Trebnitz are
-mentioned as early as 1202. The house was intended to promote education
-among girls of both noble and lowly parentage, and among them was Agnes,
-daughter of the king of Bohemia, of whom we shall hear more. It soon
-numbered a hundred inmates, and at the time when Hedwig's life was
-written, that is towards the close of the 13th century, it contained a
-hundred and twenty women.
-
-This life of Hedwig, written some time after her death, emphasizes the
-ascetic habits which she embraced, and in agreement with later
-descriptions and pictures represents her as an emaciated person worn thin
-by self-denial and fasting. On the other hand the representation of her on
-her sarcophagus, which is of an earlier date, represents her as a
-vigorous, massive and comely woman[777]. The account of her life shows
-that she advocated new ideas throughout. 'By marrying,' it says, 'she
-followed her parents' will rather than her own, as is clearly manifest
-from what followed, for she checked herself by self-restraint. Bound by
-the sacrament she was determined to live her married life as the apostle
-has taught, keeping his precepts of marriage worthily. She hoped to secure
-eternal life by giving birth to children, yet she wished also to please
-God by chastity, and with her husband's consent practised self-restraint.
-Whenever she was aware that the duties of motherhood were beginning, she
-avoided her husband's proximity, and firmly denied herself all intercourse
-until the time of her confinement. She did so from the time of first
-becoming a mother, that is at the age of thirteen years and thirteen
-weeks, and under like circumstances ever behaved in the same way. When she
-had become the mother of three sons, Boleslaus, Konrad, and Heinrich, and
-of three daughters, Agnes, Sophie, and Gertrud, she altogether embraced a
-life of chastity. The like observation of chastity in marriage which
-Mother Church has sanctioned she pressed upon every one she could.' Her
-conduct appears to have had her husband's sanction. Heinrich's sympathies
-are apparent in his granting property to the Cistercians for a monastery
-called after him Heinrichsau, in founding an important hospital in Breslau
-dedicated to the Holy Ghost, and in making a foundation for canons at
-Neumarkt, where he erected an important leper hospital[778]. During one
-of the wars which he engaged in, he was taken prisoner by the heathen
-Prussians, and the story is told how his wife, indifferent to every
-danger, went to him and procured his release.
-
-It was in connection with the lepers who were sheltered at Neumarkt that
-Hedwig's conduct appeared especially wonderful to her contemporaries. Her
-biographer tells us that she had taken into her special care the leprous
-women who lived there, 'so that she sent them money, food and game
-(ferinas) several times a week, and gave them liberally clothes and other
-necessaries of life, taking care of them as though they had been her own
-daughters. With wonderful tenderness she attended upon those who were
-afflicted with bodily ills, and her affections melted towards the poor and
-infirm, whom she tended with great love and helpfulness.'
-
-A series of paintings in miniature were executed at an early date which
-set forth the work of the pious Hedwig and of which a copy made in 1353 is
-extant[779]. It forms a valuable monument of early painting, and in
-archaeological interest compares favourably with the work of Herrad. In
-these pictures we repeatedly see Hedwig in the company of the Trebnitz
-nuns. In one picture she leads the nuns into the convent, in another she
-shows them the church, and in a third she waits on them. They are
-represented as surrounding her in her trials and at her death, and as
-laying her in her tomb. In these pictures the nuns wear grey or blue gowns
-and a black headdress, no wimples (which are worn by lay women), and they
-do not seem to share the same dwelling, but to inhabit separate small huts
-which are pictured standing side by side round the church. Hedwig herself
-wears simple clothing but no convent garb. In these pictures a legendary
-reading is given to some incidents of her life. For example she is
-represented as surrounded in her hours of tribulation by hairy and
-grotesque demons.
-
-A large number of these pictures show Hedwig's charitable zeal. There is
-one in which she is depicted urging upon her husband the cause of the
-poor; again she makes the gift of a house to them; she washes and kisses
-the feet of lepers; she feeds the sick, who are seen lying in bed; she
-gives food to the poor; she ministers to a prisoner; and she distributes
-gifts among pilgrims. Men who are in the stocks and doomed to death also
-rouse her pity; and she insists on feeding the poor with her own hands
-before she can be persuaded to sit down to meals. In these pictures we
-note the scarred and blotched appearance of those who are designated as
-lepers, the wretched appearance of the poor, and the curiously low type of
-countenance of all the beggars.
-
-In her family relations Hedwig was most unfortunate, and one can but hope
-that her charitable zeal brought her solace or that the different basis on
-which family life then rested made her feel the sad fate of her relations
-less acutely than she would otherwise have done. Her sister Agnes married
-Philippe Auguste, king of France (1180-1223), but she was repudiated in
-consequence of the Pope's attack on the validity of her marriage, and died
-in misery in 1201. Her other sister Gertrud, who was the mother of St
-Elisabeth of Thüringen, married Bela III of Hungary, and was assassinated
-in 1214. Hedwig's daughter Gertrud was betrothed to Otto von Wittelsbach,
-who in consequence of political intrigues was tempted to murder Philip,
-king of Swabia, in 1208. Heinrich and Ekbert, Hedwig's two brothers, were
-accused of being his accomplices, and the consequence was that Heinrich
-saw his castle destroyed and lived for years in banishment, and Ekbert,
-who was bishop of Bamberg (1203-37), was obliged to fly, though he was
-afterwards reinstated in his see. When Otto the king-murderer was dead,
-Gertrud, his prospective bride, entered the nunnery at Trebnitz, where she
-afterwards succeeded Pietrussa as abbess.
-
-In the year 1216, however, Hedwig had the joy of seeing her son Heinrich,
-who reigned conjointly with his father, married to Anna, a princess of
-Bohemia, whose tendencies were quite in accordance with her own. Indeed
-Anna's zeal was carried yet a step farther in the direction of
-self-imposed lowliness and humility, she readily submitted to bodily
-chastisement. She has no place among the saints, but we are in possession
-of an early account of her[780] which speaks in great praise of her
-charitable deeds. Conjointly with her husband Anna made several religious
-foundations, and greeted the Dominican and Franciscan friars as brothers
-in the Lord. Inmates of the nunnery of the order of St Francis, which she
-had founded at Breslau, spoke with enthusiasm of her goodness and charity.
-She too nursed the leprous with her own hands, distributed food among the
-poor, and was to 'forlorn children and orphans a protector and a mother.'
-
-History has preserved an account of the courageous manner in which she
-opposed the Tartars, at whose invasion of Breslau, she, her mother-in-law
-Hedwig, and Gertrud, the abbess of Trebnitz, fled to Crossen. Anna's
-husband was killed by the enemy and his head was set on a stake outside
-the town to induce her to surrender, but in vain. After the defeat of the
-Tartars the women returned to Breslau, where they found their nunnery
-utterly deserted. The nuns had fled, and years passed before the
-settlement regained its standing--Hedwig bestowed her property Schawoine
-on it in the hope that this would help it to recover.
-
-Hedwig spent the last years of her life in close connection with Trebnitz.
-She died in 1243 and as early as 1267 was canonized by Pope Clement IV.
-Her daughter-in-law, Anna, lived to a great age, and to the end of her
-days remained interested in her convent and charitable foundations. In
-1253 she founded a hospital at Kreuzberg on the model of one previously
-founded by her cousin St Elisabeth. This hospital and the one founded at
-Neumarkt by Hedwig are still in existence, but the nunneries founded by
-these women have long since passed away.
-
-The movement Hedwig had inaugurated in Silesia forthwith made itself felt
-in wider circles, and we find the princess Agnes of Bohemia, Anna's
-sister, who had lived for several years at Trebnitz, advocating after her
-return to Prague practices similar to those with which she had come into
-contact in Silesia. Agnes also is a saint of the Church[781], and her fame
-rests on her charitable works and on her indifference to position and
-possessions in comparison with the relief of suffering humanity. She is
-moreover a virgin saint. For she was to have married the emperor Friedrich
-II ([Dagger] 1250) against her wish, when her father opportunely died,
-leaving her free to remain single. She then devoted her patrimony, which
-was considerable, to founding a nunnery at Prague together with an
-important hospital.
-
-Agnes was supported at home by her brother, the king of Bohemia, and by
-the bishop of Prague. Pope Gregory IX ([Dagger] 1241) wrote to her
-praising her resolution to remain unmarried, and Clara, the friend of St
-Francis, wrote to her from Assisi to encourage her in her devotions.
-Clara's letters are extant, and afford an interesting glimpse of the aims
-which these women set before them. In one letter Clara praises Agnes for
-refusing marriage with the 'Caesar,' and advises her rather to follow
-blessed poverty and devote herself to the mortification of the flesh.
-Again she addresses Agnes as a second Rachel, admonishing her to turn her
-thoughts to eternity, and likening her to the holy St Agnes with the
-blessed lamb[782].
-
-The Bohemian princess was further encouraged in her aims by the gift of a
-prayer-book, a veil, a platter and a drinking-cup which Clara had used.
-The accounts we have of Agnes, consisting of a longer and a shorter record
-lately printed from MSS. preserved at Prague, give a full description of
-the willing humility this holy woman practised in the convent and of the
-tenderness she showed towards the sick.
-
-'There you might see her,' says the longer account[783], 'the daughter of
-Premislaus III, king of Bohemia, lighting with her own hands the fire for
-the sisters; the sister of Wenceslaus IV, king of Bohemia, cleaning out
-the dirty rooms; the intended spouse of the emperor Friedrich II
-perspiring in the kitchen like any lowly maid. And while she did so, not
-by angry expression or stern face did she resent it; filled with joy she
-worked as a servant of Christ and proved it to those who saw her by the
-sweet expression she wore. She behaved in this way not only to those who
-were healthy, but she gladly extended her kindness to those who were ill;
-she spread soft beds for them, she carefully removed all that could
-distress eyes and nose, she prepared food with her own hands, and cooked
-it that it might be served to taste, with untiring energy, that the sick
-might be freed from ill, pains diminish, illness yield and health return.
-Such were her occupations inside the convent (parthenon), but she was not
-confined by walls. Throughout Prague her doings were apparent.' We find
-her visiting women who were sick or in trouble, and collecting, mending
-and washing the garments of lepers with her own hands.
-
-Agnes lived till 1282 and is accepted as a saint, but has never been
-officially canonized. The hospital she founded at Prague is still in
-existence.
-
-The fame of these women, great and abiding as it is in the countries they
-lived in, has not penetrated much beyond the districts which knew them
-during their lifetime. It is different with another woman-saint of the
-period who, within the span of a short life, acquired such fame that she
-ranks among the holy followers of Christianity who are the possession of
-all countries and of all ages. St Elisabeth, landgravine of Thüringen, a
-princess of Hungary, combined in a rare degree those qualities of love,
-devotion, and unselfish zeal which make Christian virtue in one aspect so
-attractive. The tendencies of those among whom her lot was cast and her
-own sad personal experiences throw her loveable qualities into even
-greater relief. All the qualities in Matilda, Hedwig, Anna, and Agnes
-which made them beloved and venerated appear to meet in Elisabeth. A
-loving wife, a pious mother, a faithful widow, the comforter of the sick
-and the protector of the poor, she stands on the threshold of a new era,
-indifferent to the prejudices of her age, regardless of its derogatory
-criticism, intent only on carrying into effect the promptings dictated by
-a keener sense of sympathy with suffering and a closer appreciation of the
-needs of others than her contemporaries could generally grasp. No
-woman-saint has attained a fame at all to be compared with hers. It has
-been computed that before the middle of this century over a hundred
-versions of her story were in existence, a number which has since been
-more than doubled. Of these accounts some are in Latin, others in French,
-English, Italian and Hungarian, the mass of them being of course in
-German. Many painters, and among them some of the greatest Italian
-masters, Botticelli, Fra Angelico, Orcagna, Memmi and Taddeo Gaddi, have
-been eager to depict incidents of her life or to introduce her into their
-pictures[784].
-
-The bulk of the literature which celebrates the name and fame of Elisabeth
-has scant importance from the historical point of view, which seeks a
-reasonable basis for her fame. For most versions of her story were
-dictated more by the wish to dwell on her piety than to encourage
-discerning appreciation of her character. Among the legendary accounts
-composed in her praise there is a poetical version of her life in
-mediaeval German, which extends over four thousand five hundred lines and
-contains much that is attractive[785]. There is also in existence a modern
-German prose version of her story which has considerable charm[786]. But
-the climax of beauty of legendary narrative is reached in her case by the
-account of her life written in French in the middle of this century by
-Montalembert[787]. It is widely read in unadorned and in sumptuous
-editions in the French original and in its German translation. On the
-other hand its exuberance of religious colouring and legendary character
-have called forth an account based solely on contemporary records, which,
-drawn with a firm hand in clear outline, gives a picture of Elisabeth's
-life less fantastic, it is true, but more discerning and more truly
-beautiful[788]. In the light of this work it becomes possible to fit the
-form of Elisabeth to the background of her age, and, by thus placing her,
-to appreciate to some extent her great and lasting importance. In a
-history of the development of philanthropic endeavour and charitable work
-no woman's figure more fitly represents the beauty of unselfish devotion.
-
-Born at Presburg in Hungary in 1207, Elisabeth was related both to St
-Hedwig of Silesia and to St Agnes of Bohemia. For her father King Andreas
-II of Hungary ([Dagger] 1235) was uncle to Agnes, while her mother Gertrud
-was sister to Hedwig, so that Elisabeth was cousin to one saint and niece
-to the other. Her mother Gertrud, like Hedwig in Silesia, had become the
-centre of a small German party in Hungary, with which their two brothers
-Count Heinrich of Andechs and Bishop Ekbert of Bamberg sought refuge after
-the murder of the king of Swabia referred to above. After several years
-Bishop Ekbert was enabled to return to his see chiefly owing to the
-influence exerted in his behalf by Hermann, landgrave of Thüringen; it was
-no doubt owing to this connection that his niece, the princess Elisabeth,
-at that time a child of four, was betrothed to the son of the landgrave.
-This took place some time in the year 1211, and she was carried from
-Hungary to the Wartburg in Thüringen, there to receive her education.
-
-At this period the customs at the court of Hungary were comparatively
-speaking uncivilized, and struggles were frequent. In 1214 Gertrud,
-Elisabeth's mother, was assassinated, a victim of the revolt of the
-Hungarians against German ascendency. Thüringen and the Wartburg on the
-contrary were the seat of the greatest refinement of which the age of
-romance in German lands proved capable. Landgrave Hermann, a prince of
-uncertain politics, but a zealous patron of art, had drawn thither the
-lyric poets of the age, whose brilliant assemblies and contests in the
-eyes of posterity are surrounded with the halo of a tournament in song.
-
-But the temper of this gay throng had apparently no charm for the
-Hungarian girl, who was chiefly conscious of the levity and laxity which
-characterized it; conscious too that this outward brilliancy could not
-compensate for the hollowness which lurked beneath. A serious girl, though
-lively at times, she did not win general favour, least of all that of the
-landgravine Sophie, her prospective mother-in-law. When the news came of
-reverses at the Hungarian court, Sophie would have broken off the match
-and sent Elisabeth home or would have placed her in a nunnery. But at this
-juncture the attraction which Ludwig, the betrothed of Elisabeth, felt
-towards her asserted itself. He was conscious of a decided preference for
-the girl, and so he informed the noble knight Vargila, who had conducted
-Elisabeth from Presburg and who all along remained the staunch advocate of
-her interests.
-
-Young Ludwig of Thüringen, a gentle and loveable character, of strict
-political integrity, is regarded as a saint on account of his numerous
-religious foundations and his tragic end. His chaplain has left an account
-of his life which throws much light on his relations to Elisabeth. He was
-left heir to his father's dominions in 1216, was declared of age by the
-emperor Friedrich II, and, in spite of the advice of his courtiers and
-against his mother's wish, clung to Elisabeth and married her in 1221, he
-being twenty and she fourteen years old at the time.
-
-The happy married relations of the youthful pair are established beyond a
-doubt. Incidents are told and points insisted on by kinsfolk and friends
-which prove affection and tenderness on both sides, and directly
-contradict the statements of interested religious writers of a later date
-who maintain that life in a convent would have been more to Elisabeth's
-taste. On the contrary, whatever thoughts Elisabeth may have had
-afterwards on the superiority of a life of sacrifice to a life of domestic
-happiness, during these years she appears as the devoted wife and loving
-mother who combines the fulfilment of domestic duties with charitable
-zeal. There is a story told of her that she used to leave the Wartburg,
-her babe in her arms, and descend into the town of Eisenach, where she
-would visit the poor and the sick. Her dress on these occasions would be
-of a simple woollen material, and on her return she would take it off and
-have it given to some poor person. We hear that she frequently travelled
-about with her husband, and that she was sorely grieved at being separated
-from him when, on the summons of the emperor, he went to Italy. It was
-during his absence there in the spring of 1226 that the famine occurred
-during which Elisabeth distributed food with so lavish a hand that the
-granaries of the castle were emptied and she herself was severely censured
-by the court party, which had no sympathy with her philanthropy. The
-number of those whom she fed is sometimes quoted as three hundred,
-sometimes as nine hundred. The number may be exaggerated, but this much is
-certain, that Elisabeth's conduct attracted attention beyond her immediate
-neighbourhood. She had also opened at Eisenach a hospital or infirmary for
-twenty-four sick people, whom she partly tended herself. Writers of a
-later date tell us that at the suggestion of Cardinal Ugolino, afterwards
-Pope Gregory IX, St Francis of Assisi, hearing of Elisabeth's charitable
-work, sent her his old cloak as a sign of appreciation; but the story
-needs corroborative evidence.
-
-When Ludwig returned from Italy his courtiers were loud in their
-complaints of his spendthrift wife, but he listened to them with
-good-humoured indifference. 'Let her continue giving to the poor if God so
-wills it,' he said, 'if but the Wartburg and the Neuburg remain to us.' He
-evidently appreciated and shared her philanthropic zeal; for he founded a
-shelter (xenodochium) for the poor, the weak and the infirm at
-Reinhardsbrunn, assisted his wife in founding a hospital at Gotha, and
-encouraged brothers of the nursing order of St Lazarus to settle in that
-part of the country[789]. The interest Elisabeth felt in social outcasts
-evidently touched a sympathetic chord in his kindly nature, even when this
-interest was carried to an extreme, the meaning and social fitness of
-which it is not easy to appreciate. For example, the story is told that
-Elisabeth when staying at Neuburg tended a leper with her own hands and
-had him placed on her husband's bed, an action which greatly shocked
-Sophie, her mother-in-law. The legend-writer of later date,--not satisfied
-with the strong impulsiveness of feeling which alone renders such an
-action possible and even under certain conditions raises it above
-criticism, and at the same time unable to grasp the reasonableness of
-Sophie's point of view,--tells us that the leper suddenly assumed the form
-of Christ, a miracle by which her doubts were confounded.
-
-In 1227 Ludwig, in answer to a summons from the emperor, took the cross
-and left for Italy, never to return. His biographer says that having
-received the cross he kept it in his pocket instead of displaying it on
-his coat, for fear of distressing his wife, who was about to give birth to
-their third child. But Elisabeth came across it by chance and was bowed
-down by grief at the thought of losing him. Together with others she
-started him and his followers on their journey, and travelled on with him
-yet another day's journey to delay the dreaded moment of separation. On
-her return to the Wartburg she devoted herself to her charitable work with
-increased zeal, and her inclination to self-denial became more accentuated
-owing to contact with members of the Franciscan order.
-
-The attempt of the Franciscan friars to gain a foothold in Germany had at
-first been frustrated. Ekbert, bishop of Bamberg, Elisabeth's uncle, was
-the first to give them a gracious reception. From Bamberg they spread into
-the adjoining districts, and Elisabeth's favour enabled them to build a
-chapel at Eisenach. Konrad, one of these friars, had been nominated
-inquisitor by Pope Innocent III, and coming to Eisenach in 1226 soon won
-the affections of Ludwig and Elisabeth. At a later date Konrad of Marburg
-drew popular hatred on himself by his extreme rigour and anti-heretical
-teaching, and suffered a violent death (1233). But in earlier years he had
-gained much sympathy by preaching the views of St Francis on the
-renunciation of worldly goods and on practising unlimited charity[790].
-When Ludwig departed to the south, he entrusted Konrad with considerable
-authority, which he turned to account by strengthening the ascendency he
-had gained over Elisabeth. She accepted him as her guide in all things,
-and upheld his views that to levy taxes is an evil and that each person
-should earn the food he requires by the work of his own hands. To carry
-this into practice she refused to accept any tribute and tried to earn
-money herself. Within a short time, however, came the news that Ludwig had
-died in Italy from a fever before setting sail for the East. The news came
-to Elisabeth as an overpowering shock. 'Dead!' she exclaimed, 'dead! so
-henceforth to me is the world and all things pleasant it contains.' Trials
-now came thick upon her. Her husband's brother, Hermann, with a usurper's
-determination, seized Ludwig's possessions and expelled Elisabeth, whom he
-had always looked upon with disapproval. She was forced to fly from the
-Wartburg with her children, and in the depth of a severe winter she paced
-the streets of Eisenach, seeking refuge with those she had formerly
-befriended, but no one dared to harbour her. At last her aunt Mathilde,
-abbess of Kizzingen, sent for her and for her two faithful waiting-women,
-perhaps for the children also. Elisabeth would gladly have accepted a
-permanent home in the convent, but her uncle Ekbert interfered. He
-appointed a more suitable dwelling-place--and urged upon her the
-desirableness of a second marriage. Elisabeth refused, and we hardly need
-the assurance of the legend-writer that it was because she had taken the
-vow of chastity, considering how recently her husband had died. However in
-the meantime the band of Ludwig's followers returned home bringing with
-them their leader's corpse, and a rapid change of affairs took place in
-the Wartburg. Hermann the usurper was forced to yield, Elisabeth was
-reinstated in her rights, and was fetched back to the castle by the noble
-Vargila. But her stay there was not of long duration. Her position was
-intolerable, and she felt that nothing could bring her solace short of the
-renunciation of all prerogatives of station and wealth. She would have
-become a recluse had not the Franciscan friar Konrad prevented this excess
-of humility. As it was she went to the Franciscan chapel at Eisenach,
-publicly renounced the world and its claims, and removed to Marburg in
-Hessen where she would be near Konrad and devote herself to a life of
-sacrifice. She refused to live in the castle, and with the two
-waiting-women, who throughout remained faithful to her, dwelt in a hut on
-the hillside, devoting all her property to constructing a hospital in the
-town, where she spent most of her time waiting on the sick and infirm.
-
-Her conduct at Marburg filled the people with amazement as it had done at
-Eisenach, and numbers pressed thither to see her and to be tended by her.
-Considering that she only spent about two years there, the impression she
-made must have been extraordinary, for the undying memory of her fame
-continues to this day among the people. We hear a good deal of the
-asceticism she practised under Konrad's guidance during these last years
-of her life; how she submitted to bodily chastisement, how she admitted
-that her own children were not dearer to her than those of others, how she
-expressed regret at ever having been married, and how she suffered her
-faithful waiting-women, who like herself had adopted the grey dress of the
-order of St Francis, to be removed out of her sight. She died in 1231 at
-the early age of twenty-four. In accordance with the general wish she was
-canonized within a few years of her death by Pope Gregory IX in 1235.
-Immediately after her death hospitals constructed on the plan of that at
-Marburg and acknowledging St Elisabeth as their patron saint sprang up in
-many cities. With all these facts before us we cannot deny to her the
-achievement of lasting social importance. To this day hospitals in Germany
-founded both under Catholic and Protestant auspices are often dedicated to
-her.
-
-The loving tribute of a later age has perpetuated her fame in many ways.
-It has struck medals in her memory, has surmounted fountains by her
-statue, and has reared to her memory the minster of Marburg, one of the
-finest monuments of German mediaeval architecture. In spite of the ravages
-of time and the robberies perpetrated during warfare her sarcophagus there
-remains a wondrous achievement of the art of the goldsmith. It is still an
-object of pious admiration and devout pilgrimage, both to the faithful
-believer and to the appreciative student of history and art.
-
-Our age has witnessed a great spread of philanthropic interest and
-charitable zeal among women of the educated classes; a wave of feeling,
-similar to that which swept over mankind in the 13th century, bears down
-all other considerations when there are outcasts to be rescued and
-suffering to be alleviated. Nursing the sick has become a distinct and a
-respected profession; the administration of charity, an education in
-itself, is absorbing some of the best energies of the community, and women
-who seek to rescue suffering humanity are at last enabled to do so by the
-guiding hand of science. Certainly circumstances have changed. We live no
-longer in an age when the leper need display his sores to arouse pity, nor
-where almsgiving _per se_ has a social value. And yet now as then the
-success of charitable work depends on unselfish devotion and goodness of
-heart in the individual, and it is in this sense that the charitable work
-of the women-saints of the past retains its meaning. It is not by
-imitating their deeds that a later age walks worthily in their footsteps
-and pays them the tribute of reverence, but by accepting and furthering
-the spirit in which these deeds were done.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-
-EARLY MYSTIC LITERATURE.
-
-  'Die tumpheit behaget ir alleine selbe,
-  die weisheit kan niemer volle leren.'
-                                (_Mechthild the beguine._)
-
-
-§ 1. Mystic writings for women in England.
-
-The last chapter, in dealing with some of the women who distinguished
-themselves in the cause of charity and philanthropy, has suggested in what
-direction the determining feature of the religious life of women in the
-13th century must be sought. Outward events, stirring political changes,
-and awakening confidence in national strength, had largely increased human
-sympathies and widened the mental horizon. In regard to women, who sought
-their vocation outside the circle of home, this had led on the one hand to
-efforts for alleviating human want and human suffering, on the other to a
-stirring of the imagination in the direction of speculation on the value
-and the help afforded by religious belief.
-
-The different beauties of the active and the contemplative life had all
-along been realized, and were currently represented by the figures of Mary
-and Martha, types of divergent tendencies which were attractive in
-different ways. The busy Martha with her charitable devotion was the ideal
-of many women, since rescuing the needy, assisting the helpless, and
-ministering to the sick constituted the vocation of women in a special
-sense. But a peculiar charm of a different kind hung at all times round
-the thoughtful and studious Mary, who set the claims and realities of life
-at nought compared with the greater reality of the eternal life
-hereafter. At the beginning of the 13th century, when the increase in
-religious enthusiasm deepened yearnings for the apprehension of the
-divine, men in their individual capacities began to seek a personal and
-closer communion with God. The absorption by things spiritual as
-contrasted with things material took a new departure. On one side was the
-learned thinker who, trained in the knowledge of the schools, sought to
-fathom his own powers and through them the powers of mankind so as to
-transcend the limits of sensible existence, and who gave a new development
-to mysticism in its technical sense. On the other side was the large
-number of those who, no longer satisfied with the mediation of appointed
-ministers of the Church, sought a personal relation to God, the effect of
-which on themselves would be moral regeneration. It was in connection with
-these that a number of writings were composed which represent mysticism in
-its popular sense: the steps by which the divine can be approached, set
-forth under the form of an allegory.
-
-The allegorical mysticism of the Middle Ages culminates in Dante
-(1260-1321). It is well to bear this in mind in the presence of minor
-lights. For while there is much that is strangely fascinating in the 13th
-century mystic, and touches of simple good faith and of honest directness
-of purpose abound, the conditions under which he works and the language in
-which he expresses himself cannot pass without criticism. Cloistered
-seclusion, estrangement from the outside world, the cult of asceticism,
-and insistence on the emotional side of life, if judged by the standard of
-to-day, are not conducive to mental and moral welfare. Moreover a later
-age always finds it difficult to understand that an earlier one had its
-own notions in regard to the fitness and beauty of the surroundings it
-made for itself. But productive genius at all times freely makes for
-itself surroundings that cannot be called absolutely healthy. It needs a
-certain effort to realise on what ground the 13th century mystic stands.
-But when once we are able to follow him, moving in his world is like
-walking in an enchanted garden,--enchanted to us, but real to him, where
-each growing sentiment and each budding thought has its peculiar charm.
-
-It is the same with regard to the language in which the mystic expresses
-himself. The close communion he seeks with the Godhead leads him to use
-terms which are directly adopted from those which express the experiences
-and feelings of ordinary life. There is in him no shrinking from holding
-God and the saints as personalities, and no hesitation in expressing
-desire for things spiritual in language currently used for expressing the
-promptings of desire for things of this world; for he is a realist in the
-view he takes of God and the saints. The old interpretation of the Song of
-Solomon supplied him with a model after which to form his conceptions, and
-by a further adaptation it led every nun to greet her bridegroom in Christ
-and every monk to greet his bride in the Virgin. Outside the convent the
-age of romance had brought a new element into the relations of the sexes
-and had accepted years of service and continued wooing as the steps which
-led to the consummation of desire. This idea transferred to spiritual
-relations now caused the mystic to dwell on the steps by which the Divine
-can be approached. The poetry of romance and the poetry of mysticism have
-much in common; both appear to have been the outcome of the same
-sentiments differently applied in convent and court. And as the language
-of real life made it possible for the mystic to formulate his feelings, so
-his religious aspirations in their turn helped to spiritualise the
-relations of real life.
-
-It deserves special attention that some of the writings of these early
-mystics are in the vernacular and include some of the most beautiful
-productions in Middle English and in early German. Their philological
-interest has recently led to their publication, but their social
-importance is equally great. For in them we see how the high estimation of
-virgin purity, which was in the fore-ground of the moral consciousness of
-the age, was advocated by the leaders of thought and came to influence the
-lives of individual women, and how the asexual existence which hitherto
-had been accepted as praiseworthy was extolled as virtue in itself.
-
-Again it is difficult for a later age to rate this conception at its just
-value, for the depreciation of the relationship of sex is to the modern
-mind not only misplaced but misleading. It is only when we think of the
-gain this depreciation has helped to secure in self-control and
-self-respect that it appears at all reasonable.
-
-Of the early productions of the mystic school, which are distinctly moral
-in tendency and personal in tone, none offer greater attractions than
-works written in England during the first half of the 13th century for the
-use of women who were vowed to religion. All these writings, some of which
-will here be considered, are in the vernacular, and owing to their
-measured grace and tone of delicate refinement are among the most
-attractive monuments of Middle English. They are chiefly productions of
-the south of England where the Saxon element had been preserved in its
-integrity. Scholars have remarked how a certain roughness of diction and a
-heroic element opposed to softness of sentiment lingered on in the north
-and precluded the utterance of gentler strains, while the south used a
-language of combined vigour and grace and became the cradle of lyric
-poetry. Moreover the south at this period cultivated the qualities which
-give to a movement its moral stamina. We find loyalty to the king coupled
-with distaste for court pleasures, and strong religious feeling combined
-with that insistence on nationality which precluded servile submission to
-the Pope. The south was also in connection with the best intellectual
-forces of the age as represented by the growing schools at Oxford, and
-Oxford in its turn was in direct touch with Paris, which remained
-throughout the 12th century the most important centre of learning and
-education in Europe.
-
-A few words must be given to this connection and its results, for it was
-in Paris that the master-minds of Oxford acquired that enthusiasm for
-study which, applied to the realities of life, became zeal for reform and
-desire for moral regeneration.
-
-Two lines of study are apparent in Paris. There is the mysticism of the
-school of St Victor, represented by men of such mental calibre as Hugo
-([Dagger] 1141), a native of Germany, and his pupil Richard ([Dagger]
-1173), a native of Scotland. The combined influence of these two men on
-the English mind was very great, for many productions of the English
-mystical school were inspired by or adapted from their Latin mystical
-works. The writings of Richard translated into English are frequently
-found in manuscripts by the side of the works of the later English
-mystics, Richard Rolle ([Dagger] 1349), and Walter Hylton ([Dagger] 1395).
-
-On the other hand Paris was the first to experience the vivifying
-influence of the renewed study of Greek philosophy, especially of the
-Aristotelian _corpus_, together with its comments by Arabian philosophers,
-especially with those of Averroes (fl. 1150). Jews from the south of
-France had introduced these writings, which, repeatedly condemned but as
-often advocated, had the effect on speculative minds of the introduction
-of a new science[791]. Christian theology, rising to the occasion, adopted
-their metaphysical views, though so radically divergent from its own, and
-the result was the birth of scholastic philosophy. But where the
-incompatibility of the union was felt scholars left the halls of
-discussion and turned their energies to grappling with the problems of
-active life.
-
-In Oxford as early as 1133 Robert Pullen, who had studied in Paris, was
-lecturing on week days and preaching on Sundays to the people, and during
-the course of the 13th century a number of men who had won the highest
-distinctions at the university,--such as Edmund Rich ([Dagger] 1240), Adam
-Marsh ([Dagger] 1257-8), and Robert Grosseteste (afterwards bishop of
-Lincoln, [Dagger] 1253), followed in his footsteps. Their efforts fell in
-with those of the newly founded orders of friars, and they greeted as
-brothers in the spirit the twelve Dominicans who arrived at Oxford in 1221
-and the Franciscans who came in 1224. These maintained an utter distrust
-of learning, which led to much argument between them and the students, but
-all alike were zealous in working for the welfare of the uneducated
-classes.
-
-We are indebted to Thomas de Hales[792] for one of the earliest and most
-beautiful poems written for the use of a nun. He was a native of Hales in
-Gloucestershire, studied both at Oxford and Paris, and was under the
-influence of the Franciscan movement. Wadding says in his annals of the
-Franciscan order that 'Thomas de Hales, created a doctor of the Sorbonne,
-was most celebrated and is known not only in England, but also in France,
-Germany, and Italy.' Thomas was on friendly terms with Adam Marsh who had
-become a Franciscan friar, and he joined this order himself as is apparent
-from the superscription of his English poem[793]. Various facts suggest
-possibilities as to his career, for Hales in Gloucestershire was the home
-also of Alexander de Hales ([Dagger] 1245) who went to Paris and spent his
-energies in compiling a work on scholasticism which secured him the title
-of _doctor irrefragabilis_. Moreover in 1246 Hales became the seat of a
-Cistercian monastery founded by Henry III.'s brother, Richard, earl of
-Cornwall, who was intimately connected with the circle of men at Oxford
-and a friend and patron of the Franciscans. It is possible that Thomas
-owed encouragement to the learned Alexander or to Earl Richard. The year
-1250 is accepted as the date when he flourished, but his English poem was
-probably written somewhat earlier. This is suggested by the praise
-bestowed in it on King Henry and his wealth, which could hardly have been
-accorded later than 1240, for it was then that the king began to alienate
-his people's affection by tampering with the coinage and by countenancing
-foreign influences at court and in the Church, in compliance with the
-wishes of his wife, Eleanor of Provence.
-
-The poem of Thomas is called a _Luve Ron_, that is a love song; it
-consists of twenty-six rhymed stanzas with much alliterative assonance.
-Falling in with the tendencies of the age it treats of the happiness in
-store for women who accept Christ as their spouse. Thomas describes how he
-came to advise a nun in her choice of a lover. As the translation of the
-poem into modern English rhyme sacrifices much of its directness, the
-stanzas which follow have been rendered as prose.
-
-  'A maid of Christ bade me earnestly to make her a love-song,
-  That she might best learn how to take a faithful lover,
-  Most faithful of all, and best suited to a free woman;
-  I will not refuse her, but direct her as best I can.
-
-  Maiden, thou must understand that this world's love is rare,
-  In many ways fickle, worthless, weak, deceiving,
-  Men that are bold here pass away as the winds blow;
-  Under the earth they lie cold, fallen away as meadow grass.
-
-  No one enters life who is certain to remain,
-  For here man has many sorrows, neither repose nor rest;
-  Towards his end he hastens, abiding but a short time,
-  Pain and death hurry him away when most he clings to life.
-
-  None is so rich nor yet so free but he soon must go;
-  Gold and silver, pomp and ermine give him no surety;
-  Swift though he be, he cannot escape, nor lengthen his life by a day,
-  Thus, thou seest, this world as a shadow glides past.'
-
-The poet then enlarges on the transitoriness of terrestrial love. Where
-are Paris and Helen, Amadis, Tristram, and others famous for their love?
-'They have glided from this world as the shaft that has left the
-bow-string.' Wealth such as King Henry's, beauty such as Absalom's availed
-them nought. But the poet knows of a true king whose love abides.
-
-  'Ah sweet, if thou knewest but this one's virtues!
-  He is fair and bright, of glad cheer, mild of mood,
-  Lovely through joy, true of trust, free of heart, full of wisdom;
-  Never wouldst thou regret it if once thou wert given into his care.
-
-  He is the richest man in the land as far as men have the power of speech,
-  All is given into his hand, east, west, north and south.
-  Henry the king holds of him and bows to him.
-  Maiden, to thee he sends the message that he would be beloved by thee.'
-
-The beauty of this lover, Christ, is thus described, and the fairness of
-his dwelling, where hate, pride and envy enter not, and where all rejoice
-with the angels. 'Are not those in a good way who love such a lord?' the
-poet asks. In return for the bliss Christ grants, He asks only that the
-maiden keep bright the jewel of maidenhood which He has entrusted to her.
-The poem ends thus:
-
-  'This poem, maiden, I send thee open and without a seal,
-  Bidding thee unroll it and learn each part by heart,
-  Then be very gracious and teach it faithfully to other maidens.
-  Who knows the whole right well will be comforted by it.
-
-  If ever thou sittest lonely, draw forth this little writing,
-  Sing it with sweet tones, and do as I bid thee.
-  He who has sent thee a greeting, God Almighty, be with thee,
-  And receive thee in his bower high up in heaven where He sits.
-  And may he have good ending, who has written this little song.'
-
-From this poem we turn to the prose works written at this period for
-religious women, which are inspired by the same spirit of earnest
-devotion, and contain thoughts as tender, refined, and gentle as the poem
-of Thomas de Hales. The prose treatise known as the _Ancren Riwle_[794],
-the rule for recluses, is by far the most important of these works, and
-from the present point of view deserves close attention, for it gives a
-direct insight into the moral beauties of the religious attitude, and
-enables us to form some idea of the high degree of culture and refinement
-which the 13th century mystic attained.
-
-A few words of criticism on the purpose of the book and on its authorship
-are here necessary. We have before us a work written not for the regular
-inmates of a nunnery, not for nuns who lived under the rule of a prioress
-or abbess, but for religious women who, after being trained in a nunnery,
-left it to continue a chaste and secluded life outside. The Church at all
-times gave most honour to those monks and nuns who were members of a
-convent and lived under the rule of a superior, but it did not deny the
-credit of holy living, or the appellations monk and nun, to those who
-either alone or with a few companions devoted themselves to religion, and
-dwelt sometimes near a chapel or sanctuary, sometimes in a churchyard.
-From the earliest times the people had held such male and female recluses
-in special reverence, and the Church, yielding to popular feeling,
-accepted them as holy, and in some instances countenanced their being
-ranked as saints.
-
-With reference to the distinction made from the earliest period between
-the different classes of those who professed religion, and their
-respective claims to holiness, it seems well to quote from the
-introductory chapter of the rule of St Benedict. The following passages
-occur in all the prose versions of the rule known to me, whether written
-for the use of men, or adapted to the use of women.
-
-The Anglo-Saxon version of the rule of St Benedict made in the 10th or
-11th century, which is based on the version written by Aethelwold about
-the year 961, runs thus[795]: 'There are four kinds of monks, _muneca_;
-the first kind are those in monasteries, _mynstermonna_, who live under a
-rule or an abbot. The second kind are the hermits, _ancrena_, that is
-settlers in the wilds (_westen-setlena_), who, not in the first fervour of
-religious life, but after probation in the monastery, have learned by the
-help and experience of others to fight against the devil, and going forth
-well armed from the ranks of their brethren to the single-handed combat of
-the wilderness, are able without the support of others to fight by the
-strength of their own arm and the help of God against the vices of the
-flesh and their evil thoughts. A third and most baneful kind of monk are
-the self-appointed ones, _sylfdemena_, who have been tried by no rule nor
-by the experience of a master, as gold in the furnace, but being soft as
-lead and still serving the world in their works, are known by their
-tonsure to lie to God. These, in twos or threes or even singly without a
-shepherd, not enclosed in the Lord's sheepfold, follow the enjoyment of
-their will instead of a rule; whatever they think fit or choose to do they
-call holy, and what they like not they condemn as unlawful. There is a
-fourth kind of monk called wandering, _widscrithul_, who spend all their
-life wandering about, staying in different cells for three or four days at
-a time, ever roaming, given up to their own pleasures and the evils of
-gluttony, and worse in all ways than the self-appointed ones.'
-
-In the English versions of the rule for women, two of which, drafted
-respectively in the 13th and in the 15th century, are extant, the same
-distinctions are drawn between different kinds of nuns. The 13th century
-version states[796] that there are the nuns living in a monastery under an
-abbess, _mynecene_,--a kind of nun called _ancre_ or recluse,--the
-self-appointed nuns,--and the wandering nuns who are declared altogether
-evil.
-
-The difference between the nun and the _ancre_ is made clear by these
-passages. The _ancre_ or recluse, called in Latin _inclusa_, is the nun
-who after receiving a convent education lives a holy life away from the
-nunnery, and it is for _ancren_ or nuns of this kind that the book we are
-about to discuss was written. Fortunately the work does not stand alone as
-an exhortation to women recluses. We are in possession of a letter from
-Ailred of Rievaulx, written between 1131 and 1161, and addressed to his
-sister (sic), which was written for a similar purpose though covering very
-much narrower ground, and contains advice analogous to that contained in
-the _Ancren Riwle_. The original is in Latin[797], and in this form it was
-probably known to the author of the _Ancren Riwle_, who refers to it,
-saying how Ailred had already insisted that purity of life can be
-maintained only by observing two things, a certain hardness of bodily life
-and a careful cultivation of moral qualities.
-
-The letter of Ailred is in the form of a series of short chapters and is
-divided into two parts, the first of which (c. 1-20) treats of the outward
-rule. It gives advice as to whom the _inclusa_ should converse with, and
-whom she should admit into her presence; it tells her that she should not
-own flocks, which leads to buying and selling; that she should live by the
-work of her hands, not accepting as a gift more food than she needs for
-herself and her servants; and that she must not do as some recluses do,
-who busy themselves with 'teaching girls and boys and turn their cells
-into a school.' It also directs her about divine service, and about her
-food and clothes.
-
-Having so far dealt with outward things Ailred (c. 21-46) dwells on the
-inward life, on virginity, on the dangers of temptation and on the
-beauties of humility and love. His sentences are short and are illustrated
-by quotations from scripture, by reference to the holy virgin St Agnes,
-and by remarks on the respective merits of Mary and Martha. The concluding
-chapters (c. 47-78) are found also in the works of Anselm, archbishop of
-Canterbury ([Dagger] 1109)[798], and appear to have been borrowed from
-him.
-
-The letter of Ailred proves that the conduct of the recluse was attracting
-attention in the 12th century. Part of his letter was translated into
-Middle English by one Thomas N. in the 13th century, about the same time
-when the _Ancren Riwle_ was drawn up, and in its superscription it is
-designated as the 'information' which Ailred, abbot of Rievaulx, wrote for
-his sister the _inclusa_[799]. In this translation, however, the opening
-parts of the work which treat of the outward rule (c. 1-20) are omitted,
-evidently because the translation was intended not for recluses but for
-nuns, to whom directions about domestic matters, such as buying, selling,
-clothing and eating, would not apply.
-
-Further evidence can be adduced to show that women recluses in the 13th
-century occupied public attention to an increasing degree. Hitherto they
-had been left to dwell where they pleased, supported by chance gifts from
-the people, but in the 13th century it became usual to leave them
-legacies. A mass of information on the subject has been collected by
-Cutts[800], who describes how women recluses occupied sometimes a range of
-cells, sometimes a commodious house; and how they kept one or more
-servants to run on their errands. In 1246 the bishop of Chichester issued
-an injunction which shows that his attention had been drawn to these
-women, and that in his mind there was a distinct difference between them
-and regular nuns. Under the heading 'On recluses' (_inclusis_) it
-says[801]: 'Also we ordain that recluses shall not receive or keep any
-person in their house concerning whom sinister suspicions may arise. Also
-that they have narrow and proper windows; and we permit them to have
-secret communication with those persons only whose gravity and honesty do
-not admit of suspicion. Women recluses should not be entrusted with the
-care of church vestments; if necessity compels it, we command it to be
-done with caution, that he who carries them may have no communication with
-the recluses.'
-
-Taking these various remarks into consideration and comparing them with
-what is said in the _Ancren Riwle_ itself, the author of which keeps clear
-in his mind the difference between recluse and nun, I think the idea that
-this work was originally written for the Cistercian nunnery at Tarent in
-Dorsetshire, as is usually alleged[802], will be abandoned. This
-assumption is based on the superscription of a Latin copy of the book,
-which states that Simon of Ghent wrote it for his sisters the anchoresses
-near Tarent (apud Tarente). But the theory that the book was originally in
-Latin, and that it was written by Simon, archdeacon at Oxford in 1284, and
-bishop of Salisbury between 1307-1315, has long been abandoned. The idea
-that it was written for the nunnery at Tarent may also be discarded, for
-Tarent was a house founded by Ralph de Kahaines in the time of Richard I.
-Therefore at the time when Simon lived, and doubtless also at the time
-when the book was written (1225-1250), the settlement must have consisted
-of more than three women recluses and their servants. Women recluses might
-be living at Tarent as elsewhere, since Simon forwarded the book to
-recluses there, but they would not be members of the Cistercian convent.
-It may be noticed in passing that the other Latin copy of the rule, which
-was destroyed by fire in 1731, had a superscription saying that Robert
-Thornton, at one time prior, gave it to the recluses (_claustralibus_) of
-Bardney, which is a Benedictine abbey for men in Lincolnshire.
-
-To relinquish the idea that the _Ancren Riwle_ was written originally for
-the Cistercian nunnery at Tarent is to relinquish also the
-supposition[803] that it is the work of Richard Poor, dean of Salisbury,
-and afterwards bishop successively of Chichester and Durham ([Dagger]
-1237), for the theory of his authorship rests only on his interest in this
-nunnery, to which he added a chapel and where his heart lies buried. A
-fuller knowledge of the English writings of the time may reveal by whom
-and for whom the book was written. The dialect proves it to be the
-production of a native of the south-western part of England, while its
-tone reveals a connection with Paris and Oxford. The writer must have had
-a high degree of culture, and was familiar with French, with court
-poetry, and with the similes so frequent in the stories of romance. He
-had a sound theological training, with a knowledge of the works of Jerome,
-Augustine, Gregory, Anselm, and notably of Bernard, from whom he
-frequently quotes. He had strong religious sympathies, but imperfect
-sympathy with the established church,--these latter facts tend to prove
-that he was in some measure connected with the friars. His references to
-'our lay brethren,' and his description of the 'hours' as said by them,
-may serve as a clue to his identification[804].
-
-The _Ancren Riwle_ or rule for recluses, fills a moderately sized volume
-and is extant in eight manuscript copies, of which five are in English,
-that is four in the dialect of the south and one in that of the
-north,--two in Latin, and one in French. The work is divided into eight
-parts, a short analysis of which will give an idea of the importance of
-the book and of the wide range of its author's sympathies. As he says
-himself the book was written for three sisters who in the bloom of their
-youth had forsaken the world to become anchoresses, but he expects it will
-be read by others. He assumes that his readers know Latin and French as
-well as English, a fact which in itself proves that like the _ancren_
-referred to above, the _ancren_ here addressed had received their
-education in a nunnery.
-
-In the short introduction which precedes the work the author says he will
-accede to the request of the women who have importuned him for a rule.
-
-'Do you now ask what rule you recluses should observe?' he asks (p.
-5)[805]. 'You should always keep the inward rule well with all your might
-and strength for its own sake. The inward rule is ever alike; the outward
-varies.... No recluse by my advice shall make profession, that is promise
-to keep anything commanded, save three things, obedience, chastity and
-stedfastness; she shall not change her home save by need, such as
-compulsion, fear of death or obedience to her bishop, or her master
-(herre). For she who undertakes anything and promises to do it at God's
-command, is bound to it and sins mortally in breaking her promise by will
-or wish. If she has not promised she may do it and leave it off as she
-will, as of meat and drink, abstaining from flesh and fish and other like
-things relating to dress, rest, hours and prayers. Let her say as many of
-these as she pleases, and in what way she pleases. These and other such
-things are all in our free choice to do or let alone whenever we choose,
-unless they are promised. But charity, that is love, and meekness and
-patience, truthfulness and keeping the ten ancient commandments,
-confession and penitence, these and such as these, some of which are of
-the old law, some of the new, are not of man's invention.'
-
-He then goes on to tell them that if asked to what order they belong, they
-must say, to the order of St James, who was God's apostle (and who wrote a
-canonical epistle). He dilates upon early Christian hermits and recluses,
-saying that they were of the order of St James, for in his mind St James
-the apostle is identical with St James the hermit.
-
-He then describes the contents of his work, saying the first part only
-shall treat of the outward rule, all the others of the inward.
-
-The first part accordingly (pp. 15-48) is on religious service, and in it
-the women are advised what prayers they shall say and at what time of the
-day: 'Let everyone say her hours as she has written them,' and as a guide
-take what 'hours' are kept by 'our lay brethren.' The sick, the sorrowful,
-prisoners, and Christians who are among the heathen shall be called to
-mind. The tone which the author occasionally takes has the full personal
-ring of 13th century mysticism. (p. 35) 'After the kiss of peace in the
-mass, when the priest consecrates, forget there all the world, and there
-be entirely out of the body, there in glowing love embrace your beloved
-spouse (leofman) Christ, who is come down from heaven into the bower of
-your breast, and hold him fast till he have granted all that you wish.'
-Several prayers follow, one in Latin on the adoration of the cross, and
-several in English which are addressed to the sweet lady St Mary.
-
-Outward observances being disposed of, the author then advises the women
-how to keep guard over the heart, 'wherein is order, religion and the life
-of the soul,' against the temptations of the five senses (pp. 48-117). The
-different senses and the dangers attending them are discussed, sometimes
-casually, sometimes in a systematic manner. In connection with Sight we
-get interesting details on the arrangement of the building in which the
-recluses dwelt. Its windows are hung with black cloth on which is a white
-cross. The black cloth is impervious to the wind and difficult to see
-through; the white of the cross is more transparent and emblematic of
-purity, by the help of which it becomes safe to look abroad. Looking
-abroad, however, is generally attended with danger. 'I write more
-particularly for others,' the author here remarks, 'nothing of the kind
-touches you, my dear sisters, for you have not the name, nor shall you
-have it by the grace of God, of staring recluses, whose profession is
-unrecognisable through their unseemly conduct, as is the case with some,
-alas!'
-
-Speech too should be wisely controlled, talking out of church windows
-should be avoided, and conversation generally should be indulged in only
-through the 'house' window and the parlour window. 'Silence always at
-meals,' says the author, and quotes from Seneca and Solomon on the evil
-effects of idle prattling. Hearing, that is listening too readily, also
-has its dangers, for it leads to spreading untruths. 'She who moves her
-tongue in lying makes it a cradle to the devil's child, and rocketh it
-diligently as a nurse.' In passages which show a keen insight into human
-nature and which are dictated by a wise and kindly spirit, the author
-among other examples describes how anyone seeking the recluse's sympathy
-for bad ends would approach her in plaintive strains, deploring that he is
-drawn to her, and assuring her that he desires nothing but her
-forgiveness, and thus by engrossing her thoughts more and more, would
-perturb her mind by rousing her personal sympathy.
-
-The sense of Smell also has its dangers; but in regard to the fifth sense,
-Feeling, there is most need, the author thinks, of comfort, 'for in it the
-pain is greatest, and the pleasure also if it so happen.' The sufferings
-of Christ are analysed and it is shown how he suffered in all his senses
-but especially in feeling.
-
-The next part of the work (pp. 118-177) contains moral lessons and
-examples. The peevish recluse finds her counterpart in the pelican which
-kills her own young ones when they molest her. Like the bird, the recluse
-in anger kills her works, then repents and makes great moan. There are
-some fine passages on the effects of anger which is likened to a sorceress
-(uorschup-pild) and transforms the recluse, Christ's spouse, into a
-she-wolf (wulvene). That women devotees often behaved very differently
-from what they ought is evident from these passages, for false recluses
-are likened unto foxes who live in holes and are thievish, ravenous and
-yelping, but 'the true recluses are indeed birds of heaven, that fly aloft
-and sit on the green boughs singing merrily; that is, they meditate,
-enraptured, upon the blessedness of heaven that never fadeth but is ever
-green, singing right merrily; that is in such meditation they rest in
-peace and have gladness of heart as those who sing.' In one passage,
-where the flight of birds is described, it says, 'the wings that bear the
-recluses upwards are good principles, which they must move unto good works
-as a bird that would fly moveth its wings.' From dumb animals wisdom and
-knowledge can be learnt, says the author, giving as an example the eagle,
-which deposits in his nest a precious stone called agate, which wards off
-harm, and thus Jesus Christ should be cherished to keep off evil. In
-another passage the author plays on the words _ancre_ and anchor, saying
-that the _ancre_ or recluse is anchored to the Church as the anchor to the
-ship, that storms may not overwhelm it. The reasons for solitary life are
-then enumerated under separate headings, and passages from the Old and the
-New Testament are freely quoted in illustration and corroboration of the
-statements made.
-
-The fourth part of the book (pp. 178-298) dilates on temptation, in regard
-to which the writer holds that greater holiness brings increased
-difficulties. 'As the hill of holy and pious life is greater and higher,
-so the fiend's puffs which are the winds of temptation are stronger
-thereon and more frequent.' Patience and meekness are chiefly required to
-resist the troubles of sickness, and wisdom and spiritual strength must
-resist grief of heart, anger and wrath. Again the recluses for whom the
-book is written are assured that they have least need to be fortified
-against temptations and trials, sickness only excepted.
-
-The imagery in which the author goes on to describe the seven chief sins
-is graphic and powerful. They are personified as the Lion of Pride, the
-Serpent of Envy, the Unicorn of Wrath, the Bear of Sloth, the Fox of
-Covetousness, the Swine of Gluttony, and the Scorpion of Lust, each with
-its offspring. Of the Scorpion's progeny we are told that 'it doth not
-become a modest mouth to name the name of some of them,' while the
-Scorpion itself is a kind of worm, that has a face somewhat like that of a
-woman, but its hinder parts are those of a serpent. It puts on a pleasant
-countenance and fawns upon you with its head but stings with its tail.
-Again, the sins are likened to seven hags (heggen), to whom men who serve
-in the devil's court are married. The description of these men as
-jugglers, jesters, ash-gatherers and devil's purveyors, gives interesting
-details on the characters in real life by which they were suggested. Of
-the comforting thoughts which the recluse is to dwell upon the following
-give a fine example.
-
-'The sixth comfort is that our Lord, when he suffereth us to be tempted,
-playeth with us as the mother with her young darling: she fleeth from him
-and hides herself, and lets him sit alone, look anxiously around calling
-Dame, dame! and weep awhile, and then she leapeth forth laughing with
-outspread arms and embraceth and kisseth him and wipeth his eyes. Just so
-our Lord leaveth us sometimes alone, and withdraweth his grace and comfort
-and support, so that we find no sweetness in any good we do, nor
-satisfaction of heart; and yet all the while our dear father loveth us
-none the less, but doeth it for the great love he hath for us.'
-
-In times of tribulation the recluse is directed to meditate on God and His
-works, on the Virgin and the saints, and the temptations they withstood,
-such as are related in an English book on St Margaret. Again and again the
-writer, who does not tire of this part of his theme, dwells on the various
-sins separately, and on the best way of meeting them.
-
-The next part of the book (pp. 298-348) is devoted to an analysis of the
-use and the manner of confession, the theory and practice of which in the
-Church of Rome are ancient, but which the religious enthusiasm of the
-Middle Ages elaborated into a hard and fast system. That
-self-introspection and analysis are helpful in developing and
-strengthening conscientiousness no one will deny, but the habitual
-disclosure of one's thoughts and criticisms of self to another, though it
-may still afford support to some, has ceased to appear generally
-advisable. Granted that the practice in the past served a good purpose,
-the advice given in this book for recluses appears dictated by a strong
-sense of fitness and moderation. The author considers confession powerful
-in three directions: it 'confoundeth the devil,' it gives us back all the
-good we have lost, and it 'maketh us children of God.' Under these
-headings there is a long and systematic elaboration of the sixteen ways in
-which confession should be made, viz. it should be accusatory, bitter,
-complete, candid, and it should be made often, and speedily, humbly and
-hopefully, etc. Stories out of the Bible and parables of a later age are
-introduced in corroboration of each injunction. Under the heading of
-candid confession the words to be used in self-accusation are interesting,
-because it is obvious that a higher moral standard is claimed from women
-than from men. The person who has committed sin is to address the father
-confessor (schrift feder) in these words: 'I am a woman, and ought by
-right to have been more modest than to speak as I have spoken, or to do
-as I have done; and therefore my sin is greater than if a man had done it,
-for it became me worse.' From the Gospels and the Fathers the writer
-adduces strings of wise sayings which bear on the points he would impress
-upon his readers. This fifth part of the book, he says, belongs to all men
-alike, not to recluses in particular, and he ends by admonishing the
-sisters in this way: 'Take to your profit this short and concluding
-summary of all mentioned and known sins, as of pride, ambition,
-presumption, envy, wrath, sloth, carelessness, idle words, immoral
-thoughts, any idle hearing, any false joy or heavy mourning, hypocrisy,
-the taking too much or too little meat or drink, grumbling, being of
-morose countenance, breaking silence, sitting too long at the parlour
-window, saying hours badly or without attention of heart or at a wrong
-time, any false word or oath, play, scornful laughter, wasting crumbs, or
-spilling ale or letting things grow mouldy or rusty or rotten; leaving
-clothes not sewed, wet with rain, or unwashed; breaking a cup or a dish,
-or carelessly looking after any thing which we own and should take care
-of; or cutting or damaging through heedlessness.' These in the writer's
-eyes are the likely sins among the recluses whom he addresses and against
-which he warns them to be on their guard. If they have committed them they
-must forthwith confess, but trivial faults should be wiped away by prayers
-said before the altar the moment the recluse is conscious of them.
-
-Passing from the subject of Confession to that of Penance (pp. 348-383)
-the author as he says borrows much from the Sentences of Bernard, the
-general drift of which is in favour of self-discipline and implies
-mortification of the flesh. In this context comes the reference to
-Ailred's (Seint Aldret's) advice to his sister, who also was directed to
-give the body pain by fasting, watching, and discipline, by having coarse
-garments and a hard bed, and by bearing evil and working hard. But here
-again the recluses addressed are told that in the eyes of their adviser
-they incline rather to over-much self-denial than to over-much
-self-indulgence.
-
-The seventh part of the book (pp. 384-410) treats of the pure heart or of
-love and is attractive in many ways. The sentiments developed and the
-pictures described give one the highest opinion of the feelings of which
-the age was capable, as reflected in this writer's innermost being. The
-beautiful parable where Christ woos the soul in guise of a king is well
-worth repeating, for there we see the courtly attitude, which the age of
-romance had developed in real life, receiving a spiritual adaptation.
-
-'There was a lady who was besieged by her foes within an earthly castle,
-and her land was all destroyed and herself quite poor. The love of a
-powerful king was however fixed upon her with such boundless affection
-that to solicit her love he sent his messengers one after the other, and
-often many together, and sent her trinkets both many and fair, and
-supplies of victuals and help of his high retinue to hold her castle. She
-received them all as a careless creature with so hard a heart that he
-could never get nearer to her love. What would'st thou more? He came
-himself at last and showed her his fair face, since he was of all men the
-fairest to behold, and spoke so sweetly and with such gentle words that
-they might have raised the dead from death to life. And he wrought many
-wonders, and did many wondrous deeds before her eyes, and showed her his
-power and told her of his kingdom, and offered to make her queen of all
-that he owned. But all availed him nought. Was not this surprising
-mockery? For she was not worthy to have been his servant. But owing to his
-goodness love so mastered him that he said at last: "Lady, thou art
-attacked, and thine enemies are so strong that thou canst not without my
-help escape their hands that thou mayest not be put to a shameful death. I
-am prompted by love of thee to undertake this fight, and rid thee of those
-that seek thy death. I know well that I shall receive a mortal wound, but
-I will do it gladly to win thy heart. Now I beseech thee for the love I
-bear thee that thou love me at least after my death, since thou would'st
-not in my lifetime." Thus did the king. He freed her of her enemies and
-was himself wounded and slain in the end. Through a miracle he arose from
-death to life. Would not that same lady be of an evil kind if she did not
-love him above all things after this?'
-
-'The king is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who in this wise wooed our Soul
-which the devils had beset. And He as a noble wooer, after many messengers
-and many good deeds, came to prove His love and showed through knighthood
-that He was worthy of love, as sometime knights were wont to do. He
-entered in a tournament, and as a bold knight had His shield pierced
-everywhere in the fight for His lady's love.'
-
-The likeness between the shield and Christ's body is further dwelt upon.
-The image of His crucified form hangs suspended in church, as 'after the
-death of a valiant knight, men hang up his shield high in church to his
-memory.'
-
-There is more on the theme of love that is very fine. The ideas generated
-by knighthood are obviously present to the mind of the writer.
-
-Interesting also is his classification of the different kinds of love. The
-love of good friends (gode iueren) is first mentioned, but higher than
-that is the love between man and woman, and even higher still that between
-mother and child, for the mother to cure her child of disease is ready to
-make a bath of her blood for it. Higher again is the love of the body to
-the soul, but the love which Christ bears to His dear spouse, the soul,
-surpasses them all.
-
-'Thy love,' says our Lord, 'is either to be freely given or it is to be
-sold, or it is to be stolen and to be taken with force. If it is to be
-given, where could'st thou bestow it better than on me? Am I not of all
-the fairest? Am I not the richest king? Am I not of noblest birth? Am I
-not in wealth the wisest? Am I not the most courteous? Am I not the most
-liberal of men? For so it is said of a liberal man that he can withhold
-nothing; that his hands are perforated as mine are. Am I not of all the
-sweetest and most gentle? Thus in me all reasons thou may'st find for
-bestowing thy love, if thou lovest chaste purity; for no one can love me
-save she hold by that.--But if thy love is not to be given but is to be
-sold, say at what price; either for other love or for something else? Love
-is well sold for love, and so love should be sold and for nought else. If
-thy love is thus to be sold, I have bought it with love surpassing all
-other. For of the four kinds of love, I have shown thee the best of them
-all. And if thou sayest that thou wilt not let it go cheaply and askest
-for more, name what it shall be. Set a price on thy love. Thou canst not
-name so much but I will give thee for thy love much more. Wouldest thou
-have castles and kingdoms? Wouldest thou govern the world? I am purposed
-to do better; I am purposed to make thee withal queen of heaven. Thou
-shalt be sevenfold brighter than the sun; no evil shall harm thee, no
-creature shall vex thee, no joy shall be wanting to thee; thy will shall
-be done in heaven and on earth; yea, even in hell.'
-
-And in a further development of this idea all imaginable good, Croesus'
-wealth, Absalom's beauty, Asahel's swiftness, Samson's strength, are held
-out as a reward to the soul who responds to the wooing of Christ and
-gives herself entirely into His keeping. 'This love,' says the author in
-conclusion, 'is the rule which governs the heart.'
-
-The last part of the book (pp. 410-431) appears to be appended as an
-after-thought, as it treats once more of domestic matters. 'I said before
-at the beginning,' says the author, 'that ye ought not, like unwise
-people, to promise to keep any of the outward rules. I say the same still,
-nor do I write them save for you alone. I say this in order that recluses
-may not say that I by my authority make new rules for them. Nor do I
-command that they shall hold them, and you may change them whenever you
-will for better ones. Of things that have been in use before it matters
-little.' Practical directions follow which throw a further light on the
-position and conduct of the recluse, and which in many particulars are
-curiously like the injunctions which form the opening part of the letter
-of Ailred. The recluses shall partake of Communion on fifteen days of the
-year; they shall eat twice a day between Easter and Roodmass (September
-14), during the other half year they shall fast save on Sundays; and they
-shall not eat flesh or lard except in sickness. 'There are recluses,' says
-the writer, 'who have meals with their friends outside. That is too much
-friendship; for all orders it is unsuitable, but chiefly for the order of
-recluses who are dead to the world.' A recluse shall not be liberal of
-other men's alms, for housewifery is Martha's part and not hers. 'Martha's
-office is to feed and clothe poor men as the mistress of a house; Mary
-ought not to intermeddle in it, and if any one blame her, God Himself the
-supreme defends her for it, as holy writ bears witness. On the other hand
-a recluse ought only to take sparingly that which is necessary for her.
-Whereof, then, may she make herself liberal? She must live upon alms as
-frugally as ever she can, and not gather that she may give it away
-afterwards. She is not a housewife but a Church ancre. If she can spare
-any fragments to the poor, let her send them quietly out of her dwelling.
-Sin is oft concealed under the semblance of goodness. And how shall those
-rich anchoresses who are tillers of the ground, or have fixed rents, do
-their alms privately to poor neighbours? Desire not to have the reputation
-of bountiful anchoresses, nor, in order to give much, be too eager to
-possess more. Greediness is at the root of bitterness: all the boughs that
-spring from it are bitter. To beg in order to give away is not the part of
-a recluse. From the courtesy of a recluse and from her liberality, sin
-and shame have often come in the end.'
-
-This idea, that the recluse shall follow the example of Mary and not that
-of Martha, occurs also in Ailred's letter, though it is more briefly
-stated (c. 41 ff.).
-
-'You shall possess no beast, my dear sisters,' says the author of the
-_Ancren Riwle_, 'except only a cat. A recluse who has cattle appears as
-Martha was.' She thinks of the fodder, of the herdsman, thoughts which
-bring with them traffic. 'A recluse who is a buyer and seller (cheapild)
-selleth her soul to the chapman of hell.' Ailred similarly warned his
-'sister' against keeping flocks (c. 5 ff.). But the author of the _Riwle_
-allows the recluse to keep a cow if need be. 'Do not take charge,' he
-says, 'of other men's things in your house, nor of their property, nor of
-their clothes, neither receive under your care the church vestments nor
-the chalice, unless compelled thereto, for oftentimes much harm has come
-from such caretaking.' The clothes the sisters wear shall be warm and
-simple, 'be they white, be they black; only see that they be plain and
-warm and well-made.' He warns them against severe discipline by the use of
-hair-cloth and hedgehog-skins, and against scourging with a leathern
-thong. He desires them to have all needful clothing, but forbids wearing
-rings, brooches, ornamented girdles and gloves. The recluse shall 'make no
-purses to gain friends therewith, nor blodbendes[806] of silk; but shape
-and sew and mend church vestments, and poor people's clothes.' The point
-Ailred in his rule strongly insisted upon, the command that the recluse
-shall not keep a school as some recluses do, is reiterated by the author
-of the _Ancren Riwle_, for the excitement it brings and the personal
-affection it creates between teacher and pupil are felt to be fraught with
-danger. If there be a girl who needs to be taught, the recluse shall cause
-her to be instructed by her servant, for she shall keep two servants, the
-one to stay at home, the other to go abroad, 'whose garments shall be of
-such shape and their attire such that their calling be obvious.' The
-recluse shall read the concluding part of this book to her women once a
-week, but she herself is to read in it daily if she have leisure.
-
-Such in brief outline is the _Ancren Riwle_, a book which above all others
-gives an insight into the religious life as apprehended in the 13th
-century in England; a book which, written for women--the number of whom
-can never have been great, contains much that remains wise and instructive
-to this day, owing to its wide outlook and liberal spirit. It gives the
-very highest opinion of the author's gentleness and refinement, and of the
-exalted sentiments of the women he was addressing.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-This is not the place to dwell on the numerous spiritual love-songs which
-were written in English at this period under the influence of mystic
-tendencies; but it must be pointed out that those which breathe the love
-of a woman's soul to Christ were presumably written in the interest of
-nuns. Among them is one in prose, entitled the 'Wooing of Our Lord[807],'
-written by its author for his 'sister,' which has a certain likeness to
-the 'Ancren Riwle,' and on this ground has been ascribed to the same
-author. Probably it is a paraphrase of part of it, but it has none of the
-harmonious flow of the treatise itself, and its tone is so much more
-emotional, that it looks like the production of a later age.
-
-The idea of the exaltation of virginity at this period further led to the
-re-writing in English of the legends of women-saints whose stories turn on
-the might of virginity in conflict with the evil powers of this world.
-Among them the legends of St Margaret, St Juliana and St Cecilia, are
-extant in a manuscript of about the year 1230. Their authorship is
-unknown, but they were evidently written in the first place for religious
-women.
-
-In conclusion a few words must be said on a treatise written about the
-same time called 'Holy Maidenhood' (Hali Meidenhad), the interest of which
-lies in the fact that while advocating the same cause as the writings
-discussed above, it is quite untouched by their spirit[808]. Here also the
-advantages of the love of Christ over love for earthly things are enlarged
-on, and the superiority of the 'free' maiden over her who has embraced
-family life is upheld. But this is done in a broad familiar strain and
-with repeated fierce attacks on marriage.
-
-The author ornaments his treatise with Biblical quotations, but he
-possesses none of the courtly grace and elegance of diction of Thomas de
-Hales and the author of the _Ancren Riwle_. In form the treatise answers
-to its drift, for it is written in an alliterative homely style which
-gives it a peculiar interest from the philological point of view. Looked
-at from the religious standpoint it yields a curious example of what the
-tone and temper would be of one who, grasping the moral drift of the age,
-remained a stranger to its tenderer strains. At the same time its author
-is not without considerable insight into the realities of life and has a
-sense of humour usually absent in mystic writings. The following passage
-which dwells on some of the annoyances of married life give a good example
-of this (p. 37).
-
-'And how I ask, though it may seem odious, how does the wife stand who
-when she comes in hears her child scream, sees the cat at the flitch, and
-the hound at the hide? Her cake is burning on the stone hearth, her calf
-is sucking up the milk, the earthen pot is overflowing into the fire and
-the churl is scolding. Though it be an odious tale, it ought, maiden, to
-deter thee more strongly from marriage, for it does not seem easy to her
-who has tried it. Thou, happy maiden, who hast fully removed thyself out
-of that servitude as a free daughter of God and as His Son's spouse,
-needest not suffer anything of the kind. Therefore, happy maiden, forsake
-all such sorrow for the reward reserved to thee as thou oughtest to do
-without any reward. Now I have kept my promise, that I would show that to
-be glozed over with falsehood, which some may say and think of as true:
-the happiness and sweetness which the wedded have. For it fares not as
-those think who look at it from the outside; it happens far otherwise with
-the poor and the rich, with those who loathe and those who love each
-other, but the vexation in every case exceeds the joy, and the loss
-altogether surpasses the gain.'
-
-The writer then recommends Christ as a spouse and gives a graphic
-description of pride, which he considers a power equal to that of the
-devil. He has such a lively horror of pride and thinks its effects so
-baneful that, should the maidenhood he has been extolling be touched by
-it, its prerogative, he says, forthwith breaks down. 'A maid as regards
-the grace of maidenhood surpasses the widowed and the wedded, but a mild
-wife or meek widow is better than a proud maiden,'--a distinction which is
-curious and I believe stands alone at this early period. The saints
-Catharine, Margaret, Agnes, Juliana and Cecilia are quoted as maidens of
-irreproachable meekness.
-
-The treatise 'Hali Meidenhad' exists in one copy only, and there is no
-evidence as to how much it was read. Its obvious purpose is to encourage
-girls to become nuns, and this not so much on account of the beauties of
-convent life, as because of the troubles in worldly life they would escape
-by doing so.
-
-
-§ 2. The Convent of Helfta and its Literary Nuns[809].
-
-The mystic writings with which the present chapter has hitherto dealt are
-works written for nuns, not by them, for of all the English mystic
-writings of the 13th century, womanly though they often are in tone, none
-can claim to be the production of a woman. It is different on the
-Continent, where the mystic literature of the 13th century is largely the
-production of nuns, some of whom have secured wide literary fame. Their
-writings, which were looked upon by their contemporaries as divinely
-inspired, are among the most impassioned books of the age. They claim the
-attention both of the student of art and the student of literature. For
-strong natures who rebelled against the conditions of ordinary life, but
-were shut out from the arena of intellectual competition, found an outlet
-for their aspirations in intensified emotionalism, and this emotionalism
-led to the development of a wealth of varying imagery which subsequently
-became the subject-matter of pictorial art. In course of time the series
-of images offered and suggested by Scripture had been supplemented by a
-thousand floating fancies and a mass of legendary conceits, which were
-often based on heathen conceptions; and the 13th century mystic first
-tried to fix and interpret these in their spiritual application. His
-endeavours may appear to some a dwelling on fruitless fancies, but since
-this imagery in its later representations, especially in painting, has
-become a thing of so much wonder and delight, the writers who first tried
-to realise and describe these conceptions deserve at least respectful
-attention.
-
-The convent of Helfta near Eisleben in Saxony stands out during the 13th
-century as a centre of these mystic tendencies and of contemporary
-culture, owing to the literary activity of its nuns. All the qualities
-which make early mysticism attractive,--moral elevation, impassioned
-fervour, intense realism and an almost boundless imagination,--are here
-found reflected in the writings of three women, who were inmates of the
-same convent, and worked and wrote contemporaneously.
-
-The convent to which these women belonged was of the Benedictine order. It
-had been founded in 1229 by Burkhardt, Count von Mansfeld, and his wife
-Elisabeth, for the use of their two daughters and for other women who
-wished to join them in a religious life. So many of the daughters of the
-Thuringian nobility flocked thither that the convent was removed in 1234
-to more spacious accommodation at Rodardesdorf, and again in 1258 to a
-pleasanter and more suitable site at Helfta.
-
-The convent was then under the abbess Gertrud[810] of the noble family of
-Hackeborn, whose rule (1251-1291) marks a climax in the prosperity and
-influence of the house. The convent numbered over a hundred nuns, and
-among them were women distinguished in other ways besides writing. In the
-annals of the house mention is made of Elisabeth and Sophie, daughters of
-Hermann von Mansfeld;--the former was a good painter, and the latter
-transcribed numerous books and held the office of prioress for many years
-before she succeeded Gertrud as abbess. Reference is also made to the nun
-Mechthild von Wippra ([Dagger] c. 1300), who taught singing, an art
-zealously cultivated by these nuns.
-
-This enthusiasm for studies of all kinds was inspired in the first place
-by the abbess Gertrud, of whose wonderful liberality of mind and zeal for
-the advance of knowledge we read in an account written soon after her
-death by members of her convent[811]. She was endlessly zealous in
-collecting books and in setting her nuns to transcribe them. 'This too she
-insisted on,' says the account, 'that the girls should be instructed in
-the liberal arts, for she said that if the pursuit of knowledge (studium
-scientiae) were to perish, they would no longer be able to understand holy
-writ, and religion together with devotion would disappear.' Latin was well
-taught and written with ease by various members of the convent. The three
-women writers who have given the house lasting fame were Mechthild,--who
-was not educated at the convent but came there about the year 1268, and
-who is usually spoken of as the beguine or sister Mechthild,--the nun and
-saint Mechthild von Hackeborn, the sister of the abbess Gertrud, who was
-educated in the convent and there had visions between 1280 and 1300,--and
-Gertrud--known in literature as Gertrud the Great. Her name being the
-same as that of the abbess caused at one time a confusion between them.
-
-The writings of these nuns were composed under the influence of the same
-mystic movement which was spreading over many districts of Europe, and
-therefore they contain ideas and descriptions which, forming part of the
-imaginative wealth of the age, are nearly related to what is
-contemporaneously found elsewhere. In numerous particulars the writings of
-these nuns bear a striking resemblance to the imagery and descriptions
-introduced into the Divine Comedy by Dante. Struck by this likeness, and
-bent upon connecting _Matelda_ of the _Purgatorio_ with a real person,
-several modern students have recognised her prototype in one of the
-writers named Mechthild[812].
-
-The writings of both these women are anterior in date to the composition
-of the Divine Comedy, and as they were accepted by the Dominicans,
-certainly had a chance of being carried into distant districts. But there
-is no proof that Dante had either of these writers in his mind when he
-wrote in the _Purgatorio_ of Matelda as appearing in an earthly paradise
-to the poet on the other side of the river Lethe.
-
-  'A lady all alone, she went along
-  Singing and culling flower after flower,
-  With which the pathway was all studded o'er.
-  "Ah, beauteous lady, who in rays of love
-  Dost warm thyself, if I may trust to looks,
-  Which the heart's witnesses are wont to be,
-  May the desire come unto thee to draw
-  Near to this river's bank," I said to her,
-  "So much that I may hear what thou art singing."'
-
-It is she who makes the triumph of the Church apparent to the poet while
-Beatrice descends to him from heaven.
-
-Without entering into this controversy, it is interesting to note the
-similarity of the visions in which Mechthild von Hackeborn describes
-heaven, and those which Mechthild of Magdeburg draws of hell, to the
-descriptions of the greatest of Italian poets.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-In order to gain an idea of the interests which were prominent at the
-convent at Helfta it will be well to treat of the lives, history and
-writings of its three women writers in succession,--the beguine
-Mechthild,--the nun Mechthild,--and the nun Gertrud. Their characters and
-compositions bear marked points of difference.
-
-Mechthild the beguine[813] was born about 1212 and lived in contact with
-the world, perhaps at some court, till the age of twenty-three, when she
-left her people and came to Magdeburg to adopt the religious life. She was
-led to take this step by a troubled conscience, which was no doubt
-occasioned by her coming into contact with Dominican friars. At this time
-they were making a great stir in Saxony, and Mechthild's brother Balduin
-joined their order. Mechthild lived at Magdeburg for many years in a poor
-and humble way in a settlement of beguines, but at last she was obliged to
-seek protection in a nunnery, because she had drawn upon herself the
-hatred of the clergy.
-
-The origin and position of the bands of women called beguines[814] deserve
-attention, for the provisions made for them are evidently the outcome of a
-charitable wish to provide for homeless women, and to prevent their
-vagrancy and moral degradation. The name given to these women lies in
-great obscurity. It is sometimes connected with a priest of Liège
-(Lüttich) Lambert le Bègue (the stammerer, [Dagger] 1172), a reformer in
-his way whose work recalls that of the founders of orders of combined
-canons and nuns, and who was very popular among women of all classes and
-advocated their association. Many settlements of beguines were founded in
-the towns of Flanders and Brabant, some of which have survived to this
-day; and in German towns also the plan was readily adopted of setting
-aside a house in the town, for the use of poor women who, being thus
-provided with a roof over their heads, were then left to support
-themselves as best they could, by begging, or by sick nursing, or by the
-work of their hands. These women were not bound by any vow to remain in
-the house where they dwelt, and were not tied down to any special routine.
-This freedom led to different results among them. In some instances they
-were attracted by mysticism; in others they advocated ideas which drew on
-them the reproach of heresy and gave rise to Papal decrees condemning
-them; in others again they drifted into ways which were little to their
-credit and caused them to be classed with loose women.
-
-In one of the houses allotted to these women in Magdeburg Mechthild spent
-the years between 1235 and 1268, and during that time, under the
-encouragement of the Dominican friars, she wrote prayers, meditations,
-reflections on the times, and short accounts of spiritual visions, some in
-prose, some in verse, which had a wide circulation. The fact of their
-being written in German at a time when writings of the kind in German were
-few, was the cause of their being read in lay as well as in religious
-circles. These writings were afterwards collected, presumably in the order
-of their composition, by a Dominican friar who issued them under the title
-of 'The Flowing Light of Divinity.' Six of the seven books into which the
-work is divided were composed before Mechthild went to Helfta, and the
-visions and reflections she wrote after her admission were grouped
-together in the seventh book. These writings were originally issued in the
-German of the north, but the only German copy now extant is a south German
-transcript, which was written for the mystics of Switzerland. The work was
-translated into Latin during Mechthild's lifetime by a Dominican friar,
-but his collection only contains the first six books, the contents of
-which are arranged in a different order. Both the German and the Latin
-versions have recently been reprinted[815].
-
-Among these writings were several severely critical and condemnatory of
-the clergy of Magdeburg, who resented these attacks and persecuted
-Mechthild. On this account she sought admission at Helfta, which was not
-far distant from Halle, where her special friend the Dominican friar
-Heinrich was living[816]. The nuns at Helfta were on friendly terms with
-the Dominicans, who frequently visited them[817], and it appears that the
-nun Gertrud the Great knew of the writings of the beguine and advocated
-her admission to the nunnery. She came there in 1268 and lived there for
-about twelve years; passages in the writings of her fellow nuns refer to
-her death and burial[818].
-
-With regard to her writings we are struck by their diversified contents,
-by their variety in form, and by their many-sided sympathies. The 'Flowing
-Light of Divinity' (Fliessende Licht der Gottheit), consists of a
-collection of shorter and longer compositions, some in poetry, some in
-prose, which may be roughly classed as spiritual poems and love-songs,
-allegories, visions, and moral reflections or aphorisms. Against mysticism
-the charge has been brought that it led to no activity in theological
-thought and did not produce any religious reformation, but surely
-enquiries into the nature of the soul and its relation to God such as
-these are full of speculative interest, and have played no small part in
-paving the way towards a more rational interpretation of the position of
-man with regard to faith, to merit, to retribution and to the other great
-questions of dogma.
-
-Turning first to the poems which treat of spiritual love, many are in
-dialogue, a form much used by the Minnesingers of the age but rarely by
-its religious poets. Among them is a dialogue[819] between the Soul and
-the queen Love, who sits enthroned. The Soul accuses Love (spiritual love
-of course) of robbing her of a liking for the goods of this world, but
-Love justifies herself by saying that she has given to the Soul instead
-all that constitutes her true happiness. In another dialogue[820] the Soul
-exclaims in wonder at Love, who in eloquent strains describes the power
-that is within her. By this power she drove Christ from heaven to earth;
-is it then to be wondered at that she can capture and hold fast a soul?
-
-One of the longer pieces[821], less complete in form but more complex in
-ideas, describes how a call comes to the Soul, and how she urges her
-servants the Senses to help her to adorn herself to go forth to the dance,
-that her craving for joy may be satisfied. The Soul justifies her desire
-in strains such as these:
-
-  'The fish in the water do not drown, the birds in the air are not lost,
-  The gold in the furnace does not vanish but there attains its glow.
-  God has given to every creature to live according to its desire,
-  Why then should I resist mine?'
-
-The Soul then describes the various experiences which led to her union
-with Christ, which she expresses in passionate strains suggestive of the
-Song of Solomon.
-
-Again, we have the Soul[822] complaining to Love of the ties which bind
-her to the body, and Love directs her how to overcome them. Understanding
-too discourses with the Soul[823], and the Soul admits the greater
-capacities of Understanding, but she insists that Understanding owes to
-her the capacity both of contemplation and spiritual enjoyment. In other
-poems like points of abstract interest are touched upon. One of the most
-curious of these productions is a dialogue in which Understanding
-converses with Conscience[824] and expresses surprise at Conscience, whose
-attitude is one of proud humility. Conscience explains that her pride
-comes through her contact with God, and that her humility is due to her
-contrition at having done so few good works.
-
-The question of how far good works are necessary to salvation, in other
-words justification by faith _versus_ justification by works, is a thought
-prominent in the beguine's mind, and gives the keynote to a curious and
-interesting allegory on admission to the communion of the saints[825]. A
-poor girl longing to hear mass felt herself transported into the church of
-heaven, where at first she could see no one. Presently youths entered
-strewing flowers,--white flowers beneath the church tower, violets along
-the nave, roses before the Virgin's altar, and lilies throughout the
-choir. Others came and lighted candles, and then John the Baptist entered
-bearing the lamb, which he set on the altar and prepared to read mass.
-John the Evangelist came next, St Peter and so many more of heaven's
-inmates that the poor girl felt there was no room left for her in the nave
-of the church. She went and stood beneath the tower among people who wore
-crowns, 'but the beauty of hair, which comes from good works, they had
-not. How had they come into heaven? Through repentance and good
-intention.' There were others with them so richly clad that the girl felt
-ashamed of her appearance and went into the choir, where she saw the
-Virgin, St Catherine, holy Cecilia, bishops, martyrs and angels. But
-suddenly she too was decked with a splendid cloak, and the Virgin beckoned
-to her to stand by her side. Prompted by the Virgin she then took part in
-the religious service and was led to the altar, where John the Baptist let
-her kiss the wounds of the lamb. 'She to whom this happened is dead,'
-says the writer, 'but we hope to find her again among the choir of
-angels.'
-
-This allegory was severely censured, and in a later chapter[826] Mechthild
-says that a 'Pharisee' argued that it was forbidden for a layman, like
-John the Baptist, to hold mass. Mechthild's arguments in reply to the
-charge are somewhat involved, but she boldly declares that John, who was
-in close communion with God, was better fitted in some respects to say
-mass than Pope, bishop or priest.
-
-With Mechthild, John the Baptist, John the Evangelist and St Peter, patron
-saint of the Dominicans, stand foremost among the saints of heaven. There
-is a beautiful account[827] of a Soul who found herself in company with
-God and the saints, who each in turn explained how they had helped to
-bring her there.
-
-Glimpses of heaven and hell are frequent in these writings, and a full
-description of hell[828] and one of paradise[829] deserve special
-attention from the point of view of mediæval imagery. Hell is here
-characterised as the seat of Eternal Hatred, which is built in the deepest
-depths from stones of manifold wickedness. Pride, as shown in Lucifer,
-forms the foundation-stone; then come the stones of disobedience,
-covetousness, hatred and lewdness, brought thither through acts of Adam.
-Cain brought anger, ferocity, and warfare, and Judas brought lying,
-betrayal, despair and suicide. The building formed by these stones is so
-arranged that each part of it is occupied by those who were specially
-prone to the various sins. In its depths sits Lucifer, above him
-Christians, Jews and heathens, according to the kind of crime committed by
-each. The horrors of their sufferings recall those pictured by Herrad, and
-at a later period by Dante and Orcagna. The usurer is gnawed, the thief
-hangs suspended by his feet, murderers continually receive wounds, and
-gluttons swallow red-hot stones and drink sulphur and pitch. 'What seemed
-sweetness here is there turned into bitterness. The sluggard is loaded
-with grief, the wrathful are struck with fiery thongs. The poor musician,
-who had gleefully fed wicked vanity, weeps more tears in hell than there
-is water in the sea.' Many horrible and impressive scenes, such as the
-mediæval mind loved to dwell upon, are depicted.
-
-The picture drawn of paradise is correspondingly fair. According to the
-beguine there is an earthly and a heavenly paradise. Regarding the earthly
-paradise she says: 'There is no limit to its length and breadth. First I
-reached a spot lying on the confines of this world and paradise. There I
-saw trees and leaves and grass, but of weeds there were none. Some trees
-bore fruit, but most of them sweet-scented leaves. Rapid streams cut
-through the earth, and warm winds blew from the south. In the waters
-mingled earth's sweetness and heaven's delight. The air was sweet beyond
-expression. But of birds and animals there were none, for God has reserved
-this garden for human beings to dwell there undisturbed,' In this garden
-Mechthild finds Enoch and Elias who explain what keeps them there. Then
-she sees the higher regions of paradise in which dwell the souls who are
-waiting to enter the kingdom of God, 'floating in joy as the air floats in
-the sunshine,' says Mechthild; and she goes on to explain how on the Day
-of Judgment paradise will altogether cease to exist and its inhabitants
-will be absorbed into heaven.
-
-The beguine's writings contain various references to herself and her
-compositions, and considerable praise of the Dominican friars. In one
-place[830] she describes how she was told that her writings deserved to be
-burnt, but she turned in prayer to God as was her wont from childhood, and
-He told her not to doubt her powers for they came through Him. 'Ah Lord,'
-she exclaimed in reply, 'were I a learned man, a priest, in whom thou
-hadst made manifest this power, thou would'st see him honoured, but how
-can they believe that on such unworthy ground thou hast raised a golden
-house?... Lord, I fail to see the reason of it.' But the attacks against
-her roused her to anger, and she closes the poem with a stern invective
-against those who are false.
-
-Another passage contains an autobiographical sketch of Mechthild's early
-experiences[831]. She says that when she was twelve years old she felt
-drawn to things divine, and from that time to the present, a period of
-thirty-one years, she had been conscious of God's grace and had been saved
-from going astray. 'God is witness,' she continues, 'that I never
-consciously prayed to be told what is written in this book; it never
-occurred to me that such things could come to anyone. While I spent my
-youth with friends and relations to whom I was most dear, I had no
-knowledge of such things. Yet I always wished to be humble, and from love
-of God I came to a place (Magdeburg) where with one exception I had no
-friends.' She describes how at that time two angels and two devils were
-her companions, and were to her the representatives of the good and evil
-tendencies of which she was conscious. The devils spoke to her of her
-physical beauty, promised fame 'such as has led astray many an
-unbeliever,' and prompted her to rebellion and unchastity. Obviously her
-passionate nature rose against the mode of life she had adopted, but the
-thought of Christ's sufferings at last brought her comfort. She was much
-perturbed by her power of writing. 'Why not give it to learned folk?' she
-asked of God, but God was angered with her, and her father-confessor
-pressed upon her that writing was her vocation. In another impassioned
-account she describes how she was oppressed by a devil[832].
-
-In the third book of her writings Mechthild says[833] that God pointed out
-to her the seven virtues which priests ought to cultivate, and we gather
-from this that she did not consider the clergy devout or pure-minded. In
-further passages[834] she dilates on the duties of prelate, prior and
-prioress, and severely attacks the conduct of a deacon of Magdeburg. Even
-more explicit in its severity to the priesthood is an account[835] of how
-God spoke to her, and told her that He would touch the Pope's heart and
-make him utter a prayer, which is given, and in which the Pope declaims
-against the conduct of his clergy who are 'straightway going to hell.' In
-the Latin translation God's admonition is amplified by the following
-passages: 'For thus says the Lord: I will open the ear of the highest
-priest and touch his heart with the woe of my wrath, because my shepherds
-of Jerusalem have become robbers and wolves before my very eyes. With
-cruelty they murder my lambs and devour them. The sheep also are worn and
-weary because you call them from healthy pastures, in your godlessness do
-not suffer them to graze on the heights on green herbs, and with threats
-and reproof prevent their being tended with healthful teaching and
-healthful advice by those men who are supported by faith and knowledge. He
-who knows not the way that leads to hell and would know it, let him look
-at the life and morals of the base and degenerate clergy, who, given to
-luxury and other sins, through their impious ways are inevitably going the
-way to hell[836].'
-
-The friars, it is said, must come to the rescue and reform the world, and
-Mechthild being especially inclined to the Dominicans dwells on their
-usefulness to true faith in a number of passages[837]. There is a long
-description of how God saw that His Son, with the apostles, martyrs,
-confessors and virgins, was unable to lead back the people who had gone
-astray, and therefore He sent into the world two other children, that is
-the two orders of friars, to save them. In another vision[838] God
-explains to Mechthild the special purpose for which He has lately sent
-five new saints into the world, one of whom is Elisabeth of Thüringen
-'whom I sent,' said the Lord, 'to those wretched ladies who sit in castles
-with much unchastity, puffed up with conceit, and so absorbed by vanities
-that they ought to be cast into the nether regions. Many a lady however
-has now followed her example in what measure she would or could.' The
-other saints are Dominic, who has been sent to reclaim
-unbelievers,--Francis, who has come as a warning to covetous priests and
-conceited laymen,--a new St Peter, the Martyr ([Dagger] 1252),--and the
-sister Jutta von Sangershausen. History tells us of Peter that he was
-appointed inquisitor against the heretics in Lombardy and murdered at
-their instigation[839]; and of Jutta that, having lost her husband in
-1260, she placed her children in convents and went among the heathen
-Prussians where she tended the leprous till her death four years
-afterwards[840]. From later passages in the writings of Mechthild, written
-after she had come to live at Helfta[841], it appears that she felt that
-faith was not increasing in the world; perhaps she was disappointed in her
-exalted anticipations of the influence of the friars.
-
-The writings of Mechthild of this later period are more mystic and
-visionary than those of earlier days. She is distressed at the troublous
-times that have come to Saxony and Thüringen, and tells[842] how she fell
-ill and was so perturbed that she lost the power of prayer for seventeen
-days. Many prayers and visions, some of great sweetness and beauty, were
-the production of these later days. A long allegory called the 'Spiritual
-Convent or Ghostly Abbey[843]' shows the high opinion she had of life in a
-nunnery. In this poem the inmates of the convent are personified as the
-Virtues, an idea occasionally used during the Middle Ages, and one which
-at a later date in England, as we shall hear afterwards[844], was handled
-in a very different manner, the convent inmates being represented as the
-Vices. In Mechthild's convent Charity is abbess, Meekness is chaplain,
-Peace is prioress, Kindliness is sub-prioress, and among the inmates of
-the convent there is Hope the singing-mistress, and Wisdom the
-schoolmistress 'who with good counsel carefully instructs the ignorant, so
-that the nunnery is held holy and honoured.' Bounty is cellaress, Mercy
-sees to the clothes, Pity tends the sick, and Dread sits at the gate. The
-provost or priest is Obedience, 'to whom all these Virtues are subject.
-Thus does the convent abide before God,' the poem ends, '... happy are
-they who dwell there.'
-
-The writings of Mechthild offer many more points of interest. Not the
-least curious among her compositions are the amplified descriptions of
-Biblical history, as of the Creation, the Nativity, and the early
-experiences of the Virgin[845], which enter minutely into the feelings and
-emotions of those immediately concerned and give them an allegorical and
-spiritualised application. Short spiritual poems are also numerous, but so
-much depends on their form that a translation cannot convey their chief
-beauty. Their general drift is exemplified by the two following[846].
-
-'It is a wondrous journeying onwards, this progress of the Soul, who
-guides the Senses as the man who sees leads him who is blind. Fearlessly
-the Soul wanders on without grief of heart, for she desires nought but
-what the Lord wills who leads all to the best.'
-
-And again[847], 'My Soul spake to her Spouse: Lord, thy tenderness is to
-my body delightful ministration; thy compassion is to my spiritual nature
-wondrous comfort; and thy love is to my whole being rest eternal.'
-
-Thoughts such as these are found scattered up and down in the beguine's
-writings, and give one a high estimation of her poetic power, her ready
-imagination and her mastery of language. Her vigorous nature guided into
-the channel of spiritual aspirations frequently filled her poems with a
-passionate eloquence.
-
-In conclusion may stand a few of the beguine's moral reflections, which,
-if they are not borrowed from elsewhere, argue well for her power of
-condensing thoughts into short sentences; but here also it is not easy to
-find the exact words in which to render the chief points of these
-reflections[848].
-
-  'Vanity does not stop to think what she is losing;
-  Perseverance is laden with virtues.
-  Stupidity is ever self-sufficient;
-  The wisest never comes to the end of what he would say.
-  Anger brings darkness unto the soul;
-  Gentleness is ever sure of attaining grace.
-  Pride would ever raise herself aloft;
-  Lowliness is ever ready to yield ...
-  Sluggishness will never gain wealth;
-  The industrious seeks more than his immediate advantage.'
-
-And the following,--which are the product of a later period and have in
-them the ring of a deeper experience[849]--'None knows how firm he stands,
-until he has experienced the prompting of desire; none how strong he is,
-until hatred has attacked him; none how good he is, before he has attained
-a happy end.'
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-From the writings of the beguine Mechthild we pass to those of her
-companion at Helfta, the nun Mechthild von Hackeborn. Her 'Book of Special
-Grace[850]' consists entirely of visions or revelations described by her
-and put into writing by her fellow-nuns; it was widely read, and gave rise
-to similar productions in other nunneries. There are many early manuscript
-copies of the book in existence; it was originally written in Latin, but
-has been translated into German, English, Italian and French, and has
-repeatedly been printed.
-
-The visions are so arranged that those contained in the first part of the
-book have reference to festal days of the Church, to Christ, Mary and the
-saints. The second part treats of the manifestations of divine grace of
-which Mechthild was conscious in herself, and the third and fourth
-describe how God should be praised and what is conducive to salvation or
-'soul-hele.' In the fifth part Mechthild holds converse with those who
-have departed this life, chiefly members of the convent, for the belief
-that it was possible to hold communion with the souls of the departed was
-readily accepted at Helfta as in other religious houses.
-
-A sixth and seventh part were added to Mechthild's book after her death by
-her fellow-nuns and contain information about her sister, the abbess
-Gertrud, and details about Mechthild's death and the visions other nuns
-had of her.
-
-The nun Mechthild von Hackeborn, who was nine years younger than her
-sister Gertrud, had come to the house as a child on a visit with her
-mother, and was so much attracted to it that she remained there. She is
-described by her fellow-nuns as a person of tender and delicate
-refinement, whose religious fervour was remarkable, and these
-characteristics are reflected in her writings. She was often suffering,
-noticeably at the time when her sister, the abbess Gertrud, died (1291).
-She is praised for her lovely voice, and references to music and singing
-in her visions are frequent. It is not quite clear when her fellow-nuns
-began to put her visions into writing, presumably between 1280 and 1300,
-and authorities also differ on the year of her death, which the
-Benedictines of Solesmes accept as 1298[851], whereas Preger defers it
-till 1310[852].
-
-In the description of her visions Mechthild von Hackeborn appears
-throughout as a person of even temper and great sweetness of disposition,
-one who was not visited by picturesque temptations, troubles and doubts,
-and who therefore insisted chiefly on the beautiful side of things; for
-hell with its torments and the whole mise-en-scène of the nether regions
-have no meaning and no attraction for her. In her revelations Christ, the
-Virgin, and other members of the vast hierarchy of heaven enter as living
-realities. She is particularly fond of the angels, whom she loves to
-picture as the associates of men on earth and in heaven. In conformity
-with the conceptions of her age Christ is to her the wooer of the soul,
-the chosen bridegroom, who combines all that makes humanity attractive and
-divinity sublime. Christ and the Virgin love to confer with Mechthild, or
-rather with her Soul,--the terms are used indiscriminately,--and enter
-into converse with her whenever she seeks enlightenment. Flowers and
-precious stones, the splendour of vestments, and occasionally some homely
-object, supply her with similes and comparisons.
-
-The following descriptions occurring in visions will give some idea of the
-spirit in which Mechthild wrote[853].
-
-'After the feast of St Michael ... she saw a golden ascent divided into
-nine grades, crowded by a multitude of angels, and the first grade was
-presided over by angels, the second by archangels and so on upwards, each
-order of angels presiding over one grade. She was divinely informed that
-this ascent represented the abode of men in this way,--that whoever
-faithfully, humbly, and devotedly fulfils his duty to the Church of God,
-and for God's sake, to the infirm, to the poor and to travellers, abides
-in the first grade, consorting with the angels. Again, they who by prayer
-and devotion are closer to God and in nearness to Him, are devoted to
-knowledge of Him, to His teaching and help, are in the next grade and are
-the companions of the archangels. Those again who practise patience,
-obedience, voluntary poverty, humility, and bravely perform all virtues,
-mount to the next grade with the Virtues. And those who, opposing vice and
-greed, hold the fiend and all his suggestions in contempt, in the fourth
-grade share the triumph of glory with the Powers. Prelates who fully
-respond to the duties the Church has entrusted to them, who watch day and
-night over the salvation of souls and discreetly give back twofold the
-talent entrusted to them,--these in the fifth grade hold the glory of
-heaven as a recompense of their work with the Pre-eminences. Again, those
-who with complete submission bow before the majesty of the Divine, and who
-out of love for Him love the Creator in the created, and love themselves
-because they are fashioned after the image of God, who conform to Him as
-far as human weakness permits, and, holding the flesh subservient to the
-spirit, triumph over their mind by transferring it to things celestial,
-these glory in the sixth grade with the Rulers. But those who are
-steadfast in meditation and contemplation, who embracing pureness of heart
-and peace of mind make of themselves a temple meet for God, which truly
-may be called a paradise, according to Proverbs (viii. 31) "my delights
-were with the sons of men," and about which it is said (2 Cor. vi. 16) "I
-will dwell in them and walk in them," these dwell in the seventh grade
-with the Enthroned. Those who outstrip others in knowledge and
-apprehension, who by a singular blessedness hold God in their minds as it
-were face to face and give back what they have drawn from the fountain of
-all wisdom, by teaching and explaining to others, these abide in the
-eighth grade of the ascent together with the Cherubim. And those who love
-God with heart and soul, who place their whole being in the eternal fire
-which is God itself, love Him not with their own but with divine love
-being the chosen ones of God, who see all creatures in God and love them
-for His sake, friends as well as enemies, those whom nothing can divide
-from God nor stay in their ascent--for the more their enemies attack them
-the more they grow in love,--those who, fervent themselves, awake fervour
-in others, so that if they could they would make all mankind perfect in
-love, who weep for the sins and faults of others, because, indifferent to
-their own glory, they seek but the glory of God, these shall for evermore
-dwell in the ninth grade with the Seraphim, between whom and God there is
-nought in closer nearness to Him.
-
-'During mass she (Mechthild) saw that a large number of angels were
-present, and each angel in guise of a lovely youth stood by the side of
-the maiden entrusted to his care. Some held flowering sceptres, others
-golden flowers. And as the maidens bowed they pressed the flowers to their
-lips in sign of everlasting peace. Thus angels assisted at the entire
-mass.
-
-'And as the maidens advanced to partake of the communion, each of the
-angels led her who was entrusted to his care. And the King of Glory stood
-in the place of the priest surrounded by shining splendour, on His breast
-an ornament in the shape of a branched tree, and from His heart, in which
-lies hidden the wealth of wisdom and knowledge, flowed a stream which
-encompassed those who advanced with a flood of heavenly joy.'
-
-In the preceding passages we see Mechthild in the state of rapture called
-forth by the moments of celebration and service; the extracts which follow
-describe one of the divine visitations which came to her as a special
-manifestation of grace[854].
-
-'On a certain Sunday, while they were singing the _Asperges me, Domine_,
-she said "Lord, in what wilt thou now bathe and cleanse my heart?"
-Straightway the Lord with love unutterable bending to her as a mother
-would to her son, embraced her saying: "In the love of my divine heart I
-will bathe thee." And He opened the door of His heart, the treasure-house
-of flowing holiness, and she entered into it as though into a vineyard.
-There she saw a river of living water flowing from the east to the west,
-and round about the river there were twelve trees bearing twelve kinds of
-fruit, that is the virtues which the blessed Paul enumerates in his
-epistle: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness,
-benignity, meekness, faith, modesty, temperance, chastity[855]. This water
-is called the river of love; thereunto the soul entered and was cleansed
-of every stain. In this river there were numerous fish with golden scales,
-which signified those loving souls which, separated from earthly delights,
-have plunged themselves in the very well-spring of all good, that is, into
-Jesus. In the vineyard palm-trees were planted, some of which stood erect,
-while others were bent to the ground. The palms that stand erect are those
-who despised the world with its flowers, and who turned their minds to
-things divine; and the palms that are bent down are those wretched ones
-who lie in the earthly dust of their misdeeds. The Lord in likeness of a
-gardener was digging in the earth, and she said: "O Lord, what is thy
-spade?" And He answered: "My fear."--Now in certain places the earth was
-hard, in others soft. The hard earth signified the hearts of those who are
-hardened in sin and who know not how to be corrected either by advice or
-by reproof; the soft earth the hearts of those who are softened by tears
-and true contrition. And our Lord said: "This vineyard is my Catholic
-Church, in which for thirty-three years I laboured with my sweat; do thou
-labour with me in this vineyard." And she said: "How?" To whom the Lord
-replied: "By watering it." And straightway the Soul ran eagerly to the
-river and set a vessel filled with water on her shoulders, and as it was
-heavy, the Lord came and helped her, and its burden was lightened. And the
-Lord said: "Thus when I give grace to men, do all things performed or
-borne for my sake seem light and easy. But if I withdraw my grace, then do
-all things seem burdensome." Moreover round about the palms she saw a
-multitude of angels like unto a wall....'
-
-In a similar strain the visions of Mechthild proceed, always gentle and
-rarely impassioned but shining with the glow of endlessly changing
-imagery. There is no limit to the pictures which rise before her mental
-eye or to the points which suggest analogy with things divine[856].
-
-'To rouse the piety of believers in relation to the glorious image of our
-Saviour Jesus Christ, on the Sunday _Omnis terra_ (the second after
-Epiphany), that is on the day when the exposition at Rome of the image of
-Christ takes place, she was granted this vision. On a mountain overgrown
-with flowers she beheld our Lord seated on a throne of jasper decorated
-with gold and red stone. The jasper which is green is typical of the power
-of eternal divinity, gold represents love, and the red stone the
-sufferings which He endured through love of us. The mountain was
-surrounded by beautiful trees covered with fruit. Under these trees rested
-the souls of the saints, each of whom had a tent of cloth of gold, and
-they ate of the fruit with great enjoyment. The hill is emblematic of the
-mortal life of Christ, the trees are His virtues, love, pity and others.
-The saints rest under different trees according as they adhered to the
-Lord's different virtues; those who followed Him in charity, eat of the
-fruit of the tree of charity; those who were full of pity, eat of the
-fruit of the tree of pity, and so on according to the virtue each has
-practised.
-
-'Then those who were ready to honour the holy face with a special prayer
-approached the Lord, carrying on their shoulders their sins, which they
-laid at His feet; and they were forthwith transformed into jewels of
-glowing gold (xenia aurea). Those whose repentance had come out of love,
-because they were sad at having offended God without having been punished,
-saw their sins changed into golden necklaces. Others who had redeemed them
-by saying the psalms and other prayers, had them transformed into golden
-rings such as are used at festivals (Dominicalibus). Those who had made
-restitution for their sins by their own efforts, saw before them lovely
-golden shields; while those who had purified their sins by bodily
-suffering, beheld them as so many golden censers, for bodily chastisement
-before God is like the sweetness of thyme.'
-
-The following is an example of a homely simile[857].
-
-'On a certain occasion she was conscious of having received an unusual
-gift through the Lord's bounty, when feeling her inadequacy she humbly
-said: "O bounteous King, this gift, does it befit me who deem myself
-unworthy of entering thy kitchen and washing thy platters?" Whereupon the
-Lord: "Where is my kitchen and where are the platters thou wouldst wash?"
-She was confounded and said nothing. But the Lord, who puts questions not
-that they may be answered but that He may give answer unto them Himself,
-made her rejoice by His reply. He said: "My kitchen is my heart which,
-like unto a kitchen that is a common room of the house and open alike to
-servants and masters, is ever open to all and for the benefit of all. The
-cook in this kitchen is the Holy Ghost, who kindly without intermission
-provides things in abundance and by replenishing them makes things abound
-again. My platters are the hearts of saints and of chosen ones, which are
-filled from the overflow of the sweetness of my divine heart."'
-
-From a passage in these books[858] we learn that a large number of
-Mechthild's visions had been put into writing by her fellow-nuns before
-she was made acquainted with the fact. For a time she was sorely troubled,
-then she gained confidence, reflecting that her power to see visions had
-come from God, and indeed she heard a voice from heaven informing her that
-her book should be called the 'Book of Special Grace.'
-
-She had all her life been distressed by physical suffering. During her
-last illness she was generally unconscious and her fellow-nuns crowded
-about her praying that she would intercede with God in their behalf.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-Neither of the Mechthilds makes any reference in her writings to the nun
-Gertrud, but Gertrud's works contain various references to her
-fellow-nuns[859], and it is surmised that Gertrud helped to put the nun
-Mechthild's visions into writing before she wrote on her own account. A
-passage in her own book of visions[860] refers to revelations generally,
-and the Lord explains to her how it is that visions are sometimes written
-in one, sometimes in another language. This idea may have been suggested
-by the fact that the beguine Mechthild's writings were in German and the
-nun Mechthild's in Latin.
-
-Gertrud was very different from both of these writers in disposition[861].
-Probably of humble origin, she had been given into the care of the convent
-as a child (in 1261), and in her development was greatly influenced by the
-sisters Gertrud the abbess, and the nun Mechthild von Hackeborn. Of a
-passionate and ambitious nature, she devoted all her energies to mastering
-the liberal arts, but in consequence of a vision that came to her at
-twenty-five, she cast them aside and plunged into religious study. She
-mastered the spirit and contents of Holy Writ so rapidly that she began to
-expound them to others. Then she made extracts and collections of passages
-from the Fathers, out of which we are told she made many books. The
-influence of her personality was such that 'none conversed with her who
-did not afterwards declare they had profited by it.' The admiration she
-aroused among her fellow-nuns was so great that they declared that God had
-compared her to the nun Mechthild and that He said: 'In this one have I
-accomplished great things, but greater things will I accomplish in
-Gertrud[862].' As a proof of her industry we are told[863] that she was
-occupied from morning till night translating from Latin (into German),
-shortening some passages, amplifying others 'to the greater advantage of
-her readers.' From another passage it appears that she compiled a poem
-(carmen) from the sayings (dictis) of the saints[864], and as an
-illustration of her moral attitude we are told that when she was reading
-the Scriptures aloud and 'as it happened,' passages occurred which shocked
-her by their allusions, she hurried them over quickly or pretended not to
-understand them. 'But when it became needful to speak of such things for
-some reason of salvation, it was as though she did not mind, and she
-overcame her hesitation[865].' Her great modesty in regard to her own
-requirements is insisted on by her biographer. Many bore witness to the
-fact that they were more impressed by her words than by those of
-celebrated preachers, for she frequently moved her audience to tears[866].
-In addition the writer feels called upon to mention a few incidents that
-happened to Gertrud, giving them a miraculous rendering, no doubt from a
-wish to enhance her worth.
-
-The information about Gertrud is supplied by the first part of her book
-called 'The Legacy of Divine Piety[867],' which as it does not mention
-Gertrud's death, seems to have been written while she was alive, perhaps
-as a preface to a copy of her revelations. It was only after many years of
-study and literary activity that she determined to write down her personal
-experiences, and these accounts, written between 1289 and 1290, form the
-second part of the book as it stands at present and constitute its chief
-and abiding interest.
-
-The admiration bestowed on the 'Legacy of Divine Piety' was almost greater
-than that given to the writings of the nun Mechthild. The perusal of a
-chapter will show Gertrud's attitude of mind. Starting from the occasion
-when she first became conscious of a living communion with God, she
-describes how step by step she realised an approximation to things divine,
-such as reverence, love, and the desire of knowledge alone can secure. She
-speaks of experiencing in herself a deeper religious consciousness which
-reacted in making her feel herself unworthy of the special attention of
-her Creator, and she continues in this strain[868]:
-
-'If I look back on what the tone of my life was before and afterwards, in
-truth I declare that this is grace I am grateful for and yet unworthy of
-receiving. For thou, O Lord, didst grant unto me of the clear light of thy
-knowledge to which the sweetness of thy love prompted me more than any
-deserved correction of my faults could have done. I do not recall having
-felt such happiness save on the days when thou didst bid me to the
-delights of thy royal table. Whether thy wise forethought had so ordained,
-or my continued shortcomings were the reason of it, I cannot decide.
-
-'Thus didst thou deal with and rouse my soul on a day between Resurrection
-and Ascension when I had entered the courtyard at an early hour before
-Prime, and sitting down by the fishpond was enjoying the beauties of the
-surroundings which charmed me by the clearness of the flowing water, the
-green of the trees that stood around, and the free flight of the birds,
-especially the doves, but above all by the reposeful quiet of the retired
-situation. My mind turned on what in such surroundings would make my joy
-perfect, and I wished for a friend, a loving, affectionate and suitable
-companion, who would sweeten my solitude. Then thou, O God, author of joy
-unspeakable, who as I hope didst favour the beginning of my meditation and
-didst complete it, thou didst inspire me with the thought that if,
-conscious of thy grace, I flow back to be joined to thee like the water;
-if, growing in the knowledge of virtue like unto these trees, I flower in
-the greenness of good deeds; if, looking down on things earthly in free
-flight like these doves, I approach heaven, and, with my bodily senses
-removed from external turmoil, apprehend thee with my whole mind, then in
-joyfulness my heart will make for thee a habitation.
-
-'My thoughts during the day dwelt on these matters, and at night, as I
-knelt in prayer in the dormitory, suddenly this passage from the Gospel
-occurred to me (John xiv. 23), "If a man love me, he will keep my words;
-and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode
-with him." And my impure heart felt thee present therein. O would that an
-ocean of blood passed over my head that my miserable inadequacy were
-washed out now that thou hast made thy abode with me in dignity
-inscrutable! Or that my heart snatched from my body were given to me to
-cleanse with glowing coal, so that, freed of its dross, it might offer
-thee if not indeed a worthy abode, yet one not altogether unworthy. Thus,
-O God, didst thou show thyself from that hour onwards, sometimes kindly,
-sometimes stern, in accordance with my improved or neglectful way of life;
-though I must admit that the utmost improvement to which I sometimes
-momentarily attained, had it lasted all my life, never had made me worthy
-of the least part of the sustenance which I received in spite of many sins
-and, alas! of great wickedness. For thy extreme tenderness shows me thee
-more grieved than angered by my shortcomings, a proof to me that the
-amount of thy forbearance is greater when thou dost bear with me in my
-failings, than during thy mortal life, when thou didst bear with the
-betrayer Judas.
-
-'When I strayed in mind, tempted away by some deceitful attraction, and
-after hours, or alas! after days, or woe is me! after weeks, returned to
-my heart, always did I find thee there, so that I cannot say that thou
-hast withdrawn thyself from me from that hour, nine years ago, till eleven
-days before the feast of John the Baptist, save on one occasion, when it
-happened through some worldly dispute, I believe, and lasted from Thursday
-(the fifth feria) to Tuesday (the second feria). Then on the vigil of St
-John the Baptist, after the mass _Nec timeas etc._, thy sweetness and
-great charity came back to me, finding me so forlorn in mind that I was
-not even conscious of having lost a treasure, nor thought of grieving for
-it, nor was desirous of having it returned, so that I cannot account for
-the madness that possessed my mind, unless indeed it so happened because
-thou didst wish me to experience in myself these words of St Bernard: "We
-fly and thou pursuest us; we turn our back on thee, thou comest before us;
-thou dost ask and art refused; but no madness, no contempt of ours makes
-thee turn away who never art weary, and thou dost draw us on to the joy of
-which it is said (1 Cor. ii. 9), 'Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard it,
-neither has it entered into the heart of man.'"'
-
-These passages must suffice. Anyone desirous of following Gertrud through
-the further experiences which guided her to the knowledge of God and gave
-her an insight into the working of spiritual love must turn to her
-writings, which bear the reader onwards in continuous flow, and with much
-self-analysis and self-realisation give evidence of the conscious joy
-which develops into rapture in the presence of the Divine. A passage
-contained in the last chapter of the book describes Gertrud's hopes
-regarding her work, and fitly summarises her aspirations[869].
-
-'Behold, beloved God,' she writes, 'I here deposit the talent of thy most
-gracious friendship, which, entrusted to me, the lowliest and least worthy
-of thy creatures, I have set forth to the increase of thy power; for I
-believe and dare affirm that no reason prompted me to write and speak but
-obedience to thy will, desire for thy glory, and zeal for the salvation of
-souls. I take thee to witness that I wish thee praise and thanks, for thy
-abundant grace withdrew itself not from me on account of my unworthiness.
-And herein also shalt thou find praise, that readers of this book will
-rejoice in the sweetness of thy bounty, and, drawn to thee, learn greater
-things through it; for as students progress from first learning the
-alphabet to acquaintance with logic (logica), by means of the imagery here
-described they will be led to taste of that hidden divine sustenance
-(manna) which cannot be expressed even by allegory.... Meanwhile in
-accordance with thy faithful promise and my humble request, grant to all
-who read this book in lowliness that they rejoice in thy love, bear with
-my inadequacy, and feel true contrition themselves, in order that from the
-golden censers of their loving hearts a sweet odour may be wafted upwards
-to thee, making full amends for my carelessness and shortcomings.'
-
-Before the personal interest of this portion of the book the other parts
-written by fellow-nuns fade into insignificance. They contain accounts of
-Gertrud's thoughts on various occasions, and are chiefly interesting for
-the comments they contain on various accepted saints; we here see what
-thoughts were suggested to the Helfta nuns by the personalities of St
-Benedict, St Bernard, St Augustine, St Dominic, St Francis, St Elisabeth,
-and others. Thus the feast of St John the Apostle gives rise to an account
-of him[870] sitting in heaven, where he keeps the holy record, and writes
-in different colours, sometimes in red, sometimes in black, sometimes in
-letters of gold--a simile which recalls the art of writing. The 'Legacy of
-Divine Piety' of Gertrud has repeatedly been printed in the original
-Latin, sometimes in conjunction with the 'Book of Special Grace' of the
-nun Mechthild, and, like the revelations of Mechthild, the writings of
-Gertrud have been translated into German and English. Both in their
-original form and in selections the writings of these nuns are used as
-books of devotion among Catholics to this day, but neither Gertrud nor
-Mechthild have till now been given a place in the _Acta Sanctorum_.
-
-Gertrud outlived her distinguished contemporaries at Helfta; she died in
-1311[871], her thoughts having been engrossed by the anticipation of death
-for some time before. During these last years of her life she composed a
-number of prayers called 'Spiritual Exercises'[872] for the use of her
-fellow-nuns, the religious fervour of which has perhaps rarely been
-surpassed.
-
-They are written in rhyme but in varying rhythm; perhaps they are best
-designated as rhymed prose. Only the original Latin can give an idea of
-their eloquence, but, in the interest of the general reader I have added
-one in English prose. It is one of the series designated as 'a
-supplication for sinfulness and a preparation for death.' There is one
-prayer for every canonical hour; the following[873] is intended for
-repetition after the hour of prime, 'when the Soul holds converse with
-Love and Truth; and when the thought of eternal judgment, at which Truth
-will preside, causes the Soul to beseech Love to help her to secure Jesus
-as her advocate.'
-
-'And thus shalt thou begin to effect a reconciliation with God.
-
-'O shining Truth, O just Equity of God, how shall I appear before thy
-face, bearing my imperfections, conscious of the burden of my wasted
-life, and of the weight of my great negligence? Woe, woe is unto me; I did
-not make the payment of a Christian's faith and of a spiritual life there
-where the treasures of love are stored, that thou mightest receive it back
-with manifold increase of interest. The talent of life entrusted to me,
-not only have I left it unused; but I have forfeited it, debased it, lost
-it. Where shall I go, whither shall I turn, how can I escape from thy
-presence?
-
-'O Truth, in thee undivided abide justice and equity. In accordance with
-number, weight and measure dost thou give judgment. Whatever thou dost
-handle is weighed in truly even scales. Woe is unto me, a thousand times
-woe, if I be given over to thee with none to intercede in my behalf! O
-Love, do thou speak for me, answer for me, secure for me remission. Take
-up my cause, that through thy grace I may find eternal life.
-
-'I know what I must do. The chalice of salvation I will take; the chalice,
-Jesus, I will place on the unweighted scale of Truth. Thus, thus can I
-supply all that is wanting; thus can I outweigh the balance of my sins. By
-that chalice can I counterbalance all my defects. By that chalice I can
-more than counterpoise my sins.
-
-'Hail, O Love, thy royal bondservant Jesus, moved in His inmost being,
-whom thou didst drag at this hour before the tribunal, where the sins of
-the whole world were laid on Him who was without spot or blemish, save
-that out of pity of me He charged Himself with my sins,--Him the most
-innocent, Him the most beloved, condemned for love through my love of Him
-and suffering death for me, Him I would receive from thee to-day, O Love
-Divine, that He may be my advocate. Grant me this security that in this
-cause I have Him as my defender.
-
-'O beloved Truth! I could not come before thee without my Jesus, but with
-Jesus to come before thee is joyful and pleasant. Ah Truth, now sit thee
-on the seat of judgment, enter on the course of justice and bring against
-me what thou wilt, I fear no evil, for I know, I know thy countenance
-cannot confound me, now that He is on my side who is my great hope and my
-whole confidence. Verily, I long for thy judgment now Jesus is with me, He
-the most beloved, the most faithful, He who has taken on Himself my misery
-that He may move thee to compassion.
-
-'Ah, sweetest Jesus, thou loving pledge of my deliverance, come with me to
-the judgment court. There let us stand together side by side. Be thou my
-counsel and my advocate. Declare what thou hast done for me, how well
-thou hast thought upon me, how lovingly thou hast added to me that I might
-be sanctified through thee. Thou hast lived for me that I may not perish.
-Thou hast borne the burden of my sins. Thou hast died for me that I might
-not die an eternal death. All that thou hadst thou gavest for me, that
-through the wealth of thy merit I might be made rich.
-
-'Verily in the hour of death judge me on the basis of that innocence, of
-that purity which came to me through thee when thou didst make atonement
-for my sins with thine own self, judged and condemned for my sake, so that
-I, who am poor and destitute in myself, through thee may be wealthy beyond
-measure.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-
-SOME ASPECTS OF THE CONVENT IN ENGLAND DURING THE LATER MIDDLE AGES.
-
-  'All that wons in religioun
-  aw to haue sum ocupacioun,
-  outher in kirk or hali bedes,
-  or stodying in oder stedes;
-  ffor ydilnes, os sais sant paul
-  es grete enmy unto the soul.'
-            _Rule of St Benedict translated into English for the use of
-                women_,
-                    1400-1425 (ll. 1887 ff.).
-
-
-§ 1. The External Relations of the Convent.
-
-From consideration of affairs on the Continent we return once more to
-England, to consider the external relations of the convent and the
-purposes these institutions fulfilled during the later Middle Ages.
-Speaking generally the monasteries maintained their standing unimpaired
-till the beginning of the 14th century; then their character began to
-change and for quite a century they ceased to be attractive to progressive
-and original minds. The range of occupations cultivated by their inmates
-was restricted, and these inmates gradually came to regard everything with
-indifference except their own narrow religious interests.
-
-The previous chapters have shown that monasteries at different periods had
-served a variety of purposes and had inaugurated progress in various
-directions; but after the year 1350 few if any new developments are
-recorded. As agricultural centres they continued prosperous on the whole;
-the abbot and the abbess retained their character as good landlords;
-charity and hospitality continued to be practised by them. But as
-intellectual centres the monasteries had found their rival in the growing
-townships. The townships at the beginning of the 14th century were so well
-established that they were able to protect and further pursuits and
-industries which had hitherto flourished under the protection of monastic
-centres. Book-learning and science were cultivated in a more liberal
-spirit at the universities, where the friars of different orders had
-established houses; and the arts and crafts flourished on more fruitful
-soil under the protection of the town. The progress of the English nation
-during the 14th and 15th centuries is uncontested; but little of it, if
-any, was due to the influence of monks. On the whole monasteries continued
-to be favourably regarded by the nation, and the system of which they
-formed part was not attacked, but while the friar freely moved from city
-to city and for a while became the representative of learning and art, the
-monk bound to his convent home showed an increasing want of intellectual
-activity.
-
-The change was part of the great revolution which was taking place in
-feudal institutions generally. The age of chivalry was a thing of the
-past, and though the romantic ideas it had engendered had not ceased to
-influence mankind, they no longer possessed the transforming power of
-innovation. Similarly, mysticism which had been so largely cultivated
-inside convent walls had done its work in ushering in a spiritualised
-interpretation of religion; during the 14th century it was spread abroad
-and popularised by the friars, who gave it a new development, the monk's
-interest in it seemed to cease. But the ceremonial and ritual which the
-mystic had helped to elaborate, and the many observances by which the
-Catholicism of the Middle Ages had secured a hold on the concerns of daily
-life, continued in undisturbed prominence,--with this difference, that
-from elevating the few the ritual had now come to impress the many.
-
-It is often insisted on that during the later Middle Ages monasteries were
-homes of superstition and idolatry, and that practices in devotional
-ritual and in the cult of the miraculous were kept up by them to the
-extent of making them a hindrance to moral and intellectual development,
-and obnoxious to the advocates of more liberal and advanced views. The
-fact must be taken as part of the conservative attitude of these houses,
-which had strengthened their hold on outside attention by observances with
-which their existence was indissolubly bound up. Certainly a later age may
-be excused for condemning what had become a mischief and a hindrance; but
-it is well to recall that it was precisely those usages and tendencies
-which a later period condemned as superstitious, that had been elaborated
-at an early period by leaders in thought, who saw in them the means of
-setting forth the principles of the Christian faith. And the elaborate
-cult, the processions and imagery of mediæval Christianity, have a deeply
-significant side if we think of them in connection with the poetic,
-pictorial, dramatic and architectural arts of the later Middle Ages.
-
-Convents retained some importance for the education of women during these
-ages. Attention must be given to them in this connection, though the
-standard of tuition they offered was not high. Compared with the level
-they had reached during an earlier period convents showed signs of
-retrogression rather than of advance, and compared with what was
-contemporaneously attained at the universities, the training women
-received in the convent was poor in substance, cramped in method, and
-insufficient in application. But, as far as I have been able to ascertain,
-a convent education remained the sole training of which a girl could avail
-herself outside the home circle. For the universities absolutely ignored
-the existence of woman as a being desirous or capable of acquiring
-knowledge, and the teaching at the mediæval university was so ordered that
-students ranged in age from the merest boyhood to manhood. These centres
-then, by ignoring the existence of women, appropriated to men not only the
-privileges of a higher education, but also all knowledge from its
-rudiments upwards.
-
-The standard of education in the average nunnery was deteriorating because
-devotional interests were cultivated to the exclusion of everything else.
-In early Christian times we saw monk and nun promoting intellectual
-acquirements generally, but the separation of the sexes, and the growing
-feeling in favour of the stricter confinement of nuns within convent
-precincts, advocated by a later age in the interests of a stricter
-morality, more and more cut off the nun from contact with secular
-learning. In the 12th century we saw Queen Matilda, the pupil of a Wessex
-house, writing fluent Latin and speaking not only of the Fathers of the
-Church but quoting from classical writers of whom she evidently knew more
-than the name. But in the later Middle Ages the class of writers who were
-read in the convent was restricted; service books, the legends of the
-saints, theological works, and some amount of scripture, comprised the
-range of the nun's usual studies. The remarks of contemporary writers bear
-out the inferences to be drawn from such a narrowed curriculum of study.
-The nun is represented as a person careful in her devotions, pious in her
-intent, of good manners and gentle breeding, but one-sided in the view she
-takes of life.
-
-The author of the _Ancren Riwle_, as mentioned above, left us to infer
-that the women he was addressing were acquainted with English, French, and
-Latin, and their education must have been given them in convents. His work
-was written in the early half of the 13th century. In all convents down to
-the Reformation Latin continued to be studied to some extent, if only so
-far as to enable the nun to repeat her prayers, to follow mass and to
-transcribe a book of devotion. The lady superior, by the terms of her
-appointment and on account of the duties of her station, was bound to have
-some knowledge of it. But at the same time one comes across remarks which
-lead one to suppose that Latin was falling into disuse in nunneries,
-especially in the south of England, and that French was taking its place.
-Corroboration of this view is afforded by a list of injunctions sent by
-the bishop of Winchester to the convent at Romsey, in consequence of an
-episcopal visitation in 1310; they were drawn up in Latin, but a literal
-translation into French was appended for the greater convenience of the
-nuns[874]. The rules and ordinances prescribed by Archbishop Walter
-Reynolds to the convent of Davington in Kent about the year 1326 were
-written in French[875], and so were the set of rules forwarded by the
-abbot of St Albans to the convent of Sopwell in 1338[876]. On the other
-hand injunctions written in Latin were sent to Godstow in Oxfordshire in
-1279 and to Nun-Monkton in Yorkshire in 1397.
-
-French down to the middle of the 14th century was the language of the
-upper classes as well as the legal language[877], and many literary
-products of the time are in French. A 'Life of St Katherine' written in
-Norman French by Clemence, a nun at Barking, is extant in two MSS. Only
-its opening lines have been published in which the nun informs her readers
-that she has translated this life from Latin into 'romans[878].' Letters
-written by ladies superior during this period were usually in French. Thus
-the prioress and convent of Ankerwyke in Buckinghamshire addressed a
-petition to King Edward III. in French[879], and the abbess of Shaftesbury
-in 1382 petitioned King Richard II. in the same language[880]. Various
-documents and year-books which were kept in religious houses show that
-entries made during the early period were in Latin, but in the 14th
-century French frequently occurs. In the 15th century both Latin and
-French were abandoned and the use of English became general. The documents
-of Barking, a most important Benedictine nunnery, are partly in Latin,
-partly in French, and partly in English[881]. The extant charters of Legh
-or Minchenlegh in Devonshire are exclusively in Latin, but the rubrics of
-the 14th century are in French[882]. In the register of Crabhouse[883], an
-Austin settlement of nuns in Norfolk, all three languages are used.
-
-In the nunneries of the south of England French maintained itself longest,
-but it was Norman French, which continued in use after the change abroad
-which made the French spoken on this side of the Channel (except that of
-court circles) sound unfamiliar to a Frenchman. In the Prologue to his
-_Canterbury Tales_, written about 1386, Chaucer introduces a prioress who
-was one of the pilgrims _en route_ for Canterbury, and remarks on the kind
-of French which she spoke (l. 124):
-
-  'And Frenche she spake full fayre and fetisly
-    After the scole of Stratford atte Bow,
-    For Frenche of Paris was to hire unknowe.'
-
-Evidently he is referring to the French which was generally in use at the
-nunneries. Stratford, otherwise St Leonard's, Bromley, was situated in
-Middlesex.
-
-English was first heard at the opening of the session at Westminster in
-1363, and in 1404 French was unintelligible to the English ambassadors in
-Flanders. I have come across few French documents relating to nunneries
-which are later than the year 1400; in fact a petition in French written
-in 1433 by the prioress of Littlemore in Oxfordshire stands almost
-alone[884].
-
-There is extant a highly interesting rhymed version of the rule of St
-Benedict written for the use of nuns in the English dialect of the north
-between 1400 and 1425[885]. It is not the earliest version in English
-made for the use of nuns; there is a translation, known as the Winteney
-version, which was written for them and is preserved in a copy of the 13th
-century; and it is possible that the earliest Benedictine rule in
-Anglo-Saxon for monks was adapted from a version in the vernacular written
-for women[886]. However the author of the rhymed version of the 15th
-century is conscious of women's comparative ignorance of Latin. He
-prefaces his rule with the reason which prompted him to make it. 'Monks
-and learned men,' he says, 'may know the rule in Latin and gather from it
-how to work, serving God and Holy Church; it is for the purpose of making
-it intelligible to women who learnt no Latin in their youth that it is
-here set into English that they may easily learn it....'
-
-The name of this translator is unknown. On the ground of certain passages
-referring to singing in choir (line 1188 ff.) it has been supposed, but
-with slight probability, that the translation was the work of a woman.
-
-Another proof of the growing unfamiliarity with Latin in nunneries is
-afforded by the introduction to the register of Godstow, which was one of
-the wealthier English Benedictine nunneries. This register was written
-under the abbess Alice Henley, who is known to have been ruling in the
-year 1464, and consists of 126 folio leaves of vellum. According to
-Dugdale[887] it comprises 'an account of the foundation of the house, an
-A. B. C. of devotion, a kalendar of the year, and all the charters of the
-house translated into English.' The translator has left an introduction to
-his work which in modern English runs as follows: 'The wise man taught his
-child to read books gladly and to understand them well, for lack of such
-understanding has often caused negligence, hurt, harm and hindrance, as
-experience proves; and since women of religion in reading Latin books are
-excused from much understanding where it is not their mother tongue,
-therefore if they read their books of remembrance and of gifts written in
-Latin, for want of understanding they often take hurt and hindrance; and
-since for want of truly learned men who are ready to teach and counsel
-them, and for fear also of publishing the evidence of their titles which
-has often caused mischief, it seems right needful to the understanding of
-these religious women that they have besides their Latin books some
-written in their mother tongue, by which they may secure better knowledge
-of their property and more clearly give information to their servants,
-rent-gatherers and receivers in the absence of their learned counsellors;
-therefore I, a poor brother, and 'wellwyller' to the abbess of Godstow
-Dame Alice Henley and to all her convent, which are for the most part well
-learned in English books ... have undertaken to make this translation for
-them from Latin into English.'
-
-I have come across very few references to books which have come from
-nunneries. A celebrated manuscript in Latin, which contains a collection
-of the lives of the saints and is written on vellum, belonged to the
-convent at Romsey[888]; a copy of 'The life of St Katherine of Alexandria'
-by Capgrave (in English verse of the 15th century), which has lately been
-printed, is designated as belonging to Katherine Babington, subprioress of
-Campsey in Suffolk[889]; and the famous Vernon manuscript which contains
-the most complete collection of writings in Middle English on salvation or
-'soul-hele' probably came from a nunnery.
-
-The inventories taken of the goods and chattels belonging to convents at
-the time of the dissolution contain few references to books. Probably only
-books of devotion were numerous, and these were looked upon by the nuns as
-their personal property like their clothes, and were taken away with them
-when they left. The inventory of the nunnery of Kilburn mentions that two
-copies of the _Legenda Aurea_, the one written, the other printed, were
-kept in the chamber of the church[890]. In connection with Sion, the only
-house in England of the order of St Bridget, we shall hear of a splendid
-collection of books, all I believe of a devotional character.
-
-An inventory of the goods of the comparatively insignificant priory of
-Easebourne in Sussex, which never numbered more than five or six nuns, was
-taken in the year 1450 and shows what books of devotion were then in its
-possession. The following are enumerated: two missals, two breviaries,
-four antiphonies, one large _legenda_ or book of the histories of the
-saints, eight psalters, one book of collects, one _tropon_ or book of
-chants, one French Bible, two _ordinalia_ or books of divine office, in
-French, one book of the Gospels, and one martyrology[891]. It is in
-accordance with the exclusively pious training shown by the possession of
-books such as these that Chaucer lets his prioress, when called upon to
-contribute a tale, recount the legend of a boy-martyr who was murdered at
-Alexandria, and the nun who was with her tell the legend of St Cecilia.
-The prioress in this case did not fail to impress her hearers, while the
-monk, who was also of the party and told of worthies of biblical and of
-classical repute, roused no interest.
-
-In the eyes of Chaucer the prioress was a thoroughly estimable person.
-'Madame Eglentine,' whose smiling was 'ful simple and coy,' and who spoke
-French fluently, was distinguished also for elegance of manners at table.
-She neither dropped her food, nor steeped her fingers in the sauce, nor
-neglected to wipe her mouth, and throughout affected a certain courtly
-breeding which went well with her station.
-
-  'And sikerly she was of grete disport,
-  And ful plesant, and amiable of port,
-  And peined hire to contrefeten chere
-  Of court, and ben estatelich of manere,
-  And to ben holden digne of reverence.'
-
-Her sensitiveness was so great that she wept on seeing a mouse caught in a
-trap, and the death of one of the small dogs she kept caused her great
-grief. She could not bear to see one of them beaten, for in her 'all was
-conscience and tendre herte.' The only ornament she wore was a brooch
-which was attached to her beads and on which were inscribed the words
-_Amor vincit omnia_. The poet's designating her companion as the 'other
-nun,' suggests that the prioress in this case was a nun herself, that is
-that she was not the superior of a priory, but prioress and member of a
-convent which was under an abbess.
-
-Education in a nunnery at this period secured the privilege of being
-addressed as 'Madame,' the title of a woman of the upper classes.
-Directions in English about the consecration of nuns which were in use in
-the diocese of Lincoln about the year 1480 are in existence[892]. In these
-the bishop at the conclusion of the service is directed to offer words of
-advice to the newly professed nuns, which begin as follows: 'Daughters and
-virgins, now that you are married and espoused to Him that is above king
-and 'kaysor,' Jesus Christ, meet it is and so must you from henceforth in
-token of the same be called 'madame or ladye[892].'
-
-Judging from a passage in Chaucer (l. 3940) this privilege was apparently
-kept by those who had been educated in a nunnery and returned to the
-world. The reeve tells about the miller's wife who was 'come of noble kyn;
-she was i-fostryd in a nonnerye,' and on account of her kindred and the
-'nostelry' she had learned, no one durst call her but 'Madame.'
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-It remains to note how far the standing of nunneries was directly affected
-in the later Middle Ages by external social and political changes. Various
-conditions combined to curtail the privileges of religious houses, which
-when once lost were never recovered.
-
-The reign of Edward I (1272-1307) was marked by many legal innovations.
-One of the first acts of the king was to appoint a commission to enquire
-into jurisdictions, and a general survey of the whole kingdom was taken to
-obtain correct knowledge of the rights by which property was held. Local
-and manorial rights were throughout called into question, which in many
-instances resulted in their being curtailed to the advantage of the king.
-In common with other holders of property, the heads of monasteries
-incurred direct losses, especially the heads of smaller settlements, where
-the property was not so well managed and the superior could not afford to
-have a legal adviser.
-
-Among those cited before the justices in eyre were the abbesses and
-prioresses of convents of various orders, who as we gather from the
-account of these pleas[893] sometimes appeared in person, sometimes
-through an attorney, to justify their claims and to seek re-establishment
-of their rights. The superiors of smaller settlements, whose property lay
-near their house, generally appeared in person, but the superiors of
-larger houses, where the jurisdiction over property which lay at a
-distance was called into question, appeared by an attorney. Thus the
-abbess of Barking which lies in Essex appeared by an attorney at Bedford
-and in Buckinghamshire, but in Essex she appeared in person to defend
-certain rights connected with property she held at Chelmsford[894]. The
-abbess of Malling in Kent appeared by attorney at Canterbury, where she
-secured renewal of her rights before the king's justiciaries not only to
-liberties and franchises of the most extensive kind in East and West
-Malling, but to the holding of a market twice a week, and of three fairs
-in the year[895].
-
-On the other hand we find the prioress of Stratford appearing in person
-before the judges in eyre at the Stone Cross, bringing her charters with
-her[896]. The prioress of Wroxhall at first refused to answer the summons
-to appear at Warwick. Afterwards she appeared in person and succeeded in
-establishing her claim to her possessions in Hatton and Wroxhall together
-with many privileges and immunities which had been confirmed to her priory
-by Henry II, Richard I, John and Henry III, as appears in the charters
-granted by those monarchs[897].
-
-But not all were so successful. The prioress of Redlingfield in Suffolk
-also came in person to justify a right which was held to belong to the
-crown, but which she claimed that she and all her predecessors had held
-time out of mind. But as she could show no special warrant, William de
-Gyselham prayed judgment for the king. A day was appointed for further
-hearing of the case at Westminster, but no further proceedings
-appear[898]. Frequently a case was adjourned to Westminster and we hear no
-more of it; sometimes also the king's attorney did not choose to prosecute
-his suit further.
-
-A closer analysis of these pleas helps us to understand the various and
-complicated rights, immunities and privileges which abbess and prioress
-had acquired in common with feudal lords at an early period, and which the
-larger houses retained with few abatements down to the time of the
-dissolution. The study of these rights shows that a considerable business
-capacity and no small amount of attention were required to protect a
-settlement against deterioration and decay.
-
-The number of religious houses[899] for women which existed at this
-period, including those of all orders, was close upon a hundred and
-thirty. Their number can be estimated only approximately, because some
-fell to decay and were abandoned as we shall see later, while, regarding
-Gilbertine settlements, it is unknown at what period nuns ceased to
-inhabit some of them. The number of monasteries for men including those of
-all monkish and canonical orders, at the same period was over four
-hundred; while the friars, the number of whose houses fluctuated, at the
-time of the dissolution owned about two hundred houses.
-
-Of the settlements of nuns eighty-two belonged to the order of St
-Benedict, and twenty-seven (including two houses which had been founded by
-the order of Cluni) to Cistercian nuns. Fourteen houses were inhabited by
-Austin nuns or canonesses (including Sion), and two by nuns of the order
-of Prémontré.
-
-In England only the orders of friars of St Francis and St Dominic had
-houses for women attached to them. The nuns of the order of St Clare,
-called also Poor Clares or Nuns Minoresses, had been established in
-connection with the Franciscan friars, and owned three houses, of which
-the house in London, known as the Minories, was of considerable
-importance. Only one house of Dominican nuns existed in England. The nuns
-both of the Dominican and the Franciscan orders differed in many
-particulars from other nuns and are usually spoken of not as nuns but as
-sisters[900]. They observed strict seclusion, and as a rule took no
-interest in anything save devotion. A set of rules for the nuns of St
-Clare was written by St Francis himself, and gives a fair idea of the
-narrow interests to which women who embraced religion under his auspices
-were confined[901].
-
-Regarding the wealth of the settlements of different orders, the houses of
-the Benedictine order owned most property and drew the largest incomes;
-the houses owned by monks were throughout wealthier than those owned by
-nuns. Judging by the computations made at the time of the dissolution the
-Cistercian houses for men, and the houses of Austin and of Premonstrant
-Canons, were comparatively rich, whereas the houses of Cistercian and of
-Premonstrant nuns were poor, but the income of the Austin nunnery,
-Buckland in Somersetshire, compared favourably with that of the wealthier
-Benedictine houses for women. We shall have occasion to speak more fully
-of the house of Sion, which was of the order of St Bridget, and the wealth
-of which at the time of the dissolution exceeded that of any other
-nunnery.
-
-
-§ 2. The Internal Arrangements of the Convent.
-
-At this point of our enquiry it seems well to pause for a while to
-describe the inner arrangements of a nunnery as they present themselves
-during the later Middle Ages, the offices which fell to the several
-members of the convent, and the daily life of the nun. The material at the
-disposal of the student lies scattered in the convent registers, in the
-accounts of visitations, and in contemporary literature, and is
-supplemented by the study of ruins. The inventories of monasteries made
-during the reign of Henry VIII at the time of the dissolution (c.
-1536-1538) further add to this information. For no religious settlement
-for women was founded after the death of Edward III (1377) with the sole
-exception of Sion, and no important changes were made in the routine of
-existing houses, so that the state of things which survived at the
-dissolution may be taken with slight reservations as supplementing our
-information concerning the arrangements during the earlier period.
-
-Regarding the position and duties of the lady superior, it has been
-mentioned before[902] that comparatively few of the Benedictine nunneries
-had the standing of abbeys, most of them being priories, and that the
-abbesses of four houses had the additional title of baroness by reason of
-the property they held of the king. They were called upon to fulfil duties
-in accordance with their station, and like secular barons found knights
-for the king's service. In 1257 Agnes Ferrar, abbess of Shaftesbury, was
-summoned to Chester to take part in the expedition against Llewellin ap
-Griffith, and again in 1277 Juliana Bauceyn was summoned for a like
-purpose[903].
-
-The lady superior of a house in the 14th and 15th centuries was frequently
-seen outside the convent; pleasure as well as business might take her from
-home. It has been mentioned that the heads of convents sometimes appeared
-in person before the justices in eyre. Dame Christina Basset, prioress of
-the Benedictine nunnery of St Mary Prée in Hertfordshire, in the account
-of her expenditure between 1487-1489 had the following entry made: 'when I
-rode to London for the suit that was taken[904].' In 1368 the bishop of
-Sarum, in whose diocese Shaftesbury was, granted a dispensation to Joan
-Formage to go from her monastery to one of her manors to take the air and
-to divert herself[905]. Complaints were made of the too frequent absence
-of their prioress by members of the Benedictine nunnery of Easebourne, at
-the visitation in 1441, when it was alleged that the prioress was in the
-habit of riding about and staying away on pretence of business more often
-than was deemed advantageous to the convent[906].
-
-After her election by the convent, the lady superior made profession of
-canonical obedience to the bishop of her diocese and in some cases waited
-upon the patron of her house. The nunnery of St Mary's, Winchester, was
-one of the houses that held of the king. In 1265 Eufemia was received by
-Henry III, and her successor Lucia went to Winchester castle to be
-presented[907]. In houses which held of the king it was part of the royal
-prerogative that on his coronation the king should recommend a nun to the
-convent. In connection with Shaftesbury we find this on record in the
-first year of Richard II (1377-1399) and again in the first of Henry V. In
-1428, several years after the accession of Henry VI, who became king when
-a child, a royal mandate was issued to the abbess of Shaftesbury to admit
-Joan Ashcomb as a nun[908]. And in 1430 the same king nominated Godam
-Hampton to be received as a nun at Barking[909].
-
-All the versions of the Benedictine rule known to me speak of the head of
-the monastery as the abbot, and in the Winteney version, which was written
-for nuns in the 13th century, the head of the women's house is accordingly
-designated as abbess[910]. But, probably because the number of abbesses
-was comparatively small, the translator of the rule of St Benedict, in the
-rhymed English version of the 15th century, speaks throughout of the
-prioress as head of the nunnery[911]. It is the prioress (l. 337 ff.) who
-is to be honoured inside the abbey (sic) and out of it wherever she goes
-or rides, who shall be law in herself, who shall have no pride in her
-heart but ever love God, and who is responsible as a shepherd or herdsman
-for the women given into her care. All these injunctions are given in
-other versions of the rule to the abbot or abbess. It further says that
-the prioress shall not favour any one nun by letting her travel more than
-the rest,--a command evidently added by the translator. In another passage
-(l. 2116 ff.) closely following the original text it is enjoined that the
-prioress shall liberally entertain guests, but if it happens that there be
-none, she shall invite some of the older sisters to dine with her.
-
-A detailed account is preserved of the formalities of the appointment of a
-prioress to the convent of St Radegund's at Cambridge[912]. This
-settlement, founded about the middle of the 12th century, had experienced
-many vicissitudes, but was comparatively prosperous in the year 1457, when
-the death of the prioress, Agnes Seyntel, on September 8th, left its
-twelve inmates without a head. We gather from a charter that the first
-step taken after her demise was that the subprioress, Matilda Sudbury, and
-the convent sent information to the bishop of Ely asking for permission to
-appoint a successor. This being granted the nuns assembled on Sept. 23rd
-and fixed the 27th as the day of the election. On this day all the nuns
-were present at mass, and then three of them were chosen arbiters
-(_compromissarias_). These were Joan Lancaster, Elizabeth Walton and
-Katherine Sayntlow, who took the oath and gave their votes, and then they
-administered the oath to the other nuns, who gave their votes also. The
-form of administration of the oath and the oath itself are both given in
-Latin. The nuns were adjured 'by the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,
-at the peril of their soul, according to God and their conscience, to name
-and choose her as prioress who was most needful to the priory.' The form
-of oath corresponds to this adjuration.
-
-The votes being then counted it was found that a majority of seven were in
-favour of the appointment of Joan Lancaster, whereupon Elizabeth Walton,
-being called upon by the others, declared the result of the election. The
-_Te Deum_ was then sung and the prospective prioress, reluctantly in this
-case it seems, was led to the chief altar of the convent church, where she
-was left, while the result of the election was proclaimed to the people
-outside 'in the vulgar tongue.' All this happened before noon, when the
-nuns returned to the chapter-house and called upon Elizabeth Walton and
-Katherine Sayntlow to draw up the deeds of the election, and to lay them
-before the newly appointed prioress, who was requested to affirm her
-election at four o'clock in the vestibule of the church. After much
-persuasion Joan Lancaster yielded and accepted the election. The words of
-her speech are given; in them she declares that she is a free woman and
-legitimate, born in lawful wedlock, and therefore entitled to proffer her
-consent and assent. Eleven nuns put their signatures to this document, one
-of whom designates herself as subprioress and president, another as leader
-of the choir, _succentrix_, another as cellaress, _celeraria_, and another
-calls herself treasurer, _thesaurissa_.
-
-In connection with the Benedictine convent of Langley, in Leicestershire,
-a further formality is recorded at the election of a new prioress. The
-permission of the patron of the house having been obtained, the nuns
-proceeded to elect a new prioress, and a page with a white staff sent by
-the patron guarded the door of the priory till the election was made. 'For
-which in right of his master he was to have his diet but nothing
-more[913].'
-
-The form of consent by which an abbess accepted office is entered in the
-register of Bishop Lacy of Exeter. In 1449 Johan or Jane Arundell was
-appointed abbess of the Austin settlement of Legh or Canonlegh, in
-Devonshire[914]. Her consent is drawn up in English, and in it she speaks
-of herself as sister Johan Arundell, _mynchyn_, an ancient word for nun
-which continued in use in the south of England till the time of the
-dissolution.
-
-A previous chapter has shown that the appointment of a prioress in those
-nunneries which were cells to an abbey, depended on the abbot[915]. In the
-houses which were independent and elected their own head, a licence from
-the bishop had to be secured. And if the nuns neglected to secure this
-licence before electing a superior difficulties were apt to occur. In the
-case of Catesby, a Benedictine house in Northamptonshire, such
-difficulties are repeatedly recorded. At the death of the prioress Johanna
-de Northampton (1291), the cellaress of the house was elected in her stead
-by the nuns; but the election having been made without a licence, the
-bishop of Lincoln declared it void. Afterwards however he confirmed it in
-consideration of the merits of the person elected. At her death similar
-neglect on the one side was followed by similar opposition on the other;
-the bishop first declared the election void and then confirmed it. The
-relation of Catesby to the diocesan continued to be a source of
-difficulties. In 1444 the prioress Agnes Terry was suspended from the
-conduct of all business relating to the revenues of the house during the
-bishop's pleasure, and a commission was granted to the abbot of St James
-in Northampton to inspect the accounts of the nunnery[916].
-
-Sometimes neglect of the administration of the property of the house was
-the cause of the voluntary or forced resignation of a superior. Love of
-finery is represented as the cause of the ruin of the prioress Juliana of
-Bromhall in Berkshire, into whose conduct an enquiry was instituted in
-1404. It was found on this occasion that she 'had injured the convent and
-her own character in that she had converted to her nefarious use,
-alienated and wasted chalices, books, jewelry (_jocalia_), the income and
-possessions' of the priory[917]. She resigned, but it is not recorded
-whether she remained in the house. In several instances a deposed lady
-superior did remain in the convent. Thus Margaret Punder, prioress of
-Flixton, an Austin convent, resigned because of complaints of her
-negligence, but she remained in the house as a member of the convent[918].
-
-The dignitaries of the Church took upon themselves to protect the abbess
-or prioress against violation of her rights by laymen; under social
-arrangements which made the nunnery the one place of safety for the
-unmarried daughters of the gentry, it is obvious that ecclesiastical and
-lay authorities would be of one mind in severely punishing those who
-failed to respect the nun's privileges.
-
-In 1285 a knight carried off two nuns from the settlement at Wilton,
-'which coming to the archbishop's ears he first excommunicated him, and
-subsequently absolved him on these conditions,--first that he should never
-afterwards come within a nunnery or be in the company of a nun; then that
-on three Sundays running he should be whipped in the parish church of
-Wilton, and likewise three other days in the market and church of
-Shaftesbury; that he should fast a certain number of months; that he
-should not wear a shirt for three years; and lastly that he should not
-any more take the habit and title of a knight, but wear apparel of a
-russet colour until he had spent three years in the Holy Land[919].'
-
-Where an abbess was at the head of a nunnery, the prioress and
-sub-prioress, and sometimes a second prioress and sub-prioress were
-appointed by her; where the settlement was ruled by a prioress it was she
-who appointed the sub-prioress. This is in accordance with the written
-rule of St Benedict, where the abbot nominates the _praepositus_ or
-provost whose duties correspond to those of the prioress or
-sub-prioress[920]. The rhymed version of the rule, in which the prioress
-is treated as chief in authority, says the sub-prioress (l. 1406 ff.)
-shall be appointed by the prioress, 'for if it were done otherwise strife
-and debate might easily arise.' This provision was dictated by the feeling
-that, if chosen by the convent, the person second in authority might
-presume. For this reason 'the sub-prioress, sexton and other such officers
-shall not be chosen but appointed as the prioress desires,' and if the
-sub-prioress does wrong and refuses to mend her ways 'out of the flock she
-shall be fled.'
-
-The duties of the person second in authority consisted in seeing that the
-hours of divine service were rightly kept. A manuscript now at Oxford,
-written in English, which came from Barking nunnery gives directions as to
-the formal appointment of the prioress in that house[921]. It belongs to
-the end of the 14th century. Barking it will be remembered was one of the
-chief abbeys for women. The manner in which the abbess appointed the
-person second to her in authority is described in the following passage:
-'When a prioress is to be made, the abbess shall commend the rule to her,
-enjoining that she be helpful to her and maintain religion in accordance
-with the rule. And she shall set her in her seat. And then shall come the
-chaplain with incense towards her. And the abbess and she shall go before
-the convent into the choir. And then shall they go to St Alburgh, and the
-convent shall say the _Levavi_ (Ps. 121, _Levavi oculos meos_, 'I lifted
-up my eyes'); and the prioress shall lie prostrate, and the abbess shall
-say the prayers aforesaid with the orison _Oremus_, etc. Then shall the
-prioress go to the choir; the chapter mass being _Spiritus Domini_. And
-the same day shall be given to the convent a pittance or allowance of
-good fish. And when she dies, she must give to the convent....' Here the
-manuscript closes abruptly.
-
-In houses of the Benedictine order the lady superior of the house, whether
-abbess or prioress, usually dwelt apart from the convent in a set of
-chambers or a small house of her own, where she received visitors and
-transacted business. In some of the largest houses the prioress,
-sub-prioress and sexton also had establishments of their own as we shall
-see presently. In Cistercian houses the arrangements seem to have varied,
-but in the majority of houses of the order, usually among Austin nuns and
-always among the nuns of St Clare, the head of the house lived in closer
-contact with the members of her convent and took her meals at the same
-table as the nuns.
-
-The lady superior managed all the business of the house and presided at
-the meetings of the convent, the members of which fulfilled a number of
-functions which we will pass in rapid review. The full complement of
-offices was of course found in the larger houses only; in the smaller
-houses several posts were frequently held by one and the same person.
-Reference is most frequently made to the offices of sexton, cellaress, and
-chaplain,--these seem to have existed in almost every house.
-
-The rhymed version of St Benedict's rule gives the following injunctions
-about the duties of the sexton (l. 1521 ff.):--'She shall ring the bells
-to all the services night and day, and keep the ornaments of the church,
-the chalice, books, vestments, relics, and wax and annual rents. She shall
-preserve the vessels of the altar and keep them clean.'
-
-Other versions of the rule, as far as I am aware, contain nothing about
-these duties. The sexton at Barking at the time of the Reformation was
-responsible for the receipt of considerable sums[922].
-
-Duties of great importance devolved on the cellaress, who managed the
-receipts and expenditure appertaining to the food; certainly no light task
-and one that required considerable powers of management. On this point the
-versified rule of St Benedict closely follows the original rule. We are
-told (l. 1467 ff.) that the cellaress 'shall be chosen by counsel out of
-the community'; she shall be wise and gentle and of mild ways, not hard
-like a shrew, nor slow nor mean in her dealings (grochand in hir dede),
-but gladly do her office and take special care of young children, poor
-guests and others that ask at her door, knowing that on the day of
-judgment she will have to render account.
-
-Fortunately we are in possession of an extremely interesting document
-written in English about the year 1400. It came from Barking nunnery, and
-enables us to form some idea of the duties devolving on the
-cellaress[923]. It is entitled 'Charthe longynge to the office of the
-celeresse,' and describes the duties of buying and selling, illustrating
-the economic condition of the house no less than the standard of living at
-that convent. From the manuscript the inference can be drawn that more
-than one cellaress was appointed at a time. The one whose duties are
-described in the 'Charthe' provides and deals out the food, and manages
-the receipts from the home farm. The 'Charthe' opens with injunctions how
-the cellaress, when she comes into office, must look after what is owing
-to the office by divers farmers and rent-gatherers and see that it be paid
-as soon as may be. A list follows of the sums she receives annually from
-various sources,--farms and rent for various tenements in London and
-elsewhere. She receives 'of the canons of St Paul's in London for a yearly
-rent by the year 22 shillings; and of the prior of the convent of St
-Bartholomew's in London by the year 17 shillings.' The following entries
-are curious. 'She should receive yearly of a tenement in Friday Street,
-London, but it is not known where it stands, 23 shillings and four pence;
-and she should receive 30 shillings of the rent of Tyburn, but it is not
-paid.'
-
-A list follows of the things she is to be charged with, from which it is
-evident that the duties of selling as well as of buying devolved on her.
-She is to be charged with the ox-skins she sells, also with the 'inwards'
-of oxen, and with tallow and messes of beef; 'and all these be called the
-issues of the larder.' If she sells hay from any farm belonging to her
-office, she must charge herself with it or let it be called 'the foreign
-receipt.'
-
-She is then directed as to the stores she has to provide, which may be
-grouped under the headings of grain, flesh, fish, and condiments.
-
-The grains include malt, of which she provides three quarters yearly for
-the 'tounes' of St Alburgh and Christmas, and she pays twenty pence to the
-brewer of each 'toune';--and wheat, of which a quarter and seven bushels
-are required, which go to the allowance or pittance of the four men and
-dames resident in the monastery, for making 'russeaulx,' perhaps some
-kind of cake, during Lent, and for baking eels on Shere Tuesday (Tuesday
-preceding Good Friday). She provides two bushels of peas every year in
-Lent, and one bushel of beans for the convent against Midsummer. Both peas
-and beans are evidently dried.
-
-Under the heading 'buying of store' the only item she is mentioned as
-providing is twenty-two oxen a year, which she evidently feeds on her
-pasture. Another passage tells us that 'she shall slay but every fortnight
-if she be a good housewife.' A passage further on refers to her buying
-pigs and possibly sheep. Geese and fowls she apparently received from her
-own farm.
-
-She buys fish in large quantities, principally herrings, some white,--that
-is fresh or slightly salted, some red,--that is salted, by the cade or by
-the barrel. A note at the end of the 'Charthe' states that a cask or 'cade
-of herrings is six hundred herrings,' 'the barrel of herrings is one
-thousand herrings.' Seven cades of white herrings and three barrels of the
-same she buys for Lent.
-
-Also she must provide eighteen salt fish and fourteen or fifteen salt
-salmon for the convent in Lent. Eels are mentioned, but not that she
-bought them; no doubt they were caught on the convent property.
-
-Of condiments the cellaress has to provide almonds, twelve lbs. for Lent;
-figs, three pieces[924] and twenty-four lbs.; raisins, one piece; rice,
-twenty-eight lbs.; and mustard eight gallons. There is no mention of salt
-or of sugar as being provided for the nuns.
-
-We are next informed of the cellaress' expenses in money. Here the
-peculiar word 'russeaulx' figures again, variously spelt. All the ladies
-of the convent, who at the time numbered thirty-six, are in receipt of
-'ruscheauw sylver,' payable sixteen times in the year, 'but it is paid
-only twice now, at Easter and at Michaelmas.' The ladies also receive
-twopence each for crisps and crumcakes at Shrovetide. Wherever there is
-question of paying money or providing food in portions, the cellaress has
-to give double to the chief officers of the house, such as the prioress,
-the cellaress, etc., which suggests that they had a double ration either
-to enable them to feed their servant, or perhaps a visitor.
-
-The cellaress further pays five annuities called 'anniversaries,' namely,
-to Sir William, vicar, to Dame Alice Merton, to Dame Maud, the king's
-daughter, to Dame Maud Loveland, and to William Dunn, who are residing in
-the monastery. William Dunn moreover receives twelve gallons of good ale
-with his annuity.
-
-In 'offerings and wages' the cellaress shall pay twelve pence to the two
-cellaresses; to the steward of the household what time he brings money
-home from the courts 20 pence, and again at Christmas 20 pence; to my
-lady's (the abbess') gentlewoman 20 pence; 'to every gentleman 16 pence
-and to every yeoman as it pleases her to do, and grooms in like case.' The
-abbess receives a sugar-loaf at Christmas; her clerk is paid thirteen
-shillings and fourpence, her yeoman cook 26 shillings and eightpence for
-their wages. Her groom cook and her pudding wife (grom coke and poding
-wief) receive the gift of one gown a year of the value of two shillings.
-
-A description follows of the food which the cellaress has to provide for
-the convent on special days in the year. 'A pece of whete' and three
-gallons of milk for 'frimete on St Alburgh's day'; four bacon hogs twice
-in winter, 'and she must buy six grecys (young pigs), six sowcys (perhaps
-'sowkin,' diminutive for young female hog, or else 'sowthes,' Middle
-English for sheep) for the convent and also six inwardys and 100 (?) egges
-to make white puddings'; also bread, pepper and saffron for the same
-puddings, also three gallons of good ale for 'besons.' Other directions
-follow which are perplexing, such as 'mary bones to make white
-wortys'--can it be marrowbones to make white soup, or does 'bones' stand
-for buns? Again we hear of 'cripcis and crumcakes,' chickens, bonnes
-(buns?) at Shrovetide, and of '12 stubbe elles and 60 shafte[925] elles,'
-to bake for the convent on Shere Thursday. When the abbess receives a
-bottle of Tyre (wine) at Easter time the convent receives two gallons of
-red wine. The convent receives three gallons of ale every week. Regarding
-the wine it is well to recall that grapes were grown to some extent in
-mediæval England, and that after the dissolution, a vineyard of five acres
-is scheduled as part of the possessions of Barking nunnery[926].
-
-A paragraph is devoted to the giving out of eggs. The thirty-seven ladies
-sometimes receive money instead of eggs, 'ey sylver,' as it is called; in
-one case the alternative is open to the cellaress of giving thirty-two
-eggs or of paying twopence. Butter also forms an important item in the
-'Charthe'; it is given out in 'cobbets,' three cobbets going to a dish.
-
-It likewise falls to the cellaress to hire pasture, to see to the mowing
-of her hay, to see that all manner of houses within her office be duly
-repaired, not only within the monastery but without, on her farms and
-manors.
-
-The 'Charthe' returns to directions about food, and mentions among other
-things pork, mutton, geese, hens, bacon and oatmeal.
-
-The following passages will give some idea of the language in which these
-directions are couched.
-
-'And the under-celaress must remember at each principal feast, that my
-lady (the abbess) sits in the refectory, that is to wit five times in the
-year, at each time shall (she) ask the clerk of the kitchen (for) supper
-eggs for the convent, at Easter, Whitsuntide, the Assumption of Our Lady,
-at St Alburgh, and at Christmas; at each time to every lady two eggs, and
-each (person receiving) double that is the prioress, celaress and
-kitchener....'
-
-'Also to remember to ask of the kitchen at St Alburgh's time, for every
-lady of the convent half a goose ... also to ask at the said feast of St
-Alburgh of the said clerk for every lady of the convent one hen, or else a
-cock.' The manuscript, which is corrected in several places and has
-additions made by another hand, closes abruptly.
-
-It is interesting to compare the directions about food found in the rule
-of St Benedict with the high standard of living suggested by the 'Charthe'
-of Barking. The rhymed version says (l. 1620) that she who is seeing to
-the kitchen shall provide each day two kinds of 'mete,' so that she who
-will not eat of one kind may take the other. The convent is also to be
-supplied with two kinds of pottage (thick soup?) daily. If they have
-apples of their own growing they shall partake of them; also each lady is
-to be given a pound of bread each day, which is to serve her for her three
-meals. The rule adds words to the effect that the 'celerer' may give an
-extra allowance of food if she sees need though always with caution for
-fear of gluttony. In regard to drink, wine and ale shall be 'softly'
-tasted.
-
-It appears probable from this 'Charthe' to the cellaress that the office
-of Kitchener at Barking was a permanent appointment, which is curious
-considering that in an ordinary way the members of the convent were bound
-to serve in the convent kitchen as cook, each for the term of a week. The
-injunction is repeated in every version of the Benedictine rule known to
-me. According to the rhymed version of the north the nun who has served
-her term in the kitchen is directed to leave the kitchen and the vessels
-clean for her who succeeded her in office. When her time is up she shall
-kneel before the assembled members of the convent saying, 'Blessed be the
-Lord that has never failed me,' whereupon the nun who is to act as cook
-shall say, 'Lord, to my helping take thou heed.' But this injunction was
-evidently disregarded in the wealthier houses at a later date, for in
-connection with St Mary's, Winchester, we read of a convent-cook and an
-under convent-cook[927]. A nun of Campsey, an Austin house consisting at
-the time of a prioress and eighteen nuns, complained at the visitation of
-the house in 1532 of the unpunctuality of the meals, which she ascribed to
-the fault of the cook (culpa coci),--using a term which suggests that the
-cook in this case was a man[928].
-
-An appointment in the nunnery which has led to some controversy is that of
-chaplain, it being alleged by some writers that the chaplain of the
-convent was necessarily a man. Certainly in most houses, especially in the
-wealthier ones, there were men chaplains; for example at the nunnery of
-Shaftesbury, where men chaplains are mentioned by the side of the abbess
-in various early charters and played an important part[929]. Again at St
-Mary's, Winchester, at the time of the dissolution, men chaplains were
-among those who are described as resident in the monastery[930]; at
-Kilburn nunnery the fact that the chaplain who dwelt on the premises was a
-man is evident from the arrangement of the dwellings,--three chambers
-which lie together being designated as set apart for the chaplain and the
-hinds or herdsmen[931]. But the fact that the chaplain's office could be
-and was held by a woman is established beyond a doubt by the following
-information. In consequence of an episcopal visitation (1478) of the
-Benedictine convent of Easebourne, injunctions were sent to the prioress,
-one of which directs that 'every week, beginning with the eldest,
-excepting the sub-prioress, she shall select for herself in due course and
-in turns one of her nuns as chaplain (capellanissam) for divine service
-and to wait upon herself[932].' This injunction is in accordance with the
-words of Chaucer, who says that the prioress who was on a pilgrimage to
-Canterbury had with her a nun who acted as chaplain to her (l. 163):
-
-  'Another Nonne also with hire hadde she
-  That was hire chapelleine, and preestes thre.'
-
-In the accounts of visitations in the diocese of Norwich between 1492 and
-1532 the designation chaplain applied to an inmate of a nunnery appears in
-the Benedictine house of Redlingfield, in the Austin priory of Campsey and
-in others. In Redlingfield at the visitation of 1514 the complaint is made
-against the prioress that she does not change her chaplain, and at Flixton
-in 1520 it is alleged that the prioress has no chaplain and sleeps by
-herself in her chamber away from the dormitory[933]. At Elstow in
-Bedfordshire at the time of the surrender Katheryne Wyngate adds the
-designation 'chapellain' to her name[934], and among the nuns of Barking
-who were still in receipt of their pension in 1553 was Mathea Fabyan who
-is styled chaplain (capellan)[935]. How far the woman chaplain performed
-the same offices as the man chaplain seems impossible to tell; probably
-she recited the inferior services in the chapel of the nunnery.
-
-In the rhymed version of the rule of St Benedict the office of chaplain is
-passed over, but in the poem of the 'Spiritual Convent' written by the
-beguine Mechthild, of which a former chapter has given an account, the
-chaplain is a woman. And similarly the English version of this poem called
-the 'Ghostly Abbey' which is attributed to John Alcock, bishop of Ely
-([Dagger] 1500), refers to women chaplains. It says God had ordered His
-four daughters to come and dwell in the abbey; Charity was made abbess and
-to her Mercy and Truth were to be as 'chapeleyns,' going about with her
-wherever she goes. He bade also that Righteousness should be with Wisdom
-who was prioress, and Peace with Mekeness who was sub-prioress, Charity,
-Wisdom and Mekeness having chaplains because they were 'most of
-worship[936].'
-
-I have found very little information about the arrangements made in the
-nunnery for the young people who boarded with and were taught by the nuns,
-and hardly a clue is to be had as to the number of those who might stay
-in one house at the same time. The only allusion on this point is to St
-Mary's, Winchester, where twenty-six girls, mostly daughters of knights,
-were staying at the time of the dissolution. Rogers refers to a roll of
-expenditure of the Cistercian priory, Swine, in Yorkshire, on which he
-says are enumerated a number of young persons, daughters of the
-surrounding gentlefolk, who lived 'en pension' in this small
-community[937]; and Rye has compiled a list of those who boarded at Carrow
-at different times[938]. From 'The Death of Philip Sparrow,' a poem
-written by John Skelton ([Dagger] 1529), we gather that the girl who is
-represented as intoning the lament over a tame bird, lived and boarded
-with the 'Nuns Black' at Carrow, where her sparrow was devoured by the
-cat, whereupon she took out a sampler and worked the sparrow in stitches
-of silk for her solace[939]. Apparently not only girls, but boys also,
-were given into the care of nuns, for injunctions forwarded to Romsey in
-1310 by the bishop of Winchester forbade that boys and girls should sleep
-with the nuns or be taken by them into the choir during divine
-service[940]. Injunctions sent to Redlingfield in 1514 also directed that
-boys should not sleep in the dormitory[941]; and Bishop Kentwode in the
-directions he sent to St Helen's in London ordered that none but 'mayd
-learners' should be received into that nunnery[942]. In the year 1433
-Catherine de la Pole, abbess of Barking, petitioned Henry V. for a sum of
-money due to her for the maintenance of Edward and Jasper Tudor, sons of
-Catherine, the queen dowager, by Owen Tudor. It seems that these boys were
-receiving their education at this abbey[943]. But the popularity of the
-convent even as an educational establishment began to decrease at the
-close of the 14th century. Judging from the Paston Letters it was no
-longer customary in Norfolk to send girls to board with the nuns; they
-were sent to stay away from home with some other country family.
-
-Other offices held by members of the convent are as follows:
-_thesaurissa_,--the nun bursar who was responsible for the revenues coming
-through the Church; the _precentrix_ and _succentrix_,--the leaders and
-teachers of the choir, who are sometimes mentioned together (Campsey); the
-_cameraria_ or chambress,--who saw to the wardrobe; the _infirmaria_ or
-keeper of the infirmary,--who took charge of the sick nuns; the
-_refectuaria_,--who had the care of the refectory or dining hall; the
-_elemosinaria_,--who distributed alms; the _magistra noviciarum_,--who
-taught the novices. The _cantarista_ occurs in connection with Sheppey; no
-doubt she is identical with the _precentrix_ of other places. The further
-designations of _tutrix_, or teacher, occurs in connection with
-Shaftesbury, and _eruditrix_, instructress, in connection with Thetford; I
-have not come across these terms elsewhere.
-
-All these appointments were made by the superior of the house and declared
-in the presence of the convent, and all except those of chaplain and
-kitchener seem to have been permanent. The chaplain was probably changed
-because it was a privilege to go about with the abbess, and the kitchener
-because of the hard work her duties involved. On the death of the abbess
-often the prioress, sometimes the cellaress, was appointed to succeed her,
-but not necessarily so.
-
-Having so far treated of the duties of the convent inmates, we will
-examine the form of admission for novices and the daily routine of the
-nun.
-
-According to the rhymed rule of St Benedict (l. 2155) the girl who was old
-enough to be admitted as nun into a religious community was granted entry
-as a novice and after two months had 'the law' read to her, and then the
-question was put if she wished to stay or to go. If she stayed, it was for
-six months; after which, if still desirous of being received, she
-proffered her petition to the abbess. If after twelve months she still
-persisted in her resolution, she was received as a member of the convent
-and pronounced these words before the altar: 'Suscipe me, domine, secundum
-eloquium tuum, et vivam. Et non confundas me in expectatione mea.' The
-formal profession or consecration was undertaken by the bishop, who
-visited the nunnery periodically, but as these visits were often years
-apart, it is probable that the declaration made before the superior of a
-house and the priest constituted a novice a member of a convent, and for
-all practical purposes made her a nun. Fosbroke is of opinion that the
-girl who entered at the age of twelve made profession after she had passed
-a year in the community: he adds that she was consecrated by the bishop
-when she had reached the age of twenty-five and not before[944]. But it
-is impossible to draw a line between profession and consecration, as the
-'non-professed' nun was invariably the nun who had not been installed by
-the bishop. In 1521 at the visitation of Rusper the settlement consisted
-of the prioress, one professed nun and two nuns entered on the list as not
-professed, of whom one declared that she had lived there awaiting
-profession for twelve years, the other for three[945]. Women who had been
-professed at one house were sometimes inmates of another; and I have not
-found any remark which leads to the inference that this was thought
-objectionable. A nun residing at Rusper was afterwards prioress of
-Easebourne. The record of a visitation at Davington in Kent (1511) shows
-that the convent contained four inmates, of whom two were professed nuns.
-The one, professed at Cambridge, had been there for twenty years; the
-other, professed at Malling, had been there for ten. The other two inmates
-entered on the list as not professed were girls of ten and fifteen[946].
-
-The consecration of nuns was a very ancient and solemn rite. Several forms
-of the office as celebrated in England are in existence[947]. One comes
-from the monastery of St Mary's, Winchester, and is contained in a
-manuscript written probably soon after 1500; the directions are in
-English, but the words in which the bishop addressed the maidens and their
-answers are in Latin. Another manuscript written about 1480 contains the
-office as used in the diocese of Lincoln, with prayers in English and
-rubrics in Latin; it contains also various directions and addresses
-omitted in the other manuscript. A third is throughout in English.
-
-These forms of consecration show that after the celebration of the office
-of high mass in church the prospective nuns entered, each bearing a habit,
-a veil, a ring and a scroll. The form of interrogation they were put
-through and the prayers they recited during the installation are given.
-The declaration was made by the nuns in Latin and runs as follows: 'I,
-sister ..., promise steadfastness (stabilitatem), continuance in virtue
-(conversionem morum meorum), and obedience before God and all His saints.'
-We also have the declaration of four nuns who were installed by the
-bishop of Ely at Chatteris, which is couched in similar terms[948]. The
-nun in this case made her promise 'in accordance with the rule of St
-Benedict in this place, Chatteris, built in honour of St Mary, in the
-presence of the reverend father in Christ, William, bishop of Ely,' adding
-'I subscribe this with my own hand,' whereupon she made the sign of the
-cross on the scroll which she carried in her hand and from which she had
-read her declaration. The form of declaration made at Rusper in Sussex in
-the year 1484 is similar, but the nun further promises 'to live without
-property (sine proprio)' of her own[949].
-
-For several days after her consecration the nun lived in retirement,
-strictly observing the rule of silence. She then resumed her ordinary
-duties in church, cloister, refectory and dormitory. She usually kept
-within the convent close, but she was not altogether cut off from
-intercourse with the outside world. The rhymed rule of St Benedict of the
-north, transcribing the passages which refer to the monk's going abroad if
-need be, adapts them to the use of the nun (l. 2450), 'when a sister is
-going to her father, mother, or other friends, she shall take formal leave
-of the convent.' And if she is away on an errand (l. 1967), she shall not
-stay away for a meal though invited to do so unless she has asked leave
-before going. And again (l. 1957) if she be away during Lent and cannot
-attend service in church she shall not forget to keep the hours by saying
-her prayers. And again (l. 2094), when nuns go away into the country they
-shall wear 'more honest' clothes (that is clothes more clearly showing
-their profession), which they can take off on coming home for simpler
-ones. From passages such as these we gather that nuns sometimes stayed
-away from their convent, leave of absence having been procured; and that
-besides pilgrimages and business, friendly intercourse with their
-relatives might take them away from the convent for a time.
-
-The day at the convent was divided by the canonical hours, stated times
-fixed by ecclesiastical law for prayer and devotion[950]. The hours since
-the 6th century were seven in number, viz. matins, prime, tierce, sext,
-none, vespers or evensong, and compline.
-
-During winter a night office was said in church at the eighth hour, that
-is at two o'clock in the morning, when the _matutinae laudes_ were sung,
-but the time for that was variable. 'Then shall they rise to sing and
-read, and after that she who has need may have meditations' (Rhymed rule,
-l. 1166). Between Easter and winter however the rule says 'that the nuns
-shall unto matins rise when the day begins to dawn that they their letters
-well may know.' Injunctions sent to Easebourne in 1524 direct the prioress
-to hold matins at the sixth hour, that is at midnight. Matins were
-followed by a period of rest, probably till five o'clock, when the nuns
-rose and assembled in the choir to celebrate the office of prime. This was
-followed by business transacted in the chapter house, by a meal and by
-work. According to the prose versions of the Benedictine rule children
-were taught between prime and tierce.
-
-At tierce a short chapter-mass was sung followed by continued study; 'from
-terce to sext the nuns shall read lessons' (l. 1905). At eight the nuns
-assembled in the choir for the celebration of High Mass, the principal
-service of the day, after which came the chief meal. This was served in
-the refectory; 'the convent when they sit at meat for to read shall not
-forget' (l. 1739); and while reading went on 'if any of them need aught
-softly with signs they shall it crave' (l. 1754). The time of the meal was
-moveable. In summer the nuns were to eat at the sext, but on Wednesdays
-and Fridays they were to fast till nones, that is noon, except 'they swink
-and sweat in hay or corn with travail great' (l. 1768), when the time
-might be altered at the will of the superior. Between December and Lent
-they always ate at nones. If they eat early 'then shall they sleep and
-silence keep' (l. 1910) till nones, from which time till evensong work was
-resumed.
-
-About three o'clock, vespers, that is evensong, once more assembled the
-convent inmates in church. The celebration of evensong partook of the
-solemnity of the celebration of high mass. In the monks' houses at high
-mass and at vespers the youths who were supported there for the purpose
-attended and joined the brethren in their choral service. In the nuns'
-houses the arrangements for the girls who dwelt with the nuns were
-similar, at least in some cases. After vespers came supper, and then 'the
-nuns could sit where they would and read lessons of holy writ or else the
-lives of holy men' (l. 1791), until the tolling of the bell summoned them
-to the chapter-house, where they joined their superior. Compline
-completed the religious exercises of the day. After this the nuns retired
-to the dormitory, where silence unbroken was to be observed. Inside the
-dormitory, curtains, in some houses if not in all, were hung so as to
-separate bed from bed.
-
-The celebration of the hours formed at all times the great feature of
-monastic life, and in itself involved a considerable amount of labour,
-especially during the later period, when the ritual of service had become
-very elaborate. Indolence and ease might creep in between whiles,
-deterioration might take place in the occupations of the nuns between
-hours, but the observance of the hours themselves constituted the nun's
-privilege and her _raison d'être_, and was at all times zealously upheld.
-
-
-§ 3. The Foundation and Internal Arrangements of Sion[951].
-
-Before leaving the subject of women's convent life in England in the later
-Middle Ages, it will be interesting to devote some attention to the
-foundation and interior arrangements of Sion, a convent founded under
-peculiar circumstances at a time when it was no longer usual to found or
-endow religious settlements. The information relating to Sion has been
-characterised as the most valuable record we possess of monastic life in
-the 15th century. It refers to one short period only and bears out what
-has already been put forward with regard to other nunneries. The interests
-of the women who joined this convent centred round devotional practices
-and a highly elaborated convent routine.
-
-The settlement of Sion belonged to the order of St Bridget of Sweden, and
-was the only house of its kind in England. It was situated in beautiful
-surroundings near Isleworth on the Thames, and was so richly endowed that
-at the time of the dissolution its income far exceeded that of any other
-nunnery, not excepting the time-honoured settlements of Shaftesbury and
-Barking. It was the only English community of women which escaped being
-scattered at the time of the Reformation. Its convent of nuns removed to
-Holland, but returned to the old house for a time after the accession of
-Queen Mary. At the close of her reign the nuns again went abroad and after
-various vicissitudes settled at Lisbon, where the convent continued to be
-recruited from English homes till the beginning of this century. Then the
-nine sisters of which the convent consisted came to England, and settled
-at Chudleigh, near Newton-Abbot, in Devonshire.
-
-A few words in passing must be devoted to the nun and saint Bridget[952]
-of Sweden, founder of the order which took her name--a woman of
-acquirements and influence. She was born of a kingly race in 1304, and
-from the house of a powerful father passed to that of a powerful husband;
-but the responsibilities of a large household and the care of a family of
-seven children did not draw her attention from social and political
-affairs. She was strongly imbued with the need of reform in religion, and
-believed in the possibility of effecting a change by encouraging
-monasticism. A large part of her property and much of her time were
-devoted to enlarging the religious settlement of Wadstena. She then went
-on a pilgrimage to Santiago in Spain, after which husband and wife
-separated, each to embrace convent life. Bridget, or Birgitta as her
-people called her, dwelt at Wadstena, which she reformed according to
-rules which she believed she had received direct from heaven. She also
-wrote some 'Revelations,' which in their strong invective recall the
-Revelations of St Hildegard of Bingen with this difference, that St
-Bridget with open directness spoke of the dangers which she thought were
-gathering around Sweden. The tone of these writings brought her into
-difficulties. She escaped from them by removing to Rome in 1350, where she
-lived for over twenty years. Here she was looked upon as the
-representative of the Church party which strongly censured the Pope for
-continuing to dwell at Avignon. This party looked upon Bridget as the
-chosen mouthpiece of God. Her power of prophecy was generally recognised
-after her threatening visions about the state of things in Sweden had
-proved true. Settlements on the plan of that of Wadstena rapidly
-multiplied during her lifetime in Sweden and in North Germany. It was
-partly owing to her influence that the first attempt was made to translate
-the Bible into Swedish, and she is looked upon by the Swedes as one of
-that faithful band who worked for their national regeneration. She died in
-1372 and was officially canonised a saint in 1391[953].
-
-A great feature of the order of St Bridget was that its settlements
-consisted of a double community of men and women who combined for purposes
-of divine service, but were otherwise separate, each community having its
-own conventual buildings separately enclosed. The convent of nuns,
-according to Bridget's stipulation, numbered sixty women including the
-abbess, and in accordance with a fanciful notion, such as one comes across
-in the Middle Ages, these women had associated with them thirteen priests,
-who represented the apostles, four deacons who represented the great
-doctors of the Church, and eight lay brothers; the lady abbess was at the
-head of this double community. The order in its development abroad
-endeavoured to influence all classes. It encouraged charity, promoted
-education and collected books. But in England its tone fell in with that
-of other nunneries in the 15th century; the interests of Sion were
-entirely devotional and its large library seems to have contained
-religious works only.
-
-I am not aware of any mention of Bridget in contemporary English
-literature previous to the introduction of her order into this country,
-which took place at the beginning of the 15th century. In the year 1406
-Philippa, daughter of Henry IV, was sent to Lund in Sweden to be married
-to King Eric XIII (1382-1445), under whose rule the crowns of Sweden,
-Denmark and Norway were united. The princess travelled under the charge of
-Henry, third Baron Fitzhugh, who held an important position at the court
-of Henry IV; he was made Constable of England at the coronation of Henry
-V, and seems to have been on terms of intimacy with both these monarchs.
-By some means Fitzhugh's attention was drawn to the monastery of Wadstena,
-the chronicle of which records his visit to it. He volunteered to found a
-branch of the order of St Bridget in England, and promised the gift of a
-manor, Hinton near Cambridge, on condition that some of the order took
-possession of it within three years.
-
-In consequence of Fitzhugh's visit and offer a priest and two deacons
-professing the order of St Bridget were elected at Wadstena in 1408, and
-sent to England. Blunt considers it probable[954] that it was by the
-advice of Fitzhugh that Henry V about this time devoted manors at Sheen
-and Isleworth to religious purposes. Carthusian monks were settled at
-Sheen, nuns of St Bridget were settled at Isleworth,--and the two
-settlements were called respectively Bethlehem and Sion. In February of
-1415 Henry V in the presence of the bishop of London laid the foundation
-stone of a building destined for the nuns near Twickenham, and in March
-the royal charter was drawn up and signed. By this the members of the new
-settlement were bound 'to celebrate Divine Service for ever for our
-healthful estate while we live and for our souls when we shall have
-departed this life, and for the souls of our most dear lord and father
-(Henry IV) late king of England, and Mary his late wife, etc.' Before the
-close of the year four consecrated Swedish sisters, three novices and two
-brothers arrived in England from Wadstena. They were sent by the king and
-queen of Sweden and were sped on their way by the archbishop of Lund and
-other dignitaries.
-
-The settlement at Sion had been granted an income of a thousand marks, to
-be drawn from the royal exchequer until the permanent endowments made to
-it should amount to that sum. In 1418 Pope Martin V received the house
-under his special protection; the first profession or monastic engagement
-took place two years later. Twenty-four nuns, five priests, two deacons
-and four lay brothers pronounced their vows before archbishop Chicheley of
-Canterbury (1420). And before the close of Henry's reign (1422) the house
-was endowed with manors and spiritualities, scattered over the land from
-Kent to the Lake district, which were chiefly appropriated from the
-possessions of alien priories.
-
-The appropriation of alien priories forms an interesting episode in the
-history of English monasticism, for it constitutes a prelude to the
-dissolution of monasteries generally. While men were becoming critical of
-religious institutions owing to the spread of Lollard doctrines, the
-Lancastrian kings appropriated the lands and the revenues of alien
-priories and made use of them to fortify the Church and monasticism, thus
-counteracting influences which in the first instance had made the
-appropriation of these houses possible.
-
-The number of alien priories in England is differently quoted as a hundred
-and a hundred and forty[955]. Most of them had been founded soon after the
-Conquest, when the gift of a manor on English soil to a foreign house had
-brought over from France a few monks and nuns, who after defraying the
-expenses of their houses remitted any surplus revenue or else forwarded a
-sum of money in lieu of it to the parent house. When the relations between
-France and England became strained it appeared advisable to sever the
-connection between the foreign house and its English colonies. Edward I,
-when he determined on war with France, appropriated the revenues of alien
-priories for a time, and his successors frequently did the same; the
-dangers to which these cells were exposed causing some foreign houses to
-sever the connection by selling their English property.
-
-The alien cells occupied by nuns were very few. Amesbury, which had been
-constituted a cell to Fontevraud, regained its independent standing during
-the wars with France[956]; Westwood[957], another cell of Fontevraud, and
-Levenestre or Liminster in Surrey, a cell of Almanache in Normandy, were
-dispersed, and the abbess of Almanache treated for the sale of the
-property[958].
-
-After many attempts to interfere with foreign cells Henry V resolved on
-their final sequestration (1414), and it was part of the property thus
-appropriated which was bestowed on the houses called Bethlehem and Sion.
-
-The chief information we have on the conventual life of the women
-assembled at Sion is contained in a set of 'additional rules' written in
-English 'for the sisters of the order of St Saviour and St Bridget'[959].
-The same rules exist in a manuscript of contemporaneous date adapted to
-the use of the brothers, whose duties, save in a few particulars, were
-similar. They acted as priests and confessors to the double community. The
-chapel had a double chancel, each with its separate stalls; it was divided
-by a 'crate' or grille which did not prevent the brothers and sisters from
-being visible to each other during divine service. The gate of this grille
-was kept locked, and was only opened for the entrance and departure of the
-clergy when they said mass at the altar of the sisters' chapel. The lay
-brothers of the settlement acted as labourers, and had no part in the
-government of the house.
-
-The additional rules for the sisters are grouped together in fifty-nine
-chapters, and contain most elaborate directions not only as to the
-occupation, behaviour and special duties of the various inmates of the
-convent, but for exigencies of every kind. After directions about the
-holding of the Chapter, lists of defaults are worked out, grouped under
-the headings of light, grievous, more grievous and most grievous (c. 1-7).
-'A careful consideration of this code of "defaultes" and their penalties,'
-says Blunt[960], 'leads to the conclusion that it was intended as an
-exhaustive list of _possible_ crimes, and that it offers no ground for
-believing that the Sisters of Sion were ever guilty of them or ever
-incurred the severer punishments enjoined in connection with them.' Among
-'light defaults' we note such as neglect in religious observance and in
-washing; among 'grievous defaults,' despising the common doctrine as
-taught by the holy fathers, and going unconfessed for fourteen days. 'More
-grievous defaults' are such as sowing discord, theft, and using sorcery or
-witchcraft; 'most grievous defaults' are manslaughter, fleshly sin, and
-blasphemy. We gather from the directions that one mode of severe
-punishment was imprisonment, whereas 'discipline' was administered
-regularly by the sisters to each other. The power of the abbess over the
-members of the convent was absolute; she is spoken of in these rules
-sometimes as sovereign, sometimes as majesty. It was she who decreed
-punishment and penance, and when the bishop enjoined correction in
-consequence of an enquiry, she decided upon and administered it.
-Twenty-eight questions, which the bishop on the occasion of his visitation
-was allowed to put to the abbess and the convent, are given (c. 10). They
-refer to devotional duties, to the observance of fasts, etc. One question
-(nr 10) enquires of the sisters how they are occupied when they are not at
-divine service or at conventual observances; another (nr 18) if there be
-an inventory or register of the books of the library, and how they and
-other books of study are kept; again another (nr 26) enquires as to the
-state of the infirmary.
-
-A caution against slander suggests a curious idea of equity. If any sister
-bring an accusation against another before the bishop, she shall not be
-heard 'unless bound to the pain if she fail in proof, that she whom she
-accuses shall have, if she be found guilty.'
-
-Among the men who necessarily had access to the women's conventual
-buildings, physicians, workmen and labourers are enumerated.
-
-The election of a new abbess (c. 12) was effected by the sisters alone
-within three days of the occurrence of a vacancy. It was not managed in
-quite the same way as elsewhere. The prioress proposed a name, and if the
-sisters voted unanimously in favour of it, the election was called 'by the
-way of the Holy Ghost.' But if they did not agree, they named a candidate
-and the ballot was repeated till a sufficient majority was obtained. The
-election was not valid unless confirmed by the bishop. When the abbess
-pronounced the words of her 'obedience' she was supported by a learned man
-of law or notary, besides the confessor of the house and two brothers. The
-confessor was appointed at the discretion of the abbess herself, the
-'sadder' or elderly sisters and the brothers; but the other appointments
-were made by the abbess alone (c. 13). She appointed the sisters to office
-and could remove them. As elsewhere, she was obliged to do so in the
-chapter-house in the presence of the convent.
-
-The rules of keeping silence, the year of proof, and the instruction and
-profession of novices, are fully discussed (c. 15). The account of how the
-sisters were professed is supplemented by Aungier[961]. He gives an
-additional description of the ceremony in church, probably of somewhat
-later date, and of the interrogatory through which the bishop put the
-prospective nun. The first question which he put was to this effect: 'Art
-thou free and unfettered by any bond of the Church, or of wedlock; of vow,
-or of excommunication?' to which she made answer, 'I am truly free.' The
-bishop then asked: 'Does not shame, or perchance grief of worldly
-adversity, urge thee to a religious profession, or perhaps the multitude
-of thy debts compel thee?' To which she answered: 'Neither grief nor shame
-incites me to this, but a fervent love of Christ; and I have already paid
-all my debts according to my power,' etc. I have not met with similar
-questions in any other place.
-
-In the additional rules directions are also given about singing and
-keeping the hours and the festivals (c. 18-44). The day at Sion was
-divided by the seven 'hours' in the usual way. At the hours in chapel the
-'sadder' or elder sisters sang together with the younger ones or
-'song-sisters.' The 'observance of the altar' at both masses belonged to
-the brothers; it was so arranged that the brothers' service came first and
-the sisters' began when that of the brothers ended. In addition to the
-usual hours and masses two ceremonies were daily observed at Sion. One was
-the singing of the psalm _De Profundis_ at an open grave to which the
-whole convent wended its way after tierce. The other consisted of a prayer
-addressed to Mary in chapel before evensong, from which none of the
-sisters was to absent herself except for an important reason.
-
-A number of festivals were celebrated at Sion with special services and
-processions (c. 29). Among them were the feast of the Circumcision, the
-translation of St Bridget and the day of St John the Baptist 'when their
-feasts fall on Sunday and not else'; also Palm Sunday, St Mark's day,
-Rogation Sunday, St Peter and St Paul, St Anne's, Michaelmas, all the
-feasts of Our Lady and all the principal or high double feasts of the
-year. On these occasions the sisters walked two and two in procession, and
-the sister who was sexton bore the 'image of our lady' after the cross,
-and two torches were carried on either side a little before the image. The
-additional rules contain directions to the sisters on the arrangement of
-divine service on these occasions, and further directions in the rule for
-the brothers minutely describe the elaborate ritual which took place.
-
-The additional rules also contain a full description of the duties of each
-appointment in the convent (c. 45). The choir in church was led by a
-_chauntres_ and _subchauntres_ who should be 'cunning and perfect in
-reading and singing.' It was the duty of the _ebdomary_, or weekly
-appointed nun (c. 46), to be one of the first in choir; she was 'to
-abstayn and withdrawe herself from alle thynges that wyke that myght lette
-her to performe her office.' When the abbess did not execute the service
-the ebdomary began the _Invitatory_; and she always gave the third
-blessing after the abbess had read the third lesson. She also fulfilled
-the office of the abbess at the principal feasts, except in such things as
-belonged exclusively to the abbess.
-
-We hear also of the duties of the sexton, _sexteyne_ (c. 48), who kept the
-church ornaments and the altar 'whole and sound, fair, clean and honest,'
-and who saw to the washing of altar-cloths, _awbes_ or surplices. She was
-not allowed to touch or wash the hallowed _corporas_ or cloths with bare
-hands, but was obliged to wear linen gloves, and in starching the cloths
-she was directed to use starch made of herbs only. The sexton had in her
-keeping wax, lamps, oil and all other things belonging to the church; she
-had to provide for the church _syngynge_ or communion _brede_, _sudarys_,
-wax-candles, tallow-candles, wax rolls, tapers, torches, mats, _uattes_,
-and _roundlettes_; and she provided for the _penners_, pens, ink,
-inkhorns, tables, and all else that the abbess asked of her. Also she
-opened and shut the doors and windows of the sisters' choir and common
-places, lighted and extinguished tapers and candles, and snuffed them 'in
-such wise and in such time that the sisters be not grieved with the
-savour.'
-
-It was the duty of the sexton to ring the bells in the women's part of the
-house; the ringing of a bell regulated throughout the life of those
-assembled at Sion. It roused the brothers and sisters from sleep, summoned
-them to church, called them to meals, and ever and anon gave notice for a
-devotional pause in whatever occupation was going on at the moment. When
-one of the community passed away from life the large or curfew bell was
-tolled continuously.
-
-Another appointment in the women's convent was that of the _legister_ or
-reader at meals (c. 50), who was directed to read out distinctly and
-openly, that all might understand, whatever the abbess or chauntress had
-assigned. On one day of the week she read out the rule. Absolute silence
-reigned during meals. If anyone had a communication to make, this was done
-by means of signs, used also at other times when silence was to be
-observed. A curious 'table of signs used during the hours of silence by
-the sisters and brothers in the monastery of Sion' was drawn up by Thomas
-Betsone[962], one of the brothers. Together with other tables of the kind,
-it suggests the origin of the method by which the deaf and dumb were
-formerly taught.
-
-At Sion the abbess had her meals with the sisters, sitting at a high table
-while they sat at side tables (c. 51-52), and the servitors or lay sisters
-waited. When they had done the sisters wiped their knives and spoons on
-the napkins (without washing them?); they were to guard against spotting
-the cloth, and spilling the food, and were directed to put away their cups
-and spoons honest and clean (without washing them?) into the 'coffyns'
-which were kept underneath the table, or in some other place ordered by
-the abbess. At the end of a meal the sisters swept together the crumbs
-with their napkins, and then, at a sign from the abbess, they bore the
-food away to the serving-house. The youngest sister took the first dish,
-and each one carried away something according to age. The language in
-which the utensils are described presents some difficulties. They carried
-away the drink and then 'the garnapes that they sette on, ther pottes and
-cruses, after thys, brede, hole, kytte, cantelles, ande crommes, and laste
-of alle salt,' ending evermore with the abbess or president, and inclining
-to each sister as they took them up and they again to them.
-
-The behaviour of the sisters to each other and to the abbess in the
-refectory, the dormitory, the chapter-house, etc. was carefully regulated
-(c. 53). The sisters when they met the abbess bowed to her, 'for love
-without reverence is but childish love.' The desire for refinement in
-bearing and behaviour is manifested throughout by these directions, and
-some of them are curious. Thus the sister who washed her hands was
-directed not to 'jutte up' the water on another, nor to spit in the
-lavatory, nor to presume to go without her veil and crown upon her head,
-except only in her cell, washing-house, etc. Judging from this reference
-to cells, the dormitory at Sion was divided by partitions or curtains, so
-that each sister practically had a room to herself.
-
-Many details are then given concerning the duties of the prioress and
-other appointments. The nuns appointed to enquire into shortcomings are
-here designated as _serchers_ (c. 55). The treasurer and her fellow kept
-the muniments of the monastery and its possessions in gold and silver in
-the treasury, in a large chest to which there were two keys, one kept by
-the treasurer and the other by her fellow (c. 56). These sisters also
-provided and paid for all necessary medicines, spices and powders, etc.
-
-Duties of no small importance devolved on the _chambres_, or mistress of
-the wardrobe, who saw to the raiment of the sisters and the brothers, both
-in regard to linen and to woollen clothes, shaping, sewing, making,
-repairing and keeping them from 'wormes,' and shaking them with 'the help
-of other sisters.' I transcribe in the original spelling the things she is
-told to provide: '_canuas for bedyng_, _fryses_, _blankettes_, _shetes_,
-_bolsters_, _pelowes_, _couerlites_, _cuschens_, _basens_, _stamens_,
-_rewle cotes_, _cowles_, _mantelles_, _wymples_, _veyles_, _crownes_,
-_pynnes_, _cappes_, _nyght kerchyfes_, _pylches_, _mantel furres_,
-_cuffes_, _gloues_, _hoses_, _shoes_, _botes_, _soles_, _sokkes_,
-_mugdors_ (sic), _gyrdelles_, _purses_, _knyues_, _laces_, _poyntes_,
-_nedelles_, _threde_,--_waschyng bolles and sope_,--(written in the
-margin) and for all other necessaries, as directed by the abbess, which
-shall not be over curious but plain and homely, without wearing of any
-strange colours of silk, gold or silver, having all things of honesty and
-profit and nothing of vanity after the rule, their knives unpointed and
-purses being double of linen cloth, and not silk.'
-
-In illustration of the office of the chambress, Blunt has published a
-document preserved in the Record Office, which contains the account of
-Dame Bridget Belgrave, chambress at Sion from Michaelmas 1536 to
-Michaelmas 1537, the year preceding the dissolution[963]. This shows that
-the chambress provided the material for the dress of the sisters and
-other items. She buys _russettes_, white cloth, _kerseys_, fryce, Holland
-cloth and other linen cloth mostly by the piece, which varies in the
-number of its yards; she provides soap, calf-skins, thread, needles and
-thimbles; she purchases new spectacles and has old ones mended. Among many
-other items of interest we find fox-skins, paper, and pins of divers
-sorts; she sets down a sum for burying poor folks, and 'expences at
-London,' from which we gather that she had been there; and pays 'rewards'
-and 'wages' to the _grome_, the _skynner_, and the _shumakers_.
-
-The duties of the cellaress stand next in the additional rules (c. 56),
-and they recall the complex duties belonging to the same post at Barking.
-Blunt has also illustrated these duties by publishing the accounts,
-rendered by Dame Agnes Merrett, for the last year preceding the
-dissolution[964]. This cellaress also charged herself with various sums
-received for hides, calf-skins and wool-felles or sheep-skins. She
-received payment for boarding My Lady Kyngeston and her servants, and
-sister Elizabeth Nelson. She received rent from various tenants and
-managed the home farm at Isleworth. We hear of her buying horses, cattle,
-hogs and peacocks for its storing. Its dairy was managed by paid servants.
-This cellaress, like her fellow at Barking, purchased provisions and fish
-for the use of the convent, but her entries are more numerous and infer a
-higher standard of living, perhaps due to the fact that these accounts are
-more than a hundred years later than the 'charge of the cellaress at
-Barking.' The cellaress at Sion also bought salt salmon, herrings by the
-barrel, and red herrings by the 'caade'; also _stubbe_ eels. She further
-bought spices, fruits, sugar, nutmegs, almonds, currants, ginger,
-isinglass, pepper, cinnamon, cloves, mace, _figge doodes_ (sic),
-_topnettes_ (sic), great raisins, prunes, saffron and rice. Her 'foreign
-payments' include seed for the garden, boat-hire, and expenses at London,
-by which we see that she too, like the chambress of the house, had been
-there. Among her other expenses are _rewards_ to the 'clerke of the
-kechyn,' the 'baily of the husbandry,' the 'keper of the covent (convent)
-garden,' and the 'cookes.' Members of the convent were deputed by the
-abbess to look after the sick (c. 57), and the writer insists upon the
-need of gentleness and patience in dealing with them.
-
-'Often change their beds and clothes,' he says, 'give them medicines, lay
-to them plaisters and minister to them meat and drink, fire and water,
-and all other necessaries night and day, as need requires after the
-counsel of the physicians, and precept of the sovereign; do not be
-squeamish in washing and wiping them by avoiding them, be not angry nor
-hasty, nor impatient though one have the vomit, another the flux, another
-the frenzy, and now sings, now cries, now laughs, now weeps, now chides,
-now is frightened, now is wroth, now well apayde, for there be some
-sickness vexing the sick so greatly and provoking them to ire that the
-matter drawn up to the brain alienates the mind. And therefore those in
-attendance should have much patience with them, that thereby they may
-secure an everlasting crown.'
-
-Aungier has also reprinted lists of the capabilities of indulgence granted
-to Sion, and of the pardons secured by those who offered prayers in the
-chapel there[965]. This shows one of the means by which money was secured
-to religious houses in the 15th century. Indulgences were granted at Sion
-on almost every festival in the year. By 'devoutly giving somewhat to the
-reparation of the said monastery' and offering prayers on Midlent Sunday,
-the visitor at Sion might secure pardon extending from a hundred days to
-'clean remission of all sin except in the points which are reserved to the
-Pope.' To give alms on the feast of St Bridget, the patron saint of the
-house, secured to him who sought help 'pardon and clean remission in all
-cases reserved and unreserved,' according to the wording of the document.
-This power, as the manuscript informs us, had been granted 'by diverse
-holy fathers, popes at Rome, archbishops, bishops, cardinals and legates.'
-Aungier supplements it by printing a document which came from Norfolk on
-the capabilities of pardon possessed by different religious houses[966].
-There are entries in this referring to the 'pardoun of beyds' of the
-Charterhouse of Mount Grace and of the Charterhouse at Sheen, and to the
-pardon of beads at Sion and at the 'Crossed Friars' beside London Tower.
-
-A number of devotional books were written for the nuns at Sion; some in
-Latin, some in English. A few of the service books of the house have been
-preserved. Among them is the Martyrology which was in daily use among the
-brothers and which contains historical memoranda, accounts of the saints,
-the records of the deaths of the sisters, brothers and benefactors of the
-house between 1422 and 1639, and extracts from religious writers. This
-martyrology accompanied the women's convent on their wanderings, and since
-their return it has been acquired by the British Museum[967]. A
-translation of it into English was made by Richard Whytford ([Dagger]
-1542), a brother of Sion, 'for the edificacyon of certayn religyous
-persones unlerned that dayly dyd rede the same martiloge in Latyn not
-understandynge what they redde[968].' Whytford wrote other religious
-books, among them the 'Pype or Tonne of Perfection'; the 'Fruyte of
-redempcyon,' which is now held to be by 'Simon, the anker of London,' has
-been attributed to him.
-
-Among other books written for the nuns is a curious discourse in English
-by Thomas Fishbourne, father confessor in 1420, to which is added a
-portion of the gospel of St Peter ad Vincula[969]. It contains a
-discussion on the nature of pardons and indulgences, particularly of those
-procured at Rome. Symon Wynter, another brother of the house (1428), wrote
-a treatise for them in praise of the Virgin (Regina Coeli)[970]; and
-Thomas Prestius wrote instructions for the novices[971]. The house owned a
-large library, to the celebrity of which Sir Richard Sutton added by a
-splendid work printed at his expense by Wynkyn de Worde in 1519 and called
-in honour of the monastery 'The Orchard of Syon[972]'.
-
-The most important work in English however compiled for the nuns was a
-devotional treatise on divine service with a translation into English of
-the Offices, called the 'Mirror of Our Lady,' first printed in 1530, the
-authorship of which is attributed by its latest editor, Blunt, to Thomas
-Gascoigne (1403-1458)[973]. Gascoigne was an eminent divine, at one time
-Chancellor of the University of Oxford; he caused the life of St Bridget
-to be translated into English and bequeathed most of his books by will to
-the sisters at Sion. The Offices in this book are amplified, and Blunt was
-much struck by the similarity of many passages to the Book of Common
-Prayer. The purpose of the writer is expressed in the following
-words[974]:
-
-'As many of you, though you can sing and read, yet you cannot see what
-the meaning thereof is.... I have drawn your legend and all your service
-into English, that you see by the understanding thereof, how worthy and
-holy praising of our glorious Lady is contained therein, and the more
-devoutly and knowingly sing it and read it, and say it to her worship.'
-
-The 'Mirror of Our Lady' is very instructive with regard to the just
-estimation of the position and feelings of religious women during the
-later Middle Ages. There is much in it that is eloquent, refined, and
-beautiful, but its insistence on detail is sometimes wearisome. The style
-of the writer is fitly illustrated by the following passages, which are
-taken from the introductory treatise on the reading of religious
-books[975]. The wording of the original is retained as closely as
-possible, but the spelling is modernized.
-
-'Devout reading of holy books is called one of the parts of contemplation,
-for it causes much grace and comfort to the soul if it be well and
-discreetly used. And much reading is often lost for lack of diligence,
-that it is not intended as it ought to be. Therefore if you will profit in
-reading you must keep these five things. First you ought to take heed what
-you read, that it be such thing as is speedwell for you to read and
-convenient to the degree you stand in. For you ought to read no worldly
-matters nor worldly books, namely such as are without reason of ghostly
-edification or belong not to the need of the house; you ought also to read
-no books that speak of vanities and trifles, and much less no books of
-evil or occasion to evil. For since your holy rule forbids you all vain
-and idle words in all times and places, by the same it forbids you reading
-of all vain and idle things, for reading is a manner of speaking. The
-second, when you begin to read or to hear such books of ghostly fruit as
-accord for you to read or to hear, that then you dispose yourselves
-thereto with meek reverence and devotion.... The third that you labour to
-understand the same thing that you read. For Cato taught his son to read
-so his precepts that he understand them. For it is, he says, great
-negligence to read and not to understand. And therefore when you read by
-yourself alone you ought not to be hasty to read much at once but you
-ought to abide thereupon, and sometimes read a thing again twice or thrice
-or oftener till you understand it clearly. For St Austin said that no man
-should ween to understand a thing sufficiently in any wise by once
-reading. And if you cannot understand what you read, ask of others that
-can teach you. And they that can ought not to be loth to teach others....
-The fourth thing that is to be kept in reading is that you dress so your
-intent that your reading and study be not only for to be cunning or for to
-be able to speak it forth to others, but principally to inform yourself
-and to set it forth in your own living.... The fifth thing is discretion.
-So that according to the matter you arrange your reading. For you must
-understand that different books speak in different wise. For some books
-are made to inform the understanding and to tell how spiritual persons
-ought to be governed in all their living that they may know how they shall
-live and what they shall do, how they shall labour in cleansing their
-conscience and in getting virtues, how they shall withstand temptation and
-suffer tribulations, and how they shall pray and occupy themselves with
-ghostly exercise, with many such other full holy doctrines.... Other books
-there be that are made to quicken and to stir up the affections of the
-soul, as some that tell of the sorrows and dreads of death and of doom and
-of pains, to stir up the affection of dread and of sorrow for sin. Some
-tell of the great benefits of our Lord God, how He made us and bought us
-and what love and mercy He shewed continually to us to stir up our
-affections of love and of hope in Him. Some tell of the joys of heaven, to
-stir up the affections of joy to desire thitherward. And some tell of the
-foulness and wretchedness of sin, to stir up the affections of hate and
-loathing thereagainst.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI.
-
-MONASTIC REFORM PREVIOUS TO THE REFORMATION.
-
-  'For sum (nunnes) bene devowte, holy, and towarde,
-  And holden the ryght way to blysse;
-  And sum bene feble, lewde, and frowarde,
-  Now god amend that ys amys!'
-                              (_From_ '_Why I cannot be a nun_,' l. 311.)
-
-
-§ 1. Visitations of Nunneries in England.
-
-The changes which came over convent life towards the close of the Middle
-Ages and modified its tenor can be studied in the efforts made to reform
-monastic life in the centuries preceding the Reformation. Both in England
-and abroad the heads of many houses were zealous in removing abuses which
-their predecessors had suffered to creep in, and in checking tendencies
-the deteriorating effect of which now first came to be realized. The bull
-promulgated by Pope Benedict XII in 1336 with a view to reforming the
-Benedictine order had been accepted with a reservation in England and had
-left matters in Germany practically untouched. But in the 15th century a
-movement in favour of reform was inaugurated within the religious orders
-themselves; it was increased by pressure brought to bear on monastic
-houses from without. For the prelates of the Church as well as others were
-eager to interfere with monastic settlements, all the more as such
-interference frequently tended to the increase of their own prerogative.
-But in spite of the devoted earnestness of many individuals and the
-readiness of convents to accept correction, the movement failed to restore
-its former glory to an institution which in common with other influential
-institutions of the Middle Ages appeared doomed to decay.
-
-The attempts of the monastic orders to restore vigour to themselves, and
-the efforts of the Church to promote monastic reform, were largely
-furthered by the desire to counteract the dangers to the established
-religion which threatened from the spread of heretical teaching.
-
-In England a critical attitude towards monastic institutions and the
-Church was the outcome of Wyclif's ([Dagger] 1384) influence. It was
-checked for the time being by the alliance of the Church with the
-Lancastrian kings (after 1399) in favour of a reactionary policy. Several
-monasteries were endowed by these kings, among them houses of Carthusian
-monks and Sion, as mentioned above. Reforms were instituted and the
-prelates of the Church eagerly resumed their powers of visitation. By so
-doing they succeeded in checking monastic abuses, which continued to exist
-for a longer period on the Continent and there assumed much greater
-proportions.
-
-In Germany, owing partly to its scattered provinces, partly to the want of
-concerted action between the dignitaries of Church and State, monasteries
-throughout the 14th century were left to drift in the way they listed,
-often in the direction of indifferentism, often in that of positive evil.
-The abuses of convent life at the beginning of the 15th century were far
-greater there than in England, and the efforts at reform were
-proportionally greater and more strenuous. In Germany also the effort to
-counteract the effect of heretical doctrines by way of reform was
-decisive. For, as we shall see later on, monastic reforms on a large scale
-were instituted immediately after the Church Council at Constance (1415)
-which condemned Hus to the stake.
-
-The accounts of visitations instituted by the diocesan give us an insight
-into the abuses which threatened life in the nunnery at different periods.
-The diocesan was bound to visit the religious settlements situated within
-his diocese periodically, with the exception of those which had secured
-exemption through the Pope. For some time before the movement in favour of
-monastic reform began, these visitations appear to have taken place at
-irregular intervals and at periods often many years apart. But afterwards
-they became frequent, and called forth injunctions which give us an idea
-of the abuses which needed correction. Later still these powers of
-visitation of the diocesan were extended by means of special permits
-secured from Rome. Towards the close of the 15th century we find the
-prelates of the Church eager to interfere with monasteries, and regain a
-hold on those which had been removed from their influence.
-
-The visitation of a religious house in all cases was so conducted that the
-diocesan previously sent word to the convent announcing his arrival. After
-assisting at mass in the chapel, he repaired to the chapter-house and
-there severally interrogated the superior of the house and its inmates as
-to the state of affairs. Their depositions were taken down in writing and
-were discussed at headquarters. A list of injunctions rectifying such
-matters as called for correction was then forwarded in writing to the
-superior of the house.
-
-Among the earliest injunctions forwarded to a nunnery which I have come
-across are those sent to Godstow after a visitation held in 1279 by John
-Peckham, archbishop of Canterbury[976]. The first part treats of the
-celebration of the divine offices and of the part novices are to take in
-the singing. The feast of St John which is celebrated by childish
-festivities (puerilia solemnia), no doubt in accordance with an ancient
-folk custom, is not to be extended to a second day. Directions are then
-given about going outside precincts and staying away on business. The nuns
-are directed not to converse with the neighbouring students at Oxford
-(scholares Oxonii) unless they have permission to do so from the abbess,
-and to knit no bonds of friendship with them, 'because such affection
-often brings harmful thoughts.'
-
-The attraction which the students at Oxford exerted on the nuns of Godstow
-has a counterpart at a later date in the effect which intercourse with the
-students at Cambridge had on the nuns of St Radegund's. When John Alcock,
-bishop of Ely ([Dagger] 1500), proposed the dissolution of this nunnery he
-urged that the nearness of the university had led to the demoralisation of
-the prioress and the nuns[977].
-
-In the directions forwarded to Godstow we also find it enjoined that
-secular and religious visitors shall dine in the guest-house (hospitalaria
-communi) or in the chamber of the abbess, and on no account within the
-convent precincts with the nuns. Directions are also given as to the
-wearing of simple clothes, in which matter 'the rule of Benedict' (sic)
-shall be observed. These directions are not easy to understand. 'Linings
-of dyed woollen (imposterum burneto[978]),' say they, 'shall not be worn;
-nor red dresses (rugatas tunicas) nor other unseemly clothes wide at the
-sides.'
-
-Archbishop Peckham, who reformed abuses at Godstow, addressed a mandate
-to the abbess of Romsey in 1286 against a certain prebendary William
-Shyrlock, who seems to have been one of the residential canons of the
-place. He is not to presume to enter the cloister or the church while
-suspicions are entertained against him, and the nuns are not to converse
-with him in the house or elsewhere, for he is accused of living a
-dishonest and dissolute life[979]. No aspersion in this case is cast on
-the doings of the nuns.
-
-A serious scandal is said to have occurred about the year 1303 in the
-Cistercian nunnery of Swine in Yorkshire, but details concerning its
-nature are not forthcoming. In consequence of an enquiry into the state of
-the house the prioress resigned, and her successor also absented herself,
-it is alleged, on account of some scandal[980].
-
-The nunneries which were cells to abbeys of men were exempt from the
-visitation of the diocesan; they were inspected by the abbot of the parent
-house, who enquired into abuses and enjoined corrections. A mandate of
-this description which was forwarded to Sopwell nunnery, a cell of St
-Alban's, by the abbot in 1338 is in existence. The nuns are directed to
-observe silence in the church, the cloister, the refectory, and the
-dormitory. No sister shall hold converse with secular persons in the
-parlour unless she is wearing a cowl and a veil; and tailors and others
-who are employed shall work in some place assigned to them outside the
-convent precincts[981].
-
-Among the injunctions sent to Chatteris in Cambridgeshire in the year 1345
-the following are worth noticing: Nuns shall not keep fowls, dogs or small
-birds (aviculae) within the convent precincts, nor bring them into church
-during divine service, and they shall not, from a wish to reform them,
-take into their employ servants who are known for their bad ways[982].
-
-In April of the year 1397 a visitation of the nunnery of Nun-Monkton in
-Yorkshire was conducted by Thomas Dalby, archdeacon of Richmond, who acted
-for the archbishop of York[983]. He accused the prioress Margaret Fairfax
-of allowing various kinds of fur to be worn in her house, especially grey
-fur. He also objected to the wearing of silk veils and to the prioress
-herself acting as treasurer (bursaria) of the house, and charged her with
-having alienated its property to the value of a hundred marks. He
-censured her for entertaining John Munkton, and inviting him to dinner in
-her chamber, and for allowing the use of unusual vestments and clothes;
-for too readily receiving back nuns who had disgraced their profession
-(lapsae fornicatione); and for allowing nuns to receive gifts from friends
-to support them. He also complained that John Munkton behaved badly, had
-dallied (ludit) with the prioress at meals in her chamber, and had been
-served there with drink.
-
-Injunctions were forwarded in the following July to rectify these matters,
-and directing the prioress to have no communication with _Dominus_ John
-Munkton, William Snowe or Thomas Pape, except in the presence of the nuns.
-The usual vestments were to be worn in church, and the nuns were enjoined
-not to wear silk garments (paneis), silk veils, precious furs, finger
-rings, and embroidered or ornamental _jupes_, in English called gowns,
-like secular women. They were not to neglect the commemoration of the dead
-under penalty of being deprived of special clothes (carentiae camisarum?)
-for two whole weeks.
-
-The general tenor of these injunctions argues a want of management on the
-part of the lady superior and a tendency to luxury among the nuns. As time
-wore on complaints about mismanagement of revenues became more frequent,
-but they were accompanied by evidence of increasing poverty, especially in
-the smaller houses, which shows that the lady superior was labouring under
-difficulties for which she was not altogether responsible.
-
-A serious blow was dealt to the monastic system by the Black Death, which
-began in 1349. It produced a temporary collapse of discipline and
-indifference to religion[984], and resulted in changes in the state of
-agriculture and the position of the labourer, which affected the poorer
-and smaller houses in a disastrous manner.
-
-Thus we read about Thetford, a small Benedictine nunnery in Norfolk[985],
-that the nuns' revenues had much decreased through mortality and
-inundation since 1349, and that when Henry V levied a tax on religious
-houses, Thetford, which consisted at the time of a prioress and nine nuns,
-was excused on the plea of poverty. The increasing poverty of the house is
-evident from accounts of visitations between 1514 1520[986]. On one
-occasion the nuns declared they were short of service books; on another
-that the prioress received illiterate and deformed persons (indoctae et
-deformes) into the house; and again that there was great poverty and that
-the few novices had no teacher.
-
-Again we read of Malling in Kent that it was excused from payments in
-1404; in 1349 the bishop of Rochester had found it so decayed as to be
-hardly capable of restoration[987]. Two abbesses had died of the
-pestilence; there were only eight inmates left in the house, four of whom
-were professed and four non-professed.
-
-Malling recovered itself, but not so Wyrthorp in Northamptonshire, where
-Emma de Pinchbeck and many of the Austin nuns fell victims to the
-pestilence[988]. The archbishop appointed Agnes Bowes as prioress, but the
-convent was beyond recovery. In 1354 Sir Th. Holland, the patron of the
-house, petitioned that it should be united to the nunnery at Stamford, to
-which its prioress and the one remaining nun removed[989]. In the royal
-licence which secured this change it is stated 'that the convent being
-poorly endowed was by the pestilence which lately prevailed reduced to
-such poverty that all the nuns but one on account of penury had
-dispersed.' In the course of the 14th century other nunneries complained
-of insufficient revenue and poverty, among them Seton in Cumberland[990],
-St Sepulchre's at Canterbury in 1359[991], and Rusper and Easebourne which
-were both situated in Sussex.
-
-In a few cases accounts are preserved of successive visitations to the
-same nunnery extending over a number of years, which afford a valuable
-record of part of the life-history of the house. The visitations conducted
-between 1442 and 1527 at Rusper and at Easebourne are most instructive as
-showing the gradual collapse which many of the smaller houses experienced.
-
-The chief complaint made during the visitation of Rusper in 1442 was that
-the prioress of the house had failed to render account to the sisterhood
-during the term she had held office[992]. She was consequently enjoined by
-the bishop of Chichester to produce an account year by year and submit it
-to him and to the sisterhood. Some thirty years later in 1478 upon enquiry
-it was found that the convent was in debt, and the bishop asked for an
-inventory of the house, which was drawn up for him. The community at this
-time consisted of the prioress and five nuns, four of whom are entered as
-professed, one as non-professed.
-
-Again in 1484 the bishop visited Rusper, and three nuns were consecrated
-on this occasion. But the house had entered on a downward course of
-poverty and decay. In 1485 Rusper was exempted from paying subsidy on the
-plea of poverty. During the visitation of 1521 the nuns referred their
-pecuniary poverty to the onerous expenses caused by the too frequent
-visits of friends and relations who came to stay with the prioress, while
-the prioress herself referred the poverty to other reasons, but agreed
-that the house was fast going to ruin. No complaints were made at the
-visitation three years later (1524), except against a certain William
-Tychen, who sowed discord. Again in 1527 the prioress and nuns deposed
-that all was well in the house, but that its poverty was extreme and that
-it was on the brink of ruin.
-
-The accounts of the visitations to Easebourne[993] are even more
-instructive, for there the deteriorating effects of mismanagement and
-poverty were increased by want of discipline and quarrelsomeness among the
-nuns. In 1414 the community consisted of the prioress and six or seven
-nuns. In 1437 and 1439 its poverty was already so great that letters
-patent were secured on the plea of insufficient revenue, exonerating the
-prioress and her convent from certain payments called for by the clergy.
-In 1441 the house was in debt to the amount of £40, and here also the
-convent cast the blame of mismanagement on the head of the house,
-referring the debts to 'costly expenses of the prioress, who frequently
-rides abroad, and pretends she does so on the common business of the
-house, though it is not so, with a train of attendants much too large, and
-tarries long abroad, and she feasts sumptuously both at home and
-abroad.... And while she does so the members of the convent are made to
-work like hired workwomen, and they receive nothing whatever for their own
-use from their work, but the prioress takes the whole profit.'
-
-In reply to their complaints the bishop forbade the prioress to compel the
-sisters to continual work; 'and if they should wish of their own accord to
-work, they shall be free to do so, but yet so that they may receive for
-themselves the half part of what they gain by their hands; the other part
-shall be converted to the advantage of the house and unburdening its
-debts.' But discharging those debts was no easy matter. The prioress was
-commanded to sell her costly fur trimmings for the advantage of the house,
-and if she rode abroad to spend only what was needful, and to content
-herself with four horses. The administration of temporal goods was taken
-from her altogether and given to 'Master Thomas Boleyn and John Lylis,
-Esquire.' But under their management the debt of £40 had increased in nine
-years to £66; and in 1475, as again in 1485 and 1489, the house had to be
-excused from payments. Rumours of an unfavourable character about what
-went on in the house now reached the bishop, and before the next
-visitation in 1478, the prioress Agnes Tauke was summoned to Chichester,
-where she promised on her oath before the bishop and others to resign her
-office if called upon to do so.
-
-The deposition made by her nuns during the ensuing visitation confirmed
-the unfavourable rumours; two nuns had left the priory ostensibly for
-their health and were abroad in apostasy. One nun referred this conduct to
-neglect on the part of the prioress, another to that of the chaplain, John
-Smyth, who confessed to having sealed or caused to be sealed a licence to
-one of the nuns to go out of the priory after having had criminal
-intercourse with her. Other complaints were made against the prioress,
-'that she had her kinsmen staying with her for weeks at the priory and
-gave them the best food, while the nuns had the worst'; also that she was
-herself of bad character. But these recriminations were not accepted by
-the bishop. The desire of Agnes Tauke to improve matters was accepted as
-genuine and she was not called upon to resign.
-
-Discontent however remained a standing characteristic of the nuns at
-Easebourne. At the visitation of 1521 the prioress deposed that the nuns
-lived honestly and religiously according to the rule of St Augustine (sic)
-and were sufficiently obedient to her, but the nun sexton blamed the
-prioress for 'not making up any account annually as she ought in presence
-of the sisters concerning her administration of goods,' and another nun
-deposed that she neglected to provide for the sisters the sum of thirteen
-shillings and four pence in money to which they were entitled. Again in
-1524 the prioress deposed that all was well, but the sub-prioress
-complained of disobedience, both among the professed and the non-professed
-nuns, who on their side complained of harshness of treatment. The bishop
-believed the complaints of the latter and blamed the behaviour of the
-sub-prioress, who submitted to correction.
-
-The recriminations of the nuns at Easebourne recall a picture drawn about
-this time by Langland (c. 1390) in the _Vision of Piers the Ploughman_, in
-which Wrath personified as a friar describes how he stirred up quarrels in
-a nunnery. In its earliest version the poem omits these passages; and
-Langland, so ready to abuse and ridicule monk and friar, is chary in his
-references to nuns. In the later versions of his poem (text B and C)
-'Wrath' is described as acting first as gardener and then as cook in a
-nunnery, where in the character of 'the prioress' potager and of 'other
-poor ladies,' he 'made them broths of various scandals.' Among the stories
-he set going was
-
-              ... 'that Dame Johane was a bastard
-  And Dame Clarice a knight's daughter, a cuckold was her sire,
-  And Dame Purnell a priest's concubine, she will never become prioress,
-  For she had a child in cherry time, all our chapter it wist.'
-
-In consequence the nuns fall to quarrelling among themselves and end with
-attacking one another bodily. The picture, even if overdrawn, proves, in
-conjunction with the temper of the nuns at Easebourne, that peaceableness
-no longer formed the invariable concomitant of convent life during the
-15th century.
-
-Various particulars in the history of men's houses corroborate the fact
-that considerable changes were going on inside the monastic body during
-the 15th century.
-
-Reference has been made to the fluctuations in the history of alien
-priories. Some of the foreign houses, aware of the dangers to which their
-English colonies were exposed, advocated the sale of their property in
-England. Numerous grammar-schools and colleges profited by the change or
-owed their foundation directly to it. As early as 1390 William Wykeham
-bought estates of alien priories for New College, his foundation at
-Oxford. Waynfleet, bishop of Worcester, who in 1415 founded St Mary
-Magdalen College at Oxford, annexed to it Sele, an alien priory which had
-been admitted to denizenship[994]. It is noteworthy that some religious
-houses about this time dissolved of their own accord. Thus the master and
-brethren of St John's hospital at Oxford obtained leave from Henry VI to
-convey their house to Waynfleet[995]. The Austin priory of Selborne,
-which 'had become a desert convent without canons or prior,' was likewise
-annexed to St Mary Magdalen College, a change which was ratified by a bull
-from Innocent VIII in 1486[996].
-
-It has already been said that a change of attitude towards religious
-institutions on the part of the public was the direct outcome of the
-spread of Wyclif's teaching. In 1410 Sir John Oldcastle, the so-called
-leader of the Lollards, who was burnt for heresy eight years later, made a
-proposal in the House of Commons which is curious in various ways. It was
-to the effect that their temporalities should be taken from bishop, abbot
-and prior, and the revenues of their possessions employed to pay a
-standing army, to augment the income of the noblemen and gentry, to endow
-a hundred hospitals and to make small payments to the clergy[997]. No
-notice in this case was taken of the donors or representatives of the
-settlement, to whom land and tenements upon default, or neglect of those
-to whom they were granted, otherwise reverted. The proposal was
-accompanied by a list of monasteries which might be appropriated, but the
-proposal was summarily quashed.
-
-The Church Council held at Basel (from 1418), at which English prelates
-also were present, was emphatic in urging the need of monastic reform. It
-would be interesting to ascertain if this was prompted solely by the
-feeling that the recognised abuses of convent life lowered religion in
-general estimation, or if suspicions were entertained that religious
-houses might be harbouring unorthodox elements. Great efforts at reform
-were made within the Benedictine order; chapters were held by the abbots
-at regular intervals and the system of visitations formulated for mutual
-supervision and control by the various monasteries once more received
-attention. We shall see this system in full operation on the Continent. In
-England we have accounts of several chapters of Benedictine abbots held
-between 1422 and 1426, in which reports of extensive visitations were
-given[998]. The chapter of 1473 appointed the abbot of St Albans (Alboin,
-1464-1476) to visit at Glastonbury, and the abbot of Eynsham to visit at
-St Albans[999].
-
-Churchmen on all sides were eager to promote monastic reforms and
-interfere with monastic privileges. In 1418 Pope Martin V sent a bull to
-the archbishop of Canterbury bidding him hold visitations regularly[1000].
-But the story of the gradual encroachment of the Church on monastic
-privilege and property is less striking in England than abroad, for the
-independent spirit of individual houses was less strong, and convents
-generally, especially those of women, seem to have yielded without
-opposition to the claims made by energetic churchmen. Some monasteries of
-men, however, resented interference and maintained their rights. An
-episode in this struggle deserves attention, as it reflects unfavourably
-on two nunneries which were dependencies of the abbey of St Albans. There
-was a long-standing jealousy between the lord abbot of St Albans and the
-lord primate of Canterbury, renewed by a quarrel between Abbot Wallingford
-and Archbishop Bourchier, which had been decided in favour of the former.
-The abbey enjoyed exemption from episcopal visitation, not only for itself
-but for its dependencies or cells, among which were the nunneries of
-Sopwell and St Mary Prée. In 1489 Archbishop Morton of Canterbury secured
-a Papal bull[1001] which empowered him to visit all the monasteries of his
-diocese, those subject to his visitation and those exempt from it. And
-this, as the document says, 'not only because the former strictness of
-life is abandoned ... but also because life is luxurious and dissolute.'
-
-In consequence of the authority conferred by this bull the primate penned
-a letter[1002] to the abbot of St Albans containing charges of a serious
-nature. After a few opening sentences it continues in the following
-strain:
-
-'... Moreover, among other grave enormities and wicked crimes of which you
-are accused and for which you are noted and defamed, you admitted a
-certain married woman named Elena Germyn, who some time ago wrongfully
-left her husband and lived in adultery with another man, to be sister and
-nun in the house or priory of Pré, which you hold to be in your
-jurisdiction; and there you appointed her prioress notwithstanding her
-husband was living and is alive now. Further, brother Thomas Sudbury, your
-fellow-monk, publicly and notoriously and without interference or
-punishment from you, associated and still associates with this woman on
-terms of intimacy, like others among your brethren and fellow-monks who
-had access and still have access to her and to others elsewhere as to a
-brothel or house of ill fame. And not only in the house of Pré but also in
-the nunnery of Sopwell, which you contend is under your jurisdiction also,
-you change the prioresses and superiors (praesidentes) again and again at
-your will and caprice, deposing good and religious women and promoting to
-the highest dignity the worthless and wicked, so that religion is cast
-aside, virtue is neglected, and many expenses are incurred by
-reprehensible practices through your introducing certain of your brethren
-who are thieves and notorious villains to preside there as guardians to
-manage the goods of the priories, which more correctly speaking are
-wasted, and those places which were religious are rendered and reputed
-profane and impious, and so far impoverished by your doings and the doings
-of those with you as to be brought to the verge of ruin.
-
-'Similarly in dealing with other cells of monks which you say are subject
-to you within the monastery of the glorious protomartyr Alban, you have
-dilapidated the common property in its possessions and jewels; you have
-cut down, sold and alienated indiscriminately copses, woods, underwood,
-oaks and other forest trees to the value of 8000 marks and more; while
-those of your brethren and fellow-monks, who, as is reported, are given
-over to all the evils of the world, neglecting the service of God, and
-openly and continually consorting with harlots and loose women within the
-precincts and without, you knowingly defend instead of punishing them;
-others too you protect who are covetous of honour and promotion and bent
-on ministering to your cupidity, and who steal and make away with chalices
-and other jewels of the church, going so far as to extract sacrilegiously
-precious stones from the very shrine of St Alban.'
-
-This letter is dated 1490, and is addressed to William, presumably William
-Wallingford, as he became abbot in 1476; it is however confidently
-asserted that he died in 1484. But this date may need revision. For he was
-succeeded by his prior Thomas Ramryge, who was not elected till 1492; 'at
-all events this period of eight years is very obscure,' says the historian
-of St Albans[1003]. Concerning William Wallingford we know that the
-chapter of Benedictine abbots held at Northampton in 1480 appointed him to
-visit all the monasteries situated in the diocese of Lincoln, but that he
-deputed two of his convent to do so[1004]. His successor Ramryge wrote a
-book 'on the doings of the abbots, monks and benefactors of the monastery
-of St Albans' in which Wallingford appears of a character very different
-from that suggested by Morton's letter. 'Prudent and wise in the
-management of his abbey and resolute in the defence of its rights,' says
-Dugdale on the authority of Ramryge, 'he was successful too in resisting
-the claims of Archbishop Bourchier (Morton's predecessor) which upon
-appeal to Rome were decided in his favour.' He completed the high altar at
-St Albans and set up a printing-press in his monastery between 1480 and
-1486.
-
-In face of this evidence the language used by Morton appears somewhat
-violent. Unfortunately no additional information is forthcoming from the
-nunneries of St Mary Prée and Sopwell. We have an account rendered by the
-prioress Christina Basset of Prée for the year 1485-1486, four years
-previous to the date of Morton's letter, entries in which show that
-Christina Basset had succeeded Alice Wafer, who had been deposed for
-mismanagement of the revenues, but continued to live in the convent[1005].
-About Sopwell we only know that Wallingford appointed a commission in 1480
-to set aside the prioress Joan Chapell on account of old age and infirmity
-in favour of Elizabeth Webb, one of the nuns[1006].
-
-It were idle to deny that the state of discipline in many houses was bad,
-but the circumstances under which Morton's letter was penned argue that
-the charges made in it should be accepted with some reservation.
-
-It remains to cast a glance on the views expressed on the state of
-monasteries in general literature in the 15th century, from which we
-gather that the religious settlement was fast sinking in popular
-estimation. Two poems in this connection deserve especial attention, the
-'Land of Cockayne,' a spirited satire on monastic life generally, written
-about 1430, and a poem of somewhat later date preserved in fragments only,
-which has been published under the title, 'Why I cannot be a nun.'
-
-The 'Land of Cockayne'[1007] describes in flowing rhyme a country 'of joy
-and bliss,' where flow rivers of oil, milk, honey and wine, and where
-stands a fair abbey of white and grey monks. Their house in accordance
-with the popular fancy is a delightful abode constructed out of food and
-sweetmeats with shingles of 'flour-cakes', and the cloister is of crystal
-with a garden in which spices and flowers grow. The monks dwell here in
-the greatest comfort; some are old, some are young; at times they are
-engaged in prayer, at times they seek diversion away from home. Another
-abbey, 'a fair nunnery,' stands at no great distance, the inmates of which
-live in the like ease and carelessness. Here too there is a river of milk,
-the nuns wear silken clothing, and when it is hot they take a boat and go
-to bathe in the river. They here meet the monks and disport themselves
-together, throwing off all restraint.
-
-Clever and much to the point as this poem appeared to the laymen who had
-come to look upon convent life as a life of idleness and self-indulgence,
-its historical importance is exceeded by the poem, 'Why I cannot be a
-nun[1008].' It is generally spoken of as the production of a woman on the
-ground of its reflecting a woman's experiences, but there is no direct
-evidence on the point; its author writes as one unattached to a nunnery,
-and by the remark that he knows more than he chooses to tell is perhaps
-concealing his ignorance.
-
-It consists of an adaptation to a different purpose of the story of the
-'Ghostly Abbey,' which was peopled with personified Virtues[1009], and to
-which reference has been made in previous chapters of this work. Here
-personified Vices are described as having taken possession of the abbey.
-The poem is divided into two parts, of which it seems doubtful through the
-state of the manuscript which ought to come first. As it stands printed it
-begins abruptly with a description of how commissioners received the
-charge to ride all over England to seek out nunneries and enquire into
-their state. They visited the houses of Kent and are represented as
-returning to the father of the writer, who asks them how they have sped
-and how the nuns fared (l. 28). When he has heard their report he tells
-his daughter, who wishes to become a nun, that he will have none of it.
-The girl is sore aggrieved; she deplores her ill-luck and continues in
-this strain:
-
-  'Then it befell on a morn of May
-  In the same year as I said before,
-  My pensiveness would not away
-  But ever waxed more and more.
-  I walked alone and wept full sore
-  With sighings and with mourning.
-  I said but little and thought the more
-  But what I thought no man need hear.
-  And in a garden I disported me
-  Every day at divers hours
-  To behold and for to see
-  The sweet effect of April flowers.
-  The fair herbs and gentle flowers
-  And birds singing on every spray;
-  But my longing and sadness
-  For all this sport would not away.'
-
-She kneels to Jesus, the king of heavenly bliss, and tells Him how she is
-destitute of good counsel and would commit her cause to Him. She then
-falls asleep and a fair lady appears to her, who calls her by name
-(Kateryne, l. 122), and who on being asked says her name is Experience,
-and that she has come with the help of Christ Jesus, adding 'such things
-as I shall show thee I trust shall set thy heart at rest.' She takes the
-girl by the hand and leads her through a meadow fair and green to a house
-of 'women regular,' a cloister, 'a house of nuns in truth of divers orders
-old and young, but not well governed,' for here self-will reigns instead
-of discipline. 'Perhaps you would like to know who was dwelling here; of
-some I will tell you, of others keep counsel; so I was taught when I was
-young,' says the writer. The first lady they encounter in the house is
-Dame Pride, who is held in great repute, while poor Dame Meekness sits
-alone and forsaken. Dame Hypocrite sits there with her book, while Dame
-Devout and her few companions have been put outside by Dame Sloth and Dame
-Vainglory. In the convent remain Dame Envy 'who can sow strife in every
-state,' Dame Love-Inordinate, Dame Lust, Dame Wanton and Dame Nice, all of
-whom take scant heed of God's service. 'Dame Chastity, I dare well say,
-in that convent had little cheer, she was often on the point of going her
-way, she was so little beloved there; some loved her in their hearts full
-dear, but others did not and set nothing by her, but gave her good leave
-to go.' Walking about under the guidance of Experience the writer also
-comes upon Dame Envy who bore the keys and seldom went from home. In vain
-she sought for Dame Patience and Dame Charity; they were not in the
-convent but dwelt outside 'without strife' in a chamber where good women
-sought their company. Meanwhile Dame Disobedient set the prioress at
-nought; a fact especially distressing to the writer, 'for subjects should
-ever be diligent in word, in will, in deed, to please their sovereign' (l.
-273). Indeed she declared, when she saw no reverence, she would stay in
-the house no longer. She and Experience left and sat down on the grass
-outside the gates to discuss what they had seen. Experience explained that
-for the most part nuns are such as they have seen (l. 310); not all, she
-adds; 'some are devout, holy and blessed, and hold the right way to bliss,
-but some are weak, lewd, and forward; God amend what is amiss.' She passed
-away and the writer awakes, convinced that she certainly does not care to
-go and live in a nunnery. 'Peradventure,' the writer adds, 'some man will
-say and so it really seems to him that I soon forsook the perfect way for
-a fantasy or a dream, but dream it was not, nor a fantasy, but unto me
-welcome information (gratius mene).'
-
-The other part of the poem advises the 'ladies dear,' who have taken the
-habit which is a holy thing, to let their lives correspond with their
-outward array. The writer enlarges on the good conversation and the
-virtues of the holy women who were professed in the past, and enumerates
-as models of virtuous living a number of women saints chiefly of English
-origin.
-
-Productions such as this clearly show in what direction the estimation of
-religious houses and their inmates was tending. The nature of devotional
-pursuits and keeping the houses was not yet called into question, but
-apart from its religious significance the nunnery had little to recommend
-it. As places of residence these houses still attracted a certain number
-of unmarried women, and as centres of education still exerted some
-influence, but the high standard they had at one period maintained was a
-thing of the past.
-
-
-§ 2. Reforms in Germany.
-
-The history of monastic reform on the Continent previous to the
-Reformation supplies us with many interesting particulars both of the
-position of monasteries generally and of the convent life of women. Though
-religious settlements had been little interfered with before the Church
-Council at Constance, extensive reforms were undertaken subsequent to it
-in order to secure a return of discipline. The movement was inaugurated
-from within the religious orders, and led to the union of different houses
-into so-called congregations. But its peaceable character was soon marred
-by the introduction of political and party interests. Thirty years after
-the first convent reforms, it was no longer a question of how far the
-well-being and right living of monk and nun should be secured, but how far
-religious settlements could be made amenable to external interference and
-who should have the right of interfering with them.
-
-For this complication the instability of political life is partly
-responsible. The authority of the Pope had greatly decreased, and, at the
-beginning of the 15th century, the Emperor no longer kept the balance
-between the contending parties. The prelates of the Church, many of whom
-were independent temporal princes, had succeeded in allying themselves to
-the impoverished, but influential, nobility. In South Germany especially
-the Church was becoming more and more aristocratic; birth, not merit,
-secured admission and promotion in the ecclesiastical body. The townships
-were generally opposed to the Church and the nobility; they emphatically
-insisted on their rights, but their combined efforts to make their
-influence felt in the constitution had signally failed. Apart from them
-stood the princes and minor potentates, who tried to coerce the nobility,
-in many cases succeeded in depriving their prelates of their rights, and
-availed themselves of the general relaxation of authority to promote their
-own selfish ends.
-
-To these different representatives of power the monastery became debatable
-ground, where the diocesan, the township and the prince of the land in
-turn claimed the right of interference and where in many instances their
-interests clashed. The greater settlements, which held directly from the
-Emperor, were not drawn into the conflict; it was round the lesser ones
-that contention chiefly raged.
-
-One of the most interesting movements in the direction of monastic reform
-is associated with the Benedictine monk Johannes von Minden ([Dagger]
-1439) who, as representative of the abbot of the house of Reinhausen near
-Göttingen, was present at the general chapter of Benedictine abbots held
-near Constance in 1417[1010]. Johannes returned to his convent burning
-with reformatory zeal, which his abbot and fellow-monks would not
-countenance. He left his convent and after many hardships was enabled by
-the help of a rich patroness to settle at Bursfeld, where he realized some
-of his ideas[1011]. His views agreed with those of Johannes Rode ([Dagger]
-1439), a Carthusian, who had become abbot of the Benedictine monastery of
-St Matthias at Trier, and the joint efforts of these men resulted in a
-scheme of mutual supervision and control of different houses by means of
-periodical visitations undertaken by members of the Benedictine order. The
-settlements which agreed to the innovation joined in a union or so-called
-congregation, to which Bursfeld gave its name. The union or congregation
-of Bursfeld was eventually joined by one hundred and thirty-six
-monasteries of men and sixty-four of women. The purpose of the union was
-not to attempt any new departure, but to guarantee the maintenance of
-discipline as a means of securing the return of prosperity.
-
-The nunnery of Langendorf, near Weissenfels in Saxony, was incorporated
-into the union of Bursfeld, and a comprehensive scheme of rules[1012],
-which gives us an insight into the tone and tendency of the German
-mediæval nunnery on the reformed plan, was drawn up for its use. The rules
-recall those contemporaneously drafted for the monastery of Sion in
-England. We have in them similar directions concerning an elaborate
-ritual, similar exhortations to soberness of living and gentleness of
-manner; the information on convent life and daily routine is equally
-explicit; and we hear of the different appointments inside the convent,
-and of the several duties of its members. There is also an exhaustive list
-of possible failings and crimes, followed by directions as to correction
-and punishment. Cats, dogs and other animals are not to be kept by the
-nuns, as they detract from seriousness; if a nun feels sleepy during
-hours, she shall ask leave to withdraw rather than fall asleep; if a nun
-dies of an infectious disease, her corpse shall not be carried into
-church, but the burial service shall take place outside. No member of the
-convent shall be chosen abbess unless she has attained the age of
-twenty-nine,--a provision which I have not come across elsewhere. The
-abbess has under her the same staff of officers whose duties have already
-been described. There is the prioress, the sub-prioress, the teacher of
-the novices, the cellaress, the chauntress, the sub-chauntress, the
-sexton, the keeper of books, the chambress, the infirmaress, the portress
-and others. We are told how novices made profession and how the hours of
-the Virgin were to be kept. We are also informed of the occupations of the
-nuns between hours, and learn that they were active in many ways. There
-are references to the transcribing of books, to binding books, to
-preparing parchment, and also to spinning and weaving; but the
-transcribing of books is pronounced the more important work, since it is
-more akin to spiritual interests. Further we hear about visits paid by the
-nuns, and about the reception of visitors. Only professed religious women
-were to be received on a visit inside the convent precincts; other
-visitors were to dwell and take their meals outside.
-
-In the case of this nunnery it is unknown how far the convent showed
-readiness to join the congregation of Bursfeld, or how far it was
-persuaded or coerced into doing so. The movement in favour of monastic
-reform entered on a new stage with the advent of the zealous and
-influential reformer, Johann Busch ([Dagger] after 1479), the promoter of
-the congregation of Windesheim. The work of Busch is the more interesting
-as he has left a detailed account of it. His book 'On monastic reform'
-describes the changes he advocated and the means by which he effected them
-during a contest of over thirty years[1013]. He was a native of Zwolle in
-the Netherlands and entered the Austin convent of Windesheim, where he
-attracted so much attention that he was summoned to Wittenberg in Saxony
-(1437), and there conducted monastic reforms at the desire of the prior.
-He remained in Saxony for many years, residing sometimes at one place,
-sometimes at another, and pursued his plans so ardently that he
-occasionally transcended the limits of his authority[1014]. His success in
-persuading convents to reconsider their tenor of life and in inducing lay
-princes and prelates to assist him in his efforts was so great that
-Cardinal Cusanus, of whom we shall hear more, pronounced him especially
-fitted to act as a monastic reformer (1451). His book contains a detailed
-account of his work in connection with about twenty nunneries. His great
-merit and that of the congregation of Windesheim was the introduction of
-German devotional books.
-
-From these and other descriptions we gather that many nunneries willingly
-accepted the proposed changes in so far as they were designed to raise the
-standard of teaching and to improve the system of discipline, but that
-opposition was made where the changes tended to interfere with the
-position and prestige of the settlement. In some cases a compromise was
-effected by the energetic and intelligent conduct of the lady superior; in
-others the direct refusal of the nuns to conform resulted in open force
-being brought to bear on them. Scenes were enacted which recall the
-turbulence of early Christian times, and show how strong a sense of
-independence still lived in some convents.
-
-Among the Austin nunneries which gave Busch endless trouble was that of
-Derneburg, near Hildesheim, where he was appointed to visit as father
-confessor between 1440 and 1442[1015]. The nuns there were in the habit of
-dining out continually, and when exception was taken to this, gave as an
-excuse that relatives and friends were always ready to entertain them at
-meals, but refused to furnish contributions in kind towards the support of
-the convent. Busch got over this difficulty by pleading with the lay
-people, but his action in the matter still further roused the rebellious
-spirit of the nuns. On one occasion his life was attempted at their
-instigation; on another, when he went to inspect their cellar, they locked
-him in and left him there. As a consequence of this he refused from that
-time forward to be the first to go on any tour of inspection. His efforts
-to impress these nuns were in vain, and finally he asked for the
-assistance of the bishop of Hildesheim and the abbot of the Cistercian
-house of Marienrode; as a consequence the rebels were conveyed away from
-Derneburg to other convents, and their house was given into the hands of
-Cistercian nuns. Similar difficulties occurred at Wennigsen, at Mariensee
-and at Werder, where the Duke of Hannover interfered in the most arbitrary
-manner[1016]. At Wienhausen the abbess and convent refused to conform to
-the rule of St Benedict, though the additional authority of their diocesan
-and of Duke Otto of Brunswick was brought to bear on them[1017]. Forcible
-measures were resorted to in this case also. The abbess was deposed and
-she and her nuns were carried away in a chariot to other nunneries, and
-nuns from the reformed house of Derneburg were installed in their place.
-
-At the Cistercian nunnery of St Georg, near Halle, the nuns at first
-declared that they were exempt from the visits of the diocesan, and
-refused admission to the delegates. After prolonged opposition they
-yielded to Busch[1018]. At Heiningen the nuns pleaded poverty as an excuse
-for staying away from home[1019]. Many settlements complained of poverty
-and insufficient revenue, among which was Frankenberg, near Goslar[1020].
-The nuns of Dorstad earned money by taking pupils from outside the
-precincts[1021], and other houses, among them that of Neuwerk, received
-girls and boarded and educated them. Busch however forbade their doing so
-on the ground that intercourse with secular interests was harmful. At
-Neuwerk, which was a Cistercian nunnery at Erfurt[1022], the wealth of the
-community in vessels, vestments, and books was quite a revelation to
-Busch. The house owned thirty books of devotion (the convent at the time
-consisted of thirty inmates), a number which appeared to Busch so
-considerable that he did not insist on the nuns adopting the service-book
-in use at Windesheim, as this change would have rendered their books
-useless to them.
-
-The nuns at Neuwerk readily accepted the proposed reforms, and received
-nuns from the reformed nunnery of Heiningen who dwelt with them for three
-years and helped them to restore their system of religious discipline and
-teaching. The abbess Armengard von Rheden, of the wealthy Benedictine
-nunnery of Fischbeck on the Weser[1023], also agreed to receive nuns from
-a reformed house into her establishment as teachers.
-
-Full details are preserved of the reform of the nunnery of
-Marienberg[1024] near Helmstädt in Saxony, the prioress of which, Helena
-von Iltzen, hearing of the work of Busch, sought his assistance in matters
-of reform. Her house is said to have belonged to no order in particular.
-When she applied to Busch he was resident provost (after 1459) of the
-Austin canonry of Sülte near Hildesheim. He travelled to Bronopie, a
-nunnery situated outside Campen on the confines of Holland, to consult
-with the prioress, who accordingly deputed two nuns of her convent, Ida
-and Tecla, and one lay sister Aleydis, to repair with him to Marienberg.
-Of the two nuns Ida had been chosen for her knowledge of religious
-service, Tecla for her powers of instruction. Busch describes how he
-travelled across Germany with these women in a waggon drawn by four
-horses, and how on their arrival at Marienberg Ida was appointed to act as
-sub-prioress, and Tecla as teacher, and how the prioress of the house
-reserved to herself the management of temporal affairs only. Tecla is
-described as well versed in grammar (grammatica competenter docta); she
-instructed the inmates of the house in scholastic knowledge (scientiis
-scholasticalibus) with such success that her pupils after three years were
-able to read Holy Writ, and readily composed letters and missives in
-correct Latin (litteras sive missas in bona latina magistraliter
-dictarent). 'I have seen and examined these myself,' says Busch.
-
-After three years the illness of Ida made the nuns desirous of returning
-to their own convent, and Busch again undertook to escort them. A proof of
-the affection they had won during their stay and of the regret that was
-felt at their departure is afforded by the letters which passed between
-them and their friends. They were staying for some nights at the nunnery
-of Heiningen on their journey home when two letters reached them. In one
-the nuns wrote describing their grief. 'When we see your empty places in
-the choir, the refectory, and the dormitory, we are filled with sorrow and
-weep.' And they wish that the distance which separates them were not so
-great, then at least they might go to visit their friends. When Tecla's
-pupils (the letter says) entered the schoolroom for their lessons on the
-Saturday, they wept so much that the prioress, who was in great grief
-herself, was constrained to try to comfort them. The other letter, a short
-one specially addressed to Tecla, was written by these pupils: this
-accompanied the longer letter, and in it they assured her of their
-continued admiration and devotion. Ida, Tecla and Aleydis in reply sent
-two letters to Marienberg. A longer one was addressed by them to the
-convent collectively, and a shorter one by Tecla to her pupils, in which
-she praises them for having written such a good Latin letter and assures
-them that she is glad to think of her stay with them, since it has been
-productive of such good results.
-
-The nunnery of Marienberg, which had so readily accepted reforms, acted as
-advocate of similar changes to other houses. Busch tells us that the
-nunnery of Marienborn situated not far from it, and the nunnery at Stendal
-in Brandenburg, accepted reforms at its instigation[1025].
-
-In the records of Busch comparatively few charges of a coarse nature are
-brought against nunneries, but he adds an account of two nuns who were in
-apostasy, and who were persuaded by him to return to their convents. One
-had left her convent and had adopted lay clothing[1026]; the story of the
-other, Sophie, an illegitimate daughter of Wilhelm, duke of Brunswick,
-reads like a romance[1027]. The girl had been stowed away in the convent
-of Mariensee by her relatives for convenience, but indifferent to vows
-unwillingly accepted, she ran away and for seven years lived in the world,
-tasting few of the sweets of life and much of its bitterness. At last,
-broken in spirit by the loss of her child, she was persuaded by Busch to
-come and live in the convent of Derneburg, the members of which received
-her with tender pity for her sufferings and treated her with loving care.
-Finally she agreed to return to the nunnery she had originally left, glad
-of the peace which she found there.
-
-Some of the nunneries on which pressure was brought to bear by the
-monastic reformers altogether ceased to exist. The historian of the
-diocese of Speyer (Rheinbayern) tells us that the Benedictine nunnery of
-Schönfeld was interfered with in 1443 and fell into decay, and that its
-property was appropriated; that the Cistercian nunnery of Ramsen also
-ceased to exist, owing to feuds between Count Johann II of Nassau and the
-abbot of Morimund, who both claimed the right of interference; and that
-the dissolution of Kleinfrankenthal, a settlement of Austin nuns situated
-in the same diocese, was declared in 1431 by Pope Eugenius IV on account
-of the evil ways of the nuns[1028].
-
-The historian of the reforms undertaken in the diocese of Trier notifies
-many important changes[1029]. He considers that the nuns in many convents
-had drifted away from the former strictness of discipline and lived as
-Austin canonesses, returning to the world if they chose to get married.
-Many of these settlements now accepted stricter rules of life, and among
-them were the nunnery of Marienberg (diocese of Trier), the abbess of
-which, Isengard von Greiffenklau ([Dagger] 1469), had come under the
-influence of Johannes Rode--and Oberwerth, which owed reform to its abbess
-Adelheid Helchen (1468-1505).
-
-On the other hand Elisabeth von Seckendorff, abbess of the time-honoured
-nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstätt, refused to see that a changed
-condition of things demanded reform. The bishop of Eichstätt made his
-power felt; she was deposed, and Sophie was summoned from the nunnery of
-St Maria at Cöln, and made abbess in her stead (1456-1475)[1030].
-
-We have detailed accounts of reforms in South Germany from the pen of
-another contemporary writer, Felix Fabri ([Dagger] 1502), a Dominican
-friar of Ulm[1031]. He tells us how Elisabeth Krelin ([Dagger] 1480),
-abbess of the important Cistercian nunnery, Heggbach, a woman of great
-intelligence and strong character, effected reforms in her house on her
-sole responsibility. These changes were productive of such good results
-that many nuns left the houses to which they belonged and came to live
-under her. Gredanna von Freyberg ([Dagger] 1481), abbess of the ancient
-and wealthy Benedictine nunnery of Urspring, hearing of these changes,
-came on a visit to Heggbach, where she made friends with the abbess, and
-when she left she was bent on carrying out similar changes in her own
-convent. But here she met with opposition. Her nuns, who were members of
-the nobility, aware that the changes advocated meant interference with the
-liberty they enjoyed, divided for and against her, and those who were
-against her appealed to their relatives for support. Gredanna in vain
-asked for help from the abbot of the monastery of St Georg in the Black
-Forest to which her house was allied; he dared not interfere, and it was
-only when the archduchess Mechthild of Austria called upon him to do so,
-that he summoned nuns from the reformed nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstätt
-and with them and some monks came to Urspring. But the rebellious nuns,
-nothing daunted, shut themselves up in the outlying buildings of the
-infirmary, which they barricaded; the soldiers were called out but from a
-religious dread refused to attack them. Nothing remained short of placing
-these 'amazons' as Fabri calls them in a state of siege; the pangs of
-hunger at last forced them to yield. The reforms which Gredanna then
-effected were productive of such beneficial results that the house
-regained a high standing.
-
-The reform of Söflingen near Ulm[1032], an account of which we also owe to
-Fabri, affords one more of many examples of the tyranny of interference.
-This house belonged to the order of St Clare, and like all the houses of
-this order was subject to the Franciscan friars, who had the exclusive
-right of control over them.
-
-The Franciscans of Ulm having accepted reforms in consequence of the papal
-bull of 1484, the town authorities of Ulm called upon the nuns to do the
-same, and Fabri relates how 'a number of burghers accompanied by religious
-doctors of various orders, by noblemen, their followers, and by members of
-the town-gilds, armed and unarmed, marched upon Söflingen in a great
-crowd, as though to fight for the glory of God.' They conveyed with them a
-new abbess and a number of nuns of the reformed order of St Clare, whom
-they meant to instal at Söflingen. But here they were met by open
-defiance. The lady superior, Christine Strölin ([Dagger] 1489), shouted
-that she could not and would not be deposed, and her nuns vented their
-indignation in threats and blasphemy. Not by promises, not by threats,
-could they be persuaded to leave their lady superior. They rushed through
-the buildings, snatched up coffers and boxes, and followed Christine out
-of the house. Their loyalty and unanimity in defending their rights awaken
-feelings in their favour which are confirmed when we find the bishop of
-the diocese disapproving of the forcible measures resorted to by the
-citizens; endless quarrels and discussions ensued. The abbess Christine,
-after staying at various places, returned to Söflingen and was reinstated
-in her rights, on condition of adopting certain reforms; some of her nuns
-came back with her, but others refused to do so and went to live in other
-nunneries.
-
-Details concerning the 'reform' of one other nunnery are worth recording
-because they show how a representative of the Church openly attempted to
-curtail the privileges of a powerful nunnery. The struggle of the nunnery
-of Sonnenburg in the Tyrol with the Cardinal Legate Nicolas Cusanus
-([Dagger] 1464), bishop of Brixen, has been the subject of close
-historical enquiry, as its importance far exceeds the interests of those
-immediately concerned[1033]. In this struggle the representative of the
-Pope came into open conflict with the prince of the land, Sigmund,
-archduke of Austria and duke of Tyrol, who defied the Cardinal and obliged
-him to flee the country and seek refuge at Rome. The quarrel which began
-over the nunnery ended with the ban of excommunication being pronounced
-against Sigmund, and with his appeal to a Church Council against the
-authority of the Papal Curia.
-
-Sonnenburg was the wealthiest and most influential Benedictine settlement
-of women in the land. It was in existence as early as the 11th century and
-had extensive powers of jurisdiction which repeatedly brought its abbess
-into conflict with her rival in power, the bishop of Brixen. Against him
-she had sought and secured the protection of the archduke; but at the time
-of the appointment of Cusanus as bishop, the settlement of a matter of
-temporal administration between herself and the bishopric was pending.
-Cusanus had obtained from Rome exceptional powers of monastic visitation,
-powers such as were conferred at a later date on the Cardinal Legate
-Ximenes in Spain and on the Cardinal Legate Wolsey in England. By virtue
-of these powers Cusanus at once transferred the affair with the abbess
-from the temporal domain to the spiritual, and in his character of
-monastic visitor and reformer sent a manifesto to the abbess and nuns to
-the effect that after the coming festival of Corpus Christi they were on
-no account to absent themselves from the convent or to receive visitors.
-The abbess, Verena von Stuben, and her convent, which consisted at the
-time of seven nuns, ignored this command, obedience to which would have
-cut off intercourse with the archduke and made attention to the pending
-matter of business impossible. More closely pressed, the abbess gave an
-evasive answer and lodged a complaint with Sigmund, in which she and the
-convent declared themselves ready to accept the desired change (p.
-66[1034]) but said that they were convinced that such a course at the
-present moment would be fatal to their position. It was clear to them that
-Cusanus was bent on their ruin. The archduke to whom they appealed
-declared that the prelate was transgressing the limits of his authority,
-and intimated to him that he would not have the temporalities of the
-house interfered with,--a decision to which Cusanus for the moment
-deferred.
-
-The documents relating to the further progress of this quarrel are
-numerous. A kind of chronicle was kept at Sonnenburg written partly by the
-nuns, partly by the abbess, into which copies of over two hundred letters
-and documents were inserted. It bears the title 'On what occurred between
-Cardinal Cusanus and the abbess Verena,' and is now in the library at
-Innsbruck[1035].
-
-Foiled in his first attempt to gain control over Sonnenburg, Cusanus now
-devoted his attention to other religious communities. He took under his
-protection a number of recluses, called sylvan sisters, 'Waldschwestern'
-(p. 63), and having secured further powers from Rome, attempted to
-interfere with the convent of Minoresses or Poor Clares at Brixen (p. 87).
-But these nuns, though they were low-born and uneducated, were as stubborn
-as their high-born and learned sisters on the Sonnenburg; Verena's conduct
-may have given them the courage to oppose the Cardinal. Their lady
-superior was forcibly removed at his instigation, but they appealed
-against him at Rome, and though their opposition was censured, Cusanus was
-directed to place the matter in the hands of the Franciscans at Nürnberg,
-who declared themselves willing to institute the desired reforms. Nuns
-from the convent of St Clare at Nürnberg were despatched to Brixen, and
-the tone of the house was raised without its privileges being forfeited.
-
-On the strength of his increased visitatorial powers Cusanus (1453)
-returned to the charge at Sonnenburg, but its inmates would give no
-official declaration of their intentions (p. 90). Accordingly the bishop
-of Eichstätt was summoned to hold a visitation there, but he was refused
-admission by the nuns. However a second deputation came which could not be
-warded off, and the convent gave the desired information; the result of
-which was that injunctions were forwarded confining the authority of the
-abbess to the control of the nuns, and practically despoiling her of her
-property. Strict seclusion was to be observed, and the house was to be
-furnished with a key, which was to be given to a person appointed by
-Cusanus. The management of the monastic property was to be in the hands of
-a bailiff who was to render account to the bishop direct, not to the
-abbess. Scant wonder that the abbess Verena, indignant at the order and
-despairing of help from without, offered to resign. Her offer delighted
-the legate, who forthwith despatched Afra von Velseck to undertake the
-management of affairs at the convent, with the command that she was to
-take no step without previously consulting him (p. 94). It seems that
-Cusanus entertained the idea of appropriating the temporalities of the
-nunnery altogether, and transferring them to the use of monks, who were to
-be subject to his friend and ally, the abbot of Tegernsee (p. 95). He
-afterwards gave up the plan, 'since the nobility,' as he wrote (p. 127),
-'look upon this house as a home for their daughters and are opposed to my
-plan.'
-
-At this juncture things took an unexpected turn. Verena consulted with her
-friends in the matter of the pension on which she was to retire (p. 109);
-and Cusanus was angered by the objections they raised to his proposals.
-There was a stormy interchange of letters between him and the abbess (p.
-124), which ended in Verena's resuming her authority, and in Afra's
-deposition. Cusanus sent an armed escort to fetch away his protégée and
-threatened excommunication to the convent. In vain was a complaint against
-him sent by the nuns to Rome; Cusanus had anticipated them. The Pope
-censured the nuns' conduct, affirmed Cusanus' authority, and cast
-imputations on the character of the abbess, which were indignantly
-resented in a second letter forwarded to the Pope by the nuns.
-
-The archduke Sigmund now tried to interfere in the interest of peace. A
-second visitation was undertaken, and a list of injunctions was drawn up
-for the nuns (p. 133). Among these we note that nuns from a reformed
-convent were to come and live as teachers at Sonnenburg; the abbess was
-henceforth to have no separate household, she was forbidden to go out
-without asking leave from the diocesan, she was not to go on pilgrimages
-or visit health resorts, and she was not to be present at weddings.
-
-But the abbess and the convent refused to accept these injunctions, and
-they were accordingly placed under an interdict. The hospital belonging to
-the house and its property were confiscated, the chaplains were forbidden
-to celebrate mass, and the ban of excommunication was pronounced against
-the nuns and was reiterated by the priest of the nearest church on feast
-days and on Sundays. This was a great humiliation to the nuns and helped
-to lower them in general estimation.
-
-Sigmund was absent at the time. Soon after his return Pope Nicolas V, the
-patron of Cusanus, died (1455), and his successor Calixtus III warned the
-Cardinal against pushing things to extremes (p. 161). Sigmund also
-pleaded in favour of the nuns that they were staying within precincts, and
-that Verena was an estimable woman. Cusanus in answer contended that what
-he had done, he had done with the sanction of Rome, and that he had
-excommunicated and deposed Verena solely on account of her disobedience;
-and he then acknowledged that she was a thoroughly honest and excellent
-manager. In his letters to the abbot of Tegernsee, written about the same
-time, he speaks of Verena as a very Jezebel who is full of wiles against
-him (p. 153). 'Maybe she will pretend obedience to deceive me,' he wrote
-among other things, 'but the devil of pride has her soul in his possession
-and will prevent her from really humbling herself.' But the relations
-between Sigmund and his bishop were becoming strained in other respects.
-The first breach of the peace occurred when the abbess came to Innsbruck
-to seek support. Cusanus despatched a deacon to prevent her being
-received, and Sigmund had the deacon cast into prison.
-
-The nuns on the Sonnenburg were in a sorry plight. They dared not leave
-the house, the usual tithes were not brought to them and there had been no
-ingathering of the produce of their own harvest, for Cusanus threatened
-excommunication to anyone having intercourse with them or looking after
-their interests. They were nigh upon starvation (p. 277), and had recourse
-to an unlawful step. They took a band of armed men into their service and
-directed them to gather the tribute due to them. But the soldiers sent by
-the archbishop put these men to flight and then stormed the cloister. The
-nuns fled into the adjoining woods and found refuge in a house. 'But we
-were betrayed and had to fly again,' they wrote in their chronicle;
-'during three days we were pursued and sought by the troops, repeatedly we
-were so near to them that we saw them and they saw us. But the Virgin Mary
-helped us to escape from them.' Afra von Velseck had been put in
-possession of their empty house, but Cusanus could not support her;
-fearful of Sigmund he had fled from his bishopric and repaired to Rome.
-The archduke conducted the nuns back and begged Verena to resign, offering
-her a house near Innsbruck (p. 309). An envoy was accordingly despatched
-to Rome to proffer terms of submission to Cusanus if only he would take
-the ban of excommunication from the nuns. The bishop at last yielded to
-the Pope's command, though with a sufficiently bad grace. 'I send you a
-copy of Verena's letter to me,' he wrote to the envoy Natz, 'she tells
-lies as usual.' And on the margin of her letter, as a comment on her
-declaration that she had repeatedly sought absolution, he added the words,
-'this is a lie.'
-
-Penance in its extreme form was undergone by the convent (p. 311), but as
-Cusanus persistently denied to Sigmund the right of appointing a new
-abbess, many letters passed before the conditions of peace were settled
-and ratified. The correspondence, as Jäger remarks (p. 315), throws an
-interesting light on the character of the women concerned. Verena, who
-throughout maintained a proud dignity, retired from the convent on a
-pension; Afra, who had resorted to various intrigues, finally renounced
-all claims, and Barbara Schöndorfer came over from Brixen and was
-installed as abbess.
-
-Thus ended the quarrel about the privileges of Sonnenburg, which lasted
-six years and led to the curtailment of many of its rights. The story
-proves the inability of convents to preserve their independence, and shows
-how their weakness was made the excuse for interference from without to
-the detriment of the abbess in her position as landowner.
-
-It remains to enquire how far the improvements effected in monastic life
-by peaceful and by forcible means were lasting, and in what position the
-nunnery stood at the beginning of the 16th century.
-
-Some valuable information is given on the general state of monasticism by
-a number of addresses delivered by Tritheim, abbot of Sponheim ([Dagger]
-1516), before the assembled chapter of Benedictine abbots between 1490 and
-1492[1036]. Tritheim takes high rank among the older humanists; he was an
-enlightened man according to the notions of his age, and collected a
-wonderful and comprehensive library of books in many languages at
-Sponheim. His interest in necromancy afterwards brought reproach on him
-and he left his convent, but at the time when he pleaded before the
-assembled abbots he was full of enthusiasm for his order and full of
-regrets concerning it. In his address 'on the ruin of the Benedictine
-order,' he pointed out how effectually the Bursfeld and other
-congregations had worked in the past, but the beneficial results they
-effected had passed away and little of their influence remained. If only
-those who are vowed to religion, says Tritheim, would care more for
-learning, which has been made so much more accessible by the invention of
-printing, the outlook would not be so utterly hopeless.
-
-In these addresses Tritheim takes no account of nunneries, but we can
-discover his attitude towards nuns in an address to a convent[1037], the
-keynote of which is that the women assembled there should cultivate love,
-lowliness and patience under tribulation. The address is gentle and
-dignified, but it shows that Tritheim, in common with other men of the
-time, attached importance to nunneries chiefly for the piety they
-cultivated. His belief in this respect is shared by the zealous reformer
-Geiler von Kaisersberg ([Dagger] 1500), who preached many sermons before
-the nuns of the convents of St Mary Magdalen (Reuerinnen), and of St
-Stephan at Strasburg, and who likewise saw the beauty of a nun's vocation
-only in her devotional and contemplative attitude. We gather from his
-sermons, many of which are preserved in the form in which they were
-written out by nuns[1038], that a clear line of demarcation existed in his
-mind between reformed and unreformed convents, and that while emphatic in
-denouncing the ungodly ways of the inmates of unreformed houses, life in a
-reformed house was comparable in his eyes to Paradise. Geiler's efforts as
-a reformer were so far crowned by success that the convent of St Mary
-Magdalen to which he had devoted his efforts, outlived the attacks to
-which it was exposed at the time of the Reformation.
-
-The fact that Tritheim insists only on the devotional attitude of nuns is
-the more noticeable as he visited at the convent of Seebach, the abbess of
-which, Richmondis van der Horst, was equally praised for her own abilities
-and the superior tone she maintained in her convent. For instances were
-not wanting which show that intellectual tastes were still strong in some
-nunneries and that women living the convent life were themselves authors
-and took a certain amount of interest in the revival of classical
-learning, as we shall see later.
-
-Thus Butzbach (called Premontanus, [Dagger] 1526), a pupil of Hegius, who
-became a monk at Laach and was an admirer of Tritheim, was in
-correspondence with Aleydis Ruyskop ([Dagger] 1507), a nun at
-Rolandswerth, who had written seven homilies on St Paul in Latin and
-translated a German treatise on the mass into Latin. He dedicated to her
-his work on 'Distinguished learned women,' which he took from the work of
-the Italian Benedictine Jacopo of Bergamo, but from delicacy of feeling
-he omitted what Jacopo had inserted in praise of women's influence as
-wives and mothers[1039]. In this work Butzbach compares Aleydis to
-Hrotsvith, to Hildegard and to Elisabeth of Schönau. He also wrote to
-Gertrud von Büchel, a nun who practised the art of painting at
-Rolandswerth, and he refers to Barbara Dalberg, niece of the bishop of
-Worms, who was a nun at Marienberg, and to Ursula Cantor, who, he
-declares, was without equal in her knowledge of theology.
-
-But in spite of these instances and others, a growing indifference is
-apparent, both among the advocates of the new culture and in the outer
-world generally, to the intellectual occupation of women, and the training
-of girls. In their far-reaching plans for an improved system of education
-the humanists leave girls out of count, and dwell on their qualities of
-heart rather than on their qualities of mind. That the training of the
-mental faculties must be profitable in all cases for women does not occur
-to them, though the idea is advanced with regard to men.
-
-At the close of the 15th century Wimpheling ([Dagger] 1528) wrote a work
-on matters of education entitled _Germania_. It is a conception of ideal
-citizenship, and in it he insists that the burghers of Strasburg must let
-their sons receive a higher education and learn Latin in the 'gymnasium,'
-of which he gives his plan, regardless of the vocation they intend to
-embrace. Only a short chapter[1040] of the book refers to the training of
-girls. Their parents are cautioned against placing them in nunneries,
-which in the writer's mind are little better than brothels. He advises
-their being trained at home for domestic life and made to spin and weave
-like the daughters of Augustus.
-
-Similar tendencies are reflected in the works of Erasmus ([Dagger] 1536).
-His Colloquies or Conversations introduce us to a number of women under
-various aspects; and the want of purpose in convent life, the danger of
-masterfulness in wives, the anomalous position of loose women, and the
-general need there was of cultivating domestic qualities, are all in turn
-discussed.
-
-Two Colloquies turn on the convent life of women. In the first[1041] a
-girl of seventeen declares herself averse to matrimony, and expresses her
-intention of becoming a nun. The man who argues with her represents to her
-that if she be resolved to keep her maidenhood, she can do so by remaining
-with her parents and need not make herself from a free woman into a slave.
-'If you have a mind to read, pray or sing,' he says, 'you can go into your
-chamber as much and as often as you please. When you have enough of
-retirement, you can go to church, hear anthems, prayers, and sermons, and
-if you see any matron or virgin remarkable for piety in whose company you
-may get good, or any man who is endowed with singular probity from whom
-you can gain for your bettering, you can have their conversation, and
-choose the preacher who preaches Christ most purely. When once you are in
-the cloister, all these things, which are of great assistance in promoting
-true piety, you lose at once.' And he enlarges on the formalities of
-convent life, 'which of themselves signify nothing to the advancement of
-piety and make no one more acceptable in the eyes of Christ, who only
-looks to purity of mind.' The girl asks him if he be against the
-institution of monastic life. He replies, 'By no means. But as I will not
-persuade anyone against it who is already in it, so I would undoubtedly
-caution all young women, especially those of a generous temper, not to
-precipitate themselves unadvisedly into that state from which there is no
-getting out afterwards, and the more so because their chastity is more in
-danger in the cloister than out of it, and you may do whatever is done
-there as well at home.'
-
-His arguments however are in vain; the girl goes into a convent. But the
-next Colloquy, called the 'Penitent Virgin[1042],' describes how she
-changed her mind and came out again. She was intimidated by the nuns
-through feigned apparitions, and when she had been in the house six days
-she sent for her parents and declared that she would sooner die than
-remain there.
-
-Another Colloquy[1043] shows how masterfulness in a wife destroyed all
-possibility of domestic peace and happiness; yet another[1044] how a woman
-of loose life was persuaded to adopt other ways on purely reasonable
-grounds. Again we have a young mother who is persuaded to tend her child
-herself, since the promotion of its bodily welfare does much towards
-saving its soul[1045]. The most striking illustration however of the fact
-that in the eyes of Erasmus the position of woman was changing is afforded
-by the 'Parliament of Women[1046],' in which a great deal of talk leads to
-no result. Cornelia opens and closes the sitting, and urges that it is
-advisable that women should reconsider their position, for men, she says,
-are excluding women from all honourable employments and making them 'into
-their laundresses and cooks, while they manage everything according to
-their own pleasure.' But the assembled women dwell on irrelevant detail
-and harp on the distributions of class in a manner which shows that those
-qualities which made their participation in public affairs possible or
-advisable were utterly wanting among them. Erasmus passes no remarks
-derogatory to women as such, and yet he leaves us to infer that they
-cannot do better than devote their attention exclusively to domestic
-concerns.
-
-Judging by his writings and those of others who were active in the cause
-of progress, there was a growing feeling that the domestic virtues needed
-cultivation. A change in the position of women was not only imminent but
-was felt to be desirable, and probably it was in conformity with what
-women themselves wished. Both in England and on the Continent the idea
-that virginity was in itself pleasing to God was no longer in the
-foreground of the moral consciousness of the age; it was felt that the
-duties of a mother took higher rank, and that the truest vocation of woman
-was to be found in the circle of home. This view, as we shall see
-presently, tallied with the views taken by the Protestant reformers and
-prepared the way for the dissolution of nunneries.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-
-THE DISSOLUTION.
-
-  'In church, chapell and priory
-  Abby, hospitall and nunry,
-      Sparing nother man nor woman,
-  Coopes, albes, holy ornamentes,
-  Crosses, chalecys, sensurs and rentes,
-  Convertyng all to usys prophane.'
-                          _The Blaspheming English Lutherans_, verse 33.
-
-  'The Abbaies went doune because of there pride,
-  And made the more covetus riche for a tyme,
-  There leivenges dispercid one everi syde,
-  Where wonce was somme praier, now placis for swyne.'
-                          Quoted by Furnival from Douce MS. 365, l. 95.
-
-
-§ 1. The Dissolution in England.
-
-The movement of the 16th century commonly spoken of as the Reformation was
-the forcible manifestation of a revolution in thought which had long been
-preparing. This period may fitly be likened to a watershed between the
-socialistic tendencies of the Middle Ages and the individualistic
-tendencies which have mainly prevailed since. It forms the height which
-limits average modern conceptions, but which can be made the standpoint
-from which a more comprehensive view of things past and present becomes
-possible. Like other great epochs in history it is characterised by a
-sense of assurance, aspiration, and optimism,--and by wasted possibilities
-which give its study an ever renewed interest. The political, social, and
-intellectual changes which accompanied the Reformation are especially
-interesting nowadays when the standards which were then formulated are
-felt to be no longer final. The progressive thought of to-day, heretical
-though the assertion may sound to some, has become markedly insensible to
-the tenets which the reformers of the 16th century propounded and in which
-Protestantism found its strength and its safeguard. While paying due
-deference to the courage of the men who heralded what was advance if
-measured by such needs as they realised, the thinker of to-day dwells not
-so much on the factors of civilisation which those men turned to account
-as on those which they disregarded;--he is attracted by Erasmus, not by
-Luther, and looks more to him who worked in the interest of reform than to
-him who worked in the interest of the Reformation.
-
-Among the important social changes effected by the Reformation the
-dissolution of the monasteries forms a small but a significant feature, a
-feature pregnant with meaning if considered in the light of the changing
-standards of family and sex morality. For those who attacked the Church of
-Rome in her fundamentals, while differing in points of doctrine, were at
-one in the belief that the state of morality needed amendment, and that
-marriage supplied the means of effecting the desired change. In open
-antagonism to principles which formed the groundwork of monasticism, they
-declared celibacy odious and the vow of chastity contradictory to
-scriptural teaching and in itself foolish and presumptuous.
-
-The language in which Luther, Bullinger and Becon inculcated these
-principles is often offensive to modern ears. Their views are wanting in
-good taste, but consistency cannot be denied them. For these men were
-logical in condemning the unmarried state at every point, attacking it
-equally in the priest, the monk, the nun and the professed wanton. The
-changed attitude towards loose women has repeatedly been referred to in
-the course of this work, and it has been pointed out how such women, at
-one time not without power, had been steadily sinking in general
-estimation. Society, bent on having a clear line drawn between them and
-other women, had interfered with them in many ways, and had succeeded in
-stamping them as a class, to its own profit and to their disadvantage. But
-even at the close of the Middle Ages these women retained certain rights,
-such as that of having free quarters in the town, which the advocates of
-the new faith openly attacked and summarily swept away. Zealous if
-somewhat brutal in the cause of an improved morality, they maintained that
-marriage was the most acceptable state before God and that a woman had no
-claim to consideration except in her capacity as wife and mother.
-
-The calling of the nun was doomed to fall a sacrifice to this teaching.
-Her vocation was in antagonism to the doctrines of the party of progress,
-and where not directly attacked was regarded with a scarcely less fatal
-indifference. It has been shown that great efforts were made before the
-Reformation to reform life in nunneries, but various obstacles, and among
-them a growing indifference to the intellectual training and interests of
-women, were in the way of their permanent improvement. The nun was chiefly
-estimated by her devotional pursuits, and when the rupture came with Rome
-and these devotional pursuits were declared meaningless, individuals who
-were driven from their homes might be pitied, and voices here and there
-might be raised deploring the loss of the possibilities secured by the
-convent, but no active efforts were made to preserve the system, nothing
-was attempted to save an institution, the _raison d'être_ of which had
-vanished.
-
-Previous to the Reformation the efforts of churchmen on the Continent to
-reform convent life had led in several instances to the disbanding of a
-convent. In England like results ensued from the conduct of churchmen, who
-in their efforts to regenerate society by raising the tone of religion,
-rank with the older humanists abroad. These men had no intention of
-interfering with the institution of monasticism as such, but were bent on
-removing certain abuses. Among them were John Alcock, bishop of Ely,
-Fisher, bishop of Rochester, and Cardinal Wolsey; they appropriated a
-number of decayed convents on the plea of promoting religious education,
-and their action may be said to have paved the way towards a general
-dissolution.
-
-Among the monasteries dissolved by them were several belonging to nuns,
-and the fact is noteworthy that wherever the property of women was
-appropriated, it was appropriated to the use of men. Considering that the
-revenues of these houses had been granted for women and had been
-administered by women for centuries, this fact appears somewhat
-regrettable from the woman's point of view. But no blame attaches on this
-account to the men, for their attitude was in keeping with progressive
-thought generally and was shared by women themselves. Thus Margaret
-Beaufort ([Dagger] 1509) the mother of Henry VII, whose college
-foundations have given her lasting fame, seems never to have been struck
-by the thought that advantages might accrue from promoting education among
-women also. She founded Christ's College at Cambridge, planned the
-foundation there of St John's, and instituted divinity professorships both
-at Oxford and at Cambridge. But her efforts, in which she was supported
-by Fisher, bishop of Rochester, were entirely devoted to securing an
-improved education for the clergy.
-
-The nunnery of St Radegund's at Cambridge was among the first
-establishments appropriated in the interest of the higher religious
-education of men on the plea of decay and deterioration. It had supported
-a convent of twelve nuns as late as 1460, but in 1496 it was dissolved.
-The change was effected by John Alcock, bishop of Ely ([Dagger] 1500), a
-man of liberal spirit who ranks high among contemporary ecclesiastics. The
-king's licence[1047] for the dissolution of the house contains words to
-the effect that it had fallen into decay owing to neglect, improvidence,
-and the dissolute dispositions of the prioress and convent, which were
-referable to the close proximity of Cambridge. The house had only two
-inmates, of whom one had been professed elsewhere and the other was a
-girl. The bishop asked leave to declare the house dissolved in order to
-appropriate its possessions and revenues to the foundation of a college of
-one master (magister), six fellows (socii) and a certain number of
-students (scolares). These numbers show that the property of the house was
-not inconsiderable. The sanction of Pope Alexander III having been
-obtained[1048], the nunnery of St Radegund was transformed into Jesus
-College, Cambridge[1049].
-
-This instance paved the way for others. The suppression of the smaller
-monasteries for the purpose of founding and endowing seats of learning on
-a large scale was advocated by Cardinal Wolsey soon after his accession to
-power. He was advanced to the chancellorship in 1513 and was nominated
-cardinal by the Pope in 1515, and among the first houses which he
-dissolved were the two nunneries of Bromhall in Berkshire and Lillechurch
-in Kent.
-
-In a letter about Bromhall addressed to the bishop of Salisbury[1050]
-Wolsey directs him to 'proceed against enormities, misgovernance and
-slanderous living, long time heretofore had, used, and continued by the
-prioress and nuns.' The nuns were to be removed 'to other places of that
-religion, where you best and most conveniently bestow them, especially
-where they may be brought and induced unto better and more religious
-living.' Henry VIII asked in a letter to the bishop that the deeds and
-evidences of the convent 'by reason of the vacation of the said place'
-might be delivered to his messenger[1051]. It is not clear whether the
-inmates returned to the world or were transferred to other nunneries. In
-1522 it was found that the prioress Joan Rawlins had resigned, her only
-two nuns had abandoned the house, and it was granted to St John's College,
-Cambridge, by the interest and procurement of Fisher, bishop of
-Rochester[1052].
-
-Full information is preserved about the charges brought against the nuns
-at Lillechurch. From records at Cambridge we learn on what pleas
-proceedings were taken. The house formerly contained sixteen nuns, but for
-some years past there had been only three or four. It stood in a public
-place, that is on the road to Rochester, and was frequented by clerics,
-and the nuns were notorious for neglect of their duties and incontinence.
-Moreover the foundations at Cambridge made by Margaret Beaufort needed
-subsidizing, and public feeling was against the house. Depositions were
-taken in writing from which we see that the prioress was dead, and that
-one of the three inmates had yielded to temptation some eight or nine
-years before. In answer to the question: 'Alas, madam, how happened this
-with you?'--she replied: 'And I had been happy I might have caused this
-thing to have been unknown and hidden.'--Together with her two companions
-she agreed to sign the form of surrender (dated 1521), which was worded as
-follows. 'Not compelled by fear or dread, nor circumvented by guile or
-deceit, out of my own free will, for certain just and lawful reasons (I)
-do resign and renounce all my right, title, interest and possession that I
-have had and now have in the aforesaid monastery.' We do not know what
-became of these women. Their house was given over to Bishop Fisher, and
-by letters patent it also passed to St John's College, Cambridge[1053].
-
-Regarding the charges of immorality brought against the inmates of
-convents in this and in other instances, it has been repeatedly pointed
-out by students that such accusations should be received with a
-reservation, for the occurrence may have taken place before the nun's
-admission to the house. The conventionalities of the time were curiously
-loose in some respects; the court of Henry VIII could boast of scant
-respect even for the conjugal tie, and a woman of the upper classes who
-disgraced herself naturally took refuge in a convent, where she could hope
-in some measure to redeem her character. The fact that Anne Boleyn, who
-was averse to the whole monastic system, at one time thought of retiring
-into a nunnery, is quoted as a case in point[1054].
-
-The readiness of Wolsey to dissolve decayed convents and to appropriate
-their property grew apace with his increase of power. In no case is it
-recorded that he was deterred by opposition. In 1524 he appropriated St
-Frideswith's, a house of Austin canons at Oxford, and made it the nucleus
-of his great college[1055]. His legatine powers being further extended by
-a bull of the same year and the royal consent being obtained[1056], twenty
-small convents were dissolved by him during the next few years[1057].
-Among them we note two nunneries, Wykes in Essex, and Littlemore in
-Oxfordshire[1058]. But little is known of the number and character of
-their inmates at the time. Two further bulls[1059] were obtained by Wolsey
-from Pope Clement (1523-34) for diminishing the number of monasteries and
-suppressing houses of less than twelve inmates. Gasquet, to whom we are
-indebted for a detailed account of the dissolution, shows that Clement,
-who was hard pressed by the Lutheran agitation at the time, only
-reluctantly yielded to Wolsey's request[1060].
-
-Wolsey's proceedings in the matter, however, roused considerable local
-dissatisfaction and brought censure on him from the king. 'They say not
-that all that is ill gotten is bestowed on the colleges,' Henry wrote to
-him on the eve of his fall, 'but that the college is the cloak for
-covering mischiefs.' The king's ire was further roused by the cardinal's
-accepting the appointment of Isabel Jordan as abbess of Wilton, a house
-which was under royal patronage, and where the acceptance of the abbess
-belonged to the king. Anne Boleyn was in the ascendant in Henry's favour
-at the time, and wanted the post for someone else. But on enquiry at
-Wilton the unsuitability of this person became apparent. 'As touching the
-matter of Wilton,' Henry wrote to Anne, 'my lord cardinal has had the nuns
-before him and examined them, Master Bell being present, who has certified
-to me that for a truth she has confessed herself (which we would have
-abbess) to have had two children by sundry priests, and further since has
-been kept by a servant of Lord Broke that was, and not long ago; wherefore
-I would not for all the world clog your conscience nor mine to make her
-ruler of a house who is of such ungodly demeanour, nor I trust, you would
-not that neither for brother nor sister I should so stain mine honour and
-conscience[1061].' It is evident from this letter that whatever the
-character of the women received into the house might be, the antecedents
-of the lady superior were no matter of indifference. In this case the
-king's objection to one person and the unsuitability of the other led to
-the appointment of a third[1062].
-
-From the year 1527 all other questions were swallowed up by the momentous
-question of the king's divorce. Wolsey, who refused to comply with his
-wishes, went into retirement in 1529 and died in the following year. The
-management of affairs then passed into the hands of those who in this
-country represented the ruthless and reckless spirit of rebellion which
-had broken loose abroad. However several years passed before the attempt
-to appropriate the revenues of monasteries was resumed.
-
-In the intervening period of increasing social and political unrest we
-note the publication, some time before 1529, of the 'Supplication for
-beggars,' with which London was flooded[1063]. It was an attack on the
-existing religious and monastic orders by the pamphleteer Simon Fish
-([Dagger] c. 1530). Based on the grossest misrepresentations this
-supplication, in a humorous style admirably suited to catch popular
-attention, set forth the poverty of the people, the immorality of those
-who were vowed to religion, and the lewdness of unattached women, and
-declared that if church and monastic property were put to a better use
-these evils would be remedied. The king, who was on the eve of a rupture
-with Rome, lent a willing ear to this 'supplication,' and it so fell in
-with the general belief in coming changes that the refutation of its
-falsehoods and the severe criticism of Luther written in reply by Thomas
-More passed for the most part unheeded[1064].
-
-Another incident which reflects the spirit of the time in its
-contrarieties and instability, is the way in which Elizabeth Barton, of
-the parish of Aldington, the so-called Maid or Nun of Kent, rose to
-celebrity or notoriety. Her foresight of coming events had been received
-as genuine by many men of distinction, but her visions concerning the
-king's projected divorce were fiercely resented by the king's partisans.
-Bishop Fisher wept tears of joy over her, Wolsey received her as a
-champion of Queen Katherine's cause, and even Thomas More showed some
-interest in her, while Cromwell accused her of rank superstition and
-induced Henry to take proceedings against her[1065]. She had been a
-servant girl, but at the instigation of the clergy at Canterbury had been
-received into St Sepulchre's nunnery, where she lived for seven years and
-was looked upon with special favour by the Carthusian monks of
-Charterhouse and Sheen, and the inmates of the monastery of Sion. At the
-beginning of 1533 the king was married to Anne, and in the autumn of the
-same year Elizabeth Barton was accused of treasonable incitement and made
-to do public penance. Later a bill of attainder was brought in against
-her, and as Gasquet has shown[1066], she was condemned without a hearing
-and executed at Tyburn with several Carthusian monks who were inculpated
-with her on the charge of treason. Henry also made an attempt to get rid
-of Bishop Fisher and of Sir Thomas More by causing them to be accused of
-favouring her 'conspiracy,' but the evidence against them was too slight
-to admit of criminal proceedings. It was on the charge of declaring that
-Henry was not the supreme head of the Church that Fisher suffered death
-(June, 1535), and on the yet slighter charge of declining to give an
-opinion on the matter, that More was executed a fortnight later[1067].
-
-The parliament of 1533 had passed the act abolishing appeals to the Court
-of Rome, and among other rights had transferred that of monastic
-visitation from the Pope to the king. In the following year a further
-division was made,--the king claimed to be recognised as the head of the
-Church. It was part of Henry's policy to avoid openly attacking any part
-of the old system; gradual changes were brought about which undermined
-prerogatives without making a decided break. Cromwell was appointed
-vicegerent in ecclesiastical matters, and it was on the plea of securing
-the recognition of the king's supremacy that he deputed a number of
-visitors or agents to conduct monastic visitations on a large scale, and
-to secure all possible information about religious houses. His plan and
-the way in which it was carried out struck a mortal blow at the whole
-monastic system.
-
-The agents employed by Cromwell were naturally laymen, and the authority
-of the diocesan was suspended while they were at work. Great powers were
-conferred on them. A list of the instructions they received is in
-existence; and we gather from it that monks and nuns were put through
-searching interrogatories concerning the property of their house, the
-number of its inmates, its founders and privileges, its maintenance of
-discipline, and the right conduct of its inmates. The agents then enjoined
-severance from the Pope or any other foreign superior, and directed those
-who had taken the vow, whether men or women, henceforth to observe strict
-seclusion. A daily lesson in scripture was to be read; the celebration of
-the hours was to be curtailed; profession made under the age of
-twenty-four was declared invalid; and 'other special injunctions,' says
-the document, might 'be added by the visitors as the place and nature of
-accounts rendered (or comperts) shall require,' subject to the wisdom and
-discretion of Cromwell[1068].
-
-The character of the visitors engaged in this task has been variously
-estimated. Among them was Dr Legh ([Dagger] 1545) who is described by a
-contemporary as a doctor of low quality. He wrote to Cromwell (July, 1535)
-recommending himself and Layton ([Dagger] 1544) for the purpose of
-visitation[1069]. Layton had previously acted for Cromwell in conducting
-visitations at Sheen and Sion in the affair of Elizabeth Barton. Legh
-afterwards complained that he did not act as he himself did in regard to
-enforcing injunctions[1070], but Legh, even in the eyes of his companion
-John ap Rice, another visitor with whom he had started for the western
-countries, was needlessly severe. 'At Laycock (nunnery),' wrote ap
-Rice[1071], 'we can find no excesses. Master (Legh) everywhere restrains
-the heads, the brethren and sisters from going forth; and no women of what
-estate soever are allowed to visit religious men's houses and vice versa.
-I think this is over strict, for as many of these houses stand by
-husbandry they must fall to decay if the heads are not allowed to go out.'
-
-We have seen, in connection with matters on the Continent, that the heads
-of houses who were landowners felt it impossible to conform to the rule of
-always keeping within the precincts. The injunction in this case gave rise
-to a number of letters of complaint addressed by the heads of monasteries
-to Cromwell[1072]. Cecil Bodman, abbess of Wilton, wrote to him as
-follows[1073].
-
-'Dr Legh the king's visitor and your deputy, on visiting my house, has
-given injunction that not only all my sisters but that I should keep
-continually within the precincts. For myself personally I am content; but
-as the house is in great debt, and is not likely to improve without good
-husbandry, which cannot be exercised so well by any other as by myself, I
-beg you will allow me, in company with two or three of the sad (serious)
-and discreet sisters of the house, to supervise such things abroad as
-shall be for its profit. I do not propose to lodge any night abroad,
-except by inevitable necessity I cannot return. I beg also, that whenever
-any father, mother, brother, sister, or nigh kinsfolk of my sisters, come
-unto them, they may have licence to speak with them in the hall in my
-presence. Wilton, 5 Sept.' (1535).
-
-Another injunction which was felt to be a calamity was the order
-declaring that profession made under twenty-four was invalid. 'No greater
-blow could have been struck at the whole theory of religious life,' says
-Gasquet[1074], 'than the interference with the vows contained in the order
-to dismiss those who were under twenty-four years of age or who had been
-professed at the age of twenty. The visitors, it is clear, had no scruple
-about their power to dispense with the solemn obligations of the monastic
-profession. They freely extended it to any who would go, in their idea
-that the more they could induce to leave their convents, the better
-pleased both the king and Cromwell would be.'
-
-How far inmates of convents availed themselves of the permission to go is
-difficult to establish. Margaret Vernon, abbess of Little Marlow in
-Buckinghamshire, who was left with only one nun, did not feel unwilling to
-give up her house, and wrote to Cromwell as follows[1075].
-
-'After all due commendations had unto your good mastership, with my most
-humble thanks for the great cost made on me and my poor maidens at my last
-being with your mastership, furthermore may it please you to understand
-that your visitors have been here of late, who have discharged three of my
-sisters, the one is dame Catheryn, the other two are the young women who
-were last professed, which is not a little to my discomfort; nevertheless
-I must be content with the king's pleasure. But now as touching mine own
-part, I most humbly beseech you so special a good master unto me your poor
-bedewoman, to give me your best advice and counsel what way shall be best
-for me to take, seeing there shall be none left here but myself and this
-poor maiden; and if it will please your goodness to take this house into
-your own hands either for yourself, or for my own (master) your son, I
-would be glad with all my heart to give it into your mastership's hands,
-with that you will command me to do therein. Trusting and nothing doubting
-in your goodness, that you will so provide for us that we shall have such
-honest living that we shall not be driven by necessity either to beg or to
-fall to other inconvenience. And thus I offer myself and all mine unto
-your most high and prudent wisdom, as unto him that is my only refuge and
-comfort in this world, beseeching God of His goodness to put in you His
-Holy Spirit, that you may do all things to His laud and glory. By your own
-assured bedewoman M(argaret) V(ernon).'
-
-Some time afterwards she was in London, trying to get an interview with
-Cromwell, and eventually she became governess to his son[1076]. The
-property of her nunnery, together with that of Ankerwyke in
-Buckinghamshire, and several monasteries of men, was granted by Henry in
-1537 to the newly founded abbey of Bisham, but at the general dissolution
-it fell to the crown[1077].
-
-Another petition touching the matter of dismissing youthful convent
-inmates was addressed to Cromwell by Jane G(o)wryng[1078], in which she
-begs that four inmates of her house, whose ages are between fifteen and
-twenty-five and who are in secular apparel may resume their habits or else
-have licence to dwell in the close of the house till they are twenty-four.
-Also she wishes to know if two girls of twelve and thirteen, the one deaf
-and dumb, the other an idiot, shall depart or not. Again a letter was
-addressed to Cromwell, asking that a natural daughter of Cardinal Wolsey
-might continue at Shaftesbury till she be old enough to take the
-vow[1079].
-
-Modern writers are agreed that the effect of these visitations was
-disastrous to authority and discipline within the convent, not so much
-through the infringement of privileges as through the feeling of
-uncertainty and restlessness which they created. Visitation was dreaded in
-itself. With reference to Barking nunnery Sir Thomas Audley wrote to
-Cromwell: 'I am informed that Dr Lee is substituted by you to visit all
-the religious houses in the diocese of London. My suit at this time to you
-is that it may please you to spare the house at Barking[1080].'
-
-In point of fact the visitations were conducted in a manner which left
-those immediately concerned in no doubt as to the ultimate object in view.
-In court circles likewise men were aware that the monastic system was
-threatened by dangerous and far-reaching changes. While Cromwell's agents
-were on their tours of inspection Chapuys, the French ambassador (Sept.
-1535) wrote as follows[1081]: 'There is a report that the king intends the
-religious of all orders to be free to leave their habits and marry. And if
-they will stay in their houses they must live in poverty. He intends to
-take the rest of the revenue and will do stranger things still.' And two
-months later he wrote that the king meant to exclude the abbots from the
-House of Lords for fear of their opposition to his intentions regarding
-the spoliation of monasteries[1082].
-
-The one merit Cromwell's visitors can claim is despatch, for in six
-months, between July 1535 and February 1536, the information on the
-monasteries was collected throughout the country and laid before
-Parliament. Gasquet has shown that the House of Lords was the same which
-had been packed for passing the act of divorce, and that the king, bent on
-carrying his purpose, bullied the Commons into its acceptance[1083].
-
-The preamble to the bill is couched in strong terms and begins as
-follows[1084]: 'Forasmuch as manifest sins, vicious, carnal, and
-abominable living is daily used and committed amongst the little and small
-abbeys, priories, and other religious houses of monks, canons and nuns,
-where the congregation of such religious persons is under the number of
-twelve persons, whereby the governors of such religious houses and their
-convent spoil, destroy, consume and utterly waste, as well their churches,
-monasteries, priories, principal houses, farms, granges, lands, tenements
-and hereditaments, as the ornaments of their churches and their goods and
-chattels, to the high displeasure of Almighty God, slander of good
-religion, and to the great infamy of the king's highness and the realm, if
-redress should not be had thereof,' ... and it goes on to say that since
-visitations have produced no results, and bad living continues, the Lords
-and Commons, after deliberation, have resolved to put the possessions of
-these religious houses to a better use, and that the king and his heirs
-shall for ever enjoy all houses that are not above the clear annual value
-of £200 in like manner as the heads of houses at present enjoy it, but
-that the king by 'his most excellent charity' is pleased to grant pensions
-to those whom he deprives.
-
-Touching the evidence on which action was taken writers of the Elizabethan
-era speak of the so-called Black Book, the existence of which has since
-been disproved[1085]. Latimer in a sermon preached in 1549 refers to the
-'enormities' which were brought to the knowledge of the house; we hold a
-clue to these in the letters forwarded by Cromwell's agents when on their
-tours of inspection, and in their 'comperts' or accounts rendered. The
-condensed accounts (comperta compertorum) rendered by Layton and Legh for
-the province of York including one hundred and twenty monasteries are
-extant, as also two other reports, one on twenty-four houses in Norfolk,
-another on ten[1086].
-
-It has been remarked that the evidence collected differs according to the
-character of the informers; the reports of Tregonwell for example are by
-no means so full of scandal as those of Layton and Legh. Moreover Layton
-and Legh gave a specially bad character to houses in the north where, as
-we shall see later on, both the people and the gentry were in favour of
-their continuance. It should also be noted that the state of the lesser
-houses which fell under the act was not uniformly worse than that of the
-larger. Many difficulties of course stood in the way of the men who
-collected evidence. They were received with suspicion and hatred, which
-their proceedings were not likely to dissipate, and they naturally lent a
-willing ear to any one who gave information of the character required. It
-has been shown that in several instances their reports were directly
-contradicted by those made by the leading men in the different counties,
-who after the passing of the act were appointed to make a new and exact
-survey, so that, considering the evidence forthcoming from both sides, it
-seems reasonable to accept that while the mode of life within convents no
-longer compared favourably with the mode of life outside them, their
-standard had not fallen so low, as to render these institutions uniformly
-despicable.
-
-An example of how the visitors were received is afforded by a letter from
-Layton to Cromwell, in which he describes how after meeting Legh in the
-north they visited Chicksand, a Gilbertine house in Bedfordshire[1087].
-The nuns here at first refused to admit him, and when he forced an
-entrance the two prioresses would not admit the accusations made against
-two of their nuns, 'nor the parties concerned, nor the nuns, only one old
-beldame.' He tried intimidation and was told by the prioress 'that they
-were bound by their religion never to confess the secret faults done among
-them except only to their visitor of religion, and to that they were sworn
-every one of them at their first admission.'
-
-A similar esprit de corps was manifested by a house of Gilbertine
-canons[1088]. Layton in the same letter gives a bad character to the
-nunnery of Harwold, in Bedfordshire, which was inhabited by Austin
-canonesses[1089], and the inmates of which had been foolish enough to sign
-a Latin document in favour of Lord Mordaunt without knowing what it
-contained.
-
-The accusations brought by the visitors can be summarised under two
-headings, superstitions and scandalous living. The accounts of
-superstitions are full of most interesting particulars for the student of
-art and of folklore; the properties which were attached to relics, the
-character of the images and paintings which were held in reverence, and
-the construction of saint-images, will amply repay study[1090]. The
-instances of scandalous living recorded are numerous and affect alike the
-inmates of men's and of women's houses. Coloured as they may be to suit
-the temper of inquisitor and informer, there is no denying that they point
-to an advanced state of monastic decay.
-
-It has been estimated that the lesser houses including those of monks and
-nuns which fell under the act numbered about three hundred and eighty;
-they were to surrender to the crown within a year. Of these the women's
-houses, owing to their comparative poverty, were relatively more numerous
-than those of the men. Out of about one hundred and thirty nunneries which
-existed at this period only fifteen were exempt through having a yearly
-income exceeding £200, but in addition to these over twenty by some means
-or other secured a reprieve.
-
-As the act abolishing the lesser houses was based on the assumption of
-their corruption, the heads of some of the houses which bore a good
-character asked leave on this ground to remain. Among those who wrote to
-Cromwell in this sense was Jane Messyndyne, prioress of a convent of about
-ten nuns at Legbourne in Leicestershire, who pleaded that no fault had
-been found with her house[1091]. 'And whereas,' she wrote, 'we do hear
-that a great number of abbeys shall be punished, suppressed and put down
-because of their misliving, and that all abbeys and priories under the
-value of £200 be at our most noble prince's pleasure to suppress and put
-down, yet if it may please your goodness we trust in God you shall hear no
-complaints against us neither in our living nor hospitality keeping.' But
-petitions such as hers apparently passed unheeded, for in the autumn of
-the same year (Sept. 1536), the process of dissolution was going on at her
-house[1092].
-
-There seems no doubt that in many cases where the lesser houses were
-allowed to remain bribery was resorted to, perhaps backed by the
-intervention of friends. Payments into the Royal Exchequer were made by a
-large proportion of the lesser houses which continued unmolested, and
-among them were a number of nunneries which paid sums ranging from £20 to
-£400[1093]. Among these was Brusyard in Bedfordshire, a small settlement
-of nuns of the order of St Clare, the abbess of which wrote to Cromwell
-seeking his intervention[1094]; she ultimately secured a reprieve and paid
-the sum of £20[1095]. Alice Fitzherbert, abbess of the nunnery of
-Polesworth in Warwickshire, to which an exceptionally good character was
-given, bought a reprieve for £50, on the intervention it is said of
-friends[1096]. Again the abbess of Delapray, who is characterised as a
-very sickly and aged woman, secured a reprieve and paid £266. The agent
-Tregonwell had reported well of Godstow[1097]. Its inmates all bore a good
-character excepting one who, some thirteen years ago, had broken her vow
-while living in another convent, had been transferred to Delapray by the
-bishop of Lincoln and had since lived virtuously. Margaret Tewkesbury the
-abbess wrote to Cromwell begging him to accept a little fee and to forward
-the letter she enclosed to the king[1098]. Her convent was allowed to
-remain.
-
-The attempt of the prioress of Catesby to save her house in a similar
-manner was fruitless. The house bore an excellent character according to
-Tregonwell[1099], and his opinion was confirmed by the commissioners who
-came down later (May, 1536) to take an exact survey. 'We found the house,'
-they wrote to Cromwell[1100], 'in very perfect order, the prioress a wise,
-discreet, and religious woman with nine devout nuns under her as good as
-we have seen. The house stands where it is a relief to the poor, as we
-hear by divers trustworthy reports. If any religious house is to stand,
-none is more meet for the king's charity than Catesby. We have not found
-any such elsewhere....' But the recommendation was insufficient and Joyce
-Bykeley, 'late prioress,' addressed herself directly to Cromwell.--'Dr
-Gwent informed you last night,' she wrote[1101], 'that the queen had moved
-the king for me and offered him 2000 marks for the house at Catesby, but
-has not yet a perfect answer. I beg you, in my great sorrow, get the king
-to grant that the house may stand and get me years of payment for the 2000
-marks. You shall have 100 marks of me to buy you a gelding and my prayers
-during my life and all my sisters during their lives. I hope you have not
-forgotten the report the commissioners sent of me and my sisters....' But
-her letter was of no avail. Somehow she had incurred the king's
-displeasure[1102], and the order to dissolve her convent was not
-countermanded.
-
-The sums paid by some nunneries appear enormous compared with their yearly
-income. Thus the convent of Pollesloe, with a yearly income of £164, paid
-the sum of £400 into the Royal Exchequer; Laycock, with an income of £168,
-paid £300, and the nuns of St Mary at Chester, with an income of £66, paid
-£160; other sums paid are given by Gasquet[1103].
-
-Among the lesser houses reprieved was St Mary's, Winchester, one of the
-nunneries dating from the Anglo-Saxon period, but which in course of time
-had decreased. The report of the commissioners who came down to take stock
-of the contents of the settlement provides us with many interesting
-particulars[1104]. The number of persons residing in the monastery at the
-time was over a hundred. The abbess Elizabeth Shelley presided over a
-convent of twenty-six nuns, twenty-two of whom were professed and four
-novices. The nuns are designated in this report by the old term
-'mynchyns.' With the exception of one who desired 'capacity,' that is
-liberty to return to the world, they all declared their intention of going
-into other houses. Five lay sisters also dwelt there, thirteen
-women-servants and twenty-six girls, some of whom were the daughters of
-knights receiving their education. Of the women-servants one belonged to
-the abbess who lived in a house of her own with her gentlewoman; the
-prioress, sub-prioress, sexton, and perhaps one other nun, lived in
-separate houses and each had her servant. There were also a number of
-priests and other men designated as officers of the household. Among them
-was a general receiver and his servant, a clerk and his servant, a
-gardener (curtyar), a caterer, a bottler (botyler?), a cook, an undercook,
-a baker, a convent cook, an under convent cook, a brewer, a miller,
-several porters and 'children of the high altar,' and two men enjoying
-corrodies, that is free quarters and means of subsistence. The yearly
-income of this vast establishment was assessed at £179, and the house
-therefore came under the act. But the abbess, Elizabeth Shelley, who is
-described as a person of spirit and talent, found means to avert the
-storm. The sum £333 was paid by her into the Royal Exchequer[1105], and
-(in August 1536) letters patent were obtained by which the abbey was
-refounded with all its property excepting some valuable manors[1106].
-
-Other convents which at the same time secured a licence to remain[1107]
-were the Benedictine convent of Chatteris with Anne Seton[1108] as
-prioress; the Austin convent of Gracedieu in Leicestershire; the convent
-of the order of St Clare of Dennis; also the nuns of St Andrew's, Marricks
-in Yorkshire under Christabel Cooper, and of St Mary's, Heyninges, in
-Lincolnshire under Joan Sandford[1109]. No payment is recorded in
-connection with any of these houses so far as I have been able to
-ascertain.
-
-Among the reprieves that of the Austin nuns or White Ladies at Gracedieu
-is noteworthy, as the report of Cromwell's agents (Feb. 1536) had charged
-two of its inmates with incontinence, and among other superstitions
-countenanced by the convent, mentioned their holding in reverence the
-girdle and part of the tunic of St Francis which were supposed to help
-women in their confinement[1110]. But the special commissioners a few
-months later spoke of the prioress Agnes Litherland and her convent of
-fifteen nuns in the highest terms, describing them as of good and virtuous
-conversation and living, and saying that all of them desired their house
-to remain[1111].
-
-The convent of Dennis, which secured a licence at the same time, was one
-of the few settlements of nuns of St Clare, the abbess of which, Elizabeth
-Throgmerton, was renowned for her liberal sympathies. In 1528 a wealthy
-London merchant was imprisoned for distributing Tyndale's books and other
-practices of the sort, and he pleaded among other reasons for exculpation
-that, the abbess of Dennis wishing to borrow Tyndale's _Enchiridion_, he
-had lent it to her and had spent much money on restoring her house[1112].
-Legh in a letter to Cromwell[1113] described how on visiting Dennis he was
-met by the weeping nuns, who were all ready to return to the world, a
-statement in direct contradiction to the fact that the house was not
-dissolved.
-
-The work of dissolution began in April 1536 and continued without
-interruption throughout the summer. Gasquet holds that the women suffered
-more than the men by being turned adrift[1114]. 'Many things combined to
-render the dissolution of conventual establishments and the disbanding of
-the religious more terrible to nuns than to monks. A woman compelled to
-exchange the secluded life of a cloister with all its aids to piety for an
-existence in the world, to which she could never rightly belong, would be
-obviously in a more dangerous and undesirable position than a man.'
-
-By a provision of the act those who were professed were to receive
-pensions, but the number of inmates of the lesser houses to whom they were
-granted was comparatively small[1115]. Moreover pensions were not
-apportioned with regard to the needs of subsistence, but to the wealth of
-the house, so that even those who received them were in a great measure
-thrown on their own resources. The number of professed nuns, as is
-apparent from the accounts given of St Mary's, Winchester, and other
-houses, was relatively small compared with the number of servants and
-dependents. These in some cases received a small 'award' but were thrown
-out of employment, while the recipients of alms from the house were
-likewise deprived of their means of living, and went to swell the ranks
-of those who were dissatisfied with the innovation. While the process of
-dissolution was going on (July 1536) Chapuys the French ambassador wrote
-as follows[1116]: 'It is a lamentable thing to see a legion of monks and
-nuns who have been chased from their monasteries wandering miserably
-hither and thither seeking means to live; and several honest men have told
-me that what with monks, nuns, and persons dependent on the monasteries
-suppressed, there were over 20,000 who knew not how to live.' His estimate
-may have reference to the ultimate effect of the act[1117]. The immediate
-results of the suppression were, however, disastrous throughout the
-country, and the dissatisfaction which the suppression caused went far to
-rouse the latent discontent of the northern provinces into open rebellion.
-
-It was in Lincolnshire, in October, that the commissioners first met with
-opposition. From here a rising spread northwards to Scotland, and under
-the name of the 'Pilgrimage of Grace' drew votaries from the lay and
-religious classes alike. The insurgents claimed among other things that
-the innovations in religion should be disowned, and that despoiled
-monasteries should be restored. They pursued the visitors Layton and Legh
-with unrelenting hatred on account of their extortions; Legh was in danger
-of his life and barely escaped their fury[1118]. The rising assumed such
-proportions that the king was seriously alarmed; an army was sent to the
-north, strenuous efforts were made to win over the powerful northern
-barons, and concessions were made and rescinded with much shameful
-double-dealing. Beyond the effect it had on religious houses, the story of
-the rebellion, on which a new light has recently been thrown by the
-publication of letters which passed at the time[1119], does not concern us
-here. Wherever the insurgents spread they seized on despoiled monasteries
-and reinstated their superiors and inmates; among other houses the nunnery
-of Seton in Cumberland was restored for a time[1120]. But in proportion as
-the king regained his authority, terrible bloodshed followed; the
-representatives of the chief families and the abbots who had joined in the
-rising were hanged, burnt, or beheaded, and their property confiscated by
-attainder. Cromwell, who was still on the high road to prosperity,
-availed himself of the rebellion to institute a general suppression, which
-was speedily and summarily carried into effect. In the autumn of 1537, the
-fear of systematic revolt being quelled, the suppression began and
-extended over the whole of 1538 and 1539. No further evidence was
-collected, no act was passed till April 1539, when a provision was made by
-which all monasteries which were dissolved or surrendered fell to the
-king[1121]. The commissioners came down on each house in succession,
-beginning with the less wealthy and influential ones, and used every means
-to secure a free surrender. Even then a certain reticence in the
-proceedings was observed which went far to blind contemporaries to the
-vastness of the ultimate object in view, for every effort was made to keep
-up the fiction that Henry was doing no more than correcting abuses and
-accepting free surrenders. But the study of documents proves things to
-have been otherwise. The promise of a pension was held out on condition of
-a voluntary surrender, but where hesitation was shown in accepting, the
-effect of threats of deprivation was tried. The visitor Bedyll wrote that
-he advised the monks of Charterhouse rather to 'surrender than abide the
-extremity of the king's law[1122],' and many of the forms of surrender
-which are extant remain unsigned. On others the name of the superior is
-the only signature, on others again the names of the superior and the
-members of the convent are entered in the same hand. Considering the
-helpless position in which religious houses were placed, it seems a matter
-for wonder that any opposition was made.
-
-It is interesting to find that as late as (Jan.) 1538, two years after the
-passing of the first bill, the heads of houses were asked to believe that
-there was no wish for a general suppression[1123], and that a grant of
-continuance was made (May 1538) to the nunneries of Kirkless and
-Nunappleton in Yorkshire[1124]. In Yorkshire there was a strong feeling in
-favour of nunneries,--'in which our daughters (are) brought up in virtue,'
-as Aske, one of the leaders of the rebellion, put it[1125], and owing
-doubtless to the opposition made by the rebels, a number of lesser
-nunneries in the north which came under the act escaped dissolution.
-Among them besides Kirkless and Nunappleton were Swine and Nun-Kelyng;
-there is no evidence that they secured a licence at the time. The fact
-that Kirkless remained and gained a reprieve in 1538 is the more
-noticeable as the commissioners had in the first instance reported
-unfavourably on the state of the house[1126].
-
-In February 1538 a courtier wrote to Lord Lisle[1127], 'the abbeys go down
-as fast as they may and are surrendered to the king,' adding the pious
-wish: 'I pray God send you one among them to your part.' For the property
-of religious houses which were appropriated to the king was now frequently
-granted to courtiers, or to those who were quick enough to avail
-themselves of their opportunities in the general scramble.
-
-Several of the agents who had previously conducted visitations were among
-those who carried on the work of the dissolution. Among them London
-([Dagger] 1543) has been characterised as 'the most terrible of all the
-monastic spoilers'; his letters remain to show in what spirit he stripped
-the houses of their property, seized relics and defaced and destroyed
-everything he could lay hands on[1128]. There is a letter extant which
-Katherine Bulkeley, abbess of Godstow, wrote to Cromwell complaining of
-him[1129]. He came down to her house (Nov. 1537), ostensibly to hold a
-visitation, but really bent on securing a surrender.
-
-'... Dr London, which as your lordship does well know was against my
-promotion and has ever since borne me great malice and grudge like my
-mortal enemy, is suddenly come unto me with a great rout with him and here
-does threaten me and my sisters saying that he has the king's commission
-to suppress my house in spite of my teeth. And when he saw that I was
-content that he should do all things according to his commission and
-showed him plain that I would never surrender to his hand being my ancient
-enemy, now he begins to entreat me and to inveigle my sisters one by one
-otherwise than I ever heard tell that any of the king's subjects have been
-handled, and here tarries and continues to my great cost and charge, and
-will not take my answer that I will not surrender till I know the king's
-gracious commandment and your lordship's ...' and more to the same
-purpose.
-
-London on the following day wrote to Cromwell[1130] asking that the
-'mynchyns' or nuns of her house, many of whom were aged and without
-friends, should be generously dealt with (in the matter of a pension).
-Stories were current[1131] at the time about insults to which the nuns
-were exposed by the agents. Although it seems probable that there was no
-excessive delicacy used in their treatment, no direct complaints except
-those of the abbess of Godstow have been preserved.
-
-The last pages of the history of several of the great abbeys are full of
-traits of heroism; one cannot read without sympathy of the way in which
-for example the abbot of Glastonbury identified himself with the system to
-which he belonged, and perished with it rather than be divided from it.
-The staunch faith of the friars no less commands respect. The heads of
-women's houses naturally made less opposition. However Florence Bannerman,
-abbess of Amesbury, refused every attempt to bribe or force her into a
-surrender. After considerable delay she was deposed in December 1539, and
-was succeeded by Joan Darrell who surrendered the house at the king's
-bidding[1132], and accepted the comparatively high pension of £100.
-
-To some of the heads of houses it seemed incredible that the old system
-was passing away for ever, and they surrendered in the belief that their
-deprivation was only temporary. Elizabeth Shelley, abbess of St Mary's,
-Winchester, who in 1535 had saved her house, accepted the surrender but
-continued to dwell at Winchester with a number of her nuns, and when she
-died bequeathed a silver chalice which she had saved to the college in the
-city on condition that it should be given back to St Mary's if the convent
-were restored[1133]. The fact that she succeeded in carrying away a
-chalice appears exceptional, for the inmates of convents who were expelled
-seem as a rule to have taken with them nothing except perhaps their books
-of devotion.
-
-The story of the dissolution repeats itself in every convent. The
-inventory of the house having been taken, the lead was torn from the
-roofs, and sold together with the bells; the relics and pictures were
-packed in sacks and sent up to London to be burnt.
-
-The plate and jewels of the house, the amount of which was considerable in
-the houses of men and in some of women (for example in Barking) were also
-forwarded to London to be broken up and melted; in a few instances they
-were sold. The house's property in furniture, utensils and vestments was
-sold there and then. The superiors and convent inmates were then turned
-away, and the buildings that had so long been held in reverence were
-either devoted to some profane use or else left to decay.
-
-The inventory taken at the dissolution of the ancient Benedictine nunnery
-of Wherwell in Hampshire has been preserved among others, and shows how
-such a house was dealt with[1134]. There is a list of the inmates of the
-convent and of the pensions granted to them; the abbess in this case
-received a yearly pension of £40, and her nuns' pensions ranged from £3.
-6_s._ 8_d._ to £6. We then get a list of the dwellings of which the
-settlement was composed. The houses and buildings 'assigned to remain'
-were as follows: 'the abbess' lodging with the houses within the quadrant,
-as the water leads from the east side of the cloister to the gate, the
-farmery, the mill and millhouse with the slaughter-house adjoining, the
-brewing and baking houses with the granaries to the same, the barn and
-stables in the outer court.' The list of dwellings 'deemed to be
-superfluous' follows. 'The church, choir, and steeple covered with lead,
-the cloister covered with tiles and certain gutters of lead, the chapter
-house, the refectory (ffrayter), the dormitory, the convent kitchen and
-all the old lodgings between the granary and the hall door covered with
-tiles.' Then follow accounts of the lead and bells remaining, of the
-jewels, plate and silver 'reserved for the king's use,' and of the
-ornaments, goods and chattels which were sold. We further gather that the
-debts of the house were paid and that rewards and wages were given to the
-chaplain, officers and servants before they were turned away.
-
-As mentioned above the pensions given differed greatly, and the heads of
-wealthy houses were allowed considerable sums. Thus Elizabeth Souche,
-abbess of Shaftesbury, the yearly income of which house was taxed at
-£1166, received £133 a year and all her nuns to the number of fifty-five
-were pensioned. Dorothy Barley, abbess of Barking, a house taxed at £862,
-received a yearly pension of £133; while Elizabeth Shelley, abbess of St
-Mary's, Winchester, received only £26 a year. The prioress of St Andrew's,
-Marricks, a small house, received £5 annually, and her nuns a pension of
-from twenty to forty shillings each. Gasquet points out that a large
-number of those who were pensioned died during the first few years after
-the surrender[1135]. Probably many of them were old, but there is extant a
-pension roll of the year 1553 (reign of Philip and Mary) from which can be
-gathered that a certain number of pensioned monks and nuns were then alive
-and continued to draw their pensions. Gasquet further remarks that only a
-few of the nuns who were turned away are known to have married[1136];
-considering that hardly any are known to have left their convents
-voluntarily, and that many of the younger ones were turned away through
-the act of 1535, this seems only natural.
-
-Eye-witnesses as well as Cromwell's agents have left descriptions which
-give a striking picture of the brutality of the proceedings[1137]. But the
-hardships to which the convent inmates were exposed, the terrible waste of
-their property, and the senseless destruction of priceless art treasures,
-must not blind us to the fact that the breaking up of the monastic system
-was but an incident in one of the most momentous revolutions within
-historic record. The dissolution of the monasteries at the time of the
-Reformation, to be rightly estimated, must be considered as part of a
-wider change which was remoulding society on an altered basis.
-
-It is interesting to compare the view taken of monastic life at the time
-of the dissolution with the attitude taken towards convents in the
-following period. Some writings, as for example Lindesay in the play of
-the _Three Estates_, acted in the North in 1535[1138], severely censure
-the inclinations which are fostered in the convent.
-
-But strong as the feeling against convents and their inmates was in some
-instances at the time of the Reformation, when the system was once removed
-little antagonism remained towards those who had represented it. The
-thought of the nun, fifty years after she had passed away in England,
-roused no acrimony. Shakspere had no prejudice against her, and Milton was
-so far impressed in her favour that he represented 'Melancholy' under the
-form of a 'pensive nun, devout and pure,--Sober, steadfast and demure.' It
-was only at a much later period that the agitation raised by the fear of
-returning 'Popery' caused men to rake up scandals connected with convents
-and to make bugbears out of them.
-
-The losses incurred by the destruction of the convents were not however
-slow in making themselves felt; but as indifference towards women's
-intellectual interests had made part of the movement, a considerable time
-went by before the loss of the educational possibilities which the convent
-had secured to women was deplored. 'In the convents,' says Gasquet[1139],
-'the female portion of the population found their only teachers, the rich
-as well as the poor, and the destruction of these religious houses by
-Henry was the absolute extinction of any systematic education for women
-during a long period.' While devotion to domestic duties, exclusive of all
-other interests, continued to be claimed from women, the loss of their
-schools was a matter of indifference to society in general. But in
-proportion as shortcomings in women were felt, the thought arose that
-these might be due to want of training. The words in which the divine,
-Fuller ([Dagger] 1661), expressed such thoughts in the 17th century are
-well worth recalling. The vow of celibacy in his eyes remained a thing of
-evil, but short of this the convents had not been wholly bad.
-
-'They were good she schools wherein the girls and maids of the
-neighbourhood were taught to read and work; and sometimes a little Latin
-was taught them therein. Yea, give me leave to say, if such feminine
-foundations had still continued, provided no vow were obtruded upon them,
-(virginity is least kept where it is most constrained,) haply the weaker
-sex, besides the avoiding modern inconveniences, might be heightened to a
-higher perfection than hitherto hath been attained[1140].'
-
-
-§ 2. The Memoir of Charitas Pirckheimer.
-
-A memoir is extant from the pen of the abbess of a convent at Nürnberg. It
-was written (1524-28) during the stormy period following upon the outbreak
-of the Lutheran agitation, and it helps us to realize the effect which the
-rupture with Rome had on a convent of nuns. Charitas Pirckheimer, the
-author of this memoir, was the sister of Wilibald Pirckheimer ([Dagger]
-1530), a well-known humanist, and through him she was in touch with some
-of the leading representatives of learning and art of her day. She was
-well advanced in life and had many years of active influence behind her
-when the troubles began of which she has left a graphic description.
-
-An examination of the contents of her memoir must stand as a specimen of
-the effects which the Reformation had on women's convent life on the
-Continent, effects which varied in almost every town and every province.
-For the breaking up of the monastic system abroad had none of the
-continuity and completeness it had in England. The absence of centralised
-temporal and spiritual authority left the separate townships and
-principalities free to accept or reject the change of faith as they chose.
-The towns were ruled by councils on which the decision in the first place
-depended, and in the principalities the change depended on the attitude of
-prince and magnate, so that the succession of the prince of a different
-faith, or the conquest of one province by another, repeatedly led to a
-change of religion. In some districts the first stormy outbreak was
-followed by a reaction in favour of Rome, and convents which had disbanded
-were restored on a narrowed basis; in others the monastic system which had
-received a severe shock continued prostrate for many years. But even in
-those districts where the change of faith was permanently accepted, its
-influence on conventual establishments was so varied that an account of
-the way in which it put an end to nunneries lies beyond the scope of this
-work. It must suffice to point out that some convents, chiefly unreformed
-ones, disbanded or surrendered under the general feeling of restlessness;
-and that others were attacked and destroyed during the atrocities of the
-Peasants' War. The heads of others again, with a clearsightedness one
-cannot but admire, rejected Romish usages and beliefs in favour of the
-Lutheran faith, and their houses have continued to this day as homes for
-unmarried women of the aristocracy. Others were suffered to remain under
-the condition that no new members should be admitted, but that the old
-ones should be left in possession of their house till they died. To this
-latter class belonged the convent of St Clara at Nürnberg which we are
-about to discuss.
-
-The convent dated its existence from the year 1279, in which several nuns
-from Söflingen, near Ulm, joined a number of religious women who were
-living together at Nürnberg, and prevailed upon them to adopt the rule of
-St Clara and place themselves under the guardianship of the Franciscan
-friars who had settled in Nürnberg in 1226[1141]. It has been mentioned
-above that the nuns of this order, usually designated as Poor Clares, did
-not themselves manage that property of theirs which lay outside the
-precincts; they observed strict seclusion and were chiefly absorbed by
-devotional pursuits. Under the influence of the movement of monastic
-reform described in a previous chapter, Clara Gundelfingen (1450-1460),
-abbess of the house at Nürnberg, had greatly improved its discipline, and
-nuns were despatched from thence to convents at Brixen, Bamberg and other
-places to effect similar changes. There was another convent of nuns at
-Nürnberg dedicated to St Katherine which was under the supervision of the
-Dominican friars, but the convent of St Clara was the more important one
-and seems to have been largely recruited from members of wealthy burgher
-families. In 1476 it secured a bull from the Pope by which its use was
-altogether reserved to women who were born in Nürnberg.
-
-Charitas Pirckheimer came to live in the house (1478) at the age of
-twelve. She was one of a family of seven sisters and one brother; all the
-sisters entered convents, excepting one who married, and they were in time
-joined by three of the five daughters of their brother[1142]. These facts
-show that the women of most cultivated and influential families still felt
-convent life congenial. The Dominican writer Nider ([Dagger] 1438),
-speaking of convent life in the districts about Nürnberg, remarks that he
-had nowhere else found so many virtuous, chaste and industrious
-virgins[1143]. Of the members of the Pirckheimer family who became nuns,
-Clara ([Dagger] 1533) joined her sister Charitas and acted as secretary to
-her for many years; her letters show her to have been of a lively and
-sanguine disposition[1144]. Walpurg, another sister, lived as a nun in the
-convent of St Clara at Münich; Katharina became prioress at Geisenfeld,
-and Sabina and Euphemia entered the ancient Benedictine settlement of
-Bergen near Neuburg, of which they successively became abbesses. Sabina
-(1521-29), like her sister Charitas, was a great admirer of Albrecht
-Dürer, whom she consulted on the subject of illuminations done at her
-house[1145]. A number of her letters remain to show that she held opinions
-of her own on some points of doctrine and watched the progress of affairs
-at Nürnberg with interest[1146]. Her sister Euphemia (1529-47), who
-succeeded her, experienced even greater hardships than Charitas, for when
-Palgrave, Otto Heinrich of Neuburg, accepted the Protestant faith (1544),
-she and her nuns were expelled from their convent, and spent several years
-staying first at one place then at another, till the victory which the
-emperor Karl V won at Mühlberg (1547) made it possible for them to return
-to Bergen.
-
-Charitas on entering the house at Nürnberg found herself among the
-daughters of family friends and relations. She contracted a lasting
-friendship with Apollonia Tucher, who was afterwards elected to the office
-of prioress, which she held for many years. Apollonia was nearly related
-to Anton Tucher ([Dagger] 1524), one of the wealthiest and most
-influential men of the town, and to Sixtus Tucher ([Dagger] 1507), a
-learned divine who was made provost of the church of St Lorenz, and in
-this capacity instructed the nuns of St Clara and provided them with
-religious literature. Scheurl ([Dagger] 1542), a nephew of Apollonia and a
-distinguished jurist, who came to settle at Nürnberg, greatly admired
-Charitas. We shall return to him later on.
-
-Felicitas Grundherrin, another nun, who was made portress in 1503, wrote
-letters to her father which throw an additional light on the conduct and
-the experiences of the nuns during the period of religious contention.
-There were sixty inmates at that time, and among them we find the chief
-families of the town represented.
-
-We are not informed at what age Charitas made profession. In 1494 she was
-joined by her sister Clara, and a few years later, when we first hear of
-her and her sister in connection with their brother, she was engaged in
-teaching the novices.
-
-The career of Wilibald Pirckheimer, a man of considerable literary
-ability, is interesting, as it forms the centre of the intellectual and
-artistic life of Nürnberg, which at that time was achieving some of its
-greatest triumphs. The friend of Albrecht Dürer and of the leading
-humanists, he was himself full of enthusiasm for the revived interest in
-classic culture, and filled with that liberal appreciation of merit
-regardless of origin and nationality which is one of the attractive traits
-of the movement. In compliance with the taste of his age he had studied in
-Italy, and shortly after his return to Nürnberg, on the occasion of their
-father's death (1501), he lent his sisters, Charitas and Clara, a copy of
-the hymns of the Christian poet Prudentius, and an unnamed portion of
-Jerome's works, for their comfort and perusal; Charitas thanked him for
-the loan in a Latin letter in which we get our first glimpse of her[1147].
-She says that she has been interested to find among the hymns some which
-are habitually sung in the choir and the authorship of which was unknown
-to her, and she begs she may keep Jerome's writings for some time longer,
-as they afford her so much delight. She refers to the frequent loans of
-books from her brother and assures him how much she depends on him for her
-education, begging him to visit and further instruct her. She has some
-knowledge of scripture, she says, but barely enough to instruct the
-novices.
-
-In the year 1487 Celtes ([Dagger] 1508), a celebrated Latin scholar and
-poet, was crowned poet laureate by the Emperor Friedrich III at Nürnberg,
-and received at his hands the doctor's degree and a laurel wreath.
-Afterwards he travelled about in Germany, rousing interest in the revival
-of classical studies wherever he went, and encouraging those who were
-interested in learning to band together in societies (sodalitates) for the
-purpose of editing and publishing the classics. During a stay at a
-monastery in Regensburg (1501) he had come across the forgotten dramas of
-the nun Hrotsvith. They seemed to him so worthy of attention that he had
-them published at Nürnberg in a beautiful illustrated edition. We do not
-know if he was previously acquainted with Charitas; but he sent her a
-copy of the dramas, and she wrote a grateful reply[1148]. She begins by
-deploring the news she has heard that Celtes has been attacked and
-plundered by robbers. 'A few days ago,' she writes, 'I received the
-interesting writings of the learned virgin Hrotsvith, sent to me by you
-for no merits of my own, for which I express and owe you eternal
-gratitude. I rejoice that He who bestows powers of mind (largitor ingenii)
-and grants wisdom to men who are great and learned in the law, should not
-have denied to the frail and humbler sex some of the crumbs from the
-tables of wisdom. In this learned virgin the words of the apostle are
-verified that God chooses the humble to confound the strong....'
-
-Celtes was charmed by this letter, and was inspired to compose a Latin
-ode[1149] in praise of Charitas. In it he addressed her as the crown and
-star of womanhood, praised her for her knowledge of Latin, in which she
-worthily followed in the steps of a learned father and a learned brother,
-and enlarged on the pleasure her letter had brought. With the ode he sent
-a copy of a work on the city of Nürnberg lately published by him, and
-Charitas in reply sent a long letter which is most instructive in regard
-to the light it throws on her general attitude towards humanist
-culture[1150]. While delighted by the gifts and the attentions of so
-distinguished a man as Celtes, she felt critical towards the heathen
-element in him, which seemed to her incompatible with the claims of a
-higher morality. The letter is too long to reproduce in full, but the
-following are some of its most noteworthy passages. 'I am your unworthy
-pupil, but a great admirer of yours and a well-wisher for your salvation,
-and as such I would earnestly and with all my heart entreat you not indeed
-to give up the pursuit of worldly wisdom, but to put it to higher uses,
-that is to pass from heathen writings to holy scripture, from what is
-earthly to what is divine, from the created to the Creator.... Indeed
-neither knowledge nor any subject of investigation which is from God is to
-be contemned, but mystic theology and a good virtuous life must be ranked
-highest. For human understanding is weak and may fail us, but true faith
-and a good conscience never can. I therefore put before you, most learned
-doctor, when you have enquired into all under the sun, that the wisest of
-men said, Vanity of vanities.... In the same friendly spirit I would beg
-you to give up celebrating the unseemly tales of Jupiter, Venus, Diana,
-and other heathen beings whose souls are burning in Gehenna and who are
-condemned by right-minded men as detestable and deserving of oblivion;
-make the saints of God your friends by honouring their names and their
-memory, that they may guide you to the eternal home when you leave this
-earth.'
-
-At the end of her letter she begged to be excused writing in this strain
-in words which suggest that her brother had urged her to speak out her
-mind, and a further letter of hers addressed to Wilibald says that she is
-forwarding to him a copy of her letter to Celtes[1151]. She begs he will
-not bring him to the grating without sending her word previously, and
-expresses the belief that Celtes will not take umbrage.
-
-We hear no more of their intercourse. Celtes soon afterwards left
-Nürnberg, and when Helena Meichnerin, abbess of the convent, resigned on
-account of some complaints of the town council, Charitas was chosen abbess
-(1503). Her acceptance of the post was made conditional by the Franciscan
-friars on her giving up her Latin correspondence[1152], and there can be
-no doubt that this prohibition was primarily aimed at her intercourse with
-men like Celtes, who was known to be very lax in his morality, and whose
-sympathies in regard to learning were in direct opposition to the narrow
-religious views of the friars. Charitas conformed, but Wilibald's anger
-was roused, and he wrote to Celtes: 'You know that my sister Charitas has
-been chosen abbess. Imagine, those soft-footed men ([Greek: chulopodes])
-have forbidden her to write Latin for the future. Observe their caution,
-not to say roguery[1153].'
-
-Charitas apparently wrote no more Latin letters, but her brother's friends
-continued to take an interest in her. Wilibald had a sincere regard for
-her abilities and frequently wrote of her to his friends. Other members of
-the humanist circle sought her out. Scheurl, the young jurist mentioned
-above, sent her from Bologna a copy of his 'Uses of the mass' (Utilitates
-missae) with a flattering letter which was presented to her by the provost
-Tucher (1506)[1154]. It is overflowing with youthful enthusiasm, and says
-that of all the women he has met there are only two who are distinguished
-by abilities and intellect, knowledge and wealth, virtue and beauty, and
-are comparable to the daughters of Laelius and Hortensius and to Cornelia,
-mother of the Gracchi; the one is Cassandra (Fedele, poetess[1155]) in
-Venice, the other is Charitas in Nürnberg. He expatiates on the merits of
-the Pirckheimer family generally, and says Charitas is following the
-example of her relatives in preferring a book to wool, a pen to the
-distaff, a stilus to a needle. At a later stage of his career (1515)
-Scheurl wrote that it was usual for men who were distinguished in mind and
-power to admire and respect the abilities, learning and moral excellence
-of this abbess[1156].
-
-In 1513 Wilibald published an edition of Plutarch's essay 'On retribution'
-which he had translated from Greek into Latin, and dedicated it to his
-sister Charitas in a long and flattering epistle[1157]. Mindful no doubt
-of the influences about her and referring to difficulties in his own
-career, he spoke in the highest terms of the Stoic philosophers and of the
-help their writings afforded. 'Accept this gift on paper which, if I judge
-rightly, will not be displeasing to you,' he says, 'and carefully peruse
-the writings of this pagan author (gentilis). And you will soon see that
-the philosophers of antiquity did not stray far from the truth.' Charitas
-was able to appreciate this point of view and admitted in her reply that
-he had sent her a jewel more precious than gold and silver[1158]. Speaking
-of Plutarch she confessed that 'he writes not like an unbelieving heathen
-but like a learned divine and imitator of Christian perfection. It is a
-wonderful circumstance which has filled me with joy and surprise.' But she
-thought her brother's praise of her excessive. 'I am not learned myself,
-only the friend of those who are learned; I am no writer, I only enjoy
-reading the writings of others; I am unworthy of so precious a gift,
-though in truth you have done well and wisely in placing the word Charitas
-at the head of your work. For Charity is the virtue which makes all good
-things to be shared, and that Charity which is the Divine Spirit itself
-will reward you here and in the life to come, where honest efforts will be
-fully requited.'
-
-A short time afterwards Pirckheimer dedicated to his sister Clara, who was
-now teaching the novices, a 'Collection of the Moral Sentences of Nilus.'
-It was a translation from Greek and Latin, and the title was ornamented
-with a design by Dürer[1159]. He sent it 'to prevent her feeling any
-jealousy of her sister.' Clara shared her sister's tastes and was herself
-an ardent reader. When the New Testament edited by Erasmus appeared,
-Pirckheimer wrote to him that his sisters, who zealously read his
-writings, took great delight in this book also, and he says that they had
-greater insight into it than many men who were proud of their learning.
-They would have written themselves, he adds, if they had not felt shy of
-so great a man. Erasmus on one occasion compared the daughters of Sir
-Thomas More to the sisters of Wilibald Pirckheimer. Some writings of the
-humanist Reuchlin were also perused by them[1160].
-
-Wilibald further dedicated to Charitas his edition of the works of
-Fulgentius (1519), in a long preface in which he describes the difficulty
-he had had in procuring the manuscript from the library of his friend
-Tritheim, how he had despaired of deciphering it till the learned
-Cochlaeus came to his rescue, and how sure he felt that his sister would
-look upon the book as a treasure[1161]. The translation of the sermons of
-Gregorius Nazianzenus, an important undertaking, he also accomplished
-mainly for the use of his sisters[1162].
-
-Besides their devotional and intellectual interests, the nuns at St Clara
-made their own clothes, and seem to have had some ability in sewing, for
-when the imperial robes which were kept at Nürnberg were to be carried to
-Aachen for the coronation of the Emperor Karl V, they were first given
-into the hands of the nuns to be looked over and mended[1163].
-
-An interesting light is thrown on the less serious side of the character
-of Charitas by an amusing German letter which she wrote to Dürer and two
-envoys of Nürnberg who were staying at Augsburg in 1518 on the occasion of
-the Imperial Diet. From there they had sent her a missive penned in a
-jovial hour, and Charitas in reply wrote[1164]: 'I received your friendly
-letter with special delight and read it with such attention that my eyes
-were often brim full, but more from laughing than any other emotion. Many
-thanks to you that in spite of your great business and your amusements you
-should have taken the trouble to give directions to this little nun about
-cloister-life, of which you have a clear mirror before you at present....'
-And she begs the envoy Spengler to study accounts with a view to advising
-her how to waste everything till nothing remains, and begs Dürer, 'who is
-such a draughtsman and genius,' to give his attention to the buildings, so
-that when she has the choir rebuilt he may help and advise her how to
-introduce larger windows so that the nuns' eyes may be less dim.
-
-From these various notices we conclude that time passed not unpleasantly
-or unprofitably with the abbess of St Clara before those contentions began
-which followed upon the attack made on the established religion by Luther.
-In Nürnberg, as in most other cities, the feeling was general that the
-life of the prelacy was degenerate and that the Papacy was a hotbed of
-abuse. Luther's opposition to the Pope was therefore greeted with
-acclamation both by the enlightened men of the town, who felt that the
-tyranny of the Church was a stumblingblock in the way of progress, and by
-the people, who readily seized the idea that the means were now given them
-to break through class tyranny. Wilibald Pirckheimer was among those who
-without hesitation sided with the Lutheran agitation, but Charitas thought
-otherwise. The abbess of the convent of St Clara at Eger forwarded to her
-some of the fierce attacks on Luther from the pen of Emser ([Dagger]
-1527), and Charitas was so delighted with them that she had them read out
-aloud to the nuns during meals, and was prompted to write a letter to
-their author[1165].
-
-This letter became a source of great annoyance to her. It fell into the
-hands of Emser's enemies, and was published with an abusive running
-comment on Charitas[1166]. Even Wilibald was annoyed and declared she
-would have done better not to have written it. He strongly supported the
-Lutheran agitation at the time, and Eck, who suspected him of having
-written the attack on himself, entitled 'Eccius Dedolatus,' for personal
-reasons inscribed Wilibald's name on the Papal ban. There is extant from
-Wilibald's pen a fragment in which he expresses doubts as to the
-rightfulness of convent life generally[1167], but he gradually modified
-his views. The violence and narrowness of the representatives of the party
-of progress in Nürnberg were little to his taste. On the plea of
-ill-health he withdrew from the council, and took no part in the stormy
-discussions of 1523, when the rupture with Rome was declared complete
-and decisions arrived at, momentous for the future of the new faith not
-only in Nürnberg, but in Germany generally.
-
-At this juncture the memoir of Charitas[1168] begins. She describes the
-effect of the Lutheran teaching; how ceremonies are being abolished, rules
-and vows declared vain, so that many monks and nuns are leaving their
-cloisters, putting off convent garb and marrying and otherwise doing as
-they choose.
-
-'These various reasons brought us many troubles and difficulties,' she
-writes (p. 2), 'for many powerful and evil-minded persons came to see the
-friends they had in our cloister, and argued with them and told them of
-the new teaching, how the religious profession was a thing of evil and
-temptation in which it was not possible to keep holy, and that we were all
-of the devil. Some would take their children, sisters and relatives out of
-the cloister by force and by the help of admonitions and promises of which
-they doubtless would not have kept half. This arguing and disputing went
-on for a long time and was often accompanied by great anger and abuse. But
-since none of the nuns by God's grace was moved to go, the fault was laid
-on the Franciscans, and everyone said they encouraged us, so that it would
-be impossible to convince us of the new belief while we had them as
-preachers and confessors.'
-
-The friars had long been odious for their determined class feeling,
-religious intolerance, and encouragement of superstitions; it was obvious
-that the advocates of change would direct their attacks against them.
-Charitas, fully aware of the emergency, assembled the nuns and put before
-them the danger of being given over to 'wild priests and apostate monks,'
-and with their consent decided to hand in a 'supplication' to the town
-council. This council was presided over by three leading men (triumviri),
-of whom one named Nützel was the so-called representative (pfleger) of the
-convent, another named Ebner had a daughter among the nuns, and the third,
-Geuder, was the brother-in-law of Charitas. She consulted Wilibald on the
-matter of the supplication, but forthwith wrote and despatched a letter to
-each of these three men, begging and claiming the protection of her
-privileges.
-
-The supplication itself (p. 12) was carefully worded, and requested that
-the connection between the Franciscans and the nuns might not be severed,
-contradicting the charges which were brought against the former. They do
-not forbid the nuns to read the Evangels and other books, Charitas
-says,--'if they did so we should not obey them.' The nuns have the Old and
-the New Testament in daily use in the German and the Latin versions.
-Charitas denies despising the married state or retaining nuns by force.
-'But as we compel no one, so too we claim not to be compelled, and to
-remain free in mind as well as in body. But this cannot be if we are given
-over to strange priests, which would be destruction to our community ...,'
-and more to a like purpose.
-
-The supplication was handed in at the beginning of 1524, but after
-considerable delay the councillors postponed giving a definite reply to
-it. In the meantime Charitas was much annoyed by the mother of one of her
-nuns who tried to persuade her daughter to leave the convent, and finding
-her words of no avail, appealed to the town council (p. 19) for an order
-to take her 'out of this prison' as she called it, into which she had sent
-her nine years before at the age of fourteen. Charitas also sent in a
-statement of the case (p. 28), but again no reply was vouchsafed her.
-
-The letters which Clara wrote to her brother about this time help us to
-realise the situation. All her letters are undated, but in one she thanks
-Wilibald for his advice about the supplication, and says that if divine
-service should really be abolished she means to devote herself more to
-reading, for 'the dear beloved old writers surely were no fools[1169].' In
-another she thanks him for the loan of books and says a work of Erasmus
-(probably _De libero arbitrio_) has pleased the sisters by its moderation.
-As to Charitas 'she finds great comfort in her beloved old Cyprian, in
-whose writings she reads day and night. She sends greetings and the
-message that she prefers Cyprian to all these new evangelists who strut
-about in cut garments and golden chains[1170].'
-
-Though Clara did not lose her cheerfulness, Charitas, who saw further, was
-full of apprehension. From what her sister says she regretted the severe
-tone of her letter to Geuder[1171]. On other occasions also she was led to
-indignant utterances which she afterwards regretted[1172].
-
-A gap occurs at this period in her memoir which she resumed writing in
-March 1525, after the religious disputation had taken place at Nürnberg.
-After many stormy scenes, 'the preachers of the Evangel,' as they called
-themselves, decided to carry out their intentions without waiting for the
-decision of a Church Council. The immediate result of the decision was an
-attack on all religious houses. But in the convent of St Clara the
-determined and reckless energy of the reformers was matched by indignant
-protest and unyielding opposition on the part of the abbess.
-
-Charitas has described in full (p. 33) how a deputation from the town
-council asked to be admitted into her house, and how they informed her and
-the assembled nuns that their connection with the Franciscans was at an
-end; a 'reformed' preacher had been appointed to preach in the church of
-the nuns, and they were left the choice among several men who would act to
-them as confessors. Much argument followed, but Charitas maintained that
-her house and the Franciscans had always been closely connected. 'If we
-yield it is only to force and we turn to God,' she said, 'and before Him
-we lodge a protest and declare that we are forced against our will, and
-that we reject and discountenance all your proposals.' The assembled nuns
-rose to their feet to shew their approval of her speech, and the
-deputation in vain tried the effect of persuasion. Charitas scorned the
-idea of having anything to do with apostate monks; and the deputation
-retired after blaming the women for behaving in a most ungrateful manner.
-A second visit led to similar results; Charitas abode by her decision, the
-nuns wept, and the deputation retired after venting their indignation in
-threats.
-
-The hopes of the convent now centred in Nützel, their representative in
-the town council, and Charitas with her brother's approval wrote to him
-(p. 41) begging him to come to her. But the first words Nützel spoke
-dispelled every hope of assistance from that quarter; he blamed the nuns
-for opposing the council, and urged the advisability of their giving way.
-Charitas was most indignant and declared she was well aware that it was
-intended to force them to this new belief, but that they were agreed that
-neither in life nor in death would they listen to what the Church had not
-previously countenanced. She called upon the prioress to read out a second
-petition to the council asking to have their father confessor back or else
-to be left without one. She wanted Nützel to take charge of this petition,
-but he was only angered, and taking Charitas aside, represented to her
-that her opposition was a serious matter; her example was encouraging
-other women's convents to opposition, which would relent if she did. He
-said that by resigning and disbanding the convent bloodshed would be
-averted, and he spoke in praise of the new preacher. But Charitas remained
-unmoved. As he was leaving the house his daughter and the other nuns,
-whose fathers were members of the town council, went down on their knees
-to him imploring protection. He refused to listen, but was so far
-impressed that he never slept all the following night, as his wife
-afterwards told the nuns (p. 54).
-
-The convent's opposition to their plans was a source not only of annoyance
-but of apprehension to the town authorities. The peasants' rising was
-spreading in the direction of Nürnberg, and as popular feeling was against
-religious houses the argument that dissolving the house might help to
-avert a danger was not altogether unfounded. Nützel in a long
-expostulation (p. 55) shortly afterwards tried to impress this view on the
-abbess, but Charitas urged (p. 59) that other reasons besides hatred of
-the friars had roused the peasants to rebellion, and complained that the
-ill-feeling against her house was largely due to the reformed preachers,
-who declared they would not rest till they had driven monks and nuns out
-of the town (p. 62). Rightly or wrongly she held that Poliander, the
-reformed preacher who was now preaching in the convent church, had been
-promised a reward if he persuaded her or her nuns to leave the convent (p.
-67), and that his want of success aggravated his hatred of them. It was in
-vain that Nützel wrote in praise of him (p. 67). Charitas now looked upon
-Nützel as a dangerous enemy, and her sister Clara wrote to Wilibald[1173]
-begging him to advise the convent how to get rid of the man. In another
-letter[1174] she said that Charitas was seriously afraid of him.
-
-In place of the Franciscans a number of reformed preachers now preached
-before the nuns and the people in the convent church. Among them was
-Osiander, formerly a Carthusian, whose violence at a later period was
-censured and resented by his Protestant brethren; and the nuns were
-obliged to attend and to listen to a torrent of abuse and imprecation by
-him and others. 'I cannot and will not detail,' says Charitas in her
-memoir (p. 70), 'how they perverted Holy Writ to a strange meaning, how
-they cast down the doctrines of the Church and discarded all ceremonies;
-how they abused and reviled all religious orders and classes, and
-respected neither Pope nor Emperor, whom they openly called tyrant, devil,
-and Antichrist; how roughly and in what an unchristian-like spirit and
-against all brotherly love they abused us and charged us with great
-wickedness, for the purpose of rousing the people, whom they persuaded
-that an ungodly set like ourselves should be destroyed, our cloister
-broken open, ourselves dragged out by force, since we represented a
-despicable class, heretics, idolatrous and blasphemous people, who were
-eternally of the devil.'
-
-One might be tempted to look upon this description as an exaggeration were
-it not for a letter from Wilibald Pirckheimer to Melanchthon, in which he
-describes the outrages to which the nuns were exposed in similar terms.
-'The preachers scream, swear, and storm, and do everything in their power
-to rouse the hatred of the masses against the poor nuns; they openly say
-that as words were of no avail, recourse should be had to force,' and he
-wonders the cloister has not yet been attacked[1175].
-
-Under the pressure of popular opinion and increasing restlessness the
-Austin monks gave over their house, and they were followed by the
-Carmelites, the Benedictines, and the Carthusians. The Dominicans
-hesitated; the Franciscans refused to go. Charitas expresses wonder that
-the 'spiritual poison,' as she calls it, which the preachers several times
-a week tried to infuse into the nuns, took no effect, and that none of
-them expressed a desire to leave the convent (p. 85).
-
-Things had now come to such a pass that convents outside the city
-disbanded before the peasants' rising; and nuns from Pillenreuth and
-Engelthal sought refuge in the town with the nuns of St Clara (p. 86).
-These lived in daily fear of their house being stormed, for the people
-shouted and swore at them from below, threw stones into the choir, smashed
-the church windows, and sang insulting songs in the churchyard outside.
-But the nuns, nothing daunted, continued to keep the hours and to ring the
-bells, though they were every moment prepared for the worst. Clara in a
-letter to Wilibald described her own and her sister's fears in eloquent
-terms[1176]; and the nun Felicitas Grundherrin wrote to her father
-entreating him to abide by the old faith[1177]. In these days the nuns
-seem to have read a good deal of pamphlet literature, but they failed to
-see anything beyond an encouragement to violence and disorder in the whole
-Lutheran movement.
-
-A further attempt was made by the council to coerce the convent. A number
-of injunctions were sent to the abbess which were to be carried out within
-a month (p. 88). The first of these commanded her to absolve the nuns from
-their vow that they might enjoy 'Christian freedom'; another that she
-should send the young nuns home though they refused, 'since children
-should obey their parents.' The deputies who laid these injunctions before
-the abbess assured her that the council was prepared to restore to the
-nuns what they had brought to the convent; that they would give money to
-those who had brought nothing, and provide a dower for those who married.
-To these arguments Charitas replied that the nuns had made a vow not
-before her but before God, that it was not in her power to dispense them
-from it and that she would not urge them to disobedience. With a touch of
-bitterness she added that their mothers were continually at the convent
-grating urging them to go (p. 87). For the matrons of the town especially
-sided with the reformed preachers and cried shame on convent life. 'If it
-were not for the women and the preachers things would not be so bad,'
-Clara wrote on one occasion to Wilibald[1178], and on another she spoke of
-the sharp tongues and violent behaviour of the women.
-
-The deputation further claimed that the nuns should take off their convent
-clothes (p. 93), the sight of which they said gave umbrage. 'We are
-continually told,' Charitas replied, 'that our vows and our clothes
-threaten to cause a rising, but it is your preachers, to whom we are
-forced to listen, who try to provoke one by abusing and condemning us from
-the pulpit and charging us with vices and impurity to humour the people.'
-The command was also given to do away with the convent grating; and it was
-backed by the threat that if Charitas failed to comply with it the town
-authorities would throw open the house to all visitors. The heaviness of
-this blow was such that after the deputation had left Charitas summoned
-the nuns and asked their intentions severally. In the eyes of the whole
-convent throwing open the house involved turning it into a public resort
-of bad character. They felt they must yield or leave the house
-altogether, but they promised to abide by the decision of Charitas if she
-would stay and advise them. The intrepid abbess decided to do away with
-the grating at one window, declaring that they acted against the rule
-under protest and only temporarily. On the other points she sought the
-advice of learned men outside, but they advised compromise, for, to give
-her own words (p. 95), 'they said all chance was gone of gaining anything
-by opposition; we must yield if we did not want the house to go to ruin.
-People now did things by main force regardless of justice or equity,
-fearful neither of Pope nor Emperor, nor even of God except in word;
-things were such that these people said, What we will must be done, thus
-and not otherwise, declaring themselves more powerful than the Pope
-himself.'
-
-In the meantime the feelings against the nunnery were by no means
-unanimous. Geuder, the brother-in-law of Charitas, was emphatic at the
-council meeting in denouncing the throwing open of convents, which in his
-eyes also meant turning them into disreputable houses[1179]. But no amount
-of opposition made by him and others could prevent a scene from being
-enacted in the convent chapel, which was afterwards looked upon as
-disgraceful, not only by those who provoked it, but by outsiders whether
-partisans of the Lutheran movement or not. The repeated attempts to
-persuade the nuns to leave having failed and Charitas refusing to bid them
-go, two of the chief councillors, one of them Nützel, the representative
-of the convent's interests, and the widow of a councillor who had long
-clamoured for her daughter's release, repaired to the convent with a
-number of other persons, claimed to be admitted, and declared they had
-come to fetch their daughters away. The three nuns, who were between
-nineteen and twenty-three years of age, tried to hide, but Charitas bade
-them come forth, and they then sought refuge with her in the convent
-chapel. She has described in full how the young women besought her to
-protect them, how their parents and others abused and reviled them, and
-how in spite of their protests, their indignation and their tears, their
-relations at last resorted to violence. Four persons seized each nun and
-dragged and pushed her out of the chapel, while the women present shouted
-approval, and once outside their convent clothes were torn off and others
-substituted in their stead. After a scuffle and a scramble in which one
-nun was knocked over and her foot injured, they were carried to a
-chariot waiting outside and conveyed away.
-
-Charitas remained behind in grief and despair. 'I and all my nuns are so
-distressed at all this,' she wrote a few days later[1180], 'that I have
-almost wept out my eyes.... Nothing ever so went to my heart.' Indignation
-at the violence of the act became general in the town and spread beyond
-its confines. 'I never could have imagined women acting in such a cruel
-manner,' Sabina, the abbess of Bergen, wrote to Wilibald; and in another
-letter, apprehending the destruction of the convent at Nürnberg, she
-proposed that Charitas and her nuns should seek refuge with her[1181].
-
-But Charitas persisted in holding her ground, though with an aching heart.
-When the men who had fetched away their daughters sent word offering to
-pay for their maintenance during the time they had lived with her, she
-refused. Her trials in one direction had reached their climax,--the
-councillor Nützel, who admitted that things had gone too far, henceforth
-acted in a conciliatory spirit, and some approximation took place between
-them. Not that he ever tired of urging Charitas to desert her convent and
-her cause, but he now confined himself to persuasion and argument, and
-when one of the young nuns who had been carried off was so far reconciled
-to the world that she came to the convent window and urged her step-sister
-to return home, pretending that Nützel had sent her (p. 123), the
-councillor disclaimed having done so. His correspondence with Charitas,
-which she has faithfully inserted in her memoir, shows that she patiently
-listened to every argument in favour of the new doctrines. She had a
-conversation with the preacher Osiander which lasted four hours (p. 128),
-she listened to over a hundred sermons preached by the Lutherans, and she
-read their writings, yet she could find nothing to her taste and it seemed
-easy to her to confound their arguments. Her letters show that her
-unhappiness was great, for on one occasion she went so far as to put
-before Nützel (p. 122) what the result would be if women like themselves,
-many of whom were over sixty and several over seventy, returned to the
-world and tried to earn their living, as everyone said they ought to do.
-She declared she detained no one, the nuns were at liberty to go if they
-chose; everyone was giving her advice, she said, but she saw no salvation
-in the new doctrines, which did not appeal to her. Her readiness to listen
-to argument caused Nützel to set his hopes on a conference between
-Melanchthon and her (p. 133), and probably at the instigation of Wilibald,
-who was deeply grieved at the injustice done to his sisters without being
-able to give them direct help, Melanchthon, who was well known for his
-uprightness and conciliatory influence, came to Nürnberg towards the close
-of the year 1525. 'I am glad to hear Melanchthon is coming,' Charitas
-wrote; 'since I have heard he is an irreproachable, upright and
-justice-loving man, I do not suppose he can approve of what has been done
-here.'
-
-Nützel at once (p. 149) brought him to the convent. 'A few days later our
-representative came with Philip Melanchthon,' Charitas wrote, 'who spoke
-much about the new faith, but finding that we set our hopes more on the
-grace of God than on our works, he said we might as well seek our
-salvation in the cloister as in the world.' They had a long talk together
-and agreed on all points except on the subject of vows, for these the
-reformer declared were not binding, while Charitas maintained that a
-promise made to God must be kept. She describes Melanchthon as more
-moderate in his speech than she had ever known a Lutheran to be.
-Melanchthon, on hearing the various points of the case, blamed the
-councillors for having forbidden the Franciscans to confer with the
-convent, and for forcibly taking the nuns out of the cloister. 'I trust
-God has sent this Lutheran at the right hour,' Charitas wrote, 'for they
-were discussing whether or not to expel nuns generally, pull down their
-houses, and put the older inmates of those convents which would not
-surrender into one house, driving back the younger ones into the world'
-(p. 171).
-
-According to her account Melanchthon represented to the council that no
-convent at Wittenberg had been destroyed by force, and after a great deal
-of argument it was decreed to make one more effort to persuade the nuns to
-go, and failing this to leave them alone. No concessions were made with
-regard to the friars, the nuns remained without a minister to take their
-confessions and to administer the sacrament, but after all the nuns had
-been severally asked if they wished to stay or to go, and only one
-declared herself ready to leave the house, the rest were left in
-possession till the end of their days.
-
-With the account of the last visitation, which took place in 1528, the
-memoir of Charitas ends. From other sources we hear that short of
-annoyances about her income and a tax levied on the convent she remained
-unmolested, and passed the last few years of her life in peace. At the
-close of 1528, the fiftieth anniversary of her entering the convent, and
-the twenty-fifth year of her appointment as abbess, was celebrated with
-some amount of cheerfulness. Wilibald and others sent presents, and after
-dinner the nuns danced to the sound of the dulcimer (hackbrett), which the
-abbess played[1182]. Wilibald's interest in the convent continued, and
-towards the close of his life we find him busy writing a pamphlet in
-justification of the nuns[1183], in which he developed at some length the
-arguments against those who had oppressed and coerced them. He died in
-1530, and within a couple of years was followed by his sister Charitas
-(1533). Her sister Clara ruled the convent for a few months after her and
-was succeeded by Wilibald's daughter Charitas. The number of nuns was
-slowly but steadily dwindling; before the close of the century the house
-had fallen into the hands of the town council by default.
-
-The abbess Charitas Pirckheimer worthily represents the monastic life of
-women at the close of the Middle Ages. Faithful to the system she had
-embraced, she remained true to her convictions to the last, with a
-fearlessness, candour, and determination which give her attitude a touch
-of heroism. She is one among many staunch adherents to the old faith who
-experienced hardships which simple humanity and feelings of equity and
-justice alike condemned, but whose steadfastness could not save their
-cause from being lost.
-
-
-
-
-CONCLUSION.
-
-
-My task has drawn to its close. In a series of chapters, incompletely no
-doubt but I trust not superficially, the position of woman under
-monasticism has been brought before the reader, and some account has been
-given of the various aspects of convent life. In conclusion it seems well
-to pause and look back over the ground traversed, to take in at a glance
-what Catholic tradition, convent-life and saint-lore have done for women
-in the past. The area over which the reader has been taken is a wide one,
-and the ground in many directions remains unexplored. Still some of the
-most prominent landmarks have been noted, and some districts carefully
-examined. Thus while further information might be sought concerning many
-special points, it still seems legitimate to form a general survey and to
-draw certain conclusions.
-
-Turning back to the earliest period when Christianity with its new
-conceptions first came into contact with beliefs dating from a distant
-heathen era, we have seen how many sentiments and associations of ideas
-peculiar to pre-Christian times lived on and were absorbed into the new
-religion. The early representatives of Christianity, with a keen-sighted
-appreciation of the means by which a change of religion is most
-successfully effected, treated the older conceptions with tolerance, and
-by doing so made possible the establishment of new ideas in the old
-heathen setting. The legends and the cult of the saints contain a mine of
-wealth as yet little explored by the student of primitive civilization and
-folk-lore, a mine which has here been tapped at one vein only,--namely for
-the information it yields on the antiquity of beliefs which attach to
-certain women who are reckoned among the saints.
-
-Passing from the ground of tradition to that of history we have seen how
-the convent was looked upon with favour by women of the newly converted
-barbarian races, and how readily they availed themselves of the protection
-which the Christian religion held out to them. This development also
-needed to be studied side by side with previous social conditions in order
-to stand out in its true light, and it gained a new meaning when
-considered in connection with the elements of older folk tradition which
-it absorbed. The representatives of Christianity, profiting by a surviving
-love of independence among womankind, turned the energies of women into
-new channels, and giving scope to their activity in new directions,
-secured their help in the cause of peaceful progress. The outward
-conditions of life were such that the woman who joined the convent made
-her decision once for all. But provided she agreed to forego the claims of
-family and sex, an honourable independence was secured to her, and she was
-brought into contact with the highest aims of her age. At a period when
-monasteries, placed in the remote and uncultivated districts, radiated
-peace and civilization throughout the neighbourhood, many women devoted
-themselves to managing settlements which in the standard they attained,
-vied in excellence with the settlements managed by men.
-
-At the outset many married women left their husbands for the purpose of
-founding and governing convents; sometimes they founded convents the
-management of which they left to others, and themselves retired to them
-later in life. The prestige and advantages enjoyed by the heads of
-religious settlements were such that kings and queens frequently installed
-their daughters as abbesses in preference to seeking for them matrimonial
-alliances, and these princesses were joined by many daughters of the most
-influential families, who gladly availed themselves of the opportunity of
-embracing the religious vocation. Through their close contact with
-high-born women, convents maintained a high tone in manners, morals and
-general behaviour, and grew into important educational centres, the
-beneficent influence of which was generally recognised.
-
-The career open to the inmates of convents both in England and on the
-continent was greater than any other ever thrown open to women in the
-course of modern European history; abilities might raise the nun to the
-rank of abbess, a position of substantial authority. In the Kentish
-charter, to which reference has been made, the names of the abbesses as
-representatives of religion follow those of the bishops. In Saxony it fell
-to an abbess to act as representative of the emperor during his absence.
-As independent landowners, who held their property of and from king and
-emperor, the abbess took rank with the lords temporal and spiritual in the
-right of jurisdiction which they exercised, and in the right of being
-represented in Parliament or at the Imperial Diet as the case might be.
-
-While fulfilling the duties which devolved on them in virtue of their
-station, abbesses did not neglect their opportunities of keeping in touch
-with culture and of widening their mental horizon. In Anglo-Saxon England
-men who attained to distinction received their training in settlements
-governed by women. Histories and a chronicle of unique value were inspired
-by and drafted under the auspices of Saxon abbesses. For nuns Ealdhelm
-wrote his most famous treatises, and several valuable contemporary
-biographies, such as those of Sturmi and of Robert of Fontevraud, were
-written at the express desire of nuns. And while eager in encouraging
-productiveness in others, they were not slow in trying to develop their
-own literary powers. In the 6th century Radegund was writing epistles in
-verse under the tuition of an exiled Latin poet; to an Anglo-Saxon nun
-whose name is not recorded we owe one of the earliest and most interesting
-accounts extant of a journey to Palestine. In the 8th century the nun
-Lioba was trying her hand at Latin verse in a convent in Thanet; in the
-10th century the nun Hrotsvith in Saxony was composing Latin dramas on the
-model of Terence. The contributions of nuns to literature as well as
-incidental remarks show that the curriculum of study in the nunnery was as
-liberal as that accepted by monks, and embraced all available writing,
-whether by Christian or profane authors. While Scripture and the writings
-of the Fathers of the Church at all times formed the groundwork of
-monastic studies, Cicero at this period was read by the side of Boethius,
-Virgil by the side of Martianus Capella, Terence by the side of Isidor of
-Sevilla. From remarks made by Hrotsvith we see that the coarseness of the
-later Latin dramatists made no reason for their being forbidden to nuns,
-though she would have seen it otherwise; and Herrad was so far impressed
-by the wisdom of the heathen philosophers of antiquity that she pronounced
-this wisdom to be the 'product of the Holy Spirit also.' Throughout the
-literary world as represented by convents, the use of Latin was general,
-and made possible the even spread of culture in districts that were widely
-remote from each other and practically without intercourse.
-
-The educational influence of convents during centuries cannot be rated
-too highly. Not only did their inmates attain considerable knowledge, but
-education in a nunnery, as we saw from the remarks of Chaucer and others,
-secured an improved standing to those who were not professed. The fact
-that a considerable number of women's houses after the monastic revival of
-the 11th and 12th centuries were founded largely at the instigation of
-men, proves that the usefulness of these institutions was generally
-recognised.
-
-While devoted to reading and study which pre-eminently constituted the
-religious vocation, nuns during their leisure hours cultivated art in
-several of its branches. Spinning and weaving were necessarily practised
-in all settlements during many centuries, for the inmates of these
-settlements made the clothes which they wore. But weaving and embroidery,
-always essentially woman's work, found a new development in the convent,
-and works of marked excellence were produced both in England and abroad.
-The painstaking industry, which goes far in the production of such work,
-was reflected in the activity of women as scribes and illuminators, and
-the names of several nuns who were famous for their writing have been
-handed down to posterity. In the twofold domain of learning and art the
-climax of productiveness was reached in the person of Herrad, in whom a
-wide range of intellectual interests and a keen appreciation of study
-combined with considerable artistic skill and a certain amount of
-originality.
-
-Side by side with literary and artistic pursuits nuns were active in the
-cause of philanthropy. Several women who had the sufferings of their
-fellows at heart are numbered among the saints; and under the auspices of
-Hildegard a book was compiled on the uses of natural products in health
-and disease, which forms a landmark in the history of mediæval medicine.
-
-With the consciousness of the needs of others came too a keener power of
-self-realisation. The attention of nuns was turned to the inner life, and
-here again their productiveness did not fail them. The contributions to
-mystical literature by nuns are numerous, and their writings, which took
-the form of spiritual biography, legendary romance, or devotional
-exercise, were greatly appreciated and widely read by their
-contemporaries. Even now-a-days they are recommended as devotional works
-by the Catholic Church.
-
-We have seen that the position of the convent was throughout influenced by
-the conditions of the world outside it; changes in outside political,
-intellectual and social life necessarily made themselves felt in the
-convent. Consequent upon the spread of the feudal system of land tenure,
-which in the interest of an improved military organisation reserved the
-holding of property for men, women forfeited their chance of founding and
-endowing independent monasteries, and the houses founded after the
-monastic revival never attained a position comparable with that of those
-dating from the earlier period. As monasteries were theoretically safe
-against infringement of their privileges by prince or bishop owing to
-their connection with Rome, the relation of the Pope to temporal rulers
-and to the greater ecclesiastics directly affected them, and when the
-power of the Pope was relaxed they were at the mercy of prince and bishop.
-We have seen how kings of England appropriated alien priories, and how
-wilfully princes abroad curtailed the privileges of nunneries, the support
-of their prelates giving countenance to these changes. At a later period a
-considerable number of women's convents were interfered with by churchmen,
-who on the plea of instituting reforms took advantage of their position to
-appropriate the convent property.
-
-A change of a different kind which affected the convent in its educational
-and intellectual standing was the growth of university centres, and the
-increased facilities afforded to the student of visiting different centres
-in succession. In the 9th century Bede who never stirred from his convent
-might attain intellectual excellence; such a course was impossible in the
-13th and 14th centuries when the centre of education lay in the
-disputations which animated the lecture room. Some of the progressive
-monasteries of men lessened the loss they felt by securing a house at the
-university to which they sent their more promising pupils, but the tone at
-the mediæval university was such that one cannot wonder that no attempt
-was made in this direction by the convents of women. As a natural result
-their intellectual standard for a time remained stationary, and then,
-especially in the smaller and remoter settlements, it fell. This led to a
-want of interest in intellectual acquirements among nuns, and it was
-accompanied by a growing indifference in the outside world to the
-intellectual acquirements of women generally.
-
-Not that the desire to maintain a high standard had passed away from
-women's convents. The readiness with which many houses adopted the chance
-of betterment held out to them by the congregations of the 15th century,
-goes far to prove that nuns continued to identify the idea of salvation
-with a high moral tone and an application to study. But study now ran
-along a narrow groove, for the monastic reformers favoured devotional
-study only. The nuns, who were impressed by the excellence of the
-reformers' motives, and prevented by circumstances from forming opinions
-of their own in the matter, showed an increasing readiness to adopt their
-views. The friars led the way in this direction by cutting off the nuns,
-given into their care, from the management of outside affairs; they were
-followed by the order of Sion, and by the congregations of Bursfeld and
-Windesheim, all of which alike urged that the primary duty of a nun was
-sanctification of self. The interest of this movement lies in the
-voluminous devotional literature it called forth, a literature full of
-spiritual beauty, but in the production of which nuns, so far as we know,
-took no share. By writing out oral sermons they helped, however, to
-preserve and spread them. The change which had come over the convent life
-of women cramped rather than stimulated their intellectual vitality, and
-the system of which they made part was apparently beyond their control.
-The author of 'Holy Maidenhood' in the 13th century called the nun the
-free woman, and contrasted her with the wife who in his eyes was the
-slave. But Erasmus at the beginning of the 16th century urged that the
-woman who joined the convent by doing so became a slave, while she who
-remained outside was truly free. Erasmus also insisted on the fact that
-there was no reason why a woman should enter a convent, as she might as
-well stay in the world and remain unmarried if she so preferred. In point
-of fact social conditions had so far changed that society no longer called
-to the Church for protection of its daughters. For a time the convent
-ranked high as an educational establishment; then this use began to pass
-away also, and it was largely on account of the provision religious houses
-made for unmarried women that they still continued in favour with a
-portion of the community.
-
-Many historians have advocated the view that the Protestant reformers
-discovered the abuses of the monastic system, and finding these
-intolerable, swept the whole system away. The evidence adduced above in
-connection with the dissolution shows that matters were far otherwise,
-that the dissolution of convents was accompanied by many regrettable
-incidents, and that as far as England is concerned, it may confidently be
-called premature. For many years those who sought progress by peaceful
-educational means seemed to be confronted only by hopeless and sanguinary
-confusion; they passed away with the belief that the whole movement they
-had witnessed was opposed to real progress, holding the view that the
-Protestants were innovators of the worst and most dangerous kind.
-
-However, as far as convents are concerned, it seems as though the
-Protestant reformers, far from acting as innovators, had done no more than
-give violent and extreme application to forces which had for some time
-been at work. The dissolution was led up to by a succession of conventual
-changes, and before the outbreak of the Lutheran agitation, at least one
-well-wisher of the system in Germany, Tritheim, had despaired of putting
-this system to new and effective uses. Not that monasticism can be said to
-have generally outlived its purposes at the time of the Reformation. In
-some countries, as in France and Spain, it subsequently chronicled
-important developments. But where German elements were prevalent, convents
-were either swept away, or put to altogether different uses by the
-Protestants, or else allowed to continue on a very much narrowed basis by
-the Catholics. Many convents fell utterly to decay in course of time and
-ceased to exist at the beginning of this century, others again still
-linger on but are mere shadows of their former brilliant selves.
-
-The reason for these changes lay not altogether with those who professed
-religion in convents, they were part of a wider change which remoulded
-society on an altered basis. For the system of association, the groundwork
-of mediæval strength and achievement, was altogether giving way at the
-time of the Reformation. The socialistic temper was superseded by
-individualistic tendencies which were opposed to the prerogatives
-conferred on the older associations. These tendencies have continued to
-the present with slight abatements, and have throughout proved averse to
-the continuation of monasticism which attained greatness through the
-spirit of association.
-
-Repelled through the violence and aggressiveness of the reformers, and
-provoked by the narrowness of Protestantism generally, some modern writers
-take the view that the Reformation was throughout opposed to real
-progress, and that mankind would have been richer had the reformers left
-undisturbed many of the institutions they destroyed. The revenues of these
-institutions would now have been at the disposal of those who would put
-them to public and not to personal uses. As far as convents, especially
-those of women, are concerned, I cannot but feel sceptical on both
-points. Granting even that these houses had been undisturbed, a
-possibility difficult to imagine, experience proves that it is hardly
-likely they could now be used to secure advantages such as they gave to
-women in the past. Certainly it is not in those districts where women's
-convents have lived on, securing economic independence to unmarried women
-as in North Germany, nor where they have lingered on along old lines as in
-Bavaria, that the wish for an improved education has arisen among women in
-modern times, nor does it seem at all likely that their revenues will ever
-be granted for such an object. It is in those countries where the change
-in social conditions has been most complete, and where women for a time
-entirely forfeited all the advantages which a higher education brings, and
-which were secured in so great a measure to women by convents in the past,
-that the modern movement for women's education has arisen.
-
-
-
-
-APPENDIX
-
-(to accompany p. 253).
-
-
-RHYTHMUS HERRADIS ABATISSAE PER QUEM HOHENBURGENSES VIRGUNCULAS AMABILITER
-SALUTAT ET AD VERI SPONSI FIDEM DILECTIONEMQUE SALUBRITER INVITAT.
-
-  Salve cohors virginum
-  Hohenburgiensium,
-  Albens quasi lilium
-  Amans dei filium.
-
-  Herrat devotissima,
-  Tua fidelissima,
-  Mater et ancillula,
-  Cantat tibi cantica.
-
-  Te salutat millies
-  Et exoptat indies,
-  Ut laeta victoria
-  Vincas transitoria.
-
-  O multorum speculum,
-  Sperne, sperne seculum,
-  Virtutes accumula,
-  Veri sponsi turmula.
-
-  Insistas luctamine,
-  Diros hostes sternere,
-  Te rex regum adjuvat,
-  Quia te desiderat.
-
-  Ipse tuum animum
-  Firmat contra Zabulum.
-  Ipse post victoriam
-  Dabit regni gloriam.
-
-  Te decent deliciae,
-  Debentur divitiae,
-  Tibi coeli curia,
-  Servat bona plurima.
-
-  Christus parat nuptias
-  Miras per delicias,
-  Hunc expectes principem
-  Te servando virginem.
-
-  Interim monilia
-  Circum des nobilia,
-  Et exornes faciem
-  Mentis purgans aciem.
-
-  Christus odit maculas,
-  Rugas spernit vetulas,
-  Pulchras vult virgunculas,
-  Turpes pellit feminas.
-
-  Fide cum turturea
-  Sponsum istum reclama,
-  Ut tua formositas
-  Fiat perpes claritas.
-
-  Vivens sine fraudibus
-  Es monenda laudibus,
-  Ut consummes optima
-  Tua gradus opera.
-
-  Ne vacilles dubia
-  Inter mundi flumina,
-  Verax deus praemia
-  Spondet post pericula.
-
-  Patere nunc aspera
-  Mundi spernens prospera.
-  Nunc sis crucis socia,
-  Regni consors postea.
-
-  Per hoc mare naviga,
-  Sanctitate gravida,
-  Dum de navi exeas
-  Sion sanctam teneas.
-
-  Sion turris coelica
-  Bella tenens atria,
-  Tibi fiat statio,
-  Acto vitae spatio.
-
-  Ibi rex virgineus
-  Et Mariae filius
-  Amplectens te reclamet
-  A moerore relevet.
-
-  Parvi pendens omnia
-  Tentatoris jocula,
-  Tunc gaudebis pleniter
-  Jubilando suaviter.
-
-  Stella maris fulgida,
-  Virgo mater unica,
-  Te conjugat filio
-  Foedere perpetuo.
-
-  Et me tecum trahere
-  Non cesses praecamine,
-  Ad sponsum dulcissimum
-  Virginalem filium.
-
-  Ut tuae victoriae,
-  Tuae magnae gloriae,
-  Particeps inveniat
-  De terrenis eruat.
-
-  Vale casta concio,
-  Mea jubilatio,
-  Vivas sine crimine,
-  Christum semper dilige.
-
-  Sit hic liber utilis,
-  Tibi delectabilis
-  Et non cesses volvere
-  Hunc in tuo pectore.
-
-  Ne more struthineo
-  Surrepat oblivio,
-  Et ne viam deseras
-  Antequam provenias.
-
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen.
-
-
-
-
-INDEX.
-
-
-The women here designated as saints are either included in the _Acta
-Sanctorum Bollandorum_, or else, this work waiting completion, are entered
-as saints in the 'Table Hagiographique' of Guérin, _Les Petits
-Bollandistes_, 1882, vol. 17.
-
-  abbess, position of, 87, 152, 203, 365 ff., 388
-
-  Abra, St, 14
-
-  Achachildis or Atzin, 34
-
-  Adela, 40, _see_ Adolana
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Gandersheim, 273
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Nivelles, 152 footnote
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Quedlinburg, 152
-
-  Adelheid Helchen, abbess at Oberwerth, 421
-
-  Adelitia, nun, 213
-
-  Adeliz, abbess at Winchester, 210
-
-  Admunt, convent at, 237
-
-  Adolana, St, abbess at Pfälzel, 124
-
-  Aebbe, St, abbess at Coldingham, 97, 101-103
-
-  Aebbe, mother of Lioba, 134
-
-  Aelfgifu or Emma, queen, makes a gift of hangings, 226
-
-  Aelflaed, abbess at Whitby, 90, 93, 94, 103-106, 124, 126, 225
-
-  Aelflaed, queen, makes a gift of hangings, 226
-
-  Aelfthrith, abbess at Repton, 108
-
-  Aethelburg, St, abbess at Barking, 111, 112
-
-  Aethelburg St, or Aubierge, abbess at Brie, 78
-
-  Aethelburg, abbess (at Hackness?), 94, 106
-
-  Aethelburg, queen, founds a convent at Liming, 84
-
-  Aetheldritha, abbess at Southminstre in Thanet, 87
-
-  Aethelthrith, St, or Etheldred or Awdry, 96-99, 101, 225
-
-  Aette, abbess at Folkestone, 87
-
-  Afra, St, of Augsburg, 31, 32-33
-
-  Afra von Velseck, nun, 425 ff.
-
-  Agatha, St, of Catania, 16, 17, 141
-
-  Agilbert, St, 76
-
-  Agius, interested in nuns, 154, 155, 157-159
-
-  Agnes, St, of Rome, 18, 167, 314, 327
-
-  Agnes, St, abbess at Poitiers, 52, 55-65
-
-  Agnes, St, princess of Bohemia, 293, 296-297, 298
-
-  Agnes, abbess at Quedlinburg, 233, 234
-
-  Agnes Ferrar, abbess at Shaftesbury, 365
-
-  Agnes Litherland, prioress at Gracedieu, 449
-
-  Agnes Merrett, cellaress at Sion, 393
-
-  Agnes Seyntel, prioress at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Agnes Terry, prioress at Catesby, 369
-
-  Ailred, his connection with nuns, 215, 218, 313-314, 321, 325
-
-  Alburgh or Aethelburgh, convent of St, _see_ Barking
-
-  Alena, St, 26
-
-  Aleydis, lay sister at Bronope, 419
-
-  Aleydis Ruyskop, nun at Rolandswerth, 428
-
-  Alice Fitzherbert, abbess at Polesworth, 447
-
-  Alice Henley, abbess at Godstow, 360
-
-  Alice Wafer, prioress at Prée, 410
-
-  alien priories, their number and appropriation, 386-387
-
-  Altwick, convent at, 273
-
-  Alwid, embroideress, 226
-
-  Amalberga, St, 23
-
-  Ambrosius, bishop of Milan, on Virginity, 14,
-    on St Agnes, 167
-
-  Amesbury, convent at, 194, 201, 203, 205, 454
-
-  ancre, defined, 312
-
-  'Ancren Riwle,' 311-325, 357
-
-  Angiltrud, nun, 138
-
-  Ankerwyke, convent at, 357, 443
-
-  Anna, duchess of Silesia, 295-296, 298
-
-  Anne Boleyn, intends to retire to a nunnery, 437
-
-  Anne Seton, prioress at Chatteris, 449
-
-  anonymous nun, author of 'Hodoeporicon' etc., 139 ff.
-
-  Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, in connection with women, 184, 208-211
-
-  Anselma, nun, 213
-
-  Ansterbert, St, or Austreberta, 76
-
-  Anstrud, St, or Austrudis, 77
-
-  Apollonia Tucher, nun at Nürnberg, 460
-
-  Arles, convent at, 48-50, 52, 56, 226
-
-  armarium or bookcase, 216, 223
-
-  Armengard von Rheden, abbess at Fischbeck, 418
-
-  Atzin or Achachildis, 34
-
-  Augustine, rule of St, 196
-
-  Augustine, canons of, _see_ Austin or Black
-
-  Aurea, St, 76
-
-  Austreberta, _see_ Ansterbert
-
-  Austin or Black canons, 186, 196, 197, 209
-
-  Austin canonesses, 150, 197, 364, 371, 420
-
-  Austrudis, _see_ Anstrud
-
-  Awdry, _see_ Aethelthrith
-
-
-  Balbine, St, 30
-
-  Balthild, St, 71, 73, 74-78
-
-  Bamberg, convent of St Clara at, 459
-
-  Barbara Dalberg, nun at Marienberg, 429
-
-  Barbara Schöndorfer, abbess at Sonnenburg, 427
-
-  Barking, convent at, 111, 112, 113, 116, 121, 201, 203, 358, 363, 372,
-        377, 378, 443, 455
-
-  Basina, nun at Poitiers, 65, 67-69
-
-  Baudonivia, nun at Poitiers, 46, 52, 65
-
-  Bega, St, 89
-
-  Begu, nun at Hackness, 89, 93
-
-  beguine, defined, 331
-
-  Benedict, St, rule of, 50, 73, 74, 77, 186, 198, 215;
-    Anglo-Saxon version of, 312;
-    rhymed version of, 358 ff.
-
-  Benedictine nunneries, number of, in England, 204, 364
-
-  Bergen, convent at, 204, 460, 474
-
-  Berkley on Severn, convent at, 202
-
-  Berlindis, St, 26, 27, 31
-
-  Bernard of Clairvaux, 190, 258, 260
-
-  Berthegund, 69-70
-
-  Berthgit, nun, 139, also footnote
-
-  Berthild, St, or Bertilia, abbess at Chelles, 77
-
-  Bilihild, St, 29
-
-  Bingen, convent at, 263 ff.
-
-  Bischofsheim, convent at, 136, 137, 138
-
-  Bona, 211
-
-  Boniface, his correspondence with women, 118-142, 225, 232
-
-  Bourges, convent at, 230
-
-  Breslau, convent of St Clara at, 295
-
-  Bridget, St, of Ireland, 14 footnote
-
-  Bridget, St, of Sweden, 383 ff.
-
-  Bridget Belgrave, chambress at Sion, 392
-
-  Brie or Faremoutiers, convent at, 76, 77
-
-  Brixen, convent of St Clara at, 424, 459
-
-  Bromhall, convent at, 369, 436
-
-  Bronope, convent at, 418
-
-  Brunshausen, convent at, 155
-
-  Brusyard, convent at, 447
-
-  Buckland, convent at, 365
-
-  Bugga, correspondent of Boniface, 131-133
-
-  Bugga, daughter of King Centwin, 113
-
-  Bugga or Heaburg, 131
-
-  Burngith, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Bursfeld, congregation of, 415
-
-  Busch, reformer of nunneries, 417 ff.
-
-  Butzbach, his correspondence with nuns, 428
-
-
-  Caesaria, St, abbess at Arles, 48, 52, 56
-
-  Caesaria II, abbess at Arles, 56
-
-  Caesarius, St, rule of, 48-50, 226
-
-  Cambridge, convent of St Radegund at, 367, 380, 435 and footnote
-
-  cameraria, _see_ chambress
-
-  Campsey, convent at, 360, 376, 377, 378
-
-  Cangith, 128 footnote
-
-  Canonlegh, _see_ Legh
-
-  cantarista, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Canterbury, convent of St Sepulchre at, 403, 439
-
-  capellanissa, _see_ chaplain
-
-  Carrow, convent at, 378
-
-  Catesby, convent at, 368-369, 447-448
-
-  Cathari, 273, 281
-
-  Catherine de la Pole, abbess at Barking, 378
-
-  Cecil Bodman, abbess at Wilton, 438 footnote, 441
-
-  Cecilia, St, legend of, in English, 326
-
-  cellaress or celleraria, office of, 216, 368, 371 ff., 393
-
-  celleraria, _see_ cellaress
-
-  Celtes, his connection with nuns, 183, 461 ff.
-
-  chambress or cameraria, office of, 378, 392
-
-  Charitas Pirckheimer, abbess at Nürnberg, 458 ff.
-
-  Chartreuse, order of, 186, 199
-
-  chaplain, female, or capellanissa, office of, 376-378
-
-  Chatteris, convent at, 381, 401, 449
-
-  Chaucer on nuns, 361, 362
-
-  Chelles or Cala, convent at, 75, 77, 78, 82, 86
-
-  Chester, convent of St Mary at, 448
-
-  Chicksand, convent at, 445
-
-  Chlotildis, 41
-
-  Christiane, St, 25, 29
-
-  Christina, nun, 213
-
-  Christina, nun at Romsey, 207, 208
-
-  Christina, prioress at Mergate, 227
-
-  Christina Basset, prioress at St Mary Prée, 365, 410
-
-  Christine, abbess at Gandersheim, 159
-
-  Christine Strölin, abbess at Söflingen, 422
-
-  Chrodield, nun at Poitiers, 50, 66-69, 226
-
-  Chrothild, St, queen, 51
-
-  Chunigundis, abbess at Göss, 235
-
-  Chunihild, nun, 138, 139 footnote
-
-  Chunitrud, nun, 139
-
-  Citeaux, order of, 186, 189-192
-
-  Cistercian nunneries, number of, in England, 363
-
-  Clara, St, of Assisi, 296
-
-  Clara, St, convent of, at Brixen, Nürnberg, etc., _see_ Brixen,
-        Nürnberg, etc.
-
-  Clara Gundelfingen, abbess at Nürnberg, 459
-
-  Clara Pirckheimer, nun at Nürnberg, 459 ff.
-
-  Clares, Poor, or Nuns Minoresses, 364
-
-  Clemence, nun at Barking, 357
-
-  Clement, St, convent of, at York, _see_ York
-
-  Clugni, order of, 186, 187-189
-
-  Clugniac nunneries, number of, in England, 363
-
-  Coldingham, convent at, 97, 101, 102
-
-  Cöln, convent of St Maria at, 152 footnote, 421
-
-  Columban, St, rule of, 72, 73, 77
-
-  consecration of nuns, 380
-
-  Cordula, St, 283
-
-  Crabhouse, convent at, 358
-
-  Cunera, St, 21, 29, 43
-
-  Cusanus, as monastic reformer, 416, 422 ff.
-
-  Cuthberht, his connection with abbesses, 102-105, 225
-
-  Cuthburg, St, of Wimbourne, 106, 113, 116
-
-  Cuthburg, suffering torments in hell, 121
-
-  Cwenburg, St, of Wimbourne, 116
-
-  Cwenburg, nun at Watton, 91
-
-  Cyneburg, St, of Castor, 106, 107
-
-  Cynehild, nun, 135
-
-  Cyneswith, St, of Castor, 107
-
-  Cynethrith, abbess, 225
-
-
-  Davington, convent at, 357, 380
-
-  Delapray, convent at, 447
-
-  Dennis, convent at, 449, 450
-
-  Derneburg, convent at, 417, 420
-
-  Didimia, abbess at Poitiers, 65
-
-  Diemud, scribe, 236-237
-
-  Disibodenberg, nuns' convent attached to, 262
-
-  Dollendis, _see_ Rolendis
-
-  Dominican friars, abroad, 291, 295, 332;
-    in England, 309
-
-  Dominican nuns, 364
-
-  Dominican nunneries, number of, in England, 364
-
-  Dorothy Barley, abbess at Barking, 455
-
-  Dorstad, convent at, 418
-
-
-  Eadburg, abbess at Thanet, 120, 121, 122, 123, 225
-
-  Eadburga, 84
-
-  Eadgifu, abbess at Leominster, 202
-
-  Eadgith, nun at Barking, 112
-
-  Ealdgith, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Ealdhelm, interested in nuns, 112-115, 172, 226
-
-  Eangith, correspondent of Boniface, 118, 128-131
-
-  Eanswith, St, of Folkestone, 83
-
-  Earcongotha, St, 78, 85
-
-  Easebourne, convent at, 360, 366, 376, 403, 404-406
-
-  Easington, convent at, 93
-
-  East Dereham, convent at, 96
-
-  ebdomary, office of, 390
-
-  Ebsdorf, convent at, 236
-
-  Ecgburg, abbess at Repton, 109, 126
-
-  Edelind, abbess at Niedermünster, 241
-
-  Edigna, St, 27
-
-  Edward's, St, convent of, at Shaftesbury, _see_ Shaftesbury
-
-  Eger, convent of St Clara at, 466
-
-  Eichstätt, convent of St Walburg at, 421
-
-  Einbeth or Einbetta, St, 40
-
-  Eleanor, queen, takes the veil at Amesbury, 201
-
-  elemosinaria, office of, 378
-
-  Elisabeth, St, of Thüringen and Hungary, 285, 295, 298-304
-
-  Elisabeth, St, nun at Schönau, 257, 277-285, 429
-
-  Elisabeth Krelin, abbess at Heggbach, 421
-
-  Elisabeth von Mansfeld, nun at Helfta, 329
-
-  Elisabeth von Seckendorf, abbess at Eichstätt, 421
-
-  Elizabeth Barton, 439
-
-  Elizabeth Shelley, abbess at Winchester, 448, 449, 454, 455
-
-  Elizabeth Zouche, abbess at Shaftesbury, 455
-
-  Elizabeth Throgmerton, abbess at Dennis, 450
-
-  Elizabeth Walton, nun at Cambridge, 367, 368
-
-  Elizabeth Webb, prioress at Sopwell, 410
-
-  Ellandune, convent at, _see_ Wilton
-
-  Elstow, convent at, 204 footnote, 377
-
-  Ely, convent at, 95-106, 202, 225, 226
-
-  embroidery done by nuns, 224 ff.
-
-  Engelthal, convent at, 471
-
-  Eormenhild, St, abbess at Sheppey and Ely, 100
-
-  Erasmus, on canons, 195,
-    on the position of women, 429 ff.
-
-  Erfurt, convent at, 236
-
-  eruditrix, office of, 379
-
-  Essen, convent at, 148, 149, 151, 232
-
-  Ethel-, _see_ under Aethel-
-
-  Eufemia, abbess at Winchester, 366
-
-  Eulalia, abbess at Shaftesbury, 210
-
-  Eulalia, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Euphemia Pirckheimer, abbess at Bergen, 460
-
-  Eustadiola, St, abbess at Bourges, 230
-
-  Eutropia, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Eva, recluse, 211
-
-  Everhild, St, 111
-
-  'Exercitia Spiritualia,' by St Gertrud, 351 ff.
-
-  'Explanatio regulae St Benedicti,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-  'Explanatio symboli St Athanasii,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-  'Expositiones Evangeliorum,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-
-  Fara, St, abbess at Brie, 76
-
-  Faremoutiers, convent at, _see_ Brie
-
-  Fécamp, convent at, 77
-
-  Felicitas Grundherrin, nun at Nürnberg, 460, 471
-
-  Fischbeck, convent at, 418
-
-  'Fliessende, das, Licht der Gottheit,' by Mechthild, 332 ff.
-
-  Flixton, convent at, 369, 377
-
-  Florence Bannerman, abbess at Amesbury, 454
-
-  Folkestone, convent at, 83, 87
-
-  Fontevraud, order of, 193-194, 205
-
-  Fortunatus, his connection with nuns, 58-64
-
-  Framehild, St, 76
-
-  Francis, St, of Assisi, 285, 291, 296, 301, 364
-
-  Franciscan friars and nuns, 291, 295, 302, 309, 364, 422
-
-  Frankenberg, convent at, 418
-
-  French, use of, in convents, 357 ff.
-
-  Frideswith, St, of Oxford, 110
-
-  Frigith, nun at Hackness, 93
-
-  Fuller, on nunneries, 457
-
-
-  Gandersheim, convent at, 148, 151, 152, 154 ff.
-
-  Gehulff, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Geiler, as a reformer of convents, 428
-
-  Geisenfeld, convent at, 460
-
-  Geneviève, St, of Paris, 26, 43, 51
-
-  Genovefa, 26
-
-  Georg, St, convent of, at Halle, _see_ Halle
-
-  Gerald Barri, on monasticism, 199
-
-  Gerberg I, abbess at Gandersheim, 159
-
-  Gerberg II, abbess at Gandersheim, 151, 153, 160, 162, 163, 166, 167,
-        182
-
-  Germana, St, 25, 29
-
-  Gertrud, St, nun at Helfta, 329, 346 ff.
-
-  Gertrud, St, of Nivelles, 7, 23
-
-  Gertrud, 26
-
-  Gertrud, abbess at Helfta, 329
-
-  Gertrud, abbess at Trebnitz, 293, 295, 296
-
-  Gertrud von Büchel, nun at Rolandswerth, 429
-
-  Gilbert of Sempringham, St, order of, 186, 213-221
-
-  Gisela, 147
-
-  Gisela, queen of Hungary, 233
-
-  Gisleberga, St, 43
-
-  Godam Hampton, nun at Barking, 366
-
-  Godeleva, St, or Godeleina, 24, 25, 29, 30
-
-  Godstow, convent at, 204 footnote, 206, 357, 360, 400, 447, 453
-
-  Göss, convent at, 235
-
-  Gracedieu, convent at, 449
-
-  Grandmont, order of, 186, 199
-
-  Gredanna von Freyberg, abbess at Urspring, 421
-
-  Gregory of Tours, his connection with nuns, 51 ff.
-
-  Gudila, St, 23
-
-  Gunthild, St, 7, 27, 35, 139 footnote
-
-  Guthlac, his connection with nuns, 108-110, 225
-
-  Gutta, scribe, 237
-
-
-  Hackness, convent at, 93, 94, 106
-
-  Hadewy, abbess at Herford, 147
-
-  'Hali Meidenhad,' 326-328
-
-  Halle, convent of St Georg at, 418
-
-  Hanbury, convent at, 100
-
-  Harwold, convent at, 446
-
-  Hartlepool, convent at, 88, 89, 90, 94
-
-  Hathumod, abbess at Gandersheim, 149, 154-159
-
-  Heaburg, called Bugga, nun, 128, 131
-
-  Hedwig, St, of Silesia, 291 ff., 298, 299
-
-  Hedwig, abbess at Neuss, 152 footnote
-
-  Hedwig, duchess of Swabia, 162, 233
-
-  Heggbach, convent at, 421
-
-  Heiningen, convent at, 236, 418, 419
-
-  Heiu, abbess at Hartlepool, 88, 89
-
-  Helen, St, 114
-
-  Helen, St, convent of, in London, _see_ London
-
-  Helena von Iltzen, prioress at Marienberg, 418
-
-  Helena Meichnerin, abbess at Nürnberg, 463
-
-  Helfta, convent at, 328 ff.
-
-  Hereswith, St, 78, 82, 96, 97
-
-  Hereswytha, abbess at Sheppey, 87
-
-  Herford, convent at, 147, 148, 149, 155
-
-  Heriburg, abbess at Watton, 91
-
-  Herlind, St, abbess at Maaseyck, 230-232
-
-  Hersende, abbess at Fontevraud, 194
-
-  Heyninges, convent of St Mary at, 449
-
-  Hidburg, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Hilarius, verses on recluses, 211
-
-  Hild, St, of Whitby, 82, 89 ff., 96
-
-  Hildegard, St, of Bingen, 256 ff., 429
-
-  Hildelith, St, abbess at Barking, 112, 113, 121
-
-  Hildemarque, 77
-
-  Hilp, 11, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  'Hodoeporicon' by anonymous nun, 139 ff.
-
-  Hohenburg, convent at, 22, 24, 238 ff.
-
-  'Hortus Deliciarum,' by Herrad, 238 ff.
-
-  Hrotsvith, abbess at Gandersheim, 160
-
-  Hrotsvith, nun at Gandersheim, 143, 153, 154-183, 429
-
-
-  Ida, St, ancestress of Liudolfings, 23 footnote
-
-  Ida, abbess at St Maria (on the Münzenberg?), 152 footnote
-
-  Ida, ancestress of Karlings, 23
-
-  Ida, nun at Bronope, 419
-
-  Ida, nun at Gandersheim, 151, 152 footnote
-
-  Idonea, nun, 212
-
-  Iduberga, 43
-
-  Idung, on nuns, 198
-
-  infirmaria, 378
-
-  Ingetrud, abbess at Tours, 51, 58, 69, 70
-
-  Inthware or Iuthware, 30
-
-  Irmina, St, 40
-
-  Isabel Jordan, abbess at Wilton, 438
-
-  Isengard von Greiffenklau, 421
-
-  Itta, 43
-
-
-  Jane Gowryng, 443
-
-  Jane Messyndyne, 447
-
-  Joan Ashcomb, nun at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Joan Chapell, prioress at Sopwell, 410
-
-  Joan Darrell, abbess at Amesbury, 454
-
-  Joan Formage, abbess at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Joan Lancaster, prioress at Cambridge, 367, 368
-
-  Joan Sandford, prioress at Heyninges, 449
-
-  Joan Rawlins, prioress at Bromhall, 436
-
-  Johan or Jane Arundell, abbess at Legh, 368
-
-  Johanna de Northampton, prioress at Catesby, 368
-
-  John of Salisbury, on monks and nuns, 200, 201
-
-  Jouarre, convent at, 76
-
-  Joyce Bykeley, prioress at Catesby, 448
-
-  Juliana, St, legend of, 326, 327
-
-  Juliana, prioress at Bromhall, 369
-
-  Juliana Baucyn, abbess at Shaftesbury, 365
-
-  Justina, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Juthware, _see_ Inthware
-
-  Jutta, St, 338
-
-  Jutta, 'magistra,' at Disibodenberg, 262
-
-
-  Katharina Pirckheimer, prioress at Geisenfeld, 460
-
-  Katharine, St, life of, by Clemence of Barking, 357
-
-  Katherine Babington, nun at Campsey, 360
-
-  Katherine Bulkeley, abbess at Godstow, 453
-
-  Katherine Sayntlow, nun at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Katheryne Wyngate, nun at Elstow, 377
-
-  Kilburn, convent at, 206, 360, 376
-
-  Kirkless, convent at, 452, 453
-
-  kitchener or cook, office of, 216, 375
-
-  Kizzingen, convent at, 138, 273, 292, 293, 303
-
-  Kleinfrankenthal, convent at, 420
-
-  Krischmerge, 41
-
-  Kümmerniss, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Kunigund, St, empress, 232
-
-  Kunigundis, St, 40
-
-
-  'Land of Cockayne,' 411
-
-  Langendorf, convent at, 415
-
-  Langland, on nuns, 406
-
-  Laon, convent at, 77
-
-  Las Huelgas, convent at, 191
-
-  Laycock, convent at, 441, 448
-
-  leader of the choir or precentrix, succentrix, cantarista, 216, 368,
-        378, 391
-
-  'Legatus Divinae Pietatis,' by St Gertrud, 348 ff.
-
-  Legbourne, convent at, 446
-
-  Legh, convent of, or Canonlegh or Minchenlegh, 358, 368
-
-  legister or reader, office of, 391
-
-  Leobgith, _see_ Lioba
-
-  Leominster, convent at, 202
-
-  Leonard, St, convent of, _see_ Stratford
-
-  Leubover, abbess at Poitiers, 65 ff., 226
-
-  Leukardis, scribe, 237
-
-  Liberata, St, or Liberatrix, 35, 37, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Lillechurch, convent at, 212, 436
-
-  Liming, convent at, 84, 87
-
-  Lindesay on convent life, 456
-
-  Linthildis, _see_ Lufthildis
-
-  Lioba, St, 117, 134 ff.
-
-  Littlemore, convent at, 437
-
-  Little Marlow, convent at, 442
-
-  Liutberg, recluse, 147
-
-  Livrade, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Liwid, embroideress, 226
-
-  London, convent of Poor Clares, or Minories, 364
-
-  London, convent of St Helen in, 378
-
-  Lucia, abbess at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Lucie, St, of Sampigny, 25
-
-  Lufthildis, St, 25, 26, 42
-
-  Lul, his correspondence with nuns, 134, 137, 138
-
-  Lüne, convent at, 236
-
-  'Luve Ron,' 310
-
-
-  Maaseyck, convent at, 231-232
-
-  magistra noviciarum, _see_ mistress of the novices
-
-  Mallersdorf, convent at, 237
-
-  Malling, convent at, 204 footnote, 363, 380, 443 footnote
-
-  Margaret, St, legend of, 326
-
-  Margaret, St, queen of Scotland, 207-208, 289
-
-  Margaret Punder, prioress at Flixton, 369
-
-  Margaret Tewkesbury, abbess at Delapray, 447
-
-  Margaret Vernon, prioress at Little Marlow, 443
-
-  Maria, St, convent of, at Cöln etc., _see_ Cöln etc.
-
-  Mariahilf, 11, 35
-
-  Mariasif, 11
-
-  Marienberg, convent at, in Saxony, 418-419
-
-  Marienberg, convent at, near Trier, 421
-
-  Marienborn, convent at, 420
-
-  Mariensee, convent at, 417
-
-  Marricks, convent of St Andrew, 449, 456
-
-  Mary, St, the Virgin, 9, 10, 11
-
-  Mary and Martha, as types of activity, 305, 314, 324, 325
-
-  Mary, St, convent of, at Chester etc., _see_ Chester etc.
-
-  Mary, daughter of St Margaret, 207, 209
-
-  Mary of Blois, abbess at Romsey, 201, 212
-
-  Mathea Fabyan, nun at Barking, 377
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Essen, 151, 232
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Kizzingen, 292, 303
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Quedlinburg, 149, 151, 153, 232
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Villich, 152 footnote
-
-  Matilda, abbess at Amesbury, 201
-
-  Matilda, abbess at Winchester, 210
-
-  Matilda, queen, 207 ff., 289 ff., 298
-
-  Matilda Sudbury, nun at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Maxima, abbess, 113
-
-  Mechthild, 7
-
-  Mechthild, beguine, 305, 329, 330, 331-340
-
-  Mechthild, nun at Helfta, 329, 330, 340-346
-
-  Mechthild von Wippra, nun, 329
-
-  Mechtund, St, 40
-
-  Mergate, convent at, 227
-
-  Mildburg, St, of Wenlock, 85, 121
-
-  Mildgith, St, 85
-
-  Mildthrith, St, of Thanet, 85-86
-
-  Minories, _see_ London, convent of Poor Clares
-
-  Minstre in Thanet, _see_ Thanet
-
-  mistress of the novices, magistra noviciarum, 217, 378
-
-  Modwen, St, 111 and footnote, 446 footnote
-
-  Montreuil-les-Dames, convent at, 191
-
-  Münich, convent of St Clara at, 460
-
-  Münzenberg, convent of St Maria on the, 152 footnote
-
-  mynchyn, use of word, 364 footnote, 368, 454
-
-
-  Neuss, convent at, 152 footnote
-
-  Neuwerk, convent at Erfurt, 418
-
-  Nider, on nuns, 459
-
-  Niedermünster, convent, 241
-
-  Nigel Wirecker on monks and nuns, 200
-
-  Nivelles, convent at, 152 footnote
-
-  Norbert, St, order of, _see_ Prémontré
-
-  Notburg, St, 34
-
-  Notburg, St, or Nuppurg, 26
-
-  Notburg, 24
-
-  Nunappleton, convent at, 452, 453
-
-  Nun-Cotham, convent at, 207 footnote
-
-  Nun-Kelyng, convent at, 453
-
-  Nun-Monkton, convent at, 357
-
-  Nunnaminster, _see_ Winchester, convent of St Mary at
-
-
-  Odilia, St, 22, 24, 240, 251
-
-  Ontkommer or Wilgefortis, St, 35-38, 43
-
-  'opus anglicum,' 228
-
-  'Order of Fair Ease,' on religious orders, 201
-
-  Osburg, 111 and footnote
-
-  Osburg, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Osgith, 113 footnote
-
-  Osith, St, 110
-
-  Oswen, St, or Osman, 30
-
-  Oxenfurt, convent at, 138
-
-
-  Paris, convent at, 51, 76
-
-  Paula, St, of Avila, 36 footnote
-
-  Pavilly, convent at, 76
-
-  Pega, St, 109, 110
-
-  Pellmerge, 41
-
-  Peter of Blois, corresponding with nuns, 213
-
-  Petronille, abbess at Fontevraud, 194
-
-  Pfälzel or Palatiolum, convent at, 124
-
-  Pharaildis, St, 21, 22, 23, 27 footnote, 30, 34
-
-  Pietrussa, abbess at Trebnitz, 293, 295
-
-  Pillenreuth, convent at, 471
-
-  Poitiers, convent at, 51 ff.
-
-  Polesworth, convent at, 447
-
-  Pollesloe, convent at, 448
-
-  portress, office of, 217
-
-  Prague, convent of St Clara at, 296
-
-  precentrix, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Prée, convent of St Mary, 366, 408, 410
-
-  Prémontré, order of, 186, 193-194
-
-  prioress, position and office of, 204, 216, 370 ff.
-
-  profession and consecration of nuns, 379-380
-
-  Pusinna, St, 147
-
-
-  Quedlinburg, convent, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 232, 233
-
-
-  Radegund, St, of Poitiers, 45, 51-65, 225
-
-  Radegund, St, or Radiane, 27, 29, 34, 35
-
-  Radegund, St, convent of, _see_ Cambridge, convent of St Radegund
-
-  Ramsen, convent at, 420
-
-  Redlingfield, convent at, 363, 377, 378
-
-  refectuaria, office of, 378
-
-  Regenfled, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Regenfrith, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Regina, St, 29
-
-  Reinild, St, abbess at Maaseyck, 230-232
-
-  Reinildis, St, 23
-
-  Relind, abbess at Hohenburg, 241
-
-  Repton, convent at, 108, 126, 202
-
-  Richardis, nun at Bingen, 272
-
-  Richmondis van der Horst, abbess at Seebach, 428
-
-  Rikkardis, nun at Gandersheim, 161, 163
-
-  Robert, St, founder of the order of Fontevraud, 193
-
-  Rolandswerth, convent at, 429
-
-  Rolendis, St, 27, 42
-
-  Romsey, convent at, 201, 207, 208, 209, 212, 357, 360, 378
-
-  Rosa, 211
-
-  Rosalia, St, of Palermo, 18
-
-  Rusper, convent at, 380, 381, 403, 404
-
-  Ryhall, convent at, 107
-
-
-  Sabina Pirckheimer, abbess at Bergen, 460, 474
-
-  Saethrith, St, or Syre, 77, 85, 96
-
-  Salaberg, St, 77
-
-  Scheurl, his connection with nuns, 460, 464
-
-  Scholastica, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Schönau, convent at, 278 ff.
-
-  Schönfeld, convent at, 420
-
-  Schwellmerge, 41
-
-  scrutatrix, _see_ sercher
-
-  Seebach, convent at, 428
-
-  Sempringham, order of, 186, 195, 201, 213-221
-
-  sercher or scrutatrix, 216
-
-  Seton, convent of, 403, 451
-
-  Sexburg, St, 84, 96, 100
-
-  sexton, office of, 370, 371, 390
-
-  Shaftesbury, convent of St Edward at, 203, 204, 210, 357, 365, 366, 376,
-        379, 455
-
-  Sheppey, convent at, 84, 87, 96, 100, 205, 379
-
-  Sigegith, 113
-
-  Sinningthwaite, convent at, 207
-
-  Sion, convent at, 360, 364, 383 ff., 439
-
-  Söflingen, convent at, 422, 429
-
-  Soissons, convent at, 147
-
-  Sonnenburg, convent at, 422 ff.
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Eichstätt, 421
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Gandersheim, 151, 152
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Kizzingen, 273
-
-  Sophie, abbess (at Mainz?), 152 footnote
-
-  Sophie von Mansfeld, nun at Helfta, 329
-
-  Sopwell, convent at, 206, 357, 409, 410
-
-  Southminstre, convent at, 87
-
-  'Spiritual Convent or Ghostly Abbey,' 339, 377, 411
-
-  Stanford, convent at, 206
-
-  Stendal, convent at, 420
-
-  Strasburg, convent of St Mary Magdalen, 428, of St Stephan, 428
-
-  Stratford, convent of St Leonard at, 212, 358, 363
-
-  Streanshalch, _see_ Whitby
-
-  sub-prioress, office of, 370
-
-  succentrix, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Suitha, abbess, 134
-
-  Superba, 211
-
-  Sura, St, or Soteris or Zuwarda, 29
-
-  Swine, convent at, 207 footnote, 378, 453
-
-
-  Tart, convent at, 191
-
-  Tecla, correspondent of Boniface, 135, 138, 139
-
-  Tecla, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Tecla, nun at Bronope, 419
-
-  Teclechildis, _see_ Theodohild
-
-  Tetbury, convent at, 117
-
-  Tetta, abbess at Herford, 147
-
-  Tetta, abbess at Wimbourne, 117, 135, 136
-
-  Thanet, convent at, or Minstre, 85, 86, 87, 120
-
-  thesaurissa, _see_ treasurer
-
-  Theodohild, St, or Teclechildis, of Jouarre, 76
-
-  Theofanu, abbess at Essen, 152 footnote, 232
-
-  Theorigitha, _see_ Torctgith
-
-  Thetford, convent at, 379, 402
-
-  Thomas Beket, his connection with nuns, 201, 212
-
-  Thomas de Hales, poem for nuns, 309 ff.
-
-  Tibba or Tilba, 107, 108, 110
-
-  Tinmouth, convent at, 82 footnote
-
-  Torctgith, St, or Theorigitha, 112
-
-  Tours, convent at, 51, 58, 69-70
-
-  treasurer or thesaurissa, 368, 378
-
-  Trebnitz, convent at, 292, 293, 294, 295
-
-  Trentham, convent at, 100
-
-  Tritheim, his connection with nuns, 428
-
-  tutrix, office of, 379
-
-
-  Uncumber, 38 footnote, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Urspring, convent at, 421
-
-  Ursula, St, 21, 25, 34, 40, 283, 284
-
-  Ursula Cantor, 429
-
-
-  Verbetta, St, 40
-
-  Verena, St, of Zurzach, 23, 24, 26, 31-32
-
-  Verena, St, 283
-
-  Verena von Stuben, abbess at Sonnenburg, 423 ff.
-
-  Villbetta, St, 40
-
-  Villich, convent at, 152
-
-
-  Wadstena, convent at, 384 ff.
-
-  Wala, abbess, 130
-
-  Walburg, St, or Waltpurgis, 11 footnote, 25, 26, 27, 139
-
-  Walpurg Pirckheimer, nun, 460
-
-  Walter Map, on monks and nuns, 200, 202
-
-  Waltpurgis, _see_ Walburg
-
-  Warbeth, 40
-
-  Watton, convent at, 91, 218-219, 220
-
-  Weedon, convent at, 100
-
-  Wende, convent at, 236
-
-  Wenlock, convent at, 86, 121
-
-  Wennigsen, convent at, 417
-
-  Werburg, St, 100
-
-  Werder, convent at, 417
-
-  Wessobrunn, nuns at, 236
-
-  Wethburg, abbess, 124, 126, 127, 132
-
-  Wherwell, convent at, 212, 455
-
-  Whitby or Streanshalch, convent at, 88-95, 103, 105, 106, 124, 202
-
-  Wibrandis, St, 40
-
-  Wienhausen, convent at, 235, 417
-
-  Wihtburg, St, 96
-
-  Wilbeth, 40
-
-  Wilcoma, abbess at Chelles, 86
-
-  Wilfrith, his connection with abbesses, 95 ff., 225
-
-  Wilgefortis, St, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Wilibald Pirckheimer, his connection with nuns, 461 ff.
-
-  Wilnotha, abbess at Liming, 87
-
-  Wilton, convent at, or Ellandune, 203, 369, 438, 441
-
-  Wimbourne, convent at, 116, 117, 134, 202
-
-  Wimpheling, on nunneries, 429
-
-  Winchester, convent of St Mary at, or Nunnaminster, 184, 203, 210, 211,
-        366, 376, 380, 448, 454, 455
-
-  Windesheim, congregation of, 417 ff.
-
-  Winifred, St, 30
-
-  Winteney, convent at, 359
-
-  Wittewierum, convent at, 237
-
-  Wolfsindis, 29
-
-  Woodchester, convent at, 202 footnote
-
-  Wroxhall, convent at, 229, 363
-
-  Wykes, convent at, 437
-
-
-  York, convent of St Clement's at, 206
-
-
-  Zuwarda, _see_ Sura
-
-
-CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY J. & C. F. CLAY, AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-
-
-
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[1] The literature on this subject is daily accumulating. Among older
-authorities are Bachofen, _Das Mutterrecht_, 1861; Zmigrodski, _Die Mutter
-bei den Völkern des arischen Stammes_, 1886; Pearson, K., _Ethic of Free
-Thought_, 1888.
-
-[2] Kriegk, G. L., _Deutsches Bürgerthum im Mittelalter_, 1868, ch. 12-15.
-
-[3] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Eccles._ 5, ch. 14, 16, 19.
-
-[4] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 78.
-
-[5] Ibid. p. 881 ff.
-
-[6] Wuttke, _Deutscher Volksaberglaube_, 1869, p. 141; Weinhold, K.,
-_Deutsche Frauen_, 1882, vol. 1, p. 73.
-
-[7] Rochholz, E. L., _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, 1870, p. 191.
-
-[8] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Haar.'
-
-[9] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gunthildis, Sept. 12.
-
-[10] Bouquet, _Recueil Hist._, vol. 5, p. 690. Capitulare incerti anni, nr
-6, 'ut mulieres ad altare non ingrediantur.'
-
-[11] Montalembert, _Monks of the West_, 1, p. 359.
-
-[12] Jameson, _Legends of the Madonna_, 1857, Introd. xix.
-
-[13] Rhys, J., _Lectures on the origin and growth of religion as
-illustrated by Celtic Heathendom_, 1888, p. 102.
-
-[14] Frantz, C., _Versuch einer Geschichte des Marien und Annencultus_,
-1854, p. 54 ff.
-
-[15] Froissart, _Chronicle_, c. 162, in English translation; also Oberle,
-K. A., _Ueberreste germ. Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p. 153.
-
-[16] Menzel, _Christ. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Baum.'
-
-[17] Oberle, K. A., _Ueberreste germ. Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p.
-144.
-
-[18] Menzel, _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Himmelfahrt.'
-
-[19] Ibid., article 'Frauenberg'; also Oberle, K. A., _Ueberreste germ.
-Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p. 38.
-
-[20] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, 1870, p. 81, calls it Walburg;
-Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, _Traditions et légendes de la Belgique_, 1870, p.
-286, calls it Fro or Frigg.
-
-[21] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, 1887, p. 379; also
-Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 257.
-
-[22] Comp. below, p. 35.
-
-[23] Bede, _Ecclesiastical History_, 1, ch. 30.
-
-[24] On English calendars, Piper, F., _Kalendarien und Martyrologien der
-Angelsachsen_, 1862; Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887.
-
-[25] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-62, vol. 2,
-Einleitung.
-
-[26] For France, Guettée, _Histoire de l'Église de France_, 1847-55, vol.
-1, p. 1; for England, Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878,
-pp. 1 ff.; for Germany, Friedrich, _Kirchengeschichte_, 1867, vol. 1, pp.
-86 ff.
-
-[27] Ducange, _Glossarium_: 'coenobium.'
-
-[28] Dupuy, A., _Histoire de S. Martin_, 1852, p. 176.
-
-[29] Gildas, _Epistle_, c. 66.
-
-[30] In Ireland we hear of nunneries founded by St Bridget in the fifth
-century, the chief of which was at Kildare; also that this saint crossed
-the Irish Sea and founded nunneries at Glastonbury in England and at
-Abernethy in Scotland. The accounts of the work of Bridget are numerous,
-but have not been subjected to criticism. Comp. _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Brigida, Feb. 1, and Lanigan, _Eccles. History of Ireland_, 1829, 1, pp.
-377 ff.
-
-[31] Ambrosius, _Opera_ (edit. Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Comp._ vol. 16), _De
-virginibus_, p. 187; (vol. 17) _Ad virginem devotam_, p. 579.
-
-[32] Hilarius, _Opera_ (edit. Migne, vol. 10), _Ad Abram_, p. 547.
-
-[33] Blunt, J. J., _Vestiges of Ancient Manners in Italy and Sicily_,
-1823, pp. 56 ff.
-
-[34] Menzel, W., _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Brust,' makes this
-statement. I do not see where he takes it from.
-
-[35] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agatha, Feb. 5.
-
-[36] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agnes, Jan. 21; St Rosalia, Sept. 4.
-
-[37] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cunera, June 12.
-
-[38] Kist, N. C., in _Kerkhistorisch Archiv_, Amsterdam, 1858, vol. 2, p.
-20.
-
-[39] _Vita St Meinwerci_, bishop of Paderborn (1009-39), written about
-1155 (Potthast), c. 37.
-
-[40] Hautcoeur, _Actes de Ste Pharailde_, 1882, Introduction, p. xc.
-
-[41] _A. SS. Boll._, Gloria posthuma St Bavonis, Oct. 1, p. 261.
-
-[42] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1852, vol. 3, pp.
-111, 123 ff.
-
-[43] _A. SS. Boll._, Vita St Leodgarii, Oct. 2.
-
-[44] Roth, K. L., 'St Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, pp. 91 ff.
-
-[45] Bonnell, H. E., _Anfänge des karolingischen Hauses_, 1866, pp. 51,
-149 etc. It is noticeable that another woman-saint Ida (_A. SS. Boll._, St
-Ida, June 20) figures as ancestral mother of the Liudolfings, who became
-kings in Saxony and emperors of Germany, comp. Waitz, _Jahrbücher des
-deutschen Reichs unter Heinrich I._ 1863, Nachtrag I.
-
-[46] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 207.
-
-[47] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-82.
-
-[48] _Lebensgeschichte der heil. Othilia._ Freiburg, 1852.
-
-[49] _Alsatia_, 1858-60, p. 268, contains local stories.
-
-[50] Roth, K. L., 'St Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, p. 95.
-
-[51] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, article 'Knieen.'
-
-[52] Du Bois de Beauchesne, _Madame Ste Notburg_, 1888, pp. 85, 197 etc.
-Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, and _A. SS. Boll._ so
-far, omit her.
-
-[53] Lefebure, F. A., _Ste Godeleine et son culte_, 1888. _A. SS. Boll._,
-St Godelewa, July 6.
-
-[54] _Wonderlyk Leven._ Cortryk 1800, anon., pp. 42, 45 etc.
-
-[55] Comp. below, ch. 4, § 2.
-
-[56] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, 1870, pp. 26, 80 etc.
-
-[57] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, p. 389.
-
-[58] Clouet, _Histoire de Verdun_, p. 180; _A. SS. Boll._, St Lucie, Sept.
-9.
-
-[59] _A. SS. Boll._, St Germana, Oct. 1; Husenbeth, F. C., _Emblems of the
-Saints_, 1882.
-
-[60] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, p. 164.
-
-[61] Zacher, J., _St Genovefa Pfalzgräfin_, 1860, p. 55.
-
-[62] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, article 'Aehre,' refers to _Notre
-Dame de trois épis_ in Elsass.
-
-[63] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, St Nothburga, nr
-2.
-
-[64] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1, p. 302;
-Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 76.
-
-[65] _A. SS. Boll._, St Alena, June 19; Menzel, W., _Christliche
-Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Arm.' Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne
-Belgique_, 1844, June 19.
-
-[66] Corémans, _L'année etc._, p. 77.
-
-[67] Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, _Traditions et légendes de la Belgique_, 1870,
-vol. 1, p. 99.
-
-[68] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gunthildis, Sept. 22.
-
-[69] _Imagines SS. Augustanorum_, 1601; also Stadler and Heim,
-_Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, St Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[70] Pharaildis has been depicted with one, _A. SS. Boll._, St Pharaildis,
-Jan. 4; also Verena, comp. below.
-
-[71] Husenbeth, F. C., _Emblems of the Saints_, 1870, mentions one
-instance.
-
-[72] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, 1870, p. 7.
-
-[73] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_; _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Rolendis, May 13.
-
-[74] _A. SS. Boll._, St Edigna, Feb. 26.
-
-[75] _A. SS. Boll._, St Christiane, July 26.
-
-[76] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, p. 37.
-
-[77] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-82, St
-Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[78] Ibid., Appendix, p. 998, footnote.
-
-[79] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Regina,
-nr 4.
-
-[80] Kist, N. C., 'Reenensche Kuneralegende' in _Kerkhistorisch Archiv_,
-Amsterdam, 1858, vol. 2, p. 5.
-
-[81] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Sura.
-
-[82] _A. SS. Boll._, St Germana, Oct. 1.
-
-[83] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythologie_, 1848, pp. 5 ff., 272
-ff.
-
-[84] Capgrave, _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516.
-
-[85] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887.
-
-[86] Capgrave, _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516. Comp. Surius, _Vitae SS._
-1617.
-
-[87] Hautcoeur, _Actes de Ste Pharailde_, 1882, Introd. cxxviiii.
-
-[88] Reinsberg-Düringsfeld, _Traditions et légendes de la Belgique_, 1870,
-vol. 1, p. 288.
-
-[89] Lefebure, _Ste Godeleine et son culte_, p. 209.
-
-[90] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1852, vol. 1, p.
-304.
-
-[91] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugöttinnen_, 1870, p. 154.
-
-[92] Potthast, _Wegweiser durch die Geschichtszwerke des europ.
-Mittelalters_, 1862; Rochholz, _loc. cit._, p. 108, prints an early poetic
-version of the story in the vernacular.
-
-[93] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, 1887, p. 393.
-
-[94] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 254, footnote.
-
-[95] Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne Belgique_, pp. 61, 113, 158.
-
-[96] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 252.
-
-[97] Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne Belgique_, p. 76; Stadler und Heim,
-_Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, and the _A. SS. Boll._ pass her over.
-
-[98] Wessely, J. G., _Iconographie Gottes und der Heiligen_, 1874.
-
-[99] _A. SS. Boll._, St Afra, Aug. 5.
-
-[100] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 242.
-
-[101] Velserus, _Antiqua monumenta, Chronica der Stadt Augsp._ 1595; pp.
-4, 14, 17, 32, 88.
-
-[102] Rettberg, F. W., _Kirchengeschichte_, 1846, vol. 1, p. 147.
-
-[103] Friedrich, _Kirchengeschichte_, 1867, vol. 1, p. 413.
-
-[104] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Notburg,
-nr 1. _A. SS. Boll._, St Notburga, Jan. 26.
-
-[105] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, Appendix,
-St Achachildis.
-
-[106] Birlinger, A., _Schwäbische Sagen_, vol. 2, p. 341.
-
-[107] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[108] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 896.
-
-[109] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Kumernissa.
-
-[110] _A. SS. Boll._, St Liberata, July 20.
-
-[111] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884.
-
-[112] I cannot account for the presence of the beard; St Paula, venerated
-at Avila in Spain, is also represented with one (Stadler und Heim).
-Macrobius (_Sal._ bk 3, c. 8) tells us that the Venus Barbata was
-represented in Cyprus in the form of a man with a beard and wearing female
-clothing, which shows that goddesses of this type were venerated during
-heathen times.
-
-[113] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythol._ 1875, p. 896.
-
-[114] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, p. 36.
-
-[115] Menzel, W., _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Bart.'
-
-[116] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, pp. 31, 33, 36,
-42 etc.
-
-[117] Ibid. p. 32.
-
-[118] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Liberata, footnote, p. 807.
-
-[119] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, pp. 5, 50 etc.
-Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, series III, vol. 3, p. 194, quotes the
-following sentence from Michael Woddes, _Dialogues_, 1554: '... if a wife
-were weary of her husband she offered Otes at Poules (St Paul's) at London
-to St Uncumber,' a proof that the veneration of Ontkommer had found its
-way into England.
-
-[120] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythologie_, 1848, pp. 5 ff., 272
-ff.
-
-[121] Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 149.
-
-[122] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Myth._, 1887, p. 344.
-
-[123] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 23.
-
-[124] Corémans, _L'année de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 148.
-
-[125] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, pp. 69 ff.
-
-[126] Cradles are frequently kept in churches in Bavaria, and form, I am
-told, part of the furniture which was formerly used at the celebration of
-the Nativity play at Christmas (Weihnachtskrippenspiel).
-
-[127] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 273.
-
-[128] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Myth._, 1887, pp. 344, 349,
-gives lists of their names.
-
-[129] Grimm, _Wörterbuch_, 'Bett'; Mannhardt, W., _Germanische Mythen_,
-1858, p. 644.
-
-[130] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythol._, 1848, p. 180.
-
-[131] _A. SS. Boll._, St Einbetta, Sept. 16.
-
-[132] _A. SS. Boll._, St Kunegundis, June 16.
-
-[133] Panzer, _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 379.
-
-[134] Menck-Dittmarsch, _Des Moselthals Sagen_, 1840, pp. 178, 258.
-
-[135] Grimm, _Wörterbuch_, 'Marge.'
-
-[136] Lersch, _Centralmuseum rheinl. Inschriften_, vol. 1, p. 23; also
-_Jahrbücher des Vereins von Altertumsfreunden im Rheinlande_, Bonn: J.
-1852, Freudenberg, 'Darstellungen der Matres oder Matronae'; J. 1853,
-'Neue Matronensteine'; J. 1857, Eick, 'Matronensteine'; J. 1858, Becker,
-'Beiträge' etc.
-
-[137] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Lufthildis.
-
-[138] Ibid. St Rolendis.
-
-[139] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cunera, June 12.
-
-[140] Fustel de Coulanges, _L'invasion germanique_, 1891; Gérard, P. A.
-F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864; Ozanam, _Civilisation
-chrétienne chez les Francs_, 1855.
-
-[141] _A. SS. Boll._, St Caesaria, Jan. 12, _Regula_, pp. 730-737; also
-_A. SS. Boll._, St Caesarius episcopus, Aug. 27.
-
-[142] _A. SS. Boll._, St Caesaria, Jan. 12, _Regula_, c. 66.
-
-[143] Guettée, _Histoire de l'Église de France_, 1847, vol. 2, 46; Labbé,
-_Sacr. Conc. Collectio_, Conc. Agathense, canon nr 19.
-
-[144] Guettée, _Histoire de l'Église de France_, 1847, vol. 2, p. 109.
-
-[145] Keller, Ch., _Étude critique sur le texte de la vie de Ste
-Geneviève_, 1881; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Genovefa, Jan. 3.
-
-[146] Darboy, Mgr, _Sainte Clothilde_, 1865; also _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Chrothildis, June 3.
-
-[147] Giesebrecht, W., _Fränkische Geschichte des Gregorius_, 1851,
-Einleitung xviii.
-
-[148] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106 (in Migne, _Patrol.
-Cursus Completus_, vol. 71).
-
-[149] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Martyrum_, ch. 5 (in Migne, _Patrol.
-Cursus Compl._, vol. 71).
-
-[150] _A. SS. Boll._, St Radegundis, Aug. 13 (contains both these
-accounts).
-
-[151] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887.
-
-[152] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 9, ch. 42.
-
-[153] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 3, ch. 7; Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch.
-2-4.
-
-[154] Giesebrecht, W., _Fränkische Geschichte des Gregorius_, 1851,
-appendix.
-
-[155] Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch. 3.
-
-[156] Ibid., ch. 10.
-
-[157] Ibid., ch. 5.
-
-[158] Baudonivia, _Vita_, ch. 2.
-
-[159] _A. SS. Boll._, St Medardus, June 8.
-
-[160] Commentators are much exercised by this summary breaking of the
-marriage tie; some urge that Radegund's union had not been blessed by the
-Church. In the _A. SS._ it is argued that the Gallic bishop Medardus in
-pronouncing her divorce acted in ignorance of certain canons of the
-Church.
-
-[161] Fortunatus, _Vita_, c. 10.
-
-[162] Ibid., ch. 11; Baudonivia, _Vita_, ch. 6.
-
-[163] Ibid., _Vita_, ch. 12.
-
-[164] Stadler und Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, Johannes, nr 52;
-Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 23.
-
-[165] Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch. 26.
-
-[166] Lucchi, _Vie de Venantius Fortunatus_, ch. 85 (in Fortunatus, _Opera
-poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887).
-
-[167] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106.
-
-[168] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 111, 3, p.
-214.
-
-[169] Gérard, P. A. F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864, vol. 1,
-p. 272.
-
-[170] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 9, ch. 40.
-
-[171] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 11, 1, p. 76.
-
-[172] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 8, ch. 40.
-
-[173] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 7, ch. 36.
-
-[174] Baudonivia, _Vita_, c. 11.
-
-[175] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, bk 10, nr 9.
-
-[176] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, bk 2, nr 16.
-
-[177] Ibid., bk 6, nr 1.
-
-[178] Mone, F. J., _Lateinische Hymnen des Mittelalters_, 1853-5, vol 1,
-101; Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, note, p. 76.
-
-[179] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, Appendix, nr 2.
-
-[180] Ibid., bk 8, nr 1.
-
-[181] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, note 9, p. 213.
-
-[182] Ibid., Appendix, nr 16.
-
-[183] Ibid., nr 31.
-
-[184] Nisard, Ch., _Des poesies de Radegonde attribuées jusqu'ici à
-Fortunat_, 1889, p. 5.
-
-[185] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 111, 2, 3,
-etc., p. 284.
-
-[186] Ibid., 'De Excidio Thoringiae,' Appendix, nr 1.
-
-[187] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, Appendix, nr 3.
-
-[188] Ibid., bk 8, nr 8.
-
-[189] Ibid., bk 8, nr 6.
-
-[190] Ibid., bk 11, nr 10.
-
-[191] Ibid., bk 11, nr 9.
-
-[192] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, bk 11, nr 11.
-
-[193] Ibid., bk 11, nr 22.
-
-[194] Ibid., bk 11, nr 8.
-
-[195] Ibid., bk 11, nr 6.
-
-[196] Ibid., Appendix, nr 21.
-
-[197] Ibid., bk 11, nr 2.
-
-[198] Ibid., bk 11, nr 7.
-
-[199] Ibid., Appendix, nr 15.
-
-[200] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106.
-
-[201] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, chs. 39-44; bk 10, chs. 15-17,
-20.
-
-[202] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 39.
-
-[203] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 41.
-
-[204] Ibid., bk 10, ch. 15.
-
-[205] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 33; bk 10, ch. 12.
-
-[206] _A. SS. Boll._, St Vedastus, Feb. 6.
-
-[207] _A. SS. Boll._, St Eleutherius, Feb. 20, _Vita_ 1, ch. 3 (Potthast,
-Wegweiser: '_Vita auctore anonymo sed antiquo_').
-
-[208] Gérard, P. A. F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864, vol. 1,
-p. 384.
-
-[209] Comp. throughout _A. SS. Boll._, St Wandregisilus, July 22; St
-Waningus, Jan. 9, etc.
-
-[210] Drapeyron, L., _La reine Brunehilde_, 1867.
-
-[211] Gregorius, Papa, _Epistolae_, liber 9, epist. 109 (in Migne,
-_Patrol. Cursus Compl._ vol. 77).
-
-[212] St Columban who went abroad and died in 615 should be kept distinct
-from St Columba who died in 597, sometimes also called Columban. Both of
-them wrote rules for monks (cf. _Dictionary of Nat. Biography_).
-
-[213] Bouquet, _Recueil Hist._, vol. 3, p. 478.
-
-[214] _A. SS. Boll._, St Desiderius, May 23.
-
-[215] Guettée, _Histoire de l'Église de France_, vol. 1, p. 317.
-
-[216] Opinions differ as to the original form of the rule of St Benedict.
-Comp. Benedictus, _Opera_, pp. 204 ff. (in Migne, _Patrologiae Cursus
-Complet._, vol. 66).
-
-[217] _A. SS. Boll._, St Filibertus, Aug. 20.
-
-[218] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, Appendix, gives
-the Charter.
-
-[219] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, p. 249.
-
-[220] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bathildis, Jan. 26 (contains both accounts).
-
-[221] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, p. 86.
-
-[222] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bathildis, Jan. 26; _Vita_ 11., ch. 14.
-
-[223] _A. SS. Boll._, ibid., St Aurea, Oct. 4.
-
-[224] Ibid., St Filibertus, Aug. 20, _Vita_, ch. 5.
-
-[225] Ibid., St Austreberta, Feb. 10.
-
-[226] Regnault, _Vie de Ste Fare_, 1626.
-
-[227] _A. SS. Boll._, St Teclechildis, Oct. 10.
-
-[228] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bertilia, Jan. 3.
-
-[229] Ibid., St Salaberga, Sept. 22, _Vita_, ch. 8.
-
-[230] Ibid., St Austrudis, Oct. 17.
-
-[231] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 3, ch. 8; bk 4, ch. 23. Comp. below, ch.
-3, § 1.
-
-[232] _History of the Anglo-Saxons_, transl. Thorpe, 1845, vol. 2, p. 247.
-
-[233] Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_. Rolls series, vol. 1,
-Preface, p. xxiii.
-
-[234] It is probable such settlements existed. Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol.
-3, p. 302, holds a religious foundation to have existed in Tinmouth
-founded 617-33, but in Bede, _Life of Cuthbert_, transl. Stevenson, T.,
-1887, ch. 3, it is referred to as a monastery formerly of men, now of
-'virgins.'
-
-[235] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Folkestone,' vol. 1, p. 451.
-
-[236] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 226: 'the life of Eanswith cannot be traced to any earlier authority
-than John of Tinmouth ([Dagger] c. 1380) whose account Capgrave ([Dagger]
-1484) embodied in his collection of saints' lives.' The work of Capgrave,
-_Catalogus SS. Angliae_, was printed in 1516; the _Kalendre of the newe
-Legende of Englande_, printed 1516 (Pynson), from which expressions are
-quoted in the text, is an abridged translation of it into English.
-
-[237] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Folkestone,' vol. 1, p. 451, nr 2.
-
-[238] Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1880,
-'Eanswitha'; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Eanswida, Aug. 31.
-
-[239] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Liming,' vol. 1, p. 452.
-
-[240] Jenkins, R. C., in _Gentleman's Magazine_, 1862, August, p. 196
-quotes this statement; I do not see where he takes it from.
-
-[241] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 144.
-
-[242] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 475.
-
-[243] Gocelinus, _Vita St Wereburgae_, c. 1 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-Compl._, vol. 155).
-
-[244] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 130 footnote.
-
-[245] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sheppey,' vol. 2, p. 49.
-
-[246] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 123.
-
-[247] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 3, ch. 8, transl. Gidley, 1870.
-
-[248] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thanet,' vol. 1, p. 447; Hardy, Th. D.,
-_Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, on lives of St Mildred, vol.
-1, p. 376; _A. SS. Boll._, St Mildreda, July 13.
-
-[249] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, July 13.
-
-[250] Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, article
-'Mildred' by Bishop Stubbs.
-
-[251] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thanet,' vol. 1, p. 447.
-
-[252] _A. SS. Boll._, St Milburga, Feb. 23.
-
-[253] Ibid., St Mildwida, Jan. 17.
-
-[254] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, Jan. 17.
-
-[255] 'Lives of Women Saints' (written about 1610) p. 64, edited by
-Horstman for the Early Engl. Text Soc., London, 1887.
-
-[256] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents_, 1869,
-vol. 3, p. 240.
-
-[257] 'Upmynstre, Suthmynstre, Folcanstan, Limming, Sceppeis.'
-
-[258] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Whitby,' vol. 1, p. 405.
-
-[259] Bede, _Eccl. Hist._, bk 4, ch. 23 transl. Gidley, 1870. Dugdale,
-_Monasticon_, 'Hartlepool,' vol. 6, p. 1618, places the foundation about
-the year 640.
-
-[260] Bede, _Eccl. Hist._ bk 3, chs. 24-25; bk 4, chs. 23-24.
-
-[261] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bega, Sept. 6; Tomlinson, G. C., _Life and
-Miracles of St Bega_, 1839.
-
-[262] _Carthularium abbathiae de Whiteby_, publ. Surtees Soc., 1879.
-
-[263] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 23, translat. Gidley, 1870, with
-additions and alterations.
-
-[264] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 5, ch. 3.
-
-[265] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 10; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 1,
-p. 233, mentions Easington only as a manor of Durham.
-
-[266] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Hackness,' vol. 3, p. 633.
-
-[267] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 23.
-
-[268] _Dictionary of Nat. Biography_, article 'Caedmon' by Henry Bradley.
-
-[269] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 24, transl. Gidley, 1870.
-
-[270] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' _Yorksh.
-Archaeolog. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 370. I do not know on what authority
-Haigh designates Heiu as saint.
-
-[271] Gray, de Birch, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 15.
-
-[272] Comp. below, p. 106.
-
-[273] Charlton, L., _History of Whitby_, 1779, p. 33.
-
-[274] Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_, Rolls series, vol. 1,
-Preface p. xxvii. This volume contains reprints of several accounts of the
-life of Wilfrith, including the one by Eddi.
-
-[275] _A. SS. Boll._, St Withburga, March 17; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'East
-Dereham,' vol. 2, p. 176.
-
-[276] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,'
-_Yorkshire Archaeol. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 352, decides in favour of
-Aethelric.
-
-[277] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 235.
-
-[278] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Coldingham,' vol. 6, p. 149. The promontory
-of St Abb's Head retains her name. She is believed to have founded another
-religious settlement at a place in Durham on the river Derwent called
-Ebbchester, and the village church there is dedicated to her (_Dict. of
-Nat. Biog._).
-
-[279] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[280] _A. SS. Boll._, St Etheldreda June 23, Thomas of Ely, _Vita_ ch. 41.
-
-[281] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 252 footnote.
-
-[282] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[283] _Kalendre of the newe Legende of Englande_, printed 1516 (Pynson)
-fol. 39 b.
-
-[284] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[285] _Dictionary of National Biography_, 'Etheldreda, Saint.'
-
-[286] Bentham, _History of Ely_, 1817, p. 9.
-
-[287] Gocelinus, _Vita St Wereburgae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._
-vol. 155).
-
-[288] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 49, calls it
-Weedon in Northamptonshire; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wedon,' vol. 6, p.
-1051, doubts its existence.
-
-[289] _Life of St Werburgh_, 1521, reprinted for the Early Engl. Text
-Soc., 1887.
-
-[290] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 49.
-
-[291] Livien, E. 'On early religious houses in Staffordshire,' _Journal of
-the British Archaeolog. Assoc._, vol. 29, p. 329. (The widespread cult of
-St Werburg may be due to there having been several saints of this name;
-comp. Stanton, R., _Menology_.)
-
-[292] Eddi, _Vita_, c. 34 (in Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_,
-Rolls series).
-
-[293] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 300, casts
-discredit on this story, which is told by Eddi, _Vita_, c. 38.
-
-[294] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, pp. 301 ff.
-
-[295] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-pp. 297 ff.
-
-[296] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 10.
-
-[297] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 25.
-
-[298] The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle gives 679 as the date of the fire; Eddi's
-account represents Aebbe as alive in 681. Perhaps she died in 680; comp.
-Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1877, Ebba, nr 1;
-also Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 300, footnote.
-
-[299] Bright, W., ibid., p. 255, footnote.
-
-[300] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 312.
-
-[301] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 23.
-
-[302] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 34.
-
-[303] Ibid., ch. 24.
-
-[304] Psalm lxxxix. 10 (The Vulgate here follows the LXX.; it would be
-interesting to know what sense they or indeed Bede gave to the passage).
-
-[305] Eccles. xi. 8.
-
-[306] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 4, ch. 26.
-
-[307] Eddi, _Vita_, c. 43.
-
-[308] Bright, W., _Early English History_, 1878, p. 448, from 686-691.
-
-[309] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' _Yorksh.
-Archaeol. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 375.
-
-[310] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Peterborough,' vol. 1, p. 377, nr 2, prints
-the charter.
-
-[311] Gough, R., _Parochial History of Castor_, 1819, p. 99.
-
-[312] 'Cum beatissimis sororibus meis Kyneburga et Kyneswida, quarum prior
-regina mutavit imperium in Christi ancillarum praesidens monasterio ...
-etc.'
-
-[313] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 370.
-
-[314] _A. SS. Boll._, St Kineburga et St Kineswitha, virgines, March 6,
-argue the existence of a third sister.
-
-[315] Camden, _Britannia_, edit. 1789, vol. 2, pp. 219, 223.
-
-[316] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Repton,' vol. 6, p. 429; the abbesses he
-mentions should stand in this order: Alfritha, Edburga.
-
-[317] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Eccles. Documents_, 1869, vol. 3,
-p. 273.
-
-[318] Ibid., vol. 3, p. 274.
-
-[319] Birch, W. de Gray, _Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881.
-
-[320] _A. SS. Boll._, St Guthlac, April 11; Felix, _Vita_, c. 12.
-
-[321] Felix, _Vita_, c. 33.
-
-[322] Ibid., 'Egburgh abbatissa, Aldulfi regis filia'; Smith and Wace,
-_Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1877, call her 'Eadburga (nr 3)'; two
-abbesses Ecgburh occur in the Durham list of abbesses, comp. Gray, W. de
-Birch, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 70.
-
-[323] Comp. below, ch. 4, § 1.
-
-[324] Holdich, B., _History of Crowland Abbey_, 1816, p. 2.
-
-[325] Gray, W. de Birch, _Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881,
-Introd. p. l, footnote.
-
-[326] Brit. Mus. MS. Harleian Roll, Y 6, reproduced Gray, W. de Birch,
-_Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881, pp. 14, 16, etc.
-
-[327] Goodwin, C. W., _The Anglo-Saxon version of the life of St Guthlac_,
-1848, p. 93.
-
-[328] _A. SS. Boll._, St Pega sive Pegia, Jan. 8.
-
-[329] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ositha, Oct. 7.
-
-[330] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chich Priory,' vol. 6, p. 308.
-
-[331] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, vol. 1, pp. 524
-ff.
-
-[332] _A. SS. Boll._, St Frideswida, Oct. 19; Dugdale, _Monasticon_,
-'Christ Church,' vol. 2, p. 134.
-
-[333] _Dictionary of National Biography_, Frideswide.
-
-[334] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 137: 'we have
-no records of Osburg till 1410.'
-
-[335] Ibid., p. 310: 'there is much obscurity in the history of St
-Modwenna. It seems that she must be distinguished from one or perhaps two
-other Irish saints....' Also Livien, E., 'On early religious houses in
-Staffordshire' in _Journal of the British Archaeol. Association_, vol. 29,
-p. 333; Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, pp. 94 ff.
-
-[336] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 328.
-
-[337] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 4, chs. 7-10.
-
-[338] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 436.
-
-[339] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ethelburga, Oct. 11; Stanton, R., _Menology of
-England and Wales_, p. 485.
-
-[340] Stanton, R., _Menology_, calls her Theorigitha but says, p. 36, that
-she has no day.
-
-[341] _A. SS. Boll._, St Hildelitha, March 24.
-
-[342] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 5, ch. 18.
-
-[343] Capgrave, T., _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516, fol. 10, b.
-
-[344] _Monumenta Moguntina_, edit. Jaffé, Epist. nr 2, written between 675
-and 705; Giles (Aldhelm, _Opera Omnia_, 1844, p. 90) calls her Osgith, a
-name which occurs several times in the Durham 'Liber Vitae.'
-
-[345] Aldhelm, _Opera_, edit. Giles, 1844, p. 103.
-
-[346] Ibid., p. 115, _De Basilica_, etc.
-
-[347] Ibid., p. 135, _De Laudibus Virginum_ (it is not known over which
-house Maxima presided); p. 203, _De octo Principalibus Vitiis_.
-
-[348] Ibid., p. 1, _De Laudibus Virginitatis_ (chapter references in the
-text are to this edition).
-
-[349] Mediaeval exegesis interpreted in these four ways, comp. Cassian
-Erem., _De Spiritu Sc._, c. 8.
-
-[350] I take 'crustu' to go with 'crusta,' comp. Ducange.
-
-[351] _Monumenta Moguntina_, edit. Jaffé, Epist. nr 70.
-
-[352] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sherbourne,' vol. 1, p. 331, footnote K.
-
-[353] Will. of Malmesbury, _History_, c. 31.
-
-[354] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, 'Aldhelm.'
-
-[355] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 88.
-
-[356] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cuthberga, Aug. 31.
-
-[357] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 88.
-
-[358] _Opera_ edit. Giles, 1844, p. 216; _Dict. of Nat. Biog._,
-'Aldfrith,' he is sometimes called Alfred.
-
-[359] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 89, nr 2.
-
-[360] _Brit. Mus. MSS. Lansdowne_, 436 f., 38 b.
-
-[361] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Tetbury,' vol. 6, p. 1619.
-
-[362] _A. SS. Boll._, St Lioba, Sept. 28, c. 2.
-
-[363] Arndt, W., Introd. to translation into German (in Pertz,
-_Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit_, Jahrhundert 8, Band 2), p.
-xix.
-
-[364] Epist. nr 12. The only edition of the letters of Boniface which
-attempts chronological order is that of Jaffé, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_,
-1866, the numeration of which I have followed. Additional remarks on the
-dates of some of the letters are contained in Hahn, H., _Bonifaz und Lull,
-ihre angelsächsischen Correspondenten_, 1883.
-
-[365] Willibaldus presb., _Vita Bonifacii_, edit. Jaffé, Ph., _Monumenta
-Moguntina_, 1866, pp. 422-506, c. 2.
-
-[366] Whether Eadburg of Thanet is identical with St Eadburga buried at
-Liming (comp. p. 84), is uncertain.
-
-[367] Epist. nr 10.
-
-[368] Epist. nr 112.
-
-[369] Epist. nr 32, written 735 (Jaffé); after 732 (Hahn).
-
-[370] Epist. nr 75.
-
-[371] Epist. nr 31.
-
-[372] Epist. nr 62.
-
-[373] Epist. nr 76.
-
-[374] Epist. nr 22, written 722 (Jaffé).
-
-[375] Epist. nr 39.
-
-[376] Epist. nr 46.
-
-[377] Epist. nr 72, 2 Cor. vii. 5.
-
-[378] Epist. nr 73.
-
-[379] Comp. Ps. cxix. 105.
-
-[380] Epist. nr 87.
-
-[381] Epist. nr 8; written between 709 and 712 (Hahn). Boniface is known
-to have travelled in the district of the Mosel; there is no other reason
-why this letter should be included in the correspondence.
-
-[382] John xv. 12.
-
-[383] Epist. nr 59; written 745 (Hahn).
-
-[384] Epist. nr 60.
-
-[385] Epist. nr 61.
-
-[386] Epist. nr 70; written after 748 (Hahn).
-
-[387] Epist. nr 13, written 717-19 (Hahn).
-
-[388] Jaffé, Ph., _loc. cit._, footnote, p. 64, quotes the lines Virg.
-_Aen._, 11. 369-70, of which this sentence seems an adaptation.
-
-[389] Comp. Psalm i. 2.
-
-[390] Romans x. 15.
-
-[391] Matth. xxv. 36.
-
-[392] Comp. Matth. xix. 28.
-
-[393] Epist. nr 14, written 719-22 (Jaffé). Haigh, D. H., 'On the
-monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' in _Yorkshire Archaeol. Journal_,
-vol. 3, p. 377, speaks of her as Cangith and holds her to have been abbess
-of Hackness.
-
-[394] Birch, W. de Gray, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 68.
-
-[395] Matth. vii. 25.
-
-[396] Comp. Luc. xiv. 31.
-
-[397] Wisdom vi. 7 (Vulgate).
-
-[398] Wisdom iv. 12 (Vulgate).
-
-[399] There are some difficulties in this passage.
-
-[400] Daniel xiv. 33 (Vulgate).
-
-[401] Acts viii. 26.
-
-[402] Ps. cxix. 103.
-
-[403] Ps. xxxvi. 6.
-
-[404] Cp. Ps. cxli. 2.
-
-[405] Cp. 2 Cor. v. 12.
-
-[406] The name Bugga occurs frequently during this period.
-
-[407] Epist. nr 16, written 720-22 (Jaffé); I think somewhat later.
-
-[408] Epist. nr 86.
-
-[409] Epist. nr 88.
-
-[410] Epist. nrs 37, 38, 39.
-
-[411] Epist. nr 103, written shortly after 740 (Hahn).
-
-[412] Epist. nr 113.
-
-[413] Epist. nr 53.
-
-[414] Epist. nr 70.
-
-[415] Epist. nr 126.
-
-[416] Epist. nr 23; the verse runs as follows:
-
-  'Arbiter omnipotens, solus qui cuncta creavit,
-  In regno Patris semper qui lumine fulget,
-  Qua jugiter flagrans sic regnat gloria Christi,
-  Inlaesum servet semper te jure perenni.'
-
-[417] _A. SS. Boll._, St Lioba, Sept. 28, _Vita_, ch. 9.
-
-[418] Epist. nr 91, written between 737-41 (Hahn).
-
-[419] _Vita_, ch. 13.
-
-[420] Epist. nr 34.
-
-[421] Epist. nr 98, written 732-747 (Hahn).
-
-[422] _Vita_, ch. 14.
-
-[423] Epist. nr 93.
-
-[424] Epist. nr 126; also Epist. nr 68, written 748 (from the Pope on the
-consecration of abbot and abbess).
-
-[425] _Vita St Sturmi_ in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 2, p. 365.
-
-[426] In Jaffé, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_, 1866, p. 475.
-
-[427] Comp. above, p. 135.
-
-[428] _A. SS. Boll._, St Tecla, Oct. 15, casts discredit on Tecla's
-settling at Kizzingen and argues in favour of Oxenfurt. Kizzingen existed
-in the 15 c.; nothing is known concerning the later history of Oxenfurt.
-
-[429] Hahn, H., _Bonifaz und Lull, ihre angelsächsischen Correspondenten_,
-1883, p. 138, footnote 4, considers her identical with the Cynehild of the
-correspondence.
-
-[430] Two letters, nrs 148, 149, in the correspondence are written by
-'Berthgyth,' apparently a nun in England who wished to go abroad, to her
-brother Baldhard, but judging by their contents ('I have been deserted by
-my parents,' etc.) it is improbable that she is identical with the nun
-referred to above.
-
-[431] Jaffé, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_, 1866, p. 490.
-
-[432] Comp. above, p. 25.
-
-[433] Comp. the attempt to identify Chunihilt with St Gunthildis, _A. SS.
-Boll._, Sept. 22.
-
-[434] Edit. Canisius, H., _Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2; this anonymous nun is
-sometimes considered identical with the sister of Wilibald and Wunebald,
-and therefore with St Walburg.
-
-[435] _Vita St Willibaldi_ (also called Hodoeporicon), edit. Canisius, H.,
-_Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2, ch. 2.
-
-[436] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 5, ch. 15.
-
-[437] For erasing writing from parchment.
-
-[438] _Vita St Wunebaldi_, edit. Canisius, H., _Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2.
-
-[439] Widukind, _Annalium libri tres_, year 924.
-
-[440] Giesebrecht, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit_, 4 ed. 1873,
-vol. 1.
-
-[441] Ex Vita Liutbergae in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 4, p. 158
-(Potthast, _Wegweiser_, written about 870).
-
-[442] Dümmler, E., _Geschichte des ostfränkischen Reichs_, 1865, vol. 1,
-p. 348.
-
-[443] Translatio St Pusinnae in _A. SS. Boll._, April 23 (Potthast,
-_Wegweiser_, written probably by a monk of Corvei between 860-877).
-
-[444] Dümmler, E., _Geschichte des ostfränkischen Reichs_, 1865, vol. 2,
-p. 336.
-
-[445] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Diöcese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 22.
-
-[446] Vita Mathildis Reg. (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 4, p. 283
-ff.), c. 26.
-
-[447] _Annales Quedliburgenses_, year 999.
-
-[448] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1826, vol. 1, p.
-45.
-
-[449] Luther, _An den Adel christl. Nation_, 1520, edit. Knaake, vol. 6,
-p. 440.
-
-[450] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, vol. 1, p. 529.
-
-[451] Engelhausen, _Chronicon_ (in Leibnitz, _Scriptores rer. Brunsv._
-1707, vol. 2), p. 978.
-
-[452] Comp. below, ch. 6, § 1.
-
-[453] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Diöcese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 67, quoting 'Reimchronik,'
-
-  'Dat Bog segt, dat se so vele Wisheit konde,
-  Dat se ok wol gelerden Meistern wedderstunde.'
-
-[454] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, vol. 1, p. 626 ff.
-
-[455] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Diöcese und Stadt Hildesheim_, vol. 1, p.
-319.
-
-[456] 'De fundatione Brunswilarensis' (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Scriptores_,
-vol. 11, p. 394 footnote); Adelheid was abbess of Nivelles, Mathilde of
-Villich and Diedenkirchen, Theofanu of Essen, Hedwig of Neuss; Sophie and
-Ida, to whom reference has been made in the text, are said by Pertz to
-have presided over Gandersheim and St Maria at Cöln; Sophie certainly did
-not become abbess at Gandersheim, perhaps she went to Mainz; Ida probably
-presided over the convent of St Maria on the Münzenberg, a dependency of
-Gandersheim.
-
-[457] Waitz, G., _Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte_, 1868, vol. 7, p. 258.
-
-[458] Reichstage, 1548-1594.
-
-[459] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-259.
-
-[460] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Diöcese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 67.
-
-[461] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-84.
-
-[462] Ebert, Ad., _Geschichte der Litteratur des Mittelalters_, 1887, vol.
-3, p. 429 footnote.
-
-[463] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Ganders._, 1734; also Luentzel,
-_Geschichte der Diöcese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol. 1, pp. 33 ff.,
-63 ff.
-
-[464] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_ (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ.
-Scriptores_, vol. 4, pp. 166-189).
-
-[465] Hrotsvith, 'Carmen de Primordiis Coenobii Gandersh.,' in _Opera_,
-edit. Barack, 1858, p. 339 ff.
-
-[466] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 3.
-
-[467] Ibid. ch. 5.
-
-[468] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 9.
-
-[469] Ibid. ch. 15.
-
-[470] 'Carmen de Primordiis Coenobii Gandersh.,' line 273.
-
-[471] 'Carmen de Gestis Oddonis I,' in _Opera_, edit. Barack, 1858, p.
-302.
-
-[472] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 11.
-
-[473] Köpke, R., _Deutschlands älteste Dichterin_, 1869, p. 17.
-
-[474] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, p. 589.
-
-[475] Meibom, H., _Rerum German. Script._, 1688, vol. 1, p. 706, quoting
-Selneccer.
-
-[476] Hrotsvith, _Opera_, edit. Barack, 1858; Ebert, Ad., _Allgemeine
-Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887, vol. 3, p. 285 ff.
-
-[477] _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 6.
-
-[478] Piltz, O., _Die Dramen der Roswitha_, no date; Magnin, _Théâtre de
-Hrotsvitha_, 1845.
-
-[479] Köpke, R., _Deutschlands älteste Dichterin_, 1869, p. 28.
-
-[480] Hrotsvith, _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 54.
-
-[481] 'Maria,' _Opera_, p. 7.
-
-[482] _Opera_, edit. Barack, p. 2.
-
-[483] 'Ascensio Domini,' _Opera_, p. 37.
-
-[484] _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 48.
-
-[485] 'Gongolf,' _Opera_, p. 43.
-
-[486] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 290.
-
-[487] 'Pelagius,' _Opera_, p. 63.
-
-[488] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 295.
-
-[489] 'Theophilus,' _Opera_, p. 79.
-
-[490] 'Proterius,' _Opera_, p. 97.
-
-[491] 'Dionysius,' _Opera_, p. 107.
-
-[492] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 300.
-
-[493] 'Agnes,' _Opera_, p. 117.
-
-[494] _Opera_, p. 133.
-
-[495] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 301.
-
-[496] _Opera_, p. 95.
-
-[497] _Opera_, p. 137.
-
-[498] Hudson, W. H., 'Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim,' _English Historical
-Review_, 1888.
-
-[499] 'Gallicanus,' _Opera_, p. 143.
-
-[500] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 316.
-
-[501] 'Dulcetius,' _Opera_, p. 174.
-
-[502] 'Calimachus,' _Opera_, p. 191.
-
-[503] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 321.
-
-[504] 'Abraham,' _Opera_, p. 213.
-
-[505] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 323.
-
-[506] 'Paphnutius,' _Opera_, p. 237.
-
-[507] Piltz, O., _Dramen der Roswitha_ (no date), p. 178, refers to
-Boëthius, _In Categorias Aristotelis_, liber 1, 'de substantia'; and to
-_De musica_, liber 1.
-
-[508] The ancient course of university study included the seven 'liberal
-arts' and was divided into the _Trivium_ including grammar, dialectic and
-rhetoric, and the _Quadrivium_ including arithmetic, geometry, astronomy
-and music. The _Trivium_ was sometimes designated as _logic_ and the
-_Quadrivium_ as _physic_.
-
-[509] 'Sapientia,' _Opera_, p. 27.
-
-[510] Piltz, _Die Dramen der Roswitha_, p. 181, refers to Boëthius, _De
-Arithmetica_, liber 1, cc. 9-22.
-
-[511] 'who favoured and improved these works before they were sent forth,'
-additional words of some manuscripts; _Opera_, edit. Barak, p. 140
-footnote.
-
-[512] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 305.
-
-[513] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 311.
-
-[514] Köpke, _Die älteste deutsche Dichterin_, 1869.
-
-[515] Comp. _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Roswitha.'
-
-[516] Labbé, _Sacror. Concil. Collectio_, 1763, years 789, 804, 811;
-Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, p. 146 ff.
-
-[517] Matth. Paris, _Historia Major Angliae_, sub anno.
-
-[518] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 184
-ff.; Ladewig, _Poppo von Stablo und die Klosterreform unter den Saliern_,
-1883.
-
-[519] _Wulfstan_, edit. Napier, Arthur, Berlin 1883, p. 156.
-
-[520] Tanner, T., _Notitia monastica_, edit. Nasmith, 1787, Introduction,
-p. ix.
-
-[521] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 341
-ff.; _A. SS. Boll._, St Stephanus abbas, April 17.
-
-[522] Janauschek, L., _Origines Cisterciensium_, 1877.
-
-[523] Dialogus inter Clun. et Cist. in Martène and Durand's _Thesaurus
-nov. Anecdot._ Paris, 1717, vol. 5, p. 1568.
-
-[524] Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia Occidentalis_, 1597, c. 15.
-
-[525] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 375,
-468 ff.
-
-[526] Hermannus, _De Mirac. St Mariae Laudun._ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-completus_, vol. 156), p. 1002.
-
-[527] Brunner, S., _Ein Cisterzienserbuch_, 1881, p. 612.
-
-[528] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, p. 376.
-
-[529] Birch, W. de Gray, _On the Date of Foundation ascribed to the
-Cistercian Abbeys of Great Britain_, 1870.
-
-[530] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rivaulx,' vol. 5, p. 274.
-
-[531] Ibid. 'Fountains,' vol. 5, p. 292, nrs I-XI.
-
-[532] _A. SS. Boll._, St Robertus, Feb. 25, contains two accounts of his
-life, the one by Baldric ([Dagger] 1130), the other by Andrea. Comp. also
-Helyot, _Hist, des ordres mon._, 1714, vol. 6, pp. 83 ff.
-
-[533] Differing from settlements of the Gilbertine order, in which there
-were lay sisters also.
-
-[534] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, pp. 156 ff.
-'Leben des heil. Norbert' (written before 1155) transl. by Hertel in
-Pertz, _Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit_.
-
-[535] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, p. 175;
-Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia occidentalis_, 1597, ch. 15.
-
-[536] Gonzague, _Monastère de Storrington_, 1884, p. 8.
-
-[537] They were Brodholm and Irford.
-
-[538] § 3 of this chapter.
-
-[539] 'Peregrinatio Relig. ergo.'
-
-[540] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, pp. 11 ff.
-
-[541] Tanner, J., _Notitia Monastica_ edit. Nasmith, 1787, Introd. XI.
-
-[542] Rohrbacher, _Histoire universelle de l'église catholique_, 1868,
-vol. 6, p. 252.
-
-[543] Labbé, C., _Sacror. Conc. Collectio_, 1763, year 816, part 2.
-
-[544] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, p. 55.
-
-[545] Hugonin, 'Essai sur la fondation de l'école St Victor à Paris,'
-printed as an introduction to Hugo de St Victore, _Opera_ (in Migne,
-_Patrologiae Cursus Compl._ vol. 175).
-
-[546] Comp. below, ch. 9, § 1.
-
-[547] Norgate, Kate, _History of the Angevin Kings_, 1887, vol. 1, p. 66.
-
-[548] Idung, _De quatuor questionibus_ in Pez, B., _Thesaurus anecdot.
-nov. 1721_, vol. 2.
-
-[549] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 7, pp. 366,
-406. Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia Occidentalis_, 1597, c. 15.
-
-[550] Giraldus Cambrensis, _Speculum Ecclesiae_, edit. Brewer, 1873.
-
-[551] Map, W., _De Nugis Curialium_ (written 1182-89), 1850, p. 38.
-
-[552] John of Salisbury, _Polycraticus_, edit. Giles, bk. VII. chs. 21-23.
-
-[553] Wirecker, N., _Brunellus_, 1662, p. 83.
-
-[554] Goldsmid, _Political Songs_, vol. 2, p. 64.
-
-[555] Freeman, _Norman Conquest_, 3rd edit. 1877, vol. 2, p. 609.
-
-[556] Ibid. p. 554; Map, _De Nugis Curialium_, 1850, p. 201 (Freeman: Map
-like other Norman writers speaks very ill of Godwin).
-
-[557] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6, p. 1618 (p. 1619 he says in
-connection with the destroyed nunnery Woodchester that the wife of Earl
-Godwin built it to make amends for her husband's fraud at Berkley).
-
-[558] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 470.
-
-[559] Ibid. 'Nunnaminster,' vol. 2, p. 451.
-
-[560] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 436.
-
-[561] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 472. The abbess does not even seem
-to have been represented (as she was at the Diet abroad).
-
-[562] Ibid. p. 472; and p. 473 footnote.
-
-[563] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 1, p. 472.
-
-[564] They were Godstow, Elstow, Malling.
-
-[565] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Amesbury,' vol. 2, p. 333; Freeman, _History
-of the Norman Conquest_ (3rd edit. 1877), vol. 2, p. 610; the event is
-dated 1177; perhaps the letters from John of Salisbury, _Epist._ edit.
-Giles, nrs 72, 74, are addressed to the abbess of Amesbury, who was
-deposed.
-
-[566] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 362.
-
-[567] Ibid. 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 422.
-
-[568] Ibid. 'St Clement's,' vol. 4, p. 323.
-
-[569] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Stanford,' vol. 4, p. 257.
-
-[570] Ibid. 'Sinningthwaite,' vol. 5, p. 463.
-
-[571] Ibid. 'Swine,' vol. 5, p. 494, nr 2; 'Nun-Cotham,' vol. 5, p. 676,
-nr 2.
-
-[572] _A. SS. Boll._, St Margaret, June 10.
-
-[573] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, Christina.
-
-[574] Brand, _History of Newcastle_, vol. 1, p. 204.
-
-[575] Freeman, _History of William Rufus_, vol. 2, pp. 596, 682.
-
-[576] Will. of Malmesbury, _Gesta Reg._ (Rolls Series), pp. 279, 470, 493.
-
-[577] Orderic Vitalis, _Eccles. Hist._, transl. by Forester, 1847, vol. 3,
-p. 12.
-
-[578] Eadmer, _Historia_ (Rolls Series), p. 122.
-
-[579] Comp. below, ch. 8, § 2.
-
-[580] Anselm of Canterbury, _Epistolae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-completus_, vol. 159), the numeration of which is followed in the text.
-
-[581] Hilarius, _Versus et ludi_, edit. Champollion-Figeac, 1838, p. 1.
-(Champollion prints Clinton, which he no doubt misread for Winton.)
-
-[582] Milner, J., _History of Winchester_, 1823, vol. 1, p. 212.
-
-[583] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wherwell,' vol. 2, p. 634.
-
-[584] Ibid. 'St Mary's Abbey,' vol. 2, p. 452.
-
-[585] Ibid. 'Lillechurch,' vol. 4, p. 378, charter nr 2.
-
-[586] Ibid. 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 506.
-
-[587] Norgate, Kate, _History of the Angevin Kings_, 1887, vol. 1, p. 469.
-
-[588] Beket, _Epistolae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus compl._, vol. 190), nr
-196.
-
-[589] Petrus Blesiensis, _Epistolae_, edit. Giles, letters nrs 35, 36, 55,
-239.
-
-[590] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gilbert, Feb. 4, contain two short lives;
-Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6 inserted between pp. 946, 947, contains a
-longer account, the 'Institutiones,' and various references to Gilbert;
-_Dict. of Nat. Biography_ refers to a MS. account at Oxford, Digby, 36,
-Bodleian.
-
-[591] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres mon._, 1714, vol. 2, p. 190.
-
-[592] _Dict. of Nat. Biography._
-
-[593] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gilbert, Feb. 4, _Vita_, nr 2, ch. 3; Dugdale,
-_Vita_, p. xi.
-
-[594] The 'precentrix' is strictly speaking the leader of the choir. Cf.
-below ch. 10 § 2.
-
-[595] Dugdale, _Institutiones_, p. lxxxii.
-
-[596] _Dict. of Nat. Biography._
-
-[597] Ailred, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus comp._, vol. 195), p.
-789. 'De sanctimoniali de Wattun.'
-
-[598] Oliver, G., _History of Beverley and Watton_, 1829, p. 520 ff.; cf.
-above, p. 91.
-
-[599] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6, p. xcviii.
-
-[600] Report in _Athenaeum_, Oct. 7, 1893.
-
-[601] Oliver, G., _History of Beverley and Watton_, 1829, p. 531.
-
-[602] Wattenbach, W., _Schriftwesen im Mittelalter_, 2nd edit. 1875, p.
-374.
-
-[603] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 3 vols. 1866-71, vol.
-1, p. 214.
-
-[604] Cf. above, p. 122.
-
-[605] Cf. above, pp. 122, 132.
-
-[606] Cf. above, p. 109.
-
-[607] Cf. above, p. 106.
-
-[608] Michel, F., _Étoffes de soie au moyen âge_, 1852, vol. 2, p. 339,
-contains this and other references.
-
-[609] Eddi, _Vita Wilfredi_, c. 65 (it is unknown over which house she
-presided).
-
-[610] Cf. above, p. 63.
-
-[611] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents_, 1869.
-
-[612] Cf. above, pp. 103, 115, 198, and below, ch. 11, § 1.
-
-[613] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 142.
-
-[614] Michel, F., _Étoffes de soie pendant le moyen âge_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-340.
-
-[615] Wharton, _Anglia Sacra_, vol. 1, p. 607.
-
-[616] Michel, F., _Étoffes de soie pendant le moyen âge_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-338.
-
-[617] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 186 footnote.
-
-[618] Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated MSS._, 1892, p. 112.
-
-[619] For example in the South Kensington Museum, nr 594-1884, Italian
-chasuble; nr 1321-1864, panel of canvas, from Bock's Collection
-(_Descriptive Catalogue of Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[620] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 209,
-suggests that gold plaques may have been sewn into the work.
-
-[621] Cf. South Kensington Museum, nr 28-1892, a number of fragments of
-textile linen worked over in coloured silks and gold thread with scenes
-taken from the life of the Virgin. English work of the 14th century
-(_Descriptive Catalogue of Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[622] Michel, F., _Étoffes de soie pendant le moyen âge_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-337, points out that the expression 'opus anglicum' was applied also to
-the work of the goldsmith; comp. Ducange, _Glossarium_, 'Anglicum.'
-'Loculus ille mirificus ... argento et auro gemmisque, anglico opere
-subtilitater ac pulcherrime decoratus.'
-
-[623] _Historia Major Angliae_, sub anno.
-
-[624] South Kensington Museum, nr 83-1864 (_Descriptive Catalogue of
-Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[625] Ibid. p. 168.
-
-[626] _A. SS. Boll._, St Eustadiola, June 8. Vita, ch. 3.
-
-[627] _A. SS. Boll._, SS. Herlindis et Renild, March 22, ch. 5 (videlicet
-nendo et texendo, creando ac suendo, in auro quoque ac margaritis in
-serico componendo).
-
-[628] Ibid. ch. 12 (palliola ... multis modis variisque compositionibus
-diversae artis innumerabilibus ornamentis).
-
-[629] Stadler and Heim, _Vollständiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858,
-'Harlindis.'
-
-[630] _Zeitschrift für Christl. Archaeologie_, edit. Schnuetgen, 1856,
-'Münsterkirche in Essen,' 1860, Beiträge.
-
-[631] Labarte, _Arts industriels au moyen âge_, 1872, vol. 1, p. 341.
-
-[632] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 84.
-
-[633] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 2, p.
-326.
-
-[634] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 155.
-
-[635] Schultz, A., _Höfisches Leben zur Zeit der Minnesinger_, 1889, cites
-many passages from the epics which refer to embroidery worn by heroes and
-heroines. A piece of work of special beauty described vol. 1, p. 326, had
-been made by an apostate nun.
-
-[636] Ekkehard IV., c. 10, in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Scriptores_, vol. 2, p.
-123.
-
-[637] Erath, _Codex diplom. Quedliburg._, 1764, p. 109.
-
-[638] Brunner, S., _Kunstgenossen der Klosterzelle_, 1863, vol. 2, p. 555.
-
-[639] Kugler, F., _Kleine Schriften_, 1853, vol. 1, pp. 635 ff.; part of
-the hanging is given by Muentz, E., _Tapisseries, broderies et dentelles_,
-1890, plate 2.
-
-[640] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-121.
-
-[641] Kugler, F., _Kleine Schriften_, 1853, vol. 1, p. 540.
-
-[642] Büsching, F. G., _Reise durch einige Münsterkirchen_, 1819, p. 235.
-
-[643] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 227.
-
-[644] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewänder_, 1866, vol. 3, pp. 201
-ff.
-
-[645] Ibid. 1866, vol. 3, p. 202.
-
-[646] Hefner, _Oberbair. Archiv_, 1830, vol. 1, p. 355.
-
-[647] Westermayer in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biog._, article 'Diemud';
-_Catalogus Cod. Lat. Bibliothecae Reg. Monac._, vol. 7, 1881, nrs 140,
-146-154.
-
-[648] Wattenbach, W., _Schriftwesen im Mittelalter_, 2nd edit. 1875, p.
-374.
-
-[649] Ibid. p. 177.
-
-[650] Ibid. p. 304.
-
-[651] Ibid. p. 374.
-
-[652] Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated MSS._, 1892, p. 216.
-
-[653] Michel, F., _Étoffes de soie pendant le moyen âge_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-350.
-
-[654] _Reproductions par la Société pour la conservation des monuments de
-l'Alsace_, Sept livraisons containing Plates 1-53 inclusive (till 1895).
-
-[655] Silbermann, J. A., _Beschreibung von Hohenburg_, 1781.
-
-[656] Roth, K. L., 'Der Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, vol. 1, pp. 91
-ff.
-
-[657] Comp. above, pp. 22, 24.
-
-[658] Wiegand, in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Relind.'
-
-[659] It is possible but hardly probable that the miniaturist in colouring
-the picture gave free play to his fancy.
-
-[660] Gérard, Ch., _Les artistes de l'Alsace_, 1872, p. 92.
-
-[661] Ibid.; Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818. p. 16,
-footnote.
-
-[662] The monument is represented in Schoepflin, _Alsatia Illustrata_,
-1751, vol. 1, ad pag. 797.
-
-[663] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, with sheets
-of illustrations, which in a few copies are coloured.
-
-[664] Woltman, in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Herrad.'
-
-[665] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, Vorwort p.
-xi.
-
-[666] Cf. above, p. 180.
-
-[667] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, p. 104.
-
-[668] Piper, F., _Kalendarien und Martyrologien der Angelsachsen_, 1862.
-
-[669] Apparently following the 'Psychomachia' of Prudentius, a Christian
-poet of the 5th century.
-
-[670] Gérard, Ch., _Les artistes de l'Alsace_, 1872, Introd. p. xix., p.
-46, footnote.
-
-[671] Probably with reference to Job xxxix., 14-15.
-
-[672] Hildegardis, _Opera_, 1882 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol.
-197, which contains the acts of the saint reprinted from _A. SS. Boll._,
-St Hildegardis, Sept. 17; her life written by Godefrid and Theodor; the
-'Acta Inquisitionis'; the article by Dr Reuss, and the fullest collection
-of the saint's works hitherto published).
-
-[673] Roth, F. W., _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth und die Schriften von
-Ekbert und Emecho von Schönau_, 1884.
-
-[674] 'Annales Palidenses' in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 16, p. 90.
-
-[675] Neander, _Der heil. Bernard und seine Zeit_, 1848.
-
-[676] _Opera_ (_Vita_, c. 17), p. 104.
-
-[677] _Opera_, 'Scivias,' pp. 383-738.
-
-[678] Ibid. (_Vita_, c. 5), p. 94.
-
-[679] Giesebrecht, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit_, vol. 4, p.
-505.
-
-[680] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 29), p. 189.
-
-[681] _Opera_ (Responsum), p. 189.
-
-[682] Ibid. 'Epistolae,' pp. 1-382.
-
-[683] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877,
-pp. 19 ff.
-
-[684] Ibid. pp. 53 ff.
-
-[685] Schneegans, W., _Kloster Disibodenberg_; Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und
-Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, pp. 45 ff.
-
-[686] _Opera_ (Responsum to Bernard), p. 190.
-
-[687] Ibid. (_Vita_ c. 14), p. 101.
-
-[688] Ibid. (_Vita_ c. 19), p. 105.
-
-[689] Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, p.
-53.
-
-[690] _Opera_ (_Vita_ c. 21), p. 106.
-
-[691] Ibid.
-
-[692] Ibid. (Acta Inquisitionis), p. 136.
-
-[693] Ibid. (Epist. nr 4), p. 154.
-
-[694] _Opera_, p. 383.
-
-[695] _Opera_ (lib. 2, visio 7), p. 555.
-
-[696] _Opera_ (lib. 3, visio 11), p. 709.
-
-[697] _Opera_ (lib. 3, visio 13), p. 733.
-
-[698] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 1), p. 145.
-
-[699] _Opera_ (Responsum), p. 145.
-
-[700] This interpretation is given by Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken
-der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, p. 157.
-
-[701] Jessen, 'Ueber die medic. naturhist. Werke der heil. Hildegardis,'
-in _Kaiserl. Acad. der Wissenschaften, Wien, Naturwissensch. Abth._ vol.
-45 (1862), pp. 97 ff.
-
-[702] _Opera_, 'Physica,' pp. 1117-1352.
-
-[703] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders im
-Mittelalter,' in _Archiv für pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, p. 286.
-
-[704] Haeser, H., _Lehrbuch der Geschichte der Medizin_, 1875, vol. 1, p.
-640.
-
-[705] Jessen, _Botanik der Gegenwart und Vorzeit_, 1864, pp. 120-127.
-
-[706] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-83; an example of the musical notation as an appendix in Schmelzeis, _Das
-Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879.
-
-[707] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-78, 'Expositiones Evangeliorum.'
-
-[708] _Opera_, 'Explanatio regulae St Benedicti,' pp. 1053-1069.
-
-[709] Ibid. 'Explanatio symboli St Athanasii,' pp. 1066-1093.
-
-[710] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-38.
-
-[711] _Opera_, 'Solutiones triginta octo quaestionum,' pp. 1038-1053.
-
-[712] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-79.
-
-[713] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 12), p. 164.
-
-[714] Ibid. (Epist. nr 6), p. 157.
-
-[715] Ibid. (Epist. nr 11), p. 163.
-
-[716] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 62), p. 281.
-
-[717] Ibid. (Epist. nr 49), p. 253.
-
-[718] Ibid. (Epist. nr 22), p. 178.
-
-[719] Ibid. (Epist. nr 5), p. 156.
-
-[720] Ibid. (Epist. nr 10), p. 161.
-
-[721] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 100), p. 321.
-
-[722] Ibid. (Epist. nr 101), p. 322.
-
-[723] Ibid. (Epist. nr 96), p. 317.
-
-[724] Ibid. (Epist. nr 48), p. 243; cf. below, p. 281.
-
-[725] Ibid. (_Vita_, c. 44), p. 122; also p. 142 (Reuss here
-misunderstands the _Acta Inquisitionis_, p. 138), comp. Schmelzeis, _Das
-Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, pp. 538 ff.
-
-[726] _Opera_, 'Liber divinorum Operum,' pp. 739-1037.
-
-[727] Ibid. (visio 4), pp. 807 ff.
-
-[728] _Opera_ (visio 5, c. 36), p. 934.
-
-[729] Ibid. (visio 5, c. 43), p. 945.
-
-[730] Ibid. (visio 10, c. 25), p. 1026.
-
-[731] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877,
-pp. 95 ff.
-
-[732] Line 1401.
-
-[733] Cf. _The Nunns prophesie ... concerning the rise and downfall of ...
-the ... Jesuits_, 1680.
-
-[734] _Prédictions sur la révolution de la Belgique._ Amsterdam, 1832.
-
-[735] _Opera_, 'Vita St Rupertis,' pp. 1081-1092.
-
-[736] Ibid. 'Vita St Disibodi,' pp. 1093-1116.
-
-[737] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-75, footnote.
-
-[738] _Opera_, p. 90; _A. SS. Boll._ St Hildegardis, Sept. 17.
-
-[739] Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879.
-
-[740] Linde, _Handschriften der königl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877.
-
-[741] _Opera_, p. 140, footnote.
-
-[742] Roth, F. W. E., _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884,
-Vorwort, p. cv.
-
-[743] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, Vorwort, pp.
-cvii. ff.
-
-[744] Ibid. 'Liber Visionum primus,' Prologus, p. 1.
-
-[745] Ibid. 'Liber Visionum secundus,' c. 31, p. 53; Anlage, p. 153.
-
-[746] Ibid. 'Liber Viarum Dei,' pp. 88-122.
-
-[747] Ibid. Vorwort, p. cix.
-
-[748] Ibid. 'Liber Viarum Dei,' c. 10, p. 92.
-
-[749] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, 'Liber Viarum
-Dei,' c. 13, p. 100.
-
-[750] Ibid. p. 104.
-
-[751] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, 'Liber Viarum
-Dei,' c. 20, p. 122.
-
-[752] Ibid. pp. 70, 178.
-
-[753] Ibid. p. 74.
-
-[754] Ibid. 'De Sacro Exercitu Virginum Coloniensium,' pp. 123-153.
-
-[755] Ibid. Vorwort, pp. cxi ff. Roth discusses the history of the
-development of this legend.
-
-[756] Comp. above, p. 40.
-
-[757] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ursula, Oct. 21.
-
-[758] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, Vorwort, p.
-cxxiv; Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive catalogue of MS. material_, 1858, vol.
-2, p. 417.
-
-[759] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, p. 253.
-
-[760] _A. SS. Boll._, St Elisabetha, June 18.
-
-[761] _A. SS. Boll._, St Severinus, Jan. 8.
-
-[762] _A. SS. Boll._, St Magnericus, July 25, _Vita_, c. 49.
-
-[763] Creighton, C., _History of Epidemics in England_, vol. 1, 1891, p.
-85.
-
-[764] Ibid. p. 97.
-
-[765] Muratori, _Antiquitates Italiae_, 1738. Pope Hadrian I to Karl the
-Great, vol. 3, p. 581.
-
-[766] Salles, F., _Annales de l'ordre de Malte, ou des hospitaliers de St
-Jean de Jérusalem_, 1889.
-
-[767] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Hospital of St Gregory,' vol. 6, p. 615, nr
-1.
-
-[768] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Herbaldoun,' vol. 6, p. 653; Creighton, C.,
-_History of Epidemics_, vol. 1, 1891, p. 87.
-
-[769] Map, W., _De Nugis Curialium_, 1850, p. 228.
-
-[770] Ailred, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Completus_, vol. 195), p.
-368.
-
-[771] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Giles in the Fields,' vol. 6, p. 635.
-
-[772] Creighton, C., _History of Epidemics in England_, vol. 1, 1891, p.
-88.
-
-[773] Hormayr, 'Die Grafen von Andechs und Tyrol,' _Sämtl. Werke_, vol. 3.
-
-[774] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv für pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-311.
-
-[775] _Allgemeine deutsche Biographie_, article 'Hedwig.'
-
-[776] Stenzel, G. A. H., _Scriptores rerum Siles._, Breslau 1835, 'Vita St
-Hedwigis' vol. 2, pp. 1-114; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Hedwig, Oct. 17.
-
-[777] _Verein für das Museum schles. Alterthümer_, edit. Luchs, H., 1870.
-Also Luchs, H., _Schlesische Fürstenbilder_, 1872.
-
-[778] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv für pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-275.
-
-[779] Wolfskron, _Bilder der Hedwigslegende_, 1846.
-
-[780] Stenzel, G. A. H., _Scriptores rer. Siles._, 1835, 'Vita Annae
-ducissae Sil.' vol. 2, p. 127.
-
-[781] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agnes de Bohemia, March 6, print two accounts, of
-uncertain date.
-
-[782] _A. SS. Boll._, Ibid., print these letters.
-
-[783] _A. SS. Boll._, Ibid., _Vita_ 1, ch. 32.
-
-[784] Montalembert, C., _Histoire de Ste Elisabeth de Hongrie, duchesse de
-Thuringe_, edition de luxe 1878, with preface by Gautier, contains
-reproductions of some of those pictures; Potthast, A., _Wegweiser_,
-enumerates a number of accounts of the life of St Elisabeth.
-
-[785] Rieger, L., prints this 'Leben der heil. Elisabeth' in _Literarisch.
-Verein_, 1843, and discusses early MS. accounts of her life.
-
-[786] Justi, C. W., _Elisabeth, die Heilige_, 1797.
-
-[787] Montalembert, C., _Histoire de Ste Elisabeth de Hongrie_, 1836, 7th
-edit. 1855.
-
-[788] Wegele, F. X., 'Die heil. Elisabeth von Thüringen' in Sybel,
-_Historische Zeitschrift_, 1861, pp. 351-397, which I have followed in the
-text.
-
-[789] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv für pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-313.
-
-[790] _Allgemeine deutsche Biographie_, article 'Konrad von Marburg.'
-
-[791] Hauréau, _Histoire de la philosophie scolastique_, 1850, vol. 1, pp.
-319 ff.
-
-[792] _Dictionary of National Biography_, article 'Hales, Thomas.'
-
-[793] 'A luve ron,' edit. Morris, _Old English Miscellany_, p. 93, for the
-Early Engl. Text Soc. 1872.
-
-[794] Edit. Morton for the Camden Soc. 1853.
-
-[795] 'Die angelsächsischen Prosabearbeitungen der Benedictinerregel,'
-edit. Schröer, 1885 (in Grein, _Bibliothek der angels. Prosa_, vol. 2), p.
-9.
-
-[796] Schröer, Winteney _Version der Regula St Benedicti_, 1888, p. 13.
-
-[797] 'De vita eremetica' (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol. 32, by
-an oversight it is included among the works of St Augustine), p. 145.
-
-[798] Anselm, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol. 158),
-'Meditationes' (nr 15-17), pp. 786 ff.
-
-[799] Edit. Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 7, p. 304.
-
-[800] _Scenes and characters of the Middle Ages_, 1872, pp. 93-151.
-
-[801] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 1, p. 693.
-
-[802] Brink, B. ten, _Early English Literature_, trans. Kennedy, 1883, p.
-205.
-
-[803] First advanced by Morton, _Ancren Riwle_, Introd. pp. xii-xv; it is
-supported neither by tradition nor by documentary evidence.
-
-[804] Dalgairns, Introd. to Hylton, _Scale of Perfection_, 1870, thinks it
-possible that the author was a Dominican friar.
-
-[805] Comp. throughout _Ancren Riwle_, edit. Morton for the Camden Soc.
-1853.
-
-[806] That is bands or ligatures to be used after the letting of blood.
-
-[807] _Old English Homilies_, First Series, edit. Morris, 1867, p. 268.
-
-[808] _Hali Meidenhad_, edit. Cockayne, for the Early English Text Soc.,
-1866.
-
-[809] Comp. _Revelationes Gertrudianae ac Mechtildianae_, edit. Oudin, for
-the Benedictines of Solesmes 1875, 2 vols., which contain the works of
-these three nuns; Mechthild von Magdeburg, _Offenbarungen, oder Das
-Fliessende Licht der Gottheit_, edit. Gall Morel, 1869; Preger, W.,
-_Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874, vol. 1, pp.
-70-132.
-
-[810] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, Praefatio.
-
-[811] Ibid. vol. 1, pp. 497 ff.
-
-[812] Comp. Preger, 'Dante's Matelda,' Acad. Vortrag, 1873; Paquelin and
-Scartazzini, 'Zur Matelda-Frage' in _Jahrbuch der Dante Gesellschaft_,
-Berlin, 1877, pp. 405, 411; Lubin, _Osservazioni sulla Matilda svelata_,
-1878.
-
-[813] _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Mechthild' by Strauch,
-Ph.
-
-[814] Keller, L., _Die Reformation und die älteren Reformparteien_, 1885,
-pp. 29 ff.; also Hallman, E., _Geschichte des Ursprungs der Beguinen_,
-1843.
-
-[815] Mechthild von Magdeburg, _Offenbarungen, oder Das Fliessende Licht
-der Gottheit_, edit. Gall Morel, 1869; the abridged Latin version in
-_Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, pp. 423-710.
-
-[816] Heinrich not to be confounded with Heinrich who translated her work.
-
-[817] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, pp. 298, 329, 332, etc.
-
-[818] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 542; vol. 2, pp. 325, 330.
-
-[819] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, etc. edit. Gall Morel, p. 3 'Wie die
-minne und die kuneginne zesamene sprachen.'
-
-[820] Ibid. p. 6 'Von den megden der seele und von der minne schlage.'
-
-[821] Ibid. p. 18 'Von der minne weg,' etc.
-
-[822] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 43 'Wie die minne vraget,' etc.
-
-[823] Ibid. p. 38 'Wie die bekantnisse und die sele sprechent zesamne,'
-etc.
-
-[824] Ibid. p. 232 'Wie bekantnisse sprichet zu dem gewissede.'
-
-[825] Ibid. p. 30 'Von der armen dirnen' (I have retained the designation
-'saint' where it is used in the allegory).
-
-[826] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 210 'Da Johannes Baptista der armen
-dirnen messe sang.'
-
-[827] Ibid. p. 46 'Wie sich die minnende sele gesellet gotte,' etc.
-
-[828] Ibid. p. 82 'Von der helle,' etc.
-
-[829] Ibid. p. 270 'Ein wenig von dem paradyso.'
-
-[830] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 52 'Von diseme buche,' etc.
-
-[831] Ibid. p. 90 'Dis buch ist von gotte komen,' etc.
-
-[832] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 110 'Von einer vrowe, etc.'
-
-[833] Ibid. p. 68 'Von siben dingen die alle priester sollent haben.'
-
-[834] Ibid. p. 171 'Wie ein prior, etc.'; p. 177 'Von der regele eines
-kanoniken, etc.'; p. 178 'Got gebet herschaft.'
-
-[835] Ibid. p. 198 'Wie böse pfafheit sol genidert werden.'
-
-[836] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, p. 524.
-
-[837] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 115 'Von sehs tugenden St Domenicus';
-p. 116 'Dur sehszehen ding hat got predierorden liep'; ibid. 'Von
-vierhande crone bruder Heinrichs'; p. 154 'Von sehsleie kleider, etc.'
-
-[838] Ibid. p. 166 'Von funfleie nuwe heligen.'
-
-[839] _A. SS. Boll._, St Peter of the Dominican Order, April 29.
-
-[840] Ibid., St Jutta vidua, May 5, appendix.
-
-[841] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 256 'Wie ein predierbruder wart
-gesehen.'
-
-[842] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 243 'Von der not eines urluges.'
-
-[843] Ibid. p. 249 'Von einem geistlichen closter.'
-
-[844] Comp. below, ch. 11, § 1.
-
-[845] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 68 'Von dem angenge aller dinge'; p.
-107 'Von der heligen drivaltekeit, etc.'; p. 147 'Von sante marien gebet,
-etc.'
-
-[846] Ibid. p. 14 'In disen weg zuhet die sele, etc.'
-
-[847] Ibid. p. 16 'Von der pfrunde trost und minne.'
-
-[848] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 98 'Von zwein ungeleichen dingen,
-etc.'
-
-[849] Ibid. p. 214 'Bekorunge, die welt und ein gut ende prüfent uns.'
-
-[850] 'Liber Specialis Gratiae,' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-2, pp. 1-421.
-
-[851] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, p. 727.
-
-[852] Preger, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874,
-vol. 1, p. 87.
-
-[853] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 1, ch. 30, De angelis), p. 102.
-
-[854] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 2, ch. 2, De vinea domini), p. 137.
-
-[855] Cf. Gal. v. 22-3, to which Mechthild adds.
-
-[856] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 1, ch. 10, De veneratione imaginis Christi), p. 31.
-
-[857] Ibid. vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,' bk 2, ch. 23, De coquina
-domini), p. 165.
-
-[858] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 (bk 2, ch. 43, De nomine et
-utilitate hujus libri), p. 192.
-
-[859] Ibid. vol. 1, pp. 46, 269.
-
-[860] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 218.
-
-[861] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, pp. 1 ff. on her life.
-
-[862] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 14.
-
-[863] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 23.
-
-[864] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 227.
-
-[865] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 27.
-
-[866] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 39.
-
-[867] 'Legatus Divinae Pietatis' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, pp. 1 ff.
-
-[868] 'Legatus Divinae Pietatis' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, p. 61.
-
-[869] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, p. 113.
-
-[870] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, p. 351.
-
-[871] Preger, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874,
-vol. 1, p. 78.
-
-[872] 'Exercitia Spiritualia,' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, pp. 617-720.
-
-[873] Ibid. pp. 701 ff.
-
-[874] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507 footnote.
-
-[875] Ibid. 'Davington,' vol. 4, p. 288.
-
-[876] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 365, charter nr 7.
-
-[877] Jusserand, J., _Histoire littéraire du Peuple Anglais_, 1894, pp.
-121 ff., 235 ff.
-
-[878] _Romania_, edit. Meyer et Paris, vol. 13, p. 400.
-
-[879] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Ankerwyke,' vol. 4, p. 229, charter nr 4.
-
-[880] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 471, charter nr 21.
-
-[881] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 441.
-
-[882] Ibid. 'Legh,' vol. 6, p. 333, footnote _t_. MS. Harleian 3660.
-
-[883] Bateson, M., 'Register of Crabhouse Nunnery' (no date), _Norfolk and
-Norwich Archæol. Society_.
-
-[884] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Littlemore,' vol. 4, p. 490, charter nr 14.
-
-[885] Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 2, pp. 60 ff.
-
-[886] This supposition is based on certain peculiarities in the language
-of the rule for men. Cf. 'Die angelsächsischen Prosabearbeitungen der
-Benedictinerregel,' edit. Schröer, 1885 (in Grein, _Bibliotek der angels.
-Prosa_, vol. 2) Einleitung, p. xviii.
-
-[887] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Godstow,' vol. 4, p. 357, charter nr 23.
-
-[888] Lansdowne MS. 436.
-
-[889] _Early English Text Soc._, nr 100. Arundel MS. 396.
-
-[890] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 424.
-
-[891] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal visitations of the Benedictine nunnery of
-Easebourne' in _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 12. According to
-Bradshaw, H., 'Note on service books' (printed as an appendix in
-Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated Manuscripts_, 1892) the missal was used for
-celebration of the mass; while the breviary contained the services for the
-hours, including the _antiphony_ (anthems to the psalms)--the _legenda_
-(long lessons used at matins),--the psalter (psalms arranged for use at
-hours),--and the collects (short lessons used at all the hours except
-matins). In the list above, these are enumerated as separate books. He
-further says that the _ordinale_ contained general rules for the right
-understanding and use of the service books. It is noteworthy that this is
-in French in the list of books at Easebourne.
-
-[892] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Ritualia_, 1882, vol. 3, p. 357 footnotes.
-
-[893] _Placita de Quo Warranto_ published by Command.
-
-[894] _Placita de Quo Warranto_, pp. 11, 97, 232, 233.
-
-[895] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Malling,' vol. 3, p. 381, charter nr 5.
-
-[896] Ibid. 'Stratford,' vol. 4, p. 119, charter nr 3.
-
-[897] Ibid. 'Wroxhall,' vol. 4, p. 88.
-
-[898] Ibid. 'Redlingfield,' vol. 4, p. 25, charter nr 2.
-
-[899] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888,
-appendices to vols. 1 and 2.
-
-[900] The word 'mynchyn' was I believe never applied to them.
-
-[901] Holstenius, _Codex regularum_, 1759, vol. 3, p. 34.
-
-[902] Cf. above, p. 204.
-
-[903] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 473.
-
-[904] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary Prée,' vol. 3, p. 353, charter nr 9.
-
-[905] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 474.
-
-[906] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Benedictine Nunnery of
-Easebourne,' _Sussex Archæol. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 7.
-
-[907] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 452,
-footnote.
-
-[908] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 473.
-
-[909] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 441, charter nr 8.
-
-[910] Schröer, _Winteney Version der regula St Benedicti_, 1888, p. 16.
-
-[911] Edit. Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 2, pp. 60 ff. (line
-references in the text throughout this section are to this version).
-
-[912] Shermann, A. J., _Hist. Coll. Jesus Cantab._, edit. Halliwell, 1840,
-p. 16.
-
-[913] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Langley,' vol. 4, p. 220.
-
-[914] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Ritualia_, 1882, vol. 3, p. 358 footnote.
-
-[915] Cf. above, p. 206.
-
-[916] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Catesby,' vol. 4, p. 635.
-
-[917] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Bromhall,' vol. 4, p. 506.
-
-[918] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_,
-pp. 185, 190, 318.
-
-[919] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wilton,' vol. 2, p. 317.
-
-[920] Benedictus, _Regula_, c. 65 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._ vol.
-66).
-
-[921] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 437, footnote _k_.
-
-[922] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 445 Computus.
-
-[923] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, charter nr 15.
-
-[924] I am unable to ascertain the quantity indicated by the 'piece.'
-
-[925] I am unable to ascertain the difference between 'stubbe' and
-'shafte.'
-
-[926] Rogers, Th., _Six Centuries of Work and Wages_, 1884, p. 101.
-
-[927] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's, Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 451,
-charter nr 4.
-
-[928] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-290.
-
-[929] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 472.
-
-[930] Ibid. 'St Mary, Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 451, charter nr 4.
-
-[931] Ibid. 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 424.
-
-[932] Blaauw, W. A., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Benedictine Nunnery of
-Easebourne,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 15.
-
-[933] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-138.
-
-[934] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Elstow,' vol. 3, p. 411, charter nr 8.
-
-[935] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 438, footnote _b_.
-
-[936] 'Here begynneth a matere' etc. (by John Alcock (?)), printed by
-Wynkyn de Worde (1500), last page but one.
-
-[937] _Six Centuries of Work and Wages_, 1884, p. 166.
-
-[938] Rye, W., _Carrow Abbey_, 1889, p. 48 ff.
-
-[939] Skelton, _Poetical Works_, 1843, vol. 1, p. 51, 'Phyllyp Sparowe.'
-
-[940] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507, footnote _p_.
-
-[941] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-140.
-
-[942] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Helen's,' vol. 4, p. 551, charter nr 3.
-
-[943] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 437, footnote _m_.
-
-[944] Fosbroke, _British Monachism_, 1843, p. 176.
-
-[945] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen, at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 256.
-
-[946] Bateson, M., 'Visitations of Archbishop Warham in 1511,' in _English
-Hist. Review_, vol. 6, 1891, p. 28.
-
-[947] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Rit._, 1882, vol. 3, p. 331, 'The order of
-consecration of Nuns,' from Cambridge Fol. Mm. 3. 13, and Lansdown MS.,
-388; p. 360 'The manner to make a Nun,' from Cotton MS., Vespasian A. 25,
-fol. 12.
-
-[948] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614.
-
-[949] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 256.
-
-[950] Comp. Smith and Cheetham, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_,
-1875, article 'Hours of Prayer.'
-
-[951] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840; _Myroure of
-Oure Ladye_, Early English Text Soc., 1873, Introduction by Blunt, J. H.
-
-[952] Hammerich, _Den hellige Birgitta_, 1863.
-
-[953] _A. SS. Boll._, St Birgitta vidua, Oct. 8.
-
-[954] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xiv.
-
-[955] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol. 1,
-p. 42.
-
-[956] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Amesbury,' vol. 1, p. 333.
-
-[957] Ibid. 'Westwood,' vol. 6, p. 1004.
-
-[958] Ibid. 'Levenestre,' vol. 6, p. 1032.
-
-[959] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 249 ff.,
-from Arundel MS. nr 146 (chapter references throughout the text in this
-chapter are to this reprint).
-
-[960] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxxv.
-
-[961] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, pp. 312
-ff., from Additional MS. nr 5208.
-
-[962] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, pp. 405 ff.
-'A table of signs.'
-
-[963] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxvi.
-
-[964] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxix.
-
-[965] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 421,
-'Indulgentia monasterii de Syon,' MS. Ashmol. nr 750; p. 422, 'The Pardon
-of the monastery of Shene which is Syon,' MS. Harleian 4012, art. 9.
-
-[966] Ibid. p. 426, footnotes.
-
-[967] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xlv. B. M. Addit. MS., nr 22285.
-
-[968] Printed by Wynkyn de Worde (?), 1526; reprinted for the Bradshaw
-Society, 1893.
-
-[969] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 529. MS.
-Harleian 2321, fol. 17 ff.
-
-[970] Ibid. p. 527.
-
-[971] Ibid. p. 527.
-
-[972] Ibid. p. 526.
-
-[973] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. ix.
-
-[974] Ibid. p. 2.
-
-[975] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, pp. 65 ff.
-
-[976] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Godstow,' vol. 4, p. 357, Charter nr 16.
-
-[977] Ibid. 'St Radegund's,' vol. 4, p. 215, Charter nr 3.
-
-[978] Ducange, 'burnetum, pannus ex lana tincta confectus.'
-
-[979] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507, footnote _p_.
-
-[980] Ibid. 'Swine,' vol. 5, p. 493.
-
-[981] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 362, charter nr 7.
-
-[982] Ibid. 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614, charter nr 11.
-
-[983] Ibid. 'Nun-Monkton,' vol. 4, p. 192, charter nr 2.
-
-[984] Gasquet, A., _The Great Pestilence_, 1893, Introd. p. xvi.
-
-[985] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thetford,' vol. 4, p. 475.
-
-[986] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich, 1492-1532_, pp.
-90, 155.
-
-[987] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Malling,' vol. 3, p. 382; Gasquet, A., _The
-Great Pestilence_, 1893, pp. 104, 106.
-
-[988] Gasquet, p. 137.
-
-[989] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wyrthorp,' vol. 4, p. 266.
-
-[990] Ibid. 'Seton,' vol. 4, p. 226, charter nr 2.
-
-[991] Ibid. 'St Sepulchre's,' vol. 4, p. 413, footnote _l_.
-
-[992] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Archæol. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 244; Dugdale,
-_Monasticon_, 'Rusper,' vol. 4, p. 586.
-
-[993] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Priory of Easebourne,'
-_Sussex Archæol. Collections_, vol. 9, pp. 1-32; Dugdale, _Monasticon_,
-'Easebourn,' vol. 4, p. 423.
-
-[994] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sele,' vol. 4, p. 668.
-
-[995] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St John's,' vol. 6, p. 678.
-
-[996] Ibid. 'Selbourne,' vol. 6, p. 510.
-
-[997] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol.
-1, p. 52.
-
-[998] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, pp. 413, 419, 462.
-
-[999] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 205.
-
-[1000] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, p. 390.
-
-[1001] Ibid. 1737, vol. 3, p. 630.
-
-[1002] Ibid. Year 1490, vol. 3, p. 632. Froude without taking into
-consideration the circumstances under which this letter was penned takes
-its contents as conclusive evidence of the abuses of the monastic system
-at the time of the Reformation. Comp. _History of England_, 1893, vol. 2,
-p. 304; _Life and Letters of Erasmus_, 1894, p. 18.
-
-[1003] Newcome, P., _History of the Abbacy of St Albans_, 1793, p. 399.
-
-[1004] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 206, footnote _c_;
-'the Book of Ramryge,' MS. Cotton. Nero D. VII.
-
-[1005] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary de Prée,' vol. 3, p. 353, charter
-nr 9.
-
-[1006] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 363.
-
-[1007] 'Land of Cockayne,' in _Early English Lives of Saints_, etc.,
-Philological Society, 1858, p. 156.
-
-[1008] 'Why I cannot be a nun,' in _Early English Lives of Saints_, etc.,
-Philological Society, 1858, p. 138.
-
-[1009] Comp. above, pp. 339, 377.
-
-[1010] Möhler, J. A., _Kirchengeschichte_, edit. 1867, vol. 2, pp. 612 ff.
-
-[1011] Comp. Leuckfeld, _Antiquitates Bursfeldenses_, 1713; Pez,
-_Bibliotheca ascetica_, vol. 8, nrs 6 ff.
-
-[1012] Discussed in Klemm, G. F., _Die Frauen_, vol. 4, p. 181, using
-_Ordinarius_ preserved at Dresden (MS. L. 92).
-
-[1013] Busch, J., _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_ (written between
-1470-1475), edit. Grube, 1887.
-
-[1014] _Deutsche Allgemeine Biographie_, article 'Busch, Joh.'
-
-[1015] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Derneburg,' p. 588.
-
-[1016] Ibid. 'Wennigsen,' 'Mariensee,' 'Werder' pp. 555 ff.
-
-[1017] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Wienhausen,' p. 629.
-
-[1018] Ibid. 'St Georg in Halle,' p. 568.
-
-[1019] Ibid. 'Heiningen,' p. 600.
-
-[1020] Ibid. 'Frankenberg,' p. 607.
-
-[1021] Ibid. 'Dorstad,' p. 644.
-
-[1022] Ibid. 'Neuwerk,' p. 609.
-
-[1023] Ibid. 'Fischbeck,' p. 640.
-
-[1024] Ibid. 'Marienberg,' p. 618.
-
-[1025] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Marienborn,'
-'Stendal,' p. 622.
-
-[1026] Ibid. pp. 664 ff.
-
-[1027] Ibid. pp. 659 ff.
-
-[1028] Remling, F. X., _Urkundl. Geschichte der Abteien und Klöster in
-Rheinbayern_, 1836, 'Schönfeld,' vol. 1, p. 165; 'Ramsen,' vol. 1, p. 263;
-'Kleinfrankenthal,' vol. 2, p. 79.
-
-[1029] Marx, J., _Geschichte des Erzstifts Trier_, 1860, vol. 3, p. 466
-(Benedictine nunneries, pp. 457-511, Cistercian nunneries, pp. 579-593).
-
-[1030] Brusch, C., _Chronol. Mon. Germ._, 1682, p. 508.
-
-[1031] Fabri, F., _De Civitate Ulmensi_, edit. Veesenmeyer, Liter. Verein,
-Stuttgart, 1889, pp. 180 ff.
-
-[1032] Fabri, F., _De Civitate Ulmensi_, pp. 202 ff.
-
-[1033] Jäger, A., _Der Streit des Cardinals N. von Cusa mit dem Herzoge
-Sigmund von Oesterreich_, 1861, 2 vols, (the struggle over Sonnenburg is
-in vol. 1).
-
-[1034] Ibid. vol. 1 (page references in the text throughout this section
-are to the above account).
-
-[1035] Jäger, A., _Der Streit des Cardinals N. von Cusa_ etc., 1861,
-Vorwort, p. x.
-
-[1036] Tritheim, _Opera pia et spiritualia_, edit. Busaeus, 1604,
-'Orationes,' pp. 840-916.
-
-[1037] Tritheim, _Opera_, etc., Epist. nr 3, p. 921 (written 1485).
-
-[1038] Geiler, _Predigten Teutsch_, 1508; _Seelen-Paradies_, 1510, etc.
-
-[1039] Information on those works of Butzbach which are not published is
-given in the second supplementary volume, pp. 439 ff. of Hutten, U. v.,
-_Opera_, edit. Böcking, 1857.
-
-[1040] Wimpheling, _Germania_, transl. Martin, E., 1885, ch. 77.
-
-[1041] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, transl. Bailey, edit. Johnson, 1878, 'The
-Virgin averse to Matrimony,' vol. 1, p. 225.
-
-[1042] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, 'The Penitent Virgin,' vol. 1, p. 237.
-
-[1043] Ibid. 'The Uneasy Wife,' vol. 1, p. 241.
-
-[1044] Ibid. 'The Young Man and Harlot,' vol. 1, p. 291.
-
-[1045] Ibid. 'The Lying-in Woman,' vol. 1, p. 441.
-
-[1046] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, 'The Assembly or Parliament of Women,' vol.
-2, p. 203.
-
-[1047] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Radegund's,' vol. 4, p. 215, charter nr
-3.
-
-[1048] Gasquet, F. A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888,
-vol. 1, p. 62.
-
-[1049] At a meeting of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society (reported in the
-_Academy_, Feb. 23, 1895), Mr T. D. Atkinson read a paper on 'The
-Conventual Buildings of the priory of St Radegund,' illustrated by a plan
-showing such of the college buildings as were probably monastic, and also
-the position of some foundations discovered in the previous summer.
-According to this paper the present cloister occupies the same position as
-that of the nuns, and the conventual church was converted into a college
-chapel by Alcock. The college hall which is upstairs is the old refectory,
-the rooms below being very likely used as butteries, as they still are.
-The present kitchen is probably on the site of the old monastic kitchen,
-and very likely the rooms originally assigned to the Master are those
-which had been occupied by the prioress. Further details of arrangement
-were given about the dormitory, the chapter house, the calefactory and
-common-room, etc., from which we gather that the men who occupied the
-nunnery buildings, put these to much the same uses as they had served
-before.
-
-[1050] Fiddes, 'Life of Card. Wolsey,' 1726, _Collect._, p. 100.
-
-[1051] Ibid. p. 99.
-
-[1052] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Bromhall,' vol. 4, p. 506.
-
-[1053] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Lillechurch,' vol. 4, p. 379, footnote _e_.
-
-[1054] Gairdner, J., _Letters and papers of the reign of Henry VIII_,
-Rolls Series, vol. 10, Preface, p. 43, footnote, and nr 890.
-
-[1055] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Frideswith's,' vol. 2, p. 138. Fiddes,
-'Life of Card. Wolsey,' 1726, _Collect._, p. 95.
-
-[1056] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, 'Bull' (Sept. 1524), vol. 3, p. 703;
-'Breve regium,' ibid. p. 705.
-
-[1057] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Frideswith's,' vol. 2, p. 138, footnote
-_x_.
-
-[1058] Ibid. 'Wykes,' vol. 4, p. 513; 'Littlemore,' vol. 4, p. 490, nr 12.
-
-[1059] Rymer, _Foedera_, 'Bulla pro monasteriis supprimendis,' vol. 6, p.
-116; 'Bulla pro uniendis monasteriis,' p. 137.
-
-[1060] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol.
-1, pp. 101 ff.
-
-[1061] Blunt, _The Reformation of the Church of England_, 1882, vol. 1, p.
-92, footnote, says that the lady in question was 'Eleanor the daughter of
-Cary who had lately married (Anne's) sister Margaret.'
-
-[1062] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wilton,' vol. 2, p. 317, gives the
-correspondence. The abbess who succeeded to Isabel Jordan was probably
-Cecil Bodman or Bodenham, of whom more p. 441.
-
-[1063] Fish, S., 'A Supplicacyon for the Beggers,' republished _Early
-Engl. Text Soc._, 1871.
-
-[1064] More, Th., 'The Supplycacyon of Soulys,' 1529 (?).
-
-[1065] Wright, Th., _Three chapters of letters on the Suppression_ (Camden
-Soc., 1843), nrs 6-11.
-
-[1066] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, vol. 1, pp.
-110-150.
-
-[1067] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 8, Preface, pp. 33
-ff.
-
-[1068] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, p. 755.
-
-[1069] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, article 'Legh, Sir Thomas.'
-
-[1070] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 56.
-
-[1071] Gairdner, J., _Letters_ etc., vol. 9, nr 139.
-
-[1072] Ibid. Preface, p. 20.
-
-[1073] Ibid. vol. 9, nr 280.
-
-[1074] Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 273.
-
-[1075] Wright, _Three chapters of letters_, p. 55.
-
-[1076] Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 276; Ellis, H., _Original
-Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 11, says that after resigning at Little
-Marlow she became abbess at Malling.
-
-[1077] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Little Marlow,' vol. 4, p. 419;
-'Ankerwyke,' vol. 4, p. 229.
-
-[1078] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 1075 (her house
-is unknown).
-
-[1079] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 91.
-
-[1080] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 74.
-
-[1081] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 357.
-
-[1082] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 732.
-
-[1083] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 293.
-
-[1084] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 107.
-
-[1085] Ibid. p. 114; Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 303.
-
-[1086] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1087] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 91.
-
-[1088] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 38.
-
-[1089] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Harwold,' vol. 6, p. 330.
-
-[1090] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, speaks of the image of Our Lady of
-Caversham which was plated all over with silver, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 79;
-of that of St Modwen of Burton on Trent with her red cowl and staff,
-Series 3, vol. 3, p. 104; of the 'huge and great image' of Darvellgathern
-held in great veneration in Wales, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 82; and of others,
-which were brought to London and burnt.
-
-[1091] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 116.
-
-[1092] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 47.
-
-[1093] Ibid. Appendix 1.
-
-[1094] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 1094.
-
-[1095] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1096] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 139.
-
-[1097] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 37.
-
-[1098] Ibid. p. 116.
-
-[1099] Ibid. p. 39.
-
-[1100] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 129.
-
-[1101] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 383 (1536).
-
-[1102] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 136.
-
-[1103] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1104] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's,' vol. 2, p. 451, charter nr 4.
-
-[1105] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1106] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc. vol. 11, nr 385 (20).
-
-[1107] Ibid. (22, 23, 35).
-
-[1108] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614, calls her 'Anne
-Gayton.'
-
-[1109] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_, vol. 11, nr 519 (11); nr 1217
-(26).
-
-[1110] Ibid. vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1111] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 206; Gairdner, J.,
-_Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, Preface, p. 46.
-
-[1112] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Dennis,' vol. 6, p. 1549.
-
-[1113] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 117.
-
-[1114] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 203.
-
-[1115] Ibid. vol. 2, pp. 449 ff.
-
-[1116] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 11, nr 42.
-
-[1117] Ibid. vol. 11, Preface, p. 12.
-
-[1118] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, pp. 84 ff.
-
-[1119] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vols. 11, 12.
-
-[1120] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Seton,' vol. 4, p. 226.
-
-[1121] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 340.
-
-[1122] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 12, pt 2, nr 27.
-
-[1123] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 279.
-
-[1124] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 13, pt 1, nr 1115
-(19), nr 1519 (44).
-
-[1125] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 222.
-
-[1126] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1127] Ibid. vol. 13, pt 1, nr 235.
-
-[1128] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3.
-
-[1129] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 229.
-
-[1130] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 227.
-
-[1131] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 225.
-
-[1132] Ibid. 456.
-
-[1133] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's,' vol. 2, p. 451; Gasquet, A.,
-_Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 476.
-
-[1134] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wherwell,' vol. 2, p. 634.
-
-[1135] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 481.
-
-[1136] Ibid. p. 479.
-
-[1137] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 34, gives an
-interesting account.
-
-[1138] Lindesay, _Ane Satyre of the thrie Estaits_, edit, by Hall for the
-Early Engl. Text Soc., 1869, pp. 420 ff.
-
-[1139] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 221.
-
-[1140] Fuller, Th., _Church History_, edit. Brewer, 1845, vol. 3, p. 336.
-
-[1141] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, 1878, pp. 14 ff.
-
-[1142] Ibid. pp. 67 ff.
-
-[1143] Nider, Jos., _Formicarius_, bk. 1, ch. 4 (p. 8, edit. 1517).
-
-[1144] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirkheimer, ihre Schwestern und Nichten_,
-1826, contains some of Clara's letters.
-
-[1145] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 67.
-
-[1146] 'Briefe der Aebtissin Sabina,' edit. Lochner in _Zeitschrift für
-hist. Theologie_, vol. 36, 1866.
-
-[1147] Pirckheimer, B., _Opera_, edit. Goldast, 1610, p. 345; Binder, F.,
-_Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 52.
-
-[1148] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, edit. Goldast, 1610, p. 341; Binder, F.,
-_Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 81.
-
-[1149] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 343; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-84.
-
-[1150] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 342; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-85.
-
-[1151] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 344; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-87.
-
-[1152] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 88.
-
-[1153] Ibid. p. 220, note 26.
-
-[1154] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 340; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-89.
-
-[1155] Born in Venice in 1465, was acquainted both with Latin and Greek,
-and studied history, philosophy and theology. She disputed at Padua in
-public, wrote several learned treatises, and was much admired and
-esteemed.
-
-[1156] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 96.
-
-[1157] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 230; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-55.
-
-[1158] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 344; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-58.
-
-[1159] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 65, footnote.
-
-[1160] Ibid. p. 66.
-
-[1161] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 247; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-61.
-
-[1162] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 62
-
-[1163] Ibid. p. 35.
-
-[1164] Thausing, M., _Dürer's Briefe_ etc., 1872, p. 167.
-
-[1165] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 105.
-
-[1166] _Eyn Missyve oder Sendbrief_ etc., 1523.
-
-[1167] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 375.
-
-[1168] 'Pirkheimer, Charitas': _Denkwürdigkeiten aus dem
-Reformationszeitalter_, herausg. Höfler, C., _Quellensammlung für fränk.
-Geschichte_, vol. 4, 1852 (page references in the text to this edition).
-
-[1169] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., 1826, p. 104.
-
-[1170] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirckheimer_, p. 125, from an unpublished
-letter.
-
-[1171] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 110.
-
-[1172] Ibid., p. 118 (on a letter written to Nützel).
-
-[1173] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 106.
-
-[1174] Ibid. p. 109.
-
-[1175] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 374.
-
-[1176] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 108.
-
-[1177] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirckheimer_, p. 118.
-
-[1178] Ibid. p. 150, from an unpublished letter.
-
-[1179] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 153.
-
-[1180] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 161.
-
-[1181] 'Briefe der Aebtissin Sabina,' edit. Lochner in _Zeitschrift für
-hist. Theologie_, vol. 36, 1866, pp. 542, 545.
-
-[1182] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, pp. 183 ff.
-
-[1183] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, 'Oratio apologetica,' pp. 375-385; Binder,
-F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 198.
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber's Notes:
-
-Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_.
-
-The original text includes Greek characters that have been replaced with
-transliterations in this text version.
-
-The original text includes a Dagger symbol that is represented as [Dagger]
-in this text version.
-
-Footnote 487 appears on page 164 of the text, but there is no
-corresponding marker on the page.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-End of Project Gutenberg's Woman under Monasticism, by Lina Eckenstein
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-Title: Woman under Monasticism
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@@ -22998,384 +22959,7 @@ F., <i>Charitas Pirkheimer</i>, p. 198.</p>
 
 <p>Transcriber’s Note: <a href="#f_487">Footnote 487</a> appears on <a href="#Page_164">page 164</a> of the text, but there is no corresponding marker on the page.</p>
 
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of Woman under Monasticism, by Lina Eckenstein
-
-This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
-almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
-re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
-with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
-
-
-Title: Woman under Monasticism
-       Chapters on Saint-Lore and Convent Life between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500
-
-Author: Lina Eckenstein
-
-Release Date: May 13, 2013 [EBook #42708]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: ASCII
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM ***
-
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-Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
-http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
-generously made available by The Internet Archive.)
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-
-
-WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM.
-
-
-
-
-  London: C. J. CLAY AND SONS,
-  CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS WAREHOUSE
-  AVE MARIA LANE.
-  Glasgow: 263, ARGYLE STREET.
-
-  Leipzig: F. A. BROCKHAUS.
-  New York: MACMILLAN AND CO.
-
-
-
-
-  WOMAN UNDER MONASTICISM
-
-
-  CHAPTERS ON SAINT-LORE AND CONVENT LIFE
-  BETWEEN A.D. 500 AND A.D. 1500
-
-
-  BY LINA ECKENSTEIN.
-
-
-  'Quia vita omnium spiritualium hominum sine litteris mors est.'
-                                    ACTA MURENSIS MONASTERII.
-
-
-  CAMBRIDGE:
-  AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-  1896
-
-  [_All Rights reserved._]
-
-
-
-
-  Cambridge:
-  PRINTED BY J. & C. F. CLAY,
-  AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-
-
-
-
-  TO MY FRIENDS
-  KARL AND MARIA SHARPE PEARSON.
-
-
-
-
-PREFACE.
-
-
-The restlessness, peculiar to periods of transition, is a characteristic
-of the present age. Long-accepted standards are being questioned and
-hitherto unchallenged rules of conduct submitted to searching criticism.
-History shows us that our present social system is only a phase in human
-development, and we turn to a study of the past, confident that a clearer
-insight into the social standards and habits of life prevalent in past
-ages will aid us in a better estimation of the relative importance of
-those factors of change we find around us to-day.
-
-Monasticism during the ten centuries between A.D. 500 and A.D. 1500
-exhibits phases of vital significance for the mental and moral growth of
-Western Europe. However much both the aims and the tone of life of the
-members of the different religious orders varied, monasticism generally
-favoured tendencies which were among the most peaceful and progressive of
-the Middle Ages. For women especially the convent fostered some of the
-best sides of intellectual, moral and emotional life. Besides this it was
-for several centuries a determining factor in regard to women's economic
-status.
-
-The woman-saint and the nun are however figures the importance of which
-has hitherto been little regarded. The woman-saint has met with scant
-treatment beyond that of the eulogistic but too often uncritical writer of
-devotional works; the lady abbess and the literary nun have engrossed the
-attention of few biographers. The partisan recriminations of the
-Reformation period are still widely prevalent. The saint is thrust aside
-as a representative of gross superstition, and the nun is looked upon as
-a slothful and hysterical, if not as a dissolute character. She is still
-thought of as those who broke with the Catholic Church chose to depict
-her.
-
-The fact that these women appeared in a totally different light to their
-contemporaries is generally overlooked; that the monk and the nun enjoyed
-the esteem and regard of the general public throughout a term bordering on
-a thousand years is frequently forgotten. Even at the time of the
-Reformation, when religious contentions were at their height, the nun who
-was expelled from her home appeared deserving of pity rather than of
-reproach to her more enlightened contemporaries. As part of an institution
-that had outlived its purpose she was perhaps bound to pass away. But the
-work she had done and the aims for which she had striven contributed their
-share in formulating the new standards of life. The attitude of mind which
-had been harboured and cultivated in the cloister, must be reckoned among
-the most civilizing influences which have helped to develop mental and
-moral strength in Western Europe.
-
-The social value of cloistered life in itself may be disputed. To the
-Protestant of the 16th century a profession which involved estrangement
-from family ties appeared altogether harmful. Moreover monasteries and
-religious houses were bound up in the reformer's mind with the supremacy
-of Rome from which he was striving hard to shake himself free. Wherever
-the breach with Rome was effected the old settlements were dissolved and
-their inmates were thrust back into civic life. To men this meant much,
-but it meant less to them than to women. In losing the possibility of
-religious profession at the beginning of the 16th century, women lost the
-last chance that remained to them of an activity outside the home circle.
-The subjection of women to a round of domestic duties became more complete
-when nunneries were dissolved, and marriage for generations afterwards was
-women's only recognised vocation.
-
-But even in some of these same Protestant countries where nunneries were
-summarily dissolved, the resulting complete subjection of women has in
-modern times been felt to have outlived its purpose. How far this
-subjection was a needful stage of growth which has helped to develop a
-higher standard of willing purity and faithfulness need not now be
-discussed. In certain countries, however, where the monastic system with
-all the privileges it conferred on women was swept away, we now find a
-strong public opinion against the restriction of women's activity to the
-domestic circle, and these countries were among the first to break down
-the artificial barriers imposed on woman's influence and grant her some
-share in the intellectual and political life of the community.
-
-The right to self-development and social responsibility which the woman of
-to-day so persistently asks for, is in many ways analogous to the right
-which the convent secured to womankind a thousand years ago. The woman of
-to-day, who realises that the home circle as at present constituted
-affords insufficient scope for her energies, had a precursor in the nun
-who sought a field of activity in the convent. For the nun also hesitated,
-it may be from motives which fail to appeal to us, to undertake the
-customary duties and accept the ordinary joys of life. This hesitation may
-be attributed to perversion of instinct, it can hardly in the case of the
-nun be attributed to weakness of character, for she chose a path in life
-which was neither smooth nor easy, and in this path she accomplished great
-things, many of which have still living value.
-
-It is with a view to the better appreciation of the influence and activity
-of women connected with the Christian religion that the following chapters
-have been written. They contain an enquiry into the cult of women-saints,
-and some account of the general position of woman under monasticism. These
-subjects however are so wide and the material at the disposal of the
-student is so abundant that the analysis is confined to English and German
-women.
-
-At the outset an enquiry into the position of women among the Germans of
-pre-Christian times appeared necessary, for early hagiology and the lives
-of women who embraced the religious profession after Christianity was
-first introduced, recall in various particulars the influence of woman and
-her association with the supernatural during heathen times. The legends of
-many saints contain a large element of heathen folk-tradition, together in
-some cases with a small, scarcely perceptible element of historical fact.
-In order therefore to establish the true importance of the Christian
-women, whose labour benefited their contemporaries, and who in recognition
-of their services were raised to saintship, the nature of early
-women-saints in general had to be carefully considered.
-
-In the chapters that follow, the spread of monasticism is dealt with in so
-far as it was due to the influence of women, and some of the more
-representative phases of convent life are described. Our enquiry dealing
-with monasticism only as affecting women, the larger side of a great
-subject has necessarily been ignored. There is a growing consciousness
-now-a-days of the debt of gratitude which mankind as a whole owes to the
-monastic and religious orders, but the history of these orders remains for
-the most part unwritten. At some periods of monasticism the life of men
-and that of women flow evenly side by side and can be dealt with
-separately, at others their work so unites and intermingles that it seems
-impossible to discuss the one apart from the other. Regarding some
-developments the share taken by women, important enough in itself, seemed
-to me hardly capable of being rated at its just value unless taken in
-conjunction with that of men. These developments are therefore touched
-upon briefly or passed over altogether, especially those in which the
-devotional needs of the women are interesting chiefly in the effect which
-they had in stimulating the literary productiveness of men. Other phases
-are passed over because they were the outcome of a course of development,
-the analysis of which lies beyond the scope of this work. This applies
-generally to various continental movements which are throughout treated
-briefly, and especially to convent life in the Netherlands, and to the
-later history of mysticism. The history of the beguines in the North of
-France and the Netherlands is full of interesting particulars, marked by
-the inclusion in the _Acta Sanctorum_ of women like Marie of Oignies
-([Dagger] c. 1213), Lutgardis of Tongern ([Dagger] 1246) and Christine of
-Truyen ([Dagger] 1224), whose fame rests on states of spiritual ecstasy,
-favoured and encouraged by the Dominican friars. So again the women in
-Southern Germany, who cultivated like religious moods and expressed their
-feelings in writing, were largely influenced by the Dominicans, apart from
-whom it seemed impossible to treat them. In England the analysis of
-writings such as the 'Revelations' of Juliana of Norwich and of Margery
-Kempe necessitates a full enquiry into the influence and popularity of
-Richard Rolle ([Dagger] 1349) and Walter Hylton ([Dagger] 1395).
-
-During the later Middle Ages the study of the influences at work in the
-convent is further complicated by the development of religious
-associations outside it. Pre-eminent among these stands the school of
-Deventer which gave the impulse to the production of a devotional
-literature, the purity and refinement of which has given it world-wide
-reputation. These associations were founded by men not by women, and
-though the desire to influence nuns largely moulded the men who wrote for
-and preached to them, still the share taken by women in such movements is
-entirely subordinate.
-
-It is needless to multiply instances of the chapters on convent life which
-are here omitted; in those which I place before the reader it has been my
-aim not so much to give a consecutive history of monasticism as it
-affected women, as to show how numerous are the directions in which this
-history can be pursued. Having regard to the nature of the subject I have
-addressed myself in the first place to the student, who in the references
-given will, I trust, find corroboration of my views. In quoting from early
-writings I have referred to the accounts printed in the _Acta Sanctorum
-Bollandorum_ and to the edition of Latin writings published under the
-auspices of Migne in the 'Patrologiae Cursus Completus,' except in those
-few cases where a more recent edition of the work referred to offered
-special advantages, and regarding the date of these writings I have been
-chiefly guided by A. Potthast, _Wegweiser durch die Geschichtswerke des
-europaeischen Mittelalters_, 1862. In accordance with a division which has
-been adopted by some histories of art and seems to me to have much in its
-favour, I have taken Early Christian times to extend to the close of the
-10th century; I have spoken of the period between 1000 and 1250 as the
-Earlier, and of that between 1250 and 1500 as the Later Middle Ages. The
-spelling of proper names in a work which extends over many centuries has
-difficulties of its own. While observing a certain uniformity during each
-period, I have as far as possible adhered to the contemporary local form
-of each name.
-
-While addressing myself largely to the student, I have kept along lines
-which I trust may make the subject attractive to the general reader, in
-whose interest I have translated all the passages quoted. There is a
-growing consciousness now-a-days that for stability in social progress we
-need among other things a wider scope for women's activity. This scope as
-I hope to show was to some extent formerly secured to women by the
-monastic system. Perhaps some of those who are interested in the
-educational movements of to-day may care to recall the history and
-arrangements of institutions, which favoured the intellectual development
-of women in the past.
-
-I cannot conclude these prefatory remarks without a word of thanks to
-those who have aided me by criticism and revision. Besides the two friends
-to whom I have dedicated this book, I have to cordially thank Mrs R. W.
-Cracroft for the labour she has spent on the literary revision of my work
-in manuscript. To Dr H. F. Heath of Bedford College I am indebted for many
-suggestions on points of philology, and to Robert J. Parker, Esq. of
-Lincoln's Inn for advice on some points of law and of general arrangement.
-Conscious as I am of the many defects in my work, I cannot but be grateful
-to the Syndics of the University Press, for the assistance they have
-rendered me in its publication, and I trust that these defects may not
-deter readers from following me into somewhat unfrequented paths, wherein
-at any rate I have not stinted such powers of labour as are mine.
-
-LINA ECKENSTEIN.
-
-_December, 1895._
-
-
-
-
-CONTENTS.
-
-
-                                                                      PAGE
-
-  PREFACE                                                              vii
-
-
-  CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY.
-
-    Sec. 1. The Borderland of Heathendom and Christianity                   1
-
-    Sec. 2. The Tribal Goddess as a Christian Saint                        15
-
-    Sec. 3. Further Peculiarities of this Type of Saint                    28
-
-
-  CHAPTER II. CONVENTS AMONG THE FRANKS, A.D. 550-650.
-
-    Sec. 1. At the Frankish Invasion                                       45
-
-    Sec. 2. St Radegund and the Nunnery at Poitiers                        51
-
-    Sec. 3. The Revolt of the Nuns at Poitiers. Convent Life in the North  65
-
-
-  CHAPTER III. CONVENTS AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS, A.D. 630-730.
-
-    Sec. 1. Early Houses in Kent                                           79
-
-    Sec. 2. The Monastery at Whitby                                        88
-
-    Sec. 3. Ely and the influence of Bishop Wilfrith                       95
-
-    Sec. 4. Houses in Mercia and in the South                             106
-
-
-  CHAPTER IV. ANGLO-SAXON NUNS IN CONNECTION WITH BONIFACE.
-
-    Sec. 1. The Women corresponding with Boniface                         118
-
-    Sec. 2. Anglo-Saxon Nuns abroad                                       134
-
-
-  CHAPTER V. CONVENTS IN SAXON LANDS BETWEEN A.D. 800-1000.
-
-    Sec. 1. Women's Convents in Saxony                                    143
-
-    Sec. 2. Early History of Gandersheim                                  154
-
-    Sec. 3. The Nun Hrotsvith and her Writings                            160
-
-
-  CHAPTER VI. THE MONASTIC REVIVAL OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    Sec. 1. The new Monastic Orders                                       184
-
-    Sec. 2. Benedictine Convents in the Twelfth Century                   201
-
-    Sec. 3. The Order of St Gilbert of Sempringham                        213
-
-
-  CHAPTER VII. ART INDUSTRIES IN THE NUNNERY.
-
-    Sec. 1. Art Industries generally                                      222
-
-    Sec. 2. Herrad and the 'Garden of Delights'                           238
-
-
-  CHAPTER VIII. PROPHECY AND PHILANTHROPY.
-
-    Sec. 1. St Hildegard of Bingen and St Elisabeth of Schoenau            256
-
-    Sec. 2. Women-Saints connected with Charity and Philanthropy          285
-
-
-  CHAPTER IX. EARLY MYSTIC LITERATURE.
-
-    Sec. 1. Mystic Writings for Women in England                          305
-
-    Sec. 2. The Convent of Helfta and its Literary Nuns                   328
-
-
-  CHAPTER X. SOME ASPECTS OF THE CONVENT IN ENGLAND DURING THE
-  LATER MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    Sec. 1. The external Relations of the Convent                         354
-
-    Sec. 2. The internal Arrangements of the Convent                      365
-
-    Sec. 3. The Foundation and internal Arrangements of Sion              383
-
-
-  CHAPTER XI. MONASTIC REFORM PREVIOUS TO THE REFORMATION.
-
-    Sec. 1. Visitations of Nunneries in England                           398
-
-    Sec. 2. Reforms in Germany                                            414
-
-
-  CHAPTER XII. THE DISSOLUTION.
-
-    Sec. 1. The Dissolution of Nunneries in England                       432
-
-    Sec. 2. The Memoir of Charitas Pirckheimer                            458
-
-
-  CONCLUSION                                                           477
-
-  APPENDIX. The Rhyme of Herrad                                        485
-
-  INDEX                                                                488
-
-
-
-
-ERRATA.
-
-
-  Page 23, note 1, date of St Ida in A. SS. Boll. should be _Sept. 4_
-                       instead of _June 20_.
-    "  26, line 7, read _tilth_ instead of _silk_.
-    " 162,   " 21, read _Martianus_ instead of _Marianus_.
-    " 190,   " 32, read 1240 as the date of Jacobus di Vitriaco's death.
-    " 241,   "  8, read _Bergen_ instead of _Berg_.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER I.
-
-INTRODUCTORY.
-
-    'Die mit dem goldenen Schuh und dem Geiger ist auch eine
-    Muttergottes.' _Bavarian Saying._
-
-
-Sec. 1. The Borderland of Heathendom and Christianity.
-
-In order to gain an insight into the causes of the rapid development of
-monasticism among the German races, it is necessary to enquire into the
-social arrangements of the period which witnessed the introduction of
-Christianity, and into those survivals of the previous period of social
-development which German Christianity absorbed. Among peoples of German
-race monastic life generally, and especially monastic life which gave
-scope for independent activity among women, had a development of its own.
-Women of the newly-converted yet still barbarian race readily gathered
-together and dwelt in religious settlements founded on their own
-initiative and ruled independently of men. A reason for this must be
-sought in the drift of contemporary life, which we shall thus have to
-discuss at some length.
-
-During the period of declining heathendom--for how long, measuring time by
-centuries, it is not yet possible to say--the drift of society had been
-towards curtailing woman's liberty of movement and interfering with her
-freedom of action. When the Germans crossed the threshold of history the
-characteristics of the father-age were already in the ascendant; the
-social era, when the growing desire for certainty of fatherhood caused
-individual women and their offspring to be brought into the possession of
-individual men, had already begun. The influence of women was more and
-more restricted owing to their domestic subjection. But traditions of a
-time when it had been otherwise still lingered.
-
-Students of primitive history are recognising, for peoples of German race
-among others, the existence of an early period of development, when women
-played a greater part in both social and tribal life. Folk-lore,
-philology, and surviving customs yield overwhelming evidence in support of
-the few historic data which point to the period, conveniently called the
-mother-age, when women held positions of authority inside the tribal group
-and directly exercised influence on the doings of the tribe[1].
-
-This period, the mother-age, is generally looked upon as an advance from
-an earlier stage of savagery, and considered to be contemporaneous with
-the beginnings of settled tribal life. It brought with it the practice of
-tilth and agriculture, and led to the domestication of some of the smaller
-animals and the invention of weaving and spinning, achievements with which
-it is recognised that women must be credited.
-
-In matters of polity and sex it established the paramount importance of
-the woman; it is she who regulates the home, who notes the changes of the
-seasons, who stores the results of experience, and treasures up the
-intellectual wealth of the community in sayings which have come down to us
-in the form of quaint maxims and old-world saws. As for family
-arrangements, it was inside the tribal group and at the tribal festival
-that sex unions were contracted; and this festival, traditions of which
-survive in many parts of Europe to this day, and which was in its earliest
-forms a period of unrestrained license for the women as well as the men,
-was presided over by the tribal mothers, an arrangement which in various
-particulars affords an explanation of many ideas associated with women in
-later times.
-
-The father-age succeeding to the mother-age in time altogether
-revolutionised the relations of the sexes; transient sex unions, formerly
-the rule, were gradually eliminated by capture and retention of wives from
-outside the tribal group. The change marks a distinct step in social
-advance. When men as heads of families succeeded to much of the influence
-women had held in the tribe, barbarous tendencies, such as blood
-sacrifice, were checked and a higher moral standard was attained. But this
-was done at the cost of her prerogative to the woman; and her social
-influence to some extent passed from her.
-
-It must be granted that the character of the mother-age in some of its
-bearings is hypothetical, but we can infer many of the social arrangements
-of the period from surviving customs and usages, and its organisation
-from the part woman played in tradition and saga, and, as we shall see
-later, from folk-traditions preserved in the legends of the saints. And
-further, unless we admit that the social arrangements of the earlier
-period differed from those of the later, we are at a loss to account for
-the veneration in which woman was held and for the influence exerted by
-her as we confront her on the threshold of written history. When once we
-grasp the essentials of these earlier arrangements, we hold the clue to
-the existence of types of character and tendencies which otherwise appear
-anomalous.
-
-For at the time when contact with Christianity brought with it the
-possibility of monastic settlements, the love of domestic life had not
-penetrated so deeply, nor were its conditions so uniformly favourable, but
-that many women were ready to break away from it. Reminiscences of an
-independence belonging to them in the past, coupled with the desire for
-leadership, made many women loth to conform to life inside the family as
-wives and mothers under conditions formulated by men. Tendencies surviving
-from the earlier period, and still unsubdued, made the advantages of
-married life weigh light in the balance against a loss of liberty. To
-conceive the force of these tendencies is to gain an insight into the
-elements which the convent forthwith absorbs.
-
-In the world outside the convent commanding figures of womankind become
-fewer with outgoing heathendom, and the part played by women becomes of
-less and less importance. There is less room left for the Gannas of
-history or for the Kriemhilds of saga, for powerful natures such as the
-Visigoth princess Brunihild, queen of the Franks, or Drahomir of
-Brandenburg, queen in Bohemia, who gratify their passion for influence
-with a recklessness which strikes terror into the breasts of their
-contemporaries. As the old chronicler of St Denis remarks, women who are
-bent on evil do worse evil than men. But in the convent the influence of
-womankind lasted longer. Spirited nuns and independent-minded abbesses
-turn to account the possibilities open to them in a way which commands
-respect and repeatedly secures superstitious reverence in the outside
-world. The influence and the powers exerted by these women, as we shall
-see further on, are altogether remarkable, especially during early
-Christian times. But we also come across frequent instances of lawlessness
-among the women who band together in the convent,--a lawlessness to which
-the arrangements of the earlier age likewise supply a clue. For that very
-love of independence, which led to beneficial results where it was coupled
-with self-control and consciousness of greater responsibility, tended in
-the direction of vagrancy and dissoluteness when it was accompanied by
-distaste for every kind of restraint.
-
-In this connection we must say a few words on the varying status of loose
-women, since the estimation in which these women were held and the
-attitude assumed towards them affected monasticism in various particulars.
-It is true that during early Christian times little heed was taken of them
-and few objections were raised to their influence, but later distinct
-efforts were made by various religious orders to prevent women from
-drifting into a class which, whatever may have been its condition in past
-times, was felt to be steadily and surely deteriorating.
-
-The distinction of women into so-called respectable and disreputable
-classes dates from before the introduction of Christianity. It arose as
-the father-age gained on the mother-age, when appropriated women were more
-and more absorbed into domesticity, while those women outside, who either
-resented or escaped subjection, found their position surrounded by
-increasing difficulties, and aspersion more and more cast on their
-independence. By accepting the distinction, the teachers of Christianity
-certainly helped to make it more definite; but for centuries the existence
-of loose women, so far from being condemned, was hardly discountenanced by
-them. The revenues which ecclesiastical courts and royal households
-derived from taxes levied on these women as a class yield proof of
-this[2]. Certainly efforts were made to set limits to their practices and
-the disorderly tendencies which in the nature of things became connected
-with them and with those with whom they habitually consorted. But this was
-done not so much to restrain them as to protect women of the other class
-from being confounded with them. Down to the time of the Reformation, the
-idea that the existence of loose women as a class should be
-discountenanced does not present itself, for they were a recognised
-feature of court life and of town life everywhere. Marshalled into bands,
-they accompanied the king and the army on their most distant expeditions,
-and stepped to the fore wherever there was question of merrymaking or
-entertainment. Indeed there is reason to believe, improbable though it may
-seem at first sight, that women of loose life, as we come across them in
-the Middle Ages, are successors to a class which had been powerful in the
-past. They are not altogether depraved and despised characters such as
-legislation founded on tenets of Roman Law chose to stamp them. For law
-and custom are often at variance regarding the rights and privileges
-belonging to them. These rights and privileges they retained in various
-particulars till the time of the Reformation, which indeed marks a turning
-point in the attitude taken by society towards women generally.
-
-Different ages have different standards of purity and faithfulness. The
-loose or unattached women of the past are of many kinds and many types; to
-apply the term prostitute to them raises a false idea of their position as
-compared with that of women in other walks of life. If we would deal with
-them as a class at all, it is only this they have in common,--that they
-are indifferent to the ties of family, and that the men who associate with
-them are not by so doing held to incur any responsibility towards them or
-towards their offspring.
-
-If we bear in mind the part these women have played and the modifications
-which their status has undergone, it will be seen that the subject is one
-which nearly affects monasticism. For the convent accepted the dislike
-women felt to domestic subjection and countenanced them in their refusal
-to undertake the duties of married life. It offered an escape from the
-tyranny of the family, but it did so on condition of such a sacrifice of
-personal independence, as in the outside world more and more involved the
-loss of good repute. On the face of it, a greater contrast than that
-between the loose woman and the nun is hard to conceive; and yet they have
-this in common, that they are both the outcome of the refusal among
-womankind to accept married relations on the basis of the subjection
-imposed by the father-age.
-
-In other respects too the earlier heathen period was not without influence
-on the incoming Christian faith, and helped to determine its conceptions
-with regard to women. In actual life the sacerdotal privileges, which
-tribal mothers had appropriated to themselves at the time of the
-introduction of Christianity, were retained by the priestess; while in the
-realm of the ideal the reverence in which tribal mothers had been held
-still lived on in the worship of the tribal mother-divinity. It is under
-this twofold aspect, as priestess and as tribal mother-goddess, that the
-power of women was brought face to face with Christianity; the priestess
-and the mother-goddess were the well-defined types of heathen womanhood
-with which the early Church was called upon to deal.
-
-We will show later on how the ideal conception prevailed, and how the
-heathen mother-goddess often assumed the garb of a Christian woman-saint,
-and as a Christian woman-saint was left to exist unmolested. Not so the
-heathen priestess and prophetess. From the first introduction of
-Christianity the holding of sacerdotal powers by women was resented both
-within and without the Church, and opprobrium was cast on the women who
-claimed to mediate between the human and the divine.
-
-At the time of the advent of Christianity the Gannas and Veledas of the
-Roman period are still a living reality; they are the 'wise women' who
-every now and then leave their retreat and appear on the stage of history.
-A prophetess in gorgeous apparel makes her entry into Verdun in the year
-547, drawing crowds about her and foretelling the future. She is in no way
-intimidated by the exorcisms of prelates, and presently leaves to betake
-herself to the court of the Frankish queen Fredegund. Again in 577 we find
-the Frankish king Guntchramm in consultation with a woman soothsayer, and
-other cases of the kind are on record[3].
-
-In the ninth century the Church more effectually exercised her influence
-in the case of the woman Thiota, who coming from Switzerland inflamed the
-minds of the folk in Mainz; for she was accused of profanity and publicly
-scourged[4]. But for all the attacks of the Church, the folk persisted in
-clinging to its priestesses and in believing them gifted with special
-powers. Grimm shows how the Christian accusers of soothsaying women made
-them into odious witches[5]; Wuttke and Weinhold, both well-known
-students of folk-lore, consider that witches were originally heathen
-priestesses[6]. The intrinsic meaning of the word _hexe_, the German
-designation for witch, points to some one who originally belonged to a
-group living in a particular manner, but whose practices made her
-obnoxious to those who had apprehended the higher moral standard of a
-later social period. But the Church failed to stamp even the witch as
-wholly despicable; for in popular estimation she always retained some of
-the attributes of the priestess, the wise woman, the _bona domina_, the
-'white witch' of tradition; so that the doctrine that the soothsaying
-woman is necessarily the associate of evil was never altogether accepted.
-Even now-a-days incidents happen occasionally in remote districts which
-show how the people still readily seek the help of women in matters of
-wisdom, of leechcraft, and of prescience. It was only under the influence
-of a scare that people, who were accustomed to consult the wise woman in
-good faith, could be brought to abhor her as a witch. It was only during
-the later Middle Ages that the undisputed and indisputable connection of
-some 'wise women' with licentious customs gave their traducers a weapon of
-which they were not slow to avail themselves, and which enabled them to
-rouse fanaticism of the worst kind against these women.
-
-The practices and popularity of witchcraft were in truth the latest
-survivals of the mother-age. The woman, who devised love-charms and brewed
-manifold remedies for impotence and for allaying the pangs of childbirth,
-who pretended to control the weather and claimed the power to turn the
-milk of a whole village blue, carried on traditions of a very primitive
-period. And her powers, as we shall see, always had a close parallel in
-those attributed to women-saints. For example St Gertrud of Nivelles has
-left a highly prized relic to womankind in the form of a cloak which is
-still hung about those who are desirous of becoming mothers[7]; and the
-hair of a saint, Mechthild, is still hung outside the church at Toess in
-Switzerland to avert the thunderstorm[8]; and again St Gunthild of
-Biberbach and others are still appealed to that they may avert the cattle
-plague[9]. What difference, it may be asked, is there between the powers
-attributed to these saints and the powers with which witches are usually
-credited? They are the obverse and reverse of woman's connection with the
-supernatural, which in the one case is interpreted by the sober mind of
-reverence, and in the other is dreaded under the perturbing influence of a
-fear encouraged, if not originated, by Christian fanatics.
-
-In the Christian Church the profession of the nun was accepted as holy,
-but an impassable gulf separated her from the priestess. During early
-Christian times we come across the injunction that women shall not serve
-at the altar[10], and that lady abbesses shall not take upon themselves
-religious duties reserved to men by the Church. When we think of women
-gathered together in a religious establishment and dependent on the
-priest outside for the performing of divine worship, their desire to
-manage things for themselves does not appear unnatural, encouraged as it
-would be by traditions of sacerdotal rights belonging to them in the past.
-And it is worthy of notice that as late as the 13th century, Brother
-Berthold, an influential preacher of south Germany, speaks ardently
-against women who would officiate at divine service and urges the mischief
-that may result from such a course.
-
-Turning to the question of how far these obvious survivals from a heathen
-age are determined by time and place, we find broad lines of difference
-between the heathen survivals of the various branches of the German race,
-and considerable diversity in the character of their early Christianity
-and their early women-saints. This diversity is attributable to the fact
-that the heathen beliefs of these various peoples were not the same at the
-time of their first contact with Christianity, and that they did not
-accept it under like circumstances.
-
-For while those branches of the race who moved in the vanguard of the
-great migration, the Vandals, the Burgundians and the Goths, readily
-embraced Christianity, it was Christianity in its Arian form. Arianism,
-which elsewhere had been branded as heresy and well-nigh stamped out,
-suddenly revived among the Germans; all the branches of the race who came
-into direct contact with peoples of civilized Latinity readily embraced
-it. Now one of the distinguishing features of Arian belief was its hatred
-of monasticism[11]. The Arian convert hunted the monk from his seclusion
-and thrust him back to the duties of civic life. It is not then among
-Germans who adopted Arian Christianity that the beginnings of convent life
-must be sought. Indeed as Germans these peoples soon passed away from the
-theatre of history; they intermarried and fell in with the habits of the
-people among whom they settled, and forfeited their German language and
-their German traditions.
-
-It was otherwise with the Franks who entered Gaul at the close of the
-fourth century, and with the Anglo-Saxons who took possession of Britain.
-The essentially warlike character of these peoples was marked by their
-worship of deities such as Wodan, a worship before which the earlier
-worship of mother-divinities was giving way. Women had already been
-brought into subjection, but they had a latent desire for independence,
-and among the Franks and Anglo-Saxons women of the newly converted race
-eagerly snatched at the possibilities opened out by convent life, and in
-their ranks history chronicles some of the earliest and most remarkable
-developments of monasticism. But the Franks and the Anglo-Saxons, in
-leaving behind the land of their origin, had left behind those hallowed
-sites on which primitive worship so essentially depends. It is in vain
-that we seek among them for a direct connection between heathen
-mother-divinity and Christian woman-saint; their mother-divinities did not
-live on in connection with the Church. It is true that the inclination to
-hold women in reverence remained, and found expression in the readiness
-with which they revered women as saints. The women-saints of the
-Anglo-Saxons and the Franks are numerous, and are nearly all known to have
-been interested in convent foundations. But the legends, which in course
-of time have crystallised round them, and the miracles attributed to them,
-though containing certain elements of heathen folk-tradition, are
-colourless and pale compared with the traditions which have been preserved
-by saint legend abroad. It is in Germany proper, where the same race has
-been in possession of the same sites for countless generations, that the
-primitive character of heathen traditions is most pronounced and has most
-directly determined and influenced the cult and the legends of
-women-saints.
-
-Besides the reminiscences of the early period which have survived in saint
-legend, traditions and customs of the same period have lived on in the
-worship of the Virgin Mary. The worship of the Virgin Mary was but
-slightly developed in Romanised Gaul and Keltic Britain, but from the
-beginning of the sixth century it is a marked feature in the popular creed
-in those countries where the German element prevailed.
-
-As Mrs Jameson says in her book on the legends of the Madonna: 'It is
-curious to observe, as the worship of the Virgin mother expanded and
-gathered in itself the relics of many an ancient faith, how the new and
-the old elements, some of them apparently most heterogeneous, became
-amalgamated and were combined into the earlier forms of art...[12].'
-
-Indeed the prominence given to the Virgin is out of all proportion to the
-meagre mention of her in the gospels. During the early Christian period
-she was largely worshipped as a patron saint in France, England and
-Germany, and her fame continued steadily increasing with the centuries
-till its climax was reached in the Middle Ages, which witnessed the
-greatest concessions made by the Church to the demands of popular faith.
-
-According to Rhys[13] many churches dedicated to Mary were built on spots
-where tradition speaks of the discovery of a wooden image, probably a
-heathen statue which was connected with her.
-
-In the seventh century Pope Sergius (687-701) expressly ordered that the
-festivals of the Virgin Mary were to take place on heathen holy days in
-order that heathen celebrations might become associated with her[14]. The
-festivals of the Virgin to this day are associated with pilgrimages, the
-taste for which to the Frenchman of the Middle Ages appeared peculiarly
-German. The chronicler Froissart, writing about 1390, remarks 'for the
-Germans are fond of performing pilgrimages and it is one of their
-customs[15].'
-
-Mary then, under her own name, or under the vaguer appellation of _Our
-Lady_ (Unser liebe frau, Notre Dame, de heilige maagd), assimilated
-surviving traditions of the heathen faith which were largely reminiscences
-of the mother-age; so that Mary became the heiress of mother-divinities,
-and her worship was associated with cave, and tree, and fountain, and
-hill-top, all sites of the primitive cult.
-
-'Often,' says Menzel[16], 'a wonder-working picture of the Madonna is
-found hung on a tree or inside a tree; hence numerous appellations like
-"Our dear Lady of the Oak," "Our dear Lady of the Linden-tree," etc. Often
-at the foot of the tree, upon which such a picture is hung, a fountain
-flows to which miraculous power is ascribed.'
-
-In the Tyrol we hear of pictures which have been discovered floating in a
-fountain or which were borne to the bank by a river[17].
-
-As proof of the Virgin Mary's connection with festivals, we find her name
-associated in Belgium with many pageants held on the first of May.
-Throughout German lands the Assumption of the Virgin comes at the harvest
-festival, and furnishes an occasion for some pilgrimage or fair which
-preserves many peculiar and perplexing traits of an earlier civilization.
-
-The harvest festival is coupled in some parts of Germany with customs
-that are of extreme antiquity. In Bavaria the festival sometimes goes by
-the name of the 'day of sacred herbs,' _kraeuterweihtag_; near Wuerzburg it
-is called the 'day of sacred roots,' _wuerzelweihtag_, or 'day of
-bunch-gathering,' _bueschelfrauentag_[18]. In the Tyrol the 15th of August
-is the great day of the Virgin, _grosse frauentag_, when a collection of
-herbs for medicinal purposes is made. A number of days, _frauentage_, come
-in July and August and are now connected with the Virgin, on which herbs
-are collected and offered as sacred bunches either on the altar of Our
-Lady in church and chapel, or on hill-tops which throughout Germany are
-the sites of ancient woman-worship[19]. This collecting and offering of
-herbs points to a stage even more primitive than that represented by
-offerings of grain at the harvest festival.
-
-In a few instances the worship of Mary is directly coupled with that of
-some heathen divinity. In Antwerp to this day an ancient idol of peculiar
-appearance is preserved, which women, who are desirous of becoming
-mothers, decorate with flowers at certain times of the year. Its heathen
-appellation is lost, but above it now stands a figure of the Virgin[20].
-
-Again we find the name of Mary joined to that of the heathen goddess Sif.
-In the Eiffel district, extending between the rivers Rhine, Meuse and
-Mosel, a church stands dedicated to Mariasif, the name of Mary being
-coupled with that of Sif, a woman-divinity of the German heathen pantheon,
-whom Grimm characterizes as a giver of rain[21]. The name Mariahilf, a
-similar combination, is frequently found in south Germany, the name of
-Mary as we hope to show further down being joined to that of a goddess who
-has survived in the Christian saint Hilp[22].
-
-These examples will suffice to show the close connection between the
-conceptions of heathendom and popular Christianity, and how the cloak of
-heathen association has fallen on the shoulders of the saints of the
-Christian Church. The authorities at Rome saw no occasion to take
-exception to its doing so. Pope Gregorius II. (590-604) in a letter
-addressed to Melitus of Canterbury expressly urged that the days of
-heathen festival should receive solemnity through dedication to some holy
-martyr[23]. The Christian saint whose name was substituted for that of
-some heathen divinity readily assimilated associations of the early
-period. Scriptural characters and Christian teachers were given the
-emblems of older divinities and assumed their characteristics. But the
-varying nature of the same saint in different countries has hardly
-received due attention. St Peter of the early British Church was very
-different from St Peter who in Bavaria walked the earth like clumsy
-good-natured Thor, or from St Peter who in Rome took the place of Mars as
-protector of the city. Similarly the legends currently told of the same
-saint in different countries exhibit markedly different traits.
-
-For the transition from heathendom to Christianity was the work not of
-years but of centuries; the claims made by religion changed, but the
-underlying conceptions for a long time remained unaltered. Customs which
-had once taken a divine sanction continued to be viewed under a religious
-aspect, though they were often at variance with the newly-introduced
-faith. The craving for local divinities in itself was heathen; in course
-of time the cult of the saints altogether re-moulded the Christianity of
-Christ. But the Church of Rome, far from opposing the multitude of those
-through whom the folk sought intercession with the Godhead, opened her
-arms wide to all.
-
-At the outset it lay with the local dignitary to recognise or reject the
-names which the folk held in veneration. Religious settlements and Church
-centres regulated days and seasons according to the calendar of the chief
-festivals of the year, as accepted by the Church at Rome; but the local
-dignitary was at liberty to add further names to the list at his
-discretion. For centuries there was no need of canonisation to elevate an
-individual to the rank of saint; the inscribing of his name on a local
-calendar was sufficient. Local calendars went on indefinitely swelling the
-list of saintly names till the Papal See felt called upon to
-interfere[24]. Since the year 1153 the right to declare a person a saint
-has lain altogether with the authorities at Rome[25].
-
-Considering the circumstances under which the peoples of German race
-first came into contact with Christianity, it is well to recall the fact
-that a busy Church life had grown up in many of the cities north of the
-Alps, which were centres of the Roman system of administration previous to
-the upheaval and migration of German heathen tribes, which began in the
-fourth century. Legend has preserved stories of the apostles and their
-disciples wandering northwards and founding early bishoprics along the
-Rhine, in Gaul and in Britain[26]. The massacres of Christians in the
-reign of Diocletian cannot be altogether fabulous; but after the year 313,
-when Constantine at Rome officially accepted the new faith, until the
-German invasion, the position of Christianity was well secured.
-
-A certain development of monastic life had accompanied its spread. In
-western Gaul we hear of Martin of Tours ([Dagger] 400) who, after years of
-military service and religious persecution, settled near Poitiers and drew
-about him many who joined him in a round of devotion and work. The
-monastic, or rather coenobite, settlement of his time consisted of a
-number of wattled cells or huts, surrounded by a trench or a wall of
-earth. The distinction between the earlier word, _coenobium_, and the
-later word, _monasterium_, as used in western Europe, lies in this, that
-the _coenobium_ designates the assembled worshippers alone, while the
-monastery presupposes the possession of a definite site of land[27]. In
-this sense the word monastery is as fitly applied to settlements ruled by
-women as to those ruled by men, especially during the early period when
-these settlements frequently include members of both sexes. St Martin of
-Tours is also credited with having founded congregations of religious
-women[28], but I have found nothing definite concerning them.
-
-Our knowledge of the Christian life of the British is very limited;
-presumably the religious settlement was a school both of theology and of
-learning, and no line of distinction divided the settlements of priests
-from those of monks. From Gildas, a British writer, who at the time of the
-Anglo-Saxon invasion (c. 560) wrote a stern invective against the
-irreligious ways of his countrymen, we gather that women lived under the
-direction of priests, but it is not clear whether they were vowed to
-continence[29]. But as far as I am aware, there is no evidence
-forthcoming that before the Saxon invasion women lived in separate
-religious establishments, the rule of which was in the hands of one of
-their own sex[30].
-
-The convent is of later date. During the early centuries of established
-Christianity the woman who takes the vow of continence secures the
-protection of the Church but does not necessarily leave her
-home-surroundings.
-
-Thus Ambrosius, archbishop of Milan ([Dagger] 397), one of the most
-influential supporters of early Christianity, greatly inflamed women's
-zeal for a celibate life. But in the writings of Ambrosius, which treat of
-virginity, there is no suggestion that the widow or the maiden who vows
-continence shall seek seclusion or solitude[31]. Women vowed to continence
-moved about freely, secure through their connection with the Church from
-distasteful unions which their relatives might otherwise force upon them.
-Their only distinctive mark was the use of a veil.
-
-Similarly we find Hilarius ([Dagger] 369), bishop of Poitiers, addressing
-a letter to his daughter Abra on the beauties of the unmarried state. In
-this he assures her, that if she be strong enough to renounce an earthly
-bridegroom, together with gay and splendid apparel, a priceless pearl
-shall fall to her share[32]. But in this letter also there is no
-suggestion that the woman who embraces religion should dwell apart from
-her family. It is well to bear this in mind, for after the acceptance of
-Christianity by the peoples of German race, we occasionally hear of women
-who, though vowed to religion, move about freely among their fellows; but
-Church councils and synods began to urge more and more emphatically that
-this was productive of evil, and that a woman who had taken the religious
-vow must be a member of a convent.
-
-To sum up;--the peoples of German race, at the time of their contact with
-Christianity, were in a state of social development which directly
-affected the form in which they accepted the new faith and the
-institutions to which such acceptance gave rise. Some branches of the
-race, deserting the land of their birth, came into contact with peoples
-of Latin origin, and embraced Christianity under a form which excluded
-monasticism, and soon lost their identity as Germans. Others, as the
-Franks and Anglo-Saxons, giving up the worship of their heathen gods,
-accepted orthodox Christianity, and favoured the mode of life of those who
-followed peaceful pursuits in the monastery, pursuits which their wives
-especially were eager to embrace. Again, those peoples who remained in
-possession of their earlier homes largely preserved usages dating from a
-primitive period of tribal organization, usages which affected the
-position of their women and determined the character of their
-women-saints. It is to Germany proper that we must go for the
-woman-priestess who lives on longest as the witch, and for the loose women
-who most markedly retain special rights and privileges. And it is also in
-Germany proper that we find the woman-saint who is direct successor to the
-tribal mother-goddess.
-
-
-Sec. 2. The Tribal Goddess as a Christian Saint.
-
-Before considering the beginnings of convent life as the work of women
-whose existence rests on a firm historic basis, we must enquire into the
-nature of women-saints. From the earliest times of established
-Christianity the lives of men and women who were credited with special
-holiness have formed a favourite theme of religious narratives, which were
-intended to keep their memory green and to impress the devout with
-thoughts of their saintliness.
-
-The Acts of the Saints, the comprehensive collection of which is now in
-course of publication under the auspices of the Bollandists, form a most
-important branch of literature. They include some of the most valuable
-material for a history of the first ten centuries of our era, and give a
-most instructive insight into the drift of Christianity in different
-epochs. The aims, experiences and sufferings of Christian heroes and
-heroines inspired the student and fired the imagination of the poet. Prose
-narrative told of their lives, poems were written in their praise, and
-hymns were composed to be sung at the celebration of their office. The
-godly gained confidence from the perusal of such compositions, and the
-people hearing them read or sung were impressed in favour of Christian
-doctrine.
-
-The number of men and women whom posterity has glorified as saints is
-legion. Besides the characters of the accepted and the apocryphal gospels,
-there are the numerous early converts to Christianity who suffered for
-their faith, and all those who during early Christian times turned their
-energies to practising and preaching the tenets of the new religion, and
-to whose memory a loving recollection paid the tribute of superstitious
-reverence. Their successors in the work of Christianity accepted them as
-patron saints and added their names to the list of those to whose memory
-special days were dedicated. Many of them are individuals whose activity
-in the cause of Christianity is well authenticated. Friends have enlarged
-on their work, contemporary history refers to their existence, and often
-they have themselves left writings, which give an insight into their
-lives. They are the early and true saints of history, on whose shoulders
-in some cases the cloak of heathen association has fallen, but without
-interfering with their great and lasting worth.
-
-But besides those who were canonised for their enthusiasm in the cause of
-early Christianity, the Acts of the Saints mention a number of men and
-women who enjoy local reverence, but of whose actual existence during
-Christian times evidence is wanting. Among them are a certain number of
-women with whom the present chapter purposes to deal, women who are
-locally worshipped as saints, and whose claims to holiness are generally
-recognised, but whose existence during Christian times is hypothetical.
-Their legends contain a small, in some cases a scarcely sensible, basis of
-historic fact, and their cult preserves traits which are pre-Christian,
-often anti-Christian, in character.
-
-The traveller Blunt, during a stay in Italy in the beginning of this
-century, was struck with the many points which modern saints and ancient
-gods have in common. He gives a description of the festival of St Agatha
-at Catania, of which he was an eye-witness, and which to this day, as I
-have been told, continues little changed. The festival, as Blunt describes
-it, opened with a horse-race, which he knew from Ovid was one of the
-spectacles of the festival of the goddess Ceres; and further he witnessed
-a mummery and the carrying about of huge torches, both of which he also
-knew formed part of the old pagan festival. But more remarkable than this
-was a great procession which began in the evening and lasted into the
-night; hundreds of citizens crowded to draw through the town a ponderous
-car, on which were placed the image of the saint and her relics, which the
-priests exhibited to the ringing of bells. Among these relics were the
-veil of Agatha, to which is ascribed the power of staying the eruption of
-Mount Aetna, and the breasts of the saint, which were torn off during her
-martyrdom[33]. Catania, Blunt knew, had always been famous for the worship
-of Ceres, and the ringing of bells and a veil were marked features of her
-festivals, the greater and the lesser Eleusinia. Menzel tells us that huge
-breasts were carried about on the occasion[34]. Further, Blunt heard that
-two festivals took place yearly in Catania in honour of Agatha; one early
-in the spring, the other in the autumn, exactly corresponding to the time
-when the greater and lesser Eleusinia were celebrated. Even the name
-Agatha seemed but a taking over into the new religion of a name sacred to
-the old. Ceres was popularly addressed as _Bona Dea_, and the name Agatha,
-which does not occur as a proper name during ancient times, seemed but a
-translation of the Latin epithet into Greek.
-
-The legend of Agatha as contained in the _Acta Sanctorum_ places her
-existence in the third century and gives full details concerning her
-parentage, her trials and her martyrdom; but I have not been able to
-ascertain when it was written. Agatha is the chief saint of the district
-all about Catania, and we are told that her fame penetrated at an early
-date into Italy and Greece[35].
-
-It is of course impossible actually to disprove the existence of a
-Christian maiden Agatha in Catania in the third century. Some may incline
-to the view that such a maiden did exist, and that a strange likeness
-between her experiences and name on the one hand, and the cult of and
-epithet applied to Ceres on the other, led to the popular worship of her
-instead of the ancient goddess. The question of her existence as a
-Christian maiden during Christian times can only be answered by a balance
-of probabilities. Our opinion of the truth or falsehood of the traditions
-concerning her rests on inference, and the conclusion at which we arrive
-upon the evidence must largely depend on the attitude of mind in which we
-approach the subject.
-
-The late Professor Robertson Smith has insisted that myths are latter-day
-inventions which profess to explain surviving peculiarities of ritual. If
-this be so, we hold in the Eleusinia a clue to the incidents of the Agatha
-legend. The story for example of her veil, which remained untouched by the
-flames when she was burnt, may be a popular myth which tries to account
-for the presence of the veil at the festival. The incident of the breasts
-torn off during martyrdom was invented to account for the presence of
-these strange symbols.
-
-Instances of this kind could be indefinitely multiplied. Let the reader,
-who wishes to pursue the subject on classic soil, examine the name, the
-legend and the emblem of St Agnes, virgin martyr of Rome, who is reputed
-to have lived in the third century and whose cult is well established in
-the fourth; let him enquire into the name, legend and associations of St
-Rosalia of Palermo, invoked as a protectress from the plague, of whom no
-mention occurs till four centuries after her reputed existence[36].
-
-I have chosen Agatha as a starting point for the present enquiry, because
-there is much evidence to hand of the prevalence of mother-deities in
-pre-Christian Sicily, and because the examination of German saint-legend
-and saint-worship leads to analogous results. In Germany too the mother
-divinity of heathendom seems to survive in the virgin saint; and in
-Germany virgin saints, in attributes, cult and name, exhibit peculiarities
-which it seems impossible to explain save on the hypothesis that
-traditions of the heathen past survive in them. So much is associated with
-them which is pre-Christian, even anti-Christian in character, that it
-seems legitimate to speak of them as pseudo-saints.
-
-I own it is not always possible to distinguish between the historical
-saint and the pseudo-saint. Sometimes data are wanting to disprove the
-statements made by the legend-writer about time and place; sometimes
-information is not forthcoming about local traditions and customs, which
-might make a suggestive trait in saint-legend stand out in its full
-meaning. In some cases also, owing to a coincidence of name, fictitious
-associations have become attached to a real personage. But these cases I
-believe are comparatively few. As a general rule it holds good that a
-historical saint will be readily associated with miraculous powers, but
-not with profane and anti-Christian usages. Where the latter occur it is
-probable that no evidence will be forthcoming of the saint's actual
-existence during Christian times. If she represents a person who ever
-existed at all, such a person must have lived in a far-distant heathen
-past, at a time which had nothing in common with Christian teaching and
-with Christian tenets.
-
-There is this further peculiarity about the woman pseudo-saint of Germany,
-that she is especially the saint of the peasantry; so that we rarely hear
-more of her than perhaps her name till centuries after her reputed
-existence. Early writers of history and biography have failed to chronicle
-her doings. Indeed we do not hear of her at all till we hear of her cult
-as one of long standing or of great importance.
-
-It is only when the worship of such saints, who in the eyes of the common
-folk are the chief glory of their respective districts, attracts the
-attention of the Church, that the legend-writer sets to work to write
-their legends. He begins by ascribing to the holder of a venerated name
-human parentage and human experiences, he collects and he blends the local
-traditions associated with the saint on a would-be historical background,
-and makes a story which frequently offers a curious mixture of the
-Christian and the profane. Usually he places the saint's existence in the
-earliest period of Christianity; sometimes at a time when Christianity was
-unknown in the neighbourhood where she is the object of reverence.
-
-Moreover all these saints are patronesses of women in their times of
-special trial. Their cult generally centres round a cave, a fountain of
-peculiar power, a tree, or some other site of primitive woman-worship.
-Frequently they are connected with some peculiar local custom which
-supplies the clue to incidents introduced by the legend-writer. And even
-when the clue is wanting, it is sometimes possible to understand one
-legend by reading it in the light of another. Obscure as the parallels are
-in some cases, in others they are strikingly clear.
-
-The recognised holiness of the woman pseudo-saint is in no way determined
-by the limit of bishopric and diocese; she is worshipped within
-geographical limits, but within limits which have not been marked out by
-the Church. It was mentioned above that separate districts of Germany, or
-rather tribes occupying such districts, clung to a belief in protective
-mother-goddesses (Gaumuetter). Possibly, where the name of a pseudo-saint
-is found localised in contiguous districts, this may afford a clue to the
-migration of tribes.
-
-The _Acta Sanctorum_ give information concerning a large number of
-pseudo-saints, but this information to be read in its true light needs to
-be supplemented by further details of local veneration and cult. Such
-details are found in older books of devotion, and in modern books on
-mythology and folk-lore. Modern religious writers, who treat of these
-saints, are in the habit of leaving out or of slurring over all details
-which suggest profanity. Compared with older legends, modern accounts of
-the saints are limp and colourless, and share the weak sentimentality,
-which during the last few centuries has come to pervade the conceptions
-of Catholic Christianity as represented in pictorial art.
-
-The names of a number of women whom the people hold in veneration have
-escaped the attention of the compilers of the _Acta Sanctorum_, or else
-they have been purposely passed over because their possessors were held
-unworthy of the rank of saint. But the stories locally told of them are
-worth attention, and the more so because they throw an additional light on
-the stories of recognised saints.
-
-The larger number of recognised pseudo-saints are found in the districts
-into which Christianity spread as a religion of peace, or in remoter
-districts where the power of the Church was less immediately felt. They
-are found most often north of the Danube and east of the Rhine, especially
-in the lake districts of Bavaria and Switzerland, in the marshy wilds of
-the Low Countries, and in the remote forest regions of the Ardennes, the
-Black Forest, the Spessart or the Vosges. Where Christianity was
-established as the result of political subjection, as for example among
-the Saxons, the woman pseudo-saint is hardly found at all. Perhaps the
-heathenism of the Saxons differed from the heathenism of other German
-folk; perhaps, like the Anglo-Saxons in England, the Saxons were
-conquerors of the land they inhabited and by moving out of their old homes
-had lost their local associations and their primitive cult. But, however
-this may be, it is not where Christianity advanced at the point of the
-lance, but in the districts where its spread was due to detached efforts
-of missionaries, that the woman pseudo-saint is most frequently met with.
-
-Wandering away into forest wilds, where scattered clearings lay like
-islets in an ocean, the missionary sought a retreat remote from the
-interference of government, remote also from the interference of the
-episcopate, where he could realise his hope of living a worthier life.
-Naturally his success largely depended on his securing the goodwill of the
-people in whose neighbourhood he settled. He was obliged to adapt himself
-to their mode of thought if he would win favour for his faith, and to
-realise their views if he wished to modify them in the direction of his
-own. To bridge over the abyss which separated his standard of life from
-theirs, he was bound to defer whenever he could to their sentiments and to
-their conceptions of holiness.
-
-How far these holy men ignored, how far they countenanced, the worship of
-local divinities, necessarily remains an open question. Rightly or
-wrongly popular tradition readily coupled the names of these early
-Christians with those of its favourite women-saints.
-
-Thus Willibrord, the Anglo-Saxon missionary who settled abroad in the
-eighth century, is said to have taken up and translated relics of the
-woman-saint Cunera and to have recognised her claim to veneration; her
-cult is localised in various places near Utrecht. The life of Willibrord
-([Dagger] 739), written by Alcuin ([Dagger] 804), contains no mention of
-Cunera, for the information we have concerning Willibrord's interest in
-her is to be found in the account of her life written centuries later[37].
-This account offers such a picturesque medley of chronological
-impossibilities that the commentators of the _Acta Sanctorum_ have
-entirely recast it.
-
-The gist of the legend as told in the beginning of the 14th century is as
-follows[38]. Cunera was among the virgin companions of St Ursula, and the
-date of her murder, near Coeln, is given as 387, or as 449. Before the
-murder Cunera was borne away from Coeln by King Radbod of Friesland, who
-covered her with his cloak, an ancient symbolic form of appropriation.
-Arrived at Renen he entrusted her with the keys of his kingdom, which
-incensed his wedded wife to such an extent that she caused Cunera to be
-strangled and the body hidden away. But the site where the saint lay was
-miraculously pointed out, and the wicked queen went mad and destroyed
-herself. In vain we ask why a king of the Frisians, who persistently clung
-to their heathendom, should be interested in a Christian virgin and carry
-her off to preside over his household, and in vain we look for the
-assertion or for the proof that Cunera was a Christian at all. The _Acta
-Sanctorum_ reject the connection between Cunera and St Ursula of Coeln, but
-the writer Kist, who considers her to have been a real Christian
-individual, argues in favour of it. In the 12th century we find a certain
-Adelheid swearing to the rightfulness of her cause on the relics of St
-Cunera at Renen[39].
-
-Similarly the story goes that Agilfrid, abbot of the monastery of St Bavon
-in Flanders, afterwards bishop of Liege (765-787), about the year 754
-acquired the relics of the woman-saint Pharaildis and brought them to
-Ghent[40]. When the Northmen ravaged Flanders in 846 the bones of
-Pharaildis were among those carried away to St Omer by the Christians as
-their most valued possession, and in 939 they were brought back to
-Ghent[41].
-
-The legend of Pharaildis gives no clue to the Christian interest in her,
-nor to the veneration of her, which is localised at Ghent, Hamm,
-Steenockerzeel, and Loo. We hear that she was married against her
-inclination, that she cured her husband who was a huntsman of a wound, and
-that after his death she dwelt in solitude to an advanced age, and that
-occasionally she wrought miracles. Further, in popular belief, she crossed
-the water dryshod, she chased away geese from the corn, and she struck the
-ground and the holy fountain at Bruay welled up for the benefit of the
-harvesters--incidents which are not peculiar to her legend. The festival
-of Pharaildis is kept on different dates at Ghent, Cambray, Maastricht and
-Breda. At Ghent it is associated with a celebrated fair, the occasion for
-great rejoicings among the populace. At the church of Steenockerzeel
-stones of conical shape are kept which are carried round the altar on her
-festival[42], in the same way as stones are kept elsewhere and considered
-by some writers to be symbols of an ancient phallic cult. The legend
-explains the presence of these stones by telling how the saint one day was
-surreptitiously giving loaves to the poor, when her act would have been
-discovered but that by intercession the loaves were transformed into
-stones. This incident, the transformation of gifts secretly given to the
-poor, is introduced into the legends of other women-saints, but only in
-this case have I found it mentioned that the transformed food was
-preserved. We shall have occasion to return to Pharaildis, whose legend
-and cult offer nothing to support the view that she was an early
-Christian.
-
-There are numerous instances of a like connection between holy missionary
-and woman pseudo-saint. A fair example is yielded by Leodgar (St Leger)
-bishop of Autun ([Dagger] 678), a well-defined historical personality[43],
-whom tradition makes into a near relative of Odilia, a saint widely
-venerated, but whose reputed foundation of the monastery on the Hohenburg
-modern criticism utterly discards[44].
-
-But it is not only Christian missionaries who are associated with these
-women-saints. Quite a number of saints have been brought into connection
-with the house of the Karlings, and frequently Karl the Great himself
-figures in the stories told of them. I do not presume to decide whether
-the legendary accounts of these women are pure invention; some historic
-truth may be embodied in the stories told of them. But judging by the
-material at hand we are justified in disputing the existence of St Ida,
-who is said to have been the wife of Pippin of Landen and ancestress of
-the Karlings on the sole authority of the life of St Gertrud, her
-daughter. This work was long held to be contemporary, but its earliest
-date is now admitted to be the 11th century[45]. It is less easy to cast
-discredit on the existence of the saints Amalberga, the one a virgin
-saint, the other a widow, whom hagiologists find great difficulty in
-distinguishing. Pharaildis, mentioned above, and the saints Ermelindis,
-Reinildis and Gudila, are said to be Amalberga's daughters, but together
-with other saints of Hainault and Brabant they are very obviously
-pseudo-saints. The idea of bringing Karl the Great into some relation with
-them may have arisen from a twofold desire to justify traditions
-concerning them and to magnify the Emperor's importance.
-
-In this connection it seems worth while to quote the passage in which
-Grimm[46] describes the characteristic traits of the German goddess in his
-German Mythology, and to consider how these traits are more or less
-pronounced in the women we have called pseudo-saints.
-
-'It seems well,' he says, in the opening of his chapter on goddesses, 'to
-treat of goddesses collectively as well as individually, since a common
-conception underlies them all, which will thus stand out the more clearly.
-They are conceived essentially as divine mothers, _travelling about_ and
-_visiting mortals_, from whom mankind learn the ways and arts of
-housekeeping and tilth: _spinning_, _weaving_, _guarding the hearth_,
-_sowing_ and _reaping_' (the italics are his).
-
-The tendency of the goddess to wander from place to place is reflected in
-many women pseudo-saints who are represented in their legends as
-inhabiting at various periods of their lives different parts of the
-district in which they are the object of veneration. Verena of northern
-Switzerland dwelt first at Solothurn, where a cave, which was her
-dwelling-place, is now transformed into a chapel. Later she took boat to
-the place where the Aar, Reuss and Limmat meet, where she dwelt in
-solitude, and her memory is preserved at a spot called the cell of Verena
-(Verenazell). Later still she went to dwell at Zurzach, a place which was
-celebrated for a fair, called Verena's fair, of which more anon. All these
-places are on or near the river Aar, at no inconsiderable distance from
-each other. The legend, as told by Stadler, takes them all into account,
-explaining how Verena came to be connected with each[47].
-
-Similarly the legend of the saint Odilia[48], referred to above in
-connection with the Hohenburg, explains how the saint comes to be
-worshipped on both sides of the Rhine, a cruel father having driven her
-away from home. On the eastern side of the river there is a hill of St
-Odilia, Odilienberg, where there is a fountain which for its healing
-powers is visited twice a year and the site of which is guarded by a
-hermit. At Scherweiler there is also a site hallowed to her worship, and
-local tradition explains that she stayed there as a child; according to
-another version she was discovered floating in a wooden chest on the
-water[49]. Finally she is said to have settled on the Hohenburg west of
-the Rhine and to have founded a monastery. The critic Roth has written an
-admirable article on Odilia and the monastery of Hohenburg. He shows that
-the monastery was ancient and that at first it was dedicated to Christ and
-St Peter, though afterwards their names were supplanted by that of St
-Odilia[50]. Here, as on the other side of the Rhine, the folk celebrate
-her festival by pilgrimages to a fountain which has miraculous healing
-power, and by giving reverence to a sacred stone, on which Odilia is said
-to have knelt so long in prayer for the soul of her wicked father, that
-her knees wore holes in it[51].
-
-We hear that other saints travelled about and stayed now at one place, now
-at another. St Notburg visited different parts of the Neckar district[52],
-Godeleva of Ghistelles[53] passed some time of her life in the marshy
-district between Ostend and Bruges. This Godeleva is addressed in her
-litany as the saint of marriage; she was buried, we are told, in a cave,
-which was held holy as late as the present century. The pond, into which
-she was thrown after death, for which act no reason is given, obtained,
-and still retains, miraculous healing powers[54]. Her legend in other
-respects offers the usual traits. She is Godeleva in some parts of the
-country; in others she is Godeleina, and her life according to Potthast
-was written in the 11th century by Drago, a monk of Ghistelles.
-
-It is a curious trait in German saint-legend that the saint is often
-spoken of as coming from afar--from across the sea, from Britain, from
-Ireland, even from the Orkney Isles. It is thus with Ursula of Coeln,
-Christiane of Dendermonde (Termonde), Lucie of Sampigny and many others.
-The idea had taken root at a very early date that St Walburg, whose cult
-is widespread, was identical with a sister of the missionaries, Wilibald
-and Wunebald, who went from England to Germany under the auspices of the
-prelate Boniface in the eighth century. We shall return to her further
-on[55]. It is sufficient here to point out that there is little likeness
-between the sober-minded women-missionaries of Boniface's circle and the
-woman-saint who is localised under such different aspects, sometimes as a
-saint whose bones exude oil of miraculous power, sometimes as a valkyrie
-who anoints warriors for battle, sometimes as a witch who on the first of
-May leads forth her train to nightly riot on hill tops[56].
-
-Again the love of home industry, which Grimm claims for mother goddesses,
-is reflected in the legends of many saints, to whose real existence every
-clue is wanting. This holds good especially of spinning and of weaving.
-Lufthildis, whose date and whose very name are uncertain, is represented
-as dwelling on a hill-top near a village and marking the limits of her
-district by means of her spindle, which is preserved and can be seen to
-this day in the chapel of Luftelberg, the hill which is connected with
-her[57]. Lucie of Sampigny, to whose shrine women who are sterile make a
-pilgrimage in order to sit on the stone consecrated to her[58]; Walburg,
-referred to above; Germana, whose cult appears at Bar-sur-Aube[59]; and
-one of the numerous localised saints Gertrud[60], are all connected with
-the distaff. In the church of Frauenkirchen, which stands near the site of
-the celebrated old abbey of Lach, St Genovefa of Brabant, whose legend is
-most picturesque and who is in some degree akin to Genevieve of Paris, is
-believed to be sitting behind the altar from which the buzz of her
-spinning-wheel is audible[61].
-
-Again the protective interest in silk and agriculture, which Grimm claims
-for the German goddess, comes out in connection with the pseudo-saint. The
-harvest festival, so often associated with the Virgin Mary, is frequently
-also associated with the name of a pseudo-saint. Thus we find these saints
-represented with ears of corn, as Mary too has been represented[62]. The
-emblem of the three ears of corn was probably accepted owing to Roman
-influence. Verena of Zurzach, Notburg of Rottenburg, and Walburg, are all
-pictured holding a bunch of corn in one hand. Through the intercession of
-Walburg full barns are secured, while Notburg or Nuppurg of Rottenburg,
-one of the chief saints of Bavaria, to whose shrine many pilgrimages are
-made, holds a reaping hook as well as a bunch of corn, and throughout the
-Tyrol is looked upon as patron saint of the peasantry[63].
-
-At Meerbeck in Brabant corn is blessed before it is sown under the
-auspices of the saint Berlindis, who protects tree planting. She is a
-saint of many associations and we shall hear more of her later[64]. In
-some parts of Brabant seed sown at the time of the new moon in the month
-of June is protected by the saint Alena. We know little of Alena except
-that her arm was torn off in expiation of an unknown trespass and is kept
-as a relic in the church of Voorst, and that the archduchess Maria Anna of
-Spain sent for this relic in 1685 in the hope of securing a son by means
-of the saint's intercession[65]. To the shrine of Lufthildis corn is also
-brought as an offering to be distributed among the poor, while St Gertrud
-in Belgium protects bean and pea sowing[66].
-
-Further traits in saint worship, which suggest woman's connection with the
-beginnings of settled civilization, are found in the pseudo-saint's
-frequent association with cattle and dairy produce.
-
-Peasants, men and women, may be seen to this day touching in reverence the
-udder of the cow which a rudely cut relief in wood represents by the side
-of the saint Berlindis at Meerbeck[67]. Gunthild, the patron saint of
-Biberbach in Wuertemburg[68], is represented holding in her hand a
-milk-jug, the contents of which were inexhaustible during her lifetime.
-The connection of saints with butter-making is frequent. St Radiane,
-otherwise called Radegund, is chiefly worshipped at Wellenburg near
-Augsburg, and her intercession secures milk and butter in plenty to her
-worshippers. She was torn in pieces by wolves[69].
-
-Judging by her cult and her legends the pseudo-saint practises and
-protects in endless ways the early arts of settled agriculture and
-civilization. She herds cattle, she guards flocks of sheep, she weaves and
-she spins, and she is careful of the dairy. In her representations she is
-associated with 'emblems' which point to these various interests, and we
-find her holding corn, a reaping-hook, or a spindle. Domestic animals are
-pictured by her side, most frequently sheep, geese, cows and dogs. The cat
-appears rarely[70], perhaps because it was associated with the evil side
-of woman's power. The besom too, the ancient symbol of woman's authority,
-is rarely, if ever[71], put into the saint's hands, perhaps for a similar
-reason.
-
-One other peculiarity remains to be mentioned, which also has its
-counterpart in the witches' medicinal and curative power. The
-pseudo-saint's relics (after death) exude oil which is used for medicinal
-purposes. This peculiarity is noticed of the bones of the saints
-Walburg[72], Rolendis[73], and Edigna[74], but it is also noticed in
-connection with the relics of historical saints.
-
-But over and above these traits in the character of the pseudo-saint,
-legend often points to a heathen custom in connection with her of which
-we have definite information. Tacitus tells how the image of the German
-goddess Nerthus was carried about on festive occasions in a chariot drawn
-by cows. The pseudo-saint either during her lifetime or after her death
-was often similarly conveyed. Sometimes the animals put themselves to her
-chariot of their own accord, frequently they stopped of their own accord
-at the particular spot which the saint wished to be her last
-resting-place. Legend tells us of such incidents in connection also with
-historical saints, both men and women, and we hear further that the relics
-of saints sometimes and quite suddenly became so heavy that it was
-impossible to move them, a sure sign that it was safest not to try.
-
-So far the parallels between mother-goddess and woman pseudo-saint recall
-the practices of the heathen past, without actually offending against the
-tenor of Christianity. But the pseudo-saint has other associations of
-which this cannot be said, associations which are utterly perplexing,
-unless we go back for their explanation to the ancient tribal usages when
-the meeting of the tribe was the occasion for settling matters social and
-sexual. These associations introduce us to an aspect of the cult of the
-saints which brings primitive usages into an even clearer light, and shows
-how religious associations continued independently of a change of
-religion.
-
-
-Sec. 3. Further Peculiarities of this Type of Saint.
-
-The Church, as mentioned above, had put every facility in the way of
-transforming heathen festivals into its own festal days. The heathen
-festival in many ways carried on the traditions of the tribal festival;
-the tribal festival was connected with the cult of tribal goddesses. If we
-bear in mind the many points mother-goddess, witch, and woman pseudo-saint
-have in common, the association of the pseudo-saint with practices of a
-profane character no longer appears wonderful. Both in the turn saint
-legend takes, and in the character of festivities associated with the
-saint's name, we discern the survival of ideas which properly belong to
-differently constituted family and social arrangements, the true meaning
-of which is all but lost.
-
-On looking through the legends of many women-saints, it is surprising how
-often we find evil practices and heathen traditions associated with them,
-practices and traditions which the legend writer naturally is often at a
-loss to explain in a manner acceptable to Christianity. Thus the father
-of St Christiane of Dendermonde is said to have set up a temple where
-girls did service to Venus[75]; doing service to Venus being the usual way
-of describing licentious pursuits.
-
-In the metrical life of Bilihild, patron saint of Wuerzburg and Mainz, a
-description is introduced of the marriage festival as it was celebrated by
-the Franks in the Main district about the year 600, as this account would
-have it. Dances took place and unions were contracted for the commencing
-year. The Christian woman Bilihild was present at the festival, though we
-are of course told that she found it little to her taste and determined to
-abolish it[76]. The legend of Bilihild has very primitive traits and is
-wanting in historical foundation and probability; and it is at least
-curious that her name should be coupled with a festival which Christian
-religion and morality must have condemned.
-
-Again it is curious to find how often these women-saints die a violent
-death, not for conscience sake, nor indeed for any obvious reason at all.
-Radiane of Wellenburg, as mentioned above, was torn to pieces by
-wolves[77]; Wolfsindis of Reisbach, according to one account, was tied to
-wild oxen who tore her to pieces, according to another version of her
-story she was tied to a horse's tail[78]. St Regina of Alise, in the
-bishopric of Autun, is sometimes represented surrounded by flames,
-sometimes in a steaming caldron[79] which recalls the caldron of
-regeneration of Keltic mythology.
-
-Frequently the saints are said to have been murdered like Cunera of
-Renen[80], and St Sura otherwise Soteris or Zuwarda of Dordrecht[81];
-sometimes their heads are cut off as in the case of Germana worshipped at
-Beaufort in Champagne[82]; sometimes like Godeleva they are strangled, and
-sometimes burnt; but Christianity is not the reason assigned for their
-painful deaths. For even the legend writer does not go so far as to bring
-in martyrdom at a period and in districts where suffering for the
-Christian faith is altogether out of the question.
-
-Panzer tells us about a group of three women-saints, to whom we shall
-presently return. He says in some churches masses are read for their souls
-and prayers offered for their salvation. Though reverenced by the people
-in many districts of Germany, they are as often said to have been hostile
-to Christianity as favourably disposed towards it[83].
-
-We find immoral practices and violence ascribed to some of the English
-women-saints by Capgrave in the 15th century. He says of Inthware or
-Iuthware, who perhaps belongs to Brittany, that she was accused of being a
-harlot and put to death. Similarly he says of Osman or Oswen that she was
-accused of being a witch, but when brought before a bishop she consented
-to be baptized[84]. Stanton notifies of Iuthware that her translation was
-celebrated at Shirbourne[85]. Winifred too, who is worshipped in
-Shropshire, had her head cut off and it rolled right down the hill to a
-spot where a fountain sprang up, near St Winifred's well. The head however
-was miraculously replaced, Winifred revived and lived to the end of her
-days as a nun[86]. The want of information about these women makes it
-impossible to judge how far their existence is purely legendary; certainly
-their stories are largely coloured by heathen traditions. The names
-Iuthware and Oswen are probably not Germanic; and the fact of Winifred's
-living on the confines of Wales makes it probable that she is a Keltic
-rather than a Germanic saint.
-
-In connection with the festivals of some women pseudo-saints we find
-celebrations of a decidedly uproarious character taking place at a
-comparatively recent time. The feast of St Pharaildis, called locally Fru
-Verelde, used to be the chief holiday at Ghent, and was the occasion for
-much festivity and merrymaking[87]. At Luettich (Liege) stood a chapel
-dedicated to St Balbine, who is said to have been venerated far and wide
-in the 14th century. On her day, the first of May, there was a festival
-called Babilone at which dancing was kept up till late at night[88]. The
-festival of St Godeleva kept at Longuefort maintained even in the 18th
-century a character which led to a violent dispute between the populace
-and the Church dignitaries, who were determined to put it down[89].
-Coincident with the festival known as the day of St Berlindis, a saint
-frequently referred to as a protectress of the peasantry, there is a
-festival called the Drunken Vespers, in which as early as the 16th century
-the archbishop forbade his clergy to take part[90].
-
-But by far the most striking and the most conclusive instances of the
-pseudo-saint's association with heathen survivals are afforded by St
-Verena of Switzerland and St Afra of Augsburg, whose worship and history
-we must examine more closely.
-
-Verena's association with various rites has already been referred to; she
-is represented sometimes with ears of corn, sometimes accompanied by a
-cat, and sometimes, which is even more suggestive, she is brought into
-connection with a brothel. The procession of St Verena's day from Zurzach
-to a chapel dedicated to St Maurice passed an old linden tree which, so
-the legend goes, marked the spot where the saint used to dwell. Hard by
-was a house for lepers and a house of ill fame, where on the same day the
-district bailiff (landvogt) opened the fair. He was obliged by old custom
-to pass this tree, at which a loose woman stood awaiting him, and to dance
-round the tree with her and give her money[91].
-
-The legend of St Verena written between 1005 and 1032[92] does not explain
-these associations. We are told of a woman who came from the east with the
-Theban legion, which is generally supposed to have been massacred in 287.
-She is said to have made her home now in one district now in another, and
-one modern writer goes so far as to suggest that she was zealous in
-converting the Allemans to Christianity before the coming of Irish
-missionaries.
-
-According to folk-custom in districts between the Aar and the Rhine, girls
-who have secured husbands sacrifice their little maiden caps to Verena. At
-Zurzach married couples make pilgrimages to the Verenastift in order to
-secure offspring. Several dukes of the Allemans and their wives made such
-pilgrimages in the 9th and 10th centuries. It would lead too far to
-enumerate the many directions in which Verena is associated with
-heathendom. Her day, which comes at the harvest festival, was a time of
-unrestrained license in Zurzach, a fact on which the _Acta Sanctorum_
-cast no doubt.
-
-Rochholz considers Verena to be a tribal mother of heathendom; Simrock in
-his mythology considers her to be identical with the goddess Fru Frene, in
-whom he sees a kind of German Venus[93]. Grimm tells how the version of
-the Tannhaeuser saga, current in Switzerland, substitutes the name Frau
-Frene for that of Frau Venus[94]. The hero Tannhaeuser, according to
-mediaeval legend, wavers between a baser and a higher interpretation of
-love; the acceptance of the name Frene as representative of sensuousness
-shows the associations currently preserved in connection with this
-so-called saint.
-
-A similar association occurs in Belgium, where a saint Vreken (_Sint
-Vreke_), otherwise Vrouw Vreke, in mediaeval legend is the representative
-of sensual as opposed to spiritual love. Coremans describes how in the
-version of the saga of the faithful Eckhardt (_Van het trouwen Eckhout_)
-current in Belgium, the hero wavers between spiritual love of Our Lady and
-sensual love of Vreke. Among the folk Vrouw Vreke is a powerful personage,
-for the story goes that the Kabauters, evil spirits who dwell on the
-Kabauterberg, are in her service. In the book _Reta de Limbourg_, which
-was re-written in the 17th century, the Kabauterberg becomes a Venusberg,
-and Vreke is no longer a great witch (_eene grote heks_) but a goddess
-with all the alluring charms of Venus[95]. Grimm includes a Fru Freke
-among his German goddesses[96]. She retains her old importance among the
-folk as a protective saint and presides over tree-planting[97].
-
-Like the saints Verena and Vreke, St Afra of Augsburg is associated with
-licentiousness; Wessely expressly calls her the patron saint of
-hetairism[98]. Her legend explains the connection in a peculiar manner; as
-told by Berno, abbot of Reichenau ([Dagger] 1048), it is most picturesque.
-We hear how Afra and her mother came from Cyprus, an island which
-mediaeval, following the classical writers, associated with the cult of
-Venus, and how she settled at Augsburg and kept a house of ill fame with
-three companions. Here they entertained certain Church dignitaries
-(otherwise unknown to history) who persuaded the women to embrace
-Christianity and give up their evil practices. They became virtuous, and
-when persecutions against Christians were instituted they all suffered
-martyrdom; Afra was placed on a small island and burnt at the stake[99].
-The legend writer on the basis of the previous statement places the
-existence of these women in the early part of the fourth century during
-the reign of Diocletian. Curiously enough the legend of Afra is led up to
-by a description of the worship of the heathen goddess Zisa, a description
-to which Grimm attaches great importance[100]. This goddess was worshipped
-at or near Augsburg. Velserus[101], who in the 16th century compiled a
-chronicle of Augsburg, gives us a mass of information about traditions
-connected with her and her worship, as he also does about St Afra. There
-is in his mind of course no shadow of a suspicion of any connection
-between them. But he informs us that the Zizenberg, or hill of Zisa, and
-the Affenwald which he interprets as Afrawald or wood of Afra, are one and
-the same place.
-
-Berno also wrote a life of Ulrich (St Udalricus), bishop of Augsburg
-([Dagger] 973), who boldly defended the town at the time of the invasion
-of the Hungarians. In this life the bishop has a miraculous vision of St
-Afra, who takes him on a pilgrimage by night and points out the site where
-he afterwards founded a monastery, known to later ages as the monastery of
-St Ulrich and St Afra. The worship of Afra is referred to by the poet
-Fortunatus as early as the sixth century; the story of the saint's
-martyrdom is older than that of her conversion. The historian Rettberg is
-puzzled why so much stress should be laid on her evil ways[102]; but the
-historian Friedrich, regardless of perplexing associations, sees the
-beginnings of convent life for women in Augsburg in the fact of Afra and
-her companions dwelling together between their conversion and
-martyrdom[103].
-
-There are other traits in saint legend which point to the customs and
-arrangements of a more primitive period, and tempt the student to fit
-together pieces of the past and the present which appear meaningless if
-taken separately.
-
-It seems probable that in early times the term mother was applied to a
-number of women of a definite group by all the children of the group, and
-that the word had not the specialized meaning of one who had actually
-borne the children who termed her mother.
-
-The story of a number of children all being born at once by one woman is
-possibly due to a confused tradition dating from this period. In local
-saga, both in Germany and elsewhere, there are stories in which a woman
-suddenly finds herself in the possession of a number of offspring, and
-often with direful consequences to herself, because of the anger of her
-husband. The same incident has found its way into saint legend. Thus
-Notburg, patron saint of Sulz, had at a birth a number of children,
-variously quoted as nine, twelve and thirty-six. Stadler says that she is
-represented at Sulz holding eight children in her arms, a ninth one lying
-dead at her feet[104]. Lacking water to christen these children, she
-produced from the hard rock a fountain which even to the present day is
-believed to retain the power to cure disease.
-
-A similar story is told of Achachildis, popularly known as Atzin, who is
-held in veneration at Wendelstein near Schwabach. She bore her husband
-five children at once and then took a vow of continence. Her legend has
-never been written, but she enjoys a great reputation for holiness, and a
-series of pictures represent various incidents in her life[105].
-
-Images of women sheltering children, usually beneath their cloaks, are
-frequently found abroad built into the outer wall of the church, the place
-where Christian teachers felt justified in placing heathen images[106].
-Students of pictorial art will here recall the image of St Ursula at Coeln
-sheltering 11,000 virgins under her cloak.
-
-Again there are other emblems in saint worship which cannot be easily
-accounted for, such for instance as the holy combs of Verena and
-Pharaildis, which remind one of the comb with which the witch Lorelei sat
-combing her hair, or, on classic soil, of the comb of the Venus Calvata;
-or the holy slippers of St Radiane, which are preserved to this day in
-the church of Wellenburg and which, as Stadler informs us, had been
-re-soled within his time[107]. Slippers and shoes are ancient symbols of
-appropriation, and as such figure in folk-lore and at weddings in many
-countries to this day. The golden slipper was likewise a feature at the
-witches' festival, in which the youthful fiddler also figured[108]. Both
-the golden slipper and the youthful fiddler form important features in the
-legend of the saint Ontkommer or Wilgefortis. The images and legend of
-this saint are so peculiar that they claim a detailed account.
-
-It is evident from what has been said that the legends and cult of many
-women pseudo-saints have traits in common; indeed the acts ascribed to
-different saints are often exactly similar. The stories of Notburg of
-Rottenburg, of Radiane of Wellenburg, and of Gunthild of Biberbach, as
-Stadler remarks, are precisely alike; yet it is never suggested that these
-saints should be treated as one; each of them has her place in the _Acta
-Sanctorum_ and is looked upon as distinct from the others.
-
-There is, however, a set of women-saints whose images and legends have
-features so distinctive that hagiologists treat of them collectively as
-one, though they are held in veneration in districts widely remote from
-each other, and under very dissimilar names.
-
-The saint, who is venerated in the Low Countries as Ontkommer or
-Wilgefortis, is usually considered identical with the saint Kuemmerniss of
-Bavaria and the Tyrol; with the saint Livrade, Liberata or Liberatrix
-venerated in some districts of France as early as the 9th century when
-Usuard, writing in the monastery of St Germain-des-Pres, mentions her;
-with Gehulff of Mainz; with Hilp of the Huelfensberg at Eichsfelde; and
-with others called variously Regenfled, Regenfrith, Eutropia, etc.[109]
-The name Mariahilf, which is very common in south Germany, is probably a
-combination of the name of the Virgin Mother with that of St Hilp or St
-Gehulff.
-
-The legends of this saint, or rather of this assembly of saints, are
-characterized by Cuper in the _Acta Sanctorum_ as an endless
-labyrinth[110]. Whatever origin be ascribed to them, when once we examine
-them closely we find explanation impossible on the hypothesis that they
-relate to a single Christian woman living during Christian times.
-
-A considerable amount of information on this group of saints has lately
-been collected by Sloet, who deals also with their iconography[111]. The
-peculiarity of the images of Ontkommer or Kuemmerniss consists in this,
-that she is represented as crucified, and that the lower part of her face
-is covered by a beard, and her body in some instances by long shaggy fur.
-Her legend explains the presence of the beard and fur by telling us that
-it grew to protect the maiden from the persecutions of a lover or the
-incestuous love of her father; such love is frequently mentioned in the
-legends of women pseudo-saints.
-
-The fact that Ontkommer or Kuemmerniss is represented as crucified might be
-explained on the hypothesis that the common folk could not at first grasp
-the idea of a god and looked upon Christ as a woman, inventing the legend
-of the woman's persecution and miraculous protection in order to account
-for the presence of the beard. But other accessories of the
-representations of Ontkommer or Kuemmerniss lead us to suppose that her
-martyrdom, like that of other saints, has a different origin and that she
-is heiress to a tribal goddess of the past[112].
-
-In many of her representations Ontkommer or Kuemmerniss is seen hanging on
-the cross with only one golden slipper on, but sometimes she wears two
-slippers, and a young man is sitting below the cross playing the fiddle.
-Legend accounts for the presence of this young man in the following
-manner. He came and sat at the foot of the image and was playing on his
-fiddle, when the crucified saint suddenly awoke to life, drew off a
-slipper and flung it to him. He took it away with him, but he was accused
-of having stolen it and condemned to death. His accusers however agreed to
-his request to come with him into the presence of the holy image, to which
-he appealed. Again the crucified saint awoke to life and drew off her
-second slipper and flung it to the fiddler, whose innocence was thereby
-vindicated and he was set free. Where shall we go for a clue to this
-curious and complicated legend? Grimm tells us that a young fiddler was
-present at a festival of the witches, and that he played at the dance in
-which he was not allowed to take part. Grimm also tells us that one of the
-witches on this occasion wore only one golden slipper[113]. The
-association of Kuemmerniss with a golden slipper is deep-rooted, especially
-in Bavaria, for the saying goes there that 'She with the golden slipper
-and with the youthful fiddler is also a mother of God[114].'
-
-Many years ago Menzel wrote[115]: 'Much I believe concerning this saint is
-derived from heathen conceptions.' Stories embodying heathen traditions
-are preserved in connection with this saint in districts abroad that lie
-far apart.
-
-Thus the image of her which is preserved in North Holland is said to have
-come floating down the river, like the images of the Virgin referred to
-above. At Regensburg in Bavaria an image is preserved which is said to
-have been cast into the water at Neufarn. It was carried down by the river
-and thrown on the bank, and the bishop fetched it to Regensburg on a car
-drawn by oxen. In the Tyrol the image of the saint is sometimes hung in
-the chief bed-room of the house in order to secure a fruitful marriage,
-but often too it is hung in chapel and cloister in order to protect the
-dead. Images of the saint are preserved and venerated in a great number of
-churches in Bavaria and the Tyrol, but the ideas popularly associated with
-them have raised feelings in the Church against their cult. We hear that a
-Franciscan friar in the beginning of this century destroyed one of the
-images, and that the bishop of Augsburg in 1833 attempted in one instance
-to do away with the image and the veneration of the saint, but refrained
-from carrying out his intention, being afraid of the anger of the
-people[116].
-
-It has been mentioned above that associations of a twofold character
-survive in connection with Verena and Vreke, who are to this day popularly
-reckoned as saints, but who are introduced in mediaeval romance as
-representatives of earthly love as contrasted with spiritual. Associations
-of a twofold character have also been attached to the term Kuemmerniss. For
-in the Tyrol Kuemmerniss is venerated as a saint, but the word Kuemmerniss
-in ordinary parlance is applied to immoral women[117].
-
-Other heathen survivals are found attached to the Ontkommer-Kuemmerniss
-group of saints. At Luzern the festival of the saint was connected with so
-much riotous merrymaking and licentiousness that it was forbidden in 1799
-and again in 1801. The story is told of the saint under the name Liberata
-that she was one of a number of children whom her mother had at a
-birth[118].
-
-Sloet, on the authority of the philologist Kern, considers that the
-various names by which the saint is known in different districts are
-appellatives and have the same underlying meaning of one who is helpful in
-trouble. According to him this forms the connecting link between the names
-Ontkommer, Kuemmerniss, Wilgefortis, Gehulff, Eutropia, etc., of which the
-form Ontkommer, philologically speaking, most clearly connotes the saint's
-character, and on this ground is declared to be the original form. The
-saint is worshipped at Steenberg in Holland under the name Ontkommer, and
-Sloet is of opinion that Holland is the cradle of the worship of the whole
-group of saints[119]. But considering what we know of other women-saints
-it seems more probable that the saints who have been collected into this
-group are the outcome of a period of social evolution, which in various
-districts led to the establishment of tribal goddesses, who by a later
-development assumed the garb of Christian women-saints.
-
-The cult of women-saints under one more aspect remains to be chronicled.
-Numerous traditions are preserved concerning the cult of holy women in
-triads, who are locally held in great veneration and variously spoken of
-as three sisters, three ladies, three Marys, three nuns, or three
-women-saints.
-
-The three holy women have a parallel in the three Fates of classic
-mythology and in the three Norns of Norse saga, and like them they
-probably date from a heathen period. Throughout Germany they frequently
-appear in folk-lore and saga, besides being venerated in many instances as
-three women-saints of the Church.
-
-In stories now current these three women are conceived sometimes as
-sisters protecting the people, sometimes as ladies guarding treasures, and
-sometimes as a group of three nuns living together and founding chapels
-and oratories, and this too in places where history knows nothing of the
-existence of any religious settlement of women.
-
-Panzer has collected a mass of information on the cult of the triad as
-saints in southern Germany[120]; Coremans says that the veneration of the
-Three Sisters (_dry-susters_) is widespread in Belgium[121], but the
-Church has sanctioned this popular cult in comparatively few instances.
-
-The story is locally current that these three women were favourably
-disposed to the people and bequeathed to them what is now communal
-property. Simrock considers that this property included sites which were
-held sacred through association with a heathen cult[122]. 'In heathen
-times,' he says, 'a sacred grove was hallowed to the sister fates which
-after the establishment of Christianity continued to be the property of
-the commune. The remembrance of these helpful women who were the old
-benefactresses of the place remained, even their association with holiness
-continued.' By these means in course of time the cult of the three
-goddesses was transformed into that of Christian saints.
-
-Besides bequeathing their property to the people it was thought that these
-three women-saints protected their agricultural and domestic interests,
-especially as affecting women. In Schlehdorf in Lower Bavaria pilgrimages
-by night were made to the shrine of the triad to avert the cattle plague;
-the shrine stood on a hill which used to be surrounded by water, and at
-one time was the site of a celebrated fair and the place chosen for
-keeping the harvest festival[123]. At Brusthem in Belgium there were three
-wells into which women who sought the aid of these holy women cast three
-things, linen-thread, a needle and some corn[124]. Again in Schildturn in
-Upper Bavaria an image of the three women-saints is preserved in the
-church which bears an inscription to the effect that through the
-intercession of these saints offspring are secured and that they are
-helpful at childbirth[125]. In the same church a wooden cradle is kept
-which women who wished to become mothers used to set rocking. A second
-cradle which is plated is kept in the sacristy, and has been substituted
-for one of real silver[126].
-
-In some districts one of these three saints is credited with special power
-over the others either for good or for evil. The story goes that one of
-the sisters was coloured black or else black and white[127].
-
-In many places where the triad is worshipped the names of the individual
-sisters are lost, while in districts far apart from one another, as the
-Tyrol, Elsass, Bavaria, their names have considerable likeness. The forms
-generally accepted, but liable to fluctuation, are St Einbeth, St Warbeth
-and St Wilbeth[128]. The Church in some instances seems to have hesitated
-about accepting these names, it may be from the underlying meaning of the
-suffix _beth_ which Grimm interprets as holy site, _ara_, _fanum_, but
-Mannhardt connects it with the word to pray (beten)[129]. Certainly the
-heathen element is strong when we get traditions of the presence of these
-women at weddings and at burials, and stories of how they went to war,
-riding on horses, and achieved even more than the men[130]. Where their
-claim to Christian reverence is admitted by the Church, the stories told
-about them have a very different ring.
-
-According to the legend which has been incorporated into the _Acta
-Sanctorum_, St Einbetta, St Verbetta, and St Villbetta were Christian
-maidens who undertook the pilgrimage to Rome with St Ursula, with whose
-legend they are thus brought into connection. The three sisters stayed
-behind at Strasburg and so escaped the massacre of the 11000 virgins[131].
-
-The tendency to group women-saints into triads is very general. Kunigund,
-Mechtund and Wibrandis are women-saints who belong to the portion of Baden
-in the diocese of Constance[132]. The locus of their cult is in separate
-villages, but they are venerated as a triad in connection with a holy well
-and lie buried together under an ancient oak[133]. We hear also of
-pilgrimages being made to the image of three holy sisters preserved at Auw
-on the Kyll in the valley of the Mosel. They are represented as sitting
-side by side on the back of an ass(?), one of them having a cloth tied
-over her eyes. The three sisters in this case are known as Irmina, Adela
-and Chlotildis, and it is said they were the daughters or sisters of King
-Dagobert[134]. Irmina and Adela are historical; they founded nunneries in
-the diocese of Trier.
-
-In another instance the sisters are called Pellmerge, Schwellmerge and
-Krischmerge, _merg_ being a popular form of the name Mary which is
-preserved in many place-names[135].
-
-I have been able to discover little reference to local veneration of
-saints in a triad in England. But there is a story that a swineherd in
-Mercia had a vision in a wood of three women who, as he believed, were the
-three Marys, and who pointed out to him the spot where he was to found a
-religious settlement, which was afterwards known as Evesham.
-
-A curious side-light is thrown on the veneration of the three women-saints
-abroad by recalling the images and inscriptions about Mothers and Matrons,
-which are preserved on altars fashioned long before the introduction of
-Christianity under heathen influence.
-
-These altars have been found in outlying parts of the Roman Empire,
-especially in the districts contiguous to the ancient boundary line which
-divided Roman territory from Germania Magna. They bear inscriptions in
-Latin to the effect that they are dedicated to Mothers and Matrons, and
-sometimes it is added that they have been set up at the command of these
-divine Mothers themselves. The words _imperio ipsarum_, 'by their own
-command,' are added to the formula of dedication, and as it seems that
-they never occur on altars set up and dedicated to specified Roman or
-Gallo-Roman divinities, they yield an interesting proof of the wide-spread
-character of the worship of tribal goddesses[136].
-
-At one time it was supposed that these altars were of Keltic origin, but
-some of the tribes mentioned in their inscriptions have been identified
-with place-names in Germany. Altars found in outlying parts of the Empire
-primarily served for the use of the soldiery, for sacrifice at the altar
-of the gods was a needful preliminary to Roman military undertakings. The
-view has been advanced that, as the altars dedicated to pagan divinities
-served for the devotions of the Roman and Gallo-Roman troops, it is
-possible that these other altars dedicated to Mothers served for the
-devotions of the German heathen soldiery, who were drafted from districts
-beyond the Rhine, and at an early date made part of the Roman legions.
-
-The parallels between the mothers of the stones and the three women-saints
-are certainly remarkable.
-
-Where a representation, generally in rude relief, occurs on the altar
-stones, the Mothers are represented in a group of three, holding as
-emblems of their power fruit, flowers, and the spindle. These recall the
-emblems both of the heathen goddess of mythology and of the pseudo-saint.
-Moreover one of the Mothers of the altars is invariably distinguished by
-some peculiarity, generally by a want of the head-dress or head-gear worn
-by the two others, perhaps indicative of her greater importance. This has
-its parallel in the peculiar power with which one member of the saint
-triad is popularly credited.
-
-The erection of the altars belongs to a time before the introduction of
-Christianity; our information about the three women-saints dates back
-earlier than the 12th century in a few cases only; it chiefly depends on
-stories locally current which have been gleaned within the last hundred
-years. If the hypothesis of the mother-age preceding the father-age holds
-good, if the divine Mothers imaged on the stones are witnesses to a
-wide-spread worship of female deities during the period of established
-Roman rule, these tales told of the triad carry us back nearly twenty
-centuries. The power ascribed to tribal goddesses in a distant heathen
-past survived in the power ascribed to Christian women-saints; the
-deep-rooted belief in protective women-divinities enduring with undying
-persistence in spite of changes of religion.
-
-In conclusion, a few words may be acceptable on the names of
-pseudo-saints, which I believe to be largely epithetic or appellative.
-Grimm holds that the names of the German goddesses were originally
-appellatives. In a few cases the name of the goddess actually becomes the
-name of a saint. Mythology and hagiology both lay claim to a Vrene and a
-Vreke; but from the nature of things these cases are rare. The conception
-of the protective divinity is ancient; her name in a philological sense is
-comparatively new.
-
-With few exceptions the names are German; sometimes in contiguous
-districts variations of the same name are preserved. The saint Lufthildis
-is sometimes Linthildis[137]; Rolendis is sometimes Dollendis[138]; Ida,
-Itta, Iduberga, Gisleberga are saints of Brabant and Flanders, whom
-hagiologists have taken great trouble to keep separate. In some cases the
-name of a real and that of a fictitious person may have become confounded.
-The names are all cognate with the word _itis_, an ancient term applied to
-the woman who exercised sacred functions.
-
-The attempt to connect the group Ontkommer-Wilgefortis by the underlying
-meaning of the several names has been mentioned. It has also been
-mentioned that this saint is sometimes spoken of as a mother of God.
-Similarly St Genevieve of Paris is worshipped as Notre-Dame-la-petite, and
-again the saint Cunera of Reenen is popularly known as Knertje, which
-signifies little lady[139].
-
-On every side the student is tempted to stray from the straightforward
-road of fact into the winding paths of speculation. The frequent
-association abroad of female deities with hill tops suggests a possible
-explanation why the word _berg_, which means remoteness and height, so
-often forms part of the name of the woman pseudo-saint, and of women's
-names generally. For the beginnings of tilth and agriculture are now
-sought not in the swampy lowlands, but on the heights where a clearance
-brought sunlight and fruitfulness. Hill tops to this day are connected
-with holy rites. Is it possible that the word _berg_, designating hill
-top, should have become an appellative for woman because the settlements
-on the hills were specially connected with her?
-
-Philology hitherto has been content to trace to a common origin words
-cognate in different languages, and on the conceptions attaching to these
-words, to build up theories about the state of civilization of various
-peoples at a period previous to their dispersion from a common home. But
-the study of local beliefs and superstitions in western Europe tends more
-and more to prove that usages pointing to a very primitive mode of life
-and to a very primitive state of civilization are indissolubly connected
-with certain sites; and that the beginnings of what we usually term
-civilization, far from being imported, have largely developed on native
-soil.
-
-Thus, at the very outset of our enquiry into saint-worship and the convent
-life of the past, we have found ourselves confronted by a class of
-women-saints who must be looked upon as survivals from heathen times, and
-who are in no way connected with the beginnings of Christianity and of
-convent life; their reputation rests on their connection with some
-hallowed site of the heathen period and the persistence of popular faith
-in them. But the feeling underlying the attribution of holiness to them,
-the desire for localized saints, yields the clue to the ready raising to
-saintship of those women who in England, in France, and in Germany, showed
-appreciation of the possibilities offered to them by Christianity, and
-founded religious settlements. In some cases superstitions of a heathen
-nature which are of value to the hagiologist, if not to the historian,
-cling to these women also, but fortunately a considerable amount of
-trustworthy material is extant about their lives. These women during the
-earliest period were zealous in the cause of Christianity, and it is to
-them that our enquiry now turns.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER II.
-
-CONVENTS AMONG THE FRANKS, A.D. 550-650.
-
-    'Sicut enim apis diversa genera florum congregabat, unde mella
-    conficiat, sic illa ab his quos invitabat spirituales studebat carpere
-    flosculos, unde boni operis fructum tam sibi quam suis sequacibus
-    exhiberet.' _The nun Baudonivia on St Radegund_ (_Vita_, c. 13).
-
-
-Sec. 1. At the Frankish Invasion[140].
-
-The great interest of early monastic life among the Franks lies in the
-conversion of this hardy and ferocious people to Christianity just at the
-moment of their emergence from a state of barbarism. Fierce, warlike and
-progressive, the Franks were brought face to face with cultured Latinity.
-The clerical student who claimed direct descent from the Gallo-Roman
-rhetorician, and the bishop who was in possession of the municipal
-government of the town, found themselves confronted by shaggy-haired,
-impetuous men from forest wilds. At the outset an all but immeasurable
-distance separated the social and intellectual development of the
-Gallo-Roman from that of these strangers. Compared with the cultivated man
-of letters and with the veteran, grown grey in imperial service, the
-German invader was little more than a savage; nevertheless he succeeded in
-holding his own. At first his standards of life and conduct gave way
-before those of the Gallo-Romans. The lives of early Frankish princes, as
-their contemporary, the historian Gregory of Tours, depicts them, are
-marked by ceaseless quarrels and feuds, by numberless instances of murder,
-perjury and violence. The bonds of union among them were forcibly relaxed,
-as often happens in those periods of history when restraint and
-responsibility are broken through by a sudden and overwhelming inrush of
-new ideas. A prey to intemperance and greed, the descendants of the great
-Merovech dwindled away. But other men of the same race, stronger than they
-in mind and less prone to enervating luxury, pressed in from behind. And
-after the temporary mental and moral collapse which followed upon the
-occupation of Gaul by the Franks, the race rose to new and increased
-vigour. New standards of conduct were evolved and new conceptions of
-excellence arose, through the mingling of Latin and German elements. For
-the great Roman civilization, a subject of wonder and admiration to all
-ages, was in many of its developments realized, appropriated, and
-assimilated by the converted Germans. Three hundred years after their
-appearance in Gaul, the Franks were masters of the cultivated western
-world; they had grasped the essentials of a common nationality and had
-spread abroad a system of uniform government.
-
-The Franks at first showed a marked deficiency in the virtues which pagan
-Rome had established, and to which Christianity had given a widened and
-spiritualized meaning. Temperance, habitual self-control and the
-absorption of self in the consciousness of a greater, formed no part of
-this people's character. These virtues, together with peaceableness and a
-certain simplicity of taste, laid the groundwork of the monasticism which
-preceded the invasion. Persons who were vowed to religion were averse to
-war, because it disturbed study and industry, and they shrank from luxury
-of life, because it interrupted routine by exciting their appetites. An
-even tenor of life was the golden mean they set before themselves, and in
-some degree they had realized it in Roman Gaul before the barbarian
-invasion.
-
-The Frank at first felt little tempted in the direction of monastic life.
-His fierce and warlike tendencies, love of personal predominance and
-glory, and impatience of every kind of restraint, were directly opposed to
-the uniform round of devotion and work to which the religious devotee
-conformed.
-
-The attitude of Frankish men towards monasticism was at best passive; on
-the other hand convent life from the first found sympathy among Frankish
-women. Princesses of pure German blood and of undisputed German origin
-left the royal farms, which were the court residences of the period, and
-repaired to the religious houses, to devote themselves to religion and to
-the learning of cultured Latinity. Not one of the princes of the royal
-Frankish race entered a convent of his own accord, but their wives,
-widows, and daughters readily joined houses of religion.
-
-Meekness and devotion, self-denial and subservience are not the most
-prominent features in the character of these women. The wives and
-daughters of men to whom Macaulay attributes all vices and no virtues, are
-of a temper which largely savours of the world. What distinguishes them is
-quick determination and clear-sighted appreciation of the possibilities
-opened out to them by the religious life. Fortunately the information
-which we have concerning them is not confined to the works of interested
-eulogists. Accounts of women whom posterity estimated as saints lay stress
-on those sides of their character which are in accord with virtues
-inculcated by the Church. But we have other accounts besides these about
-women who had taken the vows of religion, but whose behaviour called forth
-violent denunciations from their contemporaries. And over and above these,
-passages in profane literature are extant which curiously illustrate the
-worldly tone and temper of many women who had adopted religion as a
-profession.
-
-These women were driven to resort to convents chiefly as the result of
-their contact with a great civilization, which threw open unknown and
-tempting possibilities to men, but raised many difficulties in the way of
-women.
-
-The resources of the districts acquired by the Franks were immeasurably
-greater than those of the lands they had left. Wealth and intemperance
-readily join hands. The plurality of recognised and unrecognised wives in
-which the Frankish princes indulged resulted in great family difficulties.
-The royal farms and the ancient cities, where these petty kings resided,
-were the scenes of continual broils and squabbles in which royal wives and
-widows took the leading parts. From the chequered existence which this
-state of things implies, convent life alone afforded a permanent refuge.
-Sometimes a princess left home from a sense of the indignities she was
-made to suffer; sometimes a reverse of fortune caused her to accept,
-willingly or unwillingly, the dignified retirement of the cloister.
-
-During the centuries preceding the Frankish conquest the development of
-religious and monastic life in Gaul had been considerable, for the Church
-had practically appropriated what was left of the Roman system of
-organization, and since this system had been chiefly municipal, the
-municipal bodies were largely composed of bishops and clerks.
-
-The monastic life of men in Gaul had a number of independent centres in
-the western provinces, due to the enthusiastic zeal of St Martin of Tours
-([Dagger] 400), to whom reference has been made.
-
-In the beginning of the 6th century a settlement of nuns was founded in
-the south, where monasteries already existed, perhaps as the result of
-direct contact with the east. A rule of life was drafted for this convent
-shortly after its foundation.
-
-Caesarius, bishop of Arles (501-573), had persuaded his sister Caesaria to
-leave Marseilles, where she dwelt in a convent associated with the name of
-Cassian. His plan was that she should join him at Arles, and preside over
-the women who had gathered there to live and work under his guidance.
-
-Caesarius now marked out a scheme of life for his sister and those women
-whom she was prepared to direct. He arranged it, as he says himself,
-according to the teachings of the fathers of the Church and, after
-repeated modifications, he embodied it in a set of rules, which have come
-down to us[141]. Great clearness and directness, a high moral tone, and
-much sensible advice are contained in these precepts of Caesarius. 'Since
-the Lord,' he says, addressing himself to the women, 'has willed to
-inspire us and help us to found a monastery for you, in order that you may
-abide in this monastery, we have culled spiritual and holy injunctions for
-you from the ancient fathers; with God's help may you be sheltered, and
-dwelling in the cells of your monastery, seeking in earnest prayer the
-presence of the Son of God, may you say in faith, "we have found him whom
-we sought." Thus may you be of the number of holy virgins devoted to God,
-who wait with tapers alight and a calm conscience, calling upon the
-Lord.--Since you are aware that I have worked towards establishing this
-monastery for you, let me be one of you through the intercession of your
-prayer.'
-
-Caesarius goes on to stipulate that those who join the community, whether
-they be maidens or widows, shall enter the house once for all and renounce
-all claims to outside property. Several paragraphs of the rule are devoted
-to settling questions of property, a proof of its importance in the mind
-of Caesarius. There were to be in the house only those who of their own
-accord accepted the routine and were prepared to live on terms of
-strictest equality without property or servants of their own.
-
-Children under the age of six or seven were not to be received at all,
-'nor shall daughters of noble parentage or lowly-born girls be taken in
-readily to be brought up and educated.'
-
-This latter injunction shows how the religious at this period wished to
-keep the advantages to be derived from artistic and intellectual training
-in their own community. They had no desire for the spread of education,
-which forms so characteristic a feature of the religious establishments of
-a later date.
-
-After their safe housing the instruction of the nuns at Arles was the most
-important matter dealt with in the 'rule.' Considerable time and thought
-were devoted to the practice of chants and to choir-singing, for the art
-of music was considered especially fitted to celebrate God. In an appendix
-to the rule of Caesarius the system of singing is described as similar to
-that adopted in the coenobite settlement at Lerins[142]. Apparently
-following Keltic usage, the chant was taken up in turn by relays of the
-professed, who kept it up night and day all the year round in perpetual
-praise of the Divinity. At this period melody and pitch were the subjects
-of close study and much discussion. The great debt owed by the art of
-music to the enthusiasm of these early singers is often overlooked.
-
-The women who joined the community at Arles also learned reading and
-writing ('omnes litteras discant'). These arts were practised in classes,
-while domestic occupations, such as cooking, were performed in turns.
-Weaving, probably that of church hangings, was among the arts practised,
-and the women also spun wool and wove it into material with which they
-made garments for their own use.
-
-There are further injunctions about tending the infirm, and stern advice
-about the hatefulness of quarrels. Intercourse with the outside world is
-restricted, but is not altogether cut off.
-
-'Dinners and entertainments,' says the rule, 'shall not be provided for
-churchmen, laymen and friends, but women from other religious houses may
-be received and entertained.'
-
-In the year 506 Caesarius, the author of this rule, was present at the
-synod of Agde at which it was decreed that no nun however good in
-character should receive the veil, that is be permanently bound by a vow,
-before her fortieth year[143]. This decree, taken together with the rule,
-proves the sober and serious spirit of these early settlements and the
-purpose which their founder set before him.
-
-The teaching of Caesarius generally reflects the spirit of cautious
-reserve characteristic of the rule instituted by the great St Benedict of
-Nursia for the monks he had assembled together on Monte Casino in Central
-Italy. His efforts like those of Caesarius were directed to the creation
-of conditions favourable to the devoutly disposed, not to the leavening of
-the outside world by the spread of Christian doctrine.
-
-It was part of the plan of Caesarius to secure independence to the
-communities he had founded; for in his capacity as bishop he addressed a
-letter to Pope Hormisda ([Dagger] 523) in which he asked the Pope's
-protection for his monasteries, one of which was for men and one for
-women, against possible interference from outside. He also begged that the
-Pope would confirm the grants of property which had already been made to
-these establishments. In his reply to this letter the Pope declared that
-the power of the bishop in regard to these settlements should be limited
-to visitation[144].
-
-It must be borne in mind that Arles and the southern parts of Gaul were
-overrun by the Goths, who inclined to Arianism and opposed the Church of
-Rome. Fear of this heresy induced the prelates of the Church to favour
-Frankish rule. After the alliance of the Frankish kings with the Church
-the religious establishments in the land remained undisturbed, and
-numerous new monasteries were founded.
-
-It is evident from what we know of the nuns at Arles, and of other bands
-of women whom the Church took under her protection, that they readily
-accepted life on the conditions proffered and were content to be
-controlled and protected by men. It is only when the untamed German
-element with its craving for self-assertion came in, that difficulties
-between the bishops and heads of nunneries arose, that women of barbarian
-origin like Radegund, Chrodield, and others, appealed to the authority of
-ruling princes against the bishop, and asserted an independence not always
-in accordance with the usual conceptions of Christian virtue and
-tolerance.
-
-
-Sec. 2. St Radegund and the Nunnery at Poitiers.
-
-Certain settlements for women in northern France claim to have existed
-from a very early period, chiefly on the ground of their association with
-Genevieve, patron saint of Paris, and with Chrothild (Clothilde, [Dagger]
-545), wife of the first Christian king of the Franks. The legend of St
-Genevieve must be received with caution[145]; while bands of women
-certainly dwelt at Paris and elsewhere previously to the Frankish
-invasion, under the protection of the Church, it is doubtful whether they
-owed their existence to Genevieve.
-
-A fictitious glamour of sanctity has been cast by legendary lore around
-the name and the doings of Queen Chrothild, because her union with King
-Clovis, advocated by the Gallo-Roman Church party, led to his conversion
-to Christianity[146]. In the pages of Gregory's history the real Chrothild
-stands out imperious, revengeful and unscrupulous. It is quite credible
-that she did service for a time as deaconess (diacona) at the church of
-Tours, and that she founded a religious house for women at the royal farm
-Les Andelys near Rouen, but we can hardly believe that the life she lived
-there was that of a devout nun.
-
-Radegund of Poitiers and Ingetrud of Tours are the first Frankish women
-who are known to have founded and ruled over nunneries in France. Their
-activity belongs to the latter half of the 6th century, which is a date
-somewhat later than that of the official acceptance of Christianity, and
-one at which the overlordship of the Franks was already well established
-throughout France. The settlements they founded lay in close proximity to
-cities which were strongholds of Church government. Poitiers had become an
-important religious centre through the influence of St Hilary, and Tours,
-to which the shrine of St Martin attracted many travellers, was of such
-importance that it has been called the centre of religion and culture in
-France at this period.
-
-The historian Gregory, afterwards bishop of Tours, to whom we are largely
-indebted for our knowledge of this period, was personally acquainted with
-the women at Tours and at Poitiers. He probably owed his appointment to
-the bishopric of Tours in 573 to the favour he had found with
-Radegund[147]. He has treated of her in his history and has written an
-account of her burial at which he officiated[148], whilst a chapter of his
-book on the _Glory of Martyrs_ praises the fragment of the Holy
-Cross[149], which had been sent to Radegund from Constantinople and from
-which the nunnery at Poitiers took its name.
-
-Besides this information two drafts of the life of Radegund are extant,
-the one written by her devoted friend and admirer the Latin poet
-Fortunatus, afterwards bishop of Poitiers, the other by the nun
-Baudonivia, Radegund's pupil and an inmate of her nunnery[150]. Fortunatus
-has moreover celebrated his intercourse with Radegund in a number of
-verses, which throw great light on their interesting personal
-relations[151].
-
-A letter is also extant written by Radegund herself and preserved by
-Gregory in which she addresses a number of bishops on the objects of her
-nunnery. She begs the prelates of the Church to protect her institution
-after her death and, if need be, assist those who are carrying on life
-there in her spirit against hindrance from without and opposition from
-within. The letter is in the usual wordy style of the Latin of that day.
-
-'Freed from the claims of a worldly life, with divine help and holy grace,
-I,' she says, 'have willingly chosen the life of religion at the direction
-of Christ; turning my thoughts and powers towards helping others, the Lord
-assisting me that my good intentions towards them may be turned to their
-weal. With the assistance of gifts granted me by the noble lord and king
-Clothacar, I have founded a monastery (monasterium) for maidens (puellae);
-after founding it I made it a grant of all that royal liberality had
-bestowed on me; moreover to the band assembled by me with Christ's help, I
-have given the rule according to which the holy Caesaria lived, and which
-the holy president (antistes) Caesarius of Arles wisely compiled from the
-teachings of the holy fathers. With the consent of the noble bishop of
-this district and others, and at the desire of our congregation, I have
-accepted as abbess my sister, dame Agnes, whom from youth upwards I have
-loved and educated as a daughter; and next to God's will I have conformed
-to her authority. I myself, together with my sisters, have followed the
-apostolic example and have granted away by charter all our worldly
-possessions, in fearful remembrance of Ananias and Sapphira, retaining
-nought of our own. But since the events and duration of human life are
-uncertain, since also the world is drawing to its close (mundo in finem
-currente), many serving their own rather than the divine will, I myself,
-impelled by the love of God, submit to you this letter, which contains my
-request, begging you to carry it out in the name of Christ[152].'
-
-Radegund was one of an unconquered German race. Her father was Hermafried,
-leader of the Thueringians, her mother a grandniece of the great Gothic
-king, Theodoric. She was captured as a child together with her brother in
-the forest wilds of Thueringen during one of the raids made into that
-district by the Frankish kings Theuderic (Thierry) of Metz, and Clothacar
-(Clothair) of Soissons. Clothacar appropriated the children as part of his
-share of the booty and sent Radegund to a 'villa' in the neighbourhood of
-Aties, in what became later the province of Picardie, where she was
-brought up and educated. 'Besides occupations usual to those of her sex,'
-her biographer says, 'she had a knowledge of letters' (litteris est
-erudita). From Aties she vainly tried to make her escape, and at the age
-of about twelve was taken to the royal farm near Soissons and there
-married to Clothacar[153]. In the list of King Clothacar's seven
-recognised wives Radegund stands fifth[154].
-
-From the first Radegund was averse to this union. She was wedded to an
-earthly bridegroom but not therefore divided from the heavenly one[155].
-Her behaviour towards her husband as described by her biographers can
-hardly be called becoming to her station as queen. She was so devoted to
-charitable work, we are told, that she often kept the king waiting at
-meals, a source of great annoyance to him, and under some pretext she
-frequently left him at night. If a man of learning came to the court she
-would devote herself to him, entirely neglecting her duty to the
-king[156]. Quarrels between the couple were frequent, and the king
-declared that he was married to a nun rather than to a queen[157]. The
-murder of her younger brother finally turned the balance of the queen's
-feelings against the king. With fearless determination she broke down all
-barriers. She was not lacking in personal courage, and had once calmly
-confronted a popular uproar caused by her having set fire to a sacred
-grove[158]. Now, regardless of consequences, she left the court and went
-to Noyon, where she sought the protection of Bishop Medardus ([Dagger]
-545), who was influential among the many powerful prelates of his
-day[159]. But the bishop hesitated, his position was evidently not so
-assured that he could, by acceding to the queen's request, risk drawing on
-himself the king's anger[160]. However Radegund's stern admonition
-prevailed: 'If you refuse to consecrate me,' she cried, 'a lamb will be
-lost to the flock[161].' Medardus so far consented as to consecrate her a
-deaconess, a term applied at the time to those who, without belonging to
-any special order, were under the protection of the Church.
-
-In the oratory of St Jumer Radegund now offered up the embroidered clothes
-and jewelry she was wearing, her robe (indumentum), her precious stones
-(gemma), and her girdle weighty with gold. Both her biographers[162] lay
-stress on this act of self-denial, which was the more noteworthy as love
-of gorgeous apparel and jewelry was characteristic of early Frankish
-royalty. Kings and queens were content to live in rural dwellings which
-were little more than barns; life in cities was altogether uncongenial to
-them, but they made up for this by a display of sumptuous clothes as a
-mark of their rank. Already during her life with the king Radegund is
-described as longing for a hair-cloth garment as a sign of unworldliness.
-She now definitely adopted the raiment of a nun, a dress made of undyed
-wool.
-
-She subsequently wandered westwards from Noyon and came into the district
-between Tours and Poitiers, where she settled for some time at a 'villa'
-her husband had given her called Sais[163]. She entered into friendly
-relations with the recluse Jean of Chinon (Johannes Monasteriensis[164]),
-a native of Brittany, who with many other recluses like himself enjoyed
-the reputation of great holiness. Jean of Chinon is represented as
-strengthening Radegund in her resolution to devote herself to religion,
-and it is probable that he helped her with practical advice.
-
-Radegund now devoted herself to the relief of distress of every kind, her
-practical turn of mind leading her to offer help in physical as well as in
-mental cases. Her biographer tells us how--like a new Martha, with a love
-of active life--she shrank from no disease, not even from leprosy[165].
-
-When she saw how many men and women sought her relief the wish to provide
-permanently for them arose. She owned property outside Poitiers which she
-devoted to founding a settlement for women; in all probability she also
-had a house for men near it[166]. Various references to the settlement
-show that it extended over a considerable area. Like other country
-residences or 'villae,' it was surrounded by walls and had the look of a
-fortress, although situated in a peaceful district. As many as two hundred
-nuns lived here at the time of Radegund's death[167]. When the house was
-ready to receive its inmates, they entered it in a procession starting
-from Poitiers. We hear that by this time the doings of Radegund 'had so
-far increased her reputation that crowds collected on the roofs to see
-them pass.'
-
-King Clothacar, however, did not calmly submit to being deserted by his
-wife; he determined to go to Poitiers with his son to find her and to take
-her back. But the queen, firm in her resolve, declared she would sooner
-die than return to her husband. She notified this resolution to Bishop
-Germanus of Paris, who besought the king not to go to Poitiers. His
-entreaties were successful. Clothacar left his wife unmolested, and seems
-to have come to some kind of agreement with her. In her letter to the
-bishops, Radegund speaks of him as the noble lord, King Clothacar, not as
-her husband.
-
-Radegund did not herself preside over the women in her nunnery. With their
-consent the youthful Agnes, the pupil of Radegund, but by no means her
-intellectual equal, was appointed abbess. Difficulties very soon occurred
-between Radegund and the bishop of Poitiers, who was probably jealous of
-her attracting religious women from himself. Radegund is said to have
-gone to Arles in order to learn about the life of the women gathered
-together there. Against the accuracy of this statement it is urged[168]
-that a written copy of the rule, together with an eloquent exhortation to
-religious perfection and virtue, was forwarded from Arles by the Abbess
-Caesaria ([Dagger] c. 560), the second of that name.
-
-The rule was established in Poitiers in 559. In the previous year King
-Clothacar, Radegund's husband, through the death of his brothers and their
-sons, had become sole king of France[169]. His monarchy thus included the
-whole of what is now called France, the contiguous districts of Burgundy
-and Thueringen, and the lands which had been taken from the Goths in Italy
-and Spain. This great kingdom remained united for a few years only. In 561
-Clothacar died and his realm was divided by his four sons, with whose
-reigns a tempestuous period begins in the history of the Franks. During
-more than forty years the rivalry and jealousy of the monarchs, aggravated
-by the mutual hatred of the queens Brunihild and Fredegund, overwhelmed
-the country with plots, counterplots, and unceasing warfare.
-
-An eloquent appeal to the kings was called forth from the historian
-Gregory by the contemplation of this state of things. It is contained in
-the preface to the fifth book of his history. Calling upon them to desist
-from the complications of civil war, he thus addresses them:
-
-'What are you bent on? What do you ask for? Have you not all in plenty?
-There is luxury in your homes; in your storehouses wine, corn, and oil
-abound; gold and silver are heaped up in your treasuries. One thing only
-you lack; while you have not peace, you have not the grace of God. Why
-must the one snatch things from the other? Why must the one covet the
-other's goods?'
-
-Living at Poitiers Radegund was close to the scene of these turmoils. The
-cities of Tours and Poitiers had fallen to the share of Charibert. When he
-died in 562 his kingdom was divided between his three brothers by cities
-rather than by districts. Tours and Poitiers fell to Sigebert of Rheims,
-who was comparatively peace-loving among these brothers. But his brother
-Chilperic of Soissons, dissatisfied with his own share, invaded Touraine
-and Poitou and forced Poitiers to submit to him. He was subsequently made
-to give way to Sigebert, but this did not bring their feuds to an end. In
-575 Sigebert was raised on the shield and proclaimed king of Neustria (the
-western part of France), but on being lifted down from the shield he was
-forthwith assassinated. New complications resulted and new factions were
-formed. In the interest of her son, Brunihild, the powerful widow of
-Sigebert, pursued with inveterate hatred Chilperic and his wife, the
-renowned Fredegund, for she looked upon Fredegund as the assassin of
-Sigebert her husband and of Galesuith her sister.
-
-Radegund had close relations with these impetuous, headstrong and
-combative persons. King Sigebert was throughout well disposed towards her.
-
-'In order to show his love and affection for her,' says Gregory[170], 'he
-sent a deputation of ecclesiastics to the Emperor Justinus II and his wife
-Sophia at Constantinople.' The Franks entertained friendly relations with
-the imperial court, and the surviving members of Radegund's family had
-found a refuge there. In due course gifts were sent to Radegund,--a
-fragment of the Holy Cross set in gold and jewels, together with other
-relics of apostles and martyrs. These relics arrived at Tours some time
-between 566 and 573[171]. It was Radegund's wish that they should be
-fetched from Tours to her nunnery by a procession headed by the bishop of
-Poitiers. But Bishop Maroveus, who was always ready to thwart the queen,
-forthwith left for his country seat when he heard of her request[172].
-Radegund, much incensed, applied in her difficulty to King Sigebert, and
-Eufronius, bishop of Tours, was ordered to conduct the translation.
-
-Radegund's adoption of the religious profession in no way diminished her
-intercourse with the outside world or the influence she had had as queen.
-We find her described as living on terms of friendship with Queen
-Brunihild 'whom she loved dearly.' Even Queen Fredegund, Brunihild's rival
-and enemy, seems to have had some kind of intimacy with her. Fortunatus in
-one of his poems suggests that Fredegund had begged Radegund to offer
-prayers for the prosperity of her husband Chilperic.
-
-It seems that Radegund's word was generally esteemed, for in a family feud
-when a certain Gundovald claimed to be the son of Clothacar and aspired to
-the succession, we find him coupling the name of Radegund with that of
-Ingetrud in asseveration of his statements.
-
-'If you would have the truth of what I declare proven,' Gundovald
-exclaimed, 'go and enquire of Radegund of Poitiers and of Ingetrud of
-Tours; they will tell you that what I maintain is the truth[173].'
-
-In an age of endless entanglements, Radegund evidently did her best to
-mediate between contending parties. 'She was always favourable to peace
-and interested in the weal of the realm whatever changes befell,' writes
-the nun Baudonivia[174]. 'She esteemed the kings and prayed for their
-welfare, and taught us nuns always to pray for their safety. If she heard
-that they had fallen out she felt troubled: and she appealed in writing,
-sometimes to one, sometimes to another, in order that they should not
-fight and war together, but keep peaceful, so that the country might rest
-securely. Similarly she exhorted the leaders to help the great princes
-with sensible advice, in order that the common people and the lands under
-their rule might prosper.'
-
-What is here said of her peace-loving disposition is corroborated by
-traits in her character mentioned by Gregory and Fortunatus. The friendly
-intercourse between Radegund and Fortunatus necessitates a few remarks on
-the life and doings of this latter-day Roman poet before he came to
-Poitiers and entered the Church.
-
-For years Fortunatus had lived the life of a fashionable man of letters at
-Ravenna, but about the year 568 the occupation of that city by the
-Langobards forced him to leave Italy. He wandered north from court to
-court, from city to city, staying sometimes with a barbarian prince,
-sometimes with a Church-prelate, who, one and the other, were equally
-ready to entertain the cultivated southerner. In return for the
-hospitality so liberally bestowed on him he celebrated his personal
-relations to his benefactors in complimentary verses. He has good wishes
-for prelates on the occasion of their appointment, flattering words for
-kings, and pleasant greetings for friends. In some of his poems he gives
-interesting descriptions of the districts through which he has travelled,
-his account of a part of the Rhine valley being specially graphic[175]. He
-glorifies the saints of the Church in terms formerly used for celebrating
-classic divinities, and addresses Bishop Medardus of Noyon as the
-possessor of Olympus[176]. He even brings in Venus to celebrate a royal
-wedding, and lets her utter praises of the queen Brunihild[177].
-
-Besides these poetical writings Fortunatus has left prose accounts of
-several of his contemporaries. An easy-going man of pleasant disposition,
-he combined in a curious way the traditions of cultured Latinity with the
-theological bent peculiar to the Christian literature of the day. His
-poems, though somewhat wanting in ideas, show a ready power of
-versification and a great facility in putting things politely and
-pleasantly. He wrote some hymns for church celebration which became widely
-known. The one beginning 'Pange, lingua, gloriosi' was adopted into the
-Roman Liturgy for the adoration of the Cross on Good Friday, and it was
-repeatedly modified and re-written during the Middle Ages. Another hymn
-written by him is the celebrated 'Vexilla regis prodeunt,' the words of
-which are comparatively poor, but the tune, the authorship of which is
-unknown, has secured it world-wide fame[178].
-
-The relic of the Holy Cross kept at Poitiers may have inspired Fortunatus
-with the idea of composing these hymns; in a flattering epistle, written
-obviously at Radegund's request, he thanks Justinus and Sophia of
-Constantinople for the splendour of their gift to her[179].
-
-Fortunatus had come to Tours on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St Martin,
-to whose intercession he attributed the restoration of his eyesight.
-Passing through Poitiers he made the acquaintance of Radegund, who at once
-acquired a great influence over him.
-
-'Radegund wished me to stay, so I stayed,' he writes from Poitiers to some
-friends[180], and he enlarges on the superiority, intellectual and
-otherwise, of the queen, whose plain clothing and simple mode of life
-greatly impressed him. Naming Eustachia, Fabiola, Melania, and all the
-other holy women he can think of, he describes how she surpasses them all.
-'She exemplifies whatever is praiseworthy in them,' he says; 'I come
-across deeds in her such as I only read about before. Her spirit is
-clothed with flesh that has been overcome, and which while yet abiding in
-her body holds all things cheap as dross. Dwelling on earth, she has
-entered heaven, and freed from the shackles of sense, seeks companionship
-in the realms above. All pious teaching is food to her; whether taught by
-Gregory or Basil, by bold Athanasius or gentle Hilary (two who were
-companions in the light of one cause); whether thundered by Ambrose or
-flashed forth by Jerome; whether poured forth by Augustine in unceasing
-flow, by gentle Sedulius or subtle Orosius. It is as though the rule of
-Caesarius had been written for her. She feeds herself with food such as
-this and refuses to take meat unless her mind be first satisfied. I will
-not say more of what by God's witness is manifest. Let everyone who can
-send her poems by religious writers; they will be esteemed as great gifts
-though the books be small. For he who gives holy writings to her may hold
-himself as giving to the accepted temples (templa) of God.'
-
-Judging from this passage, Nisard, the modern editor of Fortunatus, thinks
-it probable that Radegund was acquainted with Greek as well as with
-Latin[181], a statement which one cannot endorse.
-
-The queen was much interested in the poet's writings. 'For many years,' he
-writes in one poem, 'I have been here composing verses at your order;
-accept these in which I address you in the terms you merit[182].'
-
-Radegund too wrote verses under Fortunatus' guidance. 'You have sent me
-great verses on small tablets,' he writes. 'You succeed in giving back
-honey to dead wax; on festal days you prepare grand entertainments, but I
-hunger more for your words than for your food. The little poems you send
-are full of pleasing earnestness; you charm our thoughts by these
-words[183].'
-
-Among the poems of Fortunatus are found two which modern criticism no
-longer hesitates in attributing to Radegund. They are epistles in verse
-written in the form of elegies, and were sent by the queen to some of her
-relatives at Constantinople. Judging by internal evidence a third poem,
-telling the story of Galesuith, Queen Brunihild's sister, who was murdered
-shortly after her marriage to King Chilperic, was composed by her also;
-though Nisard claims for her not the form of the poem but only its
-inspiration[184]. 'The cry,' he says, 'which sounds through these lines,
-is the cry of a woman. Not of a German woman only, who has in her the
-expression of tender and fiery passion, but a suggestion of the strength
-of a woman of all countries and for all time.' The lament in this poem is
-intoned by several women in turn. Whoever may have composed it, the depth
-of feeling which it displays is certainly most remarkable.
-
-One of these poems written by Radegund is addressed to her cousin
-Hermalafred, who had fled from Thueringen when Radegund was captured, and
-who had afterwards taken service in the imperial army of Justinian[185].
-Hermalafred was endeared to Radegund by the recollections of her
-childhood, and in vivid remembrance of events which had made her a captive
-she begins her letter[186] in the following strain:
-
-'Sad is condition of war! Jealous is fate of human things! How proud
-kingdoms are shattered by a sudden fall! Those long-prosperous heights
-(culmina) lie fallen, destroyed by fire in the great onset. Flickering
-tongues of flame lapped round the dwelling which before rose in royal
-splendour. Grey ashes cover the glittering roof which rose on high shining
-with burnished metal. Its rulers are captive in the enemy's power, its
-chosen bands have fallen to lowly estate. The crowd of comely servants all
-dwelling together were smitten to the dust in one day; the brilliant
-circle, the multitude of powerful dependents, no grave contains them, they
-lack the honours of death. More brilliant than the fire shone the gold of
-her hair, that of my father's sister, who lay felled to the ground, white
-as milk. Alas, for the corpses unburied that cover the battle-field, a
-whole people collected together in one burial place. Not Troy alone
-bewails her destruction, the land of Thueringen has experienced a like
-carnage. Here a matron in fetters is dragged away by her streaming hair,
-unable to bid a sad farewell to her household gods. The captive is not
-allowed to press his lips to the threshold, nor turn his face towards what
-he will never more behold. Bare feet in their tread trample in the blood
-of a husband, the loving sister passes over her brother's corpse. The
-child still hangs on its mother's lips though snatched from her embrace;
-in funeral wail no tear is shed. Less sad is the fate of the child who
-loses its life, the gasping mother has lost even the power of tears.
-Barbarian though I am, I could not surpass the weeping though my tears
-flowed for ever. Each had his sorrow, I had it all, my private grief was
-also the public grief. Fate was kind to those whom the enemy cut down; I
-alone survive to weep over the many. But not only do I sorrow for my dead
-relatives, those too I deplore whom life has preserved. Often my
-tear-stained face is at variance with my eyes; my murmurs are silenced,
-but my grief is astir. I look and long for the winds to bring me a
-message, from none of them comes there a sign. Hard fate has snatched from
-my embrace the kinsman by whose loving presence I once was cheered. Ah,
-though so far away, does not my solicitude pursue thee? has the bitterness
-of misfortune taken away thy sweet love? Recall what from thy earliest age
-upwards, O Hermalafred, I, Radegund, was ever to thee. How much thou didst
-love me when I was but an infant; O son of my father's brother, O most
-beloved among those of my kin! Thou didst supply for me the place of my
-dead father, of my esteemed mother, of a sister and of a brother. Held by
-thy gentle hand, hanging on thy sweet kisses, as a child I was soothed by
-thy tender speech. Scarce a time there was when the hour did not bring
-thee, now ages go by and I hear not a word from thee! I wrestle with the
-wild anguish that is hidden in my bosom; oh, that I could call thee back,
-friend, whenever or wherever it might be. If father, or mother, or royal
-office has hitherto held thee, though thou didst hasten now to me, thy
-coming is late. Perhaps 'tis a sign of fate that I shall soon miss thee
-altogether, dearest, for unrequited affection cannot long continue. I used
-to be anxious when one house did not shelter us; when thou wast absent, I
-thought thee gone for ever. Now the east holds thee as the west holds me;
-the ocean's waters restrain me, and thou art kept away from me by the sea
-reddened by the beams of the sun (unda rubri). The earth's expanse
-stretches between those who are dear to each other, a world divides those
-whom no distance separated before.'
-
-She goes on to speculate where her cousin may be, and she says if she were
-not held by her monastery she would go to him; storm and wind and the
-thought of shipwreck would be nothing to her. The fear of incriminating
-her, she says, was the cause of the death of her murdered brother. Would
-that she had died instead of him! She beseeches Hermalafred to send news
-of himself and of his sisters, and ends her letter with these words: 'May
-Christ grant my prayer, may this letter reach those beloved ones, so that
-a letter indited with sweet messages may come to me in return! May the
-sufferings wrought by languishing hope be alleviated by the swift advent
-of sure tidings!'
-
-This poem expresses great and lasting affection for her race. But her
-relatives were a source of continued grief to the queen. She received no
-reply to her letter to Hermalafred, and later she heard of his death. She
-received this news from his nephew Artachis, who sent her at the same time
-a present of silk, and Radegund then wrote another letter[187] which is
-addressed to Artachis and is even sadder in tone. In it she deplores the
-death of Hermalafred, and asks the boy Artachis to let her have frequent
-news of himself sent to her monastery.
-
-It is pleasant to turn from the sad side of Radegund's life which these
-poems exhibit to her friendly intercourse with Fortunatus, which was no
-doubt a source of great comfort to her during the last years of her life.
-With the exception of short intervals for journeys, the Latin poet lived
-entirely at Poitiers, where he adopted the religious profession, and dwelt
-in constant communication with Radegund and the abbess Agnes, in whose
-society he learned to forget the land of his birth. The numerous poems and
-verses which he has addressed to these ladies throw a strong light on his
-attitude towards them and their great affection for him.
-
-Radegund was wont to decorate the altar of her church with a profusion of
-flowers[188]. Again and again the poet sends her flowers, accompanying his
-gift with a few lines. With a basket of violets he sends the
-following[189]:
-
-'If the time of year had given me white lilies, or had offered me roses
-laden with perfume, I had culled them as usual in the open or in the
-ground of my small garden, and had sent them, small gifts to great ladies.
-But since I am short of the first and wanting in the second, he who offers
-violets must in love be held to bring roses. Among the odorous herbs which
-I send, these purple violets have a nobleness of their own. They shine
-tinted with purple which is regal, and unite in their petals both perfume
-and beauty. What they represent may you both exemplify, that by
-association a transient gift may gain lasting worth.'
-
-The interchange of gifts between the poet and the ladies was mutual, the
-nuns of Ste Croix lacked not the good things of this world and were
-generous in giving. Fortunatus thanks them for gifts of milk, prunes,
-eggs, and tempting dishes[190]. On one occasion they send him a meal of
-several courses, vegetables and meat, almost too much for one servant to
-carry, and he describes his greedy (gulosus) enjoyment of it in graphic
-terms[191]. Are we to take the lines literally which tell us that when
-they entertained him at dinner the table was scarcely visible for the
-roses with which it was strewn, and that the foliage and flowers spread
-about made the room into a bower of greenery[192]?
-
-Sometimes a fit of indigestion was the result of the too liberal enjoyment
-of what his friends so freely provided[193]. The poet was evidently fond
-of the pleasures of the table, and accentuates the material rather than
-the spiritual side of things. Once addressing Agnes he tells her that she
-shines in the blending of two things, she provides refreshment for the
-poet's mind and excellent food for his body[194].
-
-But the 6th century poet is generally somewhat plain-spoken on delicate
-topics. In a poem addressed to Radegund and Agnes he openly defends
-himself against the imputation that the tone of his relations to them is
-other than is signified by the terms mother and sister by which he is wont
-to address them[195]. Still these platonic relations do not preclude the
-use of expressions which border on the amorous, for he tells them that
-they each possess one half of him[196], and he calls Radegund the light of
-his eyes[197].
-
-'My dear mother, my sweet sister,' he writes, 'what shall I say, left
-alone in the absence of the love of my heart[198]?...' And again[199],
-'May a good night enfold my mother and my sister; this brings them the
-good wishes of a son and a brother. May the choir of angels visit your
-hearts and hold sweet converse with your thoughts. The time of night
-forces me to be brief in my greetings; I am sending only six lines of
-verse for you both!'
-
-The vocabulary used to denote the different kinds of human affection
-contains, no doubt, many terms common to all, and if the poems of
-Fortunatus sometimes suggest the lover, it must be remembered that as
-poems of friendship they are among the earliest of their kind. They are
-throughout elegant, graceful, and characterized by a playful tenderness
-which a translator must despair of rendering.
-
-Radegund died in the year 587, and her death was a terrible loss to the
-inmates of her settlement. Gregory, bishop of Tours, who officiated at the
-burial, gives a detailed description of it, telling how some two hundred
-women crowded round the bier, bewailing her death in such words as
-these[200]:
-
-'To whom, mother, hast thou left us orphans? To whom then shall we turn in
-our distress? We left our parents, our relatives and our homes, and we
-followed thee. What have we before us now, but tears unceasing, and grief
-that never can end? Verily, this monastery is to us more than the
-greatness of village and city.... The earth is now darkened to us, this
-place has been straitened since we no longer behold thy countenance. Woe
-unto us who are left by our holy mother! Happy those who left this world
-whilst thou wast still alive...!'
-
-The nun Baudonivia says that she cannot speak of the death of Radegund
-without sobs choking her. Her account was written some time after
-Radegund's death during the rule of the abbess Didimia to whom it is
-dedicated; Didimia probably succeeded Leubover, who witnessed the serious
-outbreak of the nuns at Poitiers. This outbreak throws an interesting
-light on the temper of professed religious women at this period, and
-illustrates how needful it was that a religious establishment should be
-ruled by a woman of character and determination at a time when the
-monastic system was only in its infancy.
-
-
-Sec. 3. The Revolt of the Nuns at Poitiers[201]. Convent Life in the North.
-
-The revolt of the nuns at Poitiers, which happened within a few years of
-the death of Radegund, shows more than anything else the imperious and the
-unbridled passions that were to be found at this period in a nunnery.
-Evidently the adoption of the religious profession did not deter women
-from openly rebelling against the authority of the ministers of the
-Church, and from carrying out their purpose by force of arms. The outbreak
-at Poitiers, of which Gregory has given a description, shows what proud,
-vindictive, and unrelenting characters the Frankish convent of the 6th
-century harboured.
-
-Already during Radegund's lifetime difficulties had arisen. King Chilperic
-had placed his daughter Basina in the nunnery, and after a time he asked
-that she should leave to be married. Radegund refused and her authority
-prevailed, but we shall find this Basina taking an active part in the
-rebellion. Other incidents show how difficult it was for Radegund even to
-uphold discipline. A nun escaped through a window by aid of a rope and,
-taking refuge in the basilica of St Hilary, made accusations which
-Gregory, who was summoned to enquire into the matter, declared to be
-unfounded. The fugitive repented and was permitted to return to the
-nunnery; she was hoisted up by means of ropes so that she might enter by
-the way she had gone out. She asked to be confined in a cell apart from
-the community, and there she remained in seclusion till the news of the
-rebellion encouraged her to again break loose.
-
-Agnes the abbess appointed by Radegund died in 589. The convent chose a
-certain Leubover to succeed her, but this appointment roused the ire of
-Chrodield, another inmate of the nunnery.
-
-Chrodield held herself to be the daughter of King Charibert, and relying
-on her near connection with royalty persuaded forty nuns to take an oath
-that they would help her to remove the hated Leubover and would appoint
-her, Chrodield, as abbess in her stead. Led by Chrodield who had been
-joined by her cousin Basina, the daughter of Chilperic mentioned above,
-the whole party left the nunnery. 'I am going to my royal relatives,'
-Chrodield said, 'to inform them of the contumely we have experienced. Not
-as daughters of kings are we treated but as though we were lowly
-born[202].'
-
-Leaving Poitiers the women came to Tours where Chrodield applied for
-assistance to the bishop and historian Gregory. In vain he admonished her,
-promising to speak to Bishop Maroveus of Poitiers in her behalf, and
-urging her to abide by his decision, as the penalty might be
-excommunication.
-
-The feeling of indignation in the women must have been strong, since
-nothing he could say dissuaded them from their purpose. 'Nothing shall
-prevent us from appealing to the kings,' said Chrodield, 'to them we are
-nearly related.'
-
-The women had come on foot from Poitiers to Tours, regardless of
-hardships. They had had no food and arrived at a time of year when the
-roads were deep in mud. Gregory at last persuaded them to postpone their
-departure for the court till the summer.
-
-Then Chrodield, leaving the nuns under the care of Basina, continued her
-journey to her uncle, King Guntchram of Orleans, who at the time was
-residing at Chalons-sur-Saone. She was well received by him and came back
-to Tours there to await the convocation of bishops who were to enquire
-into the rights of her case. But she found on her return that many of her
-followers had disbanded, and some had married. The arrival too of the
-bishops was delayed, so that she felt it expedient to return with her
-followers to Poitiers where they took possession of the basilica of St
-Hilary.
-
-They now prepared for open hostility. 'We are queens,' they said, 'and we
-shall not return to the monastery unless the abbess is deposed.'
-
-At this juncture they were joined by other dissatisfied spirits,
-'murderers, adulterers, law-breakers and other wrong-doers,' as Gregory
-puts it[203]. The nun too who had previously escaped and been taken back,
-now broke loose from her cell and returned to the basilica of Hilary.
-
-The bishop of Bordeaux and his suffragan bishops of Angouleme, Perigueux,
-and Poitiers, now assembled by order of the king (Guntchram), and called
-upon the women to come into the monastery, and on their refusal the
-prelates entered the basilica of St Hilary in a body urging them to obey.
-The women refused, and the ban of excommunication was pronounced, upon
-which they and their followers attacked the prelates. In great fear the
-bishops and clergy made off helter-skelter, not even pausing to bid each
-other farewell. One deacon was so terrified that in his eagerness to get
-away he did not even ride down to the ford, but plunged with his horse
-straight into the river.
-
-King Childebert ([Dagger] 596), the son and successor of King Sigebert,
-now ordered Count Macco to put an end to the rebellion by force of arms,
-while Gondegisel, bishop of Bordeaux, sent a circular letter to his
-brethren, describing the indignity to which he had been exposed.
-Chrodield's chance of success was evidently dwindling, when she determined
-to carry her point by a bold assault, the account of which may fitly stand
-in the words of Gregory[204].
-
-'The vexations,' he says, 'which sown by the devil had sprung up in the
-monastery at Poitiers, daily increased in troublesomeness. For Chrodield,
-having collected about her, as mentioned above, a band of murderers,
-wrong-doers, law-breakers, and vagrants of all kinds, dwelt in open revolt
-and ordered her followers to break into the nunnery at night and forcibly
-to bear off the abbess. But the abbess, on hearing the noise of their
-approach, asked to be carried in front of the shrine of the Holy Cross,
-for she was suffering from a gouty foot, and thought that the Holy Cross
-would serve her as a protection in danger. The armed bands rushed in, ran
-about the monastery by the light of a torch in search of the abbess, and
-entering the oratory found her extended on the ground in front of the
-shrine of the Holy Cross. Then one of them, more audacious than the rest,
-while about to commit the impious deed of cutting her down with his sword,
-was stabbed by another, through the intercession I believe of Divine
-Providence. He fell in his own blood and did not carry out the intention
-he had impiously formed. Meanwhile the prioress Justina, together with
-other sisters, spread the altar-cover, which lay before the cross, over
-the abbess, and extinguished the altar candles. But those who rushed in
-with bared swords and lances tore her clothes, almost lacerated the hands
-of the nuns, and carried off the prioress whom they mistook for the abbess
-in the darkness, and, with her cloak dragged off and her hair coming down,
-they would have given her into custody at the basilica of St Hilary. But
-as they drew near the church, and the sky grew somewhat lighter, they saw
-she was not the abbess and told her to go back to the monastery. Coming
-back themselves they secured the real abbess, dragged her away, and placed
-her in custody near the basilica of St Hilary in a place where Basina was
-living, and placed a watch over her by the door that no one should come to
-her rescue. Then in the dark of night they returned to the monastery and
-not being able to find a light, set fire to a barrel which they took from
-the larder and which had been painted with tar and was now dry. By the
-light of the bonfire they kindled, they plundered the monastery of all its
-contents, leaving nothing but what they could not carry off. This happened
-seven days before Easter.'
-
-The bishop of Poitiers made one more attempt to interfere. He sent to
-Chrodield and asked her to set the abbess free on pain of his refusing to
-celebrate the Easter festival. 'If you do not release her,' he said, 'I
-shall bring her help with the assembled citizens.' But Chrodield
-emboldened by her success said to her followers: 'If anyone dare come to
-her rescue, slay her.'
-
-She seems now to have been in possession of the monastery; still we find
-defection among her party. Basina, who throughout had shown a changeable
-disposition, repented and went to the imprisoned Leubover, who received
-her with open arms. The bishops, mindful of the treatment they had
-received, still refused to assemble in Poitiers while the state of affairs
-continued. But Count Macco with his armed bands made an attack on the
-women and their followers, causing 'some to be beaten down, others struck
-down by spears, and those who made most strenuous opposition to be cut
-down by the sword.'
-
-Chrodield came forth from the nunnery holding on high the relic of the
-Cross; 'Do not, I charge you, use force of arms against me,' she cried, 'I
-am a queen, daughter to one king and cousin to another. Do not attack me,
-a time may come when I will take my revenge.' But no one took any notice
-of her. Her followers were dragged from the monastery and severely
-chastised. The bishops assembled and instituted a long enquiry into the
-grievances of Chrodield, and the accusations brought against Leubover by
-her. They seem to have been unfounded or insignificant. Leubover justified
-herself and returned to the monastery. Chrodield and Basina left Poitiers
-and went to the court of King Childebert.
-
-At the next Church convocation the king tendered a request that these
-women should be freed from the ban of excommunication. Basina asked
-forgiveness and was allowed to return to the monastery. But the proud
-Chrodield declared that she would not set foot there while the abbess
-Leubover remained in authority. She maintained her independence and went
-to live in a 'villa' which the king had granted her, and from that time
-she passes from the stage of history.
-
-The revolt of the nuns at Poitiers, which for two years defied the efforts
-of churchmen and laymen, is the more noteworthy in that it does not stand
-alone. Within a year we find a similar outbreak threatening the nunnery at
-Tours where a certain Berthegund, similarly disappointed of becoming
-abbess, collected malefactors and others about her and resorted to violent
-measures. The circumstances, which are also described by Gregory, differ
-in some respects from those of the insurrection at Ste Croix[205].
-
-Ingetrud, the mother of Berthegund, had founded a nunnery at Tours close
-to the church of St Martin, and she urged her daughter, who was married,
-to come and live with her. When Berthegund did so, her husband appealed to
-Gregory, who threatened her with excommunication if she persisted in her
-resolve. She returned to her husband, but subsequently left him again and
-sent for advice to her brother who was bishop of Bordeaux. He decreed that
-she need not live with her husband if she preferred convent life. But when
-this bishop of Bordeaux died, his sister Berthegund and her mother
-Ingetrud quarrelled as to the inheritance of his property, and Ingetrud,
-much incensed against her daughter, determined at least to keep from
-Berthegund her own possessions at the nunnery and succession to her
-position there. She therefore appointed a niece of hers to succeed her as
-abbess after her death. When she died the convent of nuns looked upon this
-appointment as an infringement of their rights, but Gregory persuaded them
-to keep quiet and abide by the decision of their late abbess. Berthegund
-however would not agree to it. Against the advice of the bishop she
-appealed to the authority of King Childebert, who admitted her claim to
-the property. 'Furnished with his letter she came to the monastery and
-carried off all the moveable property, leaving nothing but its bare
-walls,' Gregory says. Afterwards she settled at Poitiers, where she spoke
-evil of her cousin the abbess of Tours, and altogether 'she did so much
-evil it were difficult to tell of it all.'
-
-From the consideration of these events in central France we turn to the
-religious foundations for women in the northern districts. With the
-beginning of the 7th century a change which directly influenced convent
-life becomes apparent in the relations between the Frankish rulers and the
-representatives of Christianity. Influential posts at court were more and
-more frequently occupied by prelates of the Church, and kings and queens
-acted more directly as patrons of churches and monasteries. Hitherto the
-centres of religious influence had been in southern and central France,
-where the Gallo-Frankish population and influence predominated, and where
-monasteries flourished close to cities which had been strongholds of the
-Roman system of administration. New religious settlements now grew up
-north of the rivers Seine and Marne, where the pure Frankish element
-prevailed and where Christianity regained its foothold owing to the
-patronage of ruling princes.
-
-Whatever had survived of Latin culture and civilisation in these districts
-had disappeared before the influence of the heathen invaders; the men
-whose work it was to re-evangelise these districts found few traces of
-Christianity. Vedast (St Vaast, [Dagger] 540), who was sent by bishop
-Remigius (St Remy) of Rheims ([Dagger] 532) into the marshy districts of
-Flanders, found no Christians at Arras about the year 500, and only the
-ruins of one ancient church, which he rebuilt[206]. The author of the life
-of Vedast gives the ravages made in these districts by the Huns as the
-reason for the disappearance of Latin culture and of Christianity. But the
-author of the life of Eleutherius, bishop of Tournai ([Dagger] 531), holds
-that the Christians had fled from these districts to escape from the
-inroads of the heathen Franks[207].
-
-It was chiefly by the foundation of monasteries in these districts that
-Christianity gained ground during the 7th century. 'Through the
-establishment of monasteries,' says Gerard[208], 'the new social order
-gained a foothold in the old Salic lands.' Among the names of those who
-took an active part in this movement stand the following: Wandregisil (St
-Vandrille, [Dagger] 665) founder of the abbey of Fontenelle; Waneng
-([Dagger] c. 688) founder of Fecamp; Filibert ([Dagger] 684) founder of
-Jumieges; Eligius bishop of Noyon ([Dagger] 658) and Audoenus (St Ouen,
-[Dagger] 683) archbishop of Rouen. These men were in direct contact with
-the court and were much patronised by the ruling princes, especially by
-the holy queen Balthild. Early and reliable accounts concerning most of
-them are extant[209].
-
-With regard to political events the 7th century is the most obscure period
-of Frankish history, for the history of Gregory of Tours comes to an end
-in 591. Feuds and quarrels as violent as those he depicts continued, and
-important constitutional changes took place as their result. The vast
-dominions brought under Frankish rule showed signs of definitely
-crystallising into Austrasia which included the purely Frankish districts
-of the north, and Burgundy and Neustria where Gallo-Frankish elements were
-prevalent.
-
-The latter half of the life of the famous Queen Brunihild[210] takes its
-colouring from the rivalry between these kingdoms; during fifty years she
-was one of the chief actors in the drama of Frankish history. At one time
-she ruled conjointly with her son Childebert, and then as regent for her
-grandsons, over whom she domineered greatly. In the year 613, when she was
-over eighty years old, she was put to a cruel death by the nobles of
-Austrasia.
-
-The judgments passed on this queen are curiously contradictory. Pope
-Gregory ([Dagger] 604) writes to her praising her great zeal in the cause
-of religion, and thanks her for the protection she has afforded to
-Augustine on his passage through France, which he considers a means to the
-conversion of England[211]. On the other hand the author of the life of St
-Columban[212], whom she expelled from Burgundy, calls her a very
-Jezebel[213]; and the author of the life of Desiderius, who was murdered
-in 608, goes so far as to accuse her of incestuous practices because of
-her marriage with her husband's nephew[214]. Indirect evidence is in
-favour of the conclusion that Queen Brunihild disliked monasticism; she
-was by birth of course a princess of the Gothic dynasty of Spain who had
-accepted Christianity in its Arian form.
-
-During the reign of Brunihild's nephew Clothacar II ([Dagger] 628), under
-whose rule the different provinces were for a time united, a comprehensive
-and most interesting edict was issued, which affords an insight into the
-efforts made to give stability to the relations between princes and the
-representatives of religion. In this edict, under heading 18, we are told
-that 'no maidens, holy widows or religious persons who are vowed to God,
-whether they stay at home or live in monasteries, shall be enticed away,
-or appropriated, or taken in marriage by making use of a special royal
-permit (praeceptum). And if anyone surreptitiously gets hold of a permit,
-it shall have no force. And should anyone by violent or other means carry
-off any such woman and take her to wife, let him be put to death. And if
-he be married in church and the woman who is appropriated, or who is on
-the point of being appropriated, seems to be a consenting party, they
-shall be separated, sent into exile, and their possessions given to their
-natural heirs[215].'
-
-From these injunctions it can be gathered that the re-adjustment of social
-and moral relations was still in progress; women who were vowed to a
-religious life did not necessarily dwell in a religious settlement, and
-even if they did so they were not necessarily safe from being captured and
-thrown into subjection. Clothacar II had three wives at the same time and
-concubines innumerable; plurality of wives was indeed a prerogative of
-these Frankish kings.
-
-Monastic life in northern France at this period was also in process of
-development. It has been mentioned how Radegund adopted the rule of life
-framed and put into writing by Caesarius at Arles. The rule
-contemporaneously instituted by Benedict at Nursia in central Italy spread
-further and further northwards, and was advocated by prelates of the
-Romish Church. It served as the model on which to reform the life of
-existing settlements[216].
-
-During the first few centuries religious houses and communities had been
-founded here and there independently of each other, the mode of life and
-the routine observed depending in each case directly on the founder. Many
-and great were the attempts made by the advocates of convent life to
-formulate the type of an ideal existence outside the pale of social duties
-and family relations, in which piety, work and benevolence should be
-blended in just proportions. The questions how far the prelates of the
-Church should claim authority over the monastery, and what the respective
-positions of abbot or abbess and bishop should be, led to much discussion.
-
-During the period under consideration the rules drafted by different
-leaders of monastic thought were not looked upon as mutually exclusive. We
-are told in the life of Filibert ([Dagger] 684), written by a
-contemporary[217], that he made selections from 'the graces of St Basil,
-the rule of Macarius, the decrees of Benedict and the holy institutions of
-Columban.' Eligius, bishop of Noyon, says in a charter which he drafted
-for the monastery founded by him at Solemny that the inmates of the
-settlement shall follow the rules of St Benedict and of St Columban[218].
-
-Towards the close of the 6th century Columban came from Ireland into
-France and northern Italy and founded a number of religious settlements.
-What rule of life the inmates of these houses followed is not quite clear,
-probably that drafted by Columban. The convents in Elsass, Switzerland and
-Germany, which considered that they owed their foundation to Irish monks,
-were numerous and later became obnoxious to the Church in many ways. For
-in after years, when the feud arose between the Romish and the Irish
-Churches and the latter insisted on her independence, the houses founded
-by Irishmen also claimed freedom and remained separate from those which
-accepted the rule of St Benedict.
-
-The property granted to religious foundations in northern France went on
-increasing throughout the 7th century. The amount of land settled on
-churches and monasteries by princes of the Merovech dynasty was so great
-that on Roth's computation two-thirds of the soil of France was at one
-time in the hands of the representatives of religion[219]. Under the will
-of Dagobert, who first became king of Austrasia in 628 and afterwards of
-the whole of France, large tracts were given away. Through the gifts of
-this king the abbey of St Denis became the richest in France, and his
-great liberality on the one hand towards the Church, on the other towards
-the poor and pilgrims, is emphasized by his biographer. His son Chlodwig
-II, king of Neustria and Burgundy, followed in his footsteps. He was a
-prince of feeble intellect and his reign is remarkable for the power
-increasingly usurped by the house-mayor, who grasped more and more at the
-substance of royal authority while dispensing with its show.
-
-Chlodwig II was married to Balthild, who is esteemed a saint on the
-strength of the monastery she founded and of the gifts she made to the
-Church. There are two accounts of her works; the second is probably a
-re-written amplification of the first, which was drafted within a short
-period of her death[220]. As these accounts were written from the
-religious standpoint, they give scant information on the political
-activity and influence of the queen, which were considerable. They dwell
-chiefly on her gifts, and concern the latter part of her life when she was
-in constant communication with her nunnery.
-
-Balthild was of Anglo-Saxon origin, and her personality and activity form
-the connecting link between the women of France and England. It is
-supposed that she was descended from one of the noble families of Wessex,
-and she favoured all those religious settlements which were in direct
-connection with princesses of the Anglo-Saxon race.
-
-She had been captured on the north coast of France and had been brought to
-Paris as a slave by the house-mayor Erchinoald, who would have married
-her, but she escaped and hid herself. Her beauty and attractions are
-described as remarkable, and she found favour in the eyes of King Chlodwig
-II who made her his wife. The excesses of this king were so great that he
-became imbecile. Balthild with Erchinoald's help governed the kingdom
-during the remainder of her husband's life and after his death in the
-interest of her little sons. From a political point of view she is
-described as 'administering the affairs of the kingdom masculine wise and
-with great strength of mind.' She was especially energetic in opposing
-slavery and forbade the sale of Christians in any part of France. No doubt
-this was due to her own sad experience. She also abolished the poll-tax,
-which had been instituted by the Romans. The Frankish kings had carried it
-on and depended on it for part of their income. Its abolition is referred
-to as a most important and beneficial change[221].
-
-During the lifetime of Chlodwig and for some years after his death the
-rule of Balthild seems to have been comparatively peaceful. The
-house-mayor Erchinoald died in 658 and was succeeded by Ebruin, a man
-whose unbounded personal ambition again plunged the realm into endless
-quarrels. In his own interest Ebruin advocated the appointment of a
-separate king to the province Austrasia, and the second of Balthild's
-little sons was sent there with the house-mayor Wulfoald. But the rivalry
-between the two kingdoms soon added another dramatic chapter to the pages
-of Frankish history. At one time we find Ebruin ruling supreme and
-condemning his rival Leodgar, bishop of Autun, to seclusion in the
-monastery of Luxeuil. An insurrection broke out and Ebruin himself was
-tonsured and cast into Luxeuil. But his chief antagonist Leodgar was
-murdered. Ebruin was then set free and again became house-mayor to one of
-the shadow kings, _rois faineants_, the unworthy successors of the great
-Merovech. His career throughout reflected the tumultuous temper of the
-age; he was finally assassinated in the year 680.
-
-Queen Balthild had retired from political life long before this. She left
-the court in consequence of an insurrection in Paris which led to the
-assassination of Bishop Sigoberrand, and went to live at a palace near the
-convent of Chelles, which she had founded and which she frequently
-visited. In the account of her life we read of her doing many pious
-deeds[222]. 'A fond mother, she loved the nuns like her own daughters and
-obeyed as her mother the holy abbess whom she had herself appointed; and
-in every respect she did her duty not like a mistress but like a faithful
-servant. Also with the humility of a strong mind she served as an
-example; she did service herself as cook to the nuns, she looked after
-cleanliness,--and, what can I say more,--the purest of pearls, with her
-own hands she removed filth's impurities....'
-
-At various times of her life Balthild had been in friendly intercourse
-with many of the chief prelates and religious dignitaries of the day. She
-had taken a special interest in Eligius, bishop of Noyon, who was a Frank
-by birth and the friend and adviser of King Dagobert.
-
-We hear how Eligius took a special interest in monastic life; how at Paris
-he collected together three hundred women, some of whom were slaves,
-others of noble origin; how he placed them under the guidance of one
-Aurea; and how at Noyon also he gathered together many women[223].
-
-On receiving the news that Eligius was dying, Balthild hurried with her
-sons to Noyon, but they came too late to see him. So great was her love
-for him, that she would have borne away his body to Chelles, her favourite
-settlement, but her wish was miraculously frustrated. The writer of the
-life of Eligius tells that the holy man's body became so heavy that it was
-impossible to move it.
-
-When Eligius appointed Aurea as president of his convent at Paris she was
-living in a settlement at Pavilly which had been founded by Filibert, an
-ecclesiastic also associated with Queen Balthild. On one occasion she sent
-him as an offering her royal girdle, which is described as a mass of gold
-and jewels[224]. It was on land granted to him by Balthild and her sons
-that Filibert founded Jumieges, where he collected together as many as
-nine hundred monks. At his foundation at Pavilly over three hundred women
-lived together under the abbess Ansterbert[225].
-
-It is recorded that Ansterbert and her mother Framehild were among the
-women of northern France who came under the influence of Irish teachers.
-The same is said of Fara ([Dagger] 657)[226], the reputed founder of a
-house at Brie, which was known as Faremoutiers, another settlement
-indebted to Queen Balthild's munificence. Similarly Agilbert and
-Theodohild[227] ([Dagger] c. 660) are supposed to have been taught by
-Irish teachers who had collected women about them at Jouarre on the Marne.
-This house at Jouarre attained a high standard of excellence in regard to
-education, for we are informed that Balthild summoned Berthild[228] from
-here, a woman renowned for her learning, and appointed her abbess over the
-house at Chelles.
-
-Yet another ecclesiastic must be mentioned in connection with Balthild,
-viz. Waneng, a Frank by birth. He was counsellor for some time to the
-queen who gave the cantle of Normandy, the so-called Pays de Caux, into
-his charge. He again founded a settlement for religious women at Fecamp
-which was presided over by Hildemarque.
-
-The foundation and growth of so many religious settlements within so short
-a period and situated in a comparatively small district shows that the
-taste for monastic life was rapidly developing among the Franks.
-
-'At this period in the provinces of Gaul,' says a contemporary writer,
-'large communities of monks and of virgins were formed, not only in
-cultivated districts, in villages, cities and strongholds, but also in
-uncultivated solitudes, for the purpose of living together according to
-the rule of the holy fathers Benedict and Columban[229].'
-
-This statement is taken from the life of Salaberg, a well written
-composition which conveys the impression of truthfulness. Salaberg had
-brought up her daughter Anstrud for the religious life. Her husband had
-joined the monastery at Luxeuil and she and other women were about to
-settle near it when the rumour of impending warfare drove them north
-towards Laon where they dwelt on the Mons Clavatus. This event belongs to
-the period of Queen Balthild's regency. It was while Anstrud was abbess at
-Laon that the settlement was attacked and barely escaped destruction in
-one of the wars waged by the house-mayor Ebruin. This event is described
-in a contemporary life of Anstrud[230].
-
-It is interesting to find a connection growing up at this period between
-the religious houses of northern France and the women of Anglo-Saxon
-England. We learn from the reliable information supplied by Bede that
-Englishwomen frequently went abroad and sometimes settled entirely in
-Frankish convents. We shall return to this subject later in connection
-with the princesses of Kent and East Anglia, some of whom went to France
-and there became abbesses. The house at Brie was ruled successively by
-Saethrith (St Syre), and Aethelburg (St Aubierge), daughters of kings of
-East Anglia, and Earcongotha, a daughter of the king of Kent. About the
-same time Hereswith, a princess of Northumbria, came to reside at
-Chelles[231].
-
-We do not know how far the immigration of these women was due to
-Balthild's connection with the land of her origin, nor do we hear whether
-she found solace in the society of her countrywomen during the last years
-of her life. Her death is conjectured to have taken place in 680.
-
-With it closes the period which has given the relatively largest number of
-women-saints to France, for all the women who by founding nunneries worked
-in the interests of religion have a place in the assembly of the saints.
-They were held as benefactors in the districts which witnessed their
-efforts, and the day of their death was inscribed in the local calendar.
-They have never been officially canonised, but they all figure in the
-Roman Martyrology, and the accounts which tell of their doings have been
-incorporated in the Acts of the Saints.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER III.
-
-CONVENTS AMONG THE ANGLO-SAXONS, A.D. 630-730.
-
-  'Ecce catervim glomerant ad bella phalanges
-  Justitiae comites et virtutum agmina sancta.'
-                                  Ealdhelm, _De laude Virginum_.
-
-
-Sec. 1. Early Houses in Kent.
-
-The early history of the convent life of women in Anglo-Saxon England is
-chiefly an account of foundations. Information on the establishment of
-religious settlements founded and presided over by women is plentiful, but
-well-nigh a century went by before women who had adopted religion as a
-profession gave any insight into their lives and characters through
-writings of their own. The women who founded monasteries in Anglo-Saxon
-England have generally been raised to the rank of saint.
-
-'In the large number of convents as well as in the names of female saints
-among the Anglo-Saxons,' says Lappenberg[232], 'we may recognise the same
-spirit which attracted the notice of the Roman army among the ancient
-Germans, and was manifested in the esteem and honour of women generally,
-and in the special influence exercised by the priestess.'
-
-A great proportion of the women who founded religious houses were members
-of ruling families. From the first it was usual for a princess to receive
-a grant of land from her husband on the occasion of her marriage, and this
-land together with what she inherited from her father she could dispose of
-at will. She often devoted this property to founding a religious house
-where she established her daughters, and to which she retired either
-during her husband's lifetime or after his death. The great honour paid by
-Christianity to the celibate life and the wide field of action opened to
-a princess in a religious house were strong inducements to the sisters and
-daughters of kings to take the veil.
-
-We have trustworthy information about many of the Anglo-Saxon women who
-founded and presided over religious settlements and whom posterity
-reverenced as saints; for their work has been described by writers who
-either knew them, or gained their information from those who did. But
-there are other women whose names only are mentioned in charters, or
-correspondence, or in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Historians however
-welcome such references as chronological evidence and as proofs of these
-women's real existence; without them they would have nothing to rely upon
-but accounts dating from a later period and often consisting of little
-more than a series of incidents strung together in order to explain the
-miracles with which the saints' relics were locally credited. There is a
-certain similarity between these later accounts and those we have of
-pseudo-saints, but they differ from those of an earlier date, for the
-writers of the 8th and 9th centuries were not actuated like those of a
-later period by the desire to give a miraculous rendering of fact. Bede
-([Dagger] 735) stands pre-eminent among the earlier writers, and our
-admiration for him increases as we discover his immense superiority to
-other early historians.
-
-Most of the women who were honoured as saints in England belong to the
-first hundred years after the acceptance of Christianity in these islands.
-A few other women have been revered as saints who lived in the 10th
-century and came under the influence of the monastic revival which is
-associated with the name of Dunstan ([Dagger] 988). But no woman living
-during Anglo-Norman times has been thus honoured, for the desire to raise
-women to saintship was essentially Anglo-Saxon and was strongest in the
-times which immediately followed the acceptance of Christianity.
-
-It was more than two hundred years after the Anglo-Saxons first set foot
-on British shores that they accepted Christianity. The struggles between
-them and the inhabitants of the island had ended in the recognised
-supremacy of the invaders, and bands of heathen Germans, settling at first
-near the shore, for the sake of the open country, had gradually made their
-way up the fruitful valleys and into adjoining districts till they covered
-the land with a network of settlements. After the restlessness of invasion
-and warfare the Anglo-Saxons settled down to domestic life and
-agriculture, for compared with the British they were eminently tillers of
-the soil. Under their regime the cities built by the Romans and the
-British fastnesses alike fell into decay. The Anglo-Saxons dwelt in
-villages, and the British either lived there in subservience to them or
-else retired into districts of their own which were difficult of access.
-
-The re-introduction of Christianity into these islands is associated with
-the name of Pope Gregory. Zealous and resolute in his efforts to
-strengthen the papal power by sending forth missionaries who were devoted
-to him, he watched his opportunity to gain a foothold for the faith in
-Kent.
-
-Tradition connects the first step in this direction with the name of a
-Frankish princess, and Bede in his Church History tells how the marriage
-of Berhta, daughter of King Charibert of Paris (561-567), to King
-Aethelberht of Kent (586-616) brought an ecclesiastic to Canterbury who
-took possession of the ancient British church of St Martin: this event was
-speedily followed by the arrival of other ecclesiastics from Rome, who
-travelled across France under the leadership of Augustine.
-
-At the time of Augustine's arrival the position of Kent was threatened by
-the growing supremacy of Northumbria. Through the activity both of
-Aethelfrith ([Dagger] 617) and of Eadwin his successor, the land extending
-from the Humber to the Firth of Forth had been united under one rule;
-Northumbria was taking the lead among the petty kingdoms which had been
-formed in different parts of the island. The king of Kent strengthened his
-independent position by accepting the faith which had proved propitious to
-the Franks and by entering into alliance with his neighbours across the
-Channel; and it was no doubt with a view to encouraging peaceful relations
-with the north that Aethelburg the daughter of Aethelberht and Berhta was
-given in marriage to King Eadwin of Northumbria during the reign of her
-brother Eadbald (616-640).
-
-Again the marriage of a Christian princess was made an occasion for
-extending the faith; an ecclesiastic as usual followed in her train.
-Paulinus, the Roman chaplain who came north with Aethelburg, after various
-incidents picturesquely set forth by Bede, overcame King Eadwin's
-reluctance to embrace Christianity and prevailed upon him to be baptized
-at York with other members of his household on Easter day in the year 627.
-The event was followed by an influx of Christians into that city, for
-British Christianity had receded before the heathen Angles, but it still
-had strongholds in the north and was on the alert to regain lost ground.
-The city of York, during Roman rule, had been of great importance in
-affairs of administration. The Roman Eboracum nearly died out to arise
-anew as Anglian Eoforwic. King Eadwin recognised Paulinus as bishop and a
-stone church was begun on part of the ground now occupied by the
-Minster[233].
-
-Bede loves to dwell on the story of this conversion, which was endeared to
-all devout churchmen by many associations. Eanflaed, the child of Eadwin
-and Aethelburg, whose baptism was its immediate cause, was afterwards a
-staunch supporter of Roman versus British Church tendencies. She was the
-patron of Wilfrith, in his time the most zealous advocate of the supremacy
-of Rome.
-
-Among the members of Eadwin's household who were baptized on the same
-Easter day in 627 was Hild, a girl of fourteen, who afterwards became
-abbess of Whitby. She was grand-niece to Eadwin through her father
-Hereric, who had been treacherously made away with; her mother Beorhtswith
-and her sister Hereswith were among the early converts to Christianity.
-Hereswith afterwards married a king of the Angles, and at a later period
-was living in the Frankish settlement of Chelles (Cala), where her sister
-Hild at one time thought of joining her. Nothing is known of the life of
-Hild between the ages of fourteen and thirty-four, but evidently she had
-not dwelt in obscure retirement, for the Scottish prelate Aidan in 647,
-knowing that she was living in the midlands, begged her to return to the
-north. It is a noteworthy circumstance if, in an age when marriage was the
-rule, she remained single without taking the veil, but she may have been
-associated with some religious settlement[234].
-
-It was only a few years after the acceptance of Christianity at York that
-the days of King Eadwin's reign, 'when a woman with her babe might walk
-scatheless from sea to sea,' came to an abrupt close. Eadwin was slain in
-633 at the battle of Hatfield, a victim to the jealousy of the British
-king Caedwalla, who combined with the heathen king Penda of Mercia against
-him. Queen Aethelburg with her children and Paulinus fled from York to
-the coast and went by sea to Kent, where they were welcomed by her brother
-King Eadbald and by Archbishop Honorius.
-
-At the beginning of his reign Eadbald of Kent had been in conflict with
-the Church owing to his marriage with his father's relict, a heathen wife
-whom Aethelberht had taken to himself after the death of Berhta. It is
-characteristic of the position held at first by Christian prelates in
-England that they depended entirely on the ruling prince for their
-position. Paulinus fled from York at the death of Eadwin, and Eadbald's
-adherence to heathen customs temporarily drove the Kentish prelate abroad.
-The king of Kent had, however, found it well to repudiate his heathen wife
-and to take a Christian princess of the Franks in her stead. This act
-restored him to the goodwill of his prelate, who returned to English
-shores.
-
-Eadbald had settled a piece of land at Folkestone on his daughter
-Eanswith, and there about the year 630 she founded what is held to be the
-first religious settlement for women in Anglo-Saxon England[235]. The fact
-of this foundation is undisputed, but all we know of Eanswith's life is in
-the account given of her by Capgrave, an Augustinian monk who lived in the
-15th century[236]. He tells us how she went to live at Folkestone and how
-a king of Northumbria wished to marry her, but as the king was a heathen,
-she made their union conditional on his prevailing upon his gods to
-manifest their power by miraculously lengthening a beam. In this he failed
-and consequently departed. There follows a description how Eanswith made a
-stream to flow 'againste the hylle,' from Smelton, a mile distant from
-Folkestone, possibly by means of a well-levelled water conduit. Capgrave
-also describes how she enforced the payment of tithes.
-
-Eanswith's settlement was in existence at the close of the century, when
-it was destroyed or deserted during the viking invasion. A charter of King
-Athelstane dated 927 gives the land where 'stood the monastery and abbey
-of holy virgins and where also St Eanswith lies buried' to Christ Church,
-Canterbury, the house having been destroyed by the 'Pagans[237].'
-Capgrave says that its site was swallowed by the sea, perhaps in one of
-the landslips common to the coast; the holy woman's relics were then
-transferred to the church of St Peter. A church at Folkestone is dedicated
-conjointly to St Mary and St Eanswith, and a church at Brensett in Kent is
-dedicated solely to her[238].
-
-Queen Aethelburg coming from the north also settled in Kent at a place
-called Liming[239]. Bede knows nothing of her after her departure from the
-north, and we have to depend on Canterbury traditions for information
-concerning her and the religious house she founded. Gocelin, a monk of
-Flanders who came into Kent in the 11th century, describes Queen
-Aethelburg as 'building and upraising this temple at Liming, and obtaining
-the first name there and a remarkable burial-place in the north porch
-against the south wall of the church covered with an arch[240].' Modern
-research has shown that the buildings at Liming were so arranged as to
-contain a convent of monks as well as of nuns. The church is of Roman
-masonry and may have been built out of the fragments of a villa, such as
-the Anglo-Saxons frequently adapted to purposes of their own, or it may
-have been a Roman basilica restored.
-
-Queen Aethelburg, foundress of Liming, is not usually reckoned a saint;
-she has no day[241] and collections of saints' lives generally omit her.
-The identity of name between her and Aethelburg ([Dagger] c. 676), abbess
-of Barking at a somewhat later date, has caused some confusion between
-them[242]. Gocelin mentions that both Queen Aethelburg and 'St Eadburga'
-were buried at Liming[243]. A well lying to the east of the church at
-Liming is to this day called St Ethelburga's well, and she is commonly
-held to be identical with Queen Aethelburg[244].
-
-At a somewhat later date another religious settlement for women was
-founded at Sheppey in Kent by Queen Sexburg, the wife of Earconberht of
-Kent (640-664), the successor of Eadbald. We know little of the
-circumstances of the foundation[245]. Sexburg was a princess of East
-Anglia, where Christianity had been accepted owing to the influence of
-King Eadwin of Northumbria[246] and where direct relations with France had
-been established.
-
-'For at that time,' says Bede, writing of these districts[247], 'there
-being not yet many monasteries built in the region of the Angles, many
-were wont, for the sake of the monastic mode of life, to go from Britain
-to the monasteries of the Franks and of Gaul; they also sent their
-daughters to the same to be instructed and to be wedded to the heavenly
-spouse, chiefly in the monasteries of Brie (Faremoutiers), Chelles, and
-Andelys.'
-
-Two princesses of Anglia, Saethrith and Aethelburg, who were sisters or
-half-sisters to Sexburg, remained abroad and became in succession abbesses
-of Brie as mentioned above. Sexburg's daughter Earcongotha also went
-there, and was promoted to the rank of abbess. Both Bede and the
-Anglo-Saxon Chronicle speak in praise of her. For her other daughter
-Eormenhild, who was married to Wulfhere, king of Mercia, Queen Sexburg of
-Kent founded the house at Sheppey; she herself went to live at Ely in her
-sister Aethelthrith's convent.
-
-The statement of Bede that women at this time went abroad for their
-education is borne out by the traditional records of Mildthrith, first
-abbess of a religious settlement in Thanet which rose to considerable
-importance[248]. A huge mass of legend supplements the few historical
-facts we know of Mildthrith, whose influence, judging from the numerous
-references to her and her widespread cult, was greater than that of any
-other English woman-saint. Several days in the Calendar are consecrated to
-her, and the site where her relics had been deposited was made a subject
-of controversy in the 11th century. As late as 1882 we find that some of
-her relics were brought from Deventer in Holland to Thanet, and that Pope
-Leo XIII granted a plenary indulgence on the occasion[249]. Churches in
-London, Oxford, Canterbury and other places are dedicated to St
-Mildred[250], and Capgrave, William of Malmesbury and others give details
-of her story, which runs as follows:
-
-Her mother Eormenburg, sometimes called Domneva, was married to Merewald,
-prince of Hacanos, a district in Herefordshire. King Ecgberht (664-673) of
-Kent gave her some land in Thanet as a blood-fine for the murder of her
-two young brothers, and on it she founded a monastery. She asked for as
-much land as her tame deer could run over in one course, and received over
-ten thousand acres of the best land in Kent[251].
-
-Besides Mildthrith Eormenburg had two daughters, Mildburg and Mildgith,
-and a boy, the holy child Merwin, who was translated to heaven in his
-youth. Mildburg presided over a religious house at Wenlock in Shropshire,
-and her legend contains picturesque traits but little trustworthy
-information[252]. We know even less of the other daughter Mildgith. It is
-doubtful whether she lived in Kent or in the north, but she is considered
-a saint[253]. An ancient record says that 'St Mildgith lies in Northumbria
-where her miraculous powers were often exhibited and still are,' but it
-does not point out at what place[254].
-
-According to her legend, Mildthrith, by far the best known of the sisters,
-was sent abroad to Chelles for her education, where the abbess Wilcoma
-wished her to marry her kinsman, and on the girl's refusal cast her into a
-burning furnace from which she came forth unharmed. The girl sent her
-mother a psalter she had written together with a lock of her hair. She
-made her escape and arrived in England, landing at Ebbsfleet. 'As she
-descended from the ship to the land and set her feet on a certain square
-stone the print of her feet remained on it, most life-like, she not
-thinking anything; God so accomplishing the glory of his handmaid. And
-more than that; the dust that was scrapen off thence being drunk did cure
-sundry diseases[255].' It appears that a stone to which a superstitious
-reverence was attached was walled into the Church of St Mildred in
-Thanet.
-
-Other incidents told of her influence are not without their humorous side.
-One day a bell-ringer, forgetful of his duties, had dropped asleep, when
-Mildthrith appeared to him and gave him a blow on the ear, saying,
-'Understand, fellow, that this is an oratory to pray in, not a dormitory
-to sleep in,' and so vanished.
-
-Thus writes the author of her legend. The fact remains that Mildthrith was
-presiding over a settlement in Kent towards the close of the 7th century.
-For in a charter of privileges granted between 696 and 716 by King Wihtred
-and Queen Werburg to the churches and monasteries of Kent granting them
-security against interference, her name is among those of the five lady
-abbesses who place their signatures to the document.[256] These names
-stand after those of the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of
-Rochester and are as follows; 'Mildritha, Aetheldritha, Aette, Wilnotha
-and Hereswytha.' The settlements mentioned in the body of the charter[257]
-as being subject to them are Upminstre (or Minstre) in Thanet, afterwards
-known as St Mildred's, Southminstre, a colony of Minstre, Folkestone,
-Liming and Sheppey, the foundation of which has been described.
-
-Thus at the close of the 7th century there existed in the province of Kent
-alone five religious settlements governed by abbesses who added this title
-to their signatures, or who, judging from the place given to them, ranked
-in dignity below the bishops but above the presbyters (presbyteri), whose
-names follow theirs in the list. From the wording of the charter we see
-that men who accepted the tonsure and women who received the veil were at
-this time classed together. Those who set their signatures to the charter
-agreed that neither abbot nor abbess should be appointed without the
-consent of a prelate.
-
-The charter is the more valuable as it establishes the existence of the
-Kentish convents and their connection with each other at a period when we
-have only fragmentary information about the religious houses in the south.
-We must turn to the north for fuller information as to the foundation and
-growth of religious settlements presided over by women during the early
-Christian period.
-
-
-Sec. 2. The Monastery at Whitby[258].
-
-A temporary collapse of the Christian faith had followed the death of King
-Eadwin of Northumbria, but the restoration of King Oswald, who was not so
-strong as his predecessor in administrative power but whose religious
-fervour was greater, had given it a new impulse and a new direction.
-
-Oswald had passed some time of his life in Iona or Hii, the great Scottish
-religious settlement and the stronghold of British Christianity in the
-Hebrides. Here he had made friends with the ecclesiastic Aidan, who became
-his staunch supporter. Soon after his accession Oswald summoned a monk
-from Iona 'to minister the word of the faith to himself and to his
-people,' and when it was found that the monk made no progress, Aidan was
-moved to go among the Angles himself. In preference to York he chose the
-island Lindisfarne for his headquarters, but he spent much of his time
-with Oswald, helping him to set the practice and teaching of religion on a
-firmer footing.
-
-It was during this part of Aidan's career that he consecrated Heiu[259],
-according to Bede 'the first woman who took the vow and the habit of a nun
-in the province of Northumbria.' Heiu presided over a congregation of
-women at Hartlepool in Durham, from which she removed to Calcaria of the
-Romans, which is perhaps identical with Healaugh near Tadcaster, where
-apparently Heiu's name is retained. Further details of her career are
-wanting.
-
-Aidan's labours were interrupted for a time. Again the fierce and
-impetuous King Penda of Mercia invaded Northumbria, and again the
-Christian Angles fled before the midland heathens. King Oswald fell in
-battle (642) and Aidan retired to his rocky island, from which he watched
-the fires kindled all over the country first by the raids of Penda, and
-afterwards by civil strife between the two provinces of Northumbria, Deira
-and Bernicia. This arose through the rival claims to the throne of Oswiu,
-Oswald's brother, and Oswin, who was King Eadwin's relative.
-
-An understanding was at length effected between them by which Oswiu
-accepted Bernicia, while Oswin took possession of Deira, and Aidan, who
-found a patron in Oswin, returned to his work.
-
-He now persuaded Hild[260], who was waiting in Anglia for an opportunity
-to cross over to France, where she purposed joining her sister, to give up
-this plan and to return to the north to share in the work in which he was
-engaged. Hild came and settled down to a monastic life with a few
-companions on the river Wear. A year later, when Heiu retired to Calcaria,
-Hild became abbess at Hartlepool. She settled there only a few years
-before the close of Aidan's career. He died in 651 shortly after his
-patron Oswin, whose murder remains the great stain on the life of his
-rival Oswiu.
-
-A 12th century monk, an inmate of the monastery of St Beeves in
-Cumberland, has written a life of St Bega, the patron saint of his
-monastery, whom he identifies on the one hand with the abbess Heiu,
-consecrated by Aidan, and on the other with Begu, a nun who had a vision
-of Hild's death at the monastery of Hackness in the year 680. His
-narrative is further embellished with local traditions about a woman Bega,
-who came from Ireland and received as a gift from the Lady Egermont the
-extensive parish and promontory of St Beeves, which to this day bear her
-name[261].
-
-There has been much speculation concerning this holy woman Bega, but it is
-probable that the writer of her life combined myths which seem to be
-Keltic with accounts of two historical persons whom Bede keeps quite
-distinct. There is no reason to doubt Bede's statements in this matter or
-in others concerning affairs in the north, for he expressly affirms that
-he 'was able to gain information not from one author only but from the
-faithful assertion of innumerable witnesses who were in a position to know
-and remember these things; besides those things,' he adds, 'which I could
-ascertain myself.' He passed his whole life studying and writing in the
-monasteries of SS. Peter and Paul, two settlements spoken of as one, near
-the mouth of the river Wear, close to where Hild had first settled. He
-went there during the lifetime of Bennet Biscop ([Dagger] 690), the
-contemporary of Hild and a shining representative of the culture the
-Anglo-Saxons attained in the 7th century.
-
-Hild settled at Hartlepool about the year 647. Eight years later Oswiu
-finally routed the army of Penda, whose attacks had been for so many years
-like a battering ram to the greatness of Northumbria. And in fulfilment of
-a vow he had made that the Christian religion should profit if God
-granted him victory, he gave Hild the charge of his daughter Aelflaed 'who
-had scarcely completed the age of one year, to be consecrated to God in
-perpetual virginity, besides bestowing on the Church twelve estates.'
-Extensive property came with the child into the care of Hild, perhaps
-including the site of Streaneshalch[262], which is better known as Whitby,
-a name given to it at a later date by the Danes. Bede says that Hild here
-undertook to construct and arrange a monastery.
-
-Bede thus expresses himself on the subject of Hild's life and influence
-during the term of over thirty years which she spent first as abbess of
-Hartlepool and then as abbess of Whitby[263]:
-
-'Moreover, Hild, the handmaid of Christ, having been appointed to govern
-that monastery (at Hartlepool), presently took care to order it in the
-regular way of life, in all respects, according as she could gain
-information from learned men. For Bishop Aidan, also, and all the
-religious men who knew her, were wont to visit her constantly, to love her
-devotedly, and to instruct her diligently, on account of her innate
-wisdom, and her delight in the service of God.
-
-'When, then, she had presided over this monastery for some years, being
-very intent on establishing the regular discipline, according as she could
-learn it from learned men, it happened that she undertook also to
-construct and arrange a monastery in the place which is called
-Streanshalch; and this work being enjoined on her, she was not remiss in
-accomplishing it. For she established this also in the same discipline of
-regular life in which she established the former monastery; and, indeed,
-taught there also the strict observance of justice, piety, and chastity,
-and of the other virtues, but mostly of peace and charity, so that, after
-the example of the primitive Church, there was therein no one rich, no one
-poor; all things were common to all, since nothing seemed to be the
-private property of any one. Moreover, her prudence was so great that not
-only did ordinary persons, but even sometimes kings and princes, seek and
-receive counsel of her in their necessities. She made those who were under
-her direction give so much time to the reading of the Divine Scriptures,
-and exercise themselves so much in works of righteousness, that very many,
-it appeared, could readily be found there, who could worthily enter upon
-the ecclesiastical grade, that is the service of the altar.'
-
-In point of fact five men who had studied in Hild's monastery were
-promoted to the episcopate. Foremost among them is John, bishop of Hexham
-(687-705) and afterwards of York ([Dagger] 721), the famous St John of
-Beverley, a canonised saint of the Church, of whose doings Bede has left
-an account. In this[264] we hear of the existence of another monastery for
-women at Watton (Vetadun) not far from Whitby, where Bishop John went to
-visit the abbess Heriburg, who was living there with her 'daughter in the
-flesh,' Cwenburg, whom she designed to make abbess in her stead. We hear
-no more about Watton till centuries later, but Bede's remark is
-interesting as showing how natural he felt it to be that the rule of a
-settlement should pass from mother to daughter.
-
-Cwenburg was suffering from a swollen arm which John tells us was very
-serious, 'since she had been bled on the fourth day of the moon,' 'when
-both the light of the moon and the tide of the ocean were on their
-increase. And what can I do for the girl if she is at death's door?' he
-exclaims. However his combined prayers and remedies, which were so often
-efficacious, helped to restore her.
-
-Aetla, another of Hild's scholarly disciples, held the see of Dorchester,
-though perhaps only temporarily during the absence of Aegilberht. A third,
-Bosa, was archbishop of York between 678 and 686; Bede speaks of him as a
-monk of Whitby, a man of great holiness and humility. Oftfor, another of
-Hild's monks, went from Whitby to Canterbury, to study 'a more perfect'
-system of discipline under Archbishop Theodore ([Dagger] 690), and
-subsequently became bishop of Worcester.
-
-The career of these men shows that the system of discipline and education
-under Hild at Whitby compared favourably with that of other settlements.
-At the outset she had followed the usages of the Scottish Church, with
-which she was familiar through her intercourse with Aidan, but when the
-claims for an independent British Church were defeated at Whitby, she
-accepted the change and adopted the Roman usage.
-
-The antagonism which had existed from the first appearance of Augustine in
-England between Roman Christianity and British Christianity as upheld by
-the Scottish and Welsh clergy took the form of open disagreement in
-Northumbria. On one side was the craving for ritual, for refinement and
-for union with Rome; on the other insistence by the Scottish clergy on
-their right to independence.
-
-Aidan had been succeeded at Lindisfarne by Finnan, owing to whose
-influence discussion was checked for the time being. But after his death
-(661) the latent antagonism came to a head over the practical difficulty
-due to the different dates at which King Oswiu and Queen Eanflaed kept
-Easter. Thus the way was cleared for the Whitby synod (664), a 'gathering
-of all orders of the Church system,' at which the respective claims of
-Roman and of British Christianity were discussed.
-
-The British interest was represented among others by Colman, Finnan's
-successor at Lindisfarne, who temporarily held the see at York, and by
-Aegilberht, bishop of Dorchester. The opposite side was taken by the
-protege of Queen Eanflaed, Wilfrith, abbot of Ripon, whose ardour in the
-cause of Rome had been greatly augmented by going abroad with Bennet
-Biscop about the year 653. Besides these and other prelates, King Oswiu
-and his son and co-regent Ealhfrith were present at the synod. The abbess
-Hild was also there, but she took no part in the discussion.
-
-The questions raised were not of doctrine but of practice. The computation
-of Easter, the form of the tonsure, matters not of belief but of
-apparently trivial externals, were the points round which the discussion
-turned. Owing chiefly to Wilfrith's influence the decision was in favour
-of Rome, and a strong rebuff was given for a time to the claim for an
-independent British Church in the north.
-
-The choice of Whitby as the site of the synod marks the importance which
-this settlement had attained within ten years of its foundation. Those who
-have stood on the height of the cliff overlooking the North Sea and have
-let their gaze wander over the winding river course and the strand below
-can realize the lordly situation of the settlement which occupies such a
-distinguished place among the great houses and nurseries of culture at
-Hexham, Wearmouth, Jarrow, Ripon and York.
-
-The property which the monastery held in overlordship extended along the
-coast for many miles, and the settlement itself consisted of a large group
-of buildings; for there are references to the dwellings for the men, for
-the women, and to an outlying house for the sick. These dwellings were
-gathered round the ancient British Church of St Peter, which was situated
-under the shelter of the brow of the cliff where King Eadwin lay buried,
-and which continued to be the burial-place of the Northumbrian kings.
-Isolated chapels and churches with separate bands of religious votaries
-belonging to them lay in other parts of the monastic property, and were
-subject to the abbess of Whitby. We hear of a minor monastery at Easington
-(Osingadun)[265] during the rule of Aelflaed, Hild's successor, and at
-Hackness (Hacanos) on the limit of the monastic property, thirteen miles
-south of Whitby, a monastery of some importance had been founded by
-Hild[266]. Bands of men and of women dwelt here under the government of
-Frigith, and it was here that the nun Begu had a vision of Hild on the
-night of her death, when she saw her borne aloft by attendant angels[267].
-
-The name of Hild and the monastery at Whitby are further endeared to
-posterity through their connection with Caedmon, the most celebrated of
-the vernacular poets of Northumbria and the reputed author of the
-Anglo-Saxon metrical paraphrases of the Old Testament[268]. It was his
-great reputation as a singer that made Hild seek Caedmon and persuade him
-to join her community. Here the practice of reading Holy Scripture made
-him familiar with the stories of Hebrew literature in their grand and
-simple setting, and he drank of the waters of that well to which so many
-centuries of creative and representative art have gone for inspiration.
-
-Caedmon's power of song had been noticed outside the monastery.
-
-'And all concluded that a celestial gift had been granted him by the Lord.
-And they interpreted to him a certain passage of sacred history or
-doctrine, and ordered him to turn it if he could into poetical rhythm. And
-he, having undertaken it, departed, and returning in the morning brought
-back what he was ordered to do, composed in most excellent verse.
-Whereupon presently the abbess, embracing heartily the grace of God in the
-man, directed him to leave the secular habit, and to take the monastic
-vow; and having together with all her people received him into the
-monastery associated him with the company of the brethren, and ordered him
-to be instructed in the whole course of sacred history. And he converted
-into most sweet song whatever he could learn from hearing, by thinking it
-over by himself, and, as though a clean animal, by ruminating; and by
-making it resound more sweetly, made his teachers in turn his
-hearers[269].'
-
-These passages are curious as showing that a singer of national strains
-was persuaded to adapt his art to the purposes of religion. The
-development of Church music is usually held to have been distinct from
-that of folk-music, but in exceptional cases such as this, there seems to
-have been a relation between the two.
-
-Excavations recently made on several of the sites of ancient northern
-monasteries have laid bare curious and interesting remains which add
-touches of reality to what is known about the houses of the north during
-this early period[270]. In a field called Cross Close at Hartlepool near
-Durham skeletons of men and women were found, and a number of monumental
-stones of peculiar shape, some with runic inscriptions of women's names.
-Some of these names are among those of the abbesses inscribed in the
-so-called 'Book of Life of Durham,' a manuscript written in gold and
-silver lettering in the early part of the 9th century[271]. Again, an
-ancient tombstone of peculiar design was found at Healaugh; and at
-Hackness several memorial crosses are preserved, one of which bears the
-inscription of the name Aethelburg, who no doubt is the abbess of that
-name with whom Aelflaed, Hild's successor at Whitby, in 705 travelled to
-the death-bed of King Ealdfrith[272].
-
-Finally on the Whitby coast on the south side of the abbey a huge
-kitchen-midden was discovered. A short slope here leads to the edge of the
-cliff, and excavations on this slope and at its foot, which was once
-washed by the tide, have revealed the facts that the denizens of the
-original monastery were wont to throw the refuse of their kitchen over the
-cliff, and that the lighter material remained on the upper ledges, the
-heavier rolling to the bottom.
-
-Among the lighter deposits were found bones of birds, oyster, whelk and
-periwinkle shells, and two combs, one of which bears a runic inscription.
-Among the heavier deposits were bones of oxen, a few of sheep, and a large
-number of the bones and tusks of wild swine, besides several iron
-pot-hooks and other implements; a bone spindle and a divided ink-horn are
-among the objects specified. An inscribed leaden bulla found among the
-refuse is declared by experts to be earlier than the 8th century; it is
-therefore proof that these remains were deposited during the earlier
-period of the existence of Hild's monastery, possibly during her lifetime.
-
-Hild died after an illness of several years on November 17, 680. Would
-that there were more data whereby to estimate her personality! The few
-traits of her character that have been preserved, her eagerness to acquire
-knowledge, her success in imparting it to others, her recognition of the
-need of unity in the Church, the interest she took in one who could repeat
-the stories of the new faith in strains which made them intelligible to
-the people, are indicative of a strong personality and of an understanding
-which appreciated the needs of her time.
-
-Various myths, of which Bede knows nothing, have been attached to her name
-in course of time. According to a popular legend she transformed the
-snakes of the district into the ammonites familiar to visitors to those
-parts. And it is said that at certain times of the day her form can be
-seen flitting across the abbey ruins[273].
-
-At her death the rule of the settlement passed to Aelflaed, the princess
-who had been given into her care as a child. After King Oswiu's death in
-670 Queen Eanflaed joined her daughter in the monastery. The princess and
-abbess Aelflaed proved herself worthy of the influence under which she had
-grown up, and we shall find her among the persons of importance who took
-up a decided attitude in regard to the disturbances which broke out
-through the action of Bishop Wilfrith. The beginnings of these
-difficulties belong to the lifetime of Hild: we do not know that she took
-any interest in the matter, but judging from indirect evidence we should
-say that she shared in the feeling which condemned the prelate's
-anti-national and ultra-Roman tendencies.
-
-
-Sec. 3. Ely and the influence of Bishop Wilfrith.
-
-The further history of the monastery of Whitby and the history of the
-foundation of Ely are closely connected with the prelate Wilfrith, and for
-this reason his actions and attitude claim our attention. In him we
-recognise a direct advocate of the principle that a queen could if she
-chose leave her husband and retire to a religious settlement, and that
-such a course would secure her the favour of the Church.
-
-It has been said of him that he was the most important man in Northumbria
-for forty years after the Whitby synod[274]. He owed his education to
-Queen Eanflaed, whose attention he had attracted when quite a youth, and
-who had sent him into Kent to complete his education; there he imbibed
-strong Roman sympathies. He lived for some years in France and Italy in
-the society of Bennet Biscop, and he was already held in high esteem at
-the time of the Whitby synod, which he attended in the character of abbot
-of the monastery at Ripon, a house he had founded with the help of
-Ealhfrith.
-
-When Colman and his adherents beat a rapid retreat to the north in
-consequence of the decision of the synod, Wilfrith became bishop of York,
-an appointment which meant ecclesiastical supremacy over the whole vast
-province of Northumbria. His intellectual brilliancy gained him many
-admirers, but an innate restlessness of disposition and a wilful
-determination to support the power of Rome to the national detriment
-launched him into repeated difficulties with temporal and spiritual
-rulers. He was at the height of prosperity and popularity when Ecgfrith
-succeeded Oswiu in 670 after the death of Ealhfrith. Wilfrith had hitherto
-been on good terms with Ecgfrith, but a breach in their relations soon
-occurred, partly owing to the conduct of Ecgfrith's wife, Aethelthrith,
-whom Wilfrith supported against the king.
-
-Aethelthrith, known to a later age as Etheldred or Awdrey, was the
-daughter of King Anna of the East Angles (635-645), whose province,
-including the present shires of Norfolk and Suffolk, was removed from
-direct intercourse with others by the almost impassable reaches of the
-fens. Anglia has not left any annals of her own, and we have to depend for
-the names and dates of her kings on the slight information which other
-provinces have preserved.
-
-Written legends generally consider Anna as the father also of Sexburg, the
-foundress of Sheppey, and of Aethelburg and Saethrith, two princesses who
-had settled in France, as well as of Wihtburg, a woman-saint of whom very
-little is known, and who was associated with a religious foundation at
-East Dereham in Norfolk[275]. We further learn from legend that King Anna
-was married to Hereswith, sister of Hild of Whitby, and Aethelthrith is
-spoken of as niece to the great abbess Hild. But this connection is
-discredited by a statement in Bede which suggests that Hild's sister
-Hereswith was married not to King Anna but to his successor King
-Aethelhere (654-664). It is difficult to decide to which of the kings of
-the East Angles Hereswith was married, but Anna was certainly not her
-husband[276].
-
-The princess Aethelthrith at the time of her marriage with the king of
-Northumbria was the widow of Tunberht prince of the South-Gyrvi, or
-fen-country men. Anglia stood at this time in a relation of dependence to
-Northumbria, and in 664, four years before the Whitby synod, Aethelthrith
-a woman of over thirty was married to Ecgfrith a boy of fifteen, the
-heir-apparent to the throne of Northumbria. The marriage was no doubt
-arranged for political reasons.
-
-The consequences which followed render these facts worthy of notice. For
-Aethelthrith on her arrival in the north at once conceived a great
-admiration for the prelate Wilfrith, while she treated her husband with
-contumely. She bestowed on Wilfrith the extensive property at Hexham which
-she had received from her husband, and on which Wilfrith built the church
-which was spoken of in his days as the most wonderful building on this
-side of the Alps[277]. Judging from what Wilfrith himself told him about
-the queen's attitude Bede says 'the king knew that she loved no man more
-than Wilfrith.'
-
-The events that followed bear out this statement, for after living about
-ten years with the king, Aethelthrith left him and repaired to the
-monastery of Coldingham (Coludesburg) in Berwickshire, which had been
-founded and was ruled over by Aebbe, sister, or perhaps half-sister, of
-the kings Oswald and Oswiu[278]. King Ecgfrith may or may not have agreed
-to this step. Eddi, the friend and biographer of Wilfrith, maintains a
-judicious silence on the relations of the king and queen, while Bede
-represents[279] that Aethelthrith had always had an aversion to the
-married state and describes how he had been told by Wilfrith himself that
-Ecgfrith promised much land and money to the prelate if he persuaded the
-queen to allow him conjugal rights.
-
-At Coldingham Wilfrith gave Aethelthrith the veil; this act involved her
-breaking all marital ties. But she cannot have deemed her position secure,
-for she presently left Coldingham, which was within her husband's
-territory, and went to Ely, the island in the fens which her first husband
-Tunberht had bestowed on her.
-
-Under the date 673 stand in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle these words: 'And
-Aetheldryth began the monastery at Ely.' It was situated on a hill
-prominent above the flatness of the surrounding fen-land, which at that
-time consisted of a wilderness of marsh and water. Men and women readily
-flocked thither to live under the guidance of the queen. We hear that she
-received material aid from her cousin King Ealdwulf of Anglia, that Hunna
-acted as her chaplain, and that Bishop Wilfrith stayed with her on his
-passage from Northumbria to Rome. Thomas of Ely (fl. c. 1174) has
-embellished the account of Aethelthrith's flight and journey south by
-introducing into the story various picturesque incidents, which Bede does
-not mention. She, with her companions Sewenna and Sewara[280], was saved
-from her pursuers by water rising round a rock on which they had taken
-refuge, and she was sheltered by an ash-tree which grew in one night out
-of her pilgrim's staff and which can still be seen at a place called
-Etheldredstowe[281]. As Aethelthrith of Ely is a favourite saint of
-English legend it is interesting to find water and the tree miraculously
-associated with her.
-
-Shortly after Aethelthrith's departure Ecgfrith summoned Theodore,
-archbishop of Canterbury, to the north to divide the diocese of York into
-three separate districts. Wilfrith resented these proceedings as an
-infringement of his rights, but as he was unable to influence the king he
-determined to seek the intervention of the Pope and set out for Rome. His
-absence extended over several years.
-
-It was at this time, Bede tells us, that Aethelthrith 'having built a
-monastery at Ely began both by example and by admonition of heavenly life
-to be a virgin mother of very many virgins[282].' The particulars he gives
-of her life show that she had renounced the splendours which constituted
-so essential a feature of royalty and had willingly devoted herself to
-humility and self-denial. She wore no linen, only wool, rarely used a warm
-bath, save on the eve of great festivals, and assisted at the washing of
-others. When she fell ill of a tumour in her throat, she told the
-physician Cynefrith, who lanced it, that she looked upon it as a
-chastisement for her love of wearing necklaces in her youth. And on her
-death-bed she desired to be buried in a wooden coffin in the nun's
-ordinary cemetery.
-
-The fame of Aethelthrith spread rapidly. She was looked upon as a virgin,
-and her name with the epithet virgin was inscribed at an early date in
-both the Anglo-Saxon and Roman Calendars, and to this day it is to be
-found in the Book of Common Prayer. Later writers of her legend say that
-she lived with Ecgfrith 'not as a wyfe but as a lady,' and add as a
-fitting pendant to this story that she maintained similar relations with
-her first husband Tunberht[283]. She died in the year 679, having presided
-over her monastery only six or seven years, but during that time it had
-gained marked importance. Many women had come to live there with her, and
-among them her sister Sexburg, widow of the king of Kent, who had founded
-the monastery at Sheppey and now succeeded Aethelthrith as abbess of Ely.
-
-The chief event of Sexburg's rule at Ely was the exhumation of the bones
-of Aethelthrith in 695, which were transferred to a stone coffin of
-antique workmanship which had been opportunely, or miraculously as
-contemporaries thought, discovered at the old Roman colony of Grantchester
-near Cambridge[284]. This translation took place on the 17th of October, a
-day on which the relics were again transferred in 1106, and which is the
-date of the important fair of Ely[285].
-
-In a supplement to the History of Ely by Bentham, Essex gives an account
-of the ruins of the conventual church begun by Aethelthrith[286]. Judging
-from his investigations the church consisted of two parts, the nave and
-the choir, the windows of the nave outside being ornamented with pillars
-and arches, and the choir being arched with stone. Traces were still left
-of the apartments of the abbess from which she could enter the church in a
-private manner, and of a building opposite of equal dimensions which
-served as a dormitory for the nuns. At a little distance the remains of
-another large building were discovered, one room of which, near the
-entrance to the settlement, was a parlour for the reception of strangers,
-and the apartment over it a dormitory for the men.
-
-We know little more than the name of the next abbess of Ely. She was
-Sexburg's daughter Eormenhild, wife of King Wulfhere of Mercia, who had
-hitherto dwelt in the monastery of Sheppey. Eormenhild in her turn was
-succeeded by her daughter, the celebrated St Werburg of Chester, who was
-never married. Various stories are preserved about Werburg's influence,
-but without reference to her work at Ely. We are indebted to Gocelin for
-the oldest account of her[287]. He tells us that her uncle King Aethelraed
-of Mercia entrusted her with the care of all the monasteries in his
-kingdom, that she had founded religious houses at Trentham and at Hanbury,
-besides turning a palace at Wedon-le-Street into a monastery[288]. He
-speaks of her as a person of great cheerfulness and benevolence, and of a
-peaceful and happy disposition. Several accounts of her are extant in
-manuscripts of different dates, and as late as the 15th century her life
-was made the subject of a most graceful metrical epic by the poet Henri
-Bradshaw ([Dagger] 1513)[289].
-
-We are told that Werburg died at Trentham and that the society of that
-place wished to keep her body, but the nuns of Hanbury carried it off by
-force and enshrined it at Hanbury where the day of her deposition was
-kept[290]. During the viking invasion in 875 the body for the sake of
-safety was conveyed to Chester, of which town St Werburg then became
-patron saint. This incident gave rise at a later date to the story that
-the saint had founded the monastery and the chief church at Chester on
-land given to her by her father. Livien mentions that nine churches in
-England are dedicated to St Werburg, who appears to have been a person of
-considerable importance[291].
-
-Once more we must return to the north and to the work of Bishop Wilfrith,
-as he came into contact with various other religious women. When he
-returned to England after an absence of several years Aethelthrith was
-dead, but King Ecgfrith's hatred of him had not abated. Insulted in his
-person and nation he caused Wilfrith to be thrown into prison, offering to
-give him back part of his bishopric and other gifts if he would submit to
-royal authority and disclaim the genuineness of the document brought from
-Rome[292]. Queen Eormenburg, whom Ecgfrith had taken to wife in place of
-Aethelthrith, further embittered the king against the unlucky prelate. She
-appropriated the reliquary Wilfrith had brought from Rome and wore it as
-an ornament. For nine months the prelate was kept imprisoned, and the
-story how he regained his liberty brings us back to Aebbe, abbess at
-Coldingham, who had formerly sheltered Aethelthrith[293].
-
-According to the account of Eddi, Wilfrith's biographer, the king and
-queen of Northumbria were staying at Coldingham when the queen was
-suddenly taken ill. 'At night she was seized like the wife of Pilate by a
-devil, and worn out by many ills, hardly expected to see the day alive.'
-The abbess Aebbe went to King Ecgfrith and represented to him that the
-reason of this seizure was their treatment of Wilfrith.
-
-'And now, my son,' she said, 'do according to the bidding of your mother;
-loosen his bonds and send back to him by a trusty messenger the holy
-relics which the queen took from him and like the ark of God carried about
-with her to her harm. It were best you should have him as your bishop, but
-if you refuse, set him free and let him go with his followers from your
-kingdom wherever he list. Then by my faith you will live and your queen
-will not die; but if you refuse by God's witness you will not remain
-unpunished.'
-
-Aebbe carried her point and Wilfrith was set free. He went into Mercia
-which was at war with Northumbria, but he was not suffered to stay there,
-for Queen Ostrith, the sister of King Ecgfrith, shared her brother's
-hatred of him. Forced to fly from Mercia he went into Wessex, but King
-Centwin's wife prevented him from staying there. It is curious to note the
-hatred with which these married women pursued him while lady abbesses were
-his friends. At last he found protection among the south Saxons, who
-fifteen years before had nearly killed him, but their king Aethelwalch
-([Dagger] 686) had lately been converted to Christianity and gave him a
-friendly reception. Wilfrith is represented as joining his civilizing
-influences to those of the Irish monks who had settled on the coast. An
-interesting episode of his sojourn here was his intercourse with
-Caedwalla, afterwards king of Wessex (685-688), who at the time was living
-as an outlaw in the forests of Sussex[294].
-
-We get further glimpses of Aebbe and the settlement at Coldingham. She
-entertained a great admiration for the holy man Cuthberht ([Dagger] 687),
-one of the most attractive figures among the evangelizing prelates of the
-north, of whom Bede has left an account.
-
-Cuthberht was brought both by birth and education under Scottish
-influences. He was prior at Melrose before the Whitby synod, but after it
-came to Lindisfarne where his gentleness of temper and sweetness of
-disposition won over many to accept Roman usages. Overcome by the longing
-for solitude and contemplation which was so characteristic of many early
-Christian prelates, he dwelt as a recluse on the desert island of Farne
-from 676 to 685. There are many accounts of his life and of his
-wanderings[295].
-
-At the time when Cuthberht's fame was spreading, Aebbe of Coldingham 'sent
-to this man of God, begging him to come and condescend to edify both
-herself and the inmates of her monastery by the grace of his exhortation.
-Cuthberht accordingly went thither and tarrying for some days he expounded
-the ways of justice to all; these he not only preached, but to the same
-extent he practised[296].'
-
-It is recorded that during his stay at Coldingham Cuthberht went at night
-to pray on the deserted beach, and the seals came out of the water and
-clustered around him.
-
-The first instance mentioned by Bede of a lapse of monastic discipline was
-at Coldingham where disorders occurred during Aebbe's rule[297]. An Irish
-monk who was on a visit to the monastery had a vision of its destruction
-by fire, and when questioned about it by the abbess interpreted it as an
-impending retribution for the tenor of life of those assembled there.
-
-'For even the dwellings,' he said, 'which were built for praying and
-reading are now converted into places of revelling, drinking, conversation
-and other forbidden doings; the virgins who are vowed to God, laying aside
-all respect for their profession, whenever they have leisure spend all
-their time in weaving fine garments with which they adorn themselves like
-brides, to the detriment of their condition, and to secure the friendship
-of men outside.'
-
-Through Aebbe's efforts things somewhat improved, but after her death, the
-date of which is uncertain, the monastery really was destroyed by
-fire[298]. The story is told that Cuthberht at Lindisfarne forbade women
-to cross the threshold of his conventual church on account of the life of
-the nuns at Coldingham[299], but another version of his doings considers
-that his attitude was due to an episode with a Scottish king's daughter
-which turned him against the sex[300].
-
-Cuthberht was also the friend of Aelflaed, abbess of Whitby, who
-entertained unbounded reverence for him. On one occasion[301] she had
-fallen ill and, as she herself told the monk Herefrid, suffered so from
-cramp that she could hardly creep along. 'I would,' she said, 'I had
-something belonging to my dear Cuthberht, for I believe and trust in the
-Lord that I should soon be restored to health.'
-
-In compliance with her wish the holy man sent her a linen girdle, which
-she wore for a time and which entirely cured her. Later a nun by the help
-of the same girdle was relieved of a headache, but after that the girdle
-of miraculous power miraculously disappeared. The reason given for this
-disappearance illustrates naively enough how divine power was considered
-to be justified in making itself manifest with a reservation. 'If this
-girdle had remained present,' Bede argues, 'the sick would always flock to
-it; and whilst some one of these might not be worthy to be healed, its
-efficacy to cure might have been denied, whereas their own unworthiness
-was perhaps to blame. Therefore, as was said above, Heaven so dealt its
-benevolence, that, after the faith of believers had been confirmed, then
-immediately the opportunity for detraction was entirely withdrawn from the
-malice of the unrighteous.'
-
-Contemporary witnesses bear testimony to the wisdom and prudence of the
-abbess Aelflaed of Whitby, for Bede says in the life of Cuthberht that
-'she increased the lustre of her royal lineage with the higher nobility
-of a more exalted virginity'; whilst Eddi speaks of her as 'the most
-virtuous virgin who is actually a king's daughter,' and in another passage
-characterizes her as 'ever the comforter and best counsellor of the whole
-province.'
-
-We find her in Cuthberht's society on more than one occasion. Once he met
-her at the monastery of 'Osingadune' (Easington) where he went to dedicate
-the church, and while sitting by her at table he had a prophetic vision of
-the death of one of her servants[302].
-
-The abbess Aelflaed directly appealed to this prophetic insight of
-Cuthberht's when troubled in her mind about her brother King Ecgfrith,
-whose expedition against the Picts filled her with apprehension[303]. In
-the words of Bede: 'At another time, the same most reverend virgin and
-mother of Christ's virgins, Aelflaed, sent to the man of God, adjuring him
-in the name of the Lord that she might be allowed to see him, to converse
-on some pressing affairs. Cuthberht accordingly went on board ship,
-accompanied by some of the brethren, and came to the island which from its
-situation opposite to the river Coquet receives its name, and is
-celebrated for its community of monks; there it was that the aforesaid
-abbess had requested him to meet her. When she was satisfied with his
-replies to her many enquiries, on a sudden, while he was yet speaking, she
-fell at his feet and adjured him by the sacred and venerable Name of the
-Heavenly King and His angels, to tell her how long Ecgfrith, her brother,
-should live and rule over the kingdom of the Angles; "For I know," she
-said, "that you abound in the spirit of prophecy, and that you can tell me
-this, if you will." But he, trembling at her adjuration, and yet not
-wishing openly to reveal the secret which she asked for, replied, "It is
-marvellous that you, a woman wise and well-instructed in the Holy
-Scriptures, should speak of the term of human life as if it were long,
-seeing that the Psalmist says, 'Our years shall be considered as a
-spider[304],' and that Solomon warns us that, 'If a man live many years
-and have rejoiced in them all, he must remember the darksome time and the
-many days, which, when they shall come, the things passed shall be accused
-of vanity[305].' How much more then ought he, to whom only one year of
-life remains, to be considered as having lived a short time, when death
-shall stand at his gates?"
-
-'The abbess, on hearing this, lamented the dreadful prophecy with floods
-of tears, and having wiped her face, with feminine boldness she adjured
-him by the majesty of the sovereignty of God to tell her who would be the
-heir of the kingdom, since Ecgfrith had neither sons nor brothers.
-Cuthberht was silent for a short time, then he replied, "Say not that he
-is without heirs, for he shall have a successor whom you may embrace with
-sisterly affection as you do Ecgfrith himself." But she continued: "Tell
-me, I beseech you, where he is now." And he said, "You see this mighty and
-wide ocean, how it abounds with many islands. It is easy for God from one
-of these to provide a ruler for the kingdom of the Angles." Then she
-understood that he spoke of Ealdfrith (Aldfrid) who was said to be the son
-of Ecgfrith's father, and who at that time lived in exile, in the islands
-of the Scots, for the sake of studying letters.'
-
-This meeting, if we credit the historian, took place in 684, and
-Aelflaed's forebodings were realized. Ecgfrith lost his life, and part of
-his kingdom was taken by the Picts. In consequence of his defeat the
-settlement Whithern, set up as a religious outpost in the territory south
-of the Firth of Forth, was destroyed. Trumwin who had been entrusted with
-it was forced to fly. He and his friends sought refuge at Whitby where he
-remained and had much intercourse with Cuthberht and Aelflaed. Bede says
-that the abbess found 'great assistance in governing and also comfort for
-her own life' in Trumwin[306].
-
-Northumbria had now passed the zenith of her greatness as a political
-power, for the territory in the north which was lost through Ecgfrith's
-defeat was not regained, while in the south the province of Mercia began
-to shake off the Northumbrian yoke. King Ecgfrith had been succeeded by
-his half-brother Ealdfrith ([Dagger] 705) and owing to his attitude
-Wilfrith's exile came to an end. Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury, wrote
-a letter in his behalf to Ealdfrith and also one to Aelflaed of Whitby
-begging her to be at peace with him[307]. The prelate left Sussex for the
-north, where he remained for five years in undisturbed possession of his
-see[308]. But again the old quarrels revived, and Wilfrith in consequence
-of a council assembled by order of Ealdfrith at Eastrefield was robbed of
-his episcopal dignity and reduced to his abbacy at Ripon. He again
-insisted that the king and bishops should submit to the Pope, and at the
-age of well-nigh seventy he undertook another journey to Rome. But it was
-in vain he sent envoys to the king on his return. Ealdfrith was determined
-not to relent, but afterwards approaching death intimidated him. Feeling
-his end draw nigh he sent for Aelflaed of Whitby, who with the abbess
-Aethelburg (probably of Hackness) came to where he lay ill at Driffield in
-the East Riding. Aelflaed received the king's dying words, and at a
-council of prelates subsequently assembled on the river Nidd bore
-testimony that he had spoken in favour of making peace. Wilfrith regained
-part of his influence but remained in retirement at his monastery.
-
-Aelflaed outlived him and her friend Cuthberht who died in 687. It is
-probable that she assisted at the translation of Cuthberht's body in 698,
-for in the inventory of the church at Durham one of the linen cloths or
-outer envelopes of his body, which was taken from it in 1104, is described
-as 'a linen cloth of double texture which had enveloped the body of St
-Cuthbert in his grave; Elfled the abbess had wrapped him up in it[309].'
-
-Aelflaed is the last abbess of Whitby known by name. Her death is supposed
-to have taken place in 713. Her monastery, like so many houses in the
-north, which had grown to prosperity with the rising power of Northumbria,
-sank into insignificance with the decadence of that power. This decline
-was partly due to political reasons, but the dislike which the later kings
-of Northumbria felt towards monasteries may have had something to do with
-it. For as we shall see later on the example Queen Aethelthrith had set
-was probably followed by two other Northumbrian queens, Cyneburg, the wife
-of Ealhfrith, and Cuthburg, wife of Ealdfrith ([Dagger] 705), who returned
-to their own countries and there founded monasteries.
-
-
-Sec. 4. Houses in Mercia and in the South.
-
-From the north we turn to Mercia and Wessex, the central and south-western
-provinces of England. Mercia had clung longest to her heathen beliefs, for
-Christianity was not accepted there till after the defeat of Penda in 655
-when Northumbria gained supremacy. Penda, king of Mercia, remained
-faithful to his gods to the end himself, but his children adopted the new
-faith. His son Peada had already been baptized in Northumbria by Finnan
-who sent four ecclesiastics back with him to evangelise the Midlands, and
-Wulfhere (c. 658-675) Peada's brother and successor was married to the
-Christian princess Eormenhild of Kent, for whom Queen Sexburg had made the
-religious foundation at Sheppey. Peada had founded a religious settlement
-at Burh or Medehampstead which is better known as Peterborough, a name
-bestowed on it after its restoration in 970. The charter of the foundation
-of Burh is dated 664, and besides the signatures of Wulfhere and other
-princes and thanes it bears those of Wulfhere's sisters Cyneburg and
-Cyneswith[310].
-
-Cyneburg and Cyneswith were esteemed as saints on the strength of their
-religious foundations at Castor, a village some miles distant from
-Peterborough; the name Cyneburg is held by the local historian to survive
-in the appellations of Lady Connyburrow Walk and Coneygreve Close[311].
-Cyneburg had been married to Ealhfrith, who was for some time co-regent of
-Northumbria, but little is known of him after his presence at the synod of
-Whitby in 664. The charter of the Medehampstead foundation above referred
-to establishes beyond a doubt that Cyneburg had left her husband to found
-and preside over her monastery; for she is designated as 'formerly a queen
-who had resigned her sway to preside over a monastery of maidens[312].'
-Her legend, which is not older than John of Tinmouth[313], enlarges on
-this fact, and like Aethelthrith of Ely, Cyneburg together with her sister
-Cyneswith has found a place in the Calendar as a virgin saint[314].
-
-The legend which tells of Cyneburh and Cyneswith also refers to St Tibba
-or Tilba, their kinswoman, who dwelt at Ryhall not far from Castor. The
-same day was kept in commemoration of all these three saints at
-Peterborough, to which place their bodies were transferred at an early
-date. For the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (972) says of Aelfsi, abbot of
-Peterborough: 'And he took up St Kyneburg and St Kyneswith who lay at
-Castor, and St Tibba who lay at Ryhall, and brought them to Burh, and
-offered them all to St Peter in one day.' Camden[315] speaks of Tibba as a
-'saint of inferior order, who was worshipped as another Diana by fowlers,
-a patroness of hawking,' and adds information which shows that she was
-popularly connected with heathen survivals.
-
-Mercia was the birthplace of many picturesque legends about the conversion
-of members of the ruling family and about their religious foundations.
-When once Christianity was accepted the activity which kings, queens and
-prelates displayed in its favour was great, but the historical information
-we have about them is meagre.
-
-Thus Repton (Repandune) in Derbyshire, a monastery for women, had gained
-considerable importance when the noble youth Guthlac repaired thither in
-694 to devote himself to learning under the abbess Aelfthrith[316].
-Nothing is known about the beginnings of the house, and if the abbess
-Aelfthrith founded it she has not on this account been accepted as a saint
-like the founders of other houses. This omission may however be due to the
-difficulties which arose between Aelfthrith and the prelates of Mercia. We
-do not know their nature, but in 705 a council of Mercian clergy assembled
-to consider the re-admission of Aelfthrith to Church privileges[317]. A
-letter is also extant from Bishop Waldhere of London to Archbishop
-Brihtwald of Canterbury in which he mentions that a reconciliation has
-taken place[318].
-
-The noble youth Guthlac who came to study at Repton afterwards became
-famous, and many accounts of his life have been written[319]. The earliest
-version, drafted by his friend Felix, supplies some interesting details of
-the life at Repton and the studies there[320].
-
-We are told that Guthlac's progress was wonderful. 'When he had been there
-two years he had learnt the psalms, the canticles, the hymns and prayers
-after the ecclesiastical order,' but he met with disapproval in the
-monastery by refusing to drink wine. The accounts which he read of the
-solitary life of the older monks filled him with a longing for solitude,
-and he left Repton and wandered about till he found the place of his
-heart's desire at Crowland in the fen country, where he determined to
-settle. He had received the tonsure at Repton and returned there on a
-visit before finally settling at Crowland. He did not break his connection
-with Repton, for we hear that the abbess Ecgburh who succeeded Aelfthrith
-sent him as a gift a coffin made of wood and lead, together with a linen
-winding-sheet, and asked who should be warden of the place after him, as
-though she regarded Crowland as a dependency of Repton[321].
-
-The abbess Ecgburg was the daughter of King Ealdwulf of East Anglia
-([Dagger] 714)[322], and an eloquent letter which is quoted later in my
-account of Boniface's correspondents was probably written by her[323].
-
-In connection with Guthlac's solitary life we hear of a woman Pega, who
-had also chosen a retreat in the fen country, at a place afterwards known
-as Peykirk, which is now situated on a peninsula formed by the uplands of
-Northamptonshire and connected with the mound on which Guthlac dwelt by a
-ridge of gravel, but which at that time formed an island[324]. One version
-of Guthlac's life tells how 'he had a sister called Pega whom he would not
-see in this life, to the intent that they might the rather meet in the
-life to come'; and another manuscript life says that the Evil One appeared
-to the saint in the form of Pega. Mr W. de Birch Gray who has reprinted
-these accounts notices that the tone in which Florence of Worcester speaks
-of Pega suggests that to him at least she appeared more famous than
-Guthlac[325].
-
-Different accounts of Guthlac agree that at his death his companions at
-once departed to fetch Pega. In the celebrated series of drawings of the
-12th century, which set forth the story of St Guthlac, the holy woman Pega
-is depicted twice[326]. In one picture she steps into the boat, in which
-the companion of Guthlac has come to fetch her, and in the other she is
-represented as supporting the saint, who is enveloped in his shroud.
-
-The connection between Guthlac and Pega is at least curious, and the
-authority she at once assumed is noteworthy. 'For three days' space with
-sacred hymns of praise she commended the holy man to God,' says the
-Anglo-Saxon prose version of his life[327]. And further, 'After his death
-when he had been buried twelve months God put it into the heart of the
-servant of the Lord that she should remove the brother's body to another
-tomb. She assembled thither many of the servants of God and mass-priests,
-and others of the ecclesiastical order.... She wound the holy corpse, with
-praises of Christ's honour, in the other sheet which Ecgbriht the
-anchoress formerly sent him when alive for that same service.'
-
-The Acts of the Saints give an account of St Pega or Pegia and tell us
-that she went to Rome where she died[328]. Her reputation for holiness, as
-far as it is preserved, is based chiefly on her connection with Guthlac,
-but these accounts leave room for much that must necessarily remain
-conjecture.
-
-Other women-saints who were reputed to have lived about this period, and
-who were brought into connection with the rulers of Mercia, claim a
-passing attention, although their legends written at a much later date
-supply the only information we have about them. Thus there is St
-Osith[329] of Colchester, whose legend written in the 13th century is full
-of hopeless anachronisms. The house of Augustinian canons at Chich[330] in
-the 12th century was dedicated conjointly to the saints Peter and Paul and
-to the woman-saint Osith; a canon of this house, Albericus Veerus,
-probably wrote her legend. Perhaps St Osith of Aylesbury is identical with
-her[331].
-
-Our information is equally untrustworthy concerning St Frideswith, patron
-saint of Oxford, for it dates no further back than the 12th century[332].
-The chief interest in her legend is that its author establishes a
-connection between incidents in the life of Frideswith, and the dread
-which the kings of England had of entering Oxford; a dread which as early
-as 1264 is referred to as an 'old superstition[333].'
-
-All these women are credited in their legends with founding monasteries
-and gaining local influence, and excepting in the case of St Tibba, I have
-come across no coupling of their names with profane cults. Other
-women-saints who may perhaps be classed with them, though little survives
-except their names, are St Osburg of Coventry[334], St Modwen of Strenhall
-in Staffordshire and Burton-on-Trent[335], and St Everhild of Everingham
-in Yorkshire[336].
-
-Other names which occur in local calendars will be found in the _Menology_
-of Stanton, who has compiled a very complete list of men- and women-saints
-in England and Wales from a number of local calendars.
-
-In contrast to the uncertainty which hangs about the settlements under
-woman's rule in the Midlands and around their founders, two houses founded
-in the south of England during the 7th century stand out in clear
-prominence. Barking in Essex, and Wimbourne in Dorsetshire, attained a
-considerable degree of culture, and the information which has been
-preserved concerning them is ample and trustworthy.
-
-Bede has devoted several chapters of his history to stories connected with
-Barking[337]. It owed its foundation to Earconwald sometime bishop of
-London (675-693) who, after founding a settlement at Chertsey in Surrey
-under the rule of an abbot, in 666 made a home for his sister Aethelburg
-at Barking[338] where 'he established her excellently in the regular
-discipline.' Aethelburg appears to have been an energetic person, and has
-been raised to the rank of saint[339]. Her settlement included men as well
-as women, and young children seem to have been entrusted to her care for
-their education.
-
-Bede says that 'having taken the rule of the monastery she showed herself
-worthy of her brother the bishop in all respects, both by living rightly
-herself, and by the pious and prudent course she took to rule those who
-were subject to her; this was proved by celestial miracles.'
-
-A number of these miracles are described by him with considerable power.
-Between 664 and 684, a great pestilence, the earliest on record in
-Christian times, visited England and carried off many of the inmates of
-Barking. First a boy of three years fell ill and in dying called by name
-the nun Eadgith, who presently died. Another nun called Torctgith[340]
-also had a vision of impending death. 'One night at the beginning of dawn,
-having gone forth from the chamber in which she abode, she saw plainly as
-it were a human body, which was brighter than the sun, carried up on high,
-wrapped in fine linen, and lifted apparently from the house in which the
-sisters were usually placed to die. And when she looked more intently to
-see by what means the apparition of a glorious body which she beheld was
-raised on high, she saw that it was lifted up into the upper regions as it
-were by cords brighter than gold, until being introduced into the opening
-heavens it could no longer be seen by her.'
-
-This imagery foretold the death of Abbess Aethelburg, who was carried off
-by the pestilence. She was succeeded at Barking by Hildelith, whom
-Boniface refers to as a very estimable person and who has also found a
-place among the saints[341]. Capgrave speaks of her having been educated
-in France, whence she came to Barking at the desire of Bishop Earconwald
-to help in establishing the foreign system of discipline.
-
-It was for the abbess Hildelith and her companions at Barking that the
-scholar Ealdhelm ([Dagger] 709) wrote his great treatise on Virginity, a
-long and elaborate composition which sets before these women the beauties
-of the virgin life with a mass of illustration taken from religious and
-classical literature. From the point of view of women's religious life, it
-is worth while to describe this treatise at some length, for it shows what
-a high degree of culture had been attained at Barking towards the close of
-the seventh century.
-
-Ealdhelm, born of noble parentage about the year 640, is the
-representative in southern England of the classical revival which was
-about this time engrafted on Christian teaching. He studied first at
-Malmesbury under the learned Scot Maidulf and then at Canterbury where
-Archbishop Theodore and Abbot Hadrian were attracting many students, and
-where he perfected his Latin and musical studies and acquired in some
-measure the rare and much esteemed knowledge of Greek. 'A wonder of
-erudition in liberal as well as in ecclesiastical writings,' Bede calls
-him[342]. From Canterbury he returned to Malmesbury, which owing to his
-influence attained a fame which it kept till the Middle Ages. In 705 when
-Wessex was divided into two bishoprics, Ealdhelm was made bishop of the
-see of Sherbourne.
-
-The interest Ealdhelm took in women was so great that posterity pictured
-him as continually in their society[343]. Besides his great treatise,
-passages in his other works bear witness to this interest. In a letter
-addressed to Sigegith[344], he gave advice about the baptism of a nun who
-had been received into her community while still a heathen; to another nun
-whose name is not mentioned he sent a letter together with several
-poems[345]. He composed verses in praise of a church which Bugga, a
-daughter of King Centwin (670-685), had built[346]. And besides the prose
-treatise on virginity addressed to the sisterhood of Barking, he wrote a
-long poem in heroic hexameters on the same subject called the 'Praise of
-Virgins'; it has a preface addressed to the abbess Maxima, and is followed
-by a poem on the 'Eight chief Sins,' likewise intended for the perusal of
-nuns[347].
-
-Ealdhelm opens his prose work on virginity[348] with thanks to the women
-of Barking for the writings they have sent to him. Hildelith, Justina,
-Cuthburg, Osburg, Ealdgith, Scholastica, Hidburg, Burngith, Eulalia and
-Tecla are addressed by name. He praises them as gymnosophists, as scholars
-and as fighters in the arena of discipline (c. 2). Like unto bees, he says
-(c. 4), they collect everywhere material for study.
-
-Sometimes, he says, you study the Prophets, sometimes the Books of the
-Law, 'now skilfully tracking the fourfold wording of the gospel story,
-expounded in the mystic commentaries of the Catholic fathers, and
-spiritually bared to the kernel, and disposed fitly according to the
-four-square pattern of ecclesiastical usage, namely according to the
-letter, allegory, tropology and anagogy[349]; now carefully searching into
-the writers of history and into the collections of chronographers, who
-have handed down the changing events of the past in wording that impresses
-the mind. Sometimes you carefully examine the rules of grammarians, the
-laws of accentuation measured by tone and time, fixed in poetic feet by
-marks of punctuation, that is divided into parts of verse consisting of
-two and a half and three and a half feet, and changed in endless varieties
-of metre.'
-
-Ealdhelm then enlarges on the beauties of the virgin's life, and dwells
-especially on the charms of peaceful companionship which it secures. Again
-in their dwelling and working together the women are likened to bees.
-
-The charms of the virgin's life are then set forth in language redundant
-of imagery, verbose and grandiloquent in the extreme. We are told of the
-temptations which those who have adopted a religious life must guard
-against (c. 11). There are eight sins as to which they are especially
-warned; the chief of these is pride. Women are then directed as to the
-books they should make a special subject of study, and are recommended to
-peruse the works of Cassian (who in the 5th century wrote the 'Duties of
-Monastic Life') and the 'Moralities' of Gregory the Great (which contain
-reflections suggested by the book of Job), and they are advised to study
-the Psalms to avoid unhappiness (c. 14). With the love of contrast
-peculiar to early writers, Ealdhelm shows how the women who serve God and
-those who do not are different in their bearing and outward appearance,
-and enlarges on the relative value of different estates (c. 17): virginity
-is of gold, chastity is of silver; marriage (jugalitas) is of brass; and
-again: virginity is wealth, chastity is sufficiency, marriage is poverty,
-etc.
-
-He then displays the wide range of his learning by adducing many writers
-in support of his views (c. 20-40), in passages which are elaborate and
-instructive but wearisome through their reiterations. He enumerates all
-the women famous for their religious lives. The Virgin Mary comes first
-and she is followed by many women-saints of Italy and the East, on whom
-there is in some cases much, in others little, comment. In this list we in
-vain look for the names of religious women living on this side of the
-Alps. Helen the mother of Constantine (c. 48) is referred to, but her
-British origin is not mentioned and the idea of it had probably not arisen
-in Ealdhelm's time.
-
-The writer again turns to those who are devoted to religion, and in
-passages which are full of interest as a study of the times complains of
-the personal appearance of the clergy and of those women who have chosen
-religion as a profession. These passages are among the most instructive in
-regard to women and clearly show how completely life in a nunnery at the
-beginning of the 8th century differed from what it was later on.
-
-'It shames me,' he says, 'to speak of the bold impudence of conceit and
-the fine insolence of stupidity which are found both among nuns
-(sanctimoniales) who abide under the rule of a settlement, and among the
-men of the Church who live as clergy under the rule of the Pontiff. These
-act contrary to canonical decrees and to the rule of regular life, for
-with many-coloured vestments[350] and with elegant adornments the body is
-set off and the external form decked out limb by limb. The appearance of
-the other sex agrees with it; a vest of fine linen of a violet colour is
-worn, above it a scarlet tunic with a hood, sleeves striped with silk and
-trimmed with red fur; the locks on the forehead and the temples are curled
-with a crisping iron, the dark head-veil is given up for white and
-coloured head-dresses which, with bows of ribbon sewn on, reach down to
-the ground; the nails, like those of a falcon or sparrow-hawk, are pared
-to resemble talons'.... This state of things Ealdhelm strongly condemns.
-But he adds the remark that he is addressing no one in particular,
-evidently to avoid any umbrage his women friends might take at these
-remarks. His reference to luxurious clothing does not stand alone. The
-description Bede gives of the women at Coldingham has been quoted, and
-Boniface in a letter[351] to Cuthberht of Canterbury speaks of 'the
-adornment of clothes, trimmed with wide edging of purple,' which, he says,
-is deteriorating the young men in the monasteries, and foretells the
-coming of Antichrist. Sumptuous clothes as vestments during religious
-service remained in use, but in all other respects they were condemned as
-prejudicial to the welfare of those who were vowed to religion.
-
-Ealdhelm's work on virginity closes with an affectionate greeting to his
-women friends in which he addresses them finally as 'Flowers of the
-Church, sisters of monastic life, scholarly pupils, pearls of Christ,
-jewels of Paradise, and sharers of the eternal home.'
-
-His work was greatly prized and widely read both by his own and by later
-generations. It is extant in several copies of the 8th century[352], and
-maintained its reputation throughout the Middle Ages. William of
-Malmesbury ([Dagger] 1141) in his account of Ealdhelm specifies the work
-on virginity as one 'than which nothing can be more pleasing[353].' It
-still held its own when printing was introduced, for it was published at
-Deventer in Holland in 1512, and has since been reprinted for devotional
-purposes[354].
-
-Among those on whom the book made a profound impression was Cuthburg,
-sister of King Ina of Wessex (688-725). She was at one time an inmate of
-the Barking settlement and was probably one of those to whom the work was
-addressed.
-
-Cuthburg was held as a saint for founding a settlement at Wimbourne in
-Dorset[355], where the cult of her sister Cwenburg was associated with
-hers. Cuthburg as mentioned above was said to have left her husband
-Ealdfrith of Northumbria ([Dagger] 705) from religious motives. Her being
-held in veneration as a virgin saint may be due to her name being coupled
-with that of a virgin sister[356]. Missals printed at Rouen in 1515, and
-at Paris in 1519 and 1529, have an office prescribed for Cuthburg as a
-virgin[357]. The statement that she was the mother of Osred, afterwards
-king of Northumbria (706-717), is perhaps unfounded.
-
-There is no doubt as to Ealdhelm's friendly relations both with Cuthburg
-and her husband. He dedicated his enigmas to Ealdfrith under the title
-'Adcircius[358],' and in a letter dated 705 he declares that liberty of
-election is granted to all congregations under his government including
-that called 'Wimburnia,' over which Cuthburg, the king's sister,
-presides[359]. A manuscript of the 14th century, preserved in the nunnery
-of Romsey, contains a collection of saints' lives, and gives a full
-account of a conversation Cuthburg had with her husband previous to their
-separation[360]. It further relates how she placed the basilica of her
-settlement under the protection of the Mother of God, and was herself
-buried in it. She died some time between 720 and 730, probably nearer the
-earlier date, for several abbesses are said to have ruled between her and
-Tetta. The name of Tetta has been brought into connection with a place
-named Tetbury, but we know nothing definite concerning a monastery
-there[361]. As abbess of Wimbourne she was the teacher of Lioba, called
-also Leobgith, who went abroad at the desire of Boniface as we shall see
-further on.
-
-In the life of Lioba we get a description of the settlement of
-Wimbourne[362], which may be somewhat coloured to show the result of
-Tetta's strict and beneficent rule, but which deserves attention as
-yielding a fair example of the arrangements which in the eyes of its
-author appeared desirable for a monastery of women. The author, Rudolf of
-Fulda, was a monk who wrote between 800 and 850, and who compiled his work
-from notices which Magno ([Dagger] c. 838) had collected from women pupils
-of Lioba[363].
-
-'There were two settlements at Wimbourne, formerly erected by the kings of
-the country, surrounded by strong and lofty walls and endowed with ample
-revenues. Of these one was designed for men, the other for women; but
-neither, for such was the rule of their foundation, was ever entered by
-any member of the other sex. No woman had permission to come among the
-congregation of the men, no man to enter into the dwellings of the women,
-with the exception of the priests who entered to celebrate mass and
-withdrew at once when service was over. If a woman, desirous of quitting
-the world, asked to be admitted to the sisterhood (collegium), she joined
-it on condition that she should not leave it unless a reasonable cause or
-a special occasion took her out with the leave of the abbess. The abbess
-herself, when she gave orders in affairs of the settlement or tendered
-advice, spoke through a window and there gave her decision....'
-
-Wimbourne stands last in the list of well authenticated monastic
-foundations made by women during the early Anglo-Saxon period; of such
-foundations more than twenty have been mentioned in the course of this
-chapter. Others no doubt existed at this time, but we only hear of them at
-a later date. We find among them some of the centres most influential in
-enabling the Anglo-Saxons to attain a high degree of culture within a
-hundred years of their conversion to Christianity.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IV.
-
-ANGLO-SAXON NUNS IN CONNECTION WITH BONIFACE.
-
-    'Et ut dicitur, quid dulcius est, quam habeas illum, cum quo omnia
-    possis loqui ut tecum?' _Eangith to Boniface._
-
-
-Sec. 1. The Women corresponding with Boniface.
-
-In the course of the 6th and 7th centuries a number of men left England
-and settled abroad among the heathen Germans, partly from a wish to gain
-new converts to the faith, partly because a change of affairs at home made
-them long for a different field of labour. Through the influx of the
-heathen Anglo-Saxons, the British Christians had been deprived of their
-influence, and when Christianity was restored it was under the auspices of
-princes who were favourably inclined towards Rome. Men who objected to the
-Roman sway sought independence among the heathens abroad in preference to
-dependence on strangers at home, and it is owing to their efforts that
-Christianity was introduced into the valleys leading up from the Rhine,
-into the lake districts of Bavaria, and into Switzerland.
-
-A century later the Church had so far extended the limits of her power
-that it was felt desirable at Rome that these Christian settlers should be
-brought into subjection. For the tenets which they held and the traditions
-which had been handed down to them differed in many ways from what Rome
-could countenance. They were liberal in tolerating heathen practices, and
-ignorant of matters of ritual and creed which were insisted on in the
-Church of Rome. The bishops, who were self-appointed, were won over by the
-promise of recognising the title to which they laid claim, but the
-difficulty remained of weaning them from their objectionable practices.
-Efforts were accordingly made to reconvert the converted districts and to
-bring some amount of pressure to bear on the clergy.
-
-The representative of this movement in South Germany was Boniface,
-otherwise called Wynfred, on whom posterity has bestowed the title Apostle
-of Germany, in recognition of his services in the twofold character of
-missionary and reformer. He was a native of Wessex, and his mission abroad
-has an interest in connection with our subject because of the friendly
-relations he entertained with many inmates of women's houses in England,
-and because he invited women as well as men to leave England and assist
-him in the work which he had undertaken.
-
-Boniface had grown up as an inmate of the settlement of Nutshalling near
-Winchester and first went abroad in 716, but proceeded no further than
-Utrecht. Conjecture has been busy over the difficulties which took him
-away, and the disappointments which brought him back. Utrecht was an old
-Roman colony which had been captured from the Franks by Adgisl, king of
-the Frisians, who gave a friendly reception there to Bishop Wilfrith in
-678. But King Radbod, his successor, was hostile to the Franks and to
-Christianity, and it was only in deference to the powerful Frankish
-house-mayor Pippin that he countenanced the settling of Willibrord, a
-pupil of Wilfrith, with eleven companions in 692. However, owing to
-Radbod's enmity the position of these monks was such that they were
-obliged to leave, and it is possible that Boniface when he went to Utrecht
-was disappointed in not finding them there.
-
-Two years later Boniface went on a pilgrimage to Rome, where the idea of
-bringing his energies to assist in the extension of Papal influence
-originated. The Pope furnished him with a letter[364] in which he is
-directed to reclaim the faithless, and armed with this he travelled in the
-districts of the Main. But as soon as the news of the death of Radbod the
-Frisian ([Dagger] 719) reached him he went to Utrecht, where Willibrord
-had returned. We do not know what afterwards prompted him to resume his
-work in Germany, but perhaps the proposal of Willibrord that he should
-settle with him altogether awakened Boniface to the fact that he was not
-working for the Pope as he proposed. His reception at Rome, where he again
-went in 722, and the declaration of faith he handed in, are in favour of
-this view. But Gregory II who was aware of the abilities of Boniface
-forgave him, and on the strength of his declaration provided him with
-further letters. One of these was addressed to the Christians of Germany,
-to the representative clergy and to the Thueringians, and another to the
-house-mayor, Karl Martel, who had succeeded Pippin; both letters commanded
-that the authority of Boniface was to be everywhere recognised.
-
-From this time for a period of over thirty years Boniface devoted his
-energies to extending, organizing and systematizing the power of Rome in
-Germany. His character appears in different lights varying with the
-standpoint from which he is regarded. Judging from his letters he is
-alternately swayed by doggedness of purpose, want of confidence in
-himself, dependence on friends, and jealous insistence on his own
-authority. He has a curious way of representing himself as persecuted when
-in fact he is the persecutor, but his power of rousing enthusiasm for his
-work and for his personality is enormous.
-
-His biographer Wilibald describes this power as already peculiar to him
-during his stay at Nutshalling, where many men sought him to profit by his
-knowledge, 'while those who on account of their fragile sex could not do
-so, and those who were not allowed to stay away from their settlements,
-moved by the spirit of divine love, sought eagerly for an account of
-him[365]....'
-
-The interest Boniface had aroused at home accompanied him on his travels.
-He remained in friendly communication with many persons in England, to
-whom he wrote and who wrote to him. Among the friends and correspondents
-whose letters are preserved are churchmen, princes, abbesses, clerics of
-various degrees, and nuns. From the point of view of this book the letters
-addressed to women are of special interest, since they bring us into
-personal contact so to speak with the abbesses and inmates of English
-convents, and we hear for the first time what they personally have to tell
-us of themselves.
-
-Among Boniface's early friends and correspondents was Eadburg[366], abbess
-of the monastery in Thanet. She was a woman of great abilities, zealous in
-the pursuit of knowledge, and her influence secured several royal charters
-for her settlement. She had probably succeeded Mildthrith, but at what
-date is not known. Her letters to Boniface unfortunately have not been
-preserved, but the letters he wrote to her are full of interesting matter.
-The earliest of these was written between 718 and 719; in it Boniface does
-not yet address her as abbess[367].
-
-In this letter Boniface in compliance with a wish Eadburg had expressed,
-describes a vision of the future life which a monk living at Mildburg's
-monastery at Wenlock had seen during a state of suspended animation.
-Boniface had first heard of this vision from the abbess Hildelith of
-Barking, and he writes a graphic and eloquent account of it, parts of
-which are put into the mouth of the monk himself. The account gives
-curious glimpses of that imagery of the future life which early Christians
-dwelt upon and elaborated more and more. Nuns at this time as well as
-later took a special interest in the subject.
-
-First the monk is carried aloft through flames which enwrap the world. He
-sees many souls for the possession of which angels and devils are
-fighting. Impersonations of his sins confront and accost him, but his
-virtues arise also and enter into conflict with the sins. The virtues are
-supported by angels and the fight ends to the monk's advantage. He also
-sees fiery waters flowing towards hell: and souls like black birds which
-hover over waters from whence proceed the wails of the damned. He sees
-Paradise, and a river of pitch over which a bridge leads to Jerusalem, and
-souls are trying to cross it. Among others suffering torments he catches
-sight of King Ceolred of Mercia. At last the angels cast the monk down
-from the height and he re-awakens to life.
-
-Such descriptions of a future life multiply as one nears the Middle Ages.
-By the side of the one which Boniface sent to Eadburg should be read
-another by him, a fragmentary one, which supplements it[368]. The
-sufferers in hell mentioned in this are Cuthburg, Ceolla and Wiala (of
-whom nothing is known), an unnamed abbot and Aethelbald, king of Mercia
-([Dagger] 756).
-
-The description of the after life given by Boniface agrees in various ways
-with one contained in the works of Bede. According to this account there
-was a man in Northumbria named Drycthelm, who died, came to life again,
-and described what he had seen of the world to come.
-
-The other letters which Boniface addressed to Eadburg are of later date
-and were written when he had settled abroad and was devoting his energies
-to converting the Hessians and Thueringians. At this time he asked her to
-send him through the priest Eoban the letters of the apostle Peter, which
-she was to write for him in gold characters. 'Often,' he says, 'gifts of
-books and vestments, the proofs of your affection, have been to me a
-consolation in misfortune. So I pray that you will continue as you have
-begun, and write for me in gold characters the epistles of my master, the
-holy apostle Peter, to the honour and reverence of holy writ before mortal
-eyes while I am preaching, and because I desire always to have before me
-the words of him who led me on my mission....' He ends his letter by again
-hoping that she will accede to his request so 'that her words may shine in
-gold to the glory of the Father in heaven[369].'
-
-The art of writing in gold on parchment was unknown to Scottish artists
-and had been introduced into England from Italy. Bishop Wilfrith owned the
-four gospels 'written in purest gold on purple-coloured parchment,' and a
-few of the purple gospels with gold writing of this period have been
-preserved. The fact that women practised the art is evident from the
-letter of Boniface. Eadburg must have had a reputation for writing, for
-Lul, one of Boniface's companions, sent her among other gifts a silver
-style (_graphium argenteum_) such as was used at the time for writing on
-wax tablets[370].
-
-Boniface received frequent gifts from friends in England. Eoban, who
-carried his letter asking Eadburg for the Epistles of St Peter, was the
-bearer of a letter to an Abbot Duddo in which Boniface reminding him of
-their old friendship asked for a copy of the Epistles of St Paul[371].
-Again Boniface wrote asking Abbot Huetberht of Wearmouth for the minor
-works (_opuscula_) of Bede[372], and Lul, who was with him, wrote to
-Dealwin to forward the minor works of Ealdhelm, bishop of Sherbourne,
-those in verse and those in prose[373].
-
-Judging from the correspondence the effective work of Boniface resulted in
-the execution of only a small part of his great schemes. His original plan
-was repeatedly modified. There is extant a letter from the Pope which
-shows that he hoped for the conversion of the heathen Saxons and
-Thueringians[374], and the idea was so far embraced by Boniface that he
-wrote a letter to the bishops, priests, abbots and abbesses in England
-asking them to pray that the Saxons might accept the faith of Christ[375].
-But the plan for their conversion was eventually abandoned.
-
-At this period belief in the efficacy of prayer was unbounded, and praying
-for the living was as much part of the work of the professed as praying
-for the dead. Settlements apparently combined for the purpose of mutually
-supporting each other by prayer. A letter is extant in the correspondence
-of Boniface in which the abbot of Glastonbury, several abbesses and other
-abbots agree to pray at certain hours for each other's settlements[376].
-
-In his times of trouble and tribulation Boniface wrote to all his friends
-asking for prayers. 'We were troubled on every side,' he wrote to the
-abbess Eadburg, quoting Scripture[377], 'without were fightings, within
-were fears.' She was to pray for him that the pagans might be snatched
-from their idolatrous customs and unbelievers brought back to the Catholic
-mother Church.
-
-Eadburg had liberally responded to his request for gifts. 'Beloved
-sister,' he wrote[378], 'with gifts of holy books you have comforted the
-exile in Germany with spiritual light! For in this dark remoteness among
-German peoples man must come to the distress of death had he not the word
-of God as a lamp unto his feet and as a light unto his paths[379]. Fully
-trusting in your love I beseech that you pray for me, for I am shaken by
-my shortcomings, that take hold of me as though I were tossed by a tempest
-on a dangerous sea.' This consciousness of his shortcomings was not wholly
-due to the failure of his plans, for Boniface at one period of his life
-was much troubled by questions of theology. The simile of being
-tempest-tossed is often used by him. In a letter addressed to an unnamed
-nun he describes his position in language similar to that in which he
-addresses Eadburg. This nun also is urged to pray for him in a letter full
-of biblical quotations[380].
-
-Among the letters to Boniface there are several from nuns and abbesses
-asking for his advice. Political difficulties and the changed attitude of
-the ruling princes of Northumbria and Mercia towards convents brought such
-hardships to those who had adopted the religious profession that many of
-them wished to leave their homes, and availed themselves of the
-possibility of doing so which was afforded by the plan of going on
-pilgrimage to Rome.
-
-The wish to behold the Eternal City had given a new direction to the love
-of wandering, so strong a trait in human nature. The motives for visiting
-Rome have been different in different periods of history. To the convert
-in the 8th and 9th centuries Rome appeared as the fountain-head of
-Christianity, the residence of Christ's representative on earth, and the
-storehouse of famous deeds and priceless relics. Architectural remains
-dating from the period of Roman rule were numerous throughout Europe and
-helped to fill the imagination of those dwelling north of the Alps with
-wonder at the possible sights and treasures which a visit to Rome itself
-might disclose. Prelates and monks undertook the journey to establish
-personal relations with the Pope and to acquire books and relics for their
-settlements, but the taste for travelling spread, and laymen and wayfarers
-of all kinds joined the bands of religious pilgrims. Even kings and
-queens, with a sudden change of feeling which the Church magnified into a
-portentous conversion, renounced the splendour of their surroundings and
-donned the pilgrim's garb in the hope of beholding the Eternal City in its
-glory.
-
-Among the letters which are preserved in the correspondence of Boniface
-there is one from Aelflaed, abbess of Whitby, in which she writes to the
-abbess Adolana (probably Adela) of Pfaelzel (Palatiolum) on the Mosel near
-Trier, recommending to her care a young abbess who is on her way to Rome.
-This letter shows that Aelflaed was well versed in writing Latin. The name
-of the abbess in whose behalf the letter was penned is not known, but she
-may be identical with Wethburg, who lived and died at Rome[381].
-
-'To the holy and worshipful abbess Adolana, a greeting in the Lord of
-eternal salvation.
-
-'Since we have heard of your holiness from those who have come from your
-parts, and from widespread report, in the first place I pray for your warm
-affection, for the Lord has said: This is my command, that ye love one
-another[382].
-
-'Further we make humble request that your holy and fervent words may
-commend us worthily to God Almighty, should it not be irksome to you to
-offer devotion in return for ours; for James the Apostle has taught and
-said: Pray for one another, that ye may be saved.
-
-'Further to your great holiness and usual charity we humbly and earnestly
-commend this maiden vowed to God, a pious abbess, our dear and faithful
-daughter, who since the days of her youth, from love of Christ and for the
-honour of the apostles Peter and Paul, has been desirous of going to their
-holy threshold, but who has been kept back by us until now because we
-needed her and in order that the souls entrusted to her might profit. And
-we pray that with charity and true kindness she may be received into your
-goodwill, as well as those who are travelling with her, in order that the
-desired journey with God's help and your willing charity may at last be
-accomplished. Therefore again and again we beseech that she may be helped
-on her way with recommendations from you to the holy city Rome, by the
-help of the holy and signbearing leader (signifer) of the apostles Peter;
-and if you are present we hope and trust she may find with you whatever
-advice she requires for the journey. May divine grace watch over your
-holiness when you pray for us.'
-
-The desire to go southward was strengthened among religious women by the
-increasing difficulties of their position at home. Monastic privileges
-were no longer respected by the kings of Mercia and Northumbria, and the
-Church lacked the power of directly interfering in behalf of monks and
-nuns. There is in the correspondence a letter which Boniface wrote in his
-own name and in that of his foreign bishops to Aethelbald, king of Mercia
-(716-756); he sharply rebukes him for his immoral practices and urges on
-him the desirability of taking a lawful wife. He accuses the king of
-indulging his wicked propensities even in monasteries and with nuns and
-maidens who were vowed to God; following the example of Tacitus, he
-praises the pure morals of the heathen Germans. The passages which bear on
-the subject are worthy of perusal, for they show how uncertain was the
-position of monasteries and how keenly Boniface realized the difficulties
-of nuns. He tells the king 'that loose women, whether they be vowed to
-religion or not, conceive inferior children through their wickedness and
-frequently do away with them.' The privileges of religious houses, he
-says, were respected till the reign of King Osred (706-17) of Northumbria,
-and of King Ceolred (709-16) of Mercia, but 'these two kings have shown
-their evil disposition and have sinned in a criminal way against the
-teaching of the gospels and the doings of our Saviour. They persisted in
-vice, in the seduction of nuns and the contemptuous treatment of monastic
-rights. Condemned by the judgment of God, and hurled from the heights of
-royal authority, they were overtaken by a speedy and awful death, and are
-now cut off from eternal light, and buried in the depths of hell and in
-the abyss of the infernal regions[383].' We have seen that in the letter
-written by Boniface to Eadburg, Ceolred is described as suffering torments
-in hell, and that King Aethelbald at a later date is depicted in the same
-predicament.
-
-With his letter to Aethelbald Boniface forwarded two others to the priest
-Herefrith, probably of Lindisfarne[384], and to Ecgberht (archbishop of
-York, 732-66), requesting them to support him against Aethelbald. 'It is
-the duty of your office to see that the devil does not establish his
-kingdom in places consecrated to God,' he wrote to Ecgberht, 'that there
-be not discord instead of peace, strife instead of piety, drunkenness
-instead of sobriety, slaughter and fornication instead of charity and
-chastity[385].' Shortly afterwards he wrote to Cuthberht, archbishop of
-Canterbury (740-62), telling him of the statutes passed at the Synod of
-Soissons[386], and severely censuring the conduct of the layman, 'be he
-emperor, king or count, who snatches a monastery from bishop, abbot, or
-abbess.'
-
-These admonitions show that the position of the religious houses and that
-of their rulers depended directly on the temper of the reigning prince. In
-the correspondence there are several letters from abbesses addressed to
-Boniface bearing on this point, which give us a direct insight into the
-tone of mind of these women. Their Latin is cumbersome and faulty, and
-biblical quotations are introduced which do not seem always quite to the
-point. The writers ramble on without much regard to construction and
-style, and yet there is a genuine ring about their letters which makes the
-distress described seem very real.
-
-One of these letters was written by an abbess named Ecgburg, probably at
-an early period of Boniface's career[387]. Her reference to the remoteness
-of her settlement suggests the idea that it was Repton, and that she
-herself was identical with Ecgburg, daughter of Ealdwulf king of the East
-Angles, the abbess whom we have noticed in connection with Guthlac. If
-that be so her sister Wethburg, to whom she refers, may be identical with
-the young unnamed abbess whom Aelflaed sped on her journey to Rome.
-
-'Since a cruel and bitter death,' she writes, 'has robbed me of him, my
-brother Osher, whom I loved beyond all others, you I hold dearer than all
-other men. Not to multiply words, no day, no night passes, but I think of
-your teaching. Believe me it is on account of this that I love you, God is
-my witness. In you I confide, because you were never forgetful of the
-affection which assuredly bound you to my brother. Though inferior to him
-in knowledge and in merit, I am not unlike him in recognizing your
-goodness. Time goes by with increasing swiftness and yet the dark gloom of
-sadness leaves me not. For time as it comes brings me increase of
-indignities, as it is written "Love of man brings sorrow, but love of
-Christ gladdens the heart." More recently my equally beloved sister
-Wethburg, as though to inflict a wound and renew a pang, suddenly passed
-out of my sight, she with whom I had grown up and with whom I was nursed
-at the same breast; one mother she and I had in the Lord, and my sister
-has left me. Jesus is my witness that on all sides there is sorrow, fear,
-and the image of death[388]. I would gladly die if it so pleased God, to
-whom the unknown is manifest, for this slow death is no trifle. What was
-it I was saying? From my sister not a sudden and bitter death, but a
-bitterer separation, divides me; I believe it was for her happiness, but
-it left me unhappy, as a corpse laid low, when adopting the fashion of the
-age she went on a pilgrimage, even though she knew how much I loved and
-cherished her, whom now as I hear a prison confines at Rome. But the love
-of Christ, which is strong and powerful in her, is stronger and more
-binding than all fetters, and perfect love casteth out fear. Indeed, I
-say, he who holds the power of divination, the Ruler of high Olympus, has
-endowed you with divine wisdom, and in his law do you meditate night and
-day[389]. For it is written: "How beautiful are the feet of them that
-preach the gospel of peace, and bring tidings of good things[390]." She
-has mounted by a steep and narrow path, while I remain below, held by
-mortal flesh as by irons upon my feet. In the coming judgment full of joy
-she, like unto the Lord, will sing: "I was in prison and ye came unto
-me[391]." You also in the future life, when the twelve apostles sit on
-their twelve seats[392], will be there, and in proportion to the number of
-those whom you have won by your work, will rejoice before the tribunal of
-the eternal King, like unto a leader who is about to be crowned. But I
-living in the vale of tears as I deserve, shall be weeping for my
-offences, on account of which God holds me unfit to join the heavenly
-hosts. Therefore, believe me, the tempest-tossed mariner does not so much
-long for the haven, the thirsty fields do not long so much for rain, the
-mother on the winding shore does not so anxiously wait for her son, as I
-long to rejoice in your sight. But oppressed by sins and innumerable
-offences, I so long to be freed from imminent danger, that I am made
-desperate; adoring the footsteps of your holiness and praying to you from
-the depths of my heart as a sinner, I call to you from the ends of the
-earth, O beloved master; as my anxious heart prompts, raise me to the
-corner-stone of your prayer, for you are my hope and a strong tower
-invisible to the enemy. And I beg as consolation to my grief and as limit
-to the wave of my sorrow, that my weakness may be supported by your
-intercession as by a prop. I entreat that you will condescend to give me
-some comfort either in the form of a relic or of a few words of blessing,
-written by you, in order that through them I may hold your presence
-secure.'
-
-By the side of this letter must be quoted another written by an Abbess
-Eangith, describing similar difficulties in a similar strain[393]. We do
-not know over which settlement Eangith presided, but her name and that of
-her daughter Heaburg of whom she speaks are inscribed in the Durham 'Liber
-Vitae[394].'
-
-'Beloved brother in the spirit rather than in the flesh,' she writes, 'you
-are magnified by the abundance of spiritual graces, and to you alone, with
-God as our sole witness, we wish to make known what you see here spread
-out before you and blotted by our tears: we are borne down by an
-accumulation of miseries as by a weight and a pressing burden, and also by
-the tumult of political affairs. As the foaming masses of the ocean when
-the force of the winds and the raging fury of the tempest lash up the
-great sea, carry in and carry out again the heaving billows dashing over
-rocks, so that the keels of the boats are turned upwards and the mast of
-the ship is pressed downwards, so do the ships of our souls groan under
-the great press of our miseries and the great mass of our misfortunes. By
-the voice of truth has it been said of the heavenly house: "The rain
-descended and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that
-house[395]," etc.
-
-'First and before all noteworthy of the things that affect us from
-without, must be mentioned the multitude of our offences and our want of
-full and complete faith, due not so much to care for our own souls but,
-what is worse and more oppressive, to care for the souls of those of
-either sex and of every age which have been entrusted to us. For this care
-involves ministering to many minds and to various dispositions, and
-afterwards giving account before the supreme tribunal of Christ both for
-obvious sins in deeds and words, and for secret thoughts which men ignore
-and God alone witnesseth; with a simple sword against a double-edged one,
-with ten thousand to meet twenty thousand warriors[396]. In addition to
-this care of souls we have difficulties in our domestic affairs, and
-various disagreements which the jealous enemy of all good has sown,
-namely, he who fills the impure hearts of men with malice and scatters it
-everywhere, but chiefly in the settlements of monks and nuns; but it is
-said "the mighty shall be mightily tormented[397]." Moreover the poverty
-and scantiness of our temporal possessions oppress us, and the smallness
-of the cultivated part of our estate; and the hostility of the king, for
-we are accused before him by those who envy us, as a wise man has said:
-"the bewitching of vanity obscureth good things[398]." Similarly we are
-oppressed by service due to the king and the queen, to bishop and prefect,
-officers and attendants. It would take long to enumerate those things
-which can be more easily imagined than described.
-
-'To all these evils is added the loss of friends, connections, and
-relatives by alliance and by blood. I[399] have neither son nor brother,
-neither father nor father's brother, none but an only daughter who is
-bereft of all that was dear to her; and a sister who is old, and the son
-of our brother, who too is unhappy in his mind, for our king holds his
-family connections in great contempt. There is no one else for us to rely
-on; God has removed them all by one chance or another. Some have died in
-their native land, and their bodies lie in the grimy dust of the earth to
-rise again on the day of doom, when the Master's trumpet shall sound, and
-the whole race of man shall come forth from dark tombs to give account of
-themselves; when their spirits, borne upwards in angels' arms, shall abide
-with Christ; when all sorrow shall end, and envy be worn out, and grief
-and mourning shall vanish in sight of the saints. Again others have left
-their native shores, and trusted themselves to the wide seas, and have
-sought the threshold of the holy apostles Peter and Paul and of all those
-martyrs, virgins and confessors, whose number God alone knows.
-
-'For these and other like causes, hardly to be enumerated in one day
-though July and August lengthen the days of summer, we are weary of our
-present life and hardly care to continue it. Every man uncertain of his
-purpose and distrustful of his own counsel, seeks a faithful friend whose
-advice he follows since he distrusts his own; and such faith has he in him
-that he lays before him and reveals to him every secret of his heart. As
-has been said, what is sweeter than having someone with whom one can
-converse as with oneself? Therefore on account of the pressing miseries we
-have now insisted on to the full, we needs must find a true friend, one
-whom we can trust more than ourselves; who will treat our grief, our
-miseries and our poverty as his own, who will sympathize with us, comfort
-us, support us by his words, and raise us up by wise counsel. Long have we
-sought him. And we believe that in you we have found the friend whom we
-longed for, whom we wished for, whom we desired.
-
-'Would that God had granted to us that, as Habakkuk the prophet was sped
-with food into the lion's den to the seer Daniel[400], or that as Philip
-one of the seven deacons was sped to the eunuch[401], we also were sped
-and could come to the land and to the district where you dwell; or that it
-were possible for us to hear living words from your lips. 'How sweet are
-thy words unto my palate, O Lord, sweeter than honey to my mouth[402].'
-
-'But since this is not vouchsafed to us and we are divided from you by a
-wide expanse of land and of sea and by the boundaries of many provinces,
-because of our faith in you referred to above we will tell you, brother
-Boniface, that for a long time we have entertained the design like so many
-of our friends, relatives and others, of visiting Rome, the mistress of
-the world, there to seek forgiveness of our sins as many others have done
-and are now doing; so especially I (wish to do) since I am advanced in
-age, and have erred more than others. Wala, at one time my abbess and
-spiritual mother, was acquainted with my wish and my intention. My only
-daughter at present is young, and cannot share my desire. But because we
-know how many there are who scoff at this wish and deprecate this desire,
-and support their view by adducing what the canons of the synods enjoin,
-that wherever anyone has settled and taken his vow, there shall he remain
-and there serve God; for we all live in different ways and God's purposes
-are unknown, as the prophet says: 'Thy righteousness is like the great
-mountains, thy judgments are a great deep, O Lord[403]'; and because His
-sacred will and desire in these things is hidden,--therefore we two, both
-of us in our difficulty, call on you earnestly and reverently: be you to
-us as Aaron, a mountain of strength, let your prayer be our help, swing
-the censer of prayer with incense in sight of the Divine, and let the
-lifting up of your hands be as the evening sacrifice[404]. Indeed we trust
-in God and beg of your goodness that by supplication of mouth and inward
-prayer it may be revealed to you what seems for us wise and useful:
-whether we are to live at home or go forth on pilgrimage. Also we beg of
-your goodness to send back your answer across the sea, and reply to what
-we have scratched on these leaves in rustic style and with unpolished
-wording. We have scant faith in those who glory in appearance and not in
-heart[405], but faith in your love, your charity in God and your
-goodness.'
-
-It is not known whether Eangith carried out her intention and went to
-Rome.
-
-Boniface had another correspondence with an abbess named Bugga, but though
-Eangith states that her daughter Heaburg was sometimes called by that
-name, it is not probable that they were the same, for Boniface writing to
-Bugga makes no mention of Eangith's plan, which he would hardly have
-omitted to do if Heaburg had been his correspondent[406].
-
-Bugga was afterwards abbess of a monastery in Kent. She too sent gifts to
-Boniface, and later entertained the idea of going to Rome. In early days
-the prelate wrote to her telling her how he had been mercifully led
-through unknown countries, how 'the Pontiff of the glorious see' Gregory
-II had inclined to him, and how he had cast down 'the enemy of the
-Catholic Church, Radbod,' the Frisian.
-
-In reply she assures him of her continued affection and makes some remarks
-on books they have exchanged. The Passions of the Martyrs which he has
-asked for she has not yet procured, but she will forward them as soon as
-she can. 'But you, my friend,' she writes, 'send me as a consolation what
-you promised in your kind letter, your extracts from the holy writings.
-And I beseech you to offer the oblation of the holy mass for one of my
-relatives whom I loved beyond all others. I send you by the bearer of this
-letter fifty gold coins (solidi) and an altar cloth, better gifts I cannot
-procure. They are truly signs of a great affection though of insignificant
-appearance[407].'
-
-Bugga does not style herself abbess, but Boniface addresses her as such in
-acknowledging the receipt of her gifts and advising her about going to
-Rome. On another occasion he wrote to express concern at her troubles,
-which he heard from many people had not diminished since she retired from
-rule for the sake of quiet[408]. The letter in which he advises her about
-going to Rome is worth quoting[409].
-
-'Be it made known to you, dearest sister,' he writes, 'regarding the
-advice which you asked for in your letter, that I do not presume to forbid
-you the pilgrim's journey, neither would I directly advise it. I will
-explain why. If you gave up the charge you had of the servants of God, of
-his virgins (ancillae), and your own monastic life, for the purpose of
-securing quiet and the thought of God, in what way are you now bound to
-obey the words and the will of seculars with toil and wearing anxiety?
-Still if you cannot find peace of mind in your home in secular life among
-seculars it seems right that you should seek in a pilgrimage freedom for
-contemplation, especially since you wish it and can arrange it; just in
-the way our sister Wethburg did. She told me in her letter that she had
-found the quiet she longed for near the threshold of St Peter. In
-reference to your wish she sent me a message, for I had written to her
-about you, saying that you must wait till the attacks, hostility and
-menaces of the Saracens who have lately reached the Roman States have
-subsided, and that God willing she would then send you a letter of
-invitation. I too think this best. Prepare yourself for the journey, but
-wait for word from her, and then do as God in his grace commands. As to
-the collection of extracts for which you ask, be considerate to my
-shortcomings. Pressing work and continuous travelling prevent my
-furnishing you with what you desire. As soon as I can I will forward them
-to please you.
-
-'We thank you for the gifts and vestments which you have sent, and pray to
-God Almighty, to put aside a gift for you in return with the angels and
-archangels in the heights of heaven. And I beseech you in the name of God,
-dear sister, yea mother and sweet lady, that you diligently pray for me.
-For many troubles beset me through my shortcomings, and I am more
-distressed by uncertainty of mind than by bodily work. Rest assured that
-our old trust in each other will never fail us.'
-
-Bugga carried out her intention and went to Rome, where she met Boniface,
-who was the Pope's guest about the year 737. He had achieved a signal
-success in reconverting the Hessians, and was now appointed to constitute
-bishoprics in Bavaria and to hold councils of Church dignitaries at
-regular intervals[410]. At Rome Bugga and Boniface walked and talked
-together, and visited the churches of the holy apostles. A letter from
-Aethelberht II, king of Kent, to Boniface refers to their meeting[411].
-Bugga had come back to her old monastery and had given the king a
-description of her visit. She attained a considerable age, for she was
-advanced in years before her pilgrimage, and about twenty years later
-Bregwin, archbishop of Canterbury (759-765), wrote to Lul informing him of
-her death[412].
-
-Boniface made provision at Rome for the women in whom he was interested. A
-certain deacon Gemmulus writes to him from Rome to inform him[413] that
-'the sisters and maidens of God who have reached the threshold of the
-apostles' are there being cared for by himself and others as Boniface has
-desired.
-
-The readiness with which Anglo-Saxon nuns went abroad eventually led to a
-state of things which cast discredit on religion. Boniface addressed the
-following remarks on these pilgrimages to Cuthberht of Canterbury in the
-letter written after the synod of Soissons[414].
-
-'I will not withhold from your holiness,' he says, '... that it were a
-good thing and besides honour and a credit to your Church and a palliation
-of evils, if the synod and your princes forbade women, and those who have
-taken the veil, to travel and stay abroad as they do, coming and going in
-the Roman states. They come in great numbers and few return undefiled. For
-there are very few districts of Lombardy in which there is not some woman
-of Anglian origin living a loose life among the Franks and the Gauls. This
-is a scandal and disgrace to your whole Church....'
-
-The difficulty of exercising more control over those who chose to leave
-their settlements was only partly met by stricter rules of supervision.
-For there were no means of keeping back monk or nun who was tired of
-living the monastic life. In the 9th century Hatto bishop of Basel
-([Dagger] 836) wrote to the bishop of Toul enjoining that no one should be
-suffered to undertake a pilgrimage to Rome without leave, and provisions
-of a much later date order that houses shall not take in and harbour
-inmates from other settlements.
-
-In this connection it is interesting to find Lul, who had settled abroad
-with Boniface, excommunicating an abbess Suitha because she had allowed
-two nuns to go into a distant district for some secular purpose without
-previously asking permission from her bishop[415]. The women who settled
-in Germany under Boniface were brought under much stricter control than
-had till then been customary in either France or England.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Anglo-Saxon Nuns abroad.
-
-Among the women who came to Germany and settled there at the request of
-Boniface was Lioba, otherwise Leobgith, who had been educated at Wimbourne
-in Dorset, at no very great distance from Nutshalling where Boniface
-dwelt, and who left England between 739 and 748. She was related to him
-through her mother Aebbe, and a simple and modest little letter is extant
-in which she writes to Boniface and refers to her father's death six years
-ago; she is her parents' only child, she says, and would recall her mother
-and herself to the prelate's memory.
-
-'This too I ask for,' she writes in this letter, 'correct the rusticity of
-my style and do not neglect to send me a few words in proof of your
-goodwill. I have composed the few verses which I enclose according to the
-rules of poetic versification, not from pride but from a desire to
-cultivate the beginnings of learning, and now I am longing for your help.
-I was taught by Eadburg who unceasingly devotes herself to this divine
-art.' And she adds four lines of verse addressed to God Almighty as an
-example of what she can do[416].
-
-As mentioned above we are indebted for an account of Lioba's life to the
-monk Rudolf of Fulda ([Dagger] 865). From this we learn that Lioba at a
-tender age had been given into the care of the abbess Tetta at
-Wimbourne[417]. 'She grew up, so carefully tended by the abbess and the
-sisters, that she cared for naught but the monastery and the study of holy
-writ. She was never pleased by irreverent jokes, nor did she care for the
-other maidens' senseless amusements; her mind was fixed on the love of
-Christ, and she was ever ready to listen to the word of God, or to read
-it, and to commit to memory what she heard and read to her own practical
-advantage. In eating and drinking she was so moderate that she despised
-the allurements of a great entertainment and felt content with what was
-put before her, never asking for more. When she was not reading, she was
-working with her hands, for she had learnt that those who do not work have
-no right to eat.'
-
-She was moreover of prepossessing appearance and of engaging manners, and
-secured the goodwill of the abbess and the affection of the inmates of the
-settlement. A dream of hers is described by her biographer in which she
-saw a purple thread of indefinite length issuing from her mouth. An aged
-sister whom she consulted about it, interpreted the dream as a sign of
-coming influence.
-
-To Lioba, Tecla and Cynehild, Boniface addressed a letter from abroad,
-asking in the usual way for the support of their prayers[418]. Lioba's
-biographer tells us that when Boniface thought of establishing religious
-settlements, 'wishing that the order of either sex should exist according
-to rule,' he arranged that Sturmi, who had settled at Fulda, should go to
-Italy and there visit St Benedict's monastery at Monte Casino, and he
-'sent envoys with letters to the abbess Tetta (of Wimbourne) begging her
-as a comfort in his labour, and as a help in his mission, to send over the
-virgin Lioba, whose reputation for holiness and virtuous teaching had
-penetrated across wide lands and filled the hearts of many with praise of
-her[419].'
-
-This request shows that Boniface thought highly of the course of life and
-occupations practised in English nunneries and that he considered English
-women especially suited to manage the settlements under his care. In a
-letter written from Rome about 738 Boniface refers to the sisters and
-brothers who are living under him in Germany[420]. Parties of English men
-and women joined him at different times. One travelled under the priest
-Wiehtberht, who sent a letter to the monks of Glastonbury to inform them
-of his safe arrival and honourable reception by Boniface, and he requests
-that Tetta of Wimbourne may be told of this[421]. Perhaps Lioba, who was
-Tetta's pupil, was one of the party who travelled to Germany with
-Wiehtberht.
-
-'In pursuance of his plan,' says Lioba's life[422], 'Boniface now arranged
-monastic routine and life according to accepted rule, and set Sturmi as
-abbot over the monks and the virgin Lioba as spiritual mother over the
-nuns, and gave into her care a monastery at the place called Bischofsheim,
-where a considerable number of servants of God were collected together,
-who now followed the example of their blessed teacher, were instructed in
-divine knowledge and so profited by her teaching that several of them in
-their turn became teachers elsewhere; for few monasteries of women
-(monasteria foeminarum) existed in those districts where Lioba's pupils
-were not sought as teachers. She (Lioba) was a woman of great power and of
-such strength of purpose that she thought no more of her fatherland and of
-her relations but devoted all her energies to what she had undertaken,
-that she might be blameless before God, and a model in behaviour and
-discipline to all those who were under her. She never taught what she did
-not practise. And there was neither conceit nor domineering in her
-attitude; she was affable and kindly without exception towards everyone.
-She was as beautiful as an angel; her talk was agreeable, her intellect
-was clear; her abilities were great; she was a Catholic in faith; she was
-moderate in her expectations and wide in her affections. She always showed
-a cheerful face but she was never drawn into hilarity. No one ever heard a
-word of abuse (maledictionem) pass her lips, and the sun never went down
-on her anger. In eating and drinking she was liberal to others but
-moderate herself, and the cup out of which she usually drank was called by
-the sisters 'the little one of our beloved' (dilectae parvus) on account
-of its smallness. She was so bent on reading that she never laid aside
-her book except to pray or to strengthen her slight frame with food and
-sleep. From childhood upwards she had studied grammar and the other
-liberal arts, and hoped by perseverance to attain a perfect knowledge of
-religion, for she was well aware that the gifts of nature are doubled by
-study. She zealously read the books of the Old and New Testaments, and
-committed their divine precepts to memory; but she further added to the
-rich store of her knowledge by reading the writings of the holy Fathers,
-the canonical decrees, and the laws of the Church (totiusque ecclesiastici
-ordinis jura). In all her actions she showed great discretion, and thought
-over the outcome of an undertaking beforehand so that she might not
-afterwards repent of it. She was aware that inclination is necessary for
-prayer and for study, and she was therefore moderate in holding vigils.
-She always took a rest after dinner, and so did the sisters under her,
-especially in summer time, and she would not suffer others to stay up too
-long, for she maintained that the mind is keener for study after sleep.'
-
-Boniface, writing to Lioba while she was abbess at Bischofsheim, sanctions
-her taking a girl into the settlement for purposes of instruction.
-Bischofsheim was on the Tauber a tributary of the river Main, and
-Boniface, who dwelt at Mainz, frequently conferred with her there. Lioba
-went to stay with Boniface at Mainz in 757 before he went among the
-Frisians[423]; he presented her with his cloak and begged her to remain
-true to her work whatever might befall him. Shortly after he set out on
-his expedition he was attacked and killed by heathens. His corpse was
-brought back and buried at Fulda, and Lioba went to pray at his grave, a
-privilege granted to no other woman.
-
-Lioba was also in contact with temporal rulers. Karl the Great gave her
-presents and Queen Hildegard ([Dagger] 783) was so captivated with her
-that she tried to persuade her to come and live with her. 'Princes loved
-her,' her biographer tells us, 'noblemen received her, and bishops gladly
-entertained her and conversed with her on the scriptures and on the
-institutions of religion, for she was familiar with many writings and
-careful in giving advice.' She had the supervision of other settlements
-besides her own and travelled about a good deal. After Boniface's death
-she kept on friendly terms with Lul who had succeeded him as bishop of
-Mainz (757-786), and it was with his consent that she finally resigned
-her responsibilities and her post as abbess at Bischofsheim and went to
-dwell at Schornsheim near Mainz with a few companions. At the request of
-Queen Hildegard she once more travelled to Aachen where Karl the Great was
-keeping court. But she was old, the fatigues of the journey were too much
-for her, and she died shortly after her return in 780. Boniface had
-expressed a wish that they should share the same resting-place and her
-body was accordingly taken to Fulda, but the monks there, for some unknown
-reason, preferred burying her in another part of their church.
-
-It is noteworthy that the women who by the appointment of Boniface
-directed convent life in Germany, remained throughout in a state of
-dependence[424], while the men, noticeably Sturmi ([Dagger] 779) whom he
-had made abbot at Fulda, cast off their connection with the bishop, and
-maintained the independence of their monasteries. Throughout his life
-Sturmi showed a bold and determined spirit, but he was not therefore less
-interesting to the nuns of Boniface's circle. His pupil and successor
-Eigil wrote an account of his life at the request of the nun Angiltrud,
-who is also supposed to have come from England to Germany[425].
-
-We know little concerning the other Anglo-Saxon women who settled abroad,
-for there are no contemporary accounts of them. The 'Passion of Boniface,'
-written at Mainz between 1000 and 1050, tells us that as Lioba settled at
-Bischofsheim so Tecla settled at Kizzingen, where 'she shone like a light
-in a dark place[426].' No doubt this Tecla is identical with the nun of
-that name whom Boniface speaks of in his letter to Lioba[427]. She has a
-place among the saints[428], but it seems doubtful whether she founded the
-monastery at Kizzingen or the one at Oxenfurt.
-
-The names of several other women are given by Othlon, a monk of St Emmeran
-in Bavaria, who in consequence of a quarrel fled from his monastery and
-sought refuge at Fulda. While there, between 1062 and 1066, he re-wrote
-and amplified Wilibald's life of Boniface. In this account he gives a list
-of the men who came into Germany from England, the correctness of which
-has been called in question. He then enumerates the women who came abroad
-and mentions 'an aunt of Lul called Chunihilt[429] and her daughter
-Berthgit[430], Chunitrud and Tecla, Lioba, and Waltpurgis the sister of
-Wilibald and Wunebald[431].' The only mention of Waltpurgis is her name,
-but he describes where the other women settled, some in the district of
-the Main, others in Bavaria.
-
-This woman Waltpurgis has been the subject of many conjectures; writers
-generally do not hesitate to affirm that the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald is identical with the saint who was so widely reverenced. But St
-Waltpurgis, popularly called Walburg, is associated with customs and
-traditions which so clearly bear a heathen and profane character in the
-Netherlands and in North Germany, that it seems improbable that these
-associations should have clustered round the name of a Christian woman and
-a nun[432].
-
-In face of the existing evidence one of two conclusions must be adopted.
-Either the sister of Wunebald and Wilibald really bore the name
-Waltpurgis, and the monk Wolfhard who wrote an account of a saint of that
-name whose relics were venerated at Eichstaett (between 882 and 912) took
-advantage of the coincidence of name and claimed that the Walburg, who
-bears the character of a pseudo-saint, and the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald were identical; or else, desirous to account for the veneration
-of relics which were commonly connected with the name Walburg, he found it
-natural and reasonable to hold that Walburg had belonged to the circle of
-Boniface, and identified her with the sister of Wunebald and
-Wilibald[433].
-
-Nothing is preserved concerning this sister except a reference to her
-existence, which is contained in the accounts of the acts of Wilibald and
-Wunebald written by a nun at Heidenheim, whose name also is not
-recorded[434]. These accounts offer many points of interest. The nun who
-wrote them was of Anglo-Saxon origin; her style is highly involved and
-often falls short of the rules of grammar, but she had possession of
-interesting information, and she was determined to impart it. It has been
-noticed that her writing varies according to whether she is setting down
-facts or dilating on them; for she is concise enough when it is a question
-of facts only, but when it comes to description she falls into the spirit
-of Anglo-Saxon literature and introduces alliteration into her Latin and
-launches forth into panegyric. She came from England to Germany, as she
-tells us, shortly before the death of Wunebald (c. 765), and experiences
-of an unpleasant nature led her to expect that her writings would not pass
-without criticism.
-
-'I am but a woman,' she says[435], 'weak on account of the frailty of my
-sex, neither supported by the prerogative of wisdom nor sustained by the
-consciousness of great power, yet impelled by earnestness of purpose,' and
-she sets to work to give a description of the life of Wilibald and the
-journey which he made to Palestine, parts of which she took down from his
-dictation, for at the close of her account she says that she wrote it from
-Wilibald's narrative in the monastery of Heidenheim in the presence of
-deacons and of some of Wilibald's pupils who were witnesses to the fact.
-'This I say,' she adds, 'that no one may again declare this to be
-nonsense.'
-
-The account she gives of Wilibald's experiences contains one of the
-earliest descriptions written in northern Europe of a journey to
-Palestine, and modern writers have commented on it as a curious literary
-monument of the time. Interest in descriptions of the Holy Land was
-increasing. Besides early references to such journeys in the letters of St
-Jerome who described how Paula went from Rome to Jerusalem and settled
-there in the 4th century, we hear how Adamnan came to the court of King
-Ealdfrith of Northumbria about the year 701 and laid before him his book
-on Holy Places[436] which he had taken down from the narrative of bishop
-Arculf who had made the pilgrimage, but of whom we know nothing more. But
-Adamnan's account is bald and its interest is poor compared to this
-description of the adventures of Wilibald and of what he saw on his
-travels.
-
-The nun prefaces her account of the journey by telling us of Wilibald's
-origin. She describes how he fell ill as a child, how his parents vowed
-him to a religious life if he were spared, and how in conformity with
-their promise they took him to the abbey of Waltham at the age of five,
-where Wilibald continued studying till manhood. We are not told to what
-his love of travel was due. He determined to go south and persuaded his
-father and his brother Wunebald to accompany him. We hear how they and
-their companions took boat and arrived at Rouen, how they travelled on
-till they reached Lucca where the father fell ill and died, and how the
-brothers pursued their journey to Rome where they spent the winter. We
-hear how the heat and bad air of summer drove them away from Rome and how,
-while Wunebald remained in Italy, Wilibald with a few companions pushed on
-by way of Naples and Reggio and reached Catania in Sicily, where he took
-boat for Ephesus and Syria. We get a good deal of information by the way
-on saints and on relics, and hear of the veil of St Agatha which stayed
-the eruptions of Mount Aetna, and of the Seven Sleepers of Ephesus. The
-travellers experienced all kinds of hardships; thrice they were cast into
-prison and liberated before their feet trod on holy ground. Then they
-visited Nazareth and Chana; they gazed upon Lake Tiberias, they bathed in
-the river Jordan, and finally they reached Jerusalem where they made a
-long stay, broken however by several long expeditions. Each site is
-described in turn, and its connection with scriptural history is pointed
-out. We hear a good deal about Jerusalem, about Mount Sion, the site of
-the Ascension of the Virgin, and about the site of the Nativity at
-Bethlehem. It was 'once a cave, now it is a square house cut into the
-rock,' over which a little chapel is built. We also hear of various
-monasteries where the travellers stayed in coming and going. Finally they
-travelled to Tyre, where they took boat to Constantinople. There they made
-a lengthy stay and then journeyed on to Italy and visited the Isle of
-Lipari, where Wilibald desired to get a glimpse of the crater, which is
-designated as hell, the thought of which called forth a fine piece of
-description from the nun.
-
-'And when they arrived there they left the boat to see what sort of a hell
-it was. Wilibald especially was curious about what was inside the crater,
-and would have climbed the summit of the mountain to the opening; but he
-was prevented by cinders which rose from the black gulf and had sunk
-again; as snow settles falling from the sky and the heavenly heights in
-white thick masses, so these cinders lay heaped on the summit of the
-mountain and prevented Wilibald's ascent. But he saw a blackness and a
-terrible column of flame projected upwards with a noise like thunder from
-the pit, and he saw the flame and the smoky vapour rising to an
-immeasurable height. He also beheld pumice-stone which writers use[437]
-thrown up from the crater with the flame, and it fell into the sea and was
-again cast up on the shore; men there gathered it up to bring it away.'
-
-When Wilibald and his companion Tidberht reached Rome they had been absent
-seven years, and their travels had made them personages of such interest
-that the Pope interviewed them. Wilibald at the Pope's suggestion agreed
-to join Boniface in Germany. Wunebald, the brother whom he had left in
-Italy, had met Boniface in Rome in 738 and had travelled back with him.
-Wilibald also settled in Germany and was made bishop of the new see of
-Eichstaett. Here he came across the nun, who was so fired by his account of
-his travels that she undertook to record them.
-
-After she had finished this work she was moved to write a short account of
-the life of Wunebald[438]. It is written in a similar style and contains
-valuable historical information, but it has not the special interest of
-the other account. Wunebald on coming into Germany had first stayed at
-Mainz, then he travelled about with Boniface, and finally he settled at
-Heidenheim where he made a clearance in the midst of a wooded wilderness
-and dwelt there with a few younger men. He was active in opposing
-idolatrous customs, but does not appear to have been satisfied with his
-work. He died about the year 765, and his brother Wilibald, bishop of
-Eichstaett, and his sister, of whom mention is now made for the first time,
-came to his monastery to assist at the translation of his corpse. The
-sister took charge of his settlement, apparently for a time only, for the
-monastery at Heidenheim continued to be under the rule of an abbot and
-there is no evidence that women belonged to it.
-
-It was from this sister that the nun received her information about
-Wunebald. The theory has been put forward that she was the same person as
-a nun who came to Heidenheim and was there miraculously cured. However
-that may be, this literary nun is the last Anglo-Saxon woman of whom we
-have definite information who came abroad in connection with Boniface. Her
-name is lost, it is as the anonymous nun of Heidenheim that she has come
-down to posterity.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER V.
-
-CONVENTS IN SAXON LANDS BETWEEN A.D. 800-1000.
-
-    'Nec scientia scibilis Deum offendit, sed injustitia scientis.'
-    _Hrotsvith._
-
-
-Sec. 1. Women's Convents in Saxony.
-
-Some account has been given in the preceding chapters of the form which
-monastic settlements of women took among the Franks and the Anglo-Saxons
-during the first centuries after the acceptance of Christianity. Features
-similar to those which appear in France and England characterised the
-first period of monastic development among the continental Saxons, the
-last branch of the German race to accept Christianity as a nation. Here
-also we find highborn and influential women as abbesses at the head of
-establishments which were important centres of contemporary culture.
-
-The convent in Saxon lands, as elsewhere, was a place of residence and a
-training school for women of the ruling classes. Girls came there to be
-educated, and either considered the convent as their permanent home or
-left it to be married; the widow frequently returned to it later in life.
-But some of the Saxon settlements of women gained an additional importance
-in the 10th and 11th centuries owing to their close connection with the
-political affairs and interests of the time. The abbess was frequently a
-member of the royal or imperial family. In one case she was appointed as
-the guardian of the Emperor, in another she became representative of the
-Emperor during his absence in Italy.
-
-The story of the spread of monastic life into Saxony is closely connected
-with the history of the conquest of the country and the subsequent growth
-of national independence. The Saxons occupied the districts of northern
-Germany, Westphalia, Eastphalia and Engern, of which Westphalia bordered
-on lands occupied by the Franks. Between the 6th and the 9th centuries the
-Franks had sometimes fought against the Saxons and had sometimes made
-common cause with them against their mutual enemies the people of
-Thueringen. But the Saxons were warlike and ferocious, insensible to the
-influence of Christianity, and ready at any moment to begin hostilities.
-They became more and more dreaded by the Franks, who looked upon them as
-dangerous neighbours, and who attacked them whenever opportunity offered.
-Karl the Great ([Dagger] 814), king of the Franks, and Roman Emperor of
-the German nation, received the war against the Saxons as part of his
-heritage, but repeated inroads into Saxony and a cruelty bordering on
-vindictiveness were needed before he could speak of the conquest of the
-Saxons as an accomplished fact. In 785, after a prolonged struggle,
-Widukind, the Saxon leader in whom the spirit of Arminius lived, was
-finally defeated; and he and his followers accepted Christianity as part
-of their subjection.
-
-The Frankish Emperor and the Church now united in extending a uniform
-system of government over the lands of the Saxons. The count (_graf_ or
-_comes_) was made responsible for the maintenance of peace in the separate
-district (_gau_ or _pagus_) entrusted to him, and bishoprics were founded
-as dependencies of the ancient archiepiscopal sees of Coeln and Mainz. At
-the same time colonies of monks migrated into the conquered districts from
-the west and south. Their settlements developed rapidly, owing to the
-favour which monastic life found with the newly converted Saxons.
-
-The subjection of the Saxons was not however of long duration. The
-supremacy of the Western Empire culminated under the rule of Karl the
-Great; the union under one rule of many peoples who were in different
-stages of civilization was only possible at all through the rare
-combination of commanding qualities in this emperor; at his death the
-empire at once began to crumble away. This brought a returning sense of
-self-confidence to those peoples on whom the yoke of subjection had been
-forcibly thrust. Fifty years after Karl's death a warlike chief of the old
-type was established among the Saxons as duke (_herzog_ or _dux_); a
-hundred years later and a Saxon duke was chosen king of the Germans by the
-united votes of Frankish and Saxon nobles. The supreme authority now
-passed from the Franks to the Saxons; a change which the Saxon historian
-of the 10th century associated with the transference of the relics of St
-Vitus from France to Saxon soil[439]. The present age seeks the
-explanation of the removal of the centre of authority in less romantic
-causes, and finds it in the altogether extraordinary aptitude which the
-Saxons showed for assimilating new elements of civilization, and for
-appropriating or remodelling to their own use institutions of rule and
-government into which they breathed a spirit peculiarly their own.
-
-The history of the attainment to political supremacy by the Saxons helps
-us to understand the spirit which animated the Church and monastic
-institutions of the time. The bishoprics which Frankish overlordship had
-established were soon in the hands of men who were Saxons by birth, and a
-similar appropriation took place in regard to monastic settlements.
-Corvei, a religious colony founded on Saxon soil by monks from La Corbie
-in northern France, a lifetime after the conversion numbered Saxon nobles
-among its inmates. Settlements of women were also founded and rapidly
-gained importance, especially in the eastern districts where they rivalled
-the episcopal sees in wealth and influence.
-
-A reason for the favour with which monastic life was regarded during the
-period of political subjection lay in the practical advantages which these
-settlements offered. The nobleman who turned monk was freed from the
-obligations thrust upon him by the new regime; he was exempt from fighting
-under the standard of his conqueror, and the property which he bestowed on
-the religious settlement was in a way withdrawn from the enemy. But when
-the people regained their independence the popularity of the convent still
-remained. For the Saxons were quick in realizing the advantages of a close
-union between religion and the state, and the most powerful and
-progressive families of the land vied with each other in founding and
-endowing religious settlements.
-
-The political interest of the period centres in the career of Liudolf, who
-was styled duke by his people, but count by the Emperor. Liudolf rapidly
-rose to greatness and became the progenitor of a family which has given
-Germany many remarkable men and her first line of kings. His son Otto
-([Dagger] 912) was renowned like his father for personal valour, and
-success in every way favoured the undertakings of his grandson Heinrich
-the Fowler ([Dagger] 936), first king of the Saxon line. Heinrich became
-the favourite hero of the national poet on account of the triumphs he
-gained over the Slavs and Magyars, who at this time threatened the lands
-occupied by Germans at every point between the Baltic and the Adriatic.
-Again Heinrich's successes were reflected in those of his son Otto I
-([Dagger] 973), surnamed the Great, who added the lustre of imperial
-dignity to his father's firmly established kingship. Emulating the fame of
-Karl the Great, Otto was crowned emperor by the Pope in Rome. During the
-reign of his son, Otto II ([Dagger] 982), and of his grandson, Otto III
-([Dagger] 1002), the Saxon court remained the meeting-place of
-representatives of the civilized world. It was there that envoys were
-received from England and Italy, and it was from thence that messengers
-were sent out to Constantinople and Cordova. The elective crown of the
-German Empire remained hereditary in the Saxon dynasty for over a hundred
-years, and it is with this period that the Germans associate the first
-development of their national life on national soil.[440]
-
-At this time the kingdoms founded in other parts of Europe by peoples of
-the German race were much enfeebled. During the 9th and 10th centuries the
-Frankish princes were wanting in that unity of purpose which alone could
-prevent the appropriation of fruitful tracts of their territory by the
-vikings. In England a period of returning difficulties had followed the
-reign of King Aelfraed, so brilliant in many ways. The personal valour of
-his children, the intrepid Lady Aethelflaed ([Dagger] 918) and King
-Eadward ([Dagger] 925) her brother, had not stayed the social changes
-which prepared the way for the rule of the Dane. It is in Saxony only that
-we find the concentration and consolidation of power which make the
-advance and attitude of a nation conspicuous in history. The sword was
-here wielded to good purpose and likewise the pen. The bishoprics of
-Hildesheim, Halberstadt, and Magdeburg had become centres of artistic
-activity, and the monastery of Corvei rivalled the time-honoured
-settlements of St Gallen and Fulda in intellectual importance. The Saxon
-historian Widukind ([Dagger] after 973) was at work in Corvei in the 10th
-century; this author is for Saxon history what Gregory is for Frankish and
-Bede for Anglo-Saxon history. Monasteries for women, especially those of
-Herford, Gandersheim, and Quedlinburg, had rapidly developed and exerted a
-social and intellectual influence such as has rarely fallen to the lot of
-women's religious settlements in the course of history.
-
-The first religious house for women of which we have definite information
-is Herford, which was situated close to Corvei in Westphalia and had
-originally been founded as a dependency of it. Two small settlements for
-women existed at an early period in Eastphalia, but our knowledge of them
-is slight. The story is told that the heathen Saxon Hessi, having been
-defeated by Karl the Great in 775, went to live in the monastery of Fulda,
-and left his daughter Gisela in possession of his property, which she
-devoted to founding two little monasteries (monasteriola) for her
-daughters. This information is preserved in an account of Liutberg, a
-Saxon girl of noble parentage who was brought up in one of these little
-monasteries, but afterwards left it, as she preferred to dwell as a
-recluse in a neighbouring cell. Here she was visited by Theotgrim, bishop
-of Halberstadt ([Dagger] 840), and by the writer to whom we owe our
-account of her[441]. Wendhausen, one of the little monasteries spoken of
-in this account, was in existence a century later, for an attempt was then
-made to transfer its inmates to Quedlinburg. The fame of Liutberg's
-virtues was great during her lifetime but apparently did not secure her
-recognition as a saint. The cell in which she had lived was afterwards
-granted to Quedlinburg by charter (958).
-
-We have abundant information about Herford, the dependency of Corvei. In
-838 a certain Tetta was abbess, who came from Soissons and regulated the
-settlement at Herford on the plan of the house she had left[442]. The
-Saxon element asserted itself here also. In 854 the abbess was Addila, who
-was of Saxon parentage and probably the widow of a Saxon nobleman. Again
-in 858 we hear of another abbess, Hadewy, probably the niece of Warin, who
-was abbot of Corvei and a relation of Duke Liudolf. During her rule the
-relics of the woman-saint Pusinna were sent to Herford by the Saxon
-nobleman Kobbo as a gift to his sister the abbess Hadewy. The Saxons had
-no traditions or relics of early Christians who had lived among them, and
-so they were obliged to import relics to form a centre for their worship.
-King and bishop alike set an extraordinary value on relics and paid
-exorbitant prices for them. So great an importance was attached to the
-arrival of the relics of Pusinna at Herford that a contemporary monk wrote
-a detailed account of the event[443]. But it is characteristic of the
-author's disposition that he tells us nothing of the life and the works
-of Pusinna, who but for this account is unknown to history.
-
-A side-light is thrown on the material prosperity and the national
-sympathies of the settlements of Corvei and Herford in 889. Egilmar,
-bishop of Osnabrueck (885-906), lodged a complaint with the Pope,
-contending that these settlements, besides appropriating other rights,
-drew so many tithes from his diocese that his income was reduced to a
-quarter of what it should be. But Egilmar got scant reward for his pains,
-no doubt because those in authority at Corvei and Herford were family
-connections of Duke Liudolf, whom it was felt dangerous to cross. For the
-Saxon duke had gained in influence as the Franks relaxed their hold on
-Saxon affairs, and while he nominally remained a dependent, pressure from
-outside was not brought to bear on him. In refusing to interfere in
-Egilmar's behalf, which would have involved his coming into conflict with
-Liudolf, the Pope was acting in accordance with the policy which the
-Franks pursued in Saxon lands[444].
-
-At an early date the abbey of Herford was renowned as an educational
-centre, and it long maintained its reputation. Hathumod, a daughter of
-Duke Liudolf, was educated there previous to becoming abbess at
-Gandersheim, as we shall see later on. A hundred years later Queen
-Mathilde ([Dagger] 968) of the race of the warrior Widukind, and wife of
-Heinrich the Fowler, was brought up at Herford, her grandmother being
-abbess at the time.
-
-The foundation of Gandersheim in Eastphalia followed upon that of Herford.
-Gandersheim was founded by Duke Liudolf and remained the favourite
-settlement of the women of his family; we shall return to it later on. Two
-other important abbeys ruled by women in connection with royalty were
-Essen and Quedlinburg. Essen was founded by Altfrid, bishop of Hildesheim
-(847-874), a Saxon by birth[445], and Quedlinburg at the instigation of
-Queen Mathilde, who as mentioned above had been educated at Herford. For
-centuries the abbess of Quedlinburg remained a person of marked
-importance, in her influence both on politics and on matters social and
-literary. Essen and Quedlinburg afterwards became centres of art industry;
-all these early monastic foundations maintained their importance down to
-the time of the Reformation.
-
-The favour found by these institutions is explained when we come to
-consider the uncertainty of the times and the changeful political events
-which accompanied the growth of Saxon independence. The age, judged by a
-later standard, may well be called an age of violence. For the country was
-in the hands of a number of overlords who were frequently at war together,
-and who dwelt in isolated castles in a thickly wooded district in which
-only a patch here and there had been brought under cultivation.
-
-The monotony of life in the castles or burghs of this period can hardly be
-exaggerated. Means of communication were few and occasions for it were
-rare. When the master and his men were absent, engaged in some private
-broil, or else summoned by the arriere-ban to attend the duke or the king,
-weeks and months would go by without a reminder of the existence of the
-world outside; weeks and months when the arrival of a traveller offered
-the one welcome diversion. The young nobleman followed his father to camp
-and to court, where he tasted of the experiences of life; the young
-noblewoman stayed at home, cut off from intercourse with those of her age
-and standing, and from every possibility of widening her mental horizon.
-
-It is with the daughters of these families that the religious house first
-found favour. Settlements such as Herford, Gandersheim, Essen, and
-Quedlinburg offered the companionship of equals, and gave a domestic and
-intellectual training which was the best of its kind. Later ages were wont
-to look upon the standard of education attained at Gandersheim and
-Quedlinburg as exemplary. The word college (collegium), which early
-writers often apply to these settlements in its modern sense of a learning
-and a teaching body, aptly designates their character. For the religious
-settlement was an endowed college where girls were received to be trained,
-and where women who wished to devote themselves to learning and the arts
-permanently resided.
-
-The age at which girls were received in these settlements can be
-determined by inference only; some were given into their care as children,
-others joined them later in life. Probably here as elsewhere girls came at
-about the age of seven, and remained till the age of fourteen, when they
-left if marriage was to be their destiny. The responsibilities of married
-and of unmarried life were undertaken at this period by persons of extreme
-youth. Hathumod was made abbess of Gandersheim when she was between twelve
-and thirteen years of age; and Mathilde, as abbess of Quedlinburg, at the
-age of twelve received her dying grandmother's injunctions together with
-valuable documents[446], but in her case the chronicler notes that she had
-developed early[447].
-
-It remains an open question at what period in history the inmates of these
-settlements took vows. Fritsch, who has written a detailed history of the
-abbey of Quedlinburg, holds that its inmates never took a permanent vow,
-since not a single case of the defection of a nun is on record[448], but
-this view is disproved by accounts of consecrations during the early
-period in other houses. Luther at the time of the Reformation noted that
-the nuns of Quedlinburg were bound by no vow[449]. Probably the inmates
-took vows at first, and the custom afterwards lapsed. Harenberg, to whom
-we owe many learned dissertations on Gandersheim, says that the women
-there lived at first according to the rule of St Benedict; but after the
-12th century became Austin canonesses[450]. Engelhausen, a writer of the
-15th century, speaking of the inmates of Saxon houses generally, says that
-they lived as Austin canonesses[451]. Early writers in speaking of the
-inmates of Saxon convents use the familiar terms nuns (sanctimoniales) and
-virgins (virgines); the term canoness (canonissa), which designates a
-woman who took residence without a permanent vow, came into general use
-only at a later date[452]. It seems simplest therefore throughout to
-retain the familiar term nun when speaking of the inmates of Saxon
-settlements, though it must be understood with a reservation, for we are
-not certain of the exact meaning of the word at different periods.
-
-Engelhausen, the writer referred to above, adds that abbeys for women in
-Saxony were founded 'in order to help the noblemen who fought for the
-faith of Christ and were killed by the heathens; so that their daughters
-might not be reduced to begging (mendicare) but might live in these
-monasteries (monasteria), and when they had attained a marriageable age,
-might leave to be married.'
-
-The range of subjects taught in the Saxon nunnery was wide. It included
-the study of religious as well as of classical writers. Spinning, weaving,
-and embroidery were also taught and practised. We shall see later on that
-the nuns assembled at Quedlinburg wove large and elaborate hangings.
-Reference is also made to the study of law, and it is said that Gerberg
-II, abbess at Gandersheim ([Dagger] 1001), instructed her niece Sophie in
-convent discipline and in common law. An early chronicle in the vernacular
-says that the princess Sophie, a woman of determined character, so
-mastered these subjects that she was able to enter into disputation with
-learned men and successfully opposed them[453].
-
-Where the inmate of a convent was consecrated to the office of nun, this
-was done by the bishop of the diocese; but a curious story is told in
-connection with the consecration of the above-named princess Sophie[454].
-Sophie was the daughter of the emperor Otto II, and had been educated at
-Gandersheim, but she refused to be consecrated by the bishop of
-Hildesheim, who usually performed this office at the convent, and declared
-that she must have the archbishop of Mainz, whose dignity was more in
-keeping with her station. The compromise that both prelates should assist
-at the consecration was at last agreed upon. But Sophie was not satisfied.
-She left Gandersheim for the court of her brother, and only returned at
-the death of the abbess, whom she succeeded. Endless quarrels occurred
-during the term of her rule. On one occasion she allowed her nieces,
-Sophie and Ida, who were consecrated nuns, to depart on a visit to her
-friend the archbishop of Mainz, but when they sent word from Mainz that
-they did not intend to return to Gandersheim, she applied to her old enemy
-the bishop of Hildesheim, and forced him to interfere with the archbishop
-and bring back her nuns. They returned, but only for a time, for they were
-appointed abbesses at other convents.
-
-It is interesting to note how large a number of princesses of the ruling
-dynasty were unmarried, and remained in convents. Five daughters of Duke
-Liudolf spent their lives at Gandersheim, of whom only one as far as we
-know had been betrothed. At a later period Mathilde, the only daughter of
-Otto I, was from her cradle upwards appointed to become abbess of
-Quedlinburg; and her cousin Gerberg, daughter of Heinrich, duke of the
-Bavarians ([Dagger] 955), was abbess of Gandersheim. In the next
-generation Mathilde, daughter of Prince Liudolf ([Dagger] 957), was abbess
-at Essen ([Dagger] 1011), and her two cousins, Adelheid and Sophie, the
-daughters of Otto II, embraced the religious profession at the wish, it is
-said, of their mother. Adelheid was abbess at Quedlinburg (999-1040), and
-Sophie, the princess alluded to above, was abbess at Gandersheim
-(1001-1039). When Sophie died her sister Adelheid planned to unite in
-herself the rule of both houses, but death put a stop to her
-ambition[455]. The princess Mathilde, another daughter of Otto II, had
-married Ezo, son of the Palgrave of Lothringen, to whom she bore seven
-daughters; six of these embraced convent life and in course of time
-attained to the rank of abbess[456].
-
-These details are not without significance. They suggest that it was
-probably for the interest of the royal family that its princesses should
-remain in the convent in preference to contracting matrimonial alliances
-which might involve their relatives in political difficulties. On the
-other hand they suggest that life in these settlements must have been
-congenial in more ways than one.
-
-As abbess of one of the royal houses the princess certainly held a place
-of authority second to that of no woman in the land. To gather together a
-few items of this power: she held the abbey of the king and from the king,
-which precluded a dependent relation on lords spiritual or temporal, and
-made her abbey what is termed a free abbey (_freies reichstift_). Her
-rights of overlordship sometimes extended over many miles, and the
-property of Gandersheim is described as enormous[457].
-
-As holding the place of a feudal lord the abbess had the right of ban; she
-issued the summons when war had been declared and sent her contingent of
-armed knights into the field; and she also issued the summons to attend in
-her courts, where judgment was given by her proctor (_vogt_). In short she
-had the duties and privileges of a baron who held his property of the
-king, and as such she was summoned to the Imperial Diet (_reichstag_). She
-may have attended in person during early times, the fact appears
-doubtful; but in the 16th century she was only represented there[458].
-
-Similar rights and privileges devolved on those abbesses in England who
-were baronesses in title of the land they held. But these abbesses never
-secured some of the rights enjoyed by their sisters in Saxony, for example
-the right of striking coin which the abbess of Quedlinburg secured under
-Otto I[459]. Coins also are extant which were struck by abbesses of
-Gandersheim, whose portraits they bear[460].
-
-In addition to these advantages of position, the abbesses of the chief
-Saxon houses in the 10th and 11th centuries were in direct contact with
-the court and with politics. During the minority of Otto III, who was
-three years old when his father died in Italy (983), his mother Adelheid
-together with his aunt Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg, practically ruled
-the empire. Later when this emperor went to Italy for a prolonged stay in
-997 the management of affairs was given to the abbess Mathilde, who is
-praised for the determined measures she took to oppose the invading Wends.
-In 999 she summoned a diet at Dornberg on her own authority[461].
-
-The so-called free abbeys were under the obligation of entertaining the
-king and his retinue in return for privileges granted to them, and as the
-king had no fixed place of residence he stayed at his various palaces
-(palatia) in turn, and usually spent holiday time at one of the religious
-centres. Frequent royal visits to Quedlinburg are on record; the court was
-also entertained at Gandersheim. These visits brought a store of political
-information to the abbess of which she made use in her own way. Thus
-Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg, is thought to have supplied the annalist
-of Quedlinburg with the information which gives his chronicle its special
-value, and she was so far interested in the history of her own time that
-Widukind forwarded his history of the Saxons to her book by book for
-approval[462]. The abbess Gerberg of Gandersheim was similarly in contact
-with politics. As we shall see she supplied the nun Hrotsvith with the
-materials for writing the history of Otto the Great.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Early History of Gandersheim[463].
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the foundation and early history of
-Gandersheim, one of the earliest and wealthiest of Saxon houses, which
-claims our attention as the home of the nun Hrotsvith. It was situated on
-low-lying ground near the river Ganda in Eastphalia and was surrounded by
-the wooded heights of the Harz mountains. It owed its foundation to
-Liudolf himself, the great Saxon duke and the progenitor of the royal
-house of Saxony. At the close of a successful political career, Liudolf
-was persuaded by his wife Oda to devote some of his wealth and his
-influence to founding a settlement for women in Eastphalia, where his
-property chiefly lay.
-
-Oda was partly of Frankish origin, which may account for her seeking the
-aggrandisement of her family in a religious foundation at a time when
-there were very few in Saxon lands. It is noteworthy that this foundation
-was to be for women and that all the daughters of Liudolf and Oda went to
-live there. Information about the early history of Gandersheim is
-abundant. There are extant a life of Hathumod, its first abbess, which was
-written by her friend the monk Agius ([Dagger] 874), and an elegy on her
-death in which Agius tries to comfort her nuns for the loss they have
-sustained; both these compositions are written in a very attractive
-style[464]. A century later the nun Hrotsvith was busy at Gandersheim
-describing the early history of the settlement in a poem in which she
-celebrates both it and the family of its founder[465]. In many ways this
-is the most beautiful and finished of the nun's compositions; a work which
-reflects credit alike on her powers as a poetess, and on the settlement
-with which her name and fame are indissolubly linked.
-
-From these accounts we gather that Oda's mother, Ada, had already had a
-vision of the future greatness of her family. Hrotsvith tells how St John
-the Baptist appeared to her clad in a garment made of camel's hair of
-bright yellow, his lovely face of shining whiteness, with a small beard
-and black hair. In giving these details of the saint's appearance the nun
-was doubtless describing a picture she had before her at Gandersheim.
-
-It was in 852 that a plan was formed for transferring a small congregation
-of women, who had been living at Brunshausen, to some property on the
-river Ganda. A suitable site had to be sought and a fitting centre of
-worship provided. Liudolf and Oda undertook a journey to Rome and
-submitted their scheme to Pope Sergius II (844-847), begging him for a
-gift of relics. They received from him the bodies of the saints Anastasius
-and Innocentius, which they carried back with them to Saxony.
-
-On the night before All Saints' Day a swineherd in Liudolf's employ had a
-vision of lights falling from heaven and hanging in the air, which was
-interpreted as a heavenly indication of the site of the settlement. A
-clearance was accordingly made in the densely wooded district and a chapel
-was built.
-
-It was at this time that Hathumod, the eldest daughter of Liudolf, was
-living in Herford. From childhood her bent had been serious, and her
-friend Agius tells us that 'of her own free will she desired to be
-admitted to serious studies to which others are driven even by
-force[466].' She left her father's residence for Herford, where she was so
-happy that in after years she often longed to be back there. In 852 at the
-age of twelve she was taken away to Gandersheim to preside over the new
-settlement. This settlement was to be an improvement on existing
-institutions of the kind, for Agius tells us that its members were not
-allowed to have separate cells or to keep servants. They slept in
-tenements (villula) in the neighbourhood till their 'spiritual mother' was
-able to provide them with a suitable dwelling. Curious side-lights are
-thrown on other religious institutions by the following remarks of Agius
-on the nuns of Hathumod's convent: 'They shared everything,' he says[467];
-'their clothes were alike, neither too rich nor too poor, nor entirely of
-wool. The sisters were not allowed to dine out with relatives and friends,
-or to converse with them without leave. They were not allowed like other
-nuns (sanctimoniales) to leave the monastery to stay with relatives or
-visit dependent estates (possessiones subjectae). And they were forbidden
-to eat except at the common table at the appointed times except in cases
-of sickness. At the same hour and in the same place they partook of the
-same kind of food. They slept together and came together to celebrate the
-canonical hours (ad canonicos cursus orandi). And they set to work
-together whenever work had to be done.'
-
-Agius draws a beautiful picture of the gentleness and dignified bearing of
-Hathumod, who was at once strong and sensitive. She was always greatly
-cheered by signs of goodness in others, and she was as much grieved by an
-offence of a member of the community as if she had committed it herself.
-Agius tells us that she was slow in making friends but that she clung
-faithfully through life to those she had made.
-
-Her literary acquirements were considerable. 'No one could have shown
-greater quickness of perception, or a stronger power of understanding in
-listening to or in expounding the scriptures,' he says[468], and the
-scriptures always remained her favourite reading.
-
-It is difficult to form an idea of the standard of life in these religious
-settlements. The age was rough and barbarous in many ways, but the
-surroundings of the Saxon dukes did not lack a certain splendour, and
-traces of it would no doubt be found in the homes they made for their
-daughters. In these early accounts nothing transpires about their
-possessions in books and furniture, but it is incidentally mentioned that
-the abbess Hathumod owned a crystal vessel in the form of a dove, which
-contained relics and hung suspended by her bedside[469].
-
-The plan was formed to build a stone church for Gandersheim, an unusual
-and difficult undertaking. No suitable stone, however, could be found till
-one day, as Hathumod was praying in the chapel, she was divinely moved to
-walk forth and follow a dove which was awaiting her outside. The bird led
-the way to a spot where the underwood was removed and masses of stone
-which could be successfully dealt with were laid bare. 'It is the spot
-barren through its huge masses of stone, as we know it now-a-days,'
-Hrotsvith the nun wrote a hundred years later[470].
-
-The densely-wooded character of the neighbourhood is frequently referred
-to by early and later writers. Lingering superstitions peopled the forest
-with heathen fantasies, with 'fauns and spirits,' as Hrotsvith designates
-them. The settlement lay in the midst of the forest and was at all times
-difficult of access, but especially so in winter when the ground was
-covered with snow. In the introduction to her history of Otto the Great
-Hrotsvith likens her perplexity and fear in entering on so vast a subject
-to the state of mind of one who has to cross the forest in mid winter, a
-simile doubtless suggested by the surroundings of the convent[471]. Her
-feelings, she says, were those of 'someone who is ignorant of the vast
-expanse of the forest which lies before him, all the paths of which are
-hidden by a thick covering of snow; he is guided by no one and keeps true
-to his direction only by noticing the marks pointed out to him; sometimes
-he goes astray, unexpectedly he again strikes the right path, and having
-penetrated half way through the dense interlacing trees and brushwood he
-longs for rest and stops and would proceed no farther, were he not
-overtaken by some one, or unexpectedly guided by the footprints of those
-who have gone before.'
-
-Neither Liudolf the founder of Gandersheim nor his daughter Hathumod lived
-to see the stone church completed. He died in 866, and the abbess in 874
-at the age of thirty-two. She was surrounded by her nuns, among whom were
-several of her sisters, and her mother Oda, who had also come to live at
-Gandersheim. The monk Agius, who was a frequent visitor at the home, was
-often with her during her last illness, and after her death he composed an
-elegy in dialogue to comfort the nuns under the loss they had sustained.
-This poem is full of sweetness and delicacy of feeling, and is said to
-have been written on the model of the eclogues of Virgil. Alternate verses
-are put into the mouths of the nuns and of Agius; they describe their
-sorrow, and he dwells on the thoughts which might be a consolation to
-them. It opens in this strain:
-
-'Sad were the words we exchanged, I and those holy and worthy sisters who
-watched the dying moments of the sainted abbess Hathumod. I had been asked
-to address them, but somehow their recent grief made it impossible for
-them to listen to me, for they were bowed down by sorrow. The thoughts
-which I then expressed I have now put into verse and have added somewhat
-to them. For they (the sisters) asked me to address them in writing, since
-it would comfort them to have before their eyes, and to dwell upon, the
-words which I then spoke in sadness. Yielding to their wish and
-entreaties, I have attempted to express the thoughts which follow. Thou, O
-reader, understand that I am conversing with them, and follow us if thou
-wilt in our lament.'
-
-He then directly addresses the nuns and continues: 'Certainly we should
-weep for one who died before her time in the bloom of youth. Yet grief
-also has its limits; your sorrowful weeping should be within bounds. 'Tis
-natural you should be unhappy, still reason commands moderation in all
-things, and I therefore entreat you, O beloved and holy sisters, to stay
-your weeping and your tears. Spare your energies, spare your eyesight
-which you are wearing out by excess of grief. "Moderation in all things"
-has been said wisely and has been said well, and God Himself commands that
-it should be so.' The nuns make reply in the following words: 'What you
-put before us is certainly true. We know full well that God forbids
-excess, but our grief seems not excessive, for it falls so far short of
-what her merit claims. We can never put into words the wealth of goodness
-which we have lost in her. She was as a sister to us, as a mother, as a
-teacher, this our abbess under whose guidance we lived. We who were her
-handmaids and so far beneath her shared her life as her equals; for one
-will guided us, our wishes were the same, our pursuits alike. Shall we not
-grieve and weep and lament from our hearts for her who made our joy and
-was our glory, and in whom we have lost our happiness? There can be no
-excess of tears, of weeping and of grief, for in them only we find solace
-now that we shall never more behold her sweet face.' Agius replies: 'I
-doubt not that your grief is well founded, or that your tears rightly
-flow. But weeping will not undo you altogether, for the body has powers of
-endurance; you must bear this great anguish, for it has come to you
-through the will of God. Believe me, you are not alone in this grief, I
-too am oppressed by it, I too am suffering, and I cannot sufficiently
-express to you how much I also have lost in her. You know full well how
-great was her love for me, and how she cherished me while she lived. You
-know how anxious she was to see me when she fell ill, with what gladness
-she received me, and how she spoke to me on her deathbed. The words she
-spoke at the last were truly elevating, and ever and anon she uttered my
-name.' Agius tries to comfort himself with dwelling on Hathumod's
-gentleness and sweetness, and urges the nuns as they loved their abbess in
-the flesh now to continue loving her in the spirit. This alone, he says,
-will help the work to grow and increase which she began and loved. 'To
-dwell on grief,' he says, 'brings weeping and weakness; to dwell on love
-cheers and brings strength. The spirit of your abbess is still among you,
-it was that which you most loved in her, and it is that which you have not
-lost.'
-
-There is a curiously modern ring in much that the monk urges. His poem
-sets forth how the nuns at last took heart, and requested Agius to visit
-them again and help them with his advice, which he promised to do.
-
-On her deathbed Hathumod in talking to Agius compared her monastery to a
-plant of delicate growth and deplored that no royal charter sanctioning
-its privileges had as yet been obtained[472]. This charter and further
-privileges were secured to the settlement during the abbacy of Gerberg I
-(874-897), sister and successor of Hathumod, a woman of determined
-character and full of enthusiasm for the settlement. She was betrothed at
-one time to a certain Bernhard, against whose will she came to live at
-Gandersheim, and refused to leave it. He had been summoned to war, and
-departed declaring that she should not remain in the convent after his
-return. But opportunely for her wishes he was killed and she remained at
-Gandersheim. She ruled as abbess more than twenty years and advanced the
-interests of the settlement in many ways. The stone church which had been
-begun during Hathumod's rule was completed during that of Gerberg and was
-consecrated in 881, on All Saints' Day. The bishop of Hildesheim
-officiated at the ceremony of consecration, many visitors came to assist,
-and the assembled nuns for the first time took part in the singing of
-divine service.
-
-The abbess Gerberg was succeeded by her sister Christine, who ruled from
-897 to 919. Koepke, one of the chief modern historians of this period,
-considers that these three sisters, Hathumod, Gerberg and Christine,
-abbesses of Gandersheim, were among the most zealous advocates of culture
-and civilizing influences in Saxony during the 9th century[473]. The
-settlement became a centre of interest to the whole ducal family. After
-the death of Liudolf his widow Oda, who is said to have attained the age
-of one hundred and seven years, dwelt there altogether. She outlived her
-son, Duke Otto, who died in 912 and was buried at Gandersheim, and it is
-said that she lived to hear of the birth of her great-grandson Otto (913),
-who was destined to become king and emperor.
-
-After the death of the abbess Christine the settlement of Gandersheim
-drifts for a time into the background; Quedlinburg, founded by Heinrich I
-at the instigation of his wife Mathilde, takes its place in ducal and
-royal favour. Scant notices are preserved of the abbesses who ruled
-during the first half of the 10th century. We hear of the abbess Hrotsvith
-([Dagger] 927) that she was distinguished like her namesake of later date
-for literary acquirements[474], and that she wrote treatises on logic and
-rhetoric which are lost. And 'what is more,' says an early writer[475],
-'she forced the devil to return a bond signed with blood by which a youth
-had pledged away his soul.'
-
-Her writings may have perished in the fire which ravaged the settlement
-without permanently interfering with its prosperity during the rule of
-Gerberg II (959-1001). Contemporary writers concur in praise of the
-learning, the powers of management and the educational influence of this
-princess, who was the daughter of Heinrich, duke of the Bavarians
-([Dagger] 955). Heinrich for many years was the enemy and rival of his
-brother Otto I; and the final reconciliation and lasting friendship
-between these princes formed an important episode in the history of the
-time. We do not know what prompted Gerberg to embrace convent life;
-perhaps she became a nun at the wish of her father. She was appointed
-abbess at the age of nineteen when her father was dead and her mother
-Judith was ruling in Bavaria in the interests of her young son. Gerberg
-ruled at Gandersheim for forty-two years; she has a special claim on our
-interest because she was the friend, teacher, and patron of the nun
-Hrotsvith.
-
-
-Sec. 3. The Nun Hrotsvith and her Writings[476].
-
-The nun Hrotsvith occupies a unique position in monastic life and among
-unmarried women generally. 'This fruitful poetic talent,' says the writer
-Ebert, 'which lacks not the inspiration and the courage of genius to enter
-upon new ground, evinces how the Saxon element was chosen to guide the
-German nation in the domain of art.' The literary work of Hrotsvith can be
-grouped under three headings. To the first belongs the writing of metrical
-legends which were intended for the perusal and the edification of inmates
-of convents; to the second, the composition of seven dramas written in the
-style of Terence; and to the third, the writing of contemporary history
-in metrical form. Each kind of work has merits of its own and deserves
-attention. But while Hrotsvith as a legend writer ranks with other writers
-of the age, and as a historical writer is classed by the modern historian
-Giesebrecht with Widukind and Ruotger, as a writer of Latin drama she
-stands entirely alone. We have no other dramatic compositions except hers
-between the comedies of classic times and the miracle plays, which at
-first consisted only of a few scenes with bald dialogue.
-
-It can be gathered from Hrotsvith's writings that she was born about the
-year 932; and the fact of her entering a nunnery is proof of her gentle
-birth. It is uncertain when she came to Gandersheim, probably at a very
-early age. She owed her education there partly to Rikkardis, to whom she
-refers in her writings, but chiefly to the abbess Gerberg, who, she says,
-was somewhat younger than herself.
-
-Judging from Hrotsvith's writings she worked diligently and soon attracted
-attention beyond the limits of her convent. The following facts in regard
-to time are of importance. The first of her two sets of legends was put
-together and dedicated to Gerberg as abbess, that is after the year 959;
-she wrote and submitted part if not the whole of her history of Otto the
-Great to Wilhelm, archbishop of Mainz, before the year 968, in which the
-prelate died. How the composition of her dramas is related in point of
-time to that of the legends and the historical poems cannot be definitely
-decided; probably the dramas were written in the middle period of
-Hrotsvith's life. For the legends bear marks of being the outcome of early
-effort, while the historical poems, especially the one which tells of the
-early history of Gandersheim, were written in the full consciousness of
-power. We do not know the date of Hrotsvith's death; an early chronicle
-says that she wrote a history of the three Emperors Otto, in which case
-she must have lived till 1002, that being the year of Otto III's death.
-But the annalist to whom we owe this remark may have been misinformed;
-only a part of the history of the first emperor is extant, and we cannot
-argue from any references in her other works that she wrote a continuation
-of it[477]. The nun and her writings soon ceased to attract attention, and
-there are few references to her in any writings for nearly five hundred
-years. At the beginning of the 16th century, however, the humanist Conrad
-Celtes came across a copy of her dramas, which seemed to him so remarkable
-that he had them printed. And since then they have repeatedly been
-published, and excellent translations have been made of them into German
-and French[478].
-
-In the introduction to her plays Hrotsvith appeals to the judgment of
-powerful patrons, but she does not give their names; in her history, as
-mentioned above, she asks for criticism from Wilhelm, archbishop of Mainz,
-who was the illegitimate son of Otto I, and a leading prelate of the time.
-This exhausts what we know of friends outside the convent; probably the
-abbess Gerberg was the chief critic throughout and had more influence on
-her than any other. It was she who introduced Hrotsvith to the works,
-classical and other, which she had herself studied under learned men, and
-she was always ready to encourage her able pupil and supply her with
-materials to work upon.
-
-The library at Gandersheim, to which Hrotsvith had access, contained the
-writings of a number of classical and theological authors. Among the
-classical writers with whom the nun is thought to have been directly
-acquainted were Virgil, Lucan, Horace, Ovid, Terence, and perhaps Plautus;
-among the Christian writers Prudentius, Sedulius, Fortunatus, Marianus
-Capella, and Boethius[479]. Ebert, who has analysed the sources from which
-Hrotsvith drew the subject matter of her legends and dramas, considers
-that at this time Greek authors were read at Gandersheim in Latin
-translations only. Another writer, arguing from the fact that the nun
-frequently uses words of Greek origin, considers that she had some
-knowledge of Greek[480]. This latter opinion has little in its favour.
-However we know that Greek teachers were summoned from Constantinople to
-instruct Hedwig, Gerberg's sister, who was to have married the Emperor
-Constantine. The match fell through, but the Saxon royal family aimed
-steadily at securing an alliance with the court of Constantinople, and
-ultimately attained this object by the marriage of Otto II to the Greek
-princess Theofanu (971).
-
-After Hrotsvith had mastered the contents of the library at Gandersheim
-she was moved to try her hand at writing Latin verse; she cast into
-metrical form the account of the birth and life of the Virgin Mary
-contained in a gospel which in some manuscripts is ascribed to St James,
-the brother of Christ[481]. The story is well told, and the incidents
-described follow each other naturally; the poem exceeds nine hundred lines
-in length. She supplements the original text with some amplifications of a
-descriptive nature and a panegyric on Christ, with which she closes the
-poem.
-
-The diffidence Hrotsvith felt at first in writing is described in the
-introduction which she prefixed to the complete collection of her
-legendary poems and addressed to a wider public[482].
-
-'Unknown to others and secretly, so to speak, I worked by myself'; she
-says, 'sometimes I composed, sometimes I destroyed what I had written to
-the best of my abilities and yet badly; I dealt with material taken from
-writings with which I became acquainted within the precincts of our
-monastery of Gandersheim through the help of our learned and kindly
-teacher Rikkardis, afterwards through that of others who taught in her
-place, and finally through that of the high-born abbess Gerberg, under
-whom I am living at present, who is younger than I am in years but more
-advanced in learning as befits one of royal lineage, and who has
-introduced me to various authors whom she has herself studied with the
-help of learned men. Writing verse appears a difficult and arduous task
-especially for one of my sex, but trusting to the help of divine grace
-more than to my own powers, I have fitted the stories of this book to
-dactylic measures as best I could, for fear that the abilities that have
-been implanted in me should be dulled and wasted by neglect; for I prefer
-that these abilities should in some way ring the divine praises in support
-of devotion; the result may not be in proportion to the trouble taken and
-yet it may be to the profit of some.'
-
-The nun is filled with the consciousness that her undertaking is no mean
-one. 'Full well I know,' she says, addressing the Virgin, 'that the task
-of proclaiming thy merits exceeds my feeble strength, for the whole world
-could not celebrate worthily that which is a theme of praise among the
-angels.' The poem on the life of the Virgin is written in leonine
-hexameters, that is with rhymes at the middle and the end of the line.
-This form of verse was sometimes used at that period, and Hrotsvith
-especially in her later historical poems handled it with considerable
-skill.
-
-Hrotsvith afterwards added to the account of the Virgin a poem of a
-hundred and fifty lines on the Ascension of Christ[483]. In this, as she
-tells us, she adapted an account written by John the Bishop, which had
-been translated from Greek into Latin.
-
-This poem also is simple and dignified, and gives proof of considerable
-power of expression on the part of the nun. Her vocabulary however has
-certain peculiarities, for she is fond of diminutives, a tendency which in
-the eyes of her editor is peculiarly feminine[484].
-
-The poem on the Ascension closes with the following characteristic lines:
-'Whoever reads this let him exclaim in a forbearing spirit: Holy King,
-spare and have mercy on the suppliant Hrotsvith and suffer that she who
-here has been celebrating thy glorious deeds may persevere further in holy
-song on things divine!'
-
-The next subject which engrossed the nun's attention was the history of
-Gongolf[485], a huntsman and warrior of Burgundy, who lived in the time of
-King Pipin. He was credited with performing wonders such as calling up a
-fountain; he was a pious Christian and was put to a cruel death by his
-faithless wife and her lover. This poem is over five hundred lines in
-length and contains some fine descriptive passages. The version of the
-story Hrotsvith made use of being lost, we cannot tell how far she drew
-upon her own powers of narrative[486].
-
-But the next legend she wrote left full scope for originality of
-treatment. It describes the experiences and martyrdom of Pelagius, a youth
-who had been recently (925) put to death by the Saracens at Cordova in
-Spain; the event, as she herself informs us, had been described to
-Hrotsvith by an eye-witness. The story opens with an enthusiastic
-description of the beauties of Cordova. Pelagius, the son of a king of
-Galicia, persuaded his father to leave him as hostage with the Caliph. But
-the Caliph, enamoured by the youth's physical beauty, persecuted him with
-attentions, and meeting with contempt ordered him to be cast down from the
-city walls. The young man remained unharmed, and was then beheaded and his
-head and body thrown into the river. Fishermen picked them up and carried
-them to a monastery, where their identity was ascertained by casting the
-head in the fire, which left it untouched. The head and body were then
-given solemn burial.
-
-The next legend has repeatedly been commented on as the earliest account
-in verse of a pact with the devil and as a precursor of the many versions
-of the legend of Faust[488]. The 'Lapse and conversion of Theophilus[489]'
-may have had special attractions for Hrotsvith since the incident of the
-devil forced to return his bond was connected, as mentioned above, with
-her namesake Hrotsvith, abbess of Gandersheim. The story of Theophilus
-which Hrotsvith expanded and put into verse had recently been translated
-from Greek into Latin, as Ebert has shown. The story runs as follows.
-
-Theophilus, nephew of a bishop of Cilesia (of uncertain date), had been
-educated in the seven liberal arts, but he held himself unworthy of
-succeeding his uncle, and considered the office of 'vice-domus' more
-suited to his powers. His popularity however drew on him the hatred of the
-newly appointed bishop, who robbed him of his post. Thirsting for revenge
-the young man went for advice to a certain Hebrew, 'who by magic art
-turned away many of the faithful,' and who led him at night through the
-town to a dark place 'full of phantasms that stood in white clothes
-holding torches in their hands' (line 99). Their demon king was at first
-indignant that a Christian claimed his assistance and jeered at the
-Christians' ways, but at last he promised to help Theophilus on condition
-that he should sign an agreement by which he pledged himself to be one of
-the ghastly crew to all eternity. The young man agreed to the condition,
-and on his return home was favourably received by the bishop and
-reinstated in his dignity. But his peace of mind had deserted him; again
-and again he was seized by qualms of conscience and affrighted by
-agonising visions of eternal suffering which he forcibly describes in a
-monologue. At last he sought to escape from his contract by praying to the
-Virgin Queen of heaven in her temple, and for forty days consecutively
-prayed to her to intercede in his favour with God. The Virgin at last
-appeared to him, told him that he was free and handed him the fatal
-document. On a festal day he confessed his wrong-doing before all the
-people and burnt the parchment in their presence. In the very act of doing
-so he appeared as a changed man before their eyes and was instantly
-overtaken by death.
-
-To this legend Hrotsvith attached a little prayer of eight lines which is
-a grace for use at meals. This prayer is in no way connected with the
-legend, and its presence here indicates that the legends were originally
-intended to be read aloud during meals in the refectory, and the reading
-to be closed with a prayer.
-
-Having written so far Hrotsvith collected her legendary poems together
-with the poem on the Virgin and dedicated them in the form of a little
-book to her teacher, the abbess Gerberg. Evidently the stories attracted
-attention beyond the limits of the convent, and Hrotsvith was encouraged
-to continue in the path she had chosen. Accordingly she wrote a second set
-of legends, in composing which she was mindful of a wider public and that
-not exclusively of her own sex. For in the opening lines of the first of
-these legends which treats of the conversion of Proterius by Basilius,
-bishop of Caesarea, she begs that those who peruse this story 'will not on
-account of her sex despise the woman who draws these strains from a
-fragile reed[490].'
-
-The story of this conversion, like that of Theophilus, treats of a pact
-with the evil one, but with a difference. For in the one story the man
-signs away his soul to regain his position, in the other he subscribes the
-fatal bond for the purpose of securing the hand of the bishop's daughter.
-The bishop however intercedes with God in his behalf and regains his
-liberty for him. The poem is neither so complete nor so striking as that
-of Theophilus.
-
-Two more legends are grouped with it. One of them describes the Passion of
-Dionysius[491], who suffered martyrdom at Paris, and who at an early date
-was held identical with Dionysius the Areopagite. The hand of this saint
-had been given as a relic to King Heinrich the Fowler, and had been
-deposited by him at Quedlinburg--an incident which made the saint's name
-familiar in Saxon lands.
-
-The passion of Dionysius is described according to a prose account written
-by Hilduin ([Dagger] 814), but Hrotsvith abbreviated and altered it[492].
-She describes how Dionysius witnessed an eclipse of the sun at Memphis at
-the time when Christ was put to death, how he returned to Athens and there
-waited to hear something of the new god. The apostle Paul arrived and
-preached, and Dionysius followed him to Rome. From Rome he was despatched
-into Gaul to preach the new faith, and while there he was first cast into
-the flames which did not burn him, and then thrown before wild beasts
-which refused to touch him. He was finally beheaded during the
-persecutions under Diocletian. In this poem there is an especially fine
-passage in which we hear how Dionysius after being beheaded rose to life
-and took up his head, which he carried away down the hill to the spot
-where he wished to be buried,--a story similar to that told of many
-saints.
-
-The last legend which Hrotsvith wrote treats of the Passion of St Agnes, a
-virgin saint of Rome, whose fortitude in tribulation and stedfast
-adherence to Christianity and to the vow she had taken made her story
-especially suitable for a convent of nuns[493]. The story has often been
-put into writing from the 4th century downwards; Hrotsvith took her
-account from that ascribed to Ambrosius ([Dagger] 397), which she followed
-closely. She prefaces it with an address to maidens vowed to God, who are
-exhorted to remain steadfast in their purpose. Like most of these
-legendary tales it is between four and five hundred lines in length.
-
-Throughout her legends Hrotsvith, as she herself says in a few remarks
-which stand at the conclusion of the legends, was bent on keeping close to
-the original accounts from which she worked. 'I have taken the material
-for this book, like that for the one preceding it, from ancient books
-compiled by authentic authors (certis nominibus), the story of Pelagius
-alone is excepted.... If mistakes have crept into my accounts, it is not
-because I have intentionally erred but because I have unwittingly copied
-mistakes made by others[494].'
-
-Ebert, commenting on the spirit of the legends generally, remarks on the
-masterly way in which the nun has dealt with her material, on her skill in
-supplying gaps left by earlier writers, on her deft handling of rhyme and
-rhythm, on the right feeling which guides her throughout her work, and on
-the completeness of each of her legends as a whole[495].
-
-The lines in which the second set of legends are dedicated to Gerberg bear
-witness to the pleasure Hrotsvith derived from her work. 'To thee, lady
-Gerberg,' she says, 'I dedicate these stories, adding new to earlier ones,
-as a sinner who deserves benevolent indulgence. Rejoicing I sing to the
-accompaniment with dactylic measures; do not despise them because they
-are bad, but praise in your gentle heart the workings of God[496].'
-
-Having so far worked along accepted lines and achieved success therein,
-the nun of Gandersheim was moved to strike out a new path. Conscious of
-her powers and conscious of a need of her time, filled with admiration for
-the dramatic powers of classical writers while disapproving of their
-tendencies, she set to work to compose a series of plays on the model of
-Terence, in which she dramatised incidents and experiences calculated to
-have an elevating influence on her fellow-nuns.
-
-How she came to write plays at all and what determined her in the choice
-of her subject, she has described in passages which are worth quoting in
-full. They show that she was not wanting either in spirit or in
-determination, and that her conviction that the classical form of drama
-was without equal strengthened her in her resolve to make use of that form
-as the vehicle for stories of an altogether different tenor. The interest
-of the plays of Terence invariably turns on the seduction of women and
-exposure of the frailty of the sex; the nun of Gandersheim determined to
-set forth woman's stedfast adherence to a vow once taken and her firm
-resistance to temptation. Whatever may be thought of these compositions,
-the merit of originality can hardly be denied to them. They were intended
-for perusal only, but there is nothing in the dialogue or mechanism that
-makes a dramatic representation of them impossible.
-
-'There are many Christians,' says the nun[497], 'from whom we cannot claim
-to be excepted, who because of the charm of finished diction prefer
-heathen literature with its hollowness to our religious books; there are
-others who hold by the scripture and despise what is heathen, and yet
-eagerly peruse the poetic creations of Terence; while delighting in his
-flow of language, they are all polluted by the godless contents of his
-works. Therefore I "the well known mouthpiece of Gandersheim" have not
-hesitated in taking this poet's style as a model, and while others honour
-him by perusing his dramas, I have attempted, in the very way in which he
-treats of unchaste love among evil women, to celebrate according to my
-ability the praiseworthy chasteness of godlike maidens.
-
-'In doing so, I have often hesitated with a blush on my cheeks through
-modesty, because the nature of the work obliged me to concentrate my
-attention on and apply my mind to the wicked passion of illicit love and
-to the tempting talk of the amorous, against which we at other times close
-our ears. But if I had hesitated on account of my blushes I could not have
-carried out my purpose, or have set forth the praise of innocence to the
-fulness of my ability. For in proportion as the blandishments of lovers
-are enticing, so much greater is the glory of our helper in heaven, so
-much more glorious the triumph of those who prevail, especially where
-woman's weakness triumphs and man's shameless strength is made to succumb.
-Certainly some will allege that my language is much inferior, much poorer,
-and very unlike that of him whom I try to imitate. It is so, I agree with
-them. And yet I refuse to be reproached on this account as though I had
-meant to class myself with those who in their knowledge are so far above
-my insufficiency. I am not even so boastful as to class myself with the
-least of their pupils; all I am bent on is, however insufficiently, to
-turn the power of mind given to me to the use of Him who gave it. I am not
-so far enamoured of myself that I should cease from fear of criticism to
-proclaim the power of Christ which works in the saints in whatever way He
-grants it. If anyone is pleased with my work I shall rejoice, but if on
-account of my unpolished language it pleases no one, what I have done yet
-remains a satisfaction to myself, for while in other writings I have
-worked, however insufficiently, only in heroic strophe (heroico strophio),
-here I have combined this with dramatic form, while avoiding the dangerous
-allurements of the heathen.'
-
-Those passages in which Hrotsvith speaks of her modest hesitation are
-especially worthy of notice and will not fail to appeal to those women
-now-a-days, who, hoping to gain a clearer insight into the difficulties
-with which their sex has to contend, feel it needful to face facts from
-which their sensibilities naturally shrink. They will appreciate the
-conflicting feelings with which the nun of Gandersheim, well-nigh a
-thousand years ago, entered upon her task, and admire the spirit in which
-she met her difficulties and the courage with which she carried out her
-purpose, in spite of her consciousness of shortcomings and derogatory
-criticism.
-
-As she points out, the keynote of her dramas one and all is to insist on
-the beauties of a steadfast adherence to chastity as opposed to the frenzy
-and the vagaries of passion. In doing so she is giving expression to the
-ideas of contemporary Christian teaching, which saw in passion, not the
-inborn force that can be applied to good or evil purpose, not the storage
-of strength which works for social advantage or disadvantage, but simply a
-tendency in human nature which manifests itself in lack of self-restraint,
-and the disturbing element which interferes with the attainment of
-calmness and candour.
-
-As Hudson, one of the few English writers who has treated of this nun and
-her writings[498], remarks: 'It is on the literary side alone that
-Hrotsvitha belongs to the classic school. The spirit and essence of her
-work belong entirely to the middle ages; for beneath the rigid garb of a
-dead language beats the warm heart of a new era. Everything in her plays
-that is not formal but essential, everything that is original and
-individual, belongs wholly to the christianised Germany of the 10th
-century. Everywhere we can trace the influence of the atmosphere in which
-she lived; every thought and every motive is coloured by the spiritual
-conditions of her time. The keynote of all her works is the conflict of
-Christianity with paganism; and it is worthy of remark that in
-Hrotsvitha's hands Christianity is throughout represented by the purity
-and gentleness of woman while paganism is embodied in what she describes
-as 'the vigour of men (virile robur).'
-
-For the nun does not disparage marriage, far from it; nor does she
-inculcate a doctrine of general celibacy. It is not a question with her of
-giving up a lesser joy for a greater, but simply of the way to remain true
-to the higher standard, which in accordance with the teaching of her age
-she identified with a life of chastity. Her position may appear untenable;
-confusion of thought is a reproach which a later age readily casts on an
-earlier. But underneath what may seem unreasonable there is the aspiration
-for self-control. It is this aspiration which gives a wide and an abiding
-interest to her plays. For she is not hampered by narrowness of thought or
-by pettiness of spirit. Her horizon is limited, we grant; but she fills it
-entirely and she fills it well.
-
-Passing from these generalities to the plays themselves, we find ourselves
-in a variety of surroundings and in contact with a wide range of
-personalities. The transition period from heathendom to Christianity
-supplies in most cases the mental and moral conflicts round which centres
-the interest of these plays.
-
-The plays are six in number, and the one that stands first is divided into
-two separate parts. Their character varies considerably. There is the
-heroic, the romantic, the comic and the unrelieved tragic element, and
-the two plays that stand last contain long disquisitions on scholastic
-learning. A short analysis of their contents will give the reader an idea
-of the manner in which Hrotsvith makes her conceptions and her purpose
-evident.
-
-'Gallicanus,' the play that stands first[499], is in some ways the most
-striking of all. A complex theme is ably dealt with and the incidents
-follow each other rapidly; the scene lies alternately in Rome and on the
-battle-field. The Emperor Constantine is bent on opposing the incursions
-of the Scythians, and his general Gallicanus claims the hand of the
-emperor's daughter Constantia as a reward for undertaking so dangerous an
-expedition. Constantia is a convert to Christianity, Gallicanus is a
-heathen. In an interview with her father the girl declares she will sooner
-die than be united to a heathen, but with a mixture of shrewdness and
-confidence in her faith she agrees to marry him on his return on condition
-that the Christians John and Paul shall accompany him on his expedition,
-and that his daughters shall meanwhile be given into her keeping. The
-manner in which she receives the girls is at once proud and dignified.
-'Welcome my sisters, Attica and Artemia,' she exclaims; 'stand, do not
-kneel, rather greet me with a kiss of affection.' There is no development
-of character in the course of the play, for Hrotsvith is chiefly bent on
-depicting states of mind under given conditions. The characters in
-themselves are forcibly drawn: witness the emperor's affection for his
-daughter, the general's strength and determination, Constantia's dignified
-bearing and the gentleness of the Christian teachers. The sequel of events
-bears out Constantia's anticipations. The daughters of Gallicanus are
-easily swayed in favour of Christianity and their father is converted. For
-Gallicanus is hard pressed by the Scythians on the battle-field and
-despairs of success, when the Christian teachers urge him to call upon
-their God for help. He does so, overcomes the Scythians and takes their
-leader Bradan prisoner. In recognition of his victory he is rewarded by a
-triumphal entry into Rome. But he is now a convert to Christianity; he
-describes to the emperor how Christ Himself and the heavenly host fought
-on his side, and he approaches Constantia and his daughters and thus
-addresses them: 'I greet you, holy maidens; abide in the fear of God and
-keep inviolate your virgin crown that the eternal King may receive you in
-His embrace.' Constantia replies: 'We serve Him the more readily if thou
-dost not oppose us.' Gallicanus: 'I would not discourage, prevent or
-thwart your wishes, I respect them, so far that I would not now constrain
-thee, beloved Constantia, whom I have secured at the risk of my life.' But
-he admits that his resolve costs him much, and he decides to seek solace
-in solitude for his grief at having lost so great a prize.
-
-The sequel to this play is short, and describes the martyrdom of the
-Christian teachers, John and Paul, who had accompanied Gallicanus on his
-expedition. Gallicanus is no more, the Emperor Constantius is dead, and
-Julian the Apostate reigns in his stead and cruelly persecutes the
-Christians. No woman appears in this part of the play. We first witness
-the martyrdom of the Christians who are put to death by Terentian, one of
-the emperor's generals. Terentian's son is then seized by a terrible
-illness, and his unhappy father goes to the grave of the martyrs, where he
-becomes a convert to Christianity and prays for their intercession with
-God in behalf of his son. His prayer finds fulfilment and the boy is
-restored to health. Hrotsvith took this story from the Acts and the
-Passion of the saints John and Paul, but, as Ebert has shown, the
-development is entirely her own[500]. Though working on the model of
-Terence the nun is quite indifferent to unities of time and place, and
-sacrifices everything to the exigencies of the plot, so that the
-transition from scene to scene is often sudden and abrupt.
-
-The next play is 'Dulcetius, or the sufferings of the maidens Agape,
-Chionia and Irene[501].' It dramatises a story which was familiar in
-western Europe from an early date; Ealdhelm mentions it in his poem on
-Virginity. Its popularity is no doubt due to the juxtaposition of entirely
-divergent elements, the pathos of martyrdom being in close company with
-scenes of broad humour.
-
-During the persecutions under Diocletian three youthful sisters are
-brought before the emperor, who thus addresses the eldest:
-
-'_Diocletian._ The noble stock from which you spring and your extreme
-beauty demand that you should be connected with our court through marriage
-with high officials. This we incline to vouchsafe you if you agree to
-disown Christ and offer sacrifice to our most ancient gods.
-
-_Agape._ O spare yourself this trouble, do not think of giving us in
-marriage. Nought can compel us to disown the name of Christ, or to debase
-our purity of heart.
-
-_Diocletian._ What is the object of this madness?
-
-_Agape._ What sign of madness do you see in us?
-
-_Diocletian._ A great and obvious one.
-
-_Agape._ In what?
-
-_Diocletian._ In this, that casting from yourselves the observance of the
-ancient faith, you follow this new foolish Christian teaching.
-
-_Agape._ Blasphemer, fear the power of God Almighty, threatening
-danger....
-
-_Diocletian._ To whom?
-
-_Agape._ To you and to the realm you govern.
-
-_Diocletian._ The girl is crazy, let her be removed.'
-
-He then interviews the other two, but with similar results; threats are of
-no avail and the girls are handed over to the general Dulcetius to be
-summarily dealt with. Dulcetius, however, is so powerfully impressed by
-their beauty, that he orders them to be placed in a chamber beyond the
-kitchen, hoping to take advantage of their helplessness and induce them to
-gratify his passion. He repairs at night to the chamber in spite of the
-warning of his soldiers, when a spell falls on him, he misses the room,
-and his reason so utterly forsakes him that he proceeds to fondle and
-caress the pots and pans which he seizes upon in his excitement. The girls
-are watching him from the next room through a chink in the wall and make
-merry over his madness.
-
-'_Agape._ What is he about?
-
-_Hirena._ Why, the fool is out of his mind, he fancies he has got hold of
-us.
-
-_Agape._ What is he doing?
-
-_Hirena._ Now he presses the kettle to his heart, now he clasps the pots
-and pans and presses his lips to them.
-
-_Chionia._ How ludicrous!
-
-_Hirena._ His face, his hands, his clothes are all black and sooty; the
-soot which clings to him makes him look like an Ethiopian.
-
-_Agape._ Very fitting that he should be so in body, since the devil has
-possession of his mind.
-
-_Hirena._ Look, he is going. Let us wait to see what the soldiers who are
-waiting outside will do when they see him.'
-
-The soldiers fail to recognise their leader, they take to their heels.
-Dulcetius repairs to the palace, where the gatekeeper scoffs at his
-appearance and refuses him admittance, in spite of his insisting on his
-identity and speaking of himself as dressed in splendid attire. At last
-his wife who has heard of his madness comes forth to meet him. The spell
-is broken and he discovers that he has been the laughing-stock of the
-maidens. He then orders them to be exposed naked in the market-place as a
-punishment. But a divine power causes their garments to cling to them,
-while Dulcetius falls so fast asleep that it is impossible to rouse him.
-The Emperor Diocletian therefore entrusts the accomplishment of the
-maidens' martyrdom to Sisinnius. Two of the girls are cast into the
-flames, but their souls pass away to heaven while their bodies remain
-without apparent hurt. The third sister is threatened with shameful
-treatment, but before it is carried out she is miraculously borne away to
-a hill-top. At first the soldiers attempt in vain to approach her, but at
-last they succeed in killing her with arrows. The youthful, girlish traits
-which appear in both the mirth and the sorrow of the three sisters are
-well developed, and form a vivid contrast to the unrelieved brutality of
-Dulcetius and Sisinnius.
-
-Quite a different range of ideas is brought before the reader in the next
-play, 'Calimachus,' which is Hrotsvith's nearest approach to a love
-tragedy[502]. She took its subject from an apocryphal account of the
-apostles, but as Ebert remarks she handles her material with considerable
-freedom[503]. The opening scene shows her power of immediately presenting
-a situation. The scene is laid in the house of Andronicus, a wealthy
-Ephesian. The youth Calimachus and his friends enter.
-
-'_Calimachus._ A few words with you, friends!
-
-_Friends._ We will converse with thee as long as thou pleasest.
-
-_Calimachus._ If you do not mind, we will converse apart.
-
-_Friends._ Thou biddest, we comply.
-
-_Calimachus._ Let us repair to a secluded spot, that we may not be
-interrupted in our converse.'
-
-They go and Calimachus explains how a heavy misfortune has befallen him;
-they urge him to unbosom himself. He confesses he is in love with a most
-beauteous, most adorable being, it is a woman, the wife of Andronicus;
-what shall he do to secure her favour? His friends declare his passion
-hopeless, Drusiana is a Christian and has moreover taken the vow of
-chastity; 'I ask for help, you give me despair,' Calimachus exclaims. In
-the next scene he confronts Drusiana and declares his passion. Drusiana
-repudiates his advances but she is intimidated by his threats, and gives
-utterance to her fears in a monologue in which she declares that she would
-rather die than yield to him. Sudden death cuts her down; and the apostle
-John is called in by her husband and undertakes to give her Christian
-burial. But the youth Calimachus is not cured of his passion. At the
-instigation of his companion, Fortunatus, he goes with him by night to the
-vault where she lies and would embrace the corpse, but a serpent of
-terrible aspect surprises the two young men and kills them. In the
-following scene the apostle is leading Andronicus to the vault: when they
-enter they come upon the serpent lying by the side of the youths. The
-apostle then explains to Andronicus what has happened and gives proof of
-his great power by awakening Calimachus from the dead. The young man
-confesses his evil intentions and explains how he came there at the
-suggestion of his companion. The apostle then recalls Drusiana to life,
-and she begs that Fortunatus also may be restored, but the apostle refuses
-on account of the man's wickedness. Drusiana herself then intercedes in
-his behalf and prays to God for his restoration. Her wish is fulfilled,
-Fortunatus comes back to life, but he declares he would sooner have died
-than have seen Drusiana happy and his friend a convert to Christianity.
-The wounds which the serpent had inflicted at once begin to swell, and he
-expires before their eyes, and the apostle explains that his jealousy has
-sent him to hell. A great deal of action is crowded into this play and we
-are abruptly carried on from scene to scene. It closes with some pious
-reflections on the part of the apostle.
-
-There is considerable diversity of opinion among modern writers on the
-merits of the dramas we have discussed hitherto, but all concur in praise
-of the play called 'Abraham,' which dramatises the oft repeated story of a
-woman who yields to temptation and is reclaimed from her wicked ways. The
-interest in this play never flags and the scenes are worked out with a
-breadth of conception which gives the impression of assured strength[504].
-
-Hrotsvith took the subject of this drama from an account, written in the
-6th century by Ephrem, of the life of his friend, the hermit Abraham. The
-story was written originally in Greek and is preserved in that language;
-the translation into Latin used by Hrotsvith is lost[505]. The plot of the
-drama is as follows:
-
-The devout hermit Abraham consults his friend the hermit Ephrem as to what
-he shall do with his niece, Maria, who is left to his care, and together
-they decide that she shall come and live in a cell near her uncle. Abraham
-throughout speaks directly and to the point, while Ephrem's talk is full
-of mystic allusions. He talks to the maiden of the beauties of the
-religious vocation and assures her that her name, Maria, signifies 'star
-of the sea,' and that she is therefore intended for great things. The
-maiden is surprised at his words and naively remarks that it would be a
-great thing 'to equal the lustre of the stars.' She comes to dwell in a
-cell close to that of the two hermits, but after a time she is enticed
-away and disappears from the sight of her uncle, who is deeply grieved at
-her loss. For several years he hears nothing from her; at last a friend
-comes and tells him that the girl has been seen in the city, and is there
-living in a house of ill fame. The old man at once decides to go forth to
-seek his niece and to reclaim her. He dons shoes, a traveller's dress and
-a large hat, and takes with him money, since that only can give him access
-to her. The scene then shifts from the sylvan solitude to the house where
-Maria is living. Abraham arrives and is received by the tavern-keeper,
-whom he asks for a night's lodging, offering him his 'solidus' and
-requesting to see the woman the fame of whose beauty has spread. This
-scene and the one that follows bring the situation before the reader
-admirably. Abraham is served with a meal and Maria enters, at sight of
-whose levity he scarce represses his tears. She entertains him, and he
-feigns a gaiety corresponding to hers, the tavern-keeper being present. Of
-a sudden she is overcome by the thought of the past, but he keeps up his
-assumed character. At last supper is over, and they retire into the
-adjoining chamber. The moment for disclosure has come, and Hrotsvith is
-seen at her best.
-
-'_Abraham._ Close fast the door, that no one enter and disturb us.
-
-_Maria._ Be not concerned, I have done so; no one will find it easy to get
-in.
-
-_Abraham._ The time has come; away, deceitful clothes, that I may be
-recognised. Oh, my adopted daughter, joy of my soul, Maria, dost thou not
-know the aged man who was to thee a parent, who vowed thee to the heavenly
-king?
-
-_Maria._ Oh woe is me! It is my father, my teacher Abraham, who speaks.
-
-_Abraham._ What then has come to thee, my daughter?
-
-_Maria._ Ah, wretchedness!
-
-_Abraham._ Who was it that deceived thee? Who allured thee?
-
-_Maria._ He who was the undoing of our first parents.
-
-_Abraham._ Where is the noble life thou once wast wont to lead?
-
-_Maria._ Lost, lost for ever!
-
-_Abraham._ Where is thy virgin modesty, thy wondrous self-restraint?
-
-_Maria._ Gone from me altogether.
-
-_Abraham._ If thou dost not return to thine own self, what reward in the
-life to come canst thou expect for fasting, prayer, and watching, since
-fallen as from heaven's heights thou now art sunk in hellish depths?
-
-_Maria._ Woe, woe is me!
-
-_Abraham._ Why didst thou thus deceive me? why turn from me? Why didst
-thou not make known to me thy wretchedness, that I and my beloved Ephrem
-might work for thy repentance?
-
-_Maria._ Once fallen into sinfulness, I dared not face you who are holy.
-
-_Abraham._ But is there any one entirely faultless, except the Virgin's
-Son?
-
-_Maria._ Nay, no one.
-
-_Abraham._ 'Tis human to be frail, but to persist in wickedness is of the
-devil. Not he who falls of a sudden is condemned, but he who, having
-fallen, does not strive forthwith to rise again.
-
-_Maria._ Woe unto me, wretch that I am!
-
-  (_She sinks to the ground._)
-
-_Abraham._ Why dost thou sink? why lie upon the ground? Arise and ponder
-what I am saying.
-
-_Maria._ Fear casts me down, I cannot bear the weight of thy paternal
-admonition.
-
-_Abraham._ Dwell only on my love and thrust aside thy fear.
-
-_Maria._ I cannot.
-
-_Abraham._ Think, was it not for thee I left my little hermitage, and so
-far set aside the rule by which I lived that I, an aged hermit, became a
-visitor to wantonness, and keeping silence as to my intent spoke words in
-jest that I might not be recognised? Why then with head bent low gaze on
-the ground? Why hesitate to give answer to my questions?
-
-_Maria._ The accusations of my conscience bear me down, I dare not raise
-my eyes to heaven, nor enter into converse with thee.
-
-_Abraham._ Be not afraid, my daughter, do not despair; rise from this
-depth of misery and fix thy mind on trust in God.
-
-_Maria._ My sins in their excess have brought me to depths of desperation.
-
-_Abraham._ I know thy sins are great, but greater than aught else is
-Heaven's power of grace. Put by thy grief and do not hesitate to spend the
-time vouchsafed to thee in living in repentance; divine grace overflows,
-and overflowing washes out the horrors of wrong-doing.
-
-_Maria._ If I could entertain the hope of grace I should not be found
-wanting in repentance.
-
-_Abraham._ Think of the weariness that I have suffered for thee; leave
-this unprofitable despair, nought in this world is so misleading. He who
-despairs of God's willingness to have compassion, 'tis he who sins
-hopelessly; for as a spark struck from a stone can never set aflame the
-ocean, so the bitterness of sin must ever fail to rouse sweet and divine
-compassion.
-
-_Maria._ I know the power of grace divine, and yet the thought of how I
-have failed fills me with dread; I never can sufficiently atone.
-
-_Abraham._ Thy feeble trust in Him is a reproach to me! But come, return
-with me to where we lived, and there resume the life which thou didst
-leave.
-
-_Maria._ I would not disobey thee; if it be thy bidding, readily I yield.
-
-_Abraham._ Now I see my daughter such as I would have her; I hope still to
-hold thee dearest among all.
-
-_Maria._ I own a little wealth in gold and clothing; I abide by thy
-decision what shall be done with it.
-
-_Abraham._ What came to thee in evil, with evil cast it from thee.
-
-_Maria._ I think it might be given to the poor; or offered at the holy
-altars.
-
-_Abraham._ I doubt if wealth acquired in wickedness is acceptable to God.
-
-_Maria._ Besides this there is nothing of which the thought need trouble
-us.
-
-_Abraham._ The dawn is breaking, the daylight shining, let us now depart.
-
-_Maria._ Lead thou the way, dear father, a good shepherd to the sheep that
-went astray. As thou leadest, so I follow, guided by thy footsteps!
-
-_Abraham._ Nay, I shall walk, my horse shall bear thee, for this stony
-road might cut thy tender feet.
-
-_Maria._ Oh, that I ever left thee! Can I ever thank thee enough that, not
-by intimidation and fear, but by gentle persuasion alone, unworthy though
-I am, thou hast led me to repentance?
-
-_Abraham._ Nought do I ask of thee but this, be now devoted to God for the
-remainder of thy life.
-
-_Maria._ Readily I promise, earnestly will I persevere, and though the
-power fail me, my will shall never fail.
-
-_Abraham._ It is agreed then--as ardently as before to vanity, be thou now
-devoted to the will divine.
-
-_Maria._ Thy merits be my surety that the divine will shall be
-accomplished.
-
-_Abraham._ Now let us hasten our departure.
-
-_Maria._ Yea, hasten; for I loathe to tarry here.'
-
-They return to the hermitage together, and Maria resumes her former mode
-of life in hope of redeeming the past. The drama closes with a scene
-between Abraham and Ephrem, who discourse on the beneficent change which
-familiar surroundings are already working in Maria; the angels sing
-rejoicing at the conversion of the sinner, says Abraham; and Ephrem adds
-that the repentance of the iniquitous causes greater joy in heaven than
-the perseverance of the just.
-
-This play, currently known as 'Abraham,' but which would be more fitly
-named 'Maria,' marks the climax of Hrotsvith's power. In form it preserves
-the simple directness of the classic model, in conception it embodies the
-moral ideals of Christian teaching.
-
-The last two plays of Hrotsvith are chiefly of historical interest for the
-learned disquisitions they contain; their dramatic value is comparatively
-small, and many of the scenes are in a way repetitions of scenes in other
-plays. In 'Paphnutius' we again have the story of a penitent woman, the
-hetaira Thais, who lived in the 6th century, but whose conversion has
-little of the interest which attaches to that of Maria. In 'Sapientia' we
-have a succession of scenes of martyrdom which recall those of the play
-'Dulcetius.' The Lady Sapientia and her three daughters Fides, Spes and
-Caritas are put to death by order of the Emperor Hadrian, but the horrors
-of the situation are relieved by no minor incidents. The learned
-disquisitions in these plays are however extremely curious because they
-show on the one hand what store Hrotsvith set on learning, and on the
-other they give an idea of the method of study pursued at Gandersheim in
-those days.
-
-The play 'Paphnutius[506]' opens with passages which Hrotsvith probably
-adapted from two works of Boethius: 'On the teaching of Aristotle,' and
-'On the study of music[507].' The philosopher Paphnutius dilates to his
-assembled pupils on man as the microcosm (minor mundus) who reflects in
-himself the world, which is the macrocosm (major mundus), and then
-explains that there is antagonism in the world, which is striving for
-concord in accordance with the rules of harmony. He explains how a similar
-antagonism exists in man and is represented by body and soul, which can
-also be brought into agreement. These thoughts, he says, have been
-suggested to him by the life of the hetaira Thais whose body and soul are
-ever at variance. Paphnutius further enlarges on the higher course of
-study known as the 'quadrivium' which includes arithmetic, geometry, music
-and astronomy[508], and discourses about music and the influence of
-harmony. His pupils, however, object to being taken along such devious
-paths and having such knotty questions propounded to them, and at last
-they quote Scripture in defence of their ignorance, saying that God has
-chosen the foolish that he may confound the wise. This rouses indignation
-in Paphnutius, who declares that 'he who advocates falsehood, be he a fool
-or a learned man, deserves to be confounded by God.' And he further utters
-words which are not devoid of a deeper significance: 'It is not the
-knowledge that man can grasp which is offensive to God, but the conceit of
-the learned.'
-
-The learned disquisitions of the play 'Sapientia' are presented in a form
-still less attractive[509]. The Lady Sapientia, who speaks of herself as
-one of noble stock, and as the descendant of Greek princes, dilates on the
-relative value of numbers[510] to the emperor Hadrian till he tires of it
-and commands her to be gone.
-
-It is sometimes alleged that these two later plays were the productions of
-earlier years, and that the nun added them to her other more finished
-productions in order to equal the number of the plays of Terence. However
-this may be, they were probably the two plays which she submitted to the
-criticism of three outside but now unknown patrons with a letter in which
-she states that she has taken threads and pieces from the garment of
-philosophy to add to the worth of her work. We render this letter in full,
-since it throws an interesting light on what Hrotsvith thought of her own
-powers. If it brought advice which led to the composition of the other
-plays, we must commend the judgment of those who counselled her. But it is
-just possible that the approval which was accorded to the legends was
-denied to the plays,--the absence of the name of the abbess Gerberg in
-connection with them is remarkable,--and that, after writing a number of
-dramas which found no appreciation, Hrotsvith was moved to compose
-'Paphnutius' and 'Sapientia,' introducing learned disquisitions in hope of
-giving them a more solid value.
-
-The letter runs as follows:
-
-'To you, learned men[511], who abide in wisdom and are unenvious of
-another's progress and well-disposed towards him as befits the truly
-learned, I, Hrotsvith, though I am unlearned and lacking in thoroughness,
-address myself; I wish you health and unbroken prosperity. I cannot
-sufficiently admire your great condescension, and sufficiently thank you
-for the help of your liberal generosity and for your kindness towards me;
-you, who have been trained in the study of philosophy and have perfected
-yourselves in the pursuit of knowledge, have held my writings, those of a
-lowly woman, worthy of admiration, and have praised with brotherly
-affection the power which works in me. You have declared that there is in
-me a certain knowledge of that learning (scientiam artium) the essence of
-which is beyond my woman's understanding. Till now I have dared to show my
-rude productions only to a few of my nearest friends, and my work along
-these lines would probably have ceased, for there were few who understood
-my intentions, and fewer who could point out to me in what I had failed,
-and who urged me to persevere. But now that threefold approval comes to me
-from you I take confidence and feel strengthened by your encouragement to
-devote my energies to work where God permits, and to submit this work to
-the criticism of those who are learned. And yet I am divided between joy
-and fear, which contend within me; for in my heart I rejoice, praising
-God through whose grace alone I have become what I am; and yet I am
-fearful of appearing greater than I am, being perplexed by two things both
-of which are wrong, namely the neglect of talents vouchsafed to one by
-God, and the pretence to talents one has not. I cannot deny that through
-the help of the Creator I have acquired some amount of knowledge, for I am
-a creature capable of learning, but I acknowledge there is ignorance in
-me. For I am divinely gifted with abilities, but were it not for the
-untiring zeal of my teachers, they would have remained undeveloped and
-unused through my want of energy (pigritia). Lest this gift of God in me
-should be wasted through neglect I have sought to pluck threads and pieces
-from the garments of philosophy, and have introduced them into my
-afore-mentioned work (praefato opusculo), so that my own moderate
-knowledge may be enhanced by the addition of their greater worth, and God,
-who grants power, may be praised by so much the more as a woman's power is
-held to be inferior. This is the object of my writing, this alone the
-purpose of my exertions, for I do not conceal from myself that I am
-ignorant, and had it depended on myself alone, I should know nothing. But
-as you urge me on by the possibility of your approval and by your request
-proffered to me in writing, I now submit to your criticism this little
-work which I wrote with the intention of sending it to you but which I
-have hitherto kept concealed on account of its demerits, hoping you will
-study it with the intention of improving it as though it were your own
-work. And when you have altered it to a correct standard, send it back to
-me so that I may profit by your teaching in those points in which I may
-have largely failed.'
-
-The productions of Hrotsvith in the domain of contemporary history consist
-of a poem on the emperor Otto the Great, and a history of the monastery of
-Gandersheim. The history of Otto is thought to have been over sixteen
-hundred lines in length[512], but only a fragment of about nine hundred
-lines is preserved. The nun received the materials for this history
-chiefly if not exclusively by word of mouth from the abbess Gerberg, whose
-family feeling it seems to reflect in various particulars, for among other
-distinctive traits, the quarrel between the father of Gerberg and his
-brother the emperor is passed over; it is rather a history of the members
-of the ruling family than a description of contemporary events[513]. This
-detracts from its historic, though hardly from its poetical value, which
-is considerable. Some of the episodes, such as that of the imprisonment
-and flight of Queen Adelheid in Italy, are admirably told. Adelheid was
-the widow of the king of the Langobards, and was afterwards married to
-Otto I. Her flight and imprisonment in Italy previous to her second
-marriage are unrecorded except by Hrotsvith.
-
-The last work of the nun was probably that on the foundation and early
-history of Gandersheim, in which, as in the history of Otto, Hrotsvith
-enlarges more on persons than on events, and gives a detailed account of
-Duke Liudolf, his wife and daughters. Many details referred to above, in
-our chapter on the early history of the settlement, are taken from this
-account, which is in many ways the most finished and beautiful of
-Hrotsvith's compositions.
-
-The interest in Hrotsvith's writings lay dormant for several centuries. It
-was revived at the close of the 15th century when the learned abbot
-Tritheim wrote of her, and the poet Celtes caused her dramas to appear in
-print. During the last thirty years many writers have treated of her, an
-appreciative and attractive account of her was written by Koepke[514], and
-different views have been expressed as to her merits as a poet, a
-dramatist and a historian[515]. Whatever place be ultimately assigned to
-Hrotsvith, the reader of her writings cannot fail to be attracted by her
-modesty, her perseverance, her loftiness of thought, and the directness of
-purpose which underlies all her work. She stands nearly alone in Saxony,
-and by her very solitariness increases our respect for her powers, and for
-the system of education which made the development of these powers
-possible.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VI.
-
-THE MONASTIC REVIVAL OF THE MIDDLE AGES.
-
-    'Pulchritudo certe mentis et nutrimentum virtutum est cordis munditia,
-    cui visio Dei spiritualiter promittitur; ad quam munditiam nullus nisi
-    per magnam cordis custodiam perducitur.' _Anselm to the Abbess of St
-    Mary's._
-
-
-Sec. 1. The new Monastic Orders.
-
-In this chapter I intend to give a description of the different monastic
-orders which were founded between the 10th and the 12th centuries, and to
-enter at some length into the reasons for their progress. A mass of
-heterogeneous information must be passed in rapid review with occasional
-digressions on outside matters, for it is only possible to understand the
-rapid progress of monasticism by recalling the relation in which it stood
-to other social developments.
-
-As we cross the borderland which divides the centuries before the year
-1000 from the period that follows, we become aware of great changes which
-about this time take definite shape throughout all social institutions. In
-the various strata of society occupations were becoming more clearly
-differentiated than they had ever been before, while those who were
-devoted to peaceful pursuits, whether in lay or religious circles, were
-now combined together for mutual support and encouragement.
-
-In connection with religion we find the representatives of the Church and
-of monasticism becoming more and more conscious of differences that were
-growing up between them. Monasticism from its very beginning practically
-lay outside the established order of the Church, but this had not
-prevented bishop and abbot from working side by side and mutually
-supporting each other; nay, it even happened sometimes that one person
-combined in himself the two offices of abbot and bishop. But as early
-Christian times passed into the Middle Ages, prelates ceased to agree with
-headquarters at Rome in accepting monasticism as the means of securing a
-foothold for religion. The Church was now well established throughout
-western Europe, and her ministers were by no means prepared to side
-unconditionally with the Pope when he fell out with temporal rulers. The
-monastic orders on the contrary generally did side with him, and by
-locally furthering his interests, they became strongholds of his power.
-
-The 12th century has been called the golden age of monasticism, because it
-witnessed the increased prosperity of existing monasteries and the
-foundation of a number of new monastic and religious orders. A wave of
-enthusiasm for the life of the religious settlement, and for the manifold
-occupations which this life now embraced, passed over western Europe,
-emanating chiefly from France, the country which took the lead in culture
-and in civilizing influences.
-
-The 12th century, as it was the golden age of monasticism, was also the
-golden age of chivalry; the cloister and the court were the representative
-centres of civilized life. Under the influence of the system of mutual
-responsibility called feudalism, the knight by doughty deed and unwavering
-allegiance to his lord, his lady and his cause, gave a new meaning to
-service; while the monk, devoted to less hazardous pursuits, gave a
-hitherto unknown sanctification to toil. The knight, the lady, the
-court-chaplain and the court-poet cultivated the bearings and the
-formalities of polite intercourse which formed the background of the age
-of romance, while in the cloister the monk and the nun gave a new meaning
-to religious devotion and enthusiasm by turning their activity into
-channels which first made possible the approximation of class to class.
-
-This period knew little of townships as centres of intellectual activity,
-and their social importance remained far below that of cloister and court.
-The townsmen, whose possession of town land constituted them burghers, had
-won for themselves recognition as an independent body by buying immunities
-and privileges from bishop and king. But the struggle between them and the
-newer gilds, into which those who were below them in rank and wealth,
-formed themselves, was only beginning; the success of these newer gilds in
-securing a share in the government marks the rise of the township.
-
-The diversity of occupation in the different kinds of gilds was
-anticipated by a similar diversity of occupation in the different monastic
-orders. The great characteristic of the monastic revival of the Middle
-Ages lay in the manifold and distinct spheres of activity which life
-offered inside the religious community. The studious, the educational, the
-philanthropic, and the agricultural element, all to some extent made part
-of the old monastic system. But through the foundation of a number of
-different orders which from the outset had separate aims, tastes which
-were widely dissimilar, and temperaments that were markedly diverse, met
-with encouragement in the religious settlement. The scholar, the artist,
-the recluse, the farmer, each found a career open to him; while men and
-women were prompted to undertake duties within and without the religious
-settlement which make their activity comparable to that of the relieving
-officer, the poor-law guardian and the district nurse of a later age.
-
-To gain a clear idea of the purposes which the new monastic and religious
-orders set before them, it will be best to treat of them severally in the
-chronological order of their foundation. Two lines of development are to
-be observed. There are the strictly monastic orders which sprang from the
-order of St Benedict, which they developed and amplified. These included
-the orders of Clugni, Citeaux, Chartreuse, and Grandmont, of which the
-last two took no account of women. On the other side stand the religious
-orders which are the outcome of distinctions drawn between different kinds
-of canons, when the settlements of regular canons take a distinctly
-monastic colouring. Among these the Premonstrant and the Austin orders are
-the most important, the members of which, from the clothes they wore, were
-in England called respectively White and Black Canons.
-
-The importance of canonical orders, so far as women are concerned, lies in
-the fact that the 12th century witnessed the foundation of a number of
-religious settlements for both sexes, in which the men lived as canons and
-the women as nuns. The Premonstrant began as a combined order; the orders
-of Fontevraud and of St Gilbert of Sempringham were of a similar kind.
-Bearing these distinctions in mind, we begin our enquiry with an analysis
-of the Cluniac and the Cistercian orders, which have their root directly
-in the monasticism of St Benedict.
-
-As remarks in the previous chapters of this work will have shown,
-monasteries had sprung up during early Christian times independently of
-each other following a diversity of rules promulgated by various teachers,
-which had gradually been given up in favour of the rule of St Benedict. At
-the beginning of the 9th century this rule was largely prevalent in
-monasteries abroad, owing to councils held under the auspices of Karl the
-Great ([Dagger] 814)[516], and in England it gained ground through the
-efforts of Aethelwold, abbot of Abingdon and bishop of Winchester
-([Dagger] 984). Some obscurity hangs about the subject, for a certain
-number of houses abroad, and among them some of the oldest and wealthiest,
-clung to the prerogative of independence and refused to accept St
-Benedict's rule, while in England, where this rule was certainly accepted
-in the 11th century, great diversity of routine either remained or else
-developed inside the different houses. This is evident from the account
-which Matthew Paris ([Dagger] 1259), a monk of St Albans, gives of the
-visitation of houses in the year 1232[517].
-
-The order of Clugni[518] owes its origin to the desire of obviating a
-difficulty. As time wore on the rule of St Benedict had betrayed a
-weakness in failing to maintain any connection between separate
-monasteries. As there was no reciprocal responsibility between Benedictine
-settlements, a lay nobleman had frequently been appointed abbot through
-princely interference, and had installed himself in the monastery with his
-family, his servants and his retinue, to the detriment of the monastic
-property, and to the relaxation of discipline among the monks. The evil
-was most conspicuous abroad in the eastern districts of France and the
-western districts of Germany, and in 910 the order of Clugni was founded
-in Burgundy as a means of remedying it.
-
-At first the order of Clugni was the object of great enthusiasm, and it
-was raised to eminence by a series of remarkable and energetic men.
-Powerful patrons were secured to it, master-minds found protection in its
-shelter. The peculiarities of its organisation consisted in the two rules
-that the abbot of the Cluniac house should be chosen during the lifetime
-of his predecessor, and that the abbots of different houses should meet
-periodically at a synod at which the abbot of Clugni should preside. The
-Pope's sanction having been obtained, the order remained throughout in
-close contact with Rome. In Germany especially this connection was
-prominent, and became an important political factor in the 11th century
-when the Cluniac houses directly supported the claim of Rome in the
-struggle between Pope and Emperor.
-
-The order of Clugni took slight cognizance of women, and the nunneries of
-the order were few and comparatively unimportant. A reason for this may be
-found in the nature of the order's origin, for the settlements of nuns had
-not been interfered with like the settlements of monks during the 9th and
-10th centuries by the appointment of lay superiors, and were untouched by
-the consequent evils. If this be so the falling away from discipline,
-which called for correction in many houses of men, may justly be referred
-to a change thrust on them from without, not born from within.
-
-In England the order of Clugni was not officially introduced till after
-the Norman Conquest, and then under circumstances which set a peculiar
-stamp on it. The seed which each order scattered broadcast over the
-different countries was the same, but the nature of the soil in which it
-took root, and the climate under which it developed, modified the
-direction of its growth.
-
-During the 9th and 10th centuries England had been the scene of great
-social and political changes. The powerful kings who arose in Wessex and
-eventually claimed supremacy over all the provinces were unable to assert
-their authority to the extent of making the eastern provinces sink all
-provincial differences and jealousies, and join in organised resistance to
-the Danes. From the 9th century onwards, the entire seaboard of England,
-from Northumberland to the mouth of the Severn, had been exposed to the
-depredations of this people. Having once gained a foothold on the eastern
-coasts they quickly contracted alliances and adapted themselves to English
-customs, thus making their ultimate success secure.
-
-The heathen invaders were naturally indifferent to the teachings of the
-Christian Church, and to the privileges of monasteries, and the scant
-annals of the period written before Knut of Denmark became king of England
-in 1016, give accounts of the destruction of many settlements. Some were
-attacked and laid waste, and others were deserted by their inmates. To
-realise the collapse of Christian institutions about this time, one must
-read the address which Wulfstan, archbishop of York (1002-1023), wrote to
-rouse the English to consciousness of the indignities to which their
-religion was exposed[519]. But the collapse was only temporary, bishoprics
-and abbacies stood firm enough to command the attention of the invader,
-and as the heathenism of the Dane yielded without a blow to the teaching
-of Christ, the settlements that were in the hands of abbot and monk rose
-anew.
-
-However, it was only after the establishment of William of Normandy in
-England (1066) that the conditions of life became settled, and that the
-tide turned in favour of monasticism; that is to say in favour of the
-monastic life of men, but not of women. Various reasons have been alleged
-for this difference: that the better position of the wife under Danish
-rule made women loth to remain in the convent, or that the spread of the
-system of feudal tenure excluded women from holding property which they
-could devote to the advantage of their sex. So much is certain, that
-during the reign of William many Benedictine houses for monks were founded
-or restored, but we do not hear of one for nuns.
-
-In the wake of the Norman baron, the Norman prelate had entered this
-country, bringing with him an interest in the order of Clugni. It was
-William of Warren, son-in-law of the Conqueror, and earl of Surrey, who
-first brought over Cluniac monks, whom he settled at Lewes in Sussex. He
-did so at the suggestion of Lanfranc, a Norman monk of Italian origin, who
-had become archbishop of Canterbury (1070-1089). Before the close of
-William's reign Cluniac monks had met with patrons to build them four
-monasteries on English soil besides the house at Lewes.
-
-The Norman barons continued to make liberal endowments to the order, but
-its popularity remained comparatively small, partly owing to the
-distinctly foreign character which it continued to bear[520]. Thus we find
-that after the accession of Henry II (1154), whose reign was marked by a
-rise in English national feeling, only one Cluniac house was added to
-those already in existence.
-
-From the order of Clugni we pass to that of Citeaux[521], the foundation
-of which comes next in point of time, but which owed its existence to a
-different cause, and was characterised by widely dissimilar developments.
-
-The story of the foundation of the order has been fully told by men who
-were under the influence of the movement; the facts only of the foundation
-need be mentioned here. It originated in France when Robert, abbot of
-Molemes, roused by the remonstrances of one Stephen Harding, an English
-monk living in his convent, left his home with a band of followers in
-1098, in search of a retreat where they might carry out the rule of St
-Benedict in a worthier spirit. They found this retreat at Citeaux. From
-Citeaux and its daughter-house Clairvaux, founded in 1113 by the
-energetic Bernard, those influences went forth which made the Cistercian
-order representative of the most strenuous devotion to toil and the most
-exalted religious aspirations. While the order of Clugni in the 10th
-century secured the outward conditions favourable to a life of routine,
-devoting this routine chiefly to literary and artistic pursuits, the
-reform of Citeaux exerted a much wider influence. It at once gained
-extensive local and national sympathy, by cultivating land and by
-favouring every kind of outdoor pursuit.
-
-The agricultural activity of the Cistercian has called forth much
-enthusiastic comment. Janauschek, a modern student of the order, describes
-in eloquent terms how they turned woods into fields, how they constructed
-water-conduits and water-mills, how they cultivated gardens, orchards, and
-vineyards, how successful they were in rearing cattle, in breeding horses,
-in keeping bees, in regulating fishing, and how they made glass and
-procured the precious metals[522].
-
-A comparison of their temper and that of the Cluniacs offers many
-interesting points; a comparison which is facilitated by a dialogue
-written by a Cistercian monk between 1154 and 1174 to exalt the merits of
-his order compared with those of the order of Clugni[523]. For while the
-Cluniac delighted in luxurious surroundings, the Cistercian affected a
-simple mode of life which added to the wealth placed at his disposal by
-his untiring industry. While the Cluniac delighted in costly church
-decorations, in sumptuous vestments and in richly illuminated books of
-service, the Cistercian declared such pomp prejudicial to devotion, and
-sought to elevate the soul not so much by copying and ornamenting old
-books as by writing new ones; not so much by decorating a time-honoured
-edifice as by rearing a new and beautiful building.
-
-Perhaps the nature of these occupations yields a reason why the Cistercian
-order at first found no place for women. At an early date Cardinal de
-Vitry (Jacobus di Vitriaco, [Dagger] 1144), writing about the Cistercian
-movement, says that 'the weaker sex at the rise of the order could not
-aspire to conform to such severe rules, nor to rise to such a pitch of
-excellence[524].' In the dialogue referred to above, the Cluniac expresses
-wonder that women should enter the Cistercian order at all.
-
-The first Cistercian nunneries were founded at Tart in Langres and at
-Montreuil-les-Dames near Laon[525]. Hermann of Laon (c. 1150) describes
-'how the religious of Montreuil sewed and span, and went into the woods
-where they grubbed up briars and thorns,'--an occupation which goes far to
-equalise their activity with that of the monks[526]. In Switzerland and
-Germany there is said to have been a pronounced difference in the
-character of Cistercian nunneries, due to the various conditions of their
-foundation. Some were aristocratic in tone, while others consisted of
-women of the middle class, who banded together and placed themselves under
-the bishop of the diocese, following of their own accord the rules
-accepted by the monks of Citeaux[527].
-
-In Spain a curious development of the order of Citeaux is recorded,
-fraught with peculiarities which recall earlier developments.
-
-In 1187 Alfonso VIII, king of Leon and Castille, founded an abbacy for
-nuns of the order of Citeaux at Las Huelgas near Burgos, the abbess of
-which was declared head over twelve other nunneries. In the following year
-the king sent the bishop of Siguenza to the general chapter at Citeaux to
-obtain leave for the abbesses of his kingdom to hold a general chapter
-among themselves. This was granted. At the first chapter at Burgos the
-bishops of Burgos, Siguenza and Placenza were assembled together with six
-abbots and seven abbesses, each abbess being entitled to bring with her
-six servants and five horses. The power of the abbess of Las Huelgas
-continued to increase. In the year 1210 she had taken upon herself the
-discharge of sacerdotal functions. In the year 1260 she refused to receive
-the abbot of Citeaux, whereupon she was excommunicated. After the year
-1507 the abbess was no longer appointed for life, but for a term of three
-years only. Chapters continued to be held under her auspices at Burgos
-till the Council of Trent in 1545, which forbade women to leave their
-enclosures[528].
-
-The date of the first arrival of monks of Citeaux in England was 1128,
-when William Giffard, bishop of Winchester ([Dagger] 1129), in early days
-a partisan of Anselm against Henry I, founded Waverley in Surrey for
-them[529]. Shortly afterwards Walter Espec, the most powerful baron in
-northern England, granted them land at Rievaulx in Yorkshire[530]. About
-the same time the foundation at Fountains repeated the story of Citeaux. A
-small band of monks, burning with the desire to simplify conventual life,
-left York and retired into the wooded solitude of Fountains, whence they
-sent to Bernard at Clairvaux asking for his advice[531].
-
-These events fall within the reign of Henry I (1100-1135), the
-peacefulness of which greatly furthered the development of monastic life.
-The pursuits to which the Cistercians were devoted in England were similar
-to those they carried on abroad. Here also their agricultural successes
-were great, for they ditched, ridged and drained, wet land, they marled
-stiff soils and clayed poor ones. The land granted to them, especially in
-the northern counties, was none of the best, but they succeeded in turning
-wildernesses into fruitful land, and by so doing won great admiration.
-Similarly the churches built in this country under the auspices of these
-monks bear witness to great purity of taste and ardent imagination. The
-churches built by them were all dedicated to the Virgin Mary, who was the
-patron saint of the order.
-
-All these early settlements of the Cistercian order were for monks, not
-for nuns, for Cistercian nunneries in England were founded comparatively
-late and remained poor and unimportant. If we look upon the Cistercians as
-farmers, builders and writers, this fact is partly explained. But there
-are other reasons which suggest why the number of Cistercian nunneries was
-at first small, and why the Cistercian synod shrank from accepting control
-over them.
-
-Convents of women had hitherto been recruited by the daughters of the
-landed gentry, and their tone was aristocratic; but a desire for the
-religious life had now penetrated into the lower strata of society. Orders
-of combined canons and nuns were founded which paid special attention to
-women of the lower classes, but they encountered certain difficulties in
-dealing with them. It is just possible on the one hand that the combined
-orders forestalled the Cistercians in the inducements they held out; on
-the other, that the experience of the combined orders made the Cistercians
-cautious about admitting women.
-
-Consideration of these facts brings us back to a whole group of phenomena
-to which reference was made in a previous chapter, viz. the disorderly
-tendencies which had become apparent in connection with loose women, the
-greater opprobrium cast on these women as time went on, and the increasing
-difficulties they had to contend with. The founders of the orders of
-combined canons and nuns tried to save women from drifting into and
-swelling a class, the existence of which was felt to be injurious to
-social life, by preaching against a dissolute life and by receiving all
-persons into their settlements regardless of their antecedents.
-
-The earliest and in many ways the most interesting of these combined
-orders is that founded by Robert ([Dagger] 1117) of Arbrissel, a village
-in Brittany. Robert had begun life in the Church, but he left the clerical
-calling on account of his great desire to minister to the needs of the
-lower classes, and as a wandering preacher he gained considerable
-renown[532]. Men and women alike were roused by his words to reform their
-course of life, and they followed him about till he determined to secure
-for them a permanent abode. This he found in an outlying district at
-Fontevraud. He organised his followers into bands and apportioned to each
-its task. The men were divided into clerics, who performed religious
-service, and lay brothers, who did outdoor work. 'They were to use gentle
-talk, not to swear, and all to be joined in brotherly affection.' It
-appears that the women were all professed nuns[533]; unceasing toil was to
-be their portion, for they were to hold the industrious and hardworking
-Martha as their model and take small account of such virtues as belonged
-to Mary.
-
-From every side workers flocked to the settlements, for Robert opened his
-arms to all. We are told that 'men of all conditions came, women arrived,
-such as were poor as well as those of gentle birth; widows and virgins,
-aged men and youths, women of loose life as well as those who held aloof
-from men.' At first there was a difficulty in providing for the numerous
-settlers, but their labours brought profit, and gifts in kind poured in
-from outsiders, a proof that in the eyes of the world the settlements
-supplied an obvious need. Branch establishments were founded and
-prospered, so that in one cloister there were as many as three hundred
-women, in another one hundred, and in another sixty. Robert returned to
-his missionary work, after having appointed Hersende of Champagne as lady
-superior of the whole vast settlement. Her appointment was decisive for
-the system of government,--Fontevraud remained under the rule of an
-abbess. It was for her successor, Petronille, that the life of the founder
-Robert was written soon after his death, by Baldric, bishop of Dol
-([Dagger] 1130). Baldric repeatedly insists on the fact that no one was
-refused admission to these settlements. 'The poor were received, the
-feeble were not refused, nor women of evil life, nor sinners, neither
-lepers nor the helpless.' We are told that Robert attracted nearly three
-thousand men and women to the settlements; the nuns (ancillae Christi) in
-particular wept at his death.
-
-The fact that Robert had the welfare of women especially at heart is
-further borne out by a separate account of the last years of his life,
-written by one Andrea, probably his pupil. Andrea tells how Robert at the
-approach of death assembled the canons or clerics of the settlement around
-him and addressed them saying: 'Know that whatever I have wrought in this
-world I have wrought as a help to nuns.' Fontevraud occupied a high
-standing, and we shall find that nuns were brought thence into England
-when the nunnery of Amesbury was reformed in the reign of King John. The
-order of Fontevraud made great progress in the course of the 12th century,
-and next to it in point of time stands the foundation of the order of
-Premontre[534]. Fontevraud lies in the north-west of France, Premontre in
-the east, and the efforts of Robert have here a counterpart in those of
-Norbert ([Dagger] 1134), who worked on similar lines. Norbert also left
-the clerical calling to work as a missionary in north-western Germany,
-especially in Westphalia, and he also succeeded in rousing his listeners
-to a consciousness of their ungodly mode of life. With a view to reform he
-sought to give a changed tone to canonical life and founded a religious
-settlement in the forest of Coucy, which he afterwards called Premontre
-from the belief that the Virgin had pointed it out to him. His efforts
-were likewise crowned with success, for many settlements were forthwith
-founded on the plan of that of Premontre. Hermann of Laon, the
-contemporary of Norbert, praises him warmly and remarks that women of all
-classes flocked to his settlements, and were admitted into the communities
-by adopting the cloistered life. The statement is made, but may be
-exaggerated, that ten thousand women joined the order during Norbert's
-lifetime.
-
-Norbert differed greatly in character from Robert; his personal ambition
-was greater, and his restless temperament eventually drew him into
-political life. He died in 1134, and in 1137 the chapter at Premontre
-decided that the women should be expelled from all the settlements that
-had inmates of both sexes, and that no nuns should henceforth be admitted
-to settlements ruled by men. The reasons which led to this resolution are
-not recorded. The nuns thus rendered homeless are said to have banded
-together and dwelt in settlements which were afterwards numbered among
-Cistercian houses, thus causing a sudden increase of nunneries of this
-order. However a certain number of Premonstrant houses, occupied solely by
-nuns and ruled by a lady superior, existed previous to the decree of 1137.
-These remained unmolested, and others were added to them in course of
-time[535]. It can be gathered from a bull of 1344 that there were at that
-time over thirteen hundred settlements of Premonstrant or White Canons in
-existence in Europe, besides the outlying settlements of lay brothers, and
-about four hundred settlements of nuns[536]. The settlements of White
-Canons in England amounted to about thirty-five and were founded after the
-sexes had been separated. There were also two settlements of Premonstrant
-nuns in England[537].
-
-A third order of canons and nuns, which in various ways is akin to the
-orders of Fontevraud and Premontre previously founded abroad, was founded
-at the beginning of the 12th century in England by Gilbert of Sempringham.
-But as the material for study of this order is copious, and as it marks a
-distinct development in the history of women's convent life in England, it
-will be discussed in detail later[538].
-
-The canons who belonged to the combined orders were regular canons, that
-is they owned no individual property, and further differed from secular
-canons in holding themselves exempt from performing spiritual functions
-for the laity. Erasmus at a later date remarked that 'their life is half
-way between that of monks and that of those who are called secular
-canons[539].'
-
-As to the distinction between the two kinds, it appears that bands of
-canons who may fitly be termed regular had existed from an early period;
-but the subject is shrouded in some obscurity[540]. In the 11th century
-mention of them becomes frequent, especially in France, and at the
-beginning of the 12th century their position was defined by a decree
-published by Pope Innocent II at the Lateran Council (1139)[541]. By this
-decree all those canons who did not perform spiritual functions for the
-laity were designated as regular and were called upon to live according to
-the rule of life laid down by St Augustine in his Epistle, number 109. The
-terms Austin canon and regular canon were henceforth applied
-indiscriminately, but many independent settlements of unrecognised canons
-of an earlier date have since been included under this term.
-
-A few words are here needed in explanation of the term canoness or Austin
-canoness, which is used in diverse ways, but is generally applied to women
-of some substance, who entered a religious community and lived under a
-rule, but who were under no perpetual vow, that is, they observed
-obedience and celibacy as long as they remained in the house but were at
-liberty to return to the world. These stipulations do not imply that a
-woman on entering a convent renounced all rights of property, an
-assumption on the strength of which the Church historian Rohrbacher
-interprets as applying to canonesses the entire chapter of directions
-promulgated at Aachen in 816, in the interest of women living the
-religious life[542]. But the terms used in these provisions are the
-ordinary ones applied to abbess and nun[543]. Helyot, who has a wider
-outlook, and who speaking of the canon explains how this term was at first
-applied to all living _in canone_, points out that uncertainty hangs about
-many early settlements of women abroad, the members of which were in the
-true sense professed[544]. It seems probable that they at first observed
-the rule of St Benedict, and afterwards departed from it, as has been
-pointed out above in connection with Saxon convents.
-
-The tenor of the provisions made at Aachen shows that the monastic life of
-women in a number of early settlements abroad rested on a peculiar basis,
-and points to the fact that the inmates of settlements founded at an
-early date were in some measure justified when they declared later that
-they had always held certain liberties, and insisted on a distinction
-between themselves and other nuns. The position of the inmates of some of
-these houses continued different from that of the members of other
-nunneries till the time of the Reformation. In England, however, this
-difference does not seem to have existed. The inmates of the few Austin
-nunneries, of which there were fifteen at the dissolution, though they are
-frequently spoken of as canonesses in the charters that are secured by
-them, appear to have lived a life in no way different from that of other
-nuns, while they were in residence, but it may be they absented themselves
-more frequently.
-
-When once their position was defined the spread of the Austin Canons was
-rapid; they combined the learning of the Benedictine with the devotional
-zeal of the Cistercian, and ingratiated themselves with high and low. Of
-all the settlements of the Austin Canons abroad that of St Victor in Paris
-stands first in importance. It became a retreat for some of the master
-minds of the age[545], and its influence on English thinkers was
-especially great[546]. Austin Canons came from France into England as
-early as 1108. At first their activity here was chiefly philanthropic,
-they founded hospitals and served in them; but they soon embraced a
-variety of interests. In the words of Kate Norgate speaking with reference
-to England[547]: 'The scheme of Austin Canons was a compromise between the
-old-fashioned system of canons and that of monkish confraternities; but a
-compromise leaning strongly towards the monastic side, tending more and
-more towards it with every fresh development, and distinguished chiefly by
-a certain elasticity of organisation which gave scope to an almost
-unlimited variety in the adjustment of the relations between the active
-and the contemplative life of the members of the order, thus enabling it
-to adapt itself to the most dissimilar temperaments and to the most
-diverse spheres of activity.'
-
-Their educational system also met with such success that before the close
-of the reign of Henry I two members of the fraternity had been promoted to
-the episcopate and one to the primacy. In the remarks of contemporary
-writers on religious settlements, it is curious to note in what a
-different estimation regular canons and monks are held by those who
-shared the interests of court circles. For the courtier, as we shall
-presently see, sympathised with the canon but abused and ridiculed the
-monk.
-
-Throughout the early Christian ages the idea had been steadily gaining
-ground that the professed religious should eschew contact with the outside
-world, and it was more and more urged that the moral and mental welfare of
-monk and nun was furthered by their confining their activity within the
-convent precincts. Greater seclusion was first enforced among women; for
-in the combined orders the nuns remained inside the monastery, and were
-removed from contact with the world, while the canons were but little
-restricted in their movements. How soon habitual seclusion from the world
-became obligatory it is of course very difficult to determine, but there
-is extant a highly interesting pamphlet, written about the year 1190 by
-the monk Idung of the Benedictine monastery of St Emmeran in Bavaria,
-which shows that professed religious women in the district he was
-acquainted with went about as freely as the monks, and did not even wear a
-distinctive dress. The pamphlet[548] is the more interesting as Idung was
-evidently distressed by the behaviour of the nuns, but failed to find an
-authority on which to oppose their actions. He admits that the rule as
-drafted by St Benedict is intended alike for men and women, and that there
-are no directions to be found in it about confining nuns in particular,
-and in fact the rule allowed monks and nuns to go abroad freely as long as
-their superior approved. Idung then sets forth with many arguments that
-nuns are the frailer vessel; and he illustrates this point by a mass of
-examples adduced from classical and Biblical literature. He proves to
-himself the advisability of nuns being confined, but he is at a loss where
-to go for the means of confining them. And he ends his pamphlet with the
-advice that as it is impossible to interfere with the liberty of nuns, it
-should at least be obligatory for them when away from home to wear clothes
-which would make their vocation obvious.
-
-No doubt the view held by this monk was shared by others, and public
-opinion fell in with it, and insisted on the advantages of seclusion. Many
-Benedictine houses owned outlying manors which were often at a
-considerable distance, and the management of which required a good deal of
-moving about on the part of the monks and nuns who were told off for the
-purpose. We shall see later that those who had taken the religious vow had
-pleasure as their object as much as business in going about; but
-complaints about the Benedictines of either sex are few compared with
-those raised against the Cistercian monks. For the Cistercians in their
-capacity of producers visited fairs and markets and, where occasion
-offered, were ready to drive a bargain, which was especially objected to
-by the ministers of the Church, who declared that the Cistercians lowered
-the religious profession in general estimation. Consequently orders which
-worked on opposite lines enjoyed greater favour with the priesthood; such
-as the monastic order of Grandmont, which originally demanded of its
-members that they should not quit their settlement and forbade their
-owning any animals except bees; and the order of Chartreuse, which
-confined each monk to his cell, that is, to a set of rooms with a garden
-adjoining[549]. But these orders did not secure many votaries owing to
-their severity and narrowness.
-
-Thus at the close of the 12th century a number of new religious orders had
-been founded which spread from one country to another by means of an
-effective system of organization, raising enthusiasm for the peaceful
-pursuits of convent life among all classes of society. The reason of their
-success lay partly in their identifying themselves with the ideal
-aspirations of the age, partly in the political unrest of the time which
-favoured the development of independent institutions, but chiefly in the
-diversity of occupation which the professed religious life now offered.
-The success obtained by the monastic orders however did not fail to rouse
-apprehension among the representatives of the established Church, and it
-seems well in conclusion to turn and recall some of the remarks passed on
-the new orders by contemporary writers who moved in the court of Henry II
-(1154-89).
-
-It has been pointed out how the sympathies of court circles at this period
-in England were with the Church as represented by the priesthood; courtier
-and priest were at one in their antagonism against monks, but in sympathy
-with the canons. Conspicuous among these men stands Gerald Barri (c.
-1147-c. 1220), a Welshman of high abilities and at one time court chaplain
-to the king. He hated all monkish orders equally, and for the delectation
-of some friends whom he entertained at Oxford he compiled a collection of
-monkish scandals known as 'The Mirror of the Church[550],' in which he
-represents the Cluniac monk as married to Luxury, and the Cistercian monk
-to Avarice; but, in spite of this, incidental remarks in the stories he
-tells give a high opinion of the Cistercian's industry, hospitality and
-unbounded charity. Gerald mentions as a subject for ridicule that the
-Cistercian monk lived not on rent, but on the produce of his labour, an
-unaristocratic proceeding which was characteristic of the order. Gerald's
-attitude is reflected in that of Ralph de Glanvil ([Dagger] 1190),
-justiciar of England during the reign of Henry II, a clever and versatile
-man of whom we know, through his friend Map, that he disliked all the
-monkish orders. But his enthusiasm for religious settlements was not
-inconsiderable, and several settlements of the Premonstrant or White
-Canons were founded by him.
-
-The student of the period is familiar with the likes and dislikes of
-Walter Map ([Dagger] c. 1210), great among poets and writers of the age,
-who disliked all monks, but especially the Cistercians[551]. His friend
-Gerald tells how this hatred had originated in the encroachments made by
-the monks of Newenham on the rights and property of the church he held at
-Westbury. For the perseverance with which Cistercian monks appropriated
-all available territory and interfered with the rights of church and
-chapel, made them generally odious to the ministers of the Church; their
-encroachments were an increasing grievance. John of Salisbury, afterwards
-bishop of Chartres ([Dagger] after 1180), directly censured as pernicious
-the means taken by the monks to extend their power. He tells us they
-procured from Rome exemption from diocesan jurisdiction, they appropriated
-the right of confession, they performed burial rites; in short they
-usurped the keys of the Church[552]. By the side of these remarks it is
-interesting to recall the opinion of the monkish historian, William of
-Malmesbury, who a generation earlier had declared that the Cistercian
-monks had found the surest road to heaven.
-
-All these writers, though lavish in their criticisms on monks, tell us
-hardly anything against nuns. The order of St Gilbert for canons and nuns
-alone calls forth some remarks derogatory to the women. Nigel Wirecker,
-himself a monk, giving vent to his embittered spirit against Church and
-monkish institutions generally in the satire of Brunellus, launches into a
-fierce attack against the tone which then prevailed in women's
-settlements[553]. He does not think it right that women whose antecedents
-are of the worst kind should adopt the religious profession and that as a
-means of preserving chastity they should systematically enjoin hatred of
-men.
-
-A similar reference is contained in the poem in Norman French called the
-'Order of Fair Ease,' which is a production of the 13th century, and which
-caricatures the different religious orders by feigning an order that
-unites the characteristic vices of all[554]. It is chiefly curious in the
-emphasis it lays on the exclusiveness of monasteries generally,
-representing them as reserved for the aristocracy. It contains little on
-nunneries and only a few remarks which are derogatory to the combined
-order of Sempringham.
-
-These remarks were obviously called forth by the fact that the combined
-orders in particular admitted women from different ranks of life. For
-generally nunneries and their inmates enjoyed favour with churchman and
-courtier, whose contempt for the monk does not extend to the nun. In the
-correspondence of Thomas Beket, John of Salisbury, Peter of Blois and
-others there are letters to nuns of various houses which show that these
-men had friends and relatives among the inmates of nunneries. Indeed where
-members of the same family adopted the religious profession, the son
-habitually entered the Church while the daughter entered a nunnery. A
-sister of Thomas Beket was abbess at Barking, and various princesses of
-the royal house were abbesses of nunneries, as we shall presently see.
-They included Mary, daughter of Stephen (Romsey); a natural daughter of
-Henry II (Barking), and Matilda, daughter of Edward I (Amesbury); Queen
-Eleanor wife of Henry III also took the veil at Amesbury.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Benedictine Convents in the Twelfth Century.
-
-From this general review of the different orders we pass on to the state
-of nunneries in England during the 12th century, and to those incidents in
-their history which give some insight into their constitution.
-
-Attention is first claimed by the old Benedictine settlements which still
-continued in prosperity and independence. Of these houses only those which
-were in connection with the royal house of Wessex remained at the close of
-the 10th century; those of the northern and midland districts had
-disappeared. Some were deserted, others had been laid waste during the
-Danish invasions; it has been observed that with the return of
-tranquillity under Danish rule, not one of the houses for women was
-restored. Secular monks or laymen took possession of them, and when they
-were expelled, the Church claimed the land, or the settlement was restored
-to the use of monks. Some of the great houses founded and ruled by women
-in the past were thus appropriated to men. Whitby and Ely rose in renewed
-splendour under the rule of abbots; Repton, Wimbourne and numerous other
-nunneries became the property of monks.
-
-Various reasons have been given for the comparatively low ebb at which
-women's professed religious life remained for a time. Insecurity during
-times of warfare, and displacement of the centres of authority, supply
-obvious reasons for desertion and decay. A story is preserved showing how
-interference from without led to the disbanding of a nunnery. The Danish
-earl Swegen ([Dagger] 1052), son of Earl Godwin, took away (vi abstractam)
-the abbess Eadgifu of Leominster in Herefordshire in 1048, and kept her
-with him for a whole year as his wife. The archbishop of Canterbury and
-the bishop of Worcester threatened him with excommunication, whereupon he
-sent her home, avenging himself by seizing lands of the monastery of
-Worcester. He then fled from England and was outlawed, but at a later
-period he is said to have wanted the abbess back. The result is not
-recorded, for Leominster as a women's settlement ceased to exist about
-this time[555]. There is no need to imagine a formal dissolution of the
-settlement. The voluntary or involuntary absence of the abbess in times of
-warfare supplies quite a sufficient reason for the disbanding of the nuns.
-
-About the same time a similar fate befell the monastery of
-Berkley-on-Severn, in spite of the heroic behaviour of its abbess. The
-story is told by Walter Map how it was attacked and plundered at the
-instigation of Earl Godwin ([Dagger] 1053) and how in spite of the stand
-made by the abbess, a 'strong and determined' woman, the men who took
-possession of it turned it into a 'pantheon, a very temple of
-harlotry[556].' Berkley also ceased to exist[557].
-
-The monasteries ruled by women, which survived the political changes due
-to the Danish invasion and the Norman Conquest, had been in connection
-with women of the house of Cerdic; with hardly an exception they were
-situated in the province of Wessex within the comparatively small area
-of Dorset, Wilts, and Hampshire. Chief among them were Shaftesbury,
-Amesbury, Wilton (or Ellandune), Romsey, and St Mary Winchester (or
-Nunnaminster). With these must be classed Barking in Essex, one of the
-oldest settlements in the land, which had been deserted at one time but
-was refounded by King Edgar, and which together with the Wessex nunneries,
-carried on a line of uninterrupted traditions from the 9th century to the
-time of the dissolution.
-
-The manors owned by these settlements at the time of the Conquest lay in
-different shires, often at a considerable distance from the monastery
-itself.
-
-From the account of survey in the Domesday book we gather that Shaftesbury
-had possessions in Sussex, Wiltshire, Dorset, and Hampshire[558], and that
-Nunnaminster owned manors in Hampshire, Berkshire, and Wiltshire[559].
-Barking, the chief property of which lay in Essex, also held manors in
-Surrey, Middlesex, Berkshire, and Bedfordshire[560].
-
-These monasteries were abbacies, as indeed were all houses for nuns
-founded before the Conquest. The abbess, like the abbot, had the power of
-a bishop within the limits of her own house and bore a crozier as a sign
-of her rank. Moreover the abbesses of Shaftesbury, Wilton, Barking, and
-Nunnaminster 'were of such quality that they held of the king by an entire
-barony,' and by right of tenure had the privilege at a later date of being
-summoned to parliament, though this lapsed on account of their sex[561].
-
-The abbess as well as the abbot had a twofold income; she drew
-spiritualities from the churches which were in her keeping, and
-temporalities by means of her position as landlord and landowner. The
-abbess of Shaftesbury, who went by the title of abbess of St Edward, had
-in her gift several prebends, or portions of the appropriated tithes or
-lands for secular priests. In the reign of Henry I she found seven knights
-for the king's service, and had writs regularly directed to her to send
-her quota of soldiers into the field in proportion to her knights' fees;
-she held her own courts for pleas of debts, etc., the perquisites of which
-belonged to her[562].
-
-To look through the cartularies of some of the old monasteries, is to
-realise how complex were the duties which devolved on the ruler of one of
-these settlements, and they corroborate the truth of the remark that the
-first requirement for a good abbot was that he should have a head for
-business. Outlying manors were in the hands of bailiffs who managed them,
-and the house kept a clerk who looked after its affairs in the spiritual
-courts; for the management and protection of the rights and privileges of
-the property claimed unceasing care.
-
-The Benedictine abbesses do not seem to have been wanting in business and
-managing capacity. At the time of the dissolution the oldest nunneries in
-the land with few exceptions were also the wealthiest. The wealth of some
-was notorious. A saying was current in the western provinces that if the
-abbot of Glastonbury were to marry the abbess of Shaftesbury, their heir
-would have more land than the king of England[563]. The reason of this
-wealth lies partly in the fact that property had been settled on them at a
-time when land was held as a comparatively cheap commodity; but it speaks
-well for the managing capacities of those in authority that the high
-standing was maintained. The rulers prevented their property from being
-wasted or alienated during the 12th and 13th centuries, when the vigour or
-decline of an institution so largely depended on the capacity of the
-individual representing it, and they continued faithful to their
-traditions by effecting a compromise during the 14th and 15th centuries,
-when the increased powers of the Church and the consolidation of the
-monarchical power threatened destruction to institutions of the kind.
-
-It is worthy of attention that while all nunneries founded during
-Anglo-Saxon times were abbacies, those founded after the Conquest were
-generally priories. Sixty-four Benedictine nunneries date their foundation
-from after the Conquest, only three of which were abbacies[564]. The
-Benedictine prioress was in many cases subject to an abbot; her authority
-varied with the conditions of her appointment, but in all cases she was
-below the abbess in rank. The explanation is to be sought in the system of
-feudal tenure. Women no longer held property, nunneries were founded and
-endowed by local barons or by abbots. Where power from the preceding
-period devolved on the woman in authority, she retained it; but where new
-appointments were made the current tendency was in favour of curtailing
-her power.
-
-Similarly all the Cistercian nunneries in England, which numbered
-thirty-six at the dissolution, were without exception priories. The power
-of women professing the order abroad and the influence of the Cistercian
-abbesses in Spain and France have been mentioned--facts which preclude the
-idea of there being anything in the intrinsic nature of the order contrary
-to the holding of power by women. The form the settlement took in each
-country was determined by the prevailing drift of the time, and in England
-during the 11th and 12th centuries it was in favour of less independence
-for women.
-
-Various incidents in the history of nunneries illustrate the comparatively
-dependent position of these settlements after the Conquest. At first
-Sheppey had been an abbacy. It had been deserted during the viking period;
-and at the instigation of the archbishop of Canterbury about the year 1130
-nuns were brought there from Sittingbourne and the house was restored as a
-priory.
-
-Amesbury again, one of the oldest and wealthiest abbeys in the land for
-women, was dissolved and restored as a priory, dependent on the abbess of
-Fontevraud. This change of constitution presents some interesting
-features. The lives of the women assembled there in the 12th century were
-of a highly reprehensible character; the abbess was accused of
-incontinence and her evil ways were followed by the nuns. There was no way
-out of the difficulty short of removing the women in a body, and to
-accomplish this was evidently no easy undertaking. Several charters of the
-time of King John and bearing his signature are in existence. The abbess,
-whose name is not on record, retired into private life on a pension of ten
-marks, and the thirty nuns of her convent were placed in other nunneries.
-A prioress and twenty-four nuns were then brought over from Fontevraud and
-established at Amesbury, which became for a time a cell to the foreign
-house[565]. This connection with France, at a time when familiarity with
-French formed part of a polite education, caused Amesbury to become the
-chosen retreat of royal princesses. During the wars with France under the
-Edwards, when many priories and cells were cut off from their foreign
-connection, Amesbury regained its old standing as an abbacy.
-
-Several of the Benedictine nunneries founded after the Conquest owed
-their foundation to abbacies of men. Some were directly dependent cells,
-like Sopwell in Hertfordshire, a nunnery founded by the abbot of St
-Albans, who held the privilege of appointing its prioress. So absolute was
-this power that when the nuns appointed a prioress of their own choice in
-1330, she was deposed by the abbot of St Albans, who appointed another
-person in her stead[566]. Similarly the nunnery at Kilburn was a cell to
-Westminster, its prioress being appointed by the abbot of
-Westminster[567]. But as a general rule the priories were so constituted
-that the nuns might appoint a prioress subject to the approval of the
-patron of their house, and she was then consecrated to her office by the
-bishop.
-
-Various incidents show how jealously each house guarded its privileges and
-how needful this was, considering the changes that were apt to occur, for
-the charters of each religious house were the sole guarantee of its
-continued existence. From time to time they were renewed and confirmed,
-and if the representative of the house was not on the alert, he might
-awake to find his privileges encroached upon. In regard to the changes
-which were liable to occur the following incident deserves mention. In the
-year 1192 the archbishop of York formed the plan of subjecting the nunnery
-of St Clement's at York[568], a priory founded by his predecessor
-Thurstan, to the newly-founded abbacy for women at Godstow. Godstow was
-one of the few women's abbacies founded after the Conquest, and owed its
-wealth and influence chiefly to its connection with the family of Fair
-Rosamond, at one time the mistress of Henry II, who spent the latter part
-of her life there. But the nuns of St Clement's, who had always been free,
-would not obey the abbess of Godstow, and they saved themselves from the
-archbishop's interference by appealing directly to the Court of Rome.
-
-A curious incident occurred during the reign of Henry III in connection
-with Stanford, a nunnery in Northamptonshire. Stanford was a priory
-dependent on the abbot of Peterborough who had founded it. It appears that
-the prioress and her convent, in soliciting confirmation of their
-privileges from Rome, employed a certain proctor, who, besides the desired
-confirmation, procured the insertion of several additional articles into
-the document, one of which was permission for the nuns to choose their own
-prioress, and another a release from certain payments. When the abbot of
-Peterborough became aware of these facts he threatened to complain to the
-Pope, whereupon the prioress with the nuns' approval carried all their
-charters and records of privileges to the archbishop of Canterbury,
-alleging that the proctor had acted against their order. They renounced
-all claim to privileges secretly obtained, and besought the primate to
-represent their conduct favourably to the Pope and to make peace between
-them and their patrons[569].
-
-Both these incidents occurred in connection with Benedictine nunneries.
-The difficulties which occurred in Cistercian nunneries are less easy to
-estimate, as they were not daughter-houses to men's Cistercian abbacies,
-but in many cases held their privileges by a bull obtained directly from
-the Pope. Thus Sinningthwaite in Yorkshire[570], founded in 1160, held a
-bull from Alexander III which exempted the nuns from paying tithes on the
-lands they farmed, such exemption being the peculiar privilege of many
-Cistercian settlements. Other bulls secured by Cistercian nunneries in
-England are printed by Dugdale[571].
-
-A few incidents are recorded in connection with some of the royal
-princesses, which illustrate the attitude commonly assumed towards
-professed nuns, and give us an idea of the estimation in which convents
-were held. Queen Margaret of Scotland we are told desired to become a nun;
-her mother and her sister Christina both took the veil, and her daughters,
-the princesses Matilda and Mary, lived at Romsey for some years with their
-aunt Christina. As Pope Innocent IV canonised (1250) Queen Margaret of
-Scotland a few words must be devoted to her.
-
-Her father Edward, the son of Edmund Ironside ([Dagger] 1016), had found
-refuge at the Scottish court when he came from abroad with his wife Agatha
-and their children, a son and two daughters. Of these daughters, Christina
-became a nun; but Margaret was either persuaded or constrained to marry
-King Malcolm in 1070, and having undertaken the duties of so august a
-station as that of queen, she devoted her energies to introducing reforms
-into Scotland and to raising the standard of industrial art. We possess a
-beautiful description of her life, probably written by her chaplain
-Turgot[572], and her zeal and high principles are further evidenced by
-her letters, some of which are addressed to the primate Lanfranc.
-
-Margaret's two daughters, Matilda and Mary, were brought up in the
-convent, but it is not known when they came to Romsey in Wessex; indeed
-their connection with Wessex offers some chronological difficulties. Their
-mother's sister Christina became a professed nun at Romsey in 1086[573];
-she may have lived before in a nunnery in the north of England[574], and
-there advocated her niece Matilda's acceptance of the religious profession
-as a protection against the Normans. If this is not the case it is
-difficult to fix the date of King Malcolm's scorn for her proposal that
-Matilda should become a nun[575]. King Malcolm was killed fighting against
-William Rufus in 1093, Queen Margaret died a few days afterwards, and the
-princesses Matilda and Mary, of whom the former was about thirteen, from
-that time till 1100 dwelt at Romsey in the south of England. In the year
-1100, after the violent death of Rufus, Henry, the younger of his
-brothers, laid claim to the English crown. A union with a princess, who on
-the mother's side was of the house of Cerdic, appeared in every way
-desirable. According to the statement of William of Malmesbury ([Dagger]
-c. 1142) Henry was persuaded by his friends, and especially by his
-prelates, to marry Matilda. 'She had worn the veil to avoid ignoble
-marriages,' says William, who lived close to the locality and was nearly a
-contemporary, 'and when the king wished to marry her, witnesses were
-brought to say she had worn it without profession[576].' This is borne out
-by the historian Orderic Vitalis ([Dagger] 1142), whose information
-however is derived at second hand, for he enlarges on the princesses' stay
-with the nuns at Romsey, and on the instruction they received in letters
-and good manners, but he does not say that they were actually
-professed[577].
-
-The fullest account of the event is given by Eadmer ([Dagger] 1124), who
-was nearly connected with the primate Anselm, and he naturally puts the
-most favourable construction on Matilda's conduct. According to him she
-wished to leave the convent and went before Anselm to plead her cause.
-
-'I do not deny having worn the veil,' the princess said. 'When I was a
-child my aunt Christina, whom you know to be a determined woman, in order
-to protect me against the violence of the Normans, put a piece of black
-cloth on my head, and when I removed it gave me blows and bad language. So
-I trembling and indignant wore the veil in her presence. But as soon as I
-could get out of her sight I snatched it off and trampled it
-underfoot[578].' In a lively way she goes on to describe how her father
-seeing the veil on her head became angry and tore it off, saying he had no
-intention other than that she should be married. Anselm, before complying
-with the wish of the princess, convened a chapter at Lambeth, but after
-hearing their decision, he declared Matilda free and united her in
-marriage to the king.
-
-Anselm's behaviour is doubtless faithfully represented by Eadmer.
-Curiously enough later historians, Robert of Gloucester, Matthew Paris and
-Rudbone ([Dagger] c. 1234), represent Matilda as unwilling to leave the
-cloister to be married; and in one of these accounts she is described as
-growing angry, and pronouncing a curse on the possible offspring of the
-union. Walter Map goes so far as to say that the king took to wife a
-veiled and professed nun, Rome neither assenting nor dissenting, but
-remaining passive.
-
-Perhaps the validity of the union was afterwards for political reasons
-called in question. At any rate Mary, Matilda's sister, also left the
-convent to be married to Eustace, Count of Boulogne, without objection
-being raised.
-
-That Matilda did not object to leaving the cloister, we have conclusive
-proof in her great and continued affection for Anselm as shown in her
-letters to him. These letters and the charitable deeds of the queen, throw
-light on the Latinity of the Romsey pupil and on the tastes she had
-imbibed there.
-
-We shall have occasion to return to Matilda again in connection with the
-philanthropic movement of the age, and we shall find her founding the
-hospital of St Giles in the soke of Aldgate, and bringing the first Austin
-Canons from France into England[579].
-
-All her life she retained a taste for scholarly pursuits, and patronised
-scholars and men of letters. Her correspondence with the primate
-Anselm[580] yields proof of her own studies and the freedom with which she
-wrote Latin.
-
-In one of these letters, written shortly after her marriage (bk 3. 55),
-Matilda urges the primate in strong terms to abstain from the severe
-fasting he practises, quoting from Cicero 'on Old Age,' and arguing that
-as the mind needs food and drink, so does the body; she at the same time
-admits the Scriptures enjoin the duty of fasting, and Pythagoras, Socrates
-and others urge the need of frugality. Anselm in his answer incidentally
-mentions having joined her to the king in lawful wedlock.
-
-Matilda's next letters are less fraught with learning, and in unaffected
-terms express grief at Anselm's voluntary exile, which was the outcome of
-his quarrel with the king. She is saddened by his absence and longs for
-his return (3. 93); she would act as intercessor between him and her
-husband (3. 96), and she writes to the Pope on Anselm's behalf (3. 99).
-The queen both read and admired Anselm's writings, and compares his style
-to that of Cicero, Quintilian, Jerome, Gregory and others (3. 119) with
-whom her reading at Romsey may have made her acquainted.
-
-Anselm is not slow in answering that the king's continued bitterness is to
-him a source of grief, and in expressing the desire that the queen may
-turn his heart. It is good of her to wish for his return, which, however,
-does not depend on himself; besides 'surely she wishes him to act in
-accordance with his conscience.' In one of these letters he accuses the
-queen of disposing otherwise than she ought of the churches which are in
-her keeping (3. 57, 81, 97, 107, 120, 128).
-
-Anselm's continued absence from Canterbury, which was due to the quarrel
-about investiture, was felt to be a national calamity, and many letters
-passed between him and those among the Church dignitaries who sided with
-him against the king.
-
-Among Anselm's correspondents were several abbesses of Wessex settlements,
-who seem to have been in no way prejudiced against him on account of the
-approval he gave to Matilda's leaving the cloister. He writes in a
-friendly strain to another Matilda, abbess of St Mary's, Winchester
-(Winton), thanking her for her prayers, urging her to cultivate purity of
-heart and beauty of mind as an encouragement to virtue, and begging her to
-show obedience to Osmund (bishop of Winchester) in affairs temporal and
-spiritual (3. 30). To Adeliz, also abbess at St Mary's (3. 70), he writes
-to say she must not be sorry that William Giffard has left his appointment
-as bishop of Winchester, for his going is a reason for rejoicing among his
-friends, as it proves his steadfastness in religious matters. He also
-writes to Eulalia, abbess (of Shaftesbury), who was anxious for him to
-come back, and begs her to pray that his return may prosper (3. 125).
-
-The references to the Benedictine nunneries of Wessex contained in this
-correspondence are supplemented by information from other sources.
-
-In the early part of the 12th century a girl named Eva was brought up at a
-convent, but which she left to go to Anjou, since she preferred the life
-of a recluse there to the career which was open to her in the English
-nunnery. Her life abroad has been described in verse by Hilarius ([Dagger]
-c. 1124) who is the earliest known Englishman who wrote religious plays.
-After studying under Abelard Hilarius had taken up his abode at Angers,
-near the place where Eva dwelt, and was much impressed by her piety and
-devotions[581].
-
-From his poem we gather that Eva had been given into the care of the nuns
-at St Mary's, Winchester (Winton), a place which he designates as 'good
-and renowned.' The girl's progress in learning was the subject of wonder
-to the abbess and her companions, but when Eva reached the age at which
-her enrolment as a member of the community was close at hand, 'she turned'
-in the words of the poet, 'from success as though it had been a sinful
-trespass,' and left the nunnery to go abroad.
-
-Her admirer Hilarius has celebrated other women who were devoted to
-religious pursuits. He addresses one of them as 'Bona,' and praises her
-for caring little for the religious garb unless good works accompany it.
-The meaning of her name and that of other religious women whom Hilarius
-also addresses, such as 'Superba,' and 'Rosa,' gives him an opportunity
-for compliments on the virtues these names suggest. His poems, though
-insignificant in themselves, add touches to our knowledge of women who
-adopted the religious profession.
-
-In the wars which ensued after the death of Henry I (1134) the nunneries
-of Wessex witnessed the climax and the end of the struggle. The Empress
-Matilda, daughter of Henry I and Queen Matilda, who claimed the crown on
-the strength of her descent, finding the sympathies of London divided,
-approached Winchester, and was received by two convents of monks and the
-convent of nuns who came forth to meet her. The Empress for a time resided
-at St Mary's Abbey, and there received a visit from Theobald, archbishop
-of Canterbury[582]. During the fighting which followed the nunnery of
-Wherwell was burnt[583], and perhaps St Mary's Abbey at Winchester was
-destroyed[584]. Matilda finally yielded to Stephen, and left England on
-condition that her son Henry should succeed to the crown.
-
-The nunnery of Romsey continued its connection with royalty, and we find
-the daughter of Stephen, Mary of Blois, established there as abbess
-previous to her marriage. Her case again throws curious side-lights on the
-foundation of convents and the possibilities open to women who adopted the
-religious profession.
-
-The princess Mary had come over from St Sulpice in France with seven nuns
-to Stratford at Bow (otherwise St Leonard's, Bromley in Middlesex), when
-the manor of Lillechurch in Kent was granted to the nunnery there by King
-Stephen for her own and her companions' maintenance[585]. But these women,
-as the charter has it, because of the 'harshness of the rule and their
-different habits' could not and would not stay at Stratford, and with the
-convent's approval they left it and removed to Lillechurch, which was
-constituted by charter a priory for them. Mary removed later to Romsey
-where she became abbess some time before 1159[586], for in that year her
-brother William, the sole surviving heir of Stephen, died, so that she was
-left heiress to the county of Boulogne. She was thereupon brought out of
-the convent at the instigation of Henry II, and married to Matthew, son of
-the Count of Flanders, who through her became Count of Boulogne. Thomas
-Beket, who was then chancellor, not primate, was incensed at this unlawful
-proceeding, and intervened as a protector of monastic rule, but the only
-result of his interference was to draw on himself the hatred of Count
-Matthew[587]. It is said that Mary returned to Romsey twelve years later.
-Her daughters were, however, legitimised in 1189 and both of them married.
-
-Various letters found here and there in the correspondence of this period
-show how women vowed to religion retained their connection with the outer
-world. Among the letters of Thomas Beket there is one in which he tells
-his 'daughter' Idonea to transcribe the letter he is forwarding, and lay
-it before the archbishop of York in the presence of witnesses[588]. It
-has been mentioned that a sister of Thomas Beket was in 1173 abbess at
-Barking.
-
-Again, among the letters of Peter of Blois ([Dagger] c. 1200), chaplain to
-Henry II, are several addressed to women who had adopted the religious
-profession. Anselma 'a virgin' is urged to remain true to her calling;
-Christina, his 'sister,' is exhorted to virtue, and Adelitia 'a nun' is
-sent a discourse on the beauties of the unmarried life[589].
-
-
-Sec. 3. The Order of St Gilbert of Sempringham[590].
-
-The study of the order of St Gilbert, which is of English origin, shows
-how in this country also sympathy with convent life was spreading during
-the 12th century, and how, owing to the protection afforded to peaceful
-and domestic pursuits by the religious houses, many girls and women of the
-middle classes became nuns. From an intellectual point of view the order
-of St Gilbert has little to recommend it, for we know of no men or women
-belonging to the order who distinguished themselves in learning,
-literature or art. As a previous chapter has indicated, its purpose was
-chiefly to prevent women from drifting into the unattached and homeless
-class, the existence of which was beginning to be recognised as
-prejudicial to society.
-
-The material for the study of the order is abundant. We have several
-accounts of the life and work of Gilbert, besides minute injunctions he
-drafted to regulate the life of his communities, and there are references
-to him in contemporary literature. The success of his efforts, like that
-of the men who founded combined orders of canons and nuns abroad, was due
-to the admission of women into his settlements regardless of their class
-and antecedents. Like Robert of Arbrissel his interest centred in women,
-but he differed from him in giving the supreme authority of his
-settlements into the hands of men. For the settlements which afterwards
-became double originated in Gilbert's wish to provide for women who
-sought him as their spiritual adviser. It was only in consequence of the
-difficulties he encountered that canons were added to the settlements.
-
-Helyot likens the order of St Gilbert to that of Norbert, the founder of
-the order of Premontre[591], but here too there are marked points of
-difference, for in disposition and character Gilbert was as unlike Norbert
-as he was to Robert; he had neither the masterfulness of the one nor the
-clear-sighted determination of the other. The reason of his popularity
-lies more in his gentleness and persuasiveness, and these qualities made
-him especially attractive to women.
-
-Gilbert was a native of Lincolnshire, born about 1083, the son of a
-wealthy Norman baron and an English woman of low rank. His ungainly
-appearance and want of courtly bearing rendered him unfit for knightly
-service. He was sent to France for his education and there attained some
-reputation as a teacher. After his return home he devoted his energies to
-teaching boys and girls in the neighbourhood. His father bestowed on him
-two livings, one of which was at Sempringham. His chief characteristic was
-pity for the lowly and humble, and this attracted the attention among
-others of Robert Bloet, bishop of Lincoln ([Dagger] 1123). For a time
-Gilbert acted as a clerk in Bloet's house, and after his death remained
-with his successor Alexander ([Dagger] 1148) in a like capacity. With
-Alexander he consulted about permanently providing for those of the lower
-classes whom his liberality was attracting to Sempringham.
-
-The first step taken by Gilbert was to erect suitable dwellings round the
-church of St Andrew at Sempringham for seven women whom he had taught and
-who had devoted themselves to religion under his guidance, and as they
-were not to leave their dwelling place, lay sisters were appointed to wait
-on them. He also provided dwellings at Sempringham for the poor, the
-infirm, for lepers, and orphans.
-
-The order of Gilbert is held to have been established before 1135, the
-year of King Henry I's death[592]. The author of his life in Dugdale
-likens Gilbert's progress at this time to the chariot of Aminadab; to it
-clung clerics and laymen, literate and illiterate women, and it was drawn
-by Master Gilbert himself.
-
-Gilbert had entered into friendly relations with the Cistercian monks who
-were then gaining ground in Yorkshire, and William, first abbot of
-Rievaulx ([Dagger] 1145-6), was among them. He had a good deal to do with
-Ailred ([Dagger] 1166), a notable north-country man who came from Scotland
-to live at Rievaulx, and afterwards became abbot successively of Revesby
-and Rievaulx.
-
-At this time there were no nunneries in the north of England, for the
-great settlements of the early English period had passed away and no new
-houses for women had been founded. The numbers of those who flocked to
-Gilbert were so great that he felt called upon to give them a more
-definite organisation. His friendship with Cistercian monks no doubt
-turned his eyes to Citeaux, and the wish arose in him to affiliate his
-convents to the Cistercian order. Having placed his congregations under
-the care of the Cistercians, he set out for Citeaux about 1146.
-
-But his hopes were not fulfilled. At Citeaux he met Pope Eugenius III
-([Dagger] 1153) and other leading men. He cemented his friendship with
-Bernard of Clairvaux and entered into friendly relations with Malachy,
-bishop of Armagh ([Dagger] 1148), who had introduced the Cistercian order
-into Ireland. But the assembly at Citeaux came to the conclusion that they
-would not preside over another religious order, especially not over one
-for women[593], and Gilbert was urged to remain at the head of his
-communities and Bernard and Malachy presented him with an abbot's staff.
-
-He returned to England, burdened with a responsibility from which he would
-gladly have been free, and obliged to frame a definite rule of life for
-his followers. As one account puts it, 'he now studied the rules of all
-religious orders and culled from each its flowers.' The outcome of his
-efforts was the elaborate set of injunctions which now lie before us.
-
-From these injunctions we can see how Gilbert's original plan had
-expanded, for his settlements consisted of bands of canons, lay-brethren,
-nuns, and lay-sisters. One set of rules is drafted for the canons who
-observed the rule of St Augustine and performed religious service for the
-double community, and a separate set for the laymen who acted as servants.
-And similarly there is one set of rules for the nuns who lived by the rule
-of St Benedict, and another for their servants the lay-sisters.
-
-These rules suggest many points of similarity to the combined settlements
-of canons and nuns previously founded abroad, but there are also some
-differences.
-
-In the Gilbertine settlements the dwellings of the men and women were
-contiguous, and the convent precincts and the church were divided between
-them. The men's dwelling was under the rule of a prior, but three
-prioresses ruled conjointly in the women's house. The arrangements in both
-convents were alike, and the duties of prior and prioress similar, but in
-all matters of importance the chief authority belonged to the prior who
-was at the head of the whole settlement. The property owned by Gilbertine
-settlements apparently consisted largely of sheep, and among the men we
-note a number of shepherds and a 'procurator' who bought and sold the
-animals. The ewes were regularly milked and the wool was either used in
-the house for making clothes, or sold. The lay-sisters were appointed to
-spin and weave and the nuns to cut out and make the garments.
-
-There was one cellar and one kitchen for the whole settlement, for the
-cellaress in the women's house acted as caterer both for the canons and
-the nuns. Domestic duties fell to the share of the women. They cooked the
-canons' food as well as their own and handed the meals into the men's
-quarters through a hole in the wall with a turn-table, through which the
-plates and dishes were returned to them. They also made clothes for the
-whole establishment.
-
-At the daily chapter held in the women's house the prioresses presided in
-turn, with a companion on either side. The cellaress reported to the
-prioress, who settled the allowances and gave out the food. She received
-information also from the 'scrutatrices,' the nuns whose duty it was to go
-the round of the house and report disorders, and according to whose
-reports she imposed the various penances.
-
-We also hear in the women's house of a librarian ('precentrix[594]'), who
-had the keys of the book-case ('armarium'), which was kept locked except
-during reading time when the nuns were allowed the use of the books. There
-was to be no quarrelling over the books; the nun like the canon was
-directed to take the one allotted to her and not to appropriate that given
-to another. Simplicity of life was studied. Pictures and sculpture were
-declared superfluous and the crosses used were to be of painted wood. Only
-books for choir use were to be written in the convent, but while this
-holds good alike for the women and for the men, there is this further
-prohibition with regard to the nuns, that talking in Latin was to be
-avoided. 'Altogether,' says the rule[595], 'we forbid the use of the
-Latin tongue unless under special circumstances.'
-
-The cooking was done by the nuns in turn for a week at a time in
-compliance with a regulation contained in the rule of St Benedict. The
-librarian also had her week of cooking, and when she was on duty in the
-kitchen, gave up her keys to another nun. We hear also of the mistress
-appointed to teach the novices, and of the portress who guarded the
-approaches to the house.
-
-The injunctions drafted for the canons and the lay members of the
-settlement are equally explicit. Directions are also given about tending
-the sick, who were to be treated with tenderness and care.
-
-Girls were admitted into the company of the nuns at the age of twelve, but
-several years passed before they could be enrolled among the novices. At
-the age of twenty the alternative was put before the novice of joining the
-nuns or the lay-sisters. If she decided in favour of the latter she could
-not afterwards be promoted to the rank of nun; she was bound to observe
-chastity and obedience while she remained in the house, but she was not
-consecrated. A certain amount of knowledge of the hymns, psalms and books
-of service was required from the novice before she could make profession.
-
-The scheme of life worked out by Gilbert met with success and numerous
-patrons were found to endow settlements on the plan of that at
-Sempringham. As the chronicler says, 'many wealthy and highborn
-Englishmen, counts and barons, seeing and approving of the undertaking the
-Lord had initiated and holding that good would come of it, bestowed many
-properties ('fundos et praedia') on the holy father (Gilbert) and began to
-construct on their own account numerous monasteries in various districts.'
-
-The greater number of these settlements were situated in Lincolnshire and
-Yorkshire, but judging by the extant charters the conditions and purposes
-of their foundations were not always the same. Sometimes the grant is made
-conjointly to men and women, sometimes reference is made to the prior
-only. In the earlier charters the women are especially noticed, in the
-later ones more account is taken of the men. As time went on the order
-gradually ceased to have any attraction for women, and at the time of the
-dissolution several foundations originally made for men and women were
-occupied only by canons.
-
-Gilbert himself did not accept a position of authority in his order but
-became a canon at Bullington, one of its settlements. He appears to have
-been influential in wider circles and we find him several times at court.
-King Henry II visited him, and both the king and Queen Eleanor made grants
-of land to the order. Henry regarded Gilbert with so much favour that when
-he was summoned before the King's Court in London on the charge of having
-supported Beket in his exile, the king sent a message from abroad ordering
-his case to be reserved for royal judgment, which practically meant his
-acquittal[596].
-
-Rapidly as the number of Gilbertine houses increased, the order did not
-remain entirely free from trouble, for even in Gilbert's lifetime
-distressing incidents happened which justified to some extent the scornful
-remarks of contemporary writers. One of these difficulties arose sometime
-between 1153 and 1166 in connection with a girl at Watton. A full account
-of the affair was written and forwarded to Gilbert by Ailred, abbot of
-Rievaulx[597]. This account illustrates pointedly the readiness of the age
-to accept a miraculous rendering of fact, and gives a curious insight into
-the temper of a community of nuns. Indeed such violence of conduct, and
-details of such behaviour as are here described show that the barbarity of
-the age, which so often strikes us in connection with camp and court, was
-reflected in the monastery.
-
-Watton was among the older Gilbertine houses and had been founded before
-1148 by a nobleman Eustace Fitz-John on property which had belonged to a
-nunnery during the early English period[598]. The settlement was among the
-larger Gilbertine houses; it owned property to the extent of twenty acres.
-
-The girl had been placed under the care of the nuns of Watton at the
-suggestion of Murdach, abbot of Fountains ([Dagger] 1153), and had given
-endless trouble by her unbecoming levity and hopeless laziness. 'She is
-corrected by word of mouth but without result, she is urged by blows but
-there is no improvement,' writes Ailred, who speaks of her as a nun
-without telling us that she had actually made profession.
-
-She made the acquaintance of one of the lay-brothers who were engaged in
-repairing the women's dwelling. The two contrived to meet frequently out
-of doors until at last the nun's condition became obvious. Her fellow-nuns
-were so incensed at this discovery that they treated her with barbarous
-cruelty and would have put her to death had not the prioress intervened
-and had her chained and imprisoned. The anger of the nuns now turned
-against the lay-brother who had brought disgrace on their convent, and
-with a mixture of cunning and deceit they managed to discover him and have
-him terribly mutilated. 'I do not praise the deed, but the zeal,' says
-Ailred; 'I do not approve of bloodshed, but for all that I praise the
-virgins' hatred of such wickedness.' The esprit de corps among the nuns
-and their indignation evidently went far in his eyes to excuse behaviour
-which he would not describe as he did if he had not felt it altogether
-reprehensible.
-
-Meanwhile the nun overcome by contrition was awaiting her delivery in
-prison; there she had visions of abbot Murdach who had died some years
-before. He first rebuked her, but then miraculously relieved her of her
-burden and restored her to her normal condition. The nuns though greatly
-surprised were convinced of the truth of the statement concerning the
-miraculous doings of Murdach because they found the nun's chains loosened.
-The prior of Watton sent for Ailred to enquire more closely into the
-matter. Ailred came, collected all possible evidence, and was convinced
-that there had been divine intervention on the girl's behalf. He wrote an
-account of what had happened to Gilbert, with these words as preface: 'to
-know of the Lord's miracles and of his proofs of divine love and to be
-silent about them were sacrilege.' What became of the girl we are not
-told. For trespasses such as hers the rule of Gilbert decreed life-long
-incarceration, but the canon for a like trespass suffered no punishment
-beyond being expelled from the settlement.
-
-The old age of Gilbert was further troubled by the evil conduct of two
-men, Gerard a smith, and Ogger a carpenter. He had taken them into the
-order out of charity, but they greatly abused his kindness, appropriated
-the revenues of the order, and encouraged dishonesty and sexual
-irregularities. Their behaviour was productive of such results that it
-called forth a letter from Beket to Gilbert in which he says 'the greater
-our love, the more we are troubled and perturbed by hearing of things
-happening in your order, which are a grievance not only before the eyes of
-men but before the eyes of God.'
-
-However letters in defence of Gilbert were written by Roger archbishop of
-York ([Dagger] 1181), Henry bishop of Winchester ([Dagger] 1171) and
-William bishop of Norwich ([Dagger] 1174), who treat the occurrence as a
-misfortune and praise the order generally in the warmest terms. Praise
-from other quarters is not wanting, which shows that Gilbert's work was
-considered remarkable, especially with regard to the influence he had over
-women. William of Newburgh wrote of him: 'As far as this is concerned, in
-my opinion he holds the palm above all others whom we know to have devoted
-their energies to the control and government of religious women[599].'
-
-Gilbert lived to an advanced age. Walter Map, writing between 1182 and
-1189, speaks of him as over a hundred and well-nigh blind. He was buried
-at Sempringham, where his tomb became the goal of many pilgrimages and the
-scene of many miracles. He was canonised a saint of the Church by Pope
-Innocent II in 1202. One of the accounts of his life, written shortly
-after his death, says that the order at that time numbered thirteen
-conventual churches and contained seven hundred men and fifteen hundred
-women.
-
-The East Riding Antiquarian Society has recently begun excavating on the
-site of Watton Priory, one of the oldest Gilbertine settlements, and has
-ascertained many particulars about the inner arrangements of this
-house[600]. It has found that the church, built on the foundations of a
-Norman church which had been destroyed by fire in 1167, was divided
-throughout its entire length by a substantial partition wall nearly five
-feet thick. The church served for both sexes of the community, which were
-kept separate by this partition. In some places remains of this wall were
-found up to the height of four feet; this was part of the solid foundation
-upon which, above the height of the eye, was erected an open arcade which
-made it possible for the whole community to hear the sermon preached on
-festal days from the pulpit. The parts into which the church was divided
-were of unequal size. Dr Cox, the president of the Society, who read a
-paper on the Gilbertine statutes, said that the full complement of the
-double house at Watton consisted of a hundred and forty women and seventy
-men, and that the larger part of the church was appropriated to the women
-and the smaller to the men.
-
-It was further shown by the excavations that the dividing wall had in one
-place an archway, covering the door which was opened for the great
-processions of both sexes which took place on the fourteen great
-festivals of the year and at funerals. Remains were also found of an
-opening in the wall with a turn-table, so arranged that articles could be
-passed through without either sex seeing the other. Through this the
-chalice, when the canons' mass was over, would be passed back and restored
-to the custody of the nuns; no doubt this was constructed on the same plan
-as the opening through which the food was passed.
-
-The cloister of the nuns lay on the north side of the transept and must
-have been about a hundred feet square, an alley of ten feet wide
-surrounding it. It is thought that the stone of which the house was built
-must have been brought up the Humber from Whitby. An early writer tells us
-that the nuns' dwelling at Watton was connected by an underground passage
-with the holy well at Kilnwick, and that the nuns by means of these waters
-performed wonderful cures[601].
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VII.
-
-ART INDUSTRIES IN THE NUNNERY.
-
-  'Spernere mundum, spernere nullum, spernere sese,
-  Spernere sperni se, quatuor haec bona sunt.' _Herrad._
-
-
-Sec. 1. Art Industries generally.
-
-From consideration of the nuns of different orders we turn to enquire more
-closely into the general occupations and productive capacities of nuns
-during early Christian times and the Middle Ages. It seems worth while
-collecting the information scattered here and there on the work done by
-these women, since the grouping together of various notices gives some,
-though necessarily an incomplete, idea of the pursuits to which nuns were
-devoted when not engaged in religious service. The work done, as we shall
-see, includes art productions of every kind, weaving, embroidery, painting
-and illuminating as well as writing, which during the period under
-consideration must be looked upon as an art.
-
-From the first monastic life had been dominated by the idea that idleness
-is at the root of all evil. In a well ordered religious house the times
-for work and for leisure, for eating, sleeping and for attendance at
-divine service were fixed by custom and were enforced by routine; we shall
-treat later of the way in which the day was divided by the canonical
-hours. The purpose of the ordinary settlement, beyond observing the hours,
-was to educate girls, to train novices and to provide suitable occupation
-for the nuns of the convent. In all houses reading and copying books of
-devotion was included among the occupations, and in some, the cultivation
-of art in one or more of its branches. Between the 8th and the 14th
-century religious settlements were the centres of production in
-handicrafts and in art industry; to study the art of this period, it is
-necessary to study the productions of the monasteries.
-
-A sense of joint ownership united the members of each of the religious
-settlements, and this was especially true of the older Benedictine houses
-which have fitly been likened to small republics. To the convent inmate
-the monastery was the centre of his interests and affections, and the
-house's possessions were in a sense his own. He was proud of them and
-proud if he could add to their store. Increased communication with the
-south and the east brought books, materials and other beautiful objects
-which the inmates of the religious settlement zealously copied and
-multiplied. During times of political and social unrest, while states were
-in their making, the goldsmith, the scribe, the illuminator, and the
-embroiderer, all found protection and leisure in the religious house. The
-so-called dark ages, the centuries between 800 and 1200, cease to be dark
-as soon as one enquires into the contents of monastic libraries, and the
-monotony of convent routine ceases to appear monotonous on entering one of
-the old treasuries and reflecting on the aims and aspirations which were
-devoted to producing this wealth in design and ornamentation, the bare
-fragmentary remains of which are to us of to-day a source of unending
-delight and wonder.
-
-Some of the houses ruled by women like so many of those ruled by men
-became important centres of culture, where the industrial arts were
-cultivated, and where books were prized, stored and multiplied. Nuns as
-well as monks were busy transcribing manuscripts, a task as absorbing as
-it was laborious, for the difficulties in the way of learning to write can
-hardly be overestimated considering the awkwardness of writing materials
-and the labour involved in fabricating parchment, ink and pigment. But as
-the old writer with a play on the words _armarium_, book-case, and
-_armatorium_, armoury, remarks, 'a monastery without its book-case is what
-a castle is without its armoury.' And all houses, whether for monks or
-nuns, took rank as centres of culture in proportion to their wealth in
-books.
-
-Of the books over which the early scribe spent so much time and trouble,
-comparatively speaking only a few survive. All books are worn out by use,
-especially books of devotion; many were destroyed when printing came in
-and parchment was handy to the book-binder; many when the Reformation
-destroyed convents. The early scribe usually omitted to add his name to
-the book he was copying. In the books which are preserved the names of men
-scribes are few, and the names of women scribes fewer still, though they
-do occasionally occur. Wattenbach, a student of manuscripts and of the
-mediaeval art of writing, has collected a number of names of women whom he
-has found mentioned as scribes. He gives them, adding the remark that
-other books no doubt were written by nuns where mention of the fact is
-omitted[602].
-
-It will be profitable to recall these names and examine the references to
-work done by nuns as calligraphists and miniature painters, for here and
-there women attained great proficiency in these arts. The amount of
-writing done in women's houses compared with that done by men was no doubt
-small, for it was not in this direction that the industry of the nun lay.
-But what remains shows that where scope to activity was given talents of
-no mean kind were developed.
-
-In some departments of art industry, especially in weaving church
-hangings, and embroidering altar cloths and church vestments, nuns greatly
-distinguished themselves. In his comprehensive work on church furniture
-Bock is eloquent on the industry of nuns. He first praises their early
-proficiency in the art of weaving and passes on to the art of embroidery.
-'This art also,' he says, 'was chiefly cultivated in religious houses by
-pious nuns up to the 12th century. The inmates of women's establishments
-were especially devoted to working decorations for the altar. Their
-peaceful seclusion was spent in prayer and in doing embroidery. What work
-could seem worthier and nobler than artistic work intended for the
-decoration of the altar? It is in the nunnery that the art of design as
-well as the technique of weaving were brought to their highest
-perfection[603].'
-
-Owing to the perishable material of this work the amount which was done of
-course far exceeded what has been preserved. We often come across remarks
-on such work, rarely across remains of it, and we are obliged to take on
-trust the praise bestowed by early writers as so little exists by which we
-can judge for ourselves. But enough remains to bear out the praise which
-contemporaries bestow on the beauties of hangings and vestments
-manufactured by nuns, and to give us the highest opinion of their industry
-and their artistic skill.
-
-Among women generally embroidery has always had votaries, and in the
-nunnery it found a new development. During early Christian ages nuns
-worked large hangings for decorating the basilica walls, and short
-hangings for the square altar; and when the Gothic style took the place of
-the earlier Byzantine in architecture, rendering such hangings
-superfluous, they devoted their energies to working church vestments and
-furniture.
-
-The proficiency acquired by the girl in the convent was not lost if she
-returned to the world. We hear a good deal of badges and standards worked
-by ladies at baronial courts during the age of romance, and their work was
-no doubt influenced by what had been evolved in church decoration.
-
-In studying the art industry of the convent, we needs must treat of work
-produced with the brush and the pen side by side with work produced with
-the needle. At two periods in history, the 8th and 13th centuries, England
-takes the lead in art industry, and at both periods there is reference to
-excellent work done by nuns.
-
-A former chapter has mentioned how Eadburg, the friend of Boniface, was at
-work in her monastery in Thanet in the 8th century, transcribing
-scriptural writings on parchment in gold lettering, an art in which she
-excelled[604]. Among the gifts sent to Boniface by lady abbesses in
-England vestments and altar-cloths are mentioned which had without a doubt
-been worked in the houses over which these ladies presided if not actually
-made by themselves[605].
-
-The importance and the symbolical meaning which early Christians attached
-to death supplies the reason why the abbess of Repton in Mercia sent a
-winding-sheet to St Guthlac during his lifetime[606]. Cuthberht of
-Lindisfarne was wrapped in a shroud which his friend Aelflaed, abbess of
-Whitby, had sent[607]. Both were of linen, for early Christians, who were
-content to wear rough woollen clothes during their lifetime, thought it
-permissible to be buried in linen and silk. Thus we read that Aethelthrith
-the abbess of Ely sent to Cuthberht a present of silk stuffs which she
-decorated with gold and jewels and which were shown at his resting-place
-at Durham till the 12th century[608]. The silk robe on which the body of
-Wilfrith ([Dagger] 709) had been laid was sent as a present to an abbess
-Cynethrith[609].
-
-About this time silk, which had been rarely seen north of the Alps, was
-frequently sent from the east and was greatly prized. It has been
-mentioned in a previous chapter how Radegund at Poitiers received a gift
-of silk from a relation in Constantinople[610], and among the charges
-brought by the turbulent Chrodield against the abbess Leubover was that
-she had appropriated part of an altar-cloth to make a robe for her niece.
-Caesarius of Arles in his rule for women forbade their working embroidery
-except for purposes of church decoration. Repeated complaints were made
-during the early ages in England against nuns for wearing embroidery and
-silks. The council of Cloveshoe of the year 747 censures the undue
-attention given to dress. 'Time shall be devoted more to reading books and
-to chanting psalms than to weaving and decorating (plectendis) clothes
-with various colours in unprofitable richness[611].' But to control the
-standard of clothes remained a standing difficulty in all convents, and
-especially in those of women[612].
-
-Apart from personal decoration the arts of weaving and embroidering were
-encouraged in every way. 'Towards the 10th century the art of making large
-hangings had so far progressed in England,' says Bock, 'that large scenes
-with many figures were represented[613].'
-
-Inside the cloister and out of it the art flourished, and the mention of
-gifts of hangings becomes frequent. Thus Ealdhelm in his 'Praise of
-Virginity' (c. 7) speaks of hangings made by the nuns, while reference is
-made to secular women at the time of the Conquest who did remarkable work.
-Among them were Alwid and Liwid who practised the air of embroidery and
-taught it[614]. Emma, otherwise Aelfgifu ([Dagger] 1052), after her
-marriage to King Knut, made a gift of hangings and vestments to the abbey
-of Ely, some of which were embroidered with gold and jewels on silk,
-others of green and purple colour were of such splendour that their like
-could not be found elsewhere in England[615]. Again, Aelflaed, the wife of
-Edward the Confessor ([Dagger] 1066), made hangings with pictures of the
-apostles for Frithstan of Winchester.
-
-'We know,' says Michel in his work on silk and the use of it in
-embroidery[616], 'that the women of England, long before the Conquest,
-worked assiduously at weaving and embroidering, and that they were as
-distinguished in this branch of art as men were in others.' Unfortunately
-no specimens of the work done in religious settlements during this early
-period have been preserved, so far as I am aware. We do not know what
-artist designed and executed the famous Bayeux tapestry which is worked in
-woollen cross-stitch on a strip of linen; but it was certainly not the
-work of nuns.
-
-The references to weaving and embroidering during the later period are
-fewer, but a certain amount of the work done in England has been
-preserved, though the clue as to where and by whom it was done is
-generally wanting. While weaving and embroidery were throughout important
-branches of home industry, art-needlework seems to have owed its higher
-development to nuns.
-
-In connection with the prioress Christina of Mergate we hear that she had
-worked three mitres and several pairs of sandals in wonderful work (operis
-mirifici) as a present for Pope Hadrian IV ([Dagger] 1159), who was of
-English origin, and perhaps known to her. Her work was carried to Rome by
-the abbot of St Albans, who had affronted Hadrian in early days and wished
-to propitiate him; we hear that the Pope was so delighted with the work
-that he could not refuse the present[617].
-
-England was, indeed, at this time famous for its embroidery, and her
-products were much admired abroad. In the words of Prof. Middleton:
-
-'Another minor branch of art, in which England during the 13th century far
-surpassed the rest of the world, was the art of embroidering delicate
-pictures in silk, especially for ecclesiastical vestments. The most famous
-embroidered vestments now preserved in various places in Italy are the
-handiwork of English embroiderers between 1250 and 1300, though their
-authorship is not as a rule recognized by their present possessors. The
-embroidered miniatures on these marvellous pieces of needlework resemble
-closely in style the illuminations in fine Anglo-Norman manuscripts of the
-13th century and in many cases have obviously been copied from manuscript
-miniatures[618].'
-
-A conclusion to be possibly drawn from this is that some of the early work
-which has come back to this country from Italy may in reality be English.
-There is no doubt it is curiously like the work done in England[619]. In a
-footnote to the above passage Prof. Middleton points out that the Popes of
-the period, on sending the pall to a newly elected English archbishop,
-suggested that they would like in return embroidered vestments of English
-work, 'opus anglicum,' a term at one time applied to work done in a
-special style[620]. Its peculiarity seems to have consisted in the working
-of figures in coloured floss silk on a piece of material, generally linen;
-on this the silk was worked in close-lying chain stitches, which,
-following the contours of face and drapery, entirely covered the material
-just as the strokes of a brush in a miniature cover the parchment. The
-background to these figures was also covered with coloured floss silk, but
-this was not worked in chain stitch but in various styles of straight
-close-lying stitches in diaper pattern. Prof. Middleton, in the passage
-quoted above, says that the embroiderer copied the miniature painter; in
-composing scenes and arranging figures this would of course be the case.
-But considering the styles of some of the backgrounds, it seems possible
-that in his turn the miniature painter borrowed from the embroiderer, by
-taking the idea of filling up the background to his figures with lines and
-diagonal patterns, which lines and patterns had been suggested to the
-embroiderer by the texture of the stuff he was covering. Gold and silver
-threads were liberally used in the 'opus anglicum[621],' and even jewels
-may have been introduced[622]. The general effect was that of a shining,
-glossy picture, and the care and industry needed to produce it exceeded
-even that required in miniatures.
-
-The English monk Matthew Paris ([Dagger] 1259) describes an incident
-illustrating at once the excellence of the embroidery done in England and
-the rapacity of Pope Innocent IV. The Pope he tells us was struck by the
-splendour of the embroidery worn by the English clergy who came to Rome in
-the year 1246, and asked where it was made. 'In England,' he was told. He
-replied, 'England is really a storehouse of delight; truly it is an
-inexhaustible fountain, and where there is so much, much can be taken.'
-And he sent letters to the abbots of the Cistercian houses in England,
-ordering them to forward to him gold embroidery of this kind, 'as though
-they could get it for nothing.' Curiously enough it was supplied to them
-by London merchants[623].
-
-A certain number of pieces of early English embroidery now form part of
-the collection of art-needlework on view at South Kensington. Among them
-is a cope, nine feet seven by four feet eight; it is considered a splendid
-example of the 'opus anglicum,' and as is suggested 'may have been worked
-by the nuns of some convent which stood in or near Coventry[624].' There
-was no nunnery in Coventry in the Middle Ages, the nearest nunnery of
-importance would be the one at Wroxhall. 'This handsome cope,' says Dr
-Rock, 'so very remarkable on account of its comparative perfect
-preservation, is one of the most beautiful among the several liturgic
-vestments of the olden period anywhere to be now found in
-Christendom[625].' It is made of linen entirely covered with embroidery in
-floss silk. The space is divided up into barbed interlacing quatrefoils,
-of which in the present state of the cope there are fifteen. These enclose
-pictures representing Michael overcoming Satan, the Crucifixion, the risen
-Christ, Christ crowned as King, Christ in the garden, the death of the
-Virgin, her burial, and single figures of the apostles which are placed in
-the quatrefoils along the lower edge of the cope. Among them are St
-Philip, St Bartholomew, St Peter and St Andrew. Other pictures of the
-apostles are wanting, for the lower edge in some places is cut away. The
-faces, hands and coloured draperies of these figures are worked in
-coloured floss silk in the way described above, and the background of all
-the quatrefoils is in diaper pattern, worked in short straight stitches in
-a dark green colour. The spaces between the quatrefoils were filled with
-crimson silk which has faded to a rich brown, and in each of these spaces
-stands a winged angel, those nearest Christ standing on a wheel. Their
-faces and draperies are worked in similar style to those of the other
-figures, and the dividing bands which mark off the quatrefoils are worked
-in a variety of stitches; sometimes loose threads are laid on and sewn
-over, sometimes gold thread is worked in. In spite of many colours having
-faded the effect of the work is splendid; no textile fabric of any period
-exceeds it in evenness and finish, to say nothing of beauty of design.
-
-The edge of the cope in one place is mended by cutting and sewing
-together. A band of embroidery which represents a succession of armorial
-bearings worked in small cross-stitch is carried right round it. This band
-is considered to be fifty years later in date than the cope, and is
-somewhat different in style. Its addition suggests that some accident
-happened to the cope, perhaps by fire, and that a piece had to be cut away
-and a new finish given to the edge.
-
-At the time of the dissolution this cope was in the possession of the nuns
-of Sion, a house founded under peculiar circumstances as late as the 15th
-century. Its inmates left England in a body and carried the cope away with
-them in their wanderings. They finally settled at Lisbon, where the house
-continued to be recruited by English women. At the beginning of this
-century they returned to England, and the cope was acquired by the Museum
-authorities.
-
-In looking at this piece of work it is distressing to think of the way in
-which the property of monasteries in England was appropriated, scattered,
-and destroyed at the dissolution. In no European country was the heirloom
-of mediaeval art so uniformly effaced and defaced. The old inventories give
-some idea of the art treasures that had accumulated in monasteries in the
-course of centuries, but very few fragments were saved from the rapacity
-of Henry VIII and his agents.
-
-From England we pass to Germany to consider the remains of decorative work
-done by nuns in various departments of art between the 8th and the 14th
-centuries. Influence from two sides gave a new direction to art-industry;
-on one side was the influence of Roman art due to contact with France; on
-the other the influence of Byzantine art due to intercourse with the East.
-
-A high standard of work was soon attained in France; and at Bourges, early
-in the 7th century, we hear of the abbess Eustadiola making many gifts to
-her settlement, vases of gold and silver ornamented with jewels, crosses,
-candelabra and chalices. 'Also she made holy vestments,' says her
-biographer[626], 'and decked the altar with costly hangings which with her
-own hands and through the help of her women she embellished with
-embroidery and with gold fringes; besides the hangings with which she
-decorated the walls.'
-
-This active interest spread from France into the convents of the Low
-Countries during the 8th century, in one of which the sisters Harlind and
-Reinhild did excellent work, which is highly praised. They were
-contemporaries of Boniface and Willibrord, who visited and consecrated
-them in their settlement at Maaseyck.
-
-There is extant an account, written between 850 and 880, of the education
-they received and the work to which they were devoted[627]. We learn from
-this account that Harlind and Reinhild showed a serious disposition at a
-youthful age, and that their parents were persuaded to send them to the
-religious house for women at Valenciennes on the river Schelde, where, in
-the words of the 9th century writer, 'they were instructed in reading, in
-chanting (modulatione), in singing the psalms and also in what now-a-days
-is deemed wonderful, in writing and in painting (scribendo atque
-pingendo), a task laborious even to men. Likewise they were carefully
-trained in every department of work such as is done by women's hands, in
-various designs, in different styles; so that they attained a high
-standard of excellence in spinning, weaving, designing, sewing, and
-embroidering with gold and jewels on silk[627].'
-
-When their education was finished the girls returned to their parents, but
-they found no scope for their energies at home and decided to devote
-themselves to religion. Their parents agreed to found a settlement for
-them at Maaseyck, where at first they had twelve women with them. But many
-noble as well as freeborn girls placed a black veil on their heads, as the
-biographer says, and came to them hoping to be taken into the settlement.
-
-We hardly need to be told that these gifted sisters abhorred idleness and
-were devoted to work. Their energies were given to weaving, embroidering
-and writing. Among other things they had woven with their own hands short
-curtains, intended no doubt for the altar, which were splendidly
-embroidered with a variety of designs[628]. These, in the words of their
-biographer, 'the holy women embroidered with God and his saints ornate
-with gold and jewels, and left them behind them in their house. The four
-gospels, which contain the words and actions of Jesus Christ our Lord,
-they transcribed with commendable zeal. Likewise a book of psalms, such as
-we call a psalter, they worked (stylo texuerunt), as well as many other
-holy writings, which to this day remain in that same place, and are
-resplendent in new and shining gold, and glowing with jewels, so that the
-work might almost have been done to-day.'
-
-Thus writes the 9th century chronicler. It seems from a remark made by
-Stadler that some of the vestments they made were sent as a present to
-Boniface, and samples of their work, it is not stated of what kind, are
-preserved to this day in the little church of Maaseyck[629].
-
-A previous chapter has dealt with the rapid development of women's houses
-in Saxony in the 10th and 11th centuries. References to the encouragement
-of art in these convents are numerous; they became storehouses of wealth,
-partly through gifts bestowed on them by their abbesses and partly owing
-to the industry of the nuns. The marriage of Otto II with a Greek princess
-brought Greek decorative work into fashion, and workmen came from Greece
-into Germany, where they were patronised by bishops and lady abbesses.
-
-Thus at Essen, one of the great Saxon abbacies for women, the art treasury
-to this day contains the celebrated bronze candelabra made at the command
-of the abbess Mathilde ([Dagger] 1011)[630], and a golden crucifix of
-Greek workmanship of great beauty which, as its inscription says, was the
-gift of the abbess Theofanu (1039-1054)[631]. This abbess was the
-granddaughter of Otto II and his Greek wife, and her appointment to the
-abbacy marks a great advance in the prosperity of the house. The treasury
-at Essen also contains a Bible cover carved in ivory, which represents the
-abbess Theofanu depositing a book at the feet of the Virgin[632].
-
-An account of the great power and wealth of the abbey at Quedlinburg has
-already been given. Its treasury (zither) still contains many interesting
-specimens of early art industry collected in the days of its
-prosperity[633]. The splendid cloak worked with figures from the
-Apocalypse belonging to Otto III was probably made under the direction of
-his aunt Mathilde, abbess of Quedlinburg ([Dagger] 999). Somewhat later we
-hear of another sumptuous cloak which the Empress Kunigund ([Dagger] 1040)
-had made for her husband Heinrich II, and of the wonderful embroidery done
-in gold on purple by Heinrich's sister Gisela ([Dagger] 1037), the wife of
-Stephen, king of Hungary, which seems to have been embroidered in
-imitation of a painting on stuff preserved at a Benedictine convent near
-Raab. To the present day this embroidery forms part of the Hungarian
-coronation robes[634]. It is not directly stated where this work was made,
-but the general excellence of the work done by nuns[635], and the
-connection of Saxon princesses with convents, suggest the possibility that
-the work was done in convents.
-
-One of these Saxon princesses, Hedwig ([Dagger] 994), sister of the abbess
-Gerberg and duchess of Swabia, gave the monks of St Gallen some vestments
-which she had embroidered herself[636]. Among them was a white stole
-(stola) on which were worked in gold a series of pictures representing the
-'Marriage of Philology to Mercury,' a subject taken from a story by
-Martianus Capella, a writer of the 5th century, whose works were much read
-in nunneries. The story was afterwards translated into German by Notker
-([Dagger] 1022), a monk of St Gallen.
-
-A peculiar interest attaches to Agnes, abbess of Quedlinburg (1184-1203).
-She encouraged art industry in all its branches and under her the nuns
-made large curtains for church decoration. Some of these are still in
-existence, and Kugler, the art student, considers them as of great value
-in the study of the art industry of that period. Agnes herself wrote an
-account of the property she bequeathed to the monastery, and in it she
-mentions a golden cup, several silken covers (dorsalia), and
-hangings[637]. Her chronicler credits her with writing and illuminating
-with her own hands books for divine service; and a copy of the gospels,
-said to have been written by her, is still preserved[638]. But the great
-work of her life was the manufacture of wall-hangings, which she and her
-nuns worked together. One set was intended for the Pope, but was never
-forwarded to him. Like the vestments made by Hedwig, the subject taken for
-them was the 'Marriage of Philology to Mercury.'
-
-One curtain still exists measuring twenty-four feet by twenty; it is of a
-coarse woollen material, into which large figures are woven, which Kugler
-thinks must have been designed by two different hands. 'While some of the
-work,' he says[639], 'is in no way superior to other pictorial
-representations of the time, and only here and there in details shows
-superior skill, other parts though retaining the peculiar style of
-Byzantine art, show a grace and dignity in the arrangement of the figures,
-and a perfection in the drawing of drapery, which in works of such an
-early period arouse admiration in the beholder.' In his handbook on
-painting Kugler further says that we probably have in them the nearest
-approach of the art of the time to full perfection.
-
-In describing the curtain he tells us of a manly bearded figure with
-raised hand, probably intended for the writer Martianus himself; near him
-stands Mercury half covered by a well-draped toga, a very youthful figure
-in accordance with the author's description. These and other figures hold
-scrolls on which their names are woven, but owing to the worn state of the
-hanging some of the names are gone and some are illegible. Three female
-figures are designated as 'Manticen,'--whom Mercury would have married had
-she not preferred Apollo; 'Sichem,'--a name standing for Psyche, whom
-Cupid had already enticed away according to Martianus; and 'Sophia,'--whom
-Mercury likewise desired to marry but in vain. All these figures are
-described by Kugler as splendid, especially that of 'Sichem' whose pose
-and drapery he pronounces most beautiful.
-
-A crowned figure of a man comes next, with a scroll bearing the words
-'happy in wealth' (qua felix copia talis), whom Kugler supposes to be
-Hymenaeus, and a man and woman joining hands, who are designated as
-Mercury and Philology. Similar allegorical figures fill the other parts of
-the curtain. In Kugler's estimation the figures of 'Prudentia' and
-'Fortitudo' are strikingly grand; while others, 'Justitia,' 'Temperantia,'
-and 'Philologia' with her mother 'Pronesis,' are of inferior design.
-
-There is another set of hangings preserved at Halberstadt, which, if the
-remark of an early chronicler may be believed, was also the work of the
-abbess Agnes and her nuns[640]. Kugler however, apparently unacquainted
-with this statement, places these hangings at a somewhat earlier date,
-since they are of less finished workmanship, but he admits that 'in spite
-of their faded colours and their roughness of design, a certain severe
-dignity cannot be denied to these figures which with wide-open eyes stare
-at the beholder[641].'
-
-We have a description of these curtains from Buesching, who travelled in
-quest of monastic treasures in the beginning of this century[642]. They
-measure three-and-a-half by fifteen feet. On the centre piece a king
-(God?) is represented on a throne, with one hand raised, the other holding
-a sceptre; Cato and Seneca, each bearing a written scroll, sit on either
-side. Next to them come six apostles, sitting two and two under a canopy,
-each bearing a scroll with his name--another instance of how readily art
-in the 12th century grouped together figures of Christian and classical
-origin, where it was an object to unite the conceptions of religion and
-philosophy; then Christ, pictured under a rainbow arch, which is supported
-by angels. On Christ's further side come the other six apostles similarly
-arranged, and then follow scenes illustrating Old Testament history, such
-as Jacob's dream; Abraham visited by angels; the sacrifice of Isaac;--in
-these scenes the figures are comparatively small and of inferior design to
-the larger ones. Judging from Buesching's description, the style of the
-tapestry is the same as that of the manuscript illustrations of the time.
-The background is uniformly of one colour, and the contours of the figures
-and their draperies are in thick brown outline, the intervening spaces
-being filled with different colours. Kugler compares the pictorial effect
-of these hangings with that of the miniatures contemporaneously painted in
-the abbey of Hohenburg under the abbess Herrad, of whose work we shall
-speak presently. They recall the dignified and somewhat sombre character
-of Byzantine art.
-
-There is plenty of information from the Continent to show that nuns
-belonging to houses of different religious orders were equally industrious
-at the loom and with the needle.
-
-Thus at Goess, formerly a Benedictine nunnery near Loeben in Steier, the
-church still treasures a complete set of vestments, 'ornatus integer,'
-worked by the nuns between 1275 and 1300 during the rule of 'abbatissa
-Chunegundis.' Bock describes them as most curious and beautiful, worked on
-linen with coloured silks in a design of fantastic animals and
-flowers[643].
-
-Again at Wienhausen near Celle several ancient wall-hangings are preserved
-which were woven by the nuns of the Cistercian settlement there, and show
-their industry and skill, and the readiness with which secular subjects
-were treated in the convent. On one which dates from the 14th century the
-story of Tristan and Isold is represented; on another hunting scenes; and
-on a third the figures of the prophets[644].
-
-At Heiningen near Wolfenbuettel, a house of Austin nuns, the inmates wove
-hangings with allegorical figures which are still in existence. At Luene,
-Wende, Erfurt and at the Cistercian house of Ebsdorf wall-hangings were
-made which are still preserved, and show the ability of the nuns who
-worked at the loom between the 13th and 15th centuries[645]. We are
-indebted to Bock for a comprehensive treatise on church decoration and
-vestments. He also made a large collection of specimens of such work, but
-it has apparently been scattered. Some part of it has been acquired by the
-authorities at the South Kensington Museum where it is at present on view.
-
-From these examples of art-needlework and tapestry, we must turn to the
-art of writing and decorating books. We hear of a woman calligraphist in
-connection with one of the ancient monasteries in Bavaria, the fame of
-whose industry was carried on through centuries[646]. The monastery of
-Wessobrunn had been founded in the 8th century; it included a community of
-nuns as well as of monks, the dwelling allotted to the nuns being spoken
-of as the Parthenon, a term sometimes applied to a religious house for
-women in these districts. In the words of the monkish historian who wrote
-about 1513: 'the dwellings of the monks were where they are now, but those
-of the nuns where the parish church now stands.' Here between the years
-1057 and 1130 Diemud the nun was active as a scribe, the amount of whose
-work in the estimation of many 'exceeded what could be done by several
-men.' She had become a professed nun at an early age and 'was most skilful
-in the art of writing; for while she is not known to have composed any
-work of her own, yet she wrote with her own hand many volumes in a most
-beautiful and legible character both for divine service and for the
-library of the monastery, which volumes are enumerated in a list written
-by herself in a certain _plenarius_.' This list which is extant includes
-works to the number of forty-five, which were highly prized during the
-nun's lifetime and had a considerable market value. We find in the list 'a
-Missal with Gradual and Sequences' given to the bishop of Trier, and a
-'book of Offices with the Baptismal Service,' given to the bishop of
-Augsburg. A 'bibliotheca,' that is, a Bible, in two volumes, written by
-Diemud, was given by the monastery of Wessobrunn in exchange for an estate
-at Peissenburg. Besides these works the list mentions another Bible in
-three volumes, books containing the gospels and lessons, writings of
-Gregory and Augustine, and the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius. In
-course of time these books were scattered, lists of those which remained
-at Wessobrunn being made from time to time. At the sequestration of the
-monastery at the beginning of the 19th century only fifteen volumes
-written by Diemud remained, which were taken to Munich. They are said to
-be of rare beauty, distinguished by highly ornate initial letters and by
-small writing which is most elegant[647]. An example of this writing was
-reproduced by Hefner in the hope that it might lead to the identification
-of other books written by Diemud which may have found their way into other
-libraries and be still in existence.
-
-Contemporaneously with Diemud we find another Bavarian nun, Leukardis,
-active as a scribe at Mallersdorf; she is said to have been of Scottish
-origin and she knew Scotch (or Irish?), Greek, Latin, and German, and did
-so much good work that the monk Laiupold, who was also devoted to writing,
-established an anniversary in her memory[648].
-
-The nuns of Admunt in Bavaria are also spoken of as devoted to
-transcribing, and Wattenbach comments on the neat and elegant way in which
-they mended the parchment leaves of their manuscripts with coloured silken
-thread[649].
-
-Again a manuscript written for Marbach about the year 1149 by Gutta von
-Schwarzenthan is described as splendid. It contains the martyrology of
-Usuard, the Rule of St Augustine with the comments of Hugo of St Victor,
-the constitutions of Marbach and a homily for every day in the year[650].
-We hear of Emo, abbot of Wittewierum (1204-34), a Premonstrant house which
-contained men and women, that 'not only did he zealously encourage his
-canons (clericis) to write, acting as their instructor, but taking count
-of the diligence of the female sex he set women who were clever at writing
-to practise the art assiduously[651].' Wattenbach considers that nuns
-were especially clever in copying books for choir use, and in decorating
-them.
-
-These notices must suffice. They prove that women leading cloistered lives
-took an active interest in art-industry in all its branches and that
-productiveness in their houses was controlled by the same causes which led
-to the development and decay of art-industry in the houses of men.
-Excellent work was done in Benedictine houses during early Christian
-times, that is between the 8th and the 11th centuries; the revival of
-monastic life in the Middle Ages gave a new impulse to art-industry and
-the highest degree of excellence was reached in the first half of the 14th
-century. After that there are signs of a steadily accelerated decline. The
-reason of this, as a later chapter will show, lies chiefly in the changed
-conditions of life outside the convent, which made it easier for artisans
-in the townships to practise those arts and crafts which had hitherto been
-practised in religious settlements. Writing, decorating, and
-book-binding[652], as well as weaving and embroidering[653], were taken up
-by secular workers and were practised by them on a far larger scale; the
-spread of education in lay circles and the greater luxury in home
-surroundings having created a new taste and a new market for artistic
-productions. The taste of this wider public naturally influenced the
-character of the work which was produced; cheapness and splendour, if
-possible the combination of the two, were the qualities chiefly aimed at.
-These are valuable qualities no doubt in their way, but insistence on them
-had a discouraging effect on the productiveness of the convent. During the
-14th and 15th centuries convents gave up their artistic pursuits. The
-self-denying industry and unobtrusive earnestness which set the stamp of
-excellence on the productions of the old hand-worker were no more, for the
-spirit which looked upon the production of things beautiful as a matter of
-religion had died out.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Herrad and the 'Garden of Delights.'
-
-A work produced at Hohenburg, a nunnery in Elsass, in the 12th century
-confirms the belief that given favourable conditions it is possible for
-women to produce good work and to help to accumulate knowledge. Herrad,
-the abbess of this house, conceived the idea of compiling for the use of
-her nuns an encyclopaedic work which should embody, in pictures and in
-words, the knowledge of her age. The importance of this work has long
-survived the attainment of its original purpose, for with its hundreds of
-illustrations and its copious text it has afforded a wealth of information
-on the customs, manners, conceptions and mode of life of the 12th century,
-to which many students of archaeology, art and philology have gone for
-instruction and for the illustration of their own books. 'Few illuminated
-manuscripts had acquired a fame so well deserved as the "Garden of
-Delights," the _Hortus Deliciarum_, of Herrad,' says the editor of the
-great collection of reproductions of the pictures which illustrated her
-work[654]. For the work itself is no more. The MS. was destroyed in the
-fire which broke out in the library of Strasburg when that city was
-bombarded by the Germans in 1870, and with it perished a complete copy of
-the text. Our knowledge of the work is therefore limited to the remarks of
-those who had studied it and to those portions of it which had been copied
-or transcribed previous to its destruction. The 'Society for the
-Preservation of the Monuments of Elsass' is at present collecting and
-publishing a reproduction of all existing tracings and copies of the
-pictures or of parts of them, and this collection already numbers nearly
-two hundred. They are mere fragments of course of the work itself, and yet
-they are of the highest interest. For Herrad's 'Garden of Delights' with
-its apt illustrations gave a complete picture of life in its domestic and
-out-of-door aspects as it presented itself in the 12th century. It showed
-what conceptions and ideas were then attractive to nuns and their
-estimation of knowledge, and it has given greater insight than any other
-production into the talents, the enthusiasm and the industry which were
-found at this period in a nunnery.
-
-The religious settlement at Hohenburg[655] was an ancient foundation
-situated on the flat summit of a spur of the Vosges mountains, which here
-rise abruptly to a height of over two thousand five hundred feet from the
-wide expanse of the valley of the Rhine below. The wooded heights on
-either side of the Rhine were the favourite haunts of missionaries in
-early times, who settled there and appropriated sites in close proximity
-to the castles or strongholds of the landed gentry. At one time there were
-as many as sixty religious settlements in the Rhine valley between Basel
-and Mainz and over a hundred castles or burgs. The nunnery of Hohenburg
-was of high rank among these religious settlements owing to its extensive
-property and to its commanding situation. The summit of the hill was
-surrounded by an ancient wall dating from pre-Christian times which is
-still known as the heathen wall; it enclosed a wide clearance of fields
-and meadows, and the numerous buildings of the convent settlement. This
-height was the goal of numerous pilgrimages and had various associations
-dating from heathen times. It is at the present day a favourite health
-resort on account of its aspect and romantic surroundings.
-
-From historical information recently collected by Roth[656] we gather that
-a religious settlement of women existed on the Hohenburg as early as the
-9th century. Judith, the wife of Ludwig the Pious ([Dagger] 1840), took
-some interest in it. Legendary lore has spun many webs about the religious
-settlements in the Rhine district including that of Hohenburg, and the
-majority of modern historians have taken no trouble to unravel them.
-Legend[657] tells us that a holy maiden St Odilia fled from the
-persecution of a cruel father and came to the Hohenburg, where she settled
-and gathered many women about her. Various stories more or less fanciful
-are told of her. She was cured of blindness and baptized by Archbishop
-Hildulf of Trier and Bishop Erhard of Regensburg--who are unknown to
-history; she was carried down the river in a chest and educated at the
-convent of Beaume or Palma; and she has been given as a relative to St
-Leodgar bishop of Autun ([Dagger] 678) and as a daughter to Eticho duke of
-the Allemanni. Besides these stories we find the name Odilia locally
-associated with a cave, a well, three linden-trees and a stone of peculiar
-shape which are obviously heathen survivals, and encourage the view that
-Odilia is the representative of some pre-Christian divinity. Roth has
-shown that the name Odilia is nowhere on record in these districts before
-the 10th century, and it occurs in connection with Hohenburg only in the
-11th century, that is three or four hundred years after the saint's
-reputed foundation of the house. When Pope Leo IX (1048-1054), who was an
-Alsatian, visited his home he was presented with a rhymed 'responsarium'
-on the local saints of the district. Among them was Odilia, who at that
-time was directly associated with the nunnery. A hundred years later when
-the convent was better known through the influence and activity of its
-abbesses Relind and Herrad, St Odilia was looked upon as the daughter of
-Duke Eticho and the founder of the house--this will be shown from pictures
-preserved in Herrad's work. But evidently this abbess had no knowledge of
-the saint's blindness and sufferings, nor of her connection with St
-Leodgar and other prelates, which are all described in her legend written
-another hundred years later.
-
-In the year 1154 Relind[658], abbess of Berg, a nunnery near Neuburg on
-the Danube, was appointed abbess at Hohenburg in accordance with the wish,
-it is said, of the emperor Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190). Her influence
-was most beneficial; many daughters of the surrounding gentry came to
-study under her, and among them Herrad of the family of Landsperg. The
-term nun must be applied to these women with a reservation; some writers
-speak of them as Austin canonesses on account of the liberties they
-enjoyed. In Herrad's 'Garden' the picture of her nuns represents them
-wearing clothes that differ little from those worn by women in other walks
-of life. Their dresses are of different colours, their cloaks are
-generally brown, and their veils are always brilliantly coloured, some
-red, some purple[659]. The only detail of dress which they have in common
-is a white turban or head-dress, over which the veil is thrown. They wear
-no wimples. The establishment of the house under Herrad's rule consisted
-of forty-seven nuns and thirteen novices (or lay sisters?) who are
-represented as wearing clothes similar to those of the nuns.
-
-Herrad's admission to the house furthered its prosperity in every way, for
-besides literary and artistic abilities she had considerable powers of
-management. She succeeded Relind as abbess in 1167, and in 1181 she
-founded a settlement of Austin canons at Truttenhausen, and later another
-at St Gorgon, both of which are situated not far below the summit of the
-hill. The canons of these settlements took it in turn to read mass in the
-women's chapel. Roth speaks of other improvements which Herrad carried out
-with the help of her diocesan, the bishop of Strasburg.
-
-The consecration of a church at Niedermuenster, situated below the
-Hohenburg, also falls within the term of Herrad's rule. A second nunnery
-was founded there as a dependency, which was separated from the parent
-house probably during Herrad's lifetime, owing to the efforts of the
-abbess Edelind (1195-1200), who according to Gerard was also of the family
-of Landsperg[660]. The claim of this abbess to the attention of posterity
-rests on her having been the possessor of a still extant chased case
-several feet high, which she had made to hold a fragment of the Holy Cross
-which a camel was alleged to have brought to Niedermuenster of its own
-accord in the time of Karl the Great. This case is covered with many
-figures worked in relief and is praised by art students as a curious
-example of early metal work[661].
-
-The history of Hohenburg and Niedermuenster in the sequel offers much that
-is interesting. For while the nuns at Niedermuenster accepted the rule of
-St Benedict, the nuns on the Hohenburg persisted in their independent
-course. At Niedermuenster a stone monument is still to be seen which
-experts declare to be 13th century work, and which gives a clue to the
-association of St Odilia with Leodgar, to whom the church at Niedermuenster
-was dedicated. Three sides of this monument are covered with figures. On
-one stands St Leodgar; on the next St Odilia with long tresses, and Duke
-Eticho; on the third the Virgin, also with long tresses, and below her the
-abbesses Relind and Herrad holding a book. Both these abbesses are
-designated by name, and wear convent garb and wimples utterly different
-from the clothes worn by them in the pictures of Herrad's book[662].
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the great work of Herrad's life, to
-which she herself gave the title of the 'Garden of Delights.' It consisted
-of 324 parchment leaves of folio size, which contained an account of the
-history of the world founded on the Biblical narrative, with many
-digressions into the realm of philosophy, moral speculation, and
-contemporary knowledge--and with numerous pictures in illustration of it.
-
-The book was so arranged that the pictures stood alongside of the text;
-and the pages of the work which were devoted to illustrations were in most
-cases divided into three sections by lines across, so that the pictures
-stood one above the other. The figures in each picture were about four
-inches high. There were, however, a certain number of full-page
-illustrations with larger figures, and it is among these that the greatest
-proofs are given of Herrad's imaginative powers and the range of her
-intellectual abilities.
-
-Engelhardt, to whom we are indebted for the fullest description of the
-'Garden of Delights,' made tracings of a number of pictures and copied
-their colouring[663]. He comments on the brilliant smoothness and finish
-of the original miniature paintings. Only the silver, he says, was
-tarnished; the gold was undimmed and all the colours preserved their full
-brilliancy, when he had the work before him in the early part of this
-century. According to him the method of painting was as follows. First the
-figures were drawn in dark outline, then the colouring was filled in bit
-by bit; shadows and high lights were next laid on, and then the dark
-outlines were again gone over.
-
-The question has naturally arisen whether Herrad did the whole of the work
-herself. The text which stood at the beginning and at the end of it
-referred to her as its sole author. Students are generally agreed that the
-outline drawing and the writing were entirely her work, but the colours
-may or may not have been laid on by her. For the work was wonderfully
-complete in plan and execution--the conception of one mind, which laboured
-with unceasing perseverance to realize the conception it had formed.
-
-The style in which the pictures were drawn has likewise been the occasion
-of much comment. We are here on the border-land between the conventional
-Byzantine and the realistic Gothic styles. 'We see very clearly,' says
-Woltman[664], 'how the new ideas which scholastic learning and poetry had
-generated required new modes of expression, and led to conceptions for
-which the older art yielded no models and which had to be taken from real
-life.' In most cases Herrad no doubt had a model before her and adhered to
-the traditional rendering, but where the model was wanting she may have
-drawn on her powers of imagination and supplied details from her
-surroundings. Thus incidents of Biblical history are represented by her in
-a manner familiar to the student of early Christian art. A grave and
-serious dignity which recalls the wall mosaics at Ravenna characterizes
-the figures of God, Christ, Mary, and the angels; Engelhardt has pointed
-out the close similarity of Herrad's picture of the Annunciation to that
-contained in a Greek MS. of the 9th century[665]. But in other cases
-Herrad either composed herself or else drew from models which were nearer
-to her in time and place. Thus the picture of the sun-god Apollo
-represents him in a heavy mediaeval cart drawn by four horses, and the men
-and women in many pictures are dressed in the fashion of the time. The
-pictures drawn from real life especially delight the archaeological
-student. A water-mill grinding corn, men at the plough, soldiers on the
-march and fighting, are drawn with minute exactness and with considerable
-skill. Some of these scenes are powerfully realistic in spite of a certain
-awkwardness in the figures; for example, that of a traveller who is
-waylaid by robbers, coupled with the story of the good Samaritan, which is
-illustrated by a series of pictures. In the first of these a man is
-depicted lying by the roadside; in the second we see him on a horse which
-is led by the Samaritan, and in the third he has arrived at the inn and is
-being lifted down from the horse.
-
-Herrad executed her work between 1160 and 1170, but additional entries
-were made as late as 1190. This period falls in the reign of the emperor
-Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190), which followed upon that of the luckless
-Konrad III, and was one of comparative quiet and prosperity in Germany.
-The power of the Pope had passed its climax, there was schism in the
-Papacy, which was greatly aggravated by the line of conduct Friedrich
-adopted, but the scene of their struggle had shifted to the cities of
-northern Italy. We shall see later on that political changes were watched
-with much interest in some nunneries, and that the conduct of the Emperor,
-the Pope, and the bishops was keenly criticised among nuns. It is
-difficult to tell how far events affected Herrad. The prose narrative
-which her work contained, as far as we know, has perished and we have no
-definite clue to her interpretation of contemporary affairs, but probably
-she was content to devote her energies to rearranging and interpreting the
-intellectual wealth of the age without entering into party conflicts. The
-illustrations of the 'Garden of Delights' which have been preserved are
-invaluable for the study of contemporary life, but they contain no
-information as to contemporary events.
-
-The study and enjoyment of the work in its original form were facilitated
-by the addition to the picture of the name of every person and every
-implement in Latin or in German, sometimes in both; and in many cases an
-explanatory sentence or a moral maxim was introduced into the picture, so
-that the nun who studied the work naturally picked up Latin words and
-sentences. Through the industry of Engelhardt all these sentences and
-words have been preserved, and the coupling of implements with their
-names forms a valuable addition to our knowledge of terms as applied in
-early mediaeval times. The book also originally contained a continuous
-history in Latin for more advanced students, but unfortunately that is
-lost. Engelhardt says that it described the history of the world from the
-Creation to the coming of Antichrist, with many extracts from various
-writers. He enumerates twenty writers from whose works Herrad quotes.
-Among them are Eusebius Pamphili ([Dagger] c. 350), Jerome ([Dagger] 420),
-Isidor of Seville ([Dagger] 636), Bede ([Dagger] 735), Frechulf ([Dagger]
-838), and others who were her contemporaries, such as Petrus Lombardus
-([Dagger] 1164) and Petrus Comestor ([Dagger] 1198). When quoting from
-secular writers the abbess invariably made mention of the fact. In one
-instance she remarked that 'all these things have been described by
-philosophers by aid of their worldly wisdom (per mundanam sapientiam), but
-this was the product of the Holy Spirit also.'
-
-The attitude which Herrad assumed towards learning generally can be
-studied in the pictures which deal with abstract conceptions. They are
-usually of folio size and contain illustrations which are instructive to
-the student of mediaeval scholasticism. Two pictures introduced into the
-history of the Tower of Babel which illustrate the falling away from true
-faith deserve especial attention. The one is a representation of the 'Nine
-Muses'; on it female heads of quaint dignity in medallions are arranged in
-a circle. The other represents the 'Seven Liberal Arts,' in accordance
-with the mediaeval interpretation of the teaching of Aristotle[666]. On it
-Philosophy, a female figure, is seated in the centre of the picture
-wearing a crown with three heads. These heads are designated as 'ethica,
-logica, phisica'; by means of these three branches of learning philosophy
-adds to her powers of insight. Socrates and Plato, who are designated as
-'philosophers,' sit below, and from the figure of Philosophy 'seven
-streams of wisdom flow which are turned into liberal arts' as the text
-explains. These arts are personified as female figures in 12th century
-dress, and are so arranged that each figure stands in a separate division
-forming a circle round Philosophy and the philosophers. The Liberal Arts
-are robed in different colours, and each holds an emblem of her power.
-'Grammar,' dressed in dark red, has a book and a birch rod; 'Geometry,' in
-light red, has a measuring rod and a compass; 'Arithmetic,' in light blue,
-holds a string of alternate white and black beads; 'Music,' dressed in
-purple, has a lyre, a zither and a hurdy-gurdy; 'Astronomy,' in dark
-green, holds a measure and looks up at the stars; 'Rhetoric,' in dark
-blue, has a stilus and a writing-tablet (tabula); and 'Dialectic,' in
-light green, holds the head of a howling dog. Each figure is encircled by
-a sentence explaining the special nature of her power. In the lower part
-of the picture are four men, seated at desks, with books, pens and
-penknives, engaged in reading and writing. These are the 'poets or magi,
-who are filled with a worldly spirit'; black birds appear to be whispering
-in their ears.
-
-The whole of this picture is doubtless traditional; its admission into the
-work shows that Herrad's conception of 'profane' learning was one of
-distinct appreciation. The idea conveyed by means of the pictures to the
-young women students was by no means superficial or derogatory to
-learning. On the contrary, we see them under the influence of a teacher
-through whom their respectful attitude towards the means and modes of
-knowledge was assured.
-
-Another picture of folio size, called 'The Ladder to Perfection,' shows
-that Herrad accepted a critical attitude towards the members of religion.
-A ladder is drawn diagonally across the page and a number of figures are
-seen ascending it on their way towards heaven. The highest rung has been
-reached by Christian love (Caritas) personified as a woman to whom a crown
-is proffered from heaven. Below her stand the representatives of different
-branches of the religious profession and laymen arranged in order of
-excellence, and with each is given a picture of the temptation which
-prevents him from ascending further up the ladder. Among these the hermit
-(heremita) stands highest, but he is held back by the charms of his
-garden. Below him stands the recluse (inclusus), whose temptation is
-slothfulness, which is represented by a bed. Then comes the monk
-(monachus), who leans towards a mass of gold; 'he is typical of all false
-monks,' says Herrad, 'whose heart is drawn from duties by the sight of
-money, and who cannot rise above greed.' The nun (sanctimonialis) and the
-cleric (clericus) have reached the same rung on the ladder. She is the
-representative of false nuns who yield to the temptation of persuasion and
-gifts, and return to their parents, never attaining the crown of life; he
-is drawn away by the allurements of the table, and by a woman (amica) who
-stands below. There are also figures of a lay woman and a soldier who are
-respectively attracted by the charms of a city and of war. They are
-absorbed by vanities, and we are told 'rarely reach the crown of life
-through contemplation.' The picture is further crowded with demons who are
-attacking and angels who are defending the people on the ladder. The devil
-lurks below in the form of a dragon ready to seize upon those who fall.
-
-In further illustration of Herrad's attitude towards the clergy,
-Engelhardt cites a passage from her work in which she severely censures
-the customs which the clergy tolerate in church on festal days. In company
-with laymen and loose women they eat and drink, and indulge in jokes and
-games which invariably end in uproariousness. 'How worthy of praise,' she
-exclaims, 'if the spiritual princes of the Church (principes ecclesiae
-spirituales) restored the evangelical teaching of early times in the place
-of such customs[667].'
-
-From these general remarks we turn to the pictures which illustrate the
-Biblical narrative in a number of scenes containing a store of imagery and
-a wealth of design. We cannot but admire the ready brush of the abbess and
-the courage with which she grappled with difficulties, drawing with equal
-skill human figures and divine personifications, dramatic incidents and
-allegorical combinations.
-
-The pictures which illustrated the Creation were led up to by a number of
-diagrams and digressions on astronomy and geography, with lists of
-technical terms in Latin and their German equivalents. Among these was a
-picture of the signs of the zodiac and a 'computus' or table for
-determining the festal days of the year. The desire to fix the date of
-incidents of Old and New Testament history absorbed much attention at this
-period, and Herrad's table of computation was looked upon as so important
-that it was recently used by Piper as the starting-point for an
-investigation on the Calendar generally[668]. In Herrad's table the date
-of Easter was worked out for a cycle of 532 years, that is from 1175 till
-1706; leap-years were marked, and the day of the week on which Christmas
-fell was given for the whole period.
-
-The history of the Biblical narrative opens with a picture illustrating
-the creation of the animals. The lion, the elephant, the unicorn and the
-giraffe are most fantastic, but the ox, the ass, the horse, the domestic
-fowl, the sylvan animals of northern latitudes, and fish, are drawn with
-tolerable correctness. God is represented in classical robes moving slowly
-across a wave of the waters. In another picture He is depicted in a
-simpler manner seated and fashioning the small figure of Adam, which He
-holds between His knees. Again He is seen breathing life into Adam's
-nostrils, and then holding in His hand a rib out of which projects the
-head of Eve, while Adam is lying asleep on the ground. There is a series
-of pictures illustrating the temptation and expulsion from Paradise. A
-full-sized one gives the Tree of Life, which has many ramifications out of
-which human faces are peeping. Adam and Eve are throughout pictured as of
-the same height and are several times drawn in the nude. There is a very
-graceful picture in which Adam is seen delving while Eve spins.
-
-Poems on the First Man and on the Fall accompanied by musical notation are
-here introduced. The poems are preserved, the music is apparently lost; it
-is not stated whether Herrad wrote the music herself.
-
-The story of Noah and his sleeping in the vineyard, and the building of
-the Tower of Babel, are illustrated by scenes details of which are
-presumably drawn from real life. Here we see wooden vats and buckets, the
-various implements used in the vintage, pictures of masons at work dressed
-in short kirtles, and the various implements and arrangements for
-building.
-
-After the pictures on secular learning above referred to the thread of
-Biblical narrative is resumed, and there are many scenes from the lives of
-the patriarchs, such as Jacob giving his blessing, a picture of Jacob's
-dream, Pharaoh seated on his throne with sumptuous surroundings, and the
-passage over the Red Sea, in which the soldiers are clad in chain-mail and
-march with standards borne aloft. Soldiers similarly accoutred are drawn
-in one picture fighting under the leadership of Joshua; in another picture
-they are seen attacking a city, a scene taken from the story of the
-assault of Dan. The adoration of the golden calf gave occasion for a
-picture which also illustrates contemporary manners. Men and women dressed
-in the costume of the day are seen joining hands in a ring and dancing
-round the idol. We also have pictures of the Holy Ark and of the
-Tabernacle; the seven-branched candlestick is most elaborately drawn, and
-the twelve tribes of Israel are grouped in medallions around it.
-
-The next remarkable picture is the burial of Moses. In a solitary rocky
-surrounding God lays the patriarch in his grave, while a demon holds him
-by the legs and is pushed away by an angel. The demon was obviously a
-living reality to Herrad, and he frequently appears in her pictures with
-his wide mouth, long nose, pointed ears and green-coloured body, a figure
-grotesque rather than terrible. When the moment of death is represented he
-invariably puts in an appearance and claims the soul, which in one case
-escapes from the dying person's mouth in the shape of a small black demon.
-In another picture the soul is wrapped in swaddling clothes and is borne
-aloft by angels. This was a pre-Christian conception, that life is a small
-living thing which dwells inside a human being and escapes at death. On
-classic soil one comes across escaping life represented as a babe; in
-German folk-lore it is often a mouse or a toad.
-
-The story of Goliath and of David is also illustrated. David is a
-diminutive figure wearing a kirtle, Goliath is huge and clad in
-chain-mail. Another picture represents David playing on the harp. There
-were also a number of scenes from the books of Kings, of Job, and of
-Tobit; none of these have as yet been reproduced. A picture of the
-prophets has, however, been published, in which a number of figures of
-different ages are depicted in different attitudes standing side by side.
-One of the most curious and dramatic pictures is the full-page
-illustration of Jonah being cast up by the fish. The fish is a carp of
-huge size, but it is designated as a whale.
-
-The New Testament pictures follow on the Old Testament, but between them
-stand several which illustrate their unity. One is an allegorical figure
-with two heads, the one the head of Moses, the other that of Christ. There
-is also a picture in folio size of the mystic family of Christ. At the
-bottom is Abraham, who holds the mystic vine which grows upwards and
-divides into beautiful twisted ramifications forming circles, and in these
-are arranged the heads of patriarchs, kings, and groups of other members
-of Christ's family. A picture of Leviathan is extremely curious. He is
-depicted floating below. God stands above with a rod and line, and uses
-the cross as a fish-hook, dragging out of the huge creature's mouth the
-heads of the prophets which are strung together in a row.
-
-The history of Christ was led up to by an account of the birth of John the
-Baptist. The Nativity was celebrated by several poems, the words of which
-have come down to us; the music which accompanied them is apparently lost.
-Among the most realistic pictures preserved is that of the 'Murder of the
-Innocents'; agony is characteristically expressed in the attitude and
-faces of the mothers who watch the soldiers fulfilling their task.
-
-Other pictures, copies of which have been preserved, illustrate the
-arrival of the three kings and Christ's baptism. In this latter picture
-the Jordan is personified as a river-god sitting in the water; the doors
-of heaven above are wide open and a dove drawn in the accepted style is
-descending. Christ's parables gave the abbess many occasions for depicting
-scenes taken from real life, many of which in their simplicity are truly
-delightful. Biblical stories were supplemented by incidents taken from
-legendary history, which were likewise accompanied by pictures, few of
-which seem to have been preserved. The story of the healing power of the
-statue of Christ, the legend of the Vernacle, and the story of the True
-Cross were all illustrated. There was Adam planting the Tree of Life, King
-Solomon fetching its wood to Jerusalem and making a bridge over the river
-with it, and the Queen of Sheba coming on a visit and hesitating to cross
-the bridge.
-
-The pictures of the story of the Agony, the Resurrection, and the Acts of
-the Apostles met with great praise from all who saw them. There were
-folio-sized pictures setting forth the Universality of the Church, and the
-Contending of Virtues and Vices[669]. Of this latter series several
-pictures have just appeared in reproduction; some are arranged in pairs,
-facing each other. The chief Vices, each with a band of attendants, are
-depicted confronting and then overcome by the chief Virtues; all are
-represented as women. Thus Pride, 'Superbia,' seated on horseback on a
-lion's skin and brandishing a spear, is leading a band of women, who are
-clad in chain-mail with robes flowing about their feet and carrying
-spears, against a band of Virtues similarly attired but carrying swords. A
-most interesting picture is that of Luxury, 'Luxuria,' who is seen with
-fourteen attendant Vices riding in a sumptuous four-wheeled car; Luxury is
-in front throwing violets. She is confronted by a band of Virtues led by
-Temperance, 'Temperantia,' who are in front of the horses and hold up
-their hands in reprobation. On the next picture the car of Luxury is
-smashed, the horses are overturned, and she herself is under the wheels.
-Of her attendants 'Voluptas' has cast aside her rings and ornaments and is
-caught in a briar-bush, 'Amor' has thrown away bow and quiver, and
-'Avaritia' is seizing upon what the others have dropped. On another
-picture Liberality, 'Largitas,' has stripped Rapine and Avarice, and has
-transfixed Avarice with a spear.
-
-Some of the pictures which illustrate Solomon in his glory and Solomon's
-Vanity of Vanities have also been preserved. Among them is Solomon lying
-on a sumptuous couch and surrounded by his warriors. A representation of
-two mannikins occurs among the Vanities; these mannikins were moved by
-threads, exactly like a modern toy. The pictures illustrating the
-experiences of the Church, the position of her members from Pope to
-cleric, the means of repentance, and the coming of Antichrist, all roused
-the enthusiasm of those who saw them; none of these have till now been
-reproduced. Gerard, who was probably the last to see and handle the work
-of Herrad, was especially struck by the pictures of the Last Judgment and
-of Heaven and Hell. His descriptions of them were lying in the library at
-the time of the bombardment, and were only rescued by the devotion of a
-friend[670]. On the strength of these pictures he numbers Herrad among the
-most imaginative painters the world has known. Engelhardt also was greatly
-struck by them. He describes a picture of Hell in the following terms (p.
-51):
-
-'A mass of rocks was arranged so as to make a framework to this picture,
-in the chasms of which rocks flames were flaring and the condemned were
-seen suffering torments. Rivers of flame divided the inner part of the
-picture into four divisions. In the lowest of these, at the bottom of
-Hell, sat Lucifer or Satan in chains holding Antichrist in his lap. Next
-to him a demon carried along a covetous monk, whose punishment was then
-represented: he lay on his back without clothes and a demon poured molten
-gold into his mouth. In the second division counting from below two
-boiling caldrons hung suspended: in the one were Jews, in the other
-soldiers (the text says 'milites vel armati'). Demons stood by holding men
-of either kind ready to add them to those already in the caldrons; other
-demons were stirring the caldrons with forks. In front of the Jews'
-caldron a demon was depicted holding a naked sinner to whom he
-administered punishment by beating him. In the division above this a
-usurer had hot gold poured into his hand; a slanderer was made to lick a
-toad; an eaves-dropper had his ears pinched; a vain woman was assisted at
-her toilet by demons (they seemed to be lacing her); the woman who had
-murdered her child was forced to devour it. The following peculiar picture
-filled the highest division: a rope was drawn through chasms in the rocks
-so as to form a swing; on this a grinning demon sat swinging. At the ends
-of the rope which hung on the other side of the rocks two sinners were
-hanging bound head and foot so as to balance each other; demons held them
-by the hair. Another sinner hung suspended by his feet, with a block of
-stone hanging from his neck on which a demon was swinging. Sensual
-pleasures personified were wound around and bitten by snakes, and a man
-who had committed suicide was depicted plunging a knife into his own
-body.'
-
-These pictures illustrated with forcible directness conceptions which were
-current throughout the religious world and served as a means of teaching
-the lesson of reward and punishment in the world to come. Later on in
-treating of mysticism we shall again see these conceptions stimulating the
-imaginative powers of women living in convents.
-
-Copies of the last pages of the 'Garden of Delights,' which are devoted to
-a representation of the Hohenburg and of its convent of women, have
-fortunately been preserved. Here we see the settlement as it presented
-itself to Herrad and the thoughts she associated with it. The picture is
-the size of two folio pages. High above in the centre stands Christ in
-front of the convent church, holding in His right hand a golden staff
-which is touched by the Virgin and St Peter, and the end of which is
-supported by Duke Eticho, whom Herrad looked upon as the father of St
-Odilia. St John the Baptist and St Odilia are seen standing on the other
-side of Christ. A green hill is represented below roughly studded with
-bushes or brambles,--this is the hill of the Hohenburg. On one slope of it
-Duke Eticho is seated, and he hands the golden key of the convent to St
-Odilia, who advances towards him followed by a band of women. Relind,
-Herrad's teacher and predecessor, also stands on the hill with her hand
-resting on a cross on which are inscribed verses addressed to the nuns.
-The fact that she restored the church and the discipline at Hohenburg,
-which had fallen entirely into decay, is commemorated in a sentence which
-is placed on the other side of her. Over against her stands Herrad
-herself, who also holds verses addressed to the nuns. And between these
-two abbesses all the members of Herrad's congregation are drawn, six rows
-of women's heads placed one above the other. There is no attempt at
-portraiture, but the name of each nun and each novice is added to her
-picture. Among these names are those of families of the surrounding landed
-gentry, from which we gather that the nunnery was chiefly for the upper
-classes. The nuns in the picture address lines to Christ begging Him to
-number them among the elect.
-
-Such in rough outline was the 'Garden of Delights,' the loss of which is
-greatly to be deplored, both from the point of view of culture in general,
-and from that of women in particular. But even in its fragments the work
-is a thing to dwell upon, a monument which bears the stamp of wide
-knowledge and lofty thought. It shows how Herrad found her life's interest
-in educating the young women given into her care, how anxious she was that
-they should be right-minded in all things, and how she strove to make
-their studies delightful to them. The tone which she took towards her
-congregation is apparent from the words in which she directly addressed
-them. For besides occasional admonitory words, two long poems, one at the
-beginning, the other at the end of the work, are devoted to the admonition
-of the nuns. Herrad's poems are composed in different metres; some have
-the dignity of the hexameter, some the easier flow of shorter-lined
-dactylic verse. The poems addressed to her nuns are of the latter kind.
-Their incisive rhythm and ringing rhyme, in which their value chiefly
-lies, make a translation difficult. Still a version of the first of these
-poems in English prose will help to give the reader some idea of the tone
-of the abbess; the form of address is necessarily determined by the mode
-of expression of the 12th century, the meaning of the original is by no
-means always clear.
-
-This is: 'The rhyme of Herrad, the abbess, in which she lovingly greets
-the young maidens (virgunculas) of the Hohenburg and invites them to their
-weal to faith and love of the true Bridegroom.
-
-'Hail, cohort of Hohenburg virgins, white as the lily and loving the Son
-of God, Herrad, your most devoted, your most faithful mother and
-handmaiden sings you this song. She greets you times countless and daily
-prays that in glad victory you may triumph over things that pass. O,
-mirror of many things, spurn, spurn those of time, and garner virtues,
-Band of the true Bridegroom. Press on in the struggle to scatter the dread
-foe, the King of Kings aids you for His desire is towards you. He Himself
-strengthens your soul against Satan; He Himself will grant the glory of
-His kingdom after victory. Delights await you, riches are destined for
-you, the court of heaven proffers you countless joys. Christ prepares
-espousals wondrous in delights, and you may look for this prince if you
-preserve your chastity. Mean time put around you noble circlets (?) and
-make your faces to shine fair, freed from mental strife. Christ hates spot
-or stain, He abhors time-worn lines (of vice); He desires beauteous
-virgins and drives forth women who are unchaste. With a dove-like faith
-call upon that your Bridegroom, that your beauty may become an unbroken
-glory. Living without guile, be admonished by praisegiving, so that you
-may complete your best works of ascent. Do not hesitate amidst the
-doubtful currents of the world, the truthful God holds out rewards after
-danger. Suffer hardships now, despising the world's prosperity, be now
-fellow of the cross, hereafter sharer of the kingdom. Steer across the
-ocean freighted with holiness, till you leave the bark and land in Sion.
-May Sion's heavenly castle with its beauteous halls be your home when the
-term of life is past. May there the virgin Ruler, Mary's Son, receive you
-in His embrace and lift you up from sadness. Setting aside all the wiles
-of the mean tempter, you will be abundantly glad, sweetly rejoicing. The
-shining Star of the Sea, the one virgin Mother will join you to her Son in
-bond eternal. And by your prayer do not cease to draw me with you to the
-sweetest Bridegroom, the Son of the Virgin. As He will be partner of your
-victory and of your great glory, He will draw you from earthly things.
-Farewell, chaste band, you my exceeding joy, live without offence, ever
-love Christ. May this book prove useful and delightful to you, may you
-never cease to ponder it in your breast. May forgetfulness not seize you
-like the ostrich (more Struthineo)[671], and may you not leave the way
-before you have attained. Amen.'
-
-This address in verse was followed by these lines in prose--'Herrad, who
-through the grace of God is abbess of the church on the Hohenburg, here
-addresses the sweet maidens of Christ who are working as though in the
-vineyard of the Lord; may He grant grace and glory unto them.--I was
-thinking of your happiness when like a bee guided by the inspiring God I
-drew from many flowers of sacred and philosophic writing this book called
-the 'Garden of Delights'; and I have put it together to the praise of
-Christ and the Church, and to your enjoyment, as though into a sweet
-honeycomb. Therefore you must diligently seek your salvation in it and
-strengthen your weary spirit with its sweet honey drops; always be bent
-on love of your Bridegroom and fortified by spiritual joys, and you will
-safely pass through what is transitory, and secure great and lasting
-happiness. Through your love of Christ, help me who am climbing along a
-dangerous uncertain path by your fruitful prayer when I pass away from
-this earth's experiences. Amen.'
-
-Thus far we have followed Herrad in her work and in her relations towards
-her nuns; the question naturally arises, What inner experiences prompted
-her to her great undertaking and in what spirit did she carry it through?
-It has been noticed that a sombreness is characteristic of certain parts
-of the work, and is peculiar to some of her poems also. Two short verses
-which occur in the work seem to reflect her mental state. The one urges
-great liberality of mind. It discusses the basis of purity, and comes to
-the conclusion that purity depends less on actions than on the spirit in
-which they are done. The other follows the mind through its several stages
-of development and deserves to be chronicled among the words of wisdom. It
-runs as follows: 'Despise the world, despise nothing, despise thyself,
-despise despising thyself,--these are four good things.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER VIII.
-
-PROPHECY AND PHILANTHROPY.
-
-    'Pauper homo magnam stultitiam habet quando vestimenta sua scissa
-    sunt, semper in alium aspiciens, considerans quem colorem vestimentum
-    illius habeat, nec suum a sorde abluit.' _Hildegard._
-
-
-Sec. 1. St Hildegard of Bingen[672] and St Elisabeth of Schoenau[673].
-
-From the peaceful pursuits of mediaeval nuns we turn to some of the women
-who were interested in the problems of the day, and whose minds were
-agitated by current difficulties which they sought to solve in their own
-way. In Germany in the early Middle Ages the struggle between Pope and
-Emperor, and the interference in temporal matters of prelates in their
-character as dependents of the Pope, gave rise to a prolonged struggle.
-Much criticism, reflection and speculative energy were brought to bear on
-the relations between monarchical and ecclesiastical power, on the duties
-of the ministers of the Church, and on the Pope's efficiency in
-controlling them. It is at least curious to find among the voices that are
-raised in criticism and protest, those of two nuns, who in consideration
-of the services they have rendered to the faith are estimated as saints.
-The present chapter proposes to deal in outline with the writings of St
-Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1178) and of St Elisabeth of Schoenau (c.
-1129-1165). These two women differed somewhat in their points of view, but
-they were equally zealous in supporting the Pope's authority, and were
-equally inspired by the belief that the Church could and should maintain
-a lofty and universal standing and act as a regenerator to society. The
-exhortations of these women were very popular, and in the year 1158, when
-they were in the full exercise of their power, the annalist wrote, 'in
-these days God made manifest His power through the frail sex, in the two
-maidens Hildegard and Elisabeth, whom He filled with a prophetic spirit,
-making many kinds of visions apparent to them through His messages, which
-are to be seen in writing[674].'
-
-The attitude of these women and the tone of their writings were the direct
-outcome of contemporary events. They were deeply moved by the instability
-of social conditions and shared the belief of other great reformers of the
-age, that what was needed to remedy social evils was a livelier faith in
-the truths of religion and a higher standard of morality in conduct.
-
-The 12th century is the age when national feeling in the different
-countries of Europe first asserted itself strongly, and when consciousness
-of solidarity within made possible the apprehension of ideas which lie
-beyond the pale of immediate personal and national advantage. The
-conception of knighthood, hitherto determined only by land ownership and
-loyalty to a lord, was given a new interpretation, and the order of
-Knights Templars was founded, which held knighthood to be based upon
-devotion to the cause of religion and loyalty to the Saviour. Similarly
-love of war, which till then had expended itself in self-protective and
-aggressive warfare, was turned into a new channel, and the thought of the
-Crusade roused peoples of different nationalities to fight side by side,
-inspired by a common cause and actuated by a common interest. The
-authority of the Pope as a temporal ruler had reached its climax, and
-there were threatening signs of its decline, but when this power, like the
-conception of knighthood, received the new interpretation, its importance
-had never been more distinctly emphasized.
-
-The Popes who ruled between 900 and 1000 had been absorbed by party
-squabbles in Rome and had done little to raise the dignity of their office
-in other lands. But a change had come through Hildebrand, who nominally
-served, but practically ruled, five Popes before he himself sat in the
-chair of St Peter as Gregory VII (1073-1085). Owing to his influence the
-papal power rapidly increased and took a universal colouring, for, by
-identifying himself with all the wider and higher interests of humanity,
-the Pope succeeded in winning for himself the recognition of his supreme
-authority in matters both spiritual and temporal. There was something
-grand and inspiring in this conception of the Pope as the universal
-peace-maker, and of Rome as the central and supreme court of appeal of the
-civilized world, but it could not last. In proportion as national life in
-the different countries struggled into being, this overlordship of the
-Pope was felt to weigh heavily and to hamper development, and criticisms
-arose concerning his right to interfere in matters that did not appertain
-directly to the Church. At the time we are speaking of--the second half of
-the 12th century--there were indications of a distinction drawn between
-'sacerdotium' and 'imperium,' between priestly and imperial status
-considered as the rightful basis of power, with a consequent loss of
-prestige to the Church. The position of the Papacy was moreover seriously
-affected by continued schism. As a check to this loss of prestige, those
-who were in favour of papal supremacy urged that the Church must be
-strengthened in its members, and they sought an increase of influence in a
-reform of the life of the clergy generally.
-
-It has been mentioned above how from the 10th century onwards a direct
-connection had grown up between the Pope and the monastic centres, and how
-the founders of new religious orders had by a like direct connection
-secured a safeguard against wilful interference with their prerogatives by
-prince and prelate. Outside Italy it was in the monastery that the Pope
-throughout the 12th century found his chief advocates, that his spiritual
-supremacy was most earnestly emphasized, and that the belief was fostered
-that through his influence a re-organization of society could be obtained.
-
-In this connection no figure of the age is more remarkable than that of
-Bernard of Clairvaux[675] ([Dagger] 1153), 'the simple monk, clad in plain
-clothes, weakened by fasting,' whose power is felt in religious and lay
-circles alike. The secret of Bernard's influence lay in the fact that he
-was in one direction the mouthpiece of the ideal aspirations of his
-age--he emphasized the spiritual side of religion and insisted on the
-great social and moral advantages to be obtained by accepting spiritual
-direction as a guide in practical matters. By doing so he at once
-increased the reverence felt for religion and gave it a practical value.
-His very success commands admiration, repellent as his narrowness appears
-in some particulars. It is true that he diminished schism by persuading
-King Louis VI of France to recognise Pope Innocent II (1130-43), that he
-won over the German Emperor Lothar ([Dagger] 1137) to the same course; it
-is true that he founded the order of the Knights Templars, gave a new
-impulse to the order of Citeaux, and preached the Crusade; but it was he
-who declared the writings of Abelard ([Dagger] 1142) false, and who had
-Arnold of Brescia expelled from Paris on the charge of heresy.
-
-Socially and politically speaking the state of affairs in the German
-Empire during the first half of the 12th century had taken a deplorable
-turn through the choice of Konrad ([Dagger] 1152) as emperor. His
-vacillating policy left party hatred rampant between the rival houses of
-Welf (Guelph) and Hohenstaufen. On the slightest provocation this hatred
-broke out in warfare; it was checking all possibility of material progress
-and prosperity when the thought of a crusade offered a welcome diversion
-to these turbulent elements. For the first crusade few recruits had been
-drawn from any districts except the northern provinces of France, but the
-second assumed very different proportions. As early as 1145 Pope Eugenius
-was granting indulgences to those who joined it, while Bernard took up the
-idea and preached it with great success all along the Rhine. Disastrous as
-the undertaking itself proved to those who took part in it, its immediate
-effects on the countries from which the crusaders were drawn were most
-beneficial. After speaking of the terrible contentions which for years had
-set the ruling powers in Poland, Saxony and Bohemia at strife, Bishop Otto
-III of Freising ([Dagger] 1158) continues in this strain: 'Suddenly,
-through the counsel of the Most High, a speedy change was effected; and in
-a short time the turmoils of war were quieted, the whole earth seemed
-restored to peace, and unnumbered bands from France and from Germany
-received the Cross and departed to fight against its enemies.'
-
-When these crusaders had been sped on their way--a motley crowd in which
-figured emperor and king, adventurous knight, venturesome woman, and
-vagrants of every kind and of both sexes--Pope Eugenius, whose position at
-Rome was insecure and who had been staying at Clairvaux with Bernard,
-journeyed to Trier at the request of the archbishop to meet in council the
-prelates of the neighbouring districts. Among them was Heinrich,
-archbishop of Mainz (1142-53), who together with Wibald, abbot of Corvei,
-had been appointed representative of the emperor during his absence. It
-was on this occasion that some of Hildegard's writings were first
-submitted to the Pope, probably at the request of Archbishop Heinrich.
-Judging from what Hildegard says herself, Heinrich and the church at Mainz
-had accepted her writings, saying that 'they had come through God and
-through that power of prophecy by which the prophets had anciently
-written[676].'
-
-These writings were exhortations to faith and piety set forth in the form
-of revelations. Hildegard had been at work on them for the past six years,
-and they form the first part of the book 'Scivias' (that is 'Sci vias,'
-Know the ways[677]), as it now lies before us. The life of Hildegard,
-written shortly after her death, tells us that Bernard 'with the consent
-of others urged the Pope that he should not suffer so obvious a light to
-be obscured by silence, but should confirm it by authority[678].'
-
-The time was ripe for the kind of literature which comes under the heading
-of prophecies. At the time of the Second Crusade leaflets containing one
-of the so-called Sibylline prophecies had had a wide circulation and had
-greatly inflamed men's minds as to coming events[679]. Simultaneously with
-Hildegard the abbot Giovanni Gioachimo ([Dagger] after 1215) foretold
-coming events, so that later writers often cited Hildegard and Joachim
-side by side. There was something earnest and yet undefined, something
-fiery and suggestive in these writings, which appealed to the restless
-imagination of the age, for they were largely founded on the Apocalypse,
-and like the Apocalypse admitted of many interpretations. Their very
-vagueness repels the exact thinker, but attracts the mind that is
-conscious of quickened sensibilities and roused emotions, without being
-able to guide them into practical channels.
-
-Bernard of Clairvaux unhesitatingly accepted the divine origin of
-Hildegard's writings, and in a letter to her, which seems to have been
-written while the Pope's decision was pending, he addressed her in most
-respectful terms[680]: 'They tell us that you understand the secrets of
-heaven and grasp that which is above human ken through the help of the
-Holy Spirit,' he wrote among other things. 'Therefore we beg and entreat
-you to remember us before God and also those who are joined to us in
-spiritual union. For the spirit in you joining itself unto God, we
-believe that you can in great measure help and sustain us.'
-Hildegard--with a mixture of self-assurance, and eagerness to justify that
-assurance, which is thoroughly characteristic of her--replied to Bernard
-in ecstatic terms[681], praised him for having preached the Cross and
-spoke of him as the eagle who gazes into the sun.
-
-The correspondence[682] of Hildegard is voluminous, for from the time when
-her writings first gained approval from the Pope, many lay princes and
-dignitaries of the Church, bishops and abbots, abbesses and nuns, wrote to
-her, generally asking for her good opinion or for advice, but sometimes
-propounding questions of speculative interest, to which Hildegard in reply
-sent sometimes a few sentences, sometimes a long disquisition. It is
-largely owing to this correspondence that the fame of the abbess has
-spread beyond the confines of Germany. Linde, one of the few modern
-students who has treated of Hildegard, enumerates many manuscript copies
-of these letters which are preserved in the libraries of German cities, in
-Paris, London and Oxford. The genuineness of the letters has been
-questioned on the ground that all those addressed to Hildegard are
-curiously alike, but Linde, after examining a number of manuscript copies,
-came to the conclusion that the letters were genuine[683]. In their
-present arrangement the letters do not stand in chronological order but
-according to the rank of the correspondents, so that those written by
-Popes to Hildegard with their replies stand first, then come those written
-by archbishops, bishops, emperors, and so on. With few exceptions there is
-only one letter from each correspondent, an arrangement which suggests the
-work of a scribe, who for the sake of uniformity may in some instances
-have selected from or summarized his material. The letters printed by
-Migne are a hundred and forty-five in number, but Linde refers to a few
-more in his list with the remark that parts of the correspondence exist
-separately and are sometimes cited as separate works[684].
-
-These letters of Hildegard's, as well as her other writings, contain many
-references to herself; she never fails to inform us of the circumstances
-which led her to begin a work. She tells us that she was middle-aged when
-she first wrote an account of her visions, but that she had been subject
-to these visions from her earliest childhood, and that the mental agonies
-she went through before she sought relief in writing were ever present to
-her mind.
-
-Moreover we are in possession of an account of her life written between
-1181 and 1191, of which the first part is by Godefrid, who introduces
-extracts from the book 'Scivias.' The second and third parts are by
-Theodor, who uses an autobiography of Hildegard of which we have no other
-mention. It appears from the Acts of Inquisition of the year 1233 which
-were drafted to establish Hildegard's claim to canonization, that both
-these monks had stayed with Hildegard.
-
-Summarizing the contents of these different accounts and the information
-which the voluminous writings of the abbess supply, we gather that
-Hildegard, at the time when the Pope's attention was first drawn to her,
-was between forty and fifty years of age; that she was a daughter of one
-of the landed gentry, and that she had been given into the care of the
-nuns of Disibodenberg at the age of seven and had made profession at
-fourteen. Disibodenberg[685], situated on the river Nahe, was a monastery
-of some importance and has preserved annals extending from 831 to 1200
-which contain useful contributions to contemporary history. The house was
-under the rule of an abbot, but a convent of nuns had been lately added to
-it when Hildegard came there; this convent was under the rule of the
-'magistra' Jutta, sister of Meginhard, Count of Sponheim. From Jutta
-Hildegard received her training, which included a knowledge of books of
-devotion, scripture and music. Apparently she could not write German[686],
-and in Latin her acquaintance with grammatical inflection and construction
-was limited[687], so that when she began to write she availed herself of
-the help of a monk and afterwards of that of some nuns of her convent who
-helped her to polish (limare) her sentences.
-
-During the years she spent at Disibodenberg she seems to have been devoted
-to nursing[688], and the consecration of a chapel in the infirmary about
-this time leaves us to infer that there were in this monastery special
-conveniences for the sick[689]. In the year 1136 she succeeded Jutta as
-lady superior, and at once formed the plan of leaving Disibodenberg and
-settling some distance away on the Rupertsberg near Bingen on the Rhine,
-in a convent foundation of her own. But at first Kuno ([Dagger] 1155),
-abbot of Disibodenberg, opposed her going and cast doubts on the vision in
-which she declared she was divinely directed to do so[690], while many who
-did not belong to the monastery, and among them the parents of girls who
-had been given into her care, disapproved of their daughters being taken
-to a distant and desolate neighbourhood[691]. But Hildegard persisted, for
-the accommodation at the monastery was insufficient for herself and her
-numerous pupils, and besides as abbess at the Rupertsberg she would have a
-very different standing. She fell ill, and then, chiefly through the
-intercession of friends outside who made grants of land and helped her
-towards the erection of new buildings, the abbot was brought to agree to
-her wishes. Among others Heinrich, archbishop of Mainz, advocated her
-going, and about the year 1147 she removed to the new settlement with
-eighteen young women. We have a description of the influence she exerted
-over these girls, her spiritual daughters, when they were still at
-Disibodenberg. In the new home Hildegard adopted the rule of St Benedict,
-but she met with opposition, for some of the young women objected to the
-greater restrictions put upon them by the new rule, and the abbess needed
-the help and support of the better and wiser ones amongst them to overcome
-the difficulty. After the labour of moving Hildegard fell ill and lay
-prostrate for several years, till she was strengthened and restored by
-visions of the work that still lay before her.
-
-The Acts of Inquisition tell us that there was accommodation on the
-Rupertsberg for fifty professed nuns (dominae), seven poor women and two
-priests[692], but the independence of the nunnery was not easily secured
-and Hildegard repeatedly travelled to Disibodenberg to settle matters. The
-men's convent continued to supply priests to the women on the Rupertsberg,
-but as late as 1170 difficulties occurred in regard to their appointment,
-and we find Hildegard writing to Pope Alexander begging him to admonish
-the abbot of Disibodenberg in her behalf[693].
-
-A considerable portion of 'Scivias' was written before Hildegard removed
-to the Rupertsberg. She has described in the introduction to the book how
-she was led to write it[694].
-
-'It was in my forty-third year, when I was trembling in fearful
-anticipation of a celestial vision, that I beheld a great brightness
-through which a voice from heaven addressed me: "O fragile child of earth,
-ash of ashes, dust of dust, express and write that which thou seest and
-hearest. Thou art timid, timid in speech, artless in explaining, unlearned
-in writing, but express and write not according to art but according to
-natural ability, not under the guidance of human composition but under the
-guidance of that which thou seest and hearest in God's heaven above; what
-thus thou hearest proclaim, like a listener who understanding the words of
-his teacher, as this teacher wills and indicates, so gives expression to
-his words according to the power of his speech. Thus thou, O child of
-earth, proclaim what thou seest and hearest, and put it in writing, not as
-thou or others will it, but as He wills who knows, sees and disposes of
-all in the depths of His mysteries." Again I heard a voice from heaven,
-saying: "Speak these wonderful things, write them in thy unlearned way,
-proclaim them." And it happened in the year 1141 of Christ's incarnation,
-when I was forty-two years and seven months old, that a fiery light of
-great brilliancy streaming down from heaven entirely flooded my brain, my
-heart and my breast, like a flame that flickers not but gives glowing
-warmth, as the sun warms that on which he sheds his rays. Then of a sudden
-I had the power of explaining Scripture, that is the Psalter, the Gospels
-and the other Catholic books both of the Old and of the New Testament
-(Psalterium, Evangeliorum et aliorum catholicorum tam Veteris quam Novi
-Testamenti volumina), though I did not understand the inflections of
-words, their division into syllables, their cases and tenses. I had been
-conscious from earliest girlhood of a power of insight, and visions of
-hidden and wonderful things, ever since the age of five years, then and
-ever since. But I did not mention it save to a few religious persons who
-followed the like observances with myself; I kept it hidden by silence
-until God in His grace willed to have it made manifest.'
-
-In this strain she tells how her visions came to her, not when she was
-asleep or when she was dreaming or in any way excited, but in the most
-serious of moods. They had for years perturbed her, and she had shrunk
-from putting them into writing, when a sudden illness came upon her and
-made her alter her mind. Then in her own words, 'a noble high-born girl
-and the man whom I had secretly sought and consulted, were witnesses to
-how I set my hand to the task'--that is to the composition of 'Scivias.'
-
-It would lead us too far to give a summary of the contents of this
-extraordinary book; it is divided into three parts, the first containing
-the account of six, the second of seven, and the third of thirteen
-visions, all of which seem to have taken place in the following way.
-Hildegard is confronted by a bright light, which radiates over some
-wonderful piece of imagery, a mountain, an abyss, some beast, man, or
-building, or part of the firmament, which, with the figures that throng
-around, she minutely describes, and then she gives an explanation of the
-allegorical meaning of this picture vouchsafed to her from God in heaven.
-The real and the unreal alike supply material for these visions, which
-show great powers of imagination; in their allegorical application they
-dwell upon the Creed, the Scriptures, the Incarnation, the Trinity, and
-life hereafter, and other questions of doctrinal and theological interest.
-The descriptions are highly coloured throughout, but their application is
-often very obscure. A translation of the opening passages of one of the
-visions, which turns on the protection afforded to the faithful against
-the wiles of the devil, will give some idea of the character of their
-imagery[695].
-
-'Then I saw a shining light, wide and high as a mountain, which spreading
-upwards flashed into many tongues of fire (linguas). And outside it stood
-a number of men clad in white, in front of whom, like a veil, transparent
-crystal extended from their breasts downwards to their feet. But before
-this band, in their pathway, lay a dragon (vermis) of huge size and
-length, of such terrible and threatening aspect as cannot be expressed. On
-his left was as it were a market-place where the riches of this world lay
-heaped, wealth delightful to the eye, where buying and selling went on;
-some people passed by this place in a great hurry without buying, while
-others drew near slowly and stayed to buy and sell. The dragon was black
-and hairy, and covered with venomous excrescences, of which five kinds
-extended from his head over his body to his feet in the shape of rings;
-one was green, one white, one red, one yellow, one black, and all were
-equally charged with deadly venom. His head was broken, causing his left
-jaw to hang down. His eyes were red and flashed fire; his ears were round
-and furred; his nostrils and mouth were those of a dragon (vipera), he had
-the hands of a man, the feet of a dragon, and below a short horrible tail.
-And his neck, hands and feet were bound by a chain and this chain was
-fixed to the abyss, and held him so fast that he could not move away to
-suit his wicked will. From his mouth poured forth four streams of flame,
-of which one rose aloft, a second spread towards the children of this
-world, a third towards the company of just men, the last towards the
-abyss. The flames which rose aloft threatened those who aspired to heaven,
-who move in three ranks, one touching the sky, the other betwixt heaven
-and earth, the third close to earth, and all were crying, "We are striving
-to reach heaven." But some of them, although touched by the flames, fell
-not, others barely kept their footing, yet others falling again to earth,
-gathered themselves up and went forth anew.--The flames which spread
-towards the children of this world reached some and burnt them to utter
-blackness, of others they took hold, turning them hither and thither; yet
-others burst away, and striving towards those who were nearing heaven
-shouted out aloud: "Ye faithful ones, give us help!" But some remained as
-though spell-bound.--The flames which ran to the company of the just
-covered some with blackness; the company of the just moved in six ranks,
-and those whom the cruel flames wounded not were tainted by the poison of
-the dragon which issued from the green, white, red, yellow, and black
-parts of its body.--The flames which sought the abyss carried various
-punishments to those who had not been cleansed by baptism, who ignored the
-true faith and worshipped Satan instead of God. And I further saw arrows
-pouring from the dragon's mouth, black smoke issuing from his body,
-steaming liquid bubbling from his sides, and excretions going out from the
-lower part of his body, like to frogs that are disastrous to man, and
-which bring infection to many. And a black mist with foul odour going
-forth contaminated all.
-
-'But lo and behold the men shining in brilliancy advanced towards this
-dragon to fight and vex it, whom it could harm neither by fire nor by
-poison. And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me: "God, who disposes
-all in wisdom, summons His faithful band to the glory of their heritage;
-the old deceiver lies in wait and tries his evil powers, but he is
-overcome, his presumption is defeated; they attain their heavenly
-heritage, and he suffers eternal disgrace. Therefore dost thou behold a
-shining light, wide and high as a mountain, flashing upwards into many
-tongues of fire, which is the justice of God, as it glows in the faith of
-believers, setting forth the breadth of His holiness, the height of His
-glory, by which glory are declared the wondrous powers of the divine
-Spirit."'
-
-All the visions of the first two parts of the book are written in this
-vague indefinite strain, but in the third Hildegard, conscious of the
-evils that had come upon the Church through the schism in the Papacy,
-became more outspoken in her views, and enlarged on the true faith being
-shaken, on Holy Scripture being disregarded, and on the great works of
-learned men being neglected. She says definitely that there can be no life
-where the head is severed from the limbs; and such, in her estimation, is
-the condition of the Church while schism continues. In common with a
-current view, she expected that things would go from bad to worse till the
-coming of Antichrist, whose appearance and influence she describes in
-eloquent and impressive imagery[696]. The apprehensive tone of these
-descriptions is in agreement with the growing consciousness of wickedness
-and personal responsibility, which assumed such proportions during the
-latter half of the 12th century, and made the minds of many prepared for
-the altruistic doctrines spread abroad by the orders of friars.
-
-The last vision of the book 'Scivias' lays stress upon the final
-revolution and reconciliation which will follow the reign of Antichrist
-and the times of trouble, and in this vision occur passages in dialogue,
-cast into dramatic form and called a symphony (symphonia), which rank
-among the finest productions of their kind[697]. The subject of this
-improvised drama is 'the Progress of the Soul on her way to heaven.' It
-opens with a lament of those Souls who are still confined in the body,
-whereupon one Faithful Soul (Fidelis anima), who is set free, raises her
-voice in supplication, calling on the Virtues or Divine Powers (Virtutes)
-for assistance. They respond and promise help, when Divine Knowledge
-(Scientia Dei) raises her voice and adds to the consciousness of
-helplessness in the Faithful Soul, who is now importuned on one side by
-Pride or the Devil (Diabolus) and on the other by Humility (Humilitas),
-both of whom are striving to gain possession of her. But the Virtues urge
-her to hold by Humility and the Devil is put to flight, whereupon the
-Virtues guide the Faithful Soul upwards to Heaven where she is finally
-received by Victory (Victoria). The whole ends with a hymn in praise of
-Christ which is sung by the Virtues.
-
-It is probable that only the first and second parts of the work 'Scivias'
-were laid before the Pope in 1146. He wrote to Hildegard as abbess of the
-Rupertsberg, and the letter is short and curt[698]. He refers to her
-wonderful powers and then continues: 'We congratulate ourselves in this
-grace of God, and we congratulate thee, but we would have thee reminded
-that God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the lowly. Take good
-care of this grace which is within thee in order that what thou art
-spiritually (in spiritu) urged to proclaim, thou mayest proclaim with
-caution.' And he adds words to the effect that he confirms the settlement
-she has founded.
-
-The whole of the lengthy reply[699] which Hildegard sent to this letter
-was written in an admonitory tone, for she considered herself the chosen
-mouthpiece of God though characterizing herself as a poor lowly woman.
-'The light stays with me and glows in my soul as it has done since my
-childhood,' she says to the Pope, 'therefore I send thee these words, a
-true admonition from God.' A mass of imagery follows, powerful and direct,
-but not always clear in its application.
-
-In one place she writes: 'A jewel lies on the road, a bear comes, and
-deeming it beautiful puts out his paw and would treasure it in his bosom'
-(the bear is the German Emperor)[700]. 'But suddenly an eagle snatches the
-jewel, wraps it in the covering of his wings and bears it upwards to the
-royal palace' (the eagle represents the Pope, the palace the kingdom of
-Christ). 'The jewel gives out much light before the king, so that he
-rejoices and out of love of the jewel gives to the eagle golden shoes'
-(the insignia of papal authority), 'and praises him for his goodness. Now
-do thou, who art sitting in the place of Christ in care of the Church,
-choose the better part; be as the eagle overcoming the bear, that with the
-souls entrusted to thee thou mayest decorate the palace of the Church; so
-that with golden shoes thou mayest rise aloft and be removed from thine
-enemies.'
-
-Other images follow. It is told how the valleys overtop the hills and then
-the hills overtop the valleys, with the obvious application that no order
-is maintained in the Church, since the lower clergy presume upon and the
-higher abuse their powers; each one neglecting to do his duty, and class
-being envious of class. 'The poor man is very foolish who, when he knows
-that his garment is soiled, looks at others and reflects on the appearance
-of their clothes, instead of washing and cleaning his own.... Therefore,
-do thou, great shepherd called upon to follow Christ, supply a light to
-the hills, a rod to the valleys. Give to the teachers precepts, bring unto
-the lowly discipline.' And further, 'Make all things pure and have thine
-eyes everywhere.'
-
-After settling near Bingen Hildegard completed the book 'Scivias' and then
-engaged on the compilation of two books on medicine, one of which has
-never been published[701]. The other is usually called 'Physica'; its
-amplified title runs, 'On the nature of man, of the various elements and
-of various creatures and plants, and on the way in which they are useful
-to man[702].' This book, of which the printing press issued several
-editions in the 16th century, has been characterised by the scientist
-Virchow as an early 'materia medica, curiously complete considering the
-age to which it belongs[703].' Haeser, in his history of medicine, also
-points out the importance of the work, saying that 'it contains
-descriptions of the medicinal properties of the best-known animals, plants
-and minerals, together with directions how to improve accepted remedies
-against illness in man and beast[704].' He considers that the book has an
-historical value because it is an independent German treatise based
-chiefly on popular experience, for no writer except Isidor of Seville
-([Dagger] 636) is made use of in it. In this connection it has been
-further commented on by Jessen[705].
-
-The book consists of a collection of terse bits of description, of
-sensible advice, and of old-world superstitions. It is so arranged that a
-description is given first of plants (230 in number), and then of elements
-(14), trees (60), stones (26), fishes (37), birds (72), animals (43), and
-lastly of metals (8). The German term for each object is given and its
-health-giving or obnoxious properties are mentioned. Thus the description
-of the mulberry tree is followed by the information that a decoction of
-its leaves forms an efficacious remedy in cases of skin disease, and after
-the description of prunes comes the information that they are good for a
-dry cough. When treating of the pig Hildegard states that pork is
-indigestible and should be avoided in cases of sickness. While some
-descriptions are excellent and obviously based on direct observation, as
-for example that of the properties of soda, others are entirely
-fabulous, such as that of the unicorn. We get the savour of primitive
-leechcraft in the statements that carrying about a dead frog is good for
-the gout, that drinking water out of a cypress bowl rids one of devils and
-fantasies, and that eating raven's flesh should be avoided since it
-encourages thieving propensities. In regard to diagnosis of disease
-Hildegard's ideas are necessarily vague. The illnesses referred to are
-chiefly indigestion, fevers, coughs, delusions and leprosy. Several kinds
-of leprosy are distinguished, and the chief remedies prescribed are baths
-in decoctions of leaves and other less savoury preparations.
-
-In the light of information such as is contained in this book, the
-wonderful cures which Hildegard and many other early saints are said to
-have effected take a new meaning. It is generally allowed that the fame of
-monasteries as curative centres is founded on a basis of fact which
-consists in their healthy situation, abundance of pure water, and regular
-diet. But evidently there is more than this. When we look through the
-'Physica,' compiled under Hildegard's direction if not directly by her, we
-feel that, if we could only see behind the veil of the miraculous through
-which all religious writers persist in looking at the alleviation of
-physical and mental suffering, we should be brought face to face with much
-judicious treatment and with the application of a considerable amount of
-medicinal knowledge.
-
-During the early part of her stay on the Rupertsberg Hildegard also wrote
-a book of Latin texts for hymns (before 1153) which are accompanied by
-musical notation[706],--certain 'Expositions of the Gospels' (before 1157)
-for the use of her nuns, which have not been printed[707],--an explanation
-'of the rule of St Benedict[708],'--and another 'of the symbol of St
-Athanasius[709].' In the opening sentences of this last work she describes
-the difficulties she had to contend with in founding the nunnery, and
-admonishes the nuns to guard against division and discord when she is no
-more. Another work entitled 'Vitae meritorum,' consisting of moral
-admonitions, was written between 1158 and 1162, but has not been
-printed[710]. A series of questions was forwarded to her by Guibert of
-Gembloux and was the occasion of a lengthy reply, sent to him in the form
-of a letter[711]. Hildegard also either invented or perpetuated in writing
-a glossary of words of a secret language, each term accompanied by its
-equivalent in Latin or in German, sometimes in both. Scholars look upon
-this work as containing words invented by members of the convent to be
-used in the presence of strangers for the purpose of secret
-communication[712].
-
-These writings give proof of Hildegard's active interest in her convent,
-though at the same time she remained keenly alive to events outside. The
-choice of Friedrich Barbarossa (1152-1190) as successor to Konrad proved
-favourable in many respects to German lands, but the position of the
-Papacy was further jeopardised when Friedrich fell out with Pope Hadrian
-(1154-59). After the death of this Pope Friedrich did not support his
-legitimate successor Alexander III (1159-81), but the successive
-Antipopes, Victor IV ([Dagger] 1164), Paschalis III ([Dagger] 1168) and
-Calixtus III (resigned 1178). The cities of northern Italy tried to secure
-autonomy, and plotted against the Emperor. Again and again their rebellion
-obliged him to cross the Alps and devote himself to their subjection,
-while several of his powerful German prelates at home, by no means
-convinced of the rightfulness of his cause, sided with Pope Alexander,
-some secretly, some openly, against the Antipope and the Emperor.
-Hildegard joined this party and charged the Emperor with being partly
-responsible for the continued schism and for the diminished authority of
-the Church. With these views she wrote a letter full of adulation to
-Eberhard, archbishop of Salzburg (1147-1164), who adhered to
-Alexander[713], and sent dark forebodings of impending disaster to Arnold,
-archbishop of Mainz (1153-1160[714]). It would lead too far to dwell upon
-the numerous letters written during these years by the abbess who,
-believing herself to possess a miraculous insight into things, wrote
-sometimes in a threatening, sometimes in an admonitory, and sometimes in
-an encouraging strain. The outside world generally, including many clever
-and cultivated men, held her to be divinely enlightened. Arnold II,
-archbishop of Coeln (1151-1156), wrote to entreat her to send him her
-writings whatever their state[715]. The abbot of Elwangen wrote saying
-that she could 'speak of the present, uncover the past, and foresee the
-future[716],' and the provost and clergy of Trier wrote to consult her in
-their trouble, and declared her 'filled by the Holy Ghost and acquainted
-with things which are hidden from mankind generally[717].'
-
-Many powerful prelates, abbots and abbesses sought confirmation of their
-views or advice in tribulation from the learned abbess. Her fame spread
-beyond the confines of Germany, for we find the patriarch of Jerusalem
-addressing a letter to her, in which he said that he was living in sad
-straits and begged for her prayers, and Hildegard, evidently influenced by
-his exalted position, urging him to remain steadfast and assuring him that
-while his faith is firm he need not despair[718].
-
-Among the letters which refer to convent matters we note one addressed to
-Heinrich, the archbishop of Mainz. In early days he had supported
-Hildegard, but at a later date he advocated against her wish the promotion
-of one of her nuns to the post of abbess in another convent, thus drawing
-on himself Hildegard's scorn and anger. The nun was Hiltrud of Sponheim,
-who had helped Hildegard to put 'Scivias' into writing and whose loss was
-a serious matter to her. She vented her anger by attacking the bishop and
-threatening him with ruin. 'The rod you raise is not raised in the
-interest of God,' she wrote to him[719], and ended her letter with these
-words: 'your days are numbered, remember how Nebuchadnezzar fell and lost
-his crown. Many others who presumed that they would attain to heaven have
-likewise fallen.' In point of fact Heinrich was soon afterwards charged
-with wasting the goods of the Church, was deposed and died in exile.
-
-Another nun, who had also helped Hildegard with her writing and left her
-against her wish, was Richardis, sister of Hartwich, bishop of Bremen
-(1148-1168). The correspondence includes a letter from Hartwich to
-Hildegard, telling her that his sister died shortly after accepting her
-post as abbess, that she always regretted having left Hildegard and would
-have returned to her if she had lived. Hildegard in reply speaks warmly of
-the virtues of Richardis, and says that she finds comfort in the thought
-that God has removed her from the vanities of this world[720].
-
-Abbesses of many convents, convinced of Hildegard's being divinely
-inspired, wrote to her for advice concerning personal matters. Thus the
-abbess of Altwick near Utrecht asked if she were justified in resigning
-her post and becoming a recluse, and Hildegard in reply urged her not to
-yield to temptation but to remain in charge of her flock[721]. The abbess
-Sophie of Kizzingen had the same wish but was likewise advised to
-persevere in her vocation[722]. Among numerous other letters from the
-superiors of convents there is one from the abbess Adelheid of Gandersheim
-([Dagger] 1184) who had been educated by Hildegard and who wrote begging
-for news and saying that she was shortly coming on a visit[723].
-
-Among the letters bearing on Hildegard's religious attitude is one
-addressed to Philip von Heinsberg, an earnest adherent of Pope Alexander.
-He afterwards became archbishop of Coeln, and Hildegard wrote warning him
-of the dangers to be apprehended from a sect of heretics, doubtless the
-so-called Cathari, of whom more later[724]. This sect were at the time in
-possession of a well-planned organization in the Rhine districts, and
-aroused serious apprehension in religious circles. The archbishop of Coeln,
-Reinald von Dassel (1159-1167), disputed with them; Ekbert, a monk of
-Schoenau to whom we shall return, directly attacked their doctrines, and in
-1163 a number of them were burnt to death at Coeln. It is interesting to
-note what fears they inspired and how their doctrines were interpreted. In
-the eyes of Hildegard there is no doubt as to their being altogether evil.
-
-The situation of the Rupertsberg near the Rhine, the highway of
-communication in those days, kept Hildegard in touch with the outside
-world. She received many visitors and took frequent journeys. We hear of
-her going to Coeln, Trier, Wuerzburg, Bamberg and to many monasteries in the
-neighbourhood, but the story that she went as far as Paris and Tours is
-unfounded--the result of a misinterpreted passage in the account of her
-life[725]. Personal acquaintance with Hildegard seems only to have
-confirmed the belief in her superior abilities and her direct converse
-with the Godhead--a curious illustration of the credulity of the age, with
-its craving for signs and wonders.
-
-Her clear-sightedness and consciousness of prophetic power increased with
-age, and there is the strongest evidence of them in her last important
-work, which bears the title of 'The Book of Divine doings[726].' It was
-written between 1163 and 1170, 'when the apostolic see was most seriously
-oppressed,' and for imaginativeness, breadth of knowledge and power of
-generalization ranks highest among Hildegard's works.
-
-The leading idea of this book is to establish parallels, sometimes between
-things divine and human, sometimes between the physical and the spiritual
-world, sometimes between the facts of the Biblical narrative and their
-allegorical meaning, with a view to glorifying God in His works. It
-contains vivid bits of description, valuable glimpses of contemporary
-scientific knowledge, and occasional brilliant similes, but the
-conceptions among which it moves are so entirely those of a past age that
-it is often difficult to grasp their import.
-
-Thus in the first vision there is the description of the creation of man
-in the image and the likeness of God, which is supposed to account for the
-complexity of the human being. In another vision the heavenly spheres are
-set forth according to the accepted astronomical theory, and their
-movements within each other and mutual interdependence are described. In
-each of these spheres resides a spiritual influence, such as divine grace,
-good works, or repentance, and as the heavenly spheres influence each
-other, so these spiritual influences control and determine the nature of
-man. Many of the parallels are extremely curious, such as those between
-things physical and physiological, in which the external influences of
-wind, weather and the constellations are treated in connection with the
-humours of the human body. For the humours in the human body are so
-disposed that their undue pressure on heart, lungs or liver upsets the
-balance of the constitution and produces stomachic disorders, fevers,
-pleurisy, leprosy, etc., thus showing that these illnesses are indirectly
-the outcome of physical surroundings.
-
-The learned abbess also draws parallels between the configuration of the
-surface of the earth with its heights and depths, and human nature with
-its heights of virtue and depths of vice[727]. Forced as some of these
-comparisons appear to modern ideas, the language in which they are given
-shows considerable appreciation of phenomena in nature. Hildegard
-amplifies her book by disquisitions on passages in Job, the Psalms, St
-John, and the Apocalypse, which bear on the relation of light to life, of
-the spirit to the word, and of mental to physical darkness. The moments
-of the Creation are explained in their allegorical application, and give
-rise to comparisons such as this[728]: that the firmament of faith, like
-the firmament of nature, is illumined by two kinds of light; the greater
-light, like that of day, comes through prelates and spiritual teachers,
-the lesser light, like that of night, through kings and secular princes.
-In another passage man is likened to the soul and woman to the body, for
-the soul is of heaven and the body of earth, and their combination makes
-human life possible[729]. The wickedness which preceded the Flood, the
-falling away from the true faith, and the manner in which God chastised
-man by means of water and fire, are described in very impressive language,
-and together with a description of the Plagues of Egypt, lead up to the
-last vision, which enlarges on the evils of the time and on coming events.
-Here again as in 'Scivias' we have a description of impending changes, of
-threatening disaster, and of the results of the coming of Antichrist; it
-is perhaps as emphatic in the way of prophecy as anything that has ever
-been written. Contemporaries were powerfully impressed by this part of the
-book; even to later ages it appeared truly remarkable. Again and again in
-times of trouble and difficulty men have gone to it and found
-corroboration of the changes which were taking place around them. The
-reader can judge for himself how men's minds at the time of the
-Reformation were likely to be affected by the perusal of passages such as
-those which follow, in which the collapse of the German Empire--that is
-the Roman Empire of the German nation--and the Papacy, and their falling
-asunder had been described three hundred years before by the abbess of the
-Rupertsberg[730].
-
-'In the days to come the Emperors of the Roman See, forfeiting the power
-by which they had up to that time firmly upheld the Roman Empire, will
-become feeble in all their glory, so that the empire that has been given
-into their hands by divine power will gradually become enfeebled and fail,
-until they themselves, becoming sordid, feeble, servile and criminal in
-their practices, will be altogether useless, and yet they will claim to be
-respected by the people; but being indifferent to the people's welfare,
-they cannot be respected or held high. Then the kings and princes of the
-various peoples, who before were subject to the Roman Empire, will cut
-themselves off from it and refuse to be ruled by it. And thus the Roman
-Empire will sink to decay. For each clan and each people will set up a
-king unto themselves whom they will respect, alleging that the greatness
-of the Roman Empire was previously more an encumbrance to them than an
-advantage. But after the Imperial sceptre in this way has been divided,
-never to be restored, then the dignity of the Apostolic See (infula) will
-be impaired also. For neither princes nor other men, of the religious or
-the lay orders, will uphold any religion in the name of the Apostolic See,
-and they will violate the dignity of that name. They will appoint unto
-themselves other teachers and archbishops under some other name in the
-various districts, so that the Apostolic See (apostolicus), impaired in
-its standing through collapse of its dignity, will barely maintain its
-hold on Rome and on a few adjoining districts. This will come about partly
-through the irruptions of war, partly through the common consent and unity
-of religious and lay folk, who will demand of each secular prince that he
-fortify and rule his kingdom and his people, and of whatever archbishop or
-other spiritual teacher who is appointed that he exert discipline over
-those who are subject to him, lest they again experience the evils which
-by divine decree they experienced once before.'
-
-Various interpretations have in the course of time been given to
-Hildegard's prophecies, and a number of pamphlets, some consisting of
-amplified passages of her works, some entirely spurious, have circulated
-under her name. In the 13th century she was held to have indicated the
-threatened downfall of the Dominican friars[731], and even in England in
-the 'Creed of Piers Ploughman' we are called to 'hearken to
-Hildegard[732].' At the time of the Reformation the attention genuine
-passages from her writings attracted was very considerable, and again in
-the 17th century they were interpreted as foretelling the downfall of the
-Jesuits[733]. Even in the course of the present century, passages taken
-from Hildegard's writings have been explained as foretelling the revolt of
-Belgium[734].
-
-Hildegard lived to the advanced age of eighty-two. Her last writings,
-which were purely legendary, were a life of St Rupert, the patron saint
-of her nunnery[735], and a life of St Disibodus, patron saint of the
-monastery she had left[736]. As for Disibodus Wattenbach says that 'there
-is no mention of him previous to the 12th century[737].' Indeed Grimm has
-explained the name 'Disiboden' as a height hallowed to holy women (idisi),
-in which case, if an early Christian dwelt there at all, he must have
-taken his name from the height. In 1178 Hildegard passed away after a
-short illness, and soon after her death an enquiry was instituted with a
-view to her official canonization. In spite of renewed efforts this was
-not accomplished, but her name was placed on the Roman Martyrology and she
-is reckoned among the accepted saints of the Church[738].
-
-Surely it is curious that no attempt has hitherto been made to submit the
-writings and influence of Hildegard to a detailed critical examination.
-The few accounts which tell of her, such as that of Schmelzeis[739], are
-dictated solely by the wish to show how divine grace was made manifest in
-her. The reprint of her chief works and a descriptive account of the
-extant manuscript copies of her writings, and of genuine and
-supposititious works[740], have now brought the material for such an
-enquiry within reach of the student, and made it possible to obtain an
-analysis of the aims and character of a woman whose influence and
-popularity were far-reaching, and on whom later ages in recognition of her
-powers have bestowed the epithet of the 'Sibyl of the Rhine[741].'
-
-It remains to cast a glance at the writings of Elisabeth, the nun at
-Schoenau, who contemporaneously with Hildegard was held to be divinely
-inspired, and who, 'while Hildegard acted as adviser to Emperor and Pope,
-in humbler wise influenced the clergy and the people[742].' In later ages
-the names of Hildegard and Elisabeth were frequently coupled together, and
-their efforts to rouse the representatives of the Church to greater
-consciousness of their responsibilities were looked upon as a proof of
-God's wish to restore the supreme influence of the Church. The nun
-Elisabeth dwelt in the women's convent which was attached to the
-Benedictine monastery of Schoenau in the diocese of Trier. She went there
-in 1141 at a youthful age, and in 1157 she became lady superior
-(magistra). Her brother Ekbert ([Dagger] 1184) while a canon at Bonn
-frequently visited her, and it was through her persuasion that he finally
-became a monk at Schoenau. He was a writer of some importance, well known
-for his exhortations against the heretic Cathari; he had been educated
-with Reinald von Dassel, afterwards archbishop of Coeln, and with him
-adhered to the cause of the Emperor and the Antipope Victor. Elisabeth was
-inspired by similar political sympathies. For unlike Hildegard, who was an
-ardent supporter of Pope Alexander, Elisabeth was favourably inclined
-towards his opponent Pope Victor--a preference which laid her open to
-calumny.
-
-The 'Visions' of Elisabeth came to her between 1152 and 1160, and we are
-told that they were sent her in the first place for her own comfort,
-direction and enlightenment. They are grouped together in three books, but
-there is a later work entitled 'On the ways of God,' which is sometimes
-referred to as a fourth book of the visions[743]. She also wrote
-'Revelations on the holy band of Virgins at Coeln.' Her collected works
-fill the smaller half of a moderately sized volume.
-
-It is supposed that Elisabeth was helped by her fellow-nuns to put the
-visions of the first books into writing, and that her brother Ekbert
-assisted in their circulation. The manuscript from which they were
-published contains an introduction by Ekbert written after he had become
-abbot at Schoenau (1167), in which he says he has collected (conscripsi)
-these writings and other things that have reference to them, and that he
-has translated into Latin what happened to be in German[744].
-
-The first book of the 'Visions' contains short accounts of how on certain
-festal days during religious service Elisabeth, who was delicate and apt
-to get excited at the mention of certain saints, asserts she saw them
-before her bodily. It is described how she was liable at any time to fall
-into trances, in which she lost consciousness of what happened around her.
-In the second and third books the accounts of the visions are fuller and
-more elaborate; they contain interesting bits of imagery and symbolism,
-and give us occasional glimpses of the daily life in the convent. It is
-curious to note how the fancied visions of the nun were in various
-particulars accepted by her contemporaries as manifestations of the divine
-will. The party in the Church, who were desirous of establishing the
-'Assumption of the Virgin' as a recognised festival, greeted Elisabeth's
-vision of this incident[745] with enthusiasm. Other festivals of the
-Church, for example that of Corpus Christi, owed their general acceptance
-to inspired visions of nuns. For the emotional yearning of the age found
-relief in representations of religious ideas, and the Church readily
-ministered to the desire by elaborating the cult of relics and
-saint-worship.
-
-It is thought that Elisabeth's book 'On the ways of God[746]' was written
-after she became acquainted with the 'Scivias' of Hildegard, and her title
-looks like an imitation[747]. This work consists also of visions, but
-these are given in the form of admonitions (sermones) addressed to
-different classes of society; the work is wonderfully complete in plan and
-execution. In simple and direct language men are urged to mend their ways,
-and to listen to the admonitions which the Angel of the Lord has
-vouchsafed to them through the mouth of the nun.
-
-In this book Elisabeth sees the summit of a lofty mountain, on which
-stands a man whose face is luminous, whose eyes shine like stars and from
-whose mouth goes forth a sword. She sees three paths leading up this hill;
-one is blue, another green, and the third purple. The blue path indicates
-the use of contemplation, the green of action, and the purple of
-martyrdom. But afterwards other paths appear which also lead up the hill
-towards heaven: these are the paths of married people (conjugatorum), of
-celibates (continentium), of prelates (prelatorum), of widows
-(viduatorum), of hermits (heremitarum), of young people (adolescentum et
-juvenum) and of children (infantum).
-
-'I was resting on my bed but not asleep,' says Elisabeth, speaking of
-those who have chosen a life of contemplation[748], 'when the Angel
-(spiritus) of the Lord visited me of a sudden and inspired me to speak as
-follows: "Give heed, you, who have renounced worldly pleasures and who
-have chosen to follow in the footsteps of Him who has summoned you into
-His beauteous light and who Himself calls you His chosen sons, appointing
-you to the end of time to judge the tribes of Israel. Consider among
-yourselves in what way you should live in humility, obedience, love, and
-without murmuring, without disparagement, jealousy and pride, and take
-heed that you keep yourselves from other vices! Love one another, that
-your Father in heaven be not blasphemed in you and be not roused to anger
-at your leaving your path, the path of contemplation!" Then the Angel
-(angelus) of the Lord followed up his utterances by saying: "If there be
-among you wranglings, quarrels, disparagements, complaints, anger, hatred
-and jealousy, spiritual pride (extollencia oculorum), desire for
-advancement, boasting, ribaldry, gluttony, laziness, incontinence,
-idleness and such like, in all of which you walk on, sons of this world,
-what place do you give to divine contemplation?" And again he spoke and
-said: "This exhortation of God is addressed to you who have chosen to
-serve God whether in the clerical or in the monastic profession. You have
-chosen the best part, but take heed lest it slip from you. Studiously
-avoid the sinfulness of those who outwardly bear the semblance of
-religion, but shame its worth by their actions. With their lips they
-honour God; by their ways they blaspheme Him. Some of them strive for
-knowledge of the law, but they know not how to apply it. They turn their
-back on truth, and yet they boast of moving in the path of contemplation.
-They make the law of God and their advocacy of it serve their pride,
-avarice and desires, and from those who dwell in Jesus Christ they boldly
-snatch wealth and honours, and cherish their foulness. The sanctuary of
-God, and places to be hallowed by angels, they visit with pride and
-pollution, and raise the adorable treasures of Christ's sacrament in
-irreverent ministration with impure hearts. They jeer at him who rebukes
-them and sadden him with contempt and persecution. Those among them who
-are less wicked, are yet hateful before the Lord. For they walk about with
-the semblance of humility, but their hearts are far removed from it. They
-multiply words, but of what use are these when in their hearts they oppose
-God, neglect brotherly love, envy and disparage others, and wrangle about
-position? They profess contempt of the world, but worship that which is of
-the world, strut about boldly, and yield to every gust of their desires.
-They have cast aside the customs of their fathers; they engage in the
-business of this world and fill the Church with wranglings. Thus religion
-suffers contempt, and faith is divided. But why should I enlarge on such
-doings, saith the Lord? A shout is raised against them, but they listen
-not and repudiate my voice of admonition in contempt...."'
-
-And it is not only those of the religious profession whom the nun
-admonishes. The address to married people[749] is especially interesting,
-not only on account of her conception of the mutual obligations of husband
-and wife, claiming obedience from the wife and respect for his wife's
-feelings from the husband, but because she vehemently attacks women's love
-of dress and men's love of indulgence. The Angel of God informs Elisabeth
-that now-a-days men in large numbers degrade their desires to the level of
-women's folly, and are foolish enough to adapt themselves to women's
-stupidity. 'The love of dress, which thou dost hate and despise in the
-women of the world who come to thee, has grown apace on earth, and has
-become a madness, and brings down the wrath of God. They delight in
-walking about, their steps hampered by the mass of their garments, and
-they try to wear out to no profit what the poor sorely need. O
-wretchedness, O blindness!'
-
-It is in the course of this exhortation that Elisabeth consults the Angel
-about the heretic Cathari[750], who she states are said to reject marriage
-while teaching at the same time that only those marriages are valid where
-both parties have preserved their virginity. The Angel cannot deny that
-such marriages are most acceptable to God, but declares that they are
-rare. Yet he announces that the leaders of that sect are of Satan. 'Then,'
-the nun continues, 'I said, "Lord, what and of what kind is their faith?"
-He answered: "Their faith is contemptible, their works are worse." And I
-said: "Yet they have the appearance of just men and are praised as men of
-good works." "Truly," he replied, "they put on an appearance of just and
-innocent living, through which they attract and convert many, and yet
-inwardly they are full of the worst madness."' Considering that nothing is
-known of these early dissenters except what their opponents have
-preserved, these remarks are interesting as showing that though Hildegard
-treated the Cathari with unhesitating contempt Elisabeth was perplexed
-about them.
-
-Another exhortation addressed to the ministers of the Church is eloquent
-in its attacks on the overbearing conduct of the clergy, and on the way
-they neglect their flocks. Widows are then admonished to cultivate peace
-of mind and to reflect only on spiritual joys, and hermits are urged not
-to carry their self-denying practices to extremes, since immoderate
-fasting is productive of no good results. The book seems originally to
-have ended here, for the last two exhortations are evidently the result of
-an afterthought. In the first of these young people are recommended to
-cultivate seriousness of mind, and the second treats of young children,
-but only in a vague way, for their parents are said to be chiefly
-responsible for their behaviour. The book ends with a paragraph to the
-effect that the angel appeared and addressed the bishops of Trier, Coeln
-and Mainz telling them to amend their ways and accept the contents of the
-book. 'Read them, and hearken to their divine admonitions,' it says[751],
-'and receive them with an equable mind. Do not think they be the
-fabrications of a woman, for they are not; they have come through God, the
-Almighty Father, who is the source and origin of all goodness.'
-
-It must have been some time after she had begun to write visions that
-Elisabeth wrote the following letter to Hildegard. It is preserved in the
-third book of her visions, and also in the correspondence of Hildegard,
-together with the reply sent to it[752].
-
-'What you said had been revealed to you concerning me, I now write to
-confirm; a cloud of distrust has come over my mind owing to the foolish
-sayings of some people who are ever talking of me; they are not true. The
-talk of the people I can easily bear, but not of those who wear clerical
-garb, they bitterly oppress my spirit. For goaded on, at whose instigation
-I know not, they ridicule the grace of God that is within me, and do not
-hesitate rashly to condemn what they do not understand. I hear that
-certain letters written in their spirit are circulating under my name.
-They accuse me of having prophesied concerning the Day of Judgment, which
-I surely never have presumed to do, as knowledge of its advent is denied
-to mortal man.' She goes on to explain how the angel of God had repeatedly
-appeared to her, saying that the time for contrition and repentance had
-come, and how she had spoken of this to others. But now a letter is
-circulated, full of threats against the abbot. In her distress she begs
-that Hildegard will accept this explanation, offer prayers in her behalf
-and write her some words of consolation.
-
-In her reply to this letter Hildegard admits Elisabeth's power of
-prophecy. She also is a trumpet through which the blasts of divine
-admonition become audible. Another letter addressed to Hildegard by
-Elisabeth shows that they remained in communication[753], though their
-different church and political sympathies naturally precluded a closer
-connection.
-
-The last book Elisabeth wrote added greatly to her fame. It consists of
-'Revelations on the holy band of virgins of Coeln[754],' the companions and
-fellow-martyrs of St Ursula, the origin of which legend is shrouded in
-some obscurity[755]. The story current in Elisabeth's time in various
-versions states that in the 3rd century Ursula, a British princess, went
-on pilgrimage to Rome with 11,000 virgin companions, and that on their
-journey homewards these virgins together with many followers were murdered
-at Coeln, either by the Huns or some other heathen tribes. The name Ursula,
-however, does not occur in any of the ancient martyrologies, and therefore
-may be a latter-day addition to the story, while the extraordinary number
-of her companions is held to have originated through misreading an
-inscription which refers to eleven martyred virgins (XI M. V.). History
-speaks of virgin martyrs at Coeln at an early date.
-
-In 1156 a quantity of bones were found in an ancient cemetery outside
-Coeln, and this led to the revival of the story, which now assumed gigantic
-proportions. The relics of one of the virgins named Cordula were brought
-to Schoenau by Ekbert. Elisabeth's imagination was roused, the progress of
-St Ursula, various incidents of her journey and the character of many of
-her companions, were made manifest to her in a series of visions by St
-Verena, also one of the band, who repeatedly appeared to Elisabeth and
-divinely enlightened her on various points in dispute. With the help of
-this saint Elisabeth felt enabled to explain how Pope Cyriacus (otherwise
-unknown to history) came to be of the party; how it was that archbishops,
-cardinals and a king of England accompanied these women, and what caused
-one of the band to bury, with some of the dead, tablets inscribed with
-their names, which tablets had come to light at Coeln. The whole account,
-which Elisabeth promulgated in good faith, and which her contemporaries
-had no hesitation in accepting as genuine, forms a most interesting
-example of mediaeval religious romance. It teems with chronological and
-historical impossibilities: apart from these it bears the stamp of
-truthfulness. It is pure romance, but it is romance set forth in a spirit
-of conviction and with a circumstantiality of detail thoroughly convincing
-to the uncritical mind.
-
-Throughout the Rhine district these visions were greeted with acclamation.
-They were welcome for two reasons; they increased the interest and traffic
-in the relics at Coeln, and they fell in with current traditions and
-encouraged the revived local worship of the three women-saints. The names
-of these were now connected with that of St Ursula[756], and the legend of
-St Ursula became the centre of many floating traditions, and has
-proportionately attracted the attention of the hagiologist and the
-folk-lore student. Eleven thousand became the accepted number of Ursula's
-followers and the compilers of the _Acta Sanctorum_ have actually
-succeeded in making out a list containing over seven hundred names[757].
-
-In literature the version of the legend as told by Elisabeth was accepted
-in preference to earlier versions, and became popular not only in Germany,
-but also in England and France, especially in Normandy. In England both
-the legend and the visions were known as early as 1181 through Roger, a
-monk of the Cistercian abbey at Forde in Devonshire. It is thought that he
-came into personal contact with Elisabeth at Schoenau, and references are
-sometimes made to him as the compiler of the 'Visions' and as the author
-of the legend of the band of 11,000 virgins[758].
-
-Elisabeth died in 1164 at the early age of thirty-six, and her brother
-Ekbert, who was staying with her at the time, wrote a full account of the
-last days of her life to three nuns of the convent of St Thomas at
-Andernach[759]. In this letter he describes Elisabeth's thoughtful care
-and tenderness to her companions on her deathbed, and says that she was
-more than a sister to him and that his grief is proportionally greater.
-Like Hildegard Elisabeth has never been officially canonized, but her name
-also was inscribed in the Roman Martyrology compiled by Gregory VIII, by
-which she became a recognised saint of the Church[760].
-
-A later age witnessed other notable nuns who were divinely inspired and
-who were acknowledged to be so by their contemporaries, but, as we shall
-see later, their communings with God and the saints were chiefly directed
-to intensifying mystic and devotional feelings in themselves. They have
-neither the hold on outside events nor the wide outlook which give such a
-deep interest to the writings of St Hildegard of Bingen and St Elisabeth
-of Schoenau.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Women-Saints connected with Charity and Philanthropy.
-
-The last section showed how earnestly the religious teachers of the 12th
-century advocated a stricter practice of the precepts of religion. The
-practical outcome of this advocacy was an increased consciousness among
-those of the upper and authoritative classes of society of the needs and
-sufferings of humbler folk, and an extraordinary development of pity and
-tenderness for suffering generally. It can be noticed that everywhere
-there sprang into life the desire to help those who were in distress, and
-to cultivate that love and sympathy which is indifferent to rank, degree
-and antecedents, and especially so with regard to the diseased, despised
-and shunned.
-
-The representative figures of this movement during the 13th century are St
-Francis of Assisi ([Dagger] 1226) and St Elisabeth of Thueringen ([Dagger]
-1231), whose fame will abide wherever the precepts of Christianity in the
-direction of unselfishness and charitable zeal are cherished. The tendency
-to renounce all worldly possessions, which was a feature of the 13th
-century, culminated in them, and their example was followed by many men
-and women who on account of their altruistic sympathies are numbered among
-the saints. Since the practical outcome of their efforts carries in itself
-the beginnings of our modern charitable institutions of hospital,
-almshouse and infirmary, their work is well worth a somewhat detailed
-account, but such an account must necessarily be preceded by a few general
-remarks on the development of charitable zeal in the course of history.
-
-From the earliest period Christian teachers had championed the cause of
-the poor and afflicted, and had upheld the sanctity of human life as such,
-whether in the aged, the crippled, or the unborn. Moreover the Church
-throughout ministered to poverty by almsgiving, and looked upon the
-destitute as having a special claim on her care. At two distinct periods
-in history these self-imposed duties were specially requisite--at the
-breaking up of the Roman Empire, and at the collapse of the feudal
-system. For under the Roman social system slavery had been a safeguard
-against vagrancy, but when slavery was discontinued the class of homeless
-outcasts became numerous. And again under the feudal system men belonged
-to the soil they were born on, but in proportion as serfdom ceased,
-beggars, and especially the diseased, increased to a great extent. In both
-instances efforts to stay the consequent evils to society were made by all
-professing Christians, but the attitudes of the 5th and the 12th centuries
-have distinct points of difference which it is well to bear in mind.
-
-Glancing back along the vistas of time to the 5th century we find Severin
-bishop of Noricum ([Dagger] 482) instituting a regular and far-reaching
-system of charitable relief which has been described by his disciple
-Eugippius[761]. In connection with Magnericus of Trier ([Dagger] 596), the
-famous opposer of idolatrous practices, the newly-developed virtues of
-this period are thus summed up by his biographer, the monk Eberwein
-([Dagger] 1047)[762]: 'With him (Magnericus) the hungry found bread, the
-traveller found shelter, the naked found clothing, the weary found rest,
-and the stranger found hopefulness.' We see that the efforts of these men
-were directed to ministering to poverty but not to disease, for the
-prevalent attitude of Christian society towards disease continued for some
-centuries strongly self-preservative. The poor were fed, but the diseased
-were shunned, especially those who were visibly disfigured, and who
-included the vast class of those who from the 11th century were currently
-spoken of as lepers (leprosi).
-
-The homogeneity of the disease _lepra_ in this application has been called
-into question, and it has been shown that the 'lepers' of the Middle Ages
-included those suffering from cutaneous eruption brought on by St
-Anthony's fire, from gangrene of the limbs, such as comes through
-protracted use of bread containing rye spurred or diseased with ergot, and
-from other diseases which produce visible disfigurement. Scant provision
-was made for such people during early Christian ages, and lepers were
-numbered among social outcasts, not from fear of contagion--that was a
-comparatively late idea--but simply from a wish on the part of society to
-be spared a sorry sight. The diseased member of a family was a visible
-burden to his relations, and finding himself despised and shunned by his
-associates he took refuge with outlaws, who herded together and lived in
-a state of filth, misery and moral degradation terrible to recall.
-
-It is in the treatment of these unfortunate people that the 12th century
-witnessed a revolution. The efforts of a few large-souled individuals
-overcame the general disgust felt towards disease, the restraints of a
-more barbarous age were broken through, the way to deal with the evil was
-pointed out, and gradually its mitigation was accomplished. The task these
-people set themselves, as so often happens in the course of social reform,
-absorbed them so entirely that they thought no sacrifice too great when it
-was a question of carrying out their ideas. It seems therefore rather
-gratuitous on the part of the modern scientist to say that a 'halo of
-morbid exaggeration surrounded the idea of leprosy in the mediaeval
-religious mind. We live in a time of saner and better proportioned
-sentiment,' etc.[763] In point of fact an evil is removed only by putting
-it for a time into strong relief, when it comes to be rightly dealt with
-and so is gradually checked. In early Christian times nothing was done for
-diseased people and lepers, but in the 12th and 13th centuries first
-individuals, then the masses, became interested in them. It mattered
-little that vagrants of the worst kind felt encouraged to call themselves
-lepers because as such they could excite more pity, could gain admission
-into hospitals, or were allowed to solicit alms under royal patronage. The
-movement once set going in the right direction steadily did its work: and
-the class of lepers so prominent in the 11th and 12th centuries were
-rapidly disappearing by the end of the 13th[764].
-
-From the earliest period monasteries and church centres offered some
-alleviation for the sick and distressed, but their resources were at first
-intended for the relief of those who belonged to the settlement. The
-peaceful pursuits and regular occupations of the monk naturally prolonged
-his term of life, and as Christianity set great store by a peaceful and
-happy death, when feebleness and sickness crept on the member of a convent
-he was relieved from his duties and tended in an outhouse by a brother
-told off for the purpose. The guest-house of the settlement, called
-_hospitalis_, generally stood near this outhouse for the sick, but
-sometimes it was identical with it, and the pilgrims and travellers who
-were ill were nursed with the convent inmates. While these combined houses
-for guests and invalids, attached to convents, were numerous from the
-first, the foundation of shelters intended primarily for strangers took
-place comparatively late. Among them must be numbered the shelters
-designated as hospitals (hospitales), founded in outlying districts for
-the reception of pilgrims (pro susceptione peregrinorum) such as the Pope
-urged Karl the Great ([Dagger] 814) to keep up in the Alps[765]. Pilgrims
-were always an object of solicitude to the Church, and it was in their
-interest that the earliest independent road-side shelters and hospitals in
-cities were founded. These shelters and hospitals often consisted of no
-more than the protection of a roof, and the proctor, or brothers and
-sisters who voluntarily took charge of the house, secured the needful
-sustenance for themselves and those seeking their aid by going about
-begging.
-
-The impulse to found these rests or hospitals naturally emanated from
-Rome, from a very early date the site of pilgrimages, but a new impulse
-was given to the movement by the foundation of two important guest-houses
-at Jerusalem in the 11th century, when that city also was a frequent
-resort of pilgrims. Of these two guest-houses or hospitals[766], one was
-intended for men and placed under the management of men, the other was for
-women and placed under the management of women. They were arranged
-according to an elaborate system which is interesting in many ways. The
-men were divided into three classes--the knights who looked after the
-interests of the house, the priests who attended to the sick, and the
-lay-brothers who assisted in the same work. The knights formed themselves
-into the religious order of St John, from the name of the church near
-which their headquarters lay. Similarly the women's house, which was near
-the chapel of St Mary Magdalen, consisted of ladies, nuns and lay
-servants. The fact that St John and St Mary Magdalen were so often adopted
-as patron saints of similar houses elsewhere was due to the chance
-connection of these saints with the hospitals at Jerusalem.
-
-Looking after pilgrims and nursing the sick constituted the chief work of
-the order at Jerusalem, but after the conquest of that city in 1187, when
-the knights removed to Malta and the ladies to Spain, the care of those
-not belonging to their body ceased to hold the foremost place. But the
-existence of the hospitals at Jerusalem and the attention they had
-attracted in the different countries of Europe, where grants of land had
-been made for their support, indirectly stimulated efforts in favour of
-the foundation of similar shelters or hospitals.
-
-The first idea of independent hospitals came into England from Rome, when
-Archbishop Lanfranc ([Dagger] 1089), a native of Italy, founded two
-hospitals in the true sense of the word, one inside, one outside
-Canterbury. The one situated inside the city walls is described by the
-historian Eadmer ([Dagger] 1124) in the following terms[767]. 'He divided
-it into two parts; men who were sick in various ways inhabited the one,
-women the other part. He gave to them clothes of his own and daily
-sustenance; and ordered that there should be servants and masters who were
-to take care they should want nothing; the men had no access to the women,
-nor the women to the men.' A chapel was built on the other side of the way
-and given into the care of canons, who were to attend to the spiritual
-needs of the sick and to see to their burial after death.
-
-The other hospital founded by Lanfranc was at Herbaltown, in the woods of
-Blean, a mile away from Canterbury; it was for those who were afflicted
-with scrofula (regia valetudine fluentibus), and who at a later date, in
-the confirming charter of Henry II, are styled lepers (leprosi)[768].
-
-These accounts of Lanfranc's foundations are especially interesting as
-they give us some of the earliest well-authenticated indications of a
-changed attitude towards lepers, and anticipate the efforts made in their
-behalf in the 12th century by the founders of the orders of combined
-canons and nuns, and in the 13th century by a number of women who on this
-account are numbered among the saints. These women, as we shall see, not
-only felt interested in these unfortunate beings but unhesitatingly tended
-them with their own hands. They knew nothing of the disgust usually felt
-towards wretchedness and poverty, and found their life's happiness in
-vanquishing sordidness and filth. In the eyes of some of their
-contemporaries they were chiefly bent on seeking sorry sights and coveting
-painful experiences, but, apart from the appreciation they found among
-those to whom they directly ministered, others were generous enough to
-recognise the heroism of their efforts.
-
-Among these women must be numbered Matilda ([Dagger] 1118) the wife of
-Henry I of England, the daughter of St Margaret and the sister of St David
-of Scotland, whose education and marriage have been discussed above in
-connection with Romsey. Highly as Matilda was esteemed by her
-contemporaries, she has never been accepted as a saint, and no day is
-given to her in the Calendar. This omission is perhaps due to the fact
-that she left her nunnery against the wishes of some of the clergy,
-perhaps owing to her husband's quarrels with the Pope, for Matilda was
-beloved by high and low and early writers are unanimous in praise of her.
-Map speaks of her as the holy queen Matilda (sanctae Matildis
-reginae)[769].
-
-This estimate is based on the fact that Matilda was so moved by pity
-towards lepers that she overcame the repugnance commonly felt towards
-them. A well-authenticated story is told of how her brother David, coming
-into her apartment, found it full of lepers. She proceeded to lay aside
-her robe and with a towel girt about her washed and dried their feet and
-then kissed them, and when her brother objected she replied that in
-kissing the feet of lepers she was kissing the feet of the Eternal King.
-Ailred of Rievaux recounts the story, which he had from David, who
-repeatedly spoke of it to him[770].
-
-This generous disposition is borne out by the fact that soon after her
-marriage Matilda founded the hospital of St Giles in the East for the
-maintenance of forty lepers, a chaplain, a clerk and a messenger[771]. It
-was commonly known for a long time afterwards as the hospital of Matilda.
-It was founded in 1101, and Matthew Paris saw it a hundred and fifty years
-later and made a sketch of it which is still extant[772]. With the
-exception of the house founded by Lanfranc in Herbaltown, the inmates of
-which were not styled lepers at the time, the hospital of St Giles, the
-foundation of 'good Queen Maud,' was the first institution of its kind in
-England and for a long time remained quite the most important.
-
-But we must study the records of foreign countries to find the majority of
-those women who were actively beneficent to the sick, and who for this
-reason are officially accepted as saints. Probably leprosy, or the
-diseases collected under this designation, showed greater virulence on the
-Continent than they ever did in England, and the miseries of those who
-were repulsively disfigured were extreme, when in the first half of the
-13th century a small group of women personally related to each other took
-pity on them. The field of their labours was in Central and South Germany
-and the adjoining countries, which were at that time brought under German
-influence.
-
-All the women who were actuated by this new philanthropic spirit were
-members, either by birth or marriage, of the powerful and influential
-family of the Counts of Andechs and Meran[773]. The scientist Virchow has
-remarked that this family, which was once most prosperous and widely
-spread, practically extinguished itself through its extreme ascetic
-tendencies[774]. Its men joined the Crusades, and any who returned
-dedicated their sons to the celibacy of the bishopric and their daughters
-to that of the cloister; and in this way the family ceased to exist after
-a few generations.
-
-Whence the first impulse towards charitable deeds came to them we know
-not, but we find them sometimes taking the initiative in philanthropic
-enterprises, and sometimes uniting their efforts to those of others who
-were working on similar lines to their own. Some members of the family
-acted as patrons to the Cistercian order,--others invited and encouraged
-the settlement of the Teutonic or Red Cross Knights in their lands. Others
-again were strongly attracted by the teachings of the Dominican and
-Franciscan friars, who were very influential in the first half of the 13th
-century. Various tendencies were represented in the different countries of
-Europe by the followers of St Francis of Assisi. This divergence arose
-partly because the rule of life promulgated in 1209 was supplanted by
-another in 1221, and partly from the varied interests of each country. In
-South Germany it was the influence of the Franciscans which primarily
-encouraged charitable zeal and self-denial.
-
-Hedwig, daughter of Count Berthold, of the family of Andechs and Meran,
-first claims our attention on account of her charitable deeds. She married
-Heinrich the Bearded ([Dagger] 1238), first duke of Silesia, Poland and
-Croatia. These districts were occupied by people of the Slav race, and it
-was at this time that they were first brought into contact with German
-influence and civilization. Christianity had been introduced in the 12th
-century, but there were very few churches, and the conditions of life
-were unsettled and insecure owing to the continued feuds of the barons.
-Heinrich checked internal dissensions with a high hand; he was zealous in
-introducing German law and in encouraging German immigration, and in this
-way gave solidarity to this part of the Empire. His marriage with the
-daughter of a family which was among the wealthiest and most influential
-in South Germany is a proof of his German sympathies.
-
-Hedwig is the recognised patron saint of Silesia. Gruenhagen says[775]: 'If
-we call to mind how far the numerous churches and charitable foundations
-which are referred to the Duchess Hedwig influenced civilization at that
-period, how the monks and nuns whom Hedwig summoned spread German culture
-in these districts; if we further remember how powerfully at that time the
-example of unselfish piety and sympathy, emanating from the throne, took
-hold of the mind of the people; we shall be obliged to accept as well
-founded the veneration Hedwig generally enjoyed, although we may not feel
-attracted by the traits of exaggerated asceticism insisted on by her
-legend.'
-
-Hedwig[776] was born in 1174 and sent for her education to Kizzingen, an
-ancient convent foundation situated in Franken on property belonging to
-her family. In 1186, when not yet thirteen, she was taken from the convent
-to be married. She brought with her into Silesia a dower of thirty
-thousand marks, which was forthwith devoted to religious and charitable
-purposes, for Hedwig appears throughout to have been filled by the belief,
-which she shared with her husband, that religious settlements and colonies
-were alone capable of introducing culture and establishing civilization in
-the land.
-
-The monastic orders had only recently gained a foothold in these
-districts. In 1139 a band of Benedictine monks had settled near Breslau,
-the centre of the country, and in 1175 at the instigation of Boleslaus,
-the father of Hedwig's husband, some Cistercians had come to Leubus. These
-Cistercians were now helpful in constructing a nunnery at Trebnitz near
-Breslau, which Hedwig founded soon after her marriage. She summoned
-thither nuns from the Cistercian nunnery at Bamberg, where her sister
-Mathilde, afterwards abbess of Kizzingen, was being educated, and
-entrusted the rule of the new convent to Pietrussa ([Dagger] 1214), a nun
-from the convent of Kizzingen. The abbess and convent of Trebnitz are
-mentioned as early as 1202. The house was intended to promote education
-among girls of both noble and lowly parentage, and among them was Agnes,
-daughter of the king of Bohemia, of whom we shall hear more. It soon
-numbered a hundred inmates, and at the time when Hedwig's life was
-written, that is towards the close of the 13th century, it contained a
-hundred and twenty women.
-
-This life of Hedwig, written some time after her death, emphasizes the
-ascetic habits which she embraced, and in agreement with later
-descriptions and pictures represents her as an emaciated person worn thin
-by self-denial and fasting. On the other hand the representation of her on
-her sarcophagus, which is of an earlier date, represents her as a
-vigorous, massive and comely woman[777]. The account of her life shows
-that she advocated new ideas throughout. 'By marrying,' it says, 'she
-followed her parents' will rather than her own, as is clearly manifest
-from what followed, for she checked herself by self-restraint. Bound by
-the sacrament she was determined to live her married life as the apostle
-has taught, keeping his precepts of marriage worthily. She hoped to secure
-eternal life by giving birth to children, yet she wished also to please
-God by chastity, and with her husband's consent practised self-restraint.
-Whenever she was aware that the duties of motherhood were beginning, she
-avoided her husband's proximity, and firmly denied herself all intercourse
-until the time of her confinement. She did so from the time of first
-becoming a mother, that is at the age of thirteen years and thirteen
-weeks, and under like circumstances ever behaved in the same way. When she
-had become the mother of three sons, Boleslaus, Konrad, and Heinrich, and
-of three daughters, Agnes, Sophie, and Gertrud, she altogether embraced a
-life of chastity. The like observation of chastity in marriage which
-Mother Church has sanctioned she pressed upon every one she could.' Her
-conduct appears to have had her husband's sanction. Heinrich's sympathies
-are apparent in his granting property to the Cistercians for a monastery
-called after him Heinrichsau, in founding an important hospital in Breslau
-dedicated to the Holy Ghost, and in making a foundation for canons at
-Neumarkt, where he erected an important leper hospital[778]. During one
-of the wars which he engaged in, he was taken prisoner by the heathen
-Prussians, and the story is told how his wife, indifferent to every
-danger, went to him and procured his release.
-
-It was in connection with the lepers who were sheltered at Neumarkt that
-Hedwig's conduct appeared especially wonderful to her contemporaries. Her
-biographer tells us that she had taken into her special care the leprous
-women who lived there, 'so that she sent them money, food and game
-(ferinas) several times a week, and gave them liberally clothes and other
-necessaries of life, taking care of them as though they had been her own
-daughters. With wonderful tenderness she attended upon those who were
-afflicted with bodily ills, and her affections melted towards the poor and
-infirm, whom she tended with great love and helpfulness.'
-
-A series of paintings in miniature were executed at an early date which
-set forth the work of the pious Hedwig and of which a copy made in 1353 is
-extant[779]. It forms a valuable monument of early painting, and in
-archaeological interest compares favourably with the work of Herrad. In
-these pictures we repeatedly see Hedwig in the company of the Trebnitz
-nuns. In one picture she leads the nuns into the convent, in another she
-shows them the church, and in a third she waits on them. They are
-represented as surrounding her in her trials and at her death, and as
-laying her in her tomb. In these pictures the nuns wear grey or blue gowns
-and a black headdress, no wimples (which are worn by lay women), and they
-do not seem to share the same dwelling, but to inhabit separate small huts
-which are pictured standing side by side round the church. Hedwig herself
-wears simple clothing but no convent garb. In these pictures a legendary
-reading is given to some incidents of her life. For example she is
-represented as surrounded in her hours of tribulation by hairy and
-grotesque demons.
-
-A large number of these pictures show Hedwig's charitable zeal. There is
-one in which she is depicted urging upon her husband the cause of the
-poor; again she makes the gift of a house to them; she washes and kisses
-the feet of lepers; she feeds the sick, who are seen lying in bed; she
-gives food to the poor; she ministers to a prisoner; and she distributes
-gifts among pilgrims. Men who are in the stocks and doomed to death also
-rouse her pity; and she insists on feeding the poor with her own hands
-before she can be persuaded to sit down to meals. In these pictures we
-note the scarred and blotched appearance of those who are designated as
-lepers, the wretched appearance of the poor, and the curiously low type of
-countenance of all the beggars.
-
-In her family relations Hedwig was most unfortunate, and one can but hope
-that her charitable zeal brought her solace or that the different basis on
-which family life then rested made her feel the sad fate of her relations
-less acutely than she would otherwise have done. Her sister Agnes married
-Philippe Auguste, king of France (1180-1223), but she was repudiated in
-consequence of the Pope's attack on the validity of her marriage, and died
-in misery in 1201. Her other sister Gertrud, who was the mother of St
-Elisabeth of Thueringen, married Bela III of Hungary, and was assassinated
-in 1214. Hedwig's daughter Gertrud was betrothed to Otto von Wittelsbach,
-who in consequence of political intrigues was tempted to murder Philip,
-king of Swabia, in 1208. Heinrich and Ekbert, Hedwig's two brothers, were
-accused of being his accomplices, and the consequence was that Heinrich
-saw his castle destroyed and lived for years in banishment, and Ekbert,
-who was bishop of Bamberg (1203-37), was obliged to fly, though he was
-afterwards reinstated in his see. When Otto the king-murderer was dead,
-Gertrud, his prospective bride, entered the nunnery at Trebnitz, where she
-afterwards succeeded Pietrussa as abbess.
-
-In the year 1216, however, Hedwig had the joy of seeing her son Heinrich,
-who reigned conjointly with his father, married to Anna, a princess of
-Bohemia, whose tendencies were quite in accordance with her own. Indeed
-Anna's zeal was carried yet a step farther in the direction of
-self-imposed lowliness and humility, she readily submitted to bodily
-chastisement. She has no place among the saints, but we are in possession
-of an early account of her[780] which speaks in great praise of her
-charitable deeds. Conjointly with her husband Anna made several religious
-foundations, and greeted the Dominican and Franciscan friars as brothers
-in the Lord. Inmates of the nunnery of the order of St Francis, which she
-had founded at Breslau, spoke with enthusiasm of her goodness and charity.
-She too nursed the leprous with her own hands, distributed food among the
-poor, and was to 'forlorn children and orphans a protector and a mother.'
-
-History has preserved an account of the courageous manner in which she
-opposed the Tartars, at whose invasion of Breslau, she, her mother-in-law
-Hedwig, and Gertrud, the abbess of Trebnitz, fled to Crossen. Anna's
-husband was killed by the enemy and his head was set on a stake outside
-the town to induce her to surrender, but in vain. After the defeat of the
-Tartars the women returned to Breslau, where they found their nunnery
-utterly deserted. The nuns had fled, and years passed before the
-settlement regained its standing--Hedwig bestowed her property Schawoine
-on it in the hope that this would help it to recover.
-
-Hedwig spent the last years of her life in close connection with Trebnitz.
-She died in 1243 and as early as 1267 was canonized by Pope Clement IV.
-Her daughter-in-law, Anna, lived to a great age, and to the end of her
-days remained interested in her convent and charitable foundations. In
-1253 she founded a hospital at Kreuzberg on the model of one previously
-founded by her cousin St Elisabeth. This hospital and the one founded at
-Neumarkt by Hedwig are still in existence, but the nunneries founded by
-these women have long since passed away.
-
-The movement Hedwig had inaugurated in Silesia forthwith made itself felt
-in wider circles, and we find the princess Agnes of Bohemia, Anna's
-sister, who had lived for several years at Trebnitz, advocating after her
-return to Prague practices similar to those with which she had come into
-contact in Silesia. Agnes also is a saint of the Church[781], and her fame
-rests on her charitable works and on her indifference to position and
-possessions in comparison with the relief of suffering humanity. She is
-moreover a virgin saint. For she was to have married the emperor Friedrich
-II ([Dagger] 1250) against her wish, when her father opportunely died,
-leaving her free to remain single. She then devoted her patrimony, which
-was considerable, to founding a nunnery at Prague together with an
-important hospital.
-
-Agnes was supported at home by her brother, the king of Bohemia, and by
-the bishop of Prague. Pope Gregory IX ([Dagger] 1241) wrote to her
-praising her resolution to remain unmarried, and Clara, the friend of St
-Francis, wrote to her from Assisi to encourage her in her devotions.
-Clara's letters are extant, and afford an interesting glimpse of the aims
-which these women set before them. In one letter Clara praises Agnes for
-refusing marriage with the 'Caesar,' and advises her rather to follow
-blessed poverty and devote herself to the mortification of the flesh.
-Again she addresses Agnes as a second Rachel, admonishing her to turn her
-thoughts to eternity, and likening her to the holy St Agnes with the
-blessed lamb[782].
-
-The Bohemian princess was further encouraged in her aims by the gift of a
-prayer-book, a veil, a platter and a drinking-cup which Clara had used.
-The accounts we have of Agnes, consisting of a longer and a shorter record
-lately printed from MSS. preserved at Prague, give a full description of
-the willing humility this holy woman practised in the convent and of the
-tenderness she showed towards the sick.
-
-'There you might see her,' says the longer account[783], 'the daughter of
-Premislaus III, king of Bohemia, lighting with her own hands the fire for
-the sisters; the sister of Wenceslaus IV, king of Bohemia, cleaning out
-the dirty rooms; the intended spouse of the emperor Friedrich II
-perspiring in the kitchen like any lowly maid. And while she did so, not
-by angry expression or stern face did she resent it; filled with joy she
-worked as a servant of Christ and proved it to those who saw her by the
-sweet expression she wore. She behaved in this way not only to those who
-were healthy, but she gladly extended her kindness to those who were ill;
-she spread soft beds for them, she carefully removed all that could
-distress eyes and nose, she prepared food with her own hands, and cooked
-it that it might be served to taste, with untiring energy, that the sick
-might be freed from ill, pains diminish, illness yield and health return.
-Such were her occupations inside the convent (parthenon), but she was not
-confined by walls. Throughout Prague her doings were apparent.' We find
-her visiting women who were sick or in trouble, and collecting, mending
-and washing the garments of lepers with her own hands.
-
-Agnes lived till 1282 and is accepted as a saint, but has never been
-officially canonized. The hospital she founded at Prague is still in
-existence.
-
-The fame of these women, great and abiding as it is in the countries they
-lived in, has not penetrated much beyond the districts which knew them
-during their lifetime. It is different with another woman-saint of the
-period who, within the span of a short life, acquired such fame that she
-ranks among the holy followers of Christianity who are the possession of
-all countries and of all ages. St Elisabeth, landgravine of Thueringen, a
-princess of Hungary, combined in a rare degree those qualities of love,
-devotion, and unselfish zeal which make Christian virtue in one aspect so
-attractive. The tendencies of those among whom her lot was cast and her
-own sad personal experiences throw her loveable qualities into even
-greater relief. All the qualities in Matilda, Hedwig, Anna, and Agnes
-which made them beloved and venerated appear to meet in Elisabeth. A
-loving wife, a pious mother, a faithful widow, the comforter of the sick
-and the protector of the poor, she stands on the threshold of a new era,
-indifferent to the prejudices of her age, regardless of its derogatory
-criticism, intent only on carrying into effect the promptings dictated by
-a keener sense of sympathy with suffering and a closer appreciation of the
-needs of others than her contemporaries could generally grasp. No
-woman-saint has attained a fame at all to be compared with hers. It has
-been computed that before the middle of this century over a hundred
-versions of her story were in existence, a number which has since been
-more than doubled. Of these accounts some are in Latin, others in French,
-English, Italian and Hungarian, the mass of them being of course in
-German. Many painters, and among them some of the greatest Italian
-masters, Botticelli, Fra Angelico, Orcagna, Memmi and Taddeo Gaddi, have
-been eager to depict incidents of her life or to introduce her into their
-pictures[784].
-
-The bulk of the literature which celebrates the name and fame of Elisabeth
-has scant importance from the historical point of view, which seeks a
-reasonable basis for her fame. For most versions of her story were
-dictated more by the wish to dwell on her piety than to encourage
-discerning appreciation of her character. Among the legendary accounts
-composed in her praise there is a poetical version of her life in
-mediaeval German, which extends over four thousand five hundred lines and
-contains much that is attractive[785]. There is also in existence a modern
-German prose version of her story which has considerable charm[786]. But
-the climax of beauty of legendary narrative is reached in her case by the
-account of her life written in French in the middle of this century by
-Montalembert[787]. It is widely read in unadorned and in sumptuous
-editions in the French original and in its German translation. On the
-other hand its exuberance of religious colouring and legendary character
-have called forth an account based solely on contemporary records, which,
-drawn with a firm hand in clear outline, gives a picture of Elisabeth's
-life less fantastic, it is true, but more discerning and more truly
-beautiful[788]. In the light of this work it becomes possible to fit the
-form of Elisabeth to the background of her age, and, by thus placing her,
-to appreciate to some extent her great and lasting importance. In a
-history of the development of philanthropic endeavour and charitable work
-no woman's figure more fitly represents the beauty of unselfish devotion.
-
-Born at Presburg in Hungary in 1207, Elisabeth was related both to St
-Hedwig of Silesia and to St Agnes of Bohemia. For her father King Andreas
-II of Hungary ([Dagger] 1235) was uncle to Agnes, while her mother Gertrud
-was sister to Hedwig, so that Elisabeth was cousin to one saint and niece
-to the other. Her mother Gertrud, like Hedwig in Silesia, had become the
-centre of a small German party in Hungary, with which their two brothers
-Count Heinrich of Andechs and Bishop Ekbert of Bamberg sought refuge after
-the murder of the king of Swabia referred to above. After several years
-Bishop Ekbert was enabled to return to his see chiefly owing to the
-influence exerted in his behalf by Hermann, landgrave of Thueringen; it was
-no doubt owing to this connection that his niece, the princess Elisabeth,
-at that time a child of four, was betrothed to the son of the landgrave.
-This took place some time in the year 1211, and she was carried from
-Hungary to the Wartburg in Thueringen, there to receive her education.
-
-At this period the customs at the court of Hungary were comparatively
-speaking uncivilized, and struggles were frequent. In 1214 Gertrud,
-Elisabeth's mother, was assassinated, a victim of the revolt of the
-Hungarians against German ascendency. Thueringen and the Wartburg on the
-contrary were the seat of the greatest refinement of which the age of
-romance in German lands proved capable. Landgrave Hermann, a prince of
-uncertain politics, but a zealous patron of art, had drawn thither the
-lyric poets of the age, whose brilliant assemblies and contests in the
-eyes of posterity are surrounded with the halo of a tournament in song.
-
-But the temper of this gay throng had apparently no charm for the
-Hungarian girl, who was chiefly conscious of the levity and laxity which
-characterized it; conscious too that this outward brilliancy could not
-compensate for the hollowness which lurked beneath. A serious girl, though
-lively at times, she did not win general favour, least of all that of the
-landgravine Sophie, her prospective mother-in-law. When the news came of
-reverses at the Hungarian court, Sophie would have broken off the match
-and sent Elisabeth home or would have placed her in a nunnery. But at this
-juncture the attraction which Ludwig, the betrothed of Elisabeth, felt
-towards her asserted itself. He was conscious of a decided preference for
-the girl, and so he informed the noble knight Vargila, who had conducted
-Elisabeth from Presburg and who all along remained the staunch advocate of
-her interests.
-
-Young Ludwig of Thueringen, a gentle and loveable character, of strict
-political integrity, is regarded as a saint on account of his numerous
-religious foundations and his tragic end. His chaplain has left an account
-of his life which throws much light on his relations to Elisabeth. He was
-left heir to his father's dominions in 1216, was declared of age by the
-emperor Friedrich II, and, in spite of the advice of his courtiers and
-against his mother's wish, clung to Elisabeth and married her in 1221, he
-being twenty and she fourteen years old at the time.
-
-The happy married relations of the youthful pair are established beyond a
-doubt. Incidents are told and points insisted on by kinsfolk and friends
-which prove affection and tenderness on both sides, and directly
-contradict the statements of interested religious writers of a later date
-who maintain that life in a convent would have been more to Elisabeth's
-taste. On the contrary, whatever thoughts Elisabeth may have had
-afterwards on the superiority of a life of sacrifice to a life of domestic
-happiness, during these years she appears as the devoted wife and loving
-mother who combines the fulfilment of domestic duties with charitable
-zeal. There is a story told of her that she used to leave the Wartburg,
-her babe in her arms, and descend into the town of Eisenach, where she
-would visit the poor and the sick. Her dress on these occasions would be
-of a simple woollen material, and on her return she would take it off and
-have it given to some poor person. We hear that she frequently travelled
-about with her husband, and that she was sorely grieved at being separated
-from him when, on the summons of the emperor, he went to Italy. It was
-during his absence there in the spring of 1226 that the famine occurred
-during which Elisabeth distributed food with so lavish a hand that the
-granaries of the castle were emptied and she herself was severely censured
-by the court party, which had no sympathy with her philanthropy. The
-number of those whom she fed is sometimes quoted as three hundred,
-sometimes as nine hundred. The number may be exaggerated, but this much is
-certain, that Elisabeth's conduct attracted attention beyond her immediate
-neighbourhood. She had also opened at Eisenach a hospital or infirmary for
-twenty-four sick people, whom she partly tended herself. Writers of a
-later date tell us that at the suggestion of Cardinal Ugolino, afterwards
-Pope Gregory IX, St Francis of Assisi, hearing of Elisabeth's charitable
-work, sent her his old cloak as a sign of appreciation; but the story
-needs corroborative evidence.
-
-When Ludwig returned from Italy his courtiers were loud in their
-complaints of his spendthrift wife, but he listened to them with
-good-humoured indifference. 'Let her continue giving to the poor if God so
-wills it,' he said, 'if but the Wartburg and the Neuburg remain to us.' He
-evidently appreciated and shared her philanthropic zeal; for he founded a
-shelter (xenodochium) for the poor, the weak and the infirm at
-Reinhardsbrunn, assisted his wife in founding a hospital at Gotha, and
-encouraged brothers of the nursing order of St Lazarus to settle in that
-part of the country[789]. The interest Elisabeth felt in social outcasts
-evidently touched a sympathetic chord in his kindly nature, even when this
-interest was carried to an extreme, the meaning and social fitness of
-which it is not easy to appreciate. For example, the story is told that
-Elisabeth when staying at Neuburg tended a leper with her own hands and
-had him placed on her husband's bed, an action which greatly shocked
-Sophie, her mother-in-law. The legend-writer of later date,--not satisfied
-with the strong impulsiveness of feeling which alone renders such an
-action possible and even under certain conditions raises it above
-criticism, and at the same time unable to grasp the reasonableness of
-Sophie's point of view,--tells us that the leper suddenly assumed the form
-of Christ, a miracle by which her doubts were confounded.
-
-In 1227 Ludwig, in answer to a summons from the emperor, took the cross
-and left for Italy, never to return. His biographer says that having
-received the cross he kept it in his pocket instead of displaying it on
-his coat, for fear of distressing his wife, who was about to give birth to
-their third child. But Elisabeth came across it by chance and was bowed
-down by grief at the thought of losing him. Together with others she
-started him and his followers on their journey, and travelled on with him
-yet another day's journey to delay the dreaded moment of separation. On
-her return to the Wartburg she devoted herself to her charitable work with
-increased zeal, and her inclination to self-denial became more accentuated
-owing to contact with members of the Franciscan order.
-
-The attempt of the Franciscan friars to gain a foothold in Germany had at
-first been frustrated. Ekbert, bishop of Bamberg, Elisabeth's uncle, was
-the first to give them a gracious reception. From Bamberg they spread into
-the adjoining districts, and Elisabeth's favour enabled them to build a
-chapel at Eisenach. Konrad, one of these friars, had been nominated
-inquisitor by Pope Innocent III, and coming to Eisenach in 1226 soon won
-the affections of Ludwig and Elisabeth. At a later date Konrad of Marburg
-drew popular hatred on himself by his extreme rigour and anti-heretical
-teaching, and suffered a violent death (1233). But in earlier years he had
-gained much sympathy by preaching the views of St Francis on the
-renunciation of worldly goods and on practising unlimited charity[790].
-When Ludwig departed to the south, he entrusted Konrad with considerable
-authority, which he turned to account by strengthening the ascendency he
-had gained over Elisabeth. She accepted him as her guide in all things,
-and upheld his views that to levy taxes is an evil and that each person
-should earn the food he requires by the work of his own hands. To carry
-this into practice she refused to accept any tribute and tried to earn
-money herself. Within a short time, however, came the news that Ludwig had
-died in Italy from a fever before setting sail for the East. The news came
-to Elisabeth as an overpowering shock. 'Dead!' she exclaimed, 'dead! so
-henceforth to me is the world and all things pleasant it contains.' Trials
-now came thick upon her. Her husband's brother, Hermann, with a usurper's
-determination, seized Ludwig's possessions and expelled Elisabeth, whom he
-had always looked upon with disapproval. She was forced to fly from the
-Wartburg with her children, and in the depth of a severe winter she paced
-the streets of Eisenach, seeking refuge with those she had formerly
-befriended, but no one dared to harbour her. At last her aunt Mathilde,
-abbess of Kizzingen, sent for her and for her two faithful waiting-women,
-perhaps for the children also. Elisabeth would gladly have accepted a
-permanent home in the convent, but her uncle Ekbert interfered. He
-appointed a more suitable dwelling-place--and urged upon her the
-desirableness of a second marriage. Elisabeth refused, and we hardly need
-the assurance of the legend-writer that it was because she had taken the
-vow of chastity, considering how recently her husband had died. However in
-the meantime the band of Ludwig's followers returned home bringing with
-them their leader's corpse, and a rapid change of affairs took place in
-the Wartburg. Hermann the usurper was forced to yield, Elisabeth was
-reinstated in her rights, and was fetched back to the castle by the noble
-Vargila. But her stay there was not of long duration. Her position was
-intolerable, and she felt that nothing could bring her solace short of the
-renunciation of all prerogatives of station and wealth. She would have
-become a recluse had not the Franciscan friar Konrad prevented this excess
-of humility. As it was she went to the Franciscan chapel at Eisenach,
-publicly renounced the world and its claims, and removed to Marburg in
-Hessen where she would be near Konrad and devote herself to a life of
-sacrifice. She refused to live in the castle, and with the two
-waiting-women, who throughout remained faithful to her, dwelt in a hut on
-the hillside, devoting all her property to constructing a hospital in the
-town, where she spent most of her time waiting on the sick and infirm.
-
-Her conduct at Marburg filled the people with amazement as it had done at
-Eisenach, and numbers pressed thither to see her and to be tended by her.
-Considering that she only spent about two years there, the impression she
-made must have been extraordinary, for the undying memory of her fame
-continues to this day among the people. We hear a good deal of the
-asceticism she practised under Konrad's guidance during these last years
-of her life; how she submitted to bodily chastisement, how she admitted
-that her own children were not dearer to her than those of others, how she
-expressed regret at ever having been married, and how she suffered her
-faithful waiting-women, who like herself had adopted the grey dress of the
-order of St Francis, to be removed out of her sight. She died in 1231 at
-the early age of twenty-four. In accordance with the general wish she was
-canonized within a few years of her death by Pope Gregory IX in 1235.
-Immediately after her death hospitals constructed on the plan of that at
-Marburg and acknowledging St Elisabeth as their patron saint sprang up in
-many cities. With all these facts before us we cannot deny to her the
-achievement of lasting social importance. To this day hospitals in Germany
-founded both under Catholic and Protestant auspices are often dedicated to
-her.
-
-The loving tribute of a later age has perpetuated her fame in many ways.
-It has struck medals in her memory, has surmounted fountains by her
-statue, and has reared to her memory the minster of Marburg, one of the
-finest monuments of German mediaeval architecture. In spite of the ravages
-of time and the robberies perpetrated during warfare her sarcophagus there
-remains a wondrous achievement of the art of the goldsmith. It is still an
-object of pious admiration and devout pilgrimage, both to the faithful
-believer and to the appreciative student of history and art.
-
-Our age has witnessed a great spread of philanthropic interest and
-charitable zeal among women of the educated classes; a wave of feeling,
-similar to that which swept over mankind in the 13th century, bears down
-all other considerations when there are outcasts to be rescued and
-suffering to be alleviated. Nursing the sick has become a distinct and a
-respected profession; the administration of charity, an education in
-itself, is absorbing some of the best energies of the community, and women
-who seek to rescue suffering humanity are at last enabled to do so by the
-guiding hand of science. Certainly circumstances have changed. We live no
-longer in an age when the leper need display his sores to arouse pity, nor
-where almsgiving _per se_ has a social value. And yet now as then the
-success of charitable work depends on unselfish devotion and goodness of
-heart in the individual, and it is in this sense that the charitable work
-of the women-saints of the past retains its meaning. It is not by
-imitating their deeds that a later age walks worthily in their footsteps
-and pays them the tribute of reverence, but by accepting and furthering
-the spirit in which these deeds were done.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER IX.
-
-EARLY MYSTIC LITERATURE.
-
-  'Die tumpheit behaget ir alleine selbe,
-  die weisheit kan niemer volle leren.'
-                                (_Mechthild the beguine._)
-
-
-Sec. 1. Mystic writings for women in England.
-
-The last chapter, in dealing with some of the women who distinguished
-themselves in the cause of charity and philanthropy, has suggested in what
-direction the determining feature of the religious life of women in the
-13th century must be sought. Outward events, stirring political changes,
-and awakening confidence in national strength, had largely increased human
-sympathies and widened the mental horizon. In regard to women, who sought
-their vocation outside the circle of home, this had led on the one hand to
-efforts for alleviating human want and human suffering, on the other to a
-stirring of the imagination in the direction of speculation on the value
-and the help afforded by religious belief.
-
-The different beauties of the active and the contemplative life had all
-along been realized, and were currently represented by the figures of Mary
-and Martha, types of divergent tendencies which were attractive in
-different ways. The busy Martha with her charitable devotion was the ideal
-of many women, since rescuing the needy, assisting the helpless, and
-ministering to the sick constituted the vocation of women in a special
-sense. But a peculiar charm of a different kind hung at all times round
-the thoughtful and studious Mary, who set the claims and realities of life
-at nought compared with the greater reality of the eternal life
-hereafter. At the beginning of the 13th century, when the increase in
-religious enthusiasm deepened yearnings for the apprehension of the
-divine, men in their individual capacities began to seek a personal and
-closer communion with God. The absorption by things spiritual as
-contrasted with things material took a new departure. On one side was the
-learned thinker who, trained in the knowledge of the schools, sought to
-fathom his own powers and through them the powers of mankind so as to
-transcend the limits of sensible existence, and who gave a new development
-to mysticism in its technical sense. On the other side was the large
-number of those who, no longer satisfied with the mediation of appointed
-ministers of the Church, sought a personal relation to God, the effect of
-which on themselves would be moral regeneration. It was in connection with
-these that a number of writings were composed which represent mysticism in
-its popular sense: the steps by which the divine can be approached, set
-forth under the form of an allegory.
-
-The allegorical mysticism of the Middle Ages culminates in Dante
-(1260-1321). It is well to bear this in mind in the presence of minor
-lights. For while there is much that is strangely fascinating in the 13th
-century mystic, and touches of simple good faith and of honest directness
-of purpose abound, the conditions under which he works and the language in
-which he expresses himself cannot pass without criticism. Cloistered
-seclusion, estrangement from the outside world, the cult of asceticism,
-and insistence on the emotional side of life, if judged by the standard of
-to-day, are not conducive to mental and moral welfare. Moreover a later
-age always finds it difficult to understand that an earlier one had its
-own notions in regard to the fitness and beauty of the surroundings it
-made for itself. But productive genius at all times freely makes for
-itself surroundings that cannot be called absolutely healthy. It needs a
-certain effort to realise on what ground the 13th century mystic stands.
-But when once we are able to follow him, moving in his world is like
-walking in an enchanted garden,--enchanted to us, but real to him, where
-each growing sentiment and each budding thought has its peculiar charm.
-
-It is the same with regard to the language in which the mystic expresses
-himself. The close communion he seeks with the Godhead leads him to use
-terms which are directly adopted from those which express the experiences
-and feelings of ordinary life. There is in him no shrinking from holding
-God and the saints as personalities, and no hesitation in expressing
-desire for things spiritual in language currently used for expressing the
-promptings of desire for things of this world; for he is a realist in the
-view he takes of God and the saints. The old interpretation of the Song of
-Solomon supplied him with a model after which to form his conceptions, and
-by a further adaptation it led every nun to greet her bridegroom in Christ
-and every monk to greet his bride in the Virgin. Outside the convent the
-age of romance had brought a new element into the relations of the sexes
-and had accepted years of service and continued wooing as the steps which
-led to the consummation of desire. This idea transferred to spiritual
-relations now caused the mystic to dwell on the steps by which the Divine
-can be approached. The poetry of romance and the poetry of mysticism have
-much in common; both appear to have been the outcome of the same
-sentiments differently applied in convent and court. And as the language
-of real life made it possible for the mystic to formulate his feelings, so
-his religious aspirations in their turn helped to spiritualise the
-relations of real life.
-
-It deserves special attention that some of the writings of these early
-mystics are in the vernacular and include some of the most beautiful
-productions in Middle English and in early German. Their philological
-interest has recently led to their publication, but their social
-importance is equally great. For in them we see how the high estimation of
-virgin purity, which was in the fore-ground of the moral consciousness of
-the age, was advocated by the leaders of thought and came to influence the
-lives of individual women, and how the asexual existence which hitherto
-had been accepted as praiseworthy was extolled as virtue in itself.
-
-Again it is difficult for a later age to rate this conception at its just
-value, for the depreciation of the relationship of sex is to the modern
-mind not only misplaced but misleading. It is only when we think of the
-gain this depreciation has helped to secure in self-control and
-self-respect that it appears at all reasonable.
-
-Of the early productions of the mystic school, which are distinctly moral
-in tendency and personal in tone, none offer greater attractions than
-works written in England during the first half of the 13th century for the
-use of women who were vowed to religion. All these writings, some of which
-will here be considered, are in the vernacular, and owing to their
-measured grace and tone of delicate refinement are among the most
-attractive monuments of Middle English. They are chiefly productions of
-the south of England where the Saxon element had been preserved in its
-integrity. Scholars have remarked how a certain roughness of diction and a
-heroic element opposed to softness of sentiment lingered on in the north
-and precluded the utterance of gentler strains, while the south used a
-language of combined vigour and grace and became the cradle of lyric
-poetry. Moreover the south at this period cultivated the qualities which
-give to a movement its moral stamina. We find loyalty to the king coupled
-with distaste for court pleasures, and strong religious feeling combined
-with that insistence on nationality which precluded servile submission to
-the Pope. The south was also in connection with the best intellectual
-forces of the age as represented by the growing schools at Oxford, and
-Oxford in its turn was in direct touch with Paris, which remained
-throughout the 12th century the most important centre of learning and
-education in Europe.
-
-A few words must be given to this connection and its results, for it was
-in Paris that the master-minds of Oxford acquired that enthusiasm for
-study which, applied to the realities of life, became zeal for reform and
-desire for moral regeneration.
-
-Two lines of study are apparent in Paris. There is the mysticism of the
-school of St Victor, represented by men of such mental calibre as Hugo
-([Dagger] 1141), a native of Germany, and his pupil Richard ([Dagger]
-1173), a native of Scotland. The combined influence of these two men on
-the English mind was very great, for many productions of the English
-mystical school were inspired by or adapted from their Latin mystical
-works. The writings of Richard translated into English are frequently
-found in manuscripts by the side of the works of the later English
-mystics, Richard Rolle ([Dagger] 1349), and Walter Hylton ([Dagger] 1395).
-
-On the other hand Paris was the first to experience the vivifying
-influence of the renewed study of Greek philosophy, especially of the
-Aristotelian _corpus_, together with its comments by Arabian philosophers,
-especially with those of Averroes (fl. 1150). Jews from the south of
-France had introduced these writings, which, repeatedly condemned but as
-often advocated, had the effect on speculative minds of the introduction
-of a new science[791]. Christian theology, rising to the occasion, adopted
-their metaphysical views, though so radically divergent from its own, and
-the result was the birth of scholastic philosophy. But where the
-incompatibility of the union was felt scholars left the halls of
-discussion and turned their energies to grappling with the problems of
-active life.
-
-In Oxford as early as 1133 Robert Pullen, who had studied in Paris, was
-lecturing on week days and preaching on Sundays to the people, and during
-the course of the 13th century a number of men who had won the highest
-distinctions at the university,--such as Edmund Rich ([Dagger] 1240), Adam
-Marsh ([Dagger] 1257-8), and Robert Grosseteste (afterwards bishop of
-Lincoln, [Dagger] 1253), followed in his footsteps. Their efforts fell in
-with those of the newly founded orders of friars, and they greeted as
-brothers in the spirit the twelve Dominicans who arrived at Oxford in 1221
-and the Franciscans who came in 1224. These maintained an utter distrust
-of learning, which led to much argument between them and the students, but
-all alike were zealous in working for the welfare of the uneducated
-classes.
-
-We are indebted to Thomas de Hales[792] for one of the earliest and most
-beautiful poems written for the use of a nun. He was a native of Hales in
-Gloucestershire, studied both at Oxford and Paris, and was under the
-influence of the Franciscan movement. Wadding says in his annals of the
-Franciscan order that 'Thomas de Hales, created a doctor of the Sorbonne,
-was most celebrated and is known not only in England, but also in France,
-Germany, and Italy.' Thomas was on friendly terms with Adam Marsh who had
-become a Franciscan friar, and he joined this order himself as is apparent
-from the superscription of his English poem[793]. Various facts suggest
-possibilities as to his career, for Hales in Gloucestershire was the home
-also of Alexander de Hales ([Dagger] 1245) who went to Paris and spent his
-energies in compiling a work on scholasticism which secured him the title
-of _doctor irrefragabilis_. Moreover in 1246 Hales became the seat of a
-Cistercian monastery founded by Henry III.'s brother, Richard, earl of
-Cornwall, who was intimately connected with the circle of men at Oxford
-and a friend and patron of the Franciscans. It is possible that Thomas
-owed encouragement to the learned Alexander or to Earl Richard. The year
-1250 is accepted as the date when he flourished, but his English poem was
-probably written somewhat earlier. This is suggested by the praise
-bestowed in it on King Henry and his wealth, which could hardly have been
-accorded later than 1240, for it was then that the king began to alienate
-his people's affection by tampering with the coinage and by countenancing
-foreign influences at court and in the Church, in compliance with the
-wishes of his wife, Eleanor of Provence.
-
-The poem of Thomas is called a _Luve Ron_, that is a love song; it
-consists of twenty-six rhymed stanzas with much alliterative assonance.
-Falling in with the tendencies of the age it treats of the happiness in
-store for women who accept Christ as their spouse. Thomas describes how he
-came to advise a nun in her choice of a lover. As the translation of the
-poem into modern English rhyme sacrifices much of its directness, the
-stanzas which follow have been rendered as prose.
-
-  'A maid of Christ bade me earnestly to make her a love-song,
-  That she might best learn how to take a faithful lover,
-  Most faithful of all, and best suited to a free woman;
-  I will not refuse her, but direct her as best I can.
-
-  Maiden, thou must understand that this world's love is rare,
-  In many ways fickle, worthless, weak, deceiving,
-  Men that are bold here pass away as the winds blow;
-  Under the earth they lie cold, fallen away as meadow grass.
-
-  No one enters life who is certain to remain,
-  For here man has many sorrows, neither repose nor rest;
-  Towards his end he hastens, abiding but a short time,
-  Pain and death hurry him away when most he clings to life.
-
-  None is so rich nor yet so free but he soon must go;
-  Gold and silver, pomp and ermine give him no surety;
-  Swift though he be, he cannot escape, nor lengthen his life by a day,
-  Thus, thou seest, this world as a shadow glides past.'
-
-The poet then enlarges on the transitoriness of terrestrial love. Where
-are Paris and Helen, Amadis, Tristram, and others famous for their love?
-'They have glided from this world as the shaft that has left the
-bow-string.' Wealth such as King Henry's, beauty such as Absalom's availed
-them nought. But the poet knows of a true king whose love abides.
-
-  'Ah sweet, if thou knewest but this one's virtues!
-  He is fair and bright, of glad cheer, mild of mood,
-  Lovely through joy, true of trust, free of heart, full of wisdom;
-  Never wouldst thou regret it if once thou wert given into his care.
-
-  He is the richest man in the land as far as men have the power of speech,
-  All is given into his hand, east, west, north and south.
-  Henry the king holds of him and bows to him.
-  Maiden, to thee he sends the message that he would be beloved by thee.'
-
-The beauty of this lover, Christ, is thus described, and the fairness of
-his dwelling, where hate, pride and envy enter not, and where all rejoice
-with the angels. 'Are not those in a good way who love such a lord?' the
-poet asks. In return for the bliss Christ grants, He asks only that the
-maiden keep bright the jewel of maidenhood which He has entrusted to her.
-The poem ends thus:
-
-  'This poem, maiden, I send thee open and without a seal,
-  Bidding thee unroll it and learn each part by heart,
-  Then be very gracious and teach it faithfully to other maidens.
-  Who knows the whole right well will be comforted by it.
-
-  If ever thou sittest lonely, draw forth this little writing,
-  Sing it with sweet tones, and do as I bid thee.
-  He who has sent thee a greeting, God Almighty, be with thee,
-  And receive thee in his bower high up in heaven where He sits.
-  And may he have good ending, who has written this little song.'
-
-From this poem we turn to the prose works written at this period for
-religious women, which are inspired by the same spirit of earnest
-devotion, and contain thoughts as tender, refined, and gentle as the poem
-of Thomas de Hales. The prose treatise known as the _Ancren Riwle_[794],
-the rule for recluses, is by far the most important of these works, and
-from the present point of view deserves close attention, for it gives a
-direct insight into the moral beauties of the religious attitude, and
-enables us to form some idea of the high degree of culture and refinement
-which the 13th century mystic attained.
-
-A few words of criticism on the purpose of the book and on its authorship
-are here necessary. We have before us a work written not for the regular
-inmates of a nunnery, not for nuns who lived under the rule of a prioress
-or abbess, but for religious women who, after being trained in a nunnery,
-left it to continue a chaste and secluded life outside. The Church at all
-times gave most honour to those monks and nuns who were members of a
-convent and lived under the rule of a superior, but it did not deny the
-credit of holy living, or the appellations monk and nun, to those who
-either alone or with a few companions devoted themselves to religion, and
-dwelt sometimes near a chapel or sanctuary, sometimes in a churchyard.
-From the earliest times the people had held such male and female recluses
-in special reverence, and the Church, yielding to popular feeling,
-accepted them as holy, and in some instances countenanced their being
-ranked as saints.
-
-With reference to the distinction made from the earliest period between
-the different classes of those who professed religion, and their
-respective claims to holiness, it seems well to quote from the
-introductory chapter of the rule of St Benedict. The following passages
-occur in all the prose versions of the rule known to me, whether written
-for the use of men, or adapted to the use of women.
-
-The Anglo-Saxon version of the rule of St Benedict made in the 10th or
-11th century, which is based on the version written by Aethelwold about
-the year 961, runs thus[795]: 'There are four kinds of monks, _muneca_;
-the first kind are those in monasteries, _mynstermonna_, who live under a
-rule or an abbot. The second kind are the hermits, _ancrena_, that is
-settlers in the wilds (_westen-setlena_), who, not in the first fervour of
-religious life, but after probation in the monastery, have learned by the
-help and experience of others to fight against the devil, and going forth
-well armed from the ranks of their brethren to the single-handed combat of
-the wilderness, are able without the support of others to fight by the
-strength of their own arm and the help of God against the vices of the
-flesh and their evil thoughts. A third and most baneful kind of monk are
-the self-appointed ones, _sylfdemena_, who have been tried by no rule nor
-by the experience of a master, as gold in the furnace, but being soft as
-lead and still serving the world in their works, are known by their
-tonsure to lie to God. These, in twos or threes or even singly without a
-shepherd, not enclosed in the Lord's sheepfold, follow the enjoyment of
-their will instead of a rule; whatever they think fit or choose to do they
-call holy, and what they like not they condemn as unlawful. There is a
-fourth kind of monk called wandering, _widscrithul_, who spend all their
-life wandering about, staying in different cells for three or four days at
-a time, ever roaming, given up to their own pleasures and the evils of
-gluttony, and worse in all ways than the self-appointed ones.'
-
-In the English versions of the rule for women, two of which, drafted
-respectively in the 13th and in the 15th century, are extant, the same
-distinctions are drawn between different kinds of nuns. The 13th century
-version states[796] that there are the nuns living in a monastery under an
-abbess, _mynecene_,--a kind of nun called _ancre_ or recluse,--the
-self-appointed nuns,--and the wandering nuns who are declared altogether
-evil.
-
-The difference between the nun and the _ancre_ is made clear by these
-passages. The _ancre_ or recluse, called in Latin _inclusa_, is the nun
-who after receiving a convent education lives a holy life away from the
-nunnery, and it is for _ancren_ or nuns of this kind that the book we are
-about to discuss was written. Fortunately the work does not stand alone as
-an exhortation to women recluses. We are in possession of a letter from
-Ailred of Rievaulx, written between 1131 and 1161, and addressed to his
-sister (sic), which was written for a similar purpose though covering very
-much narrower ground, and contains advice analogous to that contained in
-the _Ancren Riwle_. The original is in Latin[797], and in this form it was
-probably known to the author of the _Ancren Riwle_, who refers to it,
-saying how Ailred had already insisted that purity of life can be
-maintained only by observing two things, a certain hardness of bodily life
-and a careful cultivation of moral qualities.
-
-The letter of Ailred is in the form of a series of short chapters and is
-divided into two parts, the first of which (c. 1-20) treats of the outward
-rule. It gives advice as to whom the _inclusa_ should converse with, and
-whom she should admit into her presence; it tells her that she should not
-own flocks, which leads to buying and selling; that she should live by the
-work of her hands, not accepting as a gift more food than she needs for
-herself and her servants; and that she must not do as some recluses do,
-who busy themselves with 'teaching girls and boys and turn their cells
-into a school.' It also directs her about divine service, and about her
-food and clothes.
-
-Having so far dealt with outward things Ailred (c. 21-46) dwells on the
-inward life, on virginity, on the dangers of temptation and on the
-beauties of humility and love. His sentences are short and are illustrated
-by quotations from scripture, by reference to the holy virgin St Agnes,
-and by remarks on the respective merits of Mary and Martha. The concluding
-chapters (c. 47-78) are found also in the works of Anselm, archbishop of
-Canterbury ([Dagger] 1109)[798], and appear to have been borrowed from
-him.
-
-The letter of Ailred proves that the conduct of the recluse was attracting
-attention in the 12th century. Part of his letter was translated into
-Middle English by one Thomas N. in the 13th century, about the same time
-when the _Ancren Riwle_ was drawn up, and in its superscription it is
-designated as the 'information' which Ailred, abbot of Rievaulx, wrote for
-his sister the _inclusa_[799]. In this translation, however, the opening
-parts of the work which treat of the outward rule (c. 1-20) are omitted,
-evidently because the translation was intended not for recluses but for
-nuns, to whom directions about domestic matters, such as buying, selling,
-clothing and eating, would not apply.
-
-Further evidence can be adduced to show that women recluses in the 13th
-century occupied public attention to an increasing degree. Hitherto they
-had been left to dwell where they pleased, supported by chance gifts from
-the people, but in the 13th century it became usual to leave them
-legacies. A mass of information on the subject has been collected by
-Cutts[800], who describes how women recluses occupied sometimes a range of
-cells, sometimes a commodious house; and how they kept one or more
-servants to run on their errands. In 1246 the bishop of Chichester issued
-an injunction which shows that his attention had been drawn to these
-women, and that in his mind there was a distinct difference between them
-and regular nuns. Under the heading 'On recluses' (_inclusis_) it
-says[801]: 'Also we ordain that recluses shall not receive or keep any
-person in their house concerning whom sinister suspicions may arise. Also
-that they have narrow and proper windows; and we permit them to have
-secret communication with those persons only whose gravity and honesty do
-not admit of suspicion. Women recluses should not be entrusted with the
-care of church vestments; if necessity compels it, we command it to be
-done with caution, that he who carries them may have no communication with
-the recluses.'
-
-Taking these various remarks into consideration and comparing them with
-what is said in the _Ancren Riwle_ itself, the author of which keeps clear
-in his mind the difference between recluse and nun, I think the idea that
-this work was originally written for the Cistercian nunnery at Tarent in
-Dorsetshire, as is usually alleged[802], will be abandoned. This
-assumption is based on the superscription of a Latin copy of the book,
-which states that Simon of Ghent wrote it for his sisters the anchoresses
-near Tarent (apud Tarente). But the theory that the book was originally in
-Latin, and that it was written by Simon, archdeacon at Oxford in 1284, and
-bishop of Salisbury between 1307-1315, has long been abandoned. The idea
-that it was written for the nunnery at Tarent may also be discarded, for
-Tarent was a house founded by Ralph de Kahaines in the time of Richard I.
-Therefore at the time when Simon lived, and doubtless also at the time
-when the book was written (1225-1250), the settlement must have consisted
-of more than three women recluses and their servants. Women recluses might
-be living at Tarent as elsewhere, since Simon forwarded the book to
-recluses there, but they would not be members of the Cistercian convent.
-It may be noticed in passing that the other Latin copy of the rule, which
-was destroyed by fire in 1731, had a superscription saying that Robert
-Thornton, at one time prior, gave it to the recluses (_claustralibus_) of
-Bardney, which is a Benedictine abbey for men in Lincolnshire.
-
-To relinquish the idea that the _Ancren Riwle_ was written originally for
-the Cistercian nunnery at Tarent is to relinquish also the
-supposition[803] that it is the work of Richard Poor, dean of Salisbury,
-and afterwards bishop successively of Chichester and Durham ([Dagger]
-1237), for the theory of his authorship rests only on his interest in this
-nunnery, to which he added a chapel and where his heart lies buried. A
-fuller knowledge of the English writings of the time may reveal by whom
-and for whom the book was written. The dialect proves it to be the
-production of a native of the south-western part of England, while its
-tone reveals a connection with Paris and Oxford. The writer must have had
-a high degree of culture, and was familiar with French, with court
-poetry, and with the similes so frequent in the stories of romance. He
-had a sound theological training, with a knowledge of the works of Jerome,
-Augustine, Gregory, Anselm, and notably of Bernard, from whom he
-frequently quotes. He had strong religious sympathies, but imperfect
-sympathy with the established church,--these latter facts tend to prove
-that he was in some measure connected with the friars. His references to
-'our lay brethren,' and his description of the 'hours' as said by them,
-may serve as a clue to his identification[804].
-
-The _Ancren Riwle_ or rule for recluses, fills a moderately sized volume
-and is extant in eight manuscript copies, of which five are in English,
-that is four in the dialect of the south and one in that of the
-north,--two in Latin, and one in French. The work is divided into eight
-parts, a short analysis of which will give an idea of the importance of
-the book and of the wide range of its author's sympathies. As he says
-himself the book was written for three sisters who in the bloom of their
-youth had forsaken the world to become anchoresses, but he expects it will
-be read by others. He assumes that his readers know Latin and French as
-well as English, a fact which in itself proves that like the _ancren_
-referred to above, the _ancren_ here addressed had received their
-education in a nunnery.
-
-In the short introduction which precedes the work the author says he will
-accede to the request of the women who have importuned him for a rule.
-
-'Do you now ask what rule you recluses should observe?' he asks (p.
-5)[805]. 'You should always keep the inward rule well with all your might
-and strength for its own sake. The inward rule is ever alike; the outward
-varies.... No recluse by my advice shall make profession, that is promise
-to keep anything commanded, save three things, obedience, chastity and
-stedfastness; she shall not change her home save by need, such as
-compulsion, fear of death or obedience to her bishop, or her master
-(herre). For she who undertakes anything and promises to do it at God's
-command, is bound to it and sins mortally in breaking her promise by will
-or wish. If she has not promised she may do it and leave it off as she
-will, as of meat and drink, abstaining from flesh and fish and other like
-things relating to dress, rest, hours and prayers. Let her say as many of
-these as she pleases, and in what way she pleases. These and other such
-things are all in our free choice to do or let alone whenever we choose,
-unless they are promised. But charity, that is love, and meekness and
-patience, truthfulness and keeping the ten ancient commandments,
-confession and penitence, these and such as these, some of which are of
-the old law, some of the new, are not of man's invention.'
-
-He then goes on to tell them that if asked to what order they belong, they
-must say, to the order of St James, who was God's apostle (and who wrote a
-canonical epistle). He dilates upon early Christian hermits and recluses,
-saying that they were of the order of St James, for in his mind St James
-the apostle is identical with St James the hermit.
-
-He then describes the contents of his work, saying the first part only
-shall treat of the outward rule, all the others of the inward.
-
-The first part accordingly (pp. 15-48) is on religious service, and in it
-the women are advised what prayers they shall say and at what time of the
-day: 'Let everyone say her hours as she has written them,' and as a guide
-take what 'hours' are kept by 'our lay brethren.' The sick, the sorrowful,
-prisoners, and Christians who are among the heathen shall be called to
-mind. The tone which the author occasionally takes has the full personal
-ring of 13th century mysticism. (p. 35) 'After the kiss of peace in the
-mass, when the priest consecrates, forget there all the world, and there
-be entirely out of the body, there in glowing love embrace your beloved
-spouse (leofman) Christ, who is come down from heaven into the bower of
-your breast, and hold him fast till he have granted all that you wish.'
-Several prayers follow, one in Latin on the adoration of the cross, and
-several in English which are addressed to the sweet lady St Mary.
-
-Outward observances being disposed of, the author then advises the women
-how to keep guard over the heart, 'wherein is order, religion and the life
-of the soul,' against the temptations of the five senses (pp. 48-117). The
-different senses and the dangers attending them are discussed, sometimes
-casually, sometimes in a systematic manner. In connection with Sight we
-get interesting details on the arrangement of the building in which the
-recluses dwelt. Its windows are hung with black cloth on which is a white
-cross. The black cloth is impervious to the wind and difficult to see
-through; the white of the cross is more transparent and emblematic of
-purity, by the help of which it becomes safe to look abroad. Looking
-abroad, however, is generally attended with danger. 'I write more
-particularly for others,' the author here remarks, 'nothing of the kind
-touches you, my dear sisters, for you have not the name, nor shall you
-have it by the grace of God, of staring recluses, whose profession is
-unrecognisable through their unseemly conduct, as is the case with some,
-alas!'
-
-Speech too should be wisely controlled, talking out of church windows
-should be avoided, and conversation generally should be indulged in only
-through the 'house' window and the parlour window. 'Silence always at
-meals,' says the author, and quotes from Seneca and Solomon on the evil
-effects of idle prattling. Hearing, that is listening too readily, also
-has its dangers, for it leads to spreading untruths. 'She who moves her
-tongue in lying makes it a cradle to the devil's child, and rocketh it
-diligently as a nurse.' In passages which show a keen insight into human
-nature and which are dictated by a wise and kindly spirit, the author
-among other examples describes how anyone seeking the recluse's sympathy
-for bad ends would approach her in plaintive strains, deploring that he is
-drawn to her, and assuring her that he desires nothing but her
-forgiveness, and thus by engrossing her thoughts more and more, would
-perturb her mind by rousing her personal sympathy.
-
-The sense of Smell also has its dangers; but in regard to the fifth sense,
-Feeling, there is most need, the author thinks, of comfort, 'for in it the
-pain is greatest, and the pleasure also if it so happen.' The sufferings
-of Christ are analysed and it is shown how he suffered in all his senses
-but especially in feeling.
-
-The next part of the work (pp. 118-177) contains moral lessons and
-examples. The peevish recluse finds her counterpart in the pelican which
-kills her own young ones when they molest her. Like the bird, the recluse
-in anger kills her works, then repents and makes great moan. There are
-some fine passages on the effects of anger which is likened to a sorceress
-(uorschup-pild) and transforms the recluse, Christ's spouse, into a
-she-wolf (wulvene). That women devotees often behaved very differently
-from what they ought is evident from these passages, for false recluses
-are likened unto foxes who live in holes and are thievish, ravenous and
-yelping, but 'the true recluses are indeed birds of heaven, that fly aloft
-and sit on the green boughs singing merrily; that is, they meditate,
-enraptured, upon the blessedness of heaven that never fadeth but is ever
-green, singing right merrily; that is in such meditation they rest in
-peace and have gladness of heart as those who sing.' In one passage,
-where the flight of birds is described, it says, 'the wings that bear the
-recluses upwards are good principles, which they must move unto good works
-as a bird that would fly moveth its wings.' From dumb animals wisdom and
-knowledge can be learnt, says the author, giving as an example the eagle,
-which deposits in his nest a precious stone called agate, which wards off
-harm, and thus Jesus Christ should be cherished to keep off evil. In
-another passage the author plays on the words _ancre_ and anchor, saying
-that the _ancre_ or recluse is anchored to the Church as the anchor to the
-ship, that storms may not overwhelm it. The reasons for solitary life are
-then enumerated under separate headings, and passages from the Old and the
-New Testament are freely quoted in illustration and corroboration of the
-statements made.
-
-The fourth part of the book (pp. 178-298) dilates on temptation, in regard
-to which the writer holds that greater holiness brings increased
-difficulties. 'As the hill of holy and pious life is greater and higher,
-so the fiend's puffs which are the winds of temptation are stronger
-thereon and more frequent.' Patience and meekness are chiefly required to
-resist the troubles of sickness, and wisdom and spiritual strength must
-resist grief of heart, anger and wrath. Again the recluses for whom the
-book is written are assured that they have least need to be fortified
-against temptations and trials, sickness only excepted.
-
-The imagery in which the author goes on to describe the seven chief sins
-is graphic and powerful. They are personified as the Lion of Pride, the
-Serpent of Envy, the Unicorn of Wrath, the Bear of Sloth, the Fox of
-Covetousness, the Swine of Gluttony, and the Scorpion of Lust, each with
-its offspring. Of the Scorpion's progeny we are told that 'it doth not
-become a modest mouth to name the name of some of them,' while the
-Scorpion itself is a kind of worm, that has a face somewhat like that of a
-woman, but its hinder parts are those of a serpent. It puts on a pleasant
-countenance and fawns upon you with its head but stings with its tail.
-Again, the sins are likened to seven hags (heggen), to whom men who serve
-in the devil's court are married. The description of these men as
-jugglers, jesters, ash-gatherers and devil's purveyors, gives interesting
-details on the characters in real life by which they were suggested. Of
-the comforting thoughts which the recluse is to dwell upon the following
-give a fine example.
-
-'The sixth comfort is that our Lord, when he suffereth us to be tempted,
-playeth with us as the mother with her young darling: she fleeth from him
-and hides herself, and lets him sit alone, look anxiously around calling
-Dame, dame! and weep awhile, and then she leapeth forth laughing with
-outspread arms and embraceth and kisseth him and wipeth his eyes. Just so
-our Lord leaveth us sometimes alone, and withdraweth his grace and comfort
-and support, so that we find no sweetness in any good we do, nor
-satisfaction of heart; and yet all the while our dear father loveth us
-none the less, but doeth it for the great love he hath for us.'
-
-In times of tribulation the recluse is directed to meditate on God and His
-works, on the Virgin and the saints, and the temptations they withstood,
-such as are related in an English book on St Margaret. Again and again the
-writer, who does not tire of this part of his theme, dwells on the various
-sins separately, and on the best way of meeting them.
-
-The next part of the book (pp. 298-348) is devoted to an analysis of the
-use and the manner of confession, the theory and practice of which in the
-Church of Rome are ancient, but which the religious enthusiasm of the
-Middle Ages elaborated into a hard and fast system. That
-self-introspection and analysis are helpful in developing and
-strengthening conscientiousness no one will deny, but the habitual
-disclosure of one's thoughts and criticisms of self to another, though it
-may still afford support to some, has ceased to appear generally
-advisable. Granted that the practice in the past served a good purpose,
-the advice given in this book for recluses appears dictated by a strong
-sense of fitness and moderation. The author considers confession powerful
-in three directions: it 'confoundeth the devil,' it gives us back all the
-good we have lost, and it 'maketh us children of God.' Under these
-headings there is a long and systematic elaboration of the sixteen ways in
-which confession should be made, viz. it should be accusatory, bitter,
-complete, candid, and it should be made often, and speedily, humbly and
-hopefully, etc. Stories out of the Bible and parables of a later age are
-introduced in corroboration of each injunction. Under the heading of
-candid confession the words to be used in self-accusation are interesting,
-because it is obvious that a higher moral standard is claimed from women
-than from men. The person who has committed sin is to address the father
-confessor (schrift feder) in these words: 'I am a woman, and ought by
-right to have been more modest than to speak as I have spoken, or to do
-as I have done; and therefore my sin is greater than if a man had done it,
-for it became me worse.' From the Gospels and the Fathers the writer
-adduces strings of wise sayings which bear on the points he would impress
-upon his readers. This fifth part of the book, he says, belongs to all men
-alike, not to recluses in particular, and he ends by admonishing the
-sisters in this way: 'Take to your profit this short and concluding
-summary of all mentioned and known sins, as of pride, ambition,
-presumption, envy, wrath, sloth, carelessness, idle words, immoral
-thoughts, any idle hearing, any false joy or heavy mourning, hypocrisy,
-the taking too much or too little meat or drink, grumbling, being of
-morose countenance, breaking silence, sitting too long at the parlour
-window, saying hours badly or without attention of heart or at a wrong
-time, any false word or oath, play, scornful laughter, wasting crumbs, or
-spilling ale or letting things grow mouldy or rusty or rotten; leaving
-clothes not sewed, wet with rain, or unwashed; breaking a cup or a dish,
-or carelessly looking after any thing which we own and should take care
-of; or cutting or damaging through heedlessness.' These in the writer's
-eyes are the likely sins among the recluses whom he addresses and against
-which he warns them to be on their guard. If they have committed them they
-must forthwith confess, but trivial faults should be wiped away by prayers
-said before the altar the moment the recluse is conscious of them.
-
-Passing from the subject of Confession to that of Penance (pp. 348-383)
-the author as he says borrows much from the Sentences of Bernard, the
-general drift of which is in favour of self-discipline and implies
-mortification of the flesh. In this context comes the reference to
-Ailred's (Seint Aldret's) advice to his sister, who also was directed to
-give the body pain by fasting, watching, and discipline, by having coarse
-garments and a hard bed, and by bearing evil and working hard. But here
-again the recluses addressed are told that in the eyes of their adviser
-they incline rather to over-much self-denial than to over-much
-self-indulgence.
-
-The seventh part of the book (pp. 384-410) treats of the pure heart or of
-love and is attractive in many ways. The sentiments developed and the
-pictures described give one the highest opinion of the feelings of which
-the age was capable, as reflected in this writer's innermost being. The
-beautiful parable where Christ woos the soul in guise of a king is well
-worth repeating, for there we see the courtly attitude, which the age of
-romance had developed in real life, receiving a spiritual adaptation.
-
-'There was a lady who was besieged by her foes within an earthly castle,
-and her land was all destroyed and herself quite poor. The love of a
-powerful king was however fixed upon her with such boundless affection
-that to solicit her love he sent his messengers one after the other, and
-often many together, and sent her trinkets both many and fair, and
-supplies of victuals and help of his high retinue to hold her castle. She
-received them all as a careless creature with so hard a heart that he
-could never get nearer to her love. What would'st thou more? He came
-himself at last and showed her his fair face, since he was of all men the
-fairest to behold, and spoke so sweetly and with such gentle words that
-they might have raised the dead from death to life. And he wrought many
-wonders, and did many wondrous deeds before her eyes, and showed her his
-power and told her of his kingdom, and offered to make her queen of all
-that he owned. But all availed him nought. Was not this surprising
-mockery? For she was not worthy to have been his servant. But owing to his
-goodness love so mastered him that he said at last: "Lady, thou art
-attacked, and thine enemies are so strong that thou canst not without my
-help escape their hands that thou mayest not be put to a shameful death. I
-am prompted by love of thee to undertake this fight, and rid thee of those
-that seek thy death. I know well that I shall receive a mortal wound, but
-I will do it gladly to win thy heart. Now I beseech thee for the love I
-bear thee that thou love me at least after my death, since thou would'st
-not in my lifetime." Thus did the king. He freed her of her enemies and
-was himself wounded and slain in the end. Through a miracle he arose from
-death to life. Would not that same lady be of an evil kind if she did not
-love him above all things after this?'
-
-'The king is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who in this wise wooed our Soul
-which the devils had beset. And He as a noble wooer, after many messengers
-and many good deeds, came to prove His love and showed through knighthood
-that He was worthy of love, as sometime knights were wont to do. He
-entered in a tournament, and as a bold knight had His shield pierced
-everywhere in the fight for His lady's love.'
-
-The likeness between the shield and Christ's body is further dwelt upon.
-The image of His crucified form hangs suspended in church, as 'after the
-death of a valiant knight, men hang up his shield high in church to his
-memory.'
-
-There is more on the theme of love that is very fine. The ideas generated
-by knighthood are obviously present to the mind of the writer.
-
-Interesting also is his classification of the different kinds of love. The
-love of good friends (gode iueren) is first mentioned, but higher than
-that is the love between man and woman, and even higher still that between
-mother and child, for the mother to cure her child of disease is ready to
-make a bath of her blood for it. Higher again is the love of the body to
-the soul, but the love which Christ bears to His dear spouse, the soul,
-surpasses them all.
-
-'Thy love,' says our Lord, 'is either to be freely given or it is to be
-sold, or it is to be stolen and to be taken with force. If it is to be
-given, where could'st thou bestow it better than on me? Am I not of all
-the fairest? Am I not the richest king? Am I not of noblest birth? Am I
-not in wealth the wisest? Am I not the most courteous? Am I not the most
-liberal of men? For so it is said of a liberal man that he can withhold
-nothing; that his hands are perforated as mine are. Am I not of all the
-sweetest and most gentle? Thus in me all reasons thou may'st find for
-bestowing thy love, if thou lovest chaste purity; for no one can love me
-save she hold by that.--But if thy love is not to be given but is to be
-sold, say at what price; either for other love or for something else? Love
-is well sold for love, and so love should be sold and for nought else. If
-thy love is thus to be sold, I have bought it with love surpassing all
-other. For of the four kinds of love, I have shown thee the best of them
-all. And if thou sayest that thou wilt not let it go cheaply and askest
-for more, name what it shall be. Set a price on thy love. Thou canst not
-name so much but I will give thee for thy love much more. Wouldest thou
-have castles and kingdoms? Wouldest thou govern the world? I am purposed
-to do better; I am purposed to make thee withal queen of heaven. Thou
-shalt be sevenfold brighter than the sun; no evil shall harm thee, no
-creature shall vex thee, no joy shall be wanting to thee; thy will shall
-be done in heaven and on earth; yea, even in hell.'
-
-And in a further development of this idea all imaginable good, Croesus'
-wealth, Absalom's beauty, Asahel's swiftness, Samson's strength, are held
-out as a reward to the soul who responds to the wooing of Christ and
-gives herself entirely into His keeping. 'This love,' says the author in
-conclusion, 'is the rule which governs the heart.'
-
-The last part of the book (pp. 410-431) appears to be appended as an
-after-thought, as it treats once more of domestic matters. 'I said before
-at the beginning,' says the author, 'that ye ought not, like unwise
-people, to promise to keep any of the outward rules. I say the same still,
-nor do I write them save for you alone. I say this in order that recluses
-may not say that I by my authority make new rules for them. Nor do I
-command that they shall hold them, and you may change them whenever you
-will for better ones. Of things that have been in use before it matters
-little.' Practical directions follow which throw a further light on the
-position and conduct of the recluse, and which in many particulars are
-curiously like the injunctions which form the opening part of the letter
-of Ailred. The recluses shall partake of Communion on fifteen days of the
-year; they shall eat twice a day between Easter and Roodmass (September
-14), during the other half year they shall fast save on Sundays; and they
-shall not eat flesh or lard except in sickness. 'There are recluses,' says
-the writer, 'who have meals with their friends outside. That is too much
-friendship; for all orders it is unsuitable, but chiefly for the order of
-recluses who are dead to the world.' A recluse shall not be liberal of
-other men's alms, for housewifery is Martha's part and not hers. 'Martha's
-office is to feed and clothe poor men as the mistress of a house; Mary
-ought not to intermeddle in it, and if any one blame her, God Himself the
-supreme defends her for it, as holy writ bears witness. On the other hand
-a recluse ought only to take sparingly that which is necessary for her.
-Whereof, then, may she make herself liberal? She must live upon alms as
-frugally as ever she can, and not gather that she may give it away
-afterwards. She is not a housewife but a Church ancre. If she can spare
-any fragments to the poor, let her send them quietly out of her dwelling.
-Sin is oft concealed under the semblance of goodness. And how shall those
-rich anchoresses who are tillers of the ground, or have fixed rents, do
-their alms privately to poor neighbours? Desire not to have the reputation
-of bountiful anchoresses, nor, in order to give much, be too eager to
-possess more. Greediness is at the root of bitterness: all the boughs that
-spring from it are bitter. To beg in order to give away is not the part of
-a recluse. From the courtesy of a recluse and from her liberality, sin
-and shame have often come in the end.'
-
-This idea, that the recluse shall follow the example of Mary and not that
-of Martha, occurs also in Ailred's letter, though it is more briefly
-stated (c. 41 ff.).
-
-'You shall possess no beast, my dear sisters,' says the author of the
-_Ancren Riwle_, 'except only a cat. A recluse who has cattle appears as
-Martha was.' She thinks of the fodder, of the herdsman, thoughts which
-bring with them traffic. 'A recluse who is a buyer and seller (cheapild)
-selleth her soul to the chapman of hell.' Ailred similarly warned his
-'sister' against keeping flocks (c. 5 ff.). But the author of the _Riwle_
-allows the recluse to keep a cow if need be. 'Do not take charge,' he
-says, 'of other men's things in your house, nor of their property, nor of
-their clothes, neither receive under your care the church vestments nor
-the chalice, unless compelled thereto, for oftentimes much harm has come
-from such caretaking.' The clothes the sisters wear shall be warm and
-simple, 'be they white, be they black; only see that they be plain and
-warm and well-made.' He warns them against severe discipline by the use of
-hair-cloth and hedgehog-skins, and against scourging with a leathern
-thong. He desires them to have all needful clothing, but forbids wearing
-rings, brooches, ornamented girdles and gloves. The recluse shall 'make no
-purses to gain friends therewith, nor blodbendes[806] of silk; but shape
-and sew and mend church vestments, and poor people's clothes.' The point
-Ailred in his rule strongly insisted upon, the command that the recluse
-shall not keep a school as some recluses do, is reiterated by the author
-of the _Ancren Riwle_, for the excitement it brings and the personal
-affection it creates between teacher and pupil are felt to be fraught with
-danger. If there be a girl who needs to be taught, the recluse shall cause
-her to be instructed by her servant, for she shall keep two servants, the
-one to stay at home, the other to go abroad, 'whose garments shall be of
-such shape and their attire such that their calling be obvious.' The
-recluse shall read the concluding part of this book to her women once a
-week, but she herself is to read in it daily if she have leisure.
-
-Such in brief outline is the _Ancren Riwle_, a book which above all others
-gives an insight into the religious life as apprehended in the 13th
-century in England; a book which, written for women--the number of whom
-can never have been great, contains much that remains wise and instructive
-to this day, owing to its wide outlook and liberal spirit. It gives the
-very highest opinion of the author's gentleness and refinement, and of the
-exalted sentiments of the women he was addressing.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-This is not the place to dwell on the numerous spiritual love-songs which
-were written in English at this period under the influence of mystic
-tendencies; but it must be pointed out that those which breathe the love
-of a woman's soul to Christ were presumably written in the interest of
-nuns. Among them is one in prose, entitled the 'Wooing of Our Lord[807],'
-written by its author for his 'sister,' which has a certain likeness to
-the 'Ancren Riwle,' and on this ground has been ascribed to the same
-author. Probably it is a paraphrase of part of it, but it has none of the
-harmonious flow of the treatise itself, and its tone is so much more
-emotional, that it looks like the production of a later age.
-
-The idea of the exaltation of virginity at this period further led to the
-re-writing in English of the legends of women-saints whose stories turn on
-the might of virginity in conflict with the evil powers of this world.
-Among them the legends of St Margaret, St Juliana and St Cecilia, are
-extant in a manuscript of about the year 1230. Their authorship is
-unknown, but they were evidently written in the first place for religious
-women.
-
-In conclusion a few words must be said on a treatise written about the
-same time called 'Holy Maidenhood' (Hali Meidenhad), the interest of which
-lies in the fact that while advocating the same cause as the writings
-discussed above, it is quite untouched by their spirit[808]. Here also the
-advantages of the love of Christ over love for earthly things are enlarged
-on, and the superiority of the 'free' maiden over her who has embraced
-family life is upheld. But this is done in a broad familiar strain and
-with repeated fierce attacks on marriage.
-
-The author ornaments his treatise with Biblical quotations, but he
-possesses none of the courtly grace and elegance of diction of Thomas de
-Hales and the author of the _Ancren Riwle_. In form the treatise answers
-to its drift, for it is written in an alliterative homely style which
-gives it a peculiar interest from the philological point of view. Looked
-at from the religious standpoint it yields a curious example of what the
-tone and temper would be of one who, grasping the moral drift of the age,
-remained a stranger to its tenderer strains. At the same time its author
-is not without considerable insight into the realities of life and has a
-sense of humour usually absent in mystic writings. The following passage
-which dwells on some of the annoyances of married life give a good example
-of this (p. 37).
-
-'And how I ask, though it may seem odious, how does the wife stand who
-when she comes in hears her child scream, sees the cat at the flitch, and
-the hound at the hide? Her cake is burning on the stone hearth, her calf
-is sucking up the milk, the earthen pot is overflowing into the fire and
-the churl is scolding. Though it be an odious tale, it ought, maiden, to
-deter thee more strongly from marriage, for it does not seem easy to her
-who has tried it. Thou, happy maiden, who hast fully removed thyself out
-of that servitude as a free daughter of God and as His Son's spouse,
-needest not suffer anything of the kind. Therefore, happy maiden, forsake
-all such sorrow for the reward reserved to thee as thou oughtest to do
-without any reward. Now I have kept my promise, that I would show that to
-be glozed over with falsehood, which some may say and think of as true:
-the happiness and sweetness which the wedded have. For it fares not as
-those think who look at it from the outside; it happens far otherwise with
-the poor and the rich, with those who loathe and those who love each
-other, but the vexation in every case exceeds the joy, and the loss
-altogether surpasses the gain.'
-
-The writer then recommends Christ as a spouse and gives a graphic
-description of pride, which he considers a power equal to that of the
-devil. He has such a lively horror of pride and thinks its effects so
-baneful that, should the maidenhood he has been extolling be touched by
-it, its prerogative, he says, forthwith breaks down. 'A maid as regards
-the grace of maidenhood surpasses the widowed and the wedded, but a mild
-wife or meek widow is better than a proud maiden,'--a distinction which is
-curious and I believe stands alone at this early period. The saints
-Catharine, Margaret, Agnes, Juliana and Cecilia are quoted as maidens of
-irreproachable meekness.
-
-The treatise 'Hali Meidenhad' exists in one copy only, and there is no
-evidence as to how much it was read. Its obvious purpose is to encourage
-girls to become nuns, and this not so much on account of the beauties of
-convent life, as because of the troubles in worldly life they would escape
-by doing so.
-
-
-Sec. 2. The Convent of Helfta and its Literary Nuns[809].
-
-The mystic writings with which the present chapter has hitherto dealt are
-works written for nuns, not by them, for of all the English mystic
-writings of the 13th century, womanly though they often are in tone, none
-can claim to be the production of a woman. It is different on the
-Continent, where the mystic literature of the 13th century is largely the
-production of nuns, some of whom have secured wide literary fame. Their
-writings, which were looked upon by their contemporaries as divinely
-inspired, are among the most impassioned books of the age. They claim the
-attention both of the student of art and the student of literature. For
-strong natures who rebelled against the conditions of ordinary life, but
-were shut out from the arena of intellectual competition, found an outlet
-for their aspirations in intensified emotionalism, and this emotionalism
-led to the development of a wealth of varying imagery which subsequently
-became the subject-matter of pictorial art. In course of time the series
-of images offered and suggested by Scripture had been supplemented by a
-thousand floating fancies and a mass of legendary conceits, which were
-often based on heathen conceptions; and the 13th century mystic first
-tried to fix and interpret these in their spiritual application. His
-endeavours may appear to some a dwelling on fruitless fancies, but since
-this imagery in its later representations, especially in painting, has
-become a thing of so much wonder and delight, the writers who first tried
-to realise and describe these conceptions deserve at least respectful
-attention.
-
-The convent of Helfta near Eisleben in Saxony stands out during the 13th
-century as a centre of these mystic tendencies and of contemporary
-culture, owing to the literary activity of its nuns. All the qualities
-which make early mysticism attractive,--moral elevation, impassioned
-fervour, intense realism and an almost boundless imagination,--are here
-found reflected in the writings of three women, who were inmates of the
-same convent, and worked and wrote contemporaneously.
-
-The convent to which these women belonged was of the Benedictine order. It
-had been founded in 1229 by Burkhardt, Count von Mansfeld, and his wife
-Elisabeth, for the use of their two daughters and for other women who
-wished to join them in a religious life. So many of the daughters of the
-Thuringian nobility flocked thither that the convent was removed in 1234
-to more spacious accommodation at Rodardesdorf, and again in 1258 to a
-pleasanter and more suitable site at Helfta.
-
-The convent was then under the abbess Gertrud[810] of the noble family of
-Hackeborn, whose rule (1251-1291) marks a climax in the prosperity and
-influence of the house. The convent numbered over a hundred nuns, and
-among them were women distinguished in other ways besides writing. In the
-annals of the house mention is made of Elisabeth and Sophie, daughters of
-Hermann von Mansfeld;--the former was a good painter, and the latter
-transcribed numerous books and held the office of prioress for many years
-before she succeeded Gertrud as abbess. Reference is also made to the nun
-Mechthild von Wippra ([Dagger] c. 1300), who taught singing, an art
-zealously cultivated by these nuns.
-
-This enthusiasm for studies of all kinds was inspired in the first place
-by the abbess Gertrud, of whose wonderful liberality of mind and zeal for
-the advance of knowledge we read in an account written soon after her
-death by members of her convent[811]. She was endlessly zealous in
-collecting books and in setting her nuns to transcribe them. 'This too she
-insisted on,' says the account, 'that the girls should be instructed in
-the liberal arts, for she said that if the pursuit of knowledge (studium
-scientiae) were to perish, they would no longer be able to understand holy
-writ, and religion together with devotion would disappear.' Latin was well
-taught and written with ease by various members of the convent. The three
-women writers who have given the house lasting fame were Mechthild,--who
-was not educated at the convent but came there about the year 1268, and
-who is usually spoken of as the beguine or sister Mechthild,--the nun and
-saint Mechthild von Hackeborn, the sister of the abbess Gertrud, who was
-educated in the convent and there had visions between 1280 and 1300,--and
-Gertrud--known in literature as Gertrud the Great. Her name being the
-same as that of the abbess caused at one time a confusion between them.
-
-The writings of these nuns were composed under the influence of the same
-mystic movement which was spreading over many districts of Europe, and
-therefore they contain ideas and descriptions which, forming part of the
-imaginative wealth of the age, are nearly related to what is
-contemporaneously found elsewhere. In numerous particulars the writings of
-these nuns bear a striking resemblance to the imagery and descriptions
-introduced into the Divine Comedy by Dante. Struck by this likeness, and
-bent upon connecting _Matelda_ of the _Purgatorio_ with a real person,
-several modern students have recognised her prototype in one of the
-writers named Mechthild[812].
-
-The writings of both these women are anterior in date to the composition
-of the Divine Comedy, and as they were accepted by the Dominicans,
-certainly had a chance of being carried into distant districts. But there
-is no proof that Dante had either of these writers in his mind when he
-wrote in the _Purgatorio_ of Matelda as appearing in an earthly paradise
-to the poet on the other side of the river Lethe.
-
-  'A lady all alone, she went along
-  Singing and culling flower after flower,
-  With which the pathway was all studded o'er.
-  "Ah, beauteous lady, who in rays of love
-  Dost warm thyself, if I may trust to looks,
-  Which the heart's witnesses are wont to be,
-  May the desire come unto thee to draw
-  Near to this river's bank," I said to her,
-  "So much that I may hear what thou art singing."'
-
-It is she who makes the triumph of the Church apparent to the poet while
-Beatrice descends to him from heaven.
-
-Without entering into this controversy, it is interesting to note the
-similarity of the visions in which Mechthild von Hackeborn describes
-heaven, and those which Mechthild of Magdeburg draws of hell, to the
-descriptions of the greatest of Italian poets.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-In order to gain an idea of the interests which were prominent at the
-convent at Helfta it will be well to treat of the lives, history and
-writings of its three women writers in succession,--the beguine
-Mechthild,--the nun Mechthild,--and the nun Gertrud. Their characters and
-compositions bear marked points of difference.
-
-Mechthild the beguine[813] was born about 1212 and lived in contact with
-the world, perhaps at some court, till the age of twenty-three, when she
-left her people and came to Magdeburg to adopt the religious life. She was
-led to take this step by a troubled conscience, which was no doubt
-occasioned by her coming into contact with Dominican friars. At this time
-they were making a great stir in Saxony, and Mechthild's brother Balduin
-joined their order. Mechthild lived at Magdeburg for many years in a poor
-and humble way in a settlement of beguines, but at last she was obliged to
-seek protection in a nunnery, because she had drawn upon herself the
-hatred of the clergy.
-
-The origin and position of the bands of women called beguines[814] deserve
-attention, for the provisions made for them are evidently the outcome of a
-charitable wish to provide for homeless women, and to prevent their
-vagrancy and moral degradation. The name given to these women lies in
-great obscurity. It is sometimes connected with a priest of Liege
-(Luettich) Lambert le Begue (the stammerer, [Dagger] 1172), a reformer in
-his way whose work recalls that of the founders of orders of combined
-canons and nuns, and who was very popular among women of all classes and
-advocated their association. Many settlements of beguines were founded in
-the towns of Flanders and Brabant, some of which have survived to this
-day; and in German towns also the plan was readily adopted of setting
-aside a house in the town, for the use of poor women who, being thus
-provided with a roof over their heads, were then left to support
-themselves as best they could, by begging, or by sick nursing, or by the
-work of their hands. These women were not bound by any vow to remain in
-the house where they dwelt, and were not tied down to any special routine.
-This freedom led to different results among them. In some instances they
-were attracted by mysticism; in others they advocated ideas which drew on
-them the reproach of heresy and gave rise to Papal decrees condemning
-them; in others again they drifted into ways which were little to their
-credit and caused them to be classed with loose women.
-
-In one of the houses allotted to these women in Magdeburg Mechthild spent
-the years between 1235 and 1268, and during that time, under the
-encouragement of the Dominican friars, she wrote prayers, meditations,
-reflections on the times, and short accounts of spiritual visions, some in
-prose, some in verse, which had a wide circulation. The fact of their
-being written in German at a time when writings of the kind in German were
-few, was the cause of their being read in lay as well as in religious
-circles. These writings were afterwards collected, presumably in the order
-of their composition, by a Dominican friar who issued them under the title
-of 'The Flowing Light of Divinity.' Six of the seven books into which the
-work is divided were composed before Mechthild went to Helfta, and the
-visions and reflections she wrote after her admission were grouped
-together in the seventh book. These writings were originally issued in the
-German of the north, but the only German copy now extant is a south German
-transcript, which was written for the mystics of Switzerland. The work was
-translated into Latin during Mechthild's lifetime by a Dominican friar,
-but his collection only contains the first six books, the contents of
-which are arranged in a different order. Both the German and the Latin
-versions have recently been reprinted[815].
-
-Among these writings were several severely critical and condemnatory of
-the clergy of Magdeburg, who resented these attacks and persecuted
-Mechthild. On this account she sought admission at Helfta, which was not
-far distant from Halle, where her special friend the Dominican friar
-Heinrich was living[816]. The nuns at Helfta were on friendly terms with
-the Dominicans, who frequently visited them[817], and it appears that the
-nun Gertrud the Great knew of the writings of the beguine and advocated
-her admission to the nunnery. She came there in 1268 and lived there for
-about twelve years; passages in the writings of her fellow nuns refer to
-her death and burial[818].
-
-With regard to her writings we are struck by their diversified contents,
-by their variety in form, and by their many-sided sympathies. The 'Flowing
-Light of Divinity' (Fliessende Licht der Gottheit), consists of a
-collection of shorter and longer compositions, some in poetry, some in
-prose, which may be roughly classed as spiritual poems and love-songs,
-allegories, visions, and moral reflections or aphorisms. Against mysticism
-the charge has been brought that it led to no activity in theological
-thought and did not produce any religious reformation, but surely
-enquiries into the nature of the soul and its relation to God such as
-these are full of speculative interest, and have played no small part in
-paving the way towards a more rational interpretation of the position of
-man with regard to faith, to merit, to retribution and to the other great
-questions of dogma.
-
-Turning first to the poems which treat of spiritual love, many are in
-dialogue, a form much used by the Minnesingers of the age but rarely by
-its religious poets. Among them is a dialogue[819] between the Soul and
-the queen Love, who sits enthroned. The Soul accuses Love (spiritual love
-of course) of robbing her of a liking for the goods of this world, but
-Love justifies herself by saying that she has given to the Soul instead
-all that constitutes her true happiness. In another dialogue[820] the Soul
-exclaims in wonder at Love, who in eloquent strains describes the power
-that is within her. By this power she drove Christ from heaven to earth;
-is it then to be wondered at that she can capture and hold fast a soul?
-
-One of the longer pieces[821], less complete in form but more complex in
-ideas, describes how a call comes to the Soul, and how she urges her
-servants the Senses to help her to adorn herself to go forth to the dance,
-that her craving for joy may be satisfied. The Soul justifies her desire
-in strains such as these:
-
-  'The fish in the water do not drown, the birds in the air are not lost,
-  The gold in the furnace does not vanish but there attains its glow.
-  God has given to every creature to live according to its desire,
-  Why then should I resist mine?'
-
-The Soul then describes the various experiences which led to her union
-with Christ, which she expresses in passionate strains suggestive of the
-Song of Solomon.
-
-Again, we have the Soul[822] complaining to Love of the ties which bind
-her to the body, and Love directs her how to overcome them. Understanding
-too discourses with the Soul[823], and the Soul admits the greater
-capacities of Understanding, but she insists that Understanding owes to
-her the capacity both of contemplation and spiritual enjoyment. In other
-poems like points of abstract interest are touched upon. One of the most
-curious of these productions is a dialogue in which Understanding
-converses with Conscience[824] and expresses surprise at Conscience, whose
-attitude is one of proud humility. Conscience explains that her pride
-comes through her contact with God, and that her humility is due to her
-contrition at having done so few good works.
-
-The question of how far good works are necessary to salvation, in other
-words justification by faith _versus_ justification by works, is a thought
-prominent in the beguine's mind, and gives the keynote to a curious and
-interesting allegory on admission to the communion of the saints[825]. A
-poor girl longing to hear mass felt herself transported into the church of
-heaven, where at first she could see no one. Presently youths entered
-strewing flowers,--white flowers beneath the church tower, violets along
-the nave, roses before the Virgin's altar, and lilies throughout the
-choir. Others came and lighted candles, and then John the Baptist entered
-bearing the lamb, which he set on the altar and prepared to read mass.
-John the Evangelist came next, St Peter and so many more of heaven's
-inmates that the poor girl felt there was no room left for her in the nave
-of the church. She went and stood beneath the tower among people who wore
-crowns, 'but the beauty of hair, which comes from good works, they had
-not. How had they come into heaven? Through repentance and good
-intention.' There were others with them so richly clad that the girl felt
-ashamed of her appearance and went into the choir, where she saw the
-Virgin, St Catherine, holy Cecilia, bishops, martyrs and angels. But
-suddenly she too was decked with a splendid cloak, and the Virgin beckoned
-to her to stand by her side. Prompted by the Virgin she then took part in
-the religious service and was led to the altar, where John the Baptist let
-her kiss the wounds of the lamb. 'She to whom this happened is dead,'
-says the writer, 'but we hope to find her again among the choir of
-angels.'
-
-This allegory was severely censured, and in a later chapter[826] Mechthild
-says that a 'Pharisee' argued that it was forbidden for a layman, like
-John the Baptist, to hold mass. Mechthild's arguments in reply to the
-charge are somewhat involved, but she boldly declares that John, who was
-in close communion with God, was better fitted in some respects to say
-mass than Pope, bishop or priest.
-
-With Mechthild, John the Baptist, John the Evangelist and St Peter, patron
-saint of the Dominicans, stand foremost among the saints of heaven. There
-is a beautiful account[827] of a Soul who found herself in company with
-God and the saints, who each in turn explained how they had helped to
-bring her there.
-
-Glimpses of heaven and hell are frequent in these writings, and a full
-description of hell[828] and one of paradise[829] deserve special
-attention from the point of view of mediaeval imagery. Hell is here
-characterised as the seat of Eternal Hatred, which is built in the deepest
-depths from stones of manifold wickedness. Pride, as shown in Lucifer,
-forms the foundation-stone; then come the stones of disobedience,
-covetousness, hatred and lewdness, brought thither through acts of Adam.
-Cain brought anger, ferocity, and warfare, and Judas brought lying,
-betrayal, despair and suicide. The building formed by these stones is so
-arranged that each part of it is occupied by those who were specially
-prone to the various sins. In its depths sits Lucifer, above him
-Christians, Jews and heathens, according to the kind of crime committed by
-each. The horrors of their sufferings recall those pictured by Herrad, and
-at a later period by Dante and Orcagna. The usurer is gnawed, the thief
-hangs suspended by his feet, murderers continually receive wounds, and
-gluttons swallow red-hot stones and drink sulphur and pitch. 'What seemed
-sweetness here is there turned into bitterness. The sluggard is loaded
-with grief, the wrathful are struck with fiery thongs. The poor musician,
-who had gleefully fed wicked vanity, weeps more tears in hell than there
-is water in the sea.' Many horrible and impressive scenes, such as the
-mediaeval mind loved to dwell upon, are depicted.
-
-The picture drawn of paradise is correspondingly fair. According to the
-beguine there is an earthly and a heavenly paradise. Regarding the earthly
-paradise she says: 'There is no limit to its length and breadth. First I
-reached a spot lying on the confines of this world and paradise. There I
-saw trees and leaves and grass, but of weeds there were none. Some trees
-bore fruit, but most of them sweet-scented leaves. Rapid streams cut
-through the earth, and warm winds blew from the south. In the waters
-mingled earth's sweetness and heaven's delight. The air was sweet beyond
-expression. But of birds and animals there were none, for God has reserved
-this garden for human beings to dwell there undisturbed,' In this garden
-Mechthild finds Enoch and Elias who explain what keeps them there. Then
-she sees the higher regions of paradise in which dwell the souls who are
-waiting to enter the kingdom of God, 'floating in joy as the air floats in
-the sunshine,' says Mechthild; and she goes on to explain how on the Day
-of Judgment paradise will altogether cease to exist and its inhabitants
-will be absorbed into heaven.
-
-The beguine's writings contain various references to herself and her
-compositions, and considerable praise of the Dominican friars. In one
-place[830] she describes how she was told that her writings deserved to be
-burnt, but she turned in prayer to God as was her wont from childhood, and
-He told her not to doubt her powers for they came through Him. 'Ah Lord,'
-she exclaimed in reply, 'were I a learned man, a priest, in whom thou
-hadst made manifest this power, thou would'st see him honoured, but how
-can they believe that on such unworthy ground thou hast raised a golden
-house?... Lord, I fail to see the reason of it.' But the attacks against
-her roused her to anger, and she closes the poem with a stern invective
-against those who are false.
-
-Another passage contains an autobiographical sketch of Mechthild's early
-experiences[831]. She says that when she was twelve years old she felt
-drawn to things divine, and from that time to the present, a period of
-thirty-one years, she had been conscious of God's grace and had been saved
-from going astray. 'God is witness,' she continues, 'that I never
-consciously prayed to be told what is written in this book; it never
-occurred to me that such things could come to anyone. While I spent my
-youth with friends and relations to whom I was most dear, I had no
-knowledge of such things. Yet I always wished to be humble, and from love
-of God I came to a place (Magdeburg) where with one exception I had no
-friends.' She describes how at that time two angels and two devils were
-her companions, and were to her the representatives of the good and evil
-tendencies of which she was conscious. The devils spoke to her of her
-physical beauty, promised fame 'such as has led astray many an
-unbeliever,' and prompted her to rebellion and unchastity. Obviously her
-passionate nature rose against the mode of life she had adopted, but the
-thought of Christ's sufferings at last brought her comfort. She was much
-perturbed by her power of writing. 'Why not give it to learned folk?' she
-asked of God, but God was angered with her, and her father-confessor
-pressed upon her that writing was her vocation. In another impassioned
-account she describes how she was oppressed by a devil[832].
-
-In the third book of her writings Mechthild says[833] that God pointed out
-to her the seven virtues which priests ought to cultivate, and we gather
-from this that she did not consider the clergy devout or pure-minded. In
-further passages[834] she dilates on the duties of prelate, prior and
-prioress, and severely attacks the conduct of a deacon of Magdeburg. Even
-more explicit in its severity to the priesthood is an account[835] of how
-God spoke to her, and told her that He would touch the Pope's heart and
-make him utter a prayer, which is given, and in which the Pope declaims
-against the conduct of his clergy who are 'straightway going to hell.' In
-the Latin translation God's admonition is amplified by the following
-passages: 'For thus says the Lord: I will open the ear of the highest
-priest and touch his heart with the woe of my wrath, because my shepherds
-of Jerusalem have become robbers and wolves before my very eyes. With
-cruelty they murder my lambs and devour them. The sheep also are worn and
-weary because you call them from healthy pastures, in your godlessness do
-not suffer them to graze on the heights on green herbs, and with threats
-and reproof prevent their being tended with healthful teaching and
-healthful advice by those men who are supported by faith and knowledge. He
-who knows not the way that leads to hell and would know it, let him look
-at the life and morals of the base and degenerate clergy, who, given to
-luxury and other sins, through their impious ways are inevitably going the
-way to hell[836].'
-
-The friars, it is said, must come to the rescue and reform the world, and
-Mechthild being especially inclined to the Dominicans dwells on their
-usefulness to true faith in a number of passages[837]. There is a long
-description of how God saw that His Son, with the apostles, martyrs,
-confessors and virgins, was unable to lead back the people who had gone
-astray, and therefore He sent into the world two other children, that is
-the two orders of friars, to save them. In another vision[838] God
-explains to Mechthild the special purpose for which He has lately sent
-five new saints into the world, one of whom is Elisabeth of Thueringen
-'whom I sent,' said the Lord, 'to those wretched ladies who sit in castles
-with much unchastity, puffed up with conceit, and so absorbed by vanities
-that they ought to be cast into the nether regions. Many a lady however
-has now followed her example in what measure she would or could.' The
-other saints are Dominic, who has been sent to reclaim
-unbelievers,--Francis, who has come as a warning to covetous priests and
-conceited laymen,--a new St Peter, the Martyr ([Dagger] 1252),--and the
-sister Jutta von Sangershausen. History tells us of Peter that he was
-appointed inquisitor against the heretics in Lombardy and murdered at
-their instigation[839]; and of Jutta that, having lost her husband in
-1260, she placed her children in convents and went among the heathen
-Prussians where she tended the leprous till her death four years
-afterwards[840]. From later passages in the writings of Mechthild, written
-after she had come to live at Helfta[841], it appears that she felt that
-faith was not increasing in the world; perhaps she was disappointed in her
-exalted anticipations of the influence of the friars.
-
-The writings of Mechthild of this later period are more mystic and
-visionary than those of earlier days. She is distressed at the troublous
-times that have come to Saxony and Thueringen, and tells[842] how she fell
-ill and was so perturbed that she lost the power of prayer for seventeen
-days. Many prayers and visions, some of great sweetness and beauty, were
-the production of these later days. A long allegory called the 'Spiritual
-Convent or Ghostly Abbey[843]' shows the high opinion she had of life in a
-nunnery. In this poem the inmates of the convent are personified as the
-Virtues, an idea occasionally used during the Middle Ages, and one which
-at a later date in England, as we shall hear afterwards[844], was handled
-in a very different manner, the convent inmates being represented as the
-Vices. In Mechthild's convent Charity is abbess, Meekness is chaplain,
-Peace is prioress, Kindliness is sub-prioress, and among the inmates of
-the convent there is Hope the singing-mistress, and Wisdom the
-schoolmistress 'who with good counsel carefully instructs the ignorant, so
-that the nunnery is held holy and honoured.' Bounty is cellaress, Mercy
-sees to the clothes, Pity tends the sick, and Dread sits at the gate. The
-provost or priest is Obedience, 'to whom all these Virtues are subject.
-Thus does the convent abide before God,' the poem ends, '... happy are
-they who dwell there.'
-
-The writings of Mechthild offer many more points of interest. Not the
-least curious among her compositions are the amplified descriptions of
-Biblical history, as of the Creation, the Nativity, and the early
-experiences of the Virgin[845], which enter minutely into the feelings and
-emotions of those immediately concerned and give them an allegorical and
-spiritualised application. Short spiritual poems are also numerous, but so
-much depends on their form that a translation cannot convey their chief
-beauty. Their general drift is exemplified by the two following[846].
-
-'It is a wondrous journeying onwards, this progress of the Soul, who
-guides the Senses as the man who sees leads him who is blind. Fearlessly
-the Soul wanders on without grief of heart, for she desires nought but
-what the Lord wills who leads all to the best.'
-
-And again[847], 'My Soul spake to her Spouse: Lord, thy tenderness is to
-my body delightful ministration; thy compassion is to my spiritual nature
-wondrous comfort; and thy love is to my whole being rest eternal.'
-
-Thoughts such as these are found scattered up and down in the beguine's
-writings, and give one a high estimation of her poetic power, her ready
-imagination and her mastery of language. Her vigorous nature guided into
-the channel of spiritual aspirations frequently filled her poems with a
-passionate eloquence.
-
-In conclusion may stand a few of the beguine's moral reflections, which,
-if they are not borrowed from elsewhere, argue well for her power of
-condensing thoughts into short sentences; but here also it is not easy to
-find the exact words in which to render the chief points of these
-reflections[848].
-
-  'Vanity does not stop to think what she is losing;
-  Perseverance is laden with virtues.
-  Stupidity is ever self-sufficient;
-  The wisest never comes to the end of what he would say.
-  Anger brings darkness unto the soul;
-  Gentleness is ever sure of attaining grace.
-  Pride would ever raise herself aloft;
-  Lowliness is ever ready to yield ...
-  Sluggishness will never gain wealth;
-  The industrious seeks more than his immediate advantage.'
-
-And the following,--which are the product of a later period and have in
-them the ring of a deeper experience[849]--'None knows how firm he stands,
-until he has experienced the prompting of desire; none how strong he is,
-until hatred has attacked him; none how good he is, before he has attained
-a happy end.'
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-From the writings of the beguine Mechthild we pass to those of her
-companion at Helfta, the nun Mechthild von Hackeborn. Her 'Book of Special
-Grace[850]' consists entirely of visions or revelations described by her
-and put into writing by her fellow-nuns; it was widely read, and gave rise
-to similar productions in other nunneries. There are many early manuscript
-copies of the book in existence; it was originally written in Latin, but
-has been translated into German, English, Italian and French, and has
-repeatedly been printed.
-
-The visions are so arranged that those contained in the first part of the
-book have reference to festal days of the Church, to Christ, Mary and the
-saints. The second part treats of the manifestations of divine grace of
-which Mechthild was conscious in herself, and the third and fourth
-describe how God should be praised and what is conducive to salvation or
-'soul-hele.' In the fifth part Mechthild holds converse with those who
-have departed this life, chiefly members of the convent, for the belief
-that it was possible to hold communion with the souls of the departed was
-readily accepted at Helfta as in other religious houses.
-
-A sixth and seventh part were added to Mechthild's book after her death by
-her fellow-nuns and contain information about her sister, the abbess
-Gertrud, and details about Mechthild's death and the visions other nuns
-had of her.
-
-The nun Mechthild von Hackeborn, who was nine years younger than her
-sister Gertrud, had come to the house as a child on a visit with her
-mother, and was so much attracted to it that she remained there. She is
-described by her fellow-nuns as a person of tender and delicate
-refinement, whose religious fervour was remarkable, and these
-characteristics are reflected in her writings. She was often suffering,
-noticeably at the time when her sister, the abbess Gertrud, died (1291).
-She is praised for her lovely voice, and references to music and singing
-in her visions are frequent. It is not quite clear when her fellow-nuns
-began to put her visions into writing, presumably between 1280 and 1300,
-and authorities also differ on the year of her death, which the
-Benedictines of Solesmes accept as 1298[851], whereas Preger defers it
-till 1310[852].
-
-In the description of her visions Mechthild von Hackeborn appears
-throughout as a person of even temper and great sweetness of disposition,
-one who was not visited by picturesque temptations, troubles and doubts,
-and who therefore insisted chiefly on the beautiful side of things; for
-hell with its torments and the whole mise-en-scene of the nether regions
-have no meaning and no attraction for her. In her revelations Christ, the
-Virgin, and other members of the vast hierarchy of heaven enter as living
-realities. She is particularly fond of the angels, whom she loves to
-picture as the associates of men on earth and in heaven. In conformity
-with the conceptions of her age Christ is to her the wooer of the soul,
-the chosen bridegroom, who combines all that makes humanity attractive and
-divinity sublime. Christ and the Virgin love to confer with Mechthild, or
-rather with her Soul,--the terms are used indiscriminately,--and enter
-into converse with her whenever she seeks enlightenment. Flowers and
-precious stones, the splendour of vestments, and occasionally some homely
-object, supply her with similes and comparisons.
-
-The following descriptions occurring in visions will give some idea of the
-spirit in which Mechthild wrote[853].
-
-'After the feast of St Michael ... she saw a golden ascent divided into
-nine grades, crowded by a multitude of angels, and the first grade was
-presided over by angels, the second by archangels and so on upwards, each
-order of angels presiding over one grade. She was divinely informed that
-this ascent represented the abode of men in this way,--that whoever
-faithfully, humbly, and devotedly fulfils his duty to the Church of God,
-and for God's sake, to the infirm, to the poor and to travellers, abides
-in the first grade, consorting with the angels. Again, they who by prayer
-and devotion are closer to God and in nearness to Him, are devoted to
-knowledge of Him, to His teaching and help, are in the next grade and are
-the companions of the archangels. Those again who practise patience,
-obedience, voluntary poverty, humility, and bravely perform all virtues,
-mount to the next grade with the Virtues. And those who, opposing vice and
-greed, hold the fiend and all his suggestions in contempt, in the fourth
-grade share the triumph of glory with the Powers. Prelates who fully
-respond to the duties the Church has entrusted to them, who watch day and
-night over the salvation of souls and discreetly give back twofold the
-talent entrusted to them,--these in the fifth grade hold the glory of
-heaven as a recompense of their work with the Pre-eminences. Again, those
-who with complete submission bow before the majesty of the Divine, and who
-out of love for Him love the Creator in the created, and love themselves
-because they are fashioned after the image of God, who conform to Him as
-far as human weakness permits, and, holding the flesh subservient to the
-spirit, triumph over their mind by transferring it to things celestial,
-these glory in the sixth grade with the Rulers. But those who are
-steadfast in meditation and contemplation, who embracing pureness of heart
-and peace of mind make of themselves a temple meet for God, which truly
-may be called a paradise, according to Proverbs (viii. 31) "my delights
-were with the sons of men," and about which it is said (2 Cor. vi. 16) "I
-will dwell in them and walk in them," these dwell in the seventh grade
-with the Enthroned. Those who outstrip others in knowledge and
-apprehension, who by a singular blessedness hold God in their minds as it
-were face to face and give back what they have drawn from the fountain of
-all wisdom, by teaching and explaining to others, these abide in the
-eighth grade of the ascent together with the Cherubim. And those who love
-God with heart and soul, who place their whole being in the eternal fire
-which is God itself, love Him not with their own but with divine love
-being the chosen ones of God, who see all creatures in God and love them
-for His sake, friends as well as enemies, those whom nothing can divide
-from God nor stay in their ascent--for the more their enemies attack them
-the more they grow in love,--those who, fervent themselves, awake fervour
-in others, so that if they could they would make all mankind perfect in
-love, who weep for the sins and faults of others, because, indifferent to
-their own glory, they seek but the glory of God, these shall for evermore
-dwell in the ninth grade with the Seraphim, between whom and God there is
-nought in closer nearness to Him.
-
-'During mass she (Mechthild) saw that a large number of angels were
-present, and each angel in guise of a lovely youth stood by the side of
-the maiden entrusted to his care. Some held flowering sceptres, others
-golden flowers. And as the maidens bowed they pressed the flowers to their
-lips in sign of everlasting peace. Thus angels assisted at the entire
-mass.
-
-'And as the maidens advanced to partake of the communion, each of the
-angels led her who was entrusted to his care. And the King of Glory stood
-in the place of the priest surrounded by shining splendour, on His breast
-an ornament in the shape of a branched tree, and from His heart, in which
-lies hidden the wealth of wisdom and knowledge, flowed a stream which
-encompassed those who advanced with a flood of heavenly joy.'
-
-In the preceding passages we see Mechthild in the state of rapture called
-forth by the moments of celebration and service; the extracts which follow
-describe one of the divine visitations which came to her as a special
-manifestation of grace[854].
-
-'On a certain Sunday, while they were singing the _Asperges me, Domine_,
-she said "Lord, in what wilt thou now bathe and cleanse my heart?"
-Straightway the Lord with love unutterable bending to her as a mother
-would to her son, embraced her saying: "In the love of my divine heart I
-will bathe thee." And He opened the door of His heart, the treasure-house
-of flowing holiness, and she entered into it as though into a vineyard.
-There she saw a river of living water flowing from the east to the west,
-and round about the river there were twelve trees bearing twelve kinds of
-fruit, that is the virtues which the blessed Paul enumerates in his
-epistle: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness,
-benignity, meekness, faith, modesty, temperance, chastity[855]. This water
-is called the river of love; thereunto the soul entered and was cleansed
-of every stain. In this river there were numerous fish with golden scales,
-which signified those loving souls which, separated from earthly delights,
-have plunged themselves in the very well-spring of all good, that is, into
-Jesus. In the vineyard palm-trees were planted, some of which stood erect,
-while others were bent to the ground. The palms that stand erect are those
-who despised the world with its flowers, and who turned their minds to
-things divine; and the palms that are bent down are those wretched ones
-who lie in the earthly dust of their misdeeds. The Lord in likeness of a
-gardener was digging in the earth, and she said: "O Lord, what is thy
-spade?" And He answered: "My fear."--Now in certain places the earth was
-hard, in others soft. The hard earth signified the hearts of those who are
-hardened in sin and who know not how to be corrected either by advice or
-by reproof; the soft earth the hearts of those who are softened by tears
-and true contrition. And our Lord said: "This vineyard is my Catholic
-Church, in which for thirty-three years I laboured with my sweat; do thou
-labour with me in this vineyard." And she said: "How?" To whom the Lord
-replied: "By watering it." And straightway the Soul ran eagerly to the
-river and set a vessel filled with water on her shoulders, and as it was
-heavy, the Lord came and helped her, and its burden was lightened. And the
-Lord said: "Thus when I give grace to men, do all things performed or
-borne for my sake seem light and easy. But if I withdraw my grace, then do
-all things seem burdensome." Moreover round about the palms she saw a
-multitude of angels like unto a wall....'
-
-In a similar strain the visions of Mechthild proceed, always gentle and
-rarely impassioned but shining with the glow of endlessly changing
-imagery. There is no limit to the pictures which rise before her mental
-eye or to the points which suggest analogy with things divine[856].
-
-'To rouse the piety of believers in relation to the glorious image of our
-Saviour Jesus Christ, on the Sunday _Omnis terra_ (the second after
-Epiphany), that is on the day when the exposition at Rome of the image of
-Christ takes place, she was granted this vision. On a mountain overgrown
-with flowers she beheld our Lord seated on a throne of jasper decorated
-with gold and red stone. The jasper which is green is typical of the power
-of eternal divinity, gold represents love, and the red stone the
-sufferings which He endured through love of us. The mountain was
-surrounded by beautiful trees covered with fruit. Under these trees rested
-the souls of the saints, each of whom had a tent of cloth of gold, and
-they ate of the fruit with great enjoyment. The hill is emblematic of the
-mortal life of Christ, the trees are His virtues, love, pity and others.
-The saints rest under different trees according as they adhered to the
-Lord's different virtues; those who followed Him in charity, eat of the
-fruit of the tree of charity; those who were full of pity, eat of the
-fruit of the tree of pity, and so on according to the virtue each has
-practised.
-
-'Then those who were ready to honour the holy face with a special prayer
-approached the Lord, carrying on their shoulders their sins, which they
-laid at His feet; and they were forthwith transformed into jewels of
-glowing gold (xenia aurea). Those whose repentance had come out of love,
-because they were sad at having offended God without having been punished,
-saw their sins changed into golden necklaces. Others who had redeemed them
-by saying the psalms and other prayers, had them transformed into golden
-rings such as are used at festivals (Dominicalibus). Those who had made
-restitution for their sins by their own efforts, saw before them lovely
-golden shields; while those who had purified their sins by bodily
-suffering, beheld them as so many golden censers, for bodily chastisement
-before God is like the sweetness of thyme.'
-
-The following is an example of a homely simile[857].
-
-'On a certain occasion she was conscious of having received an unusual
-gift through the Lord's bounty, when feeling her inadequacy she humbly
-said: "O bounteous King, this gift, does it befit me who deem myself
-unworthy of entering thy kitchen and washing thy platters?" Whereupon the
-Lord: "Where is my kitchen and where are the platters thou wouldst wash?"
-She was confounded and said nothing. But the Lord, who puts questions not
-that they may be answered but that He may give answer unto them Himself,
-made her rejoice by His reply. He said: "My kitchen is my heart which,
-like unto a kitchen that is a common room of the house and open alike to
-servants and masters, is ever open to all and for the benefit of all. The
-cook in this kitchen is the Holy Ghost, who kindly without intermission
-provides things in abundance and by replenishing them makes things abound
-again. My platters are the hearts of saints and of chosen ones, which are
-filled from the overflow of the sweetness of my divine heart."'
-
-From a passage in these books[858] we learn that a large number of
-Mechthild's visions had been put into writing by her fellow-nuns before
-she was made acquainted with the fact. For a time she was sorely troubled,
-then she gained confidence, reflecting that her power to see visions had
-come from God, and indeed she heard a voice from heaven informing her that
-her book should be called the 'Book of Special Grace.'
-
-She had all her life been distressed by physical suffering. During her
-last illness she was generally unconscious and her fellow-nuns crowded
-about her praying that she would intercede with God in their behalf.
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-Neither of the Mechthilds makes any reference in her writings to the nun
-Gertrud, but Gertrud's works contain various references to her
-fellow-nuns[859], and it is surmised that Gertrud helped to put the nun
-Mechthild's visions into writing before she wrote on her own account. A
-passage in her own book of visions[860] refers to revelations generally,
-and the Lord explains to her how it is that visions are sometimes written
-in one, sometimes in another language. This idea may have been suggested
-by the fact that the beguine Mechthild's writings were in German and the
-nun Mechthild's in Latin.
-
-Gertrud was very different from both of these writers in disposition[861].
-Probably of humble origin, she had been given into the care of the convent
-as a child (in 1261), and in her development was greatly influenced by the
-sisters Gertrud the abbess, and the nun Mechthild von Hackeborn. Of a
-passionate and ambitious nature, she devoted all her energies to mastering
-the liberal arts, but in consequence of a vision that came to her at
-twenty-five, she cast them aside and plunged into religious study. She
-mastered the spirit and contents of Holy Writ so rapidly that she began to
-expound them to others. Then she made extracts and collections of passages
-from the Fathers, out of which we are told she made many books. The
-influence of her personality was such that 'none conversed with her who
-did not afterwards declare they had profited by it.' The admiration she
-aroused among her fellow-nuns was so great that they declared that God had
-compared her to the nun Mechthild and that He said: 'In this one have I
-accomplished great things, but greater things will I accomplish in
-Gertrud[862].' As a proof of her industry we are told[863] that she was
-occupied from morning till night translating from Latin (into German),
-shortening some passages, amplifying others 'to the greater advantage of
-her readers.' From another passage it appears that she compiled a poem
-(carmen) from the sayings (dictis) of the saints[864], and as an
-illustration of her moral attitude we are told that when she was reading
-the Scriptures aloud and 'as it happened,' passages occurred which shocked
-her by their allusions, she hurried them over quickly or pretended not to
-understand them. 'But when it became needful to speak of such things for
-some reason of salvation, it was as though she did not mind, and she
-overcame her hesitation[865].' Her great modesty in regard to her own
-requirements is insisted on by her biographer. Many bore witness to the
-fact that they were more impressed by her words than by those of
-celebrated preachers, for she frequently moved her audience to tears[866].
-In addition the writer feels called upon to mention a few incidents that
-happened to Gertrud, giving them a miraculous rendering, no doubt from a
-wish to enhance her worth.
-
-The information about Gertrud is supplied by the first part of her book
-called 'The Legacy of Divine Piety[867],' which as it does not mention
-Gertrud's death, seems to have been written while she was alive, perhaps
-as a preface to a copy of her revelations. It was only after many years of
-study and literary activity that she determined to write down her personal
-experiences, and these accounts, written between 1289 and 1290, form the
-second part of the book as it stands at present and constitute its chief
-and abiding interest.
-
-The admiration bestowed on the 'Legacy of Divine Piety' was almost greater
-than that given to the writings of the nun Mechthild. The perusal of a
-chapter will show Gertrud's attitude of mind. Starting from the occasion
-when she first became conscious of a living communion with God, she
-describes how step by step she realised an approximation to things divine,
-such as reverence, love, and the desire of knowledge alone can secure. She
-speaks of experiencing in herself a deeper religious consciousness which
-reacted in making her feel herself unworthy of the special attention of
-her Creator, and she continues in this strain[868]:
-
-'If I look back on what the tone of my life was before and afterwards, in
-truth I declare that this is grace I am grateful for and yet unworthy of
-receiving. For thou, O Lord, didst grant unto me of the clear light of thy
-knowledge to which the sweetness of thy love prompted me more than any
-deserved correction of my faults could have done. I do not recall having
-felt such happiness save on the days when thou didst bid me to the
-delights of thy royal table. Whether thy wise forethought had so ordained,
-or my continued shortcomings were the reason of it, I cannot decide.
-
-'Thus didst thou deal with and rouse my soul on a day between Resurrection
-and Ascension when I had entered the courtyard at an early hour before
-Prime, and sitting down by the fishpond was enjoying the beauties of the
-surroundings which charmed me by the clearness of the flowing water, the
-green of the trees that stood around, and the free flight of the birds,
-especially the doves, but above all by the reposeful quiet of the retired
-situation. My mind turned on what in such surroundings would make my joy
-perfect, and I wished for a friend, a loving, affectionate and suitable
-companion, who would sweeten my solitude. Then thou, O God, author of joy
-unspeakable, who as I hope didst favour the beginning of my meditation and
-didst complete it, thou didst inspire me with the thought that if,
-conscious of thy grace, I flow back to be joined to thee like the water;
-if, growing in the knowledge of virtue like unto these trees, I flower in
-the greenness of good deeds; if, looking down on things earthly in free
-flight like these doves, I approach heaven, and, with my bodily senses
-removed from external turmoil, apprehend thee with my whole mind, then in
-joyfulness my heart will make for thee a habitation.
-
-'My thoughts during the day dwelt on these matters, and at night, as I
-knelt in prayer in the dormitory, suddenly this passage from the Gospel
-occurred to me (John xiv. 23), "If a man love me, he will keep my words;
-and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode
-with him." And my impure heart felt thee present therein. O would that an
-ocean of blood passed over my head that my miserable inadequacy were
-washed out now that thou hast made thy abode with me in dignity
-inscrutable! Or that my heart snatched from my body were given to me to
-cleanse with glowing coal, so that, freed of its dross, it might offer
-thee if not indeed a worthy abode, yet one not altogether unworthy. Thus,
-O God, didst thou show thyself from that hour onwards, sometimes kindly,
-sometimes stern, in accordance with my improved or neglectful way of life;
-though I must admit that the utmost improvement to which I sometimes
-momentarily attained, had it lasted all my life, never had made me worthy
-of the least part of the sustenance which I received in spite of many sins
-and, alas! of great wickedness. For thy extreme tenderness shows me thee
-more grieved than angered by my shortcomings, a proof to me that the
-amount of thy forbearance is greater when thou dost bear with me in my
-failings, than during thy mortal life, when thou didst bear with the
-betrayer Judas.
-
-'When I strayed in mind, tempted away by some deceitful attraction, and
-after hours, or alas! after days, or woe is me! after weeks, returned to
-my heart, always did I find thee there, so that I cannot say that thou
-hast withdrawn thyself from me from that hour, nine years ago, till eleven
-days before the feast of John the Baptist, save on one occasion, when it
-happened through some worldly dispute, I believe, and lasted from Thursday
-(the fifth feria) to Tuesday (the second feria). Then on the vigil of St
-John the Baptist, after the mass _Nec timeas etc._, thy sweetness and
-great charity came back to me, finding me so forlorn in mind that I was
-not even conscious of having lost a treasure, nor thought of grieving for
-it, nor was desirous of having it returned, so that I cannot account for
-the madness that possessed my mind, unless indeed it so happened because
-thou didst wish me to experience in myself these words of St Bernard: "We
-fly and thou pursuest us; we turn our back on thee, thou comest before us;
-thou dost ask and art refused; but no madness, no contempt of ours makes
-thee turn away who never art weary, and thou dost draw us on to the joy of
-which it is said (1 Cor. ii. 9), 'Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard it,
-neither has it entered into the heart of man.'"'
-
-These passages must suffice. Anyone desirous of following Gertrud through
-the further experiences which guided her to the knowledge of God and gave
-her an insight into the working of spiritual love must turn to her
-writings, which bear the reader onwards in continuous flow, and with much
-self-analysis and self-realisation give evidence of the conscious joy
-which develops into rapture in the presence of the Divine. A passage
-contained in the last chapter of the book describes Gertrud's hopes
-regarding her work, and fitly summarises her aspirations[869].
-
-'Behold, beloved God,' she writes, 'I here deposit the talent of thy most
-gracious friendship, which, entrusted to me, the lowliest and least worthy
-of thy creatures, I have set forth to the increase of thy power; for I
-believe and dare affirm that no reason prompted me to write and speak but
-obedience to thy will, desire for thy glory, and zeal for the salvation of
-souls. I take thee to witness that I wish thee praise and thanks, for thy
-abundant grace withdrew itself not from me on account of my unworthiness.
-And herein also shalt thou find praise, that readers of this book will
-rejoice in the sweetness of thy bounty, and, drawn to thee, learn greater
-things through it; for as students progress from first learning the
-alphabet to acquaintance with logic (logica), by means of the imagery here
-described they will be led to taste of that hidden divine sustenance
-(manna) which cannot be expressed even by allegory.... Meanwhile in
-accordance with thy faithful promise and my humble request, grant to all
-who read this book in lowliness that they rejoice in thy love, bear with
-my inadequacy, and feel true contrition themselves, in order that from the
-golden censers of their loving hearts a sweet odour may be wafted upwards
-to thee, making full amends for my carelessness and shortcomings.'
-
-Before the personal interest of this portion of the book the other parts
-written by fellow-nuns fade into insignificance. They contain accounts of
-Gertrud's thoughts on various occasions, and are chiefly interesting for
-the comments they contain on various accepted saints; we here see what
-thoughts were suggested to the Helfta nuns by the personalities of St
-Benedict, St Bernard, St Augustine, St Dominic, St Francis, St Elisabeth,
-and others. Thus the feast of St John the Apostle gives rise to an account
-of him[870] sitting in heaven, where he keeps the holy record, and writes
-in different colours, sometimes in red, sometimes in black, sometimes in
-letters of gold--a simile which recalls the art of writing. The 'Legacy of
-Divine Piety' of Gertrud has repeatedly been printed in the original
-Latin, sometimes in conjunction with the 'Book of Special Grace' of the
-nun Mechthild, and, like the revelations of Mechthild, the writings of
-Gertrud have been translated into German and English. Both in their
-original form and in selections the writings of these nuns are used as
-books of devotion among Catholics to this day, but neither Gertrud nor
-Mechthild have till now been given a place in the _Acta Sanctorum_.
-
-Gertrud outlived her distinguished contemporaries at Helfta; she died in
-1311[871], her thoughts having been engrossed by the anticipation of death
-for some time before. During these last years of her life she composed a
-number of prayers called 'Spiritual Exercises'[872] for the use of her
-fellow-nuns, the religious fervour of which has perhaps rarely been
-surpassed.
-
-They are written in rhyme but in varying rhythm; perhaps they are best
-designated as rhymed prose. Only the original Latin can give an idea of
-their eloquence, but, in the interest of the general reader I have added
-one in English prose. It is one of the series designated as 'a
-supplication for sinfulness and a preparation for death.' There is one
-prayer for every canonical hour; the following[873] is intended for
-repetition after the hour of prime, 'when the Soul holds converse with
-Love and Truth; and when the thought of eternal judgment, at which Truth
-will preside, causes the Soul to beseech Love to help her to secure Jesus
-as her advocate.'
-
-'And thus shalt thou begin to effect a reconciliation with God.
-
-'O shining Truth, O just Equity of God, how shall I appear before thy
-face, bearing my imperfections, conscious of the burden of my wasted
-life, and of the weight of my great negligence? Woe, woe is unto me; I did
-not make the payment of a Christian's faith and of a spiritual life there
-where the treasures of love are stored, that thou mightest receive it back
-with manifold increase of interest. The talent of life entrusted to me,
-not only have I left it unused; but I have forfeited it, debased it, lost
-it. Where shall I go, whither shall I turn, how can I escape from thy
-presence?
-
-'O Truth, in thee undivided abide justice and equity. In accordance with
-number, weight and measure dost thou give judgment. Whatever thou dost
-handle is weighed in truly even scales. Woe is unto me, a thousand times
-woe, if I be given over to thee with none to intercede in my behalf! O
-Love, do thou speak for me, answer for me, secure for me remission. Take
-up my cause, that through thy grace I may find eternal life.
-
-'I know what I must do. The chalice of salvation I will take; the chalice,
-Jesus, I will place on the unweighted scale of Truth. Thus, thus can I
-supply all that is wanting; thus can I outweigh the balance of my sins. By
-that chalice can I counterbalance all my defects. By that chalice I can
-more than counterpoise my sins.
-
-'Hail, O Love, thy royal bondservant Jesus, moved in His inmost being,
-whom thou didst drag at this hour before the tribunal, where the sins of
-the whole world were laid on Him who was without spot or blemish, save
-that out of pity of me He charged Himself with my sins,--Him the most
-innocent, Him the most beloved, condemned for love through my love of Him
-and suffering death for me, Him I would receive from thee to-day, O Love
-Divine, that He may be my advocate. Grant me this security that in this
-cause I have Him as my defender.
-
-'O beloved Truth! I could not come before thee without my Jesus, but with
-Jesus to come before thee is joyful and pleasant. Ah Truth, now sit thee
-on the seat of judgment, enter on the course of justice and bring against
-me what thou wilt, I fear no evil, for I know, I know thy countenance
-cannot confound me, now that He is on my side who is my great hope and my
-whole confidence. Verily, I long for thy judgment now Jesus is with me, He
-the most beloved, the most faithful, He who has taken on Himself my misery
-that He may move thee to compassion.
-
-'Ah, sweetest Jesus, thou loving pledge of my deliverance, come with me to
-the judgment court. There let us stand together side by side. Be thou my
-counsel and my advocate. Declare what thou hast done for me, how well
-thou hast thought upon me, how lovingly thou hast added to me that I might
-be sanctified through thee. Thou hast lived for me that I may not perish.
-Thou hast borne the burden of my sins. Thou hast died for me that I might
-not die an eternal death. All that thou hadst thou gavest for me, that
-through the wealth of thy merit I might be made rich.
-
-'Verily in the hour of death judge me on the basis of that innocence, of
-that purity which came to me through thee when thou didst make atonement
-for my sins with thine own self, judged and condemned for my sake, so that
-I, who am poor and destitute in myself, through thee may be wealthy beyond
-measure.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER X.
-
-SOME ASPECTS OF THE CONVENT IN ENGLAND DURING THE LATER MIDDLE AGES.
-
-  'All that wons in religioun
-  aw to haue sum ocupacioun,
-  outher in kirk or hali bedes,
-  or stodying in oder stedes;
-  ffor ydilnes, os sais sant paul
-  es grete enmy unto the soul.'
-            _Rule of St Benedict translated into English for the use of
-                women_,
-                    1400-1425 (ll. 1887 ff.).
-
-
-Sec. 1. The External Relations of the Convent.
-
-From consideration of affairs on the Continent we return once more to
-England, to consider the external relations of the convent and the
-purposes these institutions fulfilled during the later Middle Ages.
-Speaking generally the monasteries maintained their standing unimpaired
-till the beginning of the 14th century; then their character began to
-change and for quite a century they ceased to be attractive to progressive
-and original minds. The range of occupations cultivated by their inmates
-was restricted, and these inmates gradually came to regard everything with
-indifference except their own narrow religious interests.
-
-The previous chapters have shown that monasteries at different periods had
-served a variety of purposes and had inaugurated progress in various
-directions; but after the year 1350 few if any new developments are
-recorded. As agricultural centres they continued prosperous on the whole;
-the abbot and the abbess retained their character as good landlords;
-charity and hospitality continued to be practised by them. But as
-intellectual centres the monasteries had found their rival in the growing
-townships. The townships at the beginning of the 14th century were so well
-established that they were able to protect and further pursuits and
-industries which had hitherto flourished under the protection of monastic
-centres. Book-learning and science were cultivated in a more liberal
-spirit at the universities, where the friars of different orders had
-established houses; and the arts and crafts flourished on more fruitful
-soil under the protection of the town. The progress of the English nation
-during the 14th and 15th centuries is uncontested; but little of it, if
-any, was due to the influence of monks. On the whole monasteries continued
-to be favourably regarded by the nation, and the system of which they
-formed part was not attacked, but while the friar freely moved from city
-to city and for a while became the representative of learning and art, the
-monk bound to his convent home showed an increasing want of intellectual
-activity.
-
-The change was part of the great revolution which was taking place in
-feudal institutions generally. The age of chivalry was a thing of the
-past, and though the romantic ideas it had engendered had not ceased to
-influence mankind, they no longer possessed the transforming power of
-innovation. Similarly, mysticism which had been so largely cultivated
-inside convent walls had done its work in ushering in a spiritualised
-interpretation of religion; during the 14th century it was spread abroad
-and popularised by the friars, who gave it a new development, the monk's
-interest in it seemed to cease. But the ceremonial and ritual which the
-mystic had helped to elaborate, and the many observances by which the
-Catholicism of the Middle Ages had secured a hold on the concerns of daily
-life, continued in undisturbed prominence,--with this difference, that
-from elevating the few the ritual had now come to impress the many.
-
-It is often insisted on that during the later Middle Ages monasteries were
-homes of superstition and idolatry, and that practices in devotional
-ritual and in the cult of the miraculous were kept up by them to the
-extent of making them a hindrance to moral and intellectual development,
-and obnoxious to the advocates of more liberal and advanced views. The
-fact must be taken as part of the conservative attitude of these houses,
-which had strengthened their hold on outside attention by observances with
-which their existence was indissolubly bound up. Certainly a later age may
-be excused for condemning what had become a mischief and a hindrance; but
-it is well to recall that it was precisely those usages and tendencies
-which a later period condemned as superstitious, that had been elaborated
-at an early period by leaders in thought, who saw in them the means of
-setting forth the principles of the Christian faith. And the elaborate
-cult, the processions and imagery of mediaeval Christianity, have a deeply
-significant side if we think of them in connection with the poetic,
-pictorial, dramatic and architectural arts of the later Middle Ages.
-
-Convents retained some importance for the education of women during these
-ages. Attention must be given to them in this connection, though the
-standard of tuition they offered was not high. Compared with the level
-they had reached during an earlier period convents showed signs of
-retrogression rather than of advance, and compared with what was
-contemporaneously attained at the universities, the training women
-received in the convent was poor in substance, cramped in method, and
-insufficient in application. But, as far as I have been able to ascertain,
-a convent education remained the sole training of which a girl could avail
-herself outside the home circle. For the universities absolutely ignored
-the existence of woman as a being desirous or capable of acquiring
-knowledge, and the teaching at the mediaeval university was so ordered that
-students ranged in age from the merest boyhood to manhood. These centres
-then, by ignoring the existence of women, appropriated to men not only the
-privileges of a higher education, but also all knowledge from its
-rudiments upwards.
-
-The standard of education in the average nunnery was deteriorating because
-devotional interests were cultivated to the exclusion of everything else.
-In early Christian times we saw monk and nun promoting intellectual
-acquirements generally, but the separation of the sexes, and the growing
-feeling in favour of the stricter confinement of nuns within convent
-precincts, advocated by a later age in the interests of a stricter
-morality, more and more cut off the nun from contact with secular
-learning. In the 12th century we saw Queen Matilda, the pupil of a Wessex
-house, writing fluent Latin and speaking not only of the Fathers of the
-Church but quoting from classical writers of whom she evidently knew more
-than the name. But in the later Middle Ages the class of writers who were
-read in the convent was restricted; service books, the legends of the
-saints, theological works, and some amount of scripture, comprised the
-range of the nun's usual studies. The remarks of contemporary writers bear
-out the inferences to be drawn from such a narrowed curriculum of study.
-The nun is represented as a person careful in her devotions, pious in her
-intent, of good manners and gentle breeding, but one-sided in the view she
-takes of life.
-
-The author of the _Ancren Riwle_, as mentioned above, left us to infer
-that the women he was addressing were acquainted with English, French, and
-Latin, and their education must have been given them in convents. His work
-was written in the early half of the 13th century. In all convents down to
-the Reformation Latin continued to be studied to some extent, if only so
-far as to enable the nun to repeat her prayers, to follow mass and to
-transcribe a book of devotion. The lady superior, by the terms of her
-appointment and on account of the duties of her station, was bound to have
-some knowledge of it. But at the same time one comes across remarks which
-lead one to suppose that Latin was falling into disuse in nunneries,
-especially in the south of England, and that French was taking its place.
-Corroboration of this view is afforded by a list of injunctions sent by
-the bishop of Winchester to the convent at Romsey, in consequence of an
-episcopal visitation in 1310; they were drawn up in Latin, but a literal
-translation into French was appended for the greater convenience of the
-nuns[874]. The rules and ordinances prescribed by Archbishop Walter
-Reynolds to the convent of Davington in Kent about the year 1326 were
-written in French[875], and so were the set of rules forwarded by the
-abbot of St Albans to the convent of Sopwell in 1338[876]. On the other
-hand injunctions written in Latin were sent to Godstow in Oxfordshire in
-1279 and to Nun-Monkton in Yorkshire in 1397.
-
-French down to the middle of the 14th century was the language of the
-upper classes as well as the legal language[877], and many literary
-products of the time are in French. A 'Life of St Katherine' written in
-Norman French by Clemence, a nun at Barking, is extant in two MSS. Only
-its opening lines have been published in which the nun informs her readers
-that she has translated this life from Latin into 'romans[878].' Letters
-written by ladies superior during this period were usually in French. Thus
-the prioress and convent of Ankerwyke in Buckinghamshire addressed a
-petition to King Edward III. in French[879], and the abbess of Shaftesbury
-in 1382 petitioned King Richard II. in the same language[880]. Various
-documents and year-books which were kept in religious houses show that
-entries made during the early period were in Latin, but in the 14th
-century French frequently occurs. In the 15th century both Latin and
-French were abandoned and the use of English became general. The documents
-of Barking, a most important Benedictine nunnery, are partly in Latin,
-partly in French, and partly in English[881]. The extant charters of Legh
-or Minchenlegh in Devonshire are exclusively in Latin, but the rubrics of
-the 14th century are in French[882]. In the register of Crabhouse[883], an
-Austin settlement of nuns in Norfolk, all three languages are used.
-
-In the nunneries of the south of England French maintained itself longest,
-but it was Norman French, which continued in use after the change abroad
-which made the French spoken on this side of the Channel (except that of
-court circles) sound unfamiliar to a Frenchman. In the Prologue to his
-_Canterbury Tales_, written about 1386, Chaucer introduces a prioress who
-was one of the pilgrims _en route_ for Canterbury, and remarks on the kind
-of French which she spoke (l. 124):
-
-  'And Frenche she spake full fayre and fetisly
-    After the scole of Stratford atte Bow,
-    For Frenche of Paris was to hire unknowe.'
-
-Evidently he is referring to the French which was generally in use at the
-nunneries. Stratford, otherwise St Leonard's, Bromley, was situated in
-Middlesex.
-
-English was first heard at the opening of the session at Westminster in
-1363, and in 1404 French was unintelligible to the English ambassadors in
-Flanders. I have come across few French documents relating to nunneries
-which are later than the year 1400; in fact a petition in French written
-in 1433 by the prioress of Littlemore in Oxfordshire stands almost
-alone[884].
-
-There is extant a highly interesting rhymed version of the rule of St
-Benedict written for the use of nuns in the English dialect of the north
-between 1400 and 1425[885]. It is not the earliest version in English
-made for the use of nuns; there is a translation, known as the Winteney
-version, which was written for them and is preserved in a copy of the 13th
-century; and it is possible that the earliest Benedictine rule in
-Anglo-Saxon for monks was adapted from a version in the vernacular written
-for women[886]. However the author of the rhymed version of the 15th
-century is conscious of women's comparative ignorance of Latin. He
-prefaces his rule with the reason which prompted him to make it. 'Monks
-and learned men,' he says, 'may know the rule in Latin and gather from it
-how to work, serving God and Holy Church; it is for the purpose of making
-it intelligible to women who learnt no Latin in their youth that it is
-here set into English that they may easily learn it....'
-
-The name of this translator is unknown. On the ground of certain passages
-referring to singing in choir (line 1188 ff.) it has been supposed, but
-with slight probability, that the translation was the work of a woman.
-
-Another proof of the growing unfamiliarity with Latin in nunneries is
-afforded by the introduction to the register of Godstow, which was one of
-the wealthier English Benedictine nunneries. This register was written
-under the abbess Alice Henley, who is known to have been ruling in the
-year 1464, and consists of 126 folio leaves of vellum. According to
-Dugdale[887] it comprises 'an account of the foundation of the house, an
-A. B. C. of devotion, a kalendar of the year, and all the charters of the
-house translated into English.' The translator has left an introduction to
-his work which in modern English runs as follows: 'The wise man taught his
-child to read books gladly and to understand them well, for lack of such
-understanding has often caused negligence, hurt, harm and hindrance, as
-experience proves; and since women of religion in reading Latin books are
-excused from much understanding where it is not their mother tongue,
-therefore if they read their books of remembrance and of gifts written in
-Latin, for want of understanding they often take hurt and hindrance; and
-since for want of truly learned men who are ready to teach and counsel
-them, and for fear also of publishing the evidence of their titles which
-has often caused mischief, it seems right needful to the understanding of
-these religious women that they have besides their Latin books some
-written in their mother tongue, by which they may secure better knowledge
-of their property and more clearly give information to their servants,
-rent-gatherers and receivers in the absence of their learned counsellors;
-therefore I, a poor brother, and 'wellwyller' to the abbess of Godstow
-Dame Alice Henley and to all her convent, which are for the most part well
-learned in English books ... have undertaken to make this translation for
-them from Latin into English.'
-
-I have come across very few references to books which have come from
-nunneries. A celebrated manuscript in Latin, which contains a collection
-of the lives of the saints and is written on vellum, belonged to the
-convent at Romsey[888]; a copy of 'The life of St Katherine of Alexandria'
-by Capgrave (in English verse of the 15th century), which has lately been
-printed, is designated as belonging to Katherine Babington, subprioress of
-Campsey in Suffolk[889]; and the famous Vernon manuscript which contains
-the most complete collection of writings in Middle English on salvation or
-'soul-hele' probably came from a nunnery.
-
-The inventories taken of the goods and chattels belonging to convents at
-the time of the dissolution contain few references to books. Probably only
-books of devotion were numerous, and these were looked upon by the nuns as
-their personal property like their clothes, and were taken away with them
-when they left. The inventory of the nunnery of Kilburn mentions that two
-copies of the _Legenda Aurea_, the one written, the other printed, were
-kept in the chamber of the church[890]. In connection with Sion, the only
-house in England of the order of St Bridget, we shall hear of a splendid
-collection of books, all I believe of a devotional character.
-
-An inventory of the goods of the comparatively insignificant priory of
-Easebourne in Sussex, which never numbered more than five or six nuns, was
-taken in the year 1450 and shows what books of devotion were then in its
-possession. The following are enumerated: two missals, two breviaries,
-four antiphonies, one large _legenda_ or book of the histories of the
-saints, eight psalters, one book of collects, one _tropon_ or book of
-chants, one French Bible, two _ordinalia_ or books of divine office, in
-French, one book of the Gospels, and one martyrology[891]. It is in
-accordance with the exclusively pious training shown by the possession of
-books such as these that Chaucer lets his prioress, when called upon to
-contribute a tale, recount the legend of a boy-martyr who was murdered at
-Alexandria, and the nun who was with her tell the legend of St Cecilia.
-The prioress in this case did not fail to impress her hearers, while the
-monk, who was also of the party and told of worthies of biblical and of
-classical repute, roused no interest.
-
-In the eyes of Chaucer the prioress was a thoroughly estimable person.
-'Madame Eglentine,' whose smiling was 'ful simple and coy,' and who spoke
-French fluently, was distinguished also for elegance of manners at table.
-She neither dropped her food, nor steeped her fingers in the sauce, nor
-neglected to wipe her mouth, and throughout affected a certain courtly
-breeding which went well with her station.
-
-  'And sikerly she was of grete disport,
-  And ful plesant, and amiable of port,
-  And peined hire to contrefeten chere
-  Of court, and ben estatelich of manere,
-  And to ben holden digne of reverence.'
-
-Her sensitiveness was so great that she wept on seeing a mouse caught in a
-trap, and the death of one of the small dogs she kept caused her great
-grief. She could not bear to see one of them beaten, for in her 'all was
-conscience and tendre herte.' The only ornament she wore was a brooch
-which was attached to her beads and on which were inscribed the words
-_Amor vincit omnia_. The poet's designating her companion as the 'other
-nun,' suggests that the prioress in this case was a nun herself, that is
-that she was not the superior of a priory, but prioress and member of a
-convent which was under an abbess.
-
-Education in a nunnery at this period secured the privilege of being
-addressed as 'Madame,' the title of a woman of the upper classes.
-Directions in English about the consecration of nuns which were in use in
-the diocese of Lincoln about the year 1480 are in existence[892]. In these
-the bishop at the conclusion of the service is directed to offer words of
-advice to the newly professed nuns, which begin as follows: 'Daughters and
-virgins, now that you are married and espoused to Him that is above king
-and 'kaysor,' Jesus Christ, meet it is and so must you from henceforth in
-token of the same be called 'madame or ladye[892].'
-
-Judging from a passage in Chaucer (l. 3940) this privilege was apparently
-kept by those who had been educated in a nunnery and returned to the
-world. The reeve tells about the miller's wife who was 'come of noble kyn;
-she was i-fostryd in a nonnerye,' and on account of her kindred and the
-'nostelry' she had learned, no one durst call her but 'Madame.'
-
-       *       *       *       *       *
-
-It remains to note how far the standing of nunneries was directly affected
-in the later Middle Ages by external social and political changes. Various
-conditions combined to curtail the privileges of religious houses, which
-when once lost were never recovered.
-
-The reign of Edward I (1272-1307) was marked by many legal innovations.
-One of the first acts of the king was to appoint a commission to enquire
-into jurisdictions, and a general survey of the whole kingdom was taken to
-obtain correct knowledge of the rights by which property was held. Local
-and manorial rights were throughout called into question, which in many
-instances resulted in their being curtailed to the advantage of the king.
-In common with other holders of property, the heads of monasteries
-incurred direct losses, especially the heads of smaller settlements, where
-the property was not so well managed and the superior could not afford to
-have a legal adviser.
-
-Among those cited before the justices in eyre were the abbesses and
-prioresses of convents of various orders, who as we gather from the
-account of these pleas[893] sometimes appeared in person, sometimes
-through an attorney, to justify their claims and to seek re-establishment
-of their rights. The superiors of smaller settlements, whose property lay
-near their house, generally appeared in person, but the superiors of
-larger houses, where the jurisdiction over property which lay at a
-distance was called into question, appeared by an attorney. Thus the
-abbess of Barking which lies in Essex appeared by an attorney at Bedford
-and in Buckinghamshire, but in Essex she appeared in person to defend
-certain rights connected with property she held at Chelmsford[894]. The
-abbess of Malling in Kent appeared by attorney at Canterbury, where she
-secured renewal of her rights before the king's justiciaries not only to
-liberties and franchises of the most extensive kind in East and West
-Malling, but to the holding of a market twice a week, and of three fairs
-in the year[895].
-
-On the other hand we find the prioress of Stratford appearing in person
-before the judges in eyre at the Stone Cross, bringing her charters with
-her[896]. The prioress of Wroxhall at first refused to answer the summons
-to appear at Warwick. Afterwards she appeared in person and succeeded in
-establishing her claim to her possessions in Hatton and Wroxhall together
-with many privileges and immunities which had been confirmed to her priory
-by Henry II, Richard I, John and Henry III, as appears in the charters
-granted by those monarchs[897].
-
-But not all were so successful. The prioress of Redlingfield in Suffolk
-also came in person to justify a right which was held to belong to the
-crown, but which she claimed that she and all her predecessors had held
-time out of mind. But as she could show no special warrant, William de
-Gyselham prayed judgment for the king. A day was appointed for further
-hearing of the case at Westminster, but no further proceedings
-appear[898]. Frequently a case was adjourned to Westminster and we hear no
-more of it; sometimes also the king's attorney did not choose to prosecute
-his suit further.
-
-A closer analysis of these pleas helps us to understand the various and
-complicated rights, immunities and privileges which abbess and prioress
-had acquired in common with feudal lords at an early period, and which the
-larger houses retained with few abatements down to the time of the
-dissolution. The study of these rights shows that a considerable business
-capacity and no small amount of attention were required to protect a
-settlement against deterioration and decay.
-
-The number of religious houses[899] for women which existed at this
-period, including those of all orders, was close upon a hundred and
-thirty. Their number can be estimated only approximately, because some
-fell to decay and were abandoned as we shall see later, while, regarding
-Gilbertine settlements, it is unknown at what period nuns ceased to
-inhabit some of them. The number of monasteries for men including those of
-all monkish and canonical orders, at the same period was over four
-hundred; while the friars, the number of whose houses fluctuated, at the
-time of the dissolution owned about two hundred houses.
-
-Of the settlements of nuns eighty-two belonged to the order of St
-Benedict, and twenty-seven (including two houses which had been founded by
-the order of Cluni) to Cistercian nuns. Fourteen houses were inhabited by
-Austin nuns or canonesses (including Sion), and two by nuns of the order
-of Premontre.
-
-In England only the orders of friars of St Francis and St Dominic had
-houses for women attached to them. The nuns of the order of St Clare,
-called also Poor Clares or Nuns Minoresses, had been established in
-connection with the Franciscan friars, and owned three houses, of which
-the house in London, known as the Minories, was of considerable
-importance. Only one house of Dominican nuns existed in England. The nuns
-both of the Dominican and the Franciscan orders differed in many
-particulars from other nuns and are usually spoken of not as nuns but as
-sisters[900]. They observed strict seclusion, and as a rule took no
-interest in anything save devotion. A set of rules for the nuns of St
-Clare was written by St Francis himself, and gives a fair idea of the
-narrow interests to which women who embraced religion under his auspices
-were confined[901].
-
-Regarding the wealth of the settlements of different orders, the houses of
-the Benedictine order owned most property and drew the largest incomes;
-the houses owned by monks were throughout wealthier than those owned by
-nuns. Judging by the computations made at the time of the dissolution the
-Cistercian houses for men, and the houses of Austin and of Premonstrant
-Canons, were comparatively rich, whereas the houses of Cistercian and of
-Premonstrant nuns were poor, but the income of the Austin nunnery,
-Buckland in Somersetshire, compared favourably with that of the wealthier
-Benedictine houses for women. We shall have occasion to speak more fully
-of the house of Sion, which was of the order of St Bridget, and the wealth
-of which at the time of the dissolution exceeded that of any other
-nunnery.
-
-
-Sec. 2. The Internal Arrangements of the Convent.
-
-At this point of our enquiry it seems well to pause for a while to
-describe the inner arrangements of a nunnery as they present themselves
-during the later Middle Ages, the offices which fell to the several
-members of the convent, and the daily life of the nun. The material at the
-disposal of the student lies scattered in the convent registers, in the
-accounts of visitations, and in contemporary literature, and is
-supplemented by the study of ruins. The inventories of monasteries made
-during the reign of Henry VIII at the time of the dissolution (c.
-1536-1538) further add to this information. For no religious settlement
-for women was founded after the death of Edward III (1377) with the sole
-exception of Sion, and no important changes were made in the routine of
-existing houses, so that the state of things which survived at the
-dissolution may be taken with slight reservations as supplementing our
-information concerning the arrangements during the earlier period.
-
-Regarding the position and duties of the lady superior, it has been
-mentioned before[902] that comparatively few of the Benedictine nunneries
-had the standing of abbeys, most of them being priories, and that the
-abbesses of four houses had the additional title of baroness by reason of
-the property they held of the king. They were called upon to fulfil duties
-in accordance with their station, and like secular barons found knights
-for the king's service. In 1257 Agnes Ferrar, abbess of Shaftesbury, was
-summoned to Chester to take part in the expedition against Llewellin ap
-Griffith, and again in 1277 Juliana Bauceyn was summoned for a like
-purpose[903].
-
-The lady superior of a house in the 14th and 15th centuries was frequently
-seen outside the convent; pleasure as well as business might take her from
-home. It has been mentioned that the heads of convents sometimes appeared
-in person before the justices in eyre. Dame Christina Basset, prioress of
-the Benedictine nunnery of St Mary Pree in Hertfordshire, in the account
-of her expenditure between 1487-1489 had the following entry made: 'when I
-rode to London for the suit that was taken[904].' In 1368 the bishop of
-Sarum, in whose diocese Shaftesbury was, granted a dispensation to Joan
-Formage to go from her monastery to one of her manors to take the air and
-to divert herself[905]. Complaints were made of the too frequent absence
-of their prioress by members of the Benedictine nunnery of Easebourne, at
-the visitation in 1441, when it was alleged that the prioress was in the
-habit of riding about and staying away on pretence of business more often
-than was deemed advantageous to the convent[906].
-
-After her election by the convent, the lady superior made profession of
-canonical obedience to the bishop of her diocese and in some cases waited
-upon the patron of her house. The nunnery of St Mary's, Winchester, was
-one of the houses that held of the king. In 1265 Eufemia was received by
-Henry III, and her successor Lucia went to Winchester castle to be
-presented[907]. In houses which held of the king it was part of the royal
-prerogative that on his coronation the king should recommend a nun to the
-convent. In connection with Shaftesbury we find this on record in the
-first year of Richard II (1377-1399) and again in the first of Henry V. In
-1428, several years after the accession of Henry VI, who became king when
-a child, a royal mandate was issued to the abbess of Shaftesbury to admit
-Joan Ashcomb as a nun[908]. And in 1430 the same king nominated Godam
-Hampton to be received as a nun at Barking[909].
-
-All the versions of the Benedictine rule known to me speak of the head of
-the monastery as the abbot, and in the Winteney version, which was written
-for nuns in the 13th century, the head of the women's house is accordingly
-designated as abbess[910]. But, probably because the number of abbesses
-was comparatively small, the translator of the rule of St Benedict, in the
-rhymed English version of the 15th century, speaks throughout of the
-prioress as head of the nunnery[911]. It is the prioress (l. 337 ff.) who
-is to be honoured inside the abbey (sic) and out of it wherever she goes
-or rides, who shall be law in herself, who shall have no pride in her
-heart but ever love God, and who is responsible as a shepherd or herdsman
-for the women given into her care. All these injunctions are given in
-other versions of the rule to the abbot or abbess. It further says that
-the prioress shall not favour any one nun by letting her travel more than
-the rest,--a command evidently added by the translator. In another passage
-(l. 2116 ff.) closely following the original text it is enjoined that the
-prioress shall liberally entertain guests, but if it happens that there be
-none, she shall invite some of the older sisters to dine with her.
-
-A detailed account is preserved of the formalities of the appointment of a
-prioress to the convent of St Radegund's at Cambridge[912]. This
-settlement, founded about the middle of the 12th century, had experienced
-many vicissitudes, but was comparatively prosperous in the year 1457, when
-the death of the prioress, Agnes Seyntel, on September 8th, left its
-twelve inmates without a head. We gather from a charter that the first
-step taken after her demise was that the subprioress, Matilda Sudbury, and
-the convent sent information to the bishop of Ely asking for permission to
-appoint a successor. This being granted the nuns assembled on Sept. 23rd
-and fixed the 27th as the day of the election. On this day all the nuns
-were present at mass, and then three of them were chosen arbiters
-(_compromissarias_). These were Joan Lancaster, Elizabeth Walton and
-Katherine Sayntlow, who took the oath and gave their votes, and then they
-administered the oath to the other nuns, who gave their votes also. The
-form of administration of the oath and the oath itself are both given in
-Latin. The nuns were adjured 'by the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,
-at the peril of their soul, according to God and their conscience, to name
-and choose her as prioress who was most needful to the priory.' The form
-of oath corresponds to this adjuration.
-
-The votes being then counted it was found that a majority of seven were in
-favour of the appointment of Joan Lancaster, whereupon Elizabeth Walton,
-being called upon by the others, declared the result of the election. The
-_Te Deum_ was then sung and the prospective prioress, reluctantly in this
-case it seems, was led to the chief altar of the convent church, where she
-was left, while the result of the election was proclaimed to the people
-outside 'in the vulgar tongue.' All this happened before noon, when the
-nuns returned to the chapter-house and called upon Elizabeth Walton and
-Katherine Sayntlow to draw up the deeds of the election, and to lay them
-before the newly appointed prioress, who was requested to affirm her
-election at four o'clock in the vestibule of the church. After much
-persuasion Joan Lancaster yielded and accepted the election. The words of
-her speech are given; in them she declares that she is a free woman and
-legitimate, born in lawful wedlock, and therefore entitled to proffer her
-consent and assent. Eleven nuns put their signatures to this document, one
-of whom designates herself as subprioress and president, another as leader
-of the choir, _succentrix_, another as cellaress, _celeraria_, and another
-calls herself treasurer, _thesaurissa_.
-
-In connection with the Benedictine convent of Langley, in Leicestershire,
-a further formality is recorded at the election of a new prioress. The
-permission of the patron of the house having been obtained, the nuns
-proceeded to elect a new prioress, and a page with a white staff sent by
-the patron guarded the door of the priory till the election was made. 'For
-which in right of his master he was to have his diet but nothing
-more[913].'
-
-The form of consent by which an abbess accepted office is entered in the
-register of Bishop Lacy of Exeter. In 1449 Johan or Jane Arundell was
-appointed abbess of the Austin settlement of Legh or Canonlegh, in
-Devonshire[914]. Her consent is drawn up in English, and in it she speaks
-of herself as sister Johan Arundell, _mynchyn_, an ancient word for nun
-which continued in use in the south of England till the time of the
-dissolution.
-
-A previous chapter has shown that the appointment of a prioress in those
-nunneries which were cells to an abbey, depended on the abbot[915]. In the
-houses which were independent and elected their own head, a licence from
-the bishop had to be secured. And if the nuns neglected to secure this
-licence before electing a superior difficulties were apt to occur. In the
-case of Catesby, a Benedictine house in Northamptonshire, such
-difficulties are repeatedly recorded. At the death of the prioress Johanna
-de Northampton (1291), the cellaress of the house was elected in her stead
-by the nuns; but the election having been made without a licence, the
-bishop of Lincoln declared it void. Afterwards however he confirmed it in
-consideration of the merits of the person elected. At her death similar
-neglect on the one side was followed by similar opposition on the other;
-the bishop first declared the election void and then confirmed it. The
-relation of Catesby to the diocesan continued to be a source of
-difficulties. In 1444 the prioress Agnes Terry was suspended from the
-conduct of all business relating to the revenues of the house during the
-bishop's pleasure, and a commission was granted to the abbot of St James
-in Northampton to inspect the accounts of the nunnery[916].
-
-Sometimes neglect of the administration of the property of the house was
-the cause of the voluntary or forced resignation of a superior. Love of
-finery is represented as the cause of the ruin of the prioress Juliana of
-Bromhall in Berkshire, into whose conduct an enquiry was instituted in
-1404. It was found on this occasion that she 'had injured the convent and
-her own character in that she had converted to her nefarious use,
-alienated and wasted chalices, books, jewelry (_jocalia_), the income and
-possessions' of the priory[917]. She resigned, but it is not recorded
-whether she remained in the house. In several instances a deposed lady
-superior did remain in the convent. Thus Margaret Punder, prioress of
-Flixton, an Austin convent, resigned because of complaints of her
-negligence, but she remained in the house as a member of the convent[918].
-
-The dignitaries of the Church took upon themselves to protect the abbess
-or prioress against violation of her rights by laymen; under social
-arrangements which made the nunnery the one place of safety for the
-unmarried daughters of the gentry, it is obvious that ecclesiastical and
-lay authorities would be of one mind in severely punishing those who
-failed to respect the nun's privileges.
-
-In 1285 a knight carried off two nuns from the settlement at Wilton,
-'which coming to the archbishop's ears he first excommunicated him, and
-subsequently absolved him on these conditions,--first that he should never
-afterwards come within a nunnery or be in the company of a nun; then that
-on three Sundays running he should be whipped in the parish church of
-Wilton, and likewise three other days in the market and church of
-Shaftesbury; that he should fast a certain number of months; that he
-should not wear a shirt for three years; and lastly that he should not
-any more take the habit and title of a knight, but wear apparel of a
-russet colour until he had spent three years in the Holy Land[919].'
-
-Where an abbess was at the head of a nunnery, the prioress and
-sub-prioress, and sometimes a second prioress and sub-prioress were
-appointed by her; where the settlement was ruled by a prioress it was she
-who appointed the sub-prioress. This is in accordance with the written
-rule of St Benedict, where the abbot nominates the _praepositus_ or
-provost whose duties correspond to those of the prioress or
-sub-prioress[920]. The rhymed version of the rule, in which the prioress
-is treated as chief in authority, says the sub-prioress (l. 1406 ff.)
-shall be appointed by the prioress, 'for if it were done otherwise strife
-and debate might easily arise.' This provision was dictated by the feeling
-that, if chosen by the convent, the person second in authority might
-presume. For this reason 'the sub-prioress, sexton and other such officers
-shall not be chosen but appointed as the prioress desires,' and if the
-sub-prioress does wrong and refuses to mend her ways 'out of the flock she
-shall be fled.'
-
-The duties of the person second in authority consisted in seeing that the
-hours of divine service were rightly kept. A manuscript now at Oxford,
-written in English, which came from Barking nunnery gives directions as to
-the formal appointment of the prioress in that house[921]. It belongs to
-the end of the 14th century. Barking it will be remembered was one of the
-chief abbeys for women. The manner in which the abbess appointed the
-person second to her in authority is described in the following passage:
-'When a prioress is to be made, the abbess shall commend the rule to her,
-enjoining that she be helpful to her and maintain religion in accordance
-with the rule. And she shall set her in her seat. And then shall come the
-chaplain with incense towards her. And the abbess and she shall go before
-the convent into the choir. And then shall they go to St Alburgh, and the
-convent shall say the _Levavi_ (Ps. 121, _Levavi oculos meos_, 'I lifted
-up my eyes'); and the prioress shall lie prostrate, and the abbess shall
-say the prayers aforesaid with the orison _Oremus_, etc. Then shall the
-prioress go to the choir; the chapter mass being _Spiritus Domini_. And
-the same day shall be given to the convent a pittance or allowance of
-good fish. And when she dies, she must give to the convent....' Here the
-manuscript closes abruptly.
-
-In houses of the Benedictine order the lady superior of the house, whether
-abbess or prioress, usually dwelt apart from the convent in a set of
-chambers or a small house of her own, where she received visitors and
-transacted business. In some of the largest houses the prioress,
-sub-prioress and sexton also had establishments of their own as we shall
-see presently. In Cistercian houses the arrangements seem to have varied,
-but in the majority of houses of the order, usually among Austin nuns and
-always among the nuns of St Clare, the head of the house lived in closer
-contact with the members of her convent and took her meals at the same
-table as the nuns.
-
-The lady superior managed all the business of the house and presided at
-the meetings of the convent, the members of which fulfilled a number of
-functions which we will pass in rapid review. The full complement of
-offices was of course found in the larger houses only; in the smaller
-houses several posts were frequently held by one and the same person.
-Reference is most frequently made to the offices of sexton, cellaress, and
-chaplain,--these seem to have existed in almost every house.
-
-The rhymed version of St Benedict's rule gives the following injunctions
-about the duties of the sexton (l. 1521 ff.):--'She shall ring the bells
-to all the services night and day, and keep the ornaments of the church,
-the chalice, books, vestments, relics, and wax and annual rents. She shall
-preserve the vessels of the altar and keep them clean.'
-
-Other versions of the rule, as far as I am aware, contain nothing about
-these duties. The sexton at Barking at the time of the Reformation was
-responsible for the receipt of considerable sums[922].
-
-Duties of great importance devolved on the cellaress, who managed the
-receipts and expenditure appertaining to the food; certainly no light task
-and one that required considerable powers of management. On this point the
-versified rule of St Benedict closely follows the original rule. We are
-told (l. 1467 ff.) that the cellaress 'shall be chosen by counsel out of
-the community'; she shall be wise and gentle and of mild ways, not hard
-like a shrew, nor slow nor mean in her dealings (grochand in hir dede),
-but gladly do her office and take special care of young children, poor
-guests and others that ask at her door, knowing that on the day of
-judgment she will have to render account.
-
-Fortunately we are in possession of an extremely interesting document
-written in English about the year 1400. It came from Barking nunnery, and
-enables us to form some idea of the duties devolving on the
-cellaress[923]. It is entitled 'Charthe longynge to the office of the
-celeresse,' and describes the duties of buying and selling, illustrating
-the economic condition of the house no less than the standard of living at
-that convent. From the manuscript the inference can be drawn that more
-than one cellaress was appointed at a time. The one whose duties are
-described in the 'Charthe' provides and deals out the food, and manages
-the receipts from the home farm. The 'Charthe' opens with injunctions how
-the cellaress, when she comes into office, must look after what is owing
-to the office by divers farmers and rent-gatherers and see that it be paid
-as soon as may be. A list follows of the sums she receives annually from
-various sources,--farms and rent for various tenements in London and
-elsewhere. She receives 'of the canons of St Paul's in London for a yearly
-rent by the year 22 shillings; and of the prior of the convent of St
-Bartholomew's in London by the year 17 shillings.' The following entries
-are curious. 'She should receive yearly of a tenement in Friday Street,
-London, but it is not known where it stands, 23 shillings and four pence;
-and she should receive 30 shillings of the rent of Tyburn, but it is not
-paid.'
-
-A list follows of the things she is to be charged with, from which it is
-evident that the duties of selling as well as of buying devolved on her.
-She is to be charged with the ox-skins she sells, also with the 'inwards'
-of oxen, and with tallow and messes of beef; 'and all these be called the
-issues of the larder.' If she sells hay from any farm belonging to her
-office, she must charge herself with it or let it be called 'the foreign
-receipt.'
-
-She is then directed as to the stores she has to provide, which may be
-grouped under the headings of grain, flesh, fish, and condiments.
-
-The grains include malt, of which she provides three quarters yearly for
-the 'tounes' of St Alburgh and Christmas, and she pays twenty pence to the
-brewer of each 'toune';--and wheat, of which a quarter and seven bushels
-are required, which go to the allowance or pittance of the four men and
-dames resident in the monastery, for making 'russeaulx,' perhaps some
-kind of cake, during Lent, and for baking eels on Shere Tuesday (Tuesday
-preceding Good Friday). She provides two bushels of peas every year in
-Lent, and one bushel of beans for the convent against Midsummer. Both peas
-and beans are evidently dried.
-
-Under the heading 'buying of store' the only item she is mentioned as
-providing is twenty-two oxen a year, which she evidently feeds on her
-pasture. Another passage tells us that 'she shall slay but every fortnight
-if she be a good housewife.' A passage further on refers to her buying
-pigs and possibly sheep. Geese and fowls she apparently received from her
-own farm.
-
-She buys fish in large quantities, principally herrings, some white,--that
-is fresh or slightly salted, some red,--that is salted, by the cade or by
-the barrel. A note at the end of the 'Charthe' states that a cask or 'cade
-of herrings is six hundred herrings,' 'the barrel of herrings is one
-thousand herrings.' Seven cades of white herrings and three barrels of the
-same she buys for Lent.
-
-Also she must provide eighteen salt fish and fourteen or fifteen salt
-salmon for the convent in Lent. Eels are mentioned, but not that she
-bought them; no doubt they were caught on the convent property.
-
-Of condiments the cellaress has to provide almonds, twelve lbs. for Lent;
-figs, three pieces[924] and twenty-four lbs.; raisins, one piece; rice,
-twenty-eight lbs.; and mustard eight gallons. There is no mention of salt
-or of sugar as being provided for the nuns.
-
-We are next informed of the cellaress' expenses in money. Here the
-peculiar word 'russeaulx' figures again, variously spelt. All the ladies
-of the convent, who at the time numbered thirty-six, are in receipt of
-'ruscheauw sylver,' payable sixteen times in the year, 'but it is paid
-only twice now, at Easter and at Michaelmas.' The ladies also receive
-twopence each for crisps and crumcakes at Shrovetide. Wherever there is
-question of paying money or providing food in portions, the cellaress has
-to give double to the chief officers of the house, such as the prioress,
-the cellaress, etc., which suggests that they had a double ration either
-to enable them to feed their servant, or perhaps a visitor.
-
-The cellaress further pays five annuities called 'anniversaries,' namely,
-to Sir William, vicar, to Dame Alice Merton, to Dame Maud, the king's
-daughter, to Dame Maud Loveland, and to William Dunn, who are residing in
-the monastery. William Dunn moreover receives twelve gallons of good ale
-with his annuity.
-
-In 'offerings and wages' the cellaress shall pay twelve pence to the two
-cellaresses; to the steward of the household what time he brings money
-home from the courts 20 pence, and again at Christmas 20 pence; to my
-lady's (the abbess') gentlewoman 20 pence; 'to every gentleman 16 pence
-and to every yeoman as it pleases her to do, and grooms in like case.' The
-abbess receives a sugar-loaf at Christmas; her clerk is paid thirteen
-shillings and fourpence, her yeoman cook 26 shillings and eightpence for
-their wages. Her groom cook and her pudding wife (grom coke and poding
-wief) receive the gift of one gown a year of the value of two shillings.
-
-A description follows of the food which the cellaress has to provide for
-the convent on special days in the year. 'A pece of whete' and three
-gallons of milk for 'frimete on St Alburgh's day'; four bacon hogs twice
-in winter, 'and she must buy six grecys (young pigs), six sowcys (perhaps
-'sowkin,' diminutive for young female hog, or else 'sowthes,' Middle
-English for sheep) for the convent and also six inwardys and 100 (?) egges
-to make white puddings'; also bread, pepper and saffron for the same
-puddings, also three gallons of good ale for 'besons.' Other directions
-follow which are perplexing, such as 'mary bones to make white
-wortys'--can it be marrowbones to make white soup, or does 'bones' stand
-for buns? Again we hear of 'cripcis and crumcakes,' chickens, bonnes
-(buns?) at Shrovetide, and of '12 stubbe elles and 60 shafte[925] elles,'
-to bake for the convent on Shere Thursday. When the abbess receives a
-bottle of Tyre (wine) at Easter time the convent receives two gallons of
-red wine. The convent receives three gallons of ale every week. Regarding
-the wine it is well to recall that grapes were grown to some extent in
-mediaeval England, and that after the dissolution, a vineyard of five acres
-is scheduled as part of the possessions of Barking nunnery[926].
-
-A paragraph is devoted to the giving out of eggs. The thirty-seven ladies
-sometimes receive money instead of eggs, 'ey sylver,' as it is called; in
-one case the alternative is open to the cellaress of giving thirty-two
-eggs or of paying twopence. Butter also forms an important item in the
-'Charthe'; it is given out in 'cobbets,' three cobbets going to a dish.
-
-It likewise falls to the cellaress to hire pasture, to see to the mowing
-of her hay, to see that all manner of houses within her office be duly
-repaired, not only within the monastery but without, on her farms and
-manors.
-
-The 'Charthe' returns to directions about food, and mentions among other
-things pork, mutton, geese, hens, bacon and oatmeal.
-
-The following passages will give some idea of the language in which these
-directions are couched.
-
-'And the under-celaress must remember at each principal feast, that my
-lady (the abbess) sits in the refectory, that is to wit five times in the
-year, at each time shall (she) ask the clerk of the kitchen (for) supper
-eggs for the convent, at Easter, Whitsuntide, the Assumption of Our Lady,
-at St Alburgh, and at Christmas; at each time to every lady two eggs, and
-each (person receiving) double that is the prioress, celaress and
-kitchener....'
-
-'Also to remember to ask of the kitchen at St Alburgh's time, for every
-lady of the convent half a goose ... also to ask at the said feast of St
-Alburgh of the said clerk for every lady of the convent one hen, or else a
-cock.' The manuscript, which is corrected in several places and has
-additions made by another hand, closes abruptly.
-
-It is interesting to compare the directions about food found in the rule
-of St Benedict with the high standard of living suggested by the 'Charthe'
-of Barking. The rhymed version says (l. 1620) that she who is seeing to
-the kitchen shall provide each day two kinds of 'mete,' so that she who
-will not eat of one kind may take the other. The convent is also to be
-supplied with two kinds of pottage (thick soup?) daily. If they have
-apples of their own growing they shall partake of them; also each lady is
-to be given a pound of bread each day, which is to serve her for her three
-meals. The rule adds words to the effect that the 'celerer' may give an
-extra allowance of food if she sees need though always with caution for
-fear of gluttony. In regard to drink, wine and ale shall be 'softly'
-tasted.
-
-It appears probable from this 'Charthe' to the cellaress that the office
-of Kitchener at Barking was a permanent appointment, which is curious
-considering that in an ordinary way the members of the convent were bound
-to serve in the convent kitchen as cook, each for the term of a week. The
-injunction is repeated in every version of the Benedictine rule known to
-me. According to the rhymed version of the north the nun who has served
-her term in the kitchen is directed to leave the kitchen and the vessels
-clean for her who succeeded her in office. When her time is up she shall
-kneel before the assembled members of the convent saying, 'Blessed be the
-Lord that has never failed me,' whereupon the nun who is to act as cook
-shall say, 'Lord, to my helping take thou heed.' But this injunction was
-evidently disregarded in the wealthier houses at a later date, for in
-connection with St Mary's, Winchester, we read of a convent-cook and an
-under convent-cook[927]. A nun of Campsey, an Austin house consisting at
-the time of a prioress and eighteen nuns, complained at the visitation of
-the house in 1532 of the unpunctuality of the meals, which she ascribed to
-the fault of the cook (culpa coci),--using a term which suggests that the
-cook in this case was a man[928].
-
-An appointment in the nunnery which has led to some controversy is that of
-chaplain, it being alleged by some writers that the chaplain of the
-convent was necessarily a man. Certainly in most houses, especially in the
-wealthier ones, there were men chaplains; for example at the nunnery of
-Shaftesbury, where men chaplains are mentioned by the side of the abbess
-in various early charters and played an important part[929]. Again at St
-Mary's, Winchester, at the time of the dissolution, men chaplains were
-among those who are described as resident in the monastery[930]; at
-Kilburn nunnery the fact that the chaplain who dwelt on the premises was a
-man is evident from the arrangement of the dwellings,--three chambers
-which lie together being designated as set apart for the chaplain and the
-hinds or herdsmen[931]. But the fact that the chaplain's office could be
-and was held by a woman is established beyond a doubt by the following
-information. In consequence of an episcopal visitation (1478) of the
-Benedictine convent of Easebourne, injunctions were sent to the prioress,
-one of which directs that 'every week, beginning with the eldest,
-excepting the sub-prioress, she shall select for herself in due course and
-in turns one of her nuns as chaplain (capellanissam) for divine service
-and to wait upon herself[932].' This injunction is in accordance with the
-words of Chaucer, who says that the prioress who was on a pilgrimage to
-Canterbury had with her a nun who acted as chaplain to her (l. 163):
-
-  'Another Nonne also with hire hadde she
-  That was hire chapelleine, and preestes thre.'
-
-In the accounts of visitations in the diocese of Norwich between 1492 and
-1532 the designation chaplain applied to an inmate of a nunnery appears in
-the Benedictine house of Redlingfield, in the Austin priory of Campsey and
-in others. In Redlingfield at the visitation of 1514 the complaint is made
-against the prioress that she does not change her chaplain, and at Flixton
-in 1520 it is alleged that the prioress has no chaplain and sleeps by
-herself in her chamber away from the dormitory[933]. At Elstow in
-Bedfordshire at the time of the surrender Katheryne Wyngate adds the
-designation 'chapellain' to her name[934], and among the nuns of Barking
-who were still in receipt of their pension in 1553 was Mathea Fabyan who
-is styled chaplain (capellan)[935]. How far the woman chaplain performed
-the same offices as the man chaplain seems impossible to tell; probably
-she recited the inferior services in the chapel of the nunnery.
-
-In the rhymed version of the rule of St Benedict the office of chaplain is
-passed over, but in the poem of the 'Spiritual Convent' written by the
-beguine Mechthild, of which a former chapter has given an account, the
-chaplain is a woman. And similarly the English version of this poem called
-the 'Ghostly Abbey' which is attributed to John Alcock, bishop of Ely
-([Dagger] 1500), refers to women chaplains. It says God had ordered His
-four daughters to come and dwell in the abbey; Charity was made abbess and
-to her Mercy and Truth were to be as 'chapeleyns,' going about with her
-wherever she goes. He bade also that Righteousness should be with Wisdom
-who was prioress, and Peace with Mekeness who was sub-prioress, Charity,
-Wisdom and Mekeness having chaplains because they were 'most of
-worship[936].'
-
-I have found very little information about the arrangements made in the
-nunnery for the young people who boarded with and were taught by the nuns,
-and hardly a clue is to be had as to the number of those who might stay
-in one house at the same time. The only allusion on this point is to St
-Mary's, Winchester, where twenty-six girls, mostly daughters of knights,
-were staying at the time of the dissolution. Rogers refers to a roll of
-expenditure of the Cistercian priory, Swine, in Yorkshire, on which he
-says are enumerated a number of young persons, daughters of the
-surrounding gentlefolk, who lived 'en pension' in this small
-community[937]; and Rye has compiled a list of those who boarded at Carrow
-at different times[938]. From 'The Death of Philip Sparrow,' a poem
-written by John Skelton ([Dagger] 1529), we gather that the girl who is
-represented as intoning the lament over a tame bird, lived and boarded
-with the 'Nuns Black' at Carrow, where her sparrow was devoured by the
-cat, whereupon she took out a sampler and worked the sparrow in stitches
-of silk for her solace[939]. Apparently not only girls, but boys also,
-were given into the care of nuns, for injunctions forwarded to Romsey in
-1310 by the bishop of Winchester forbade that boys and girls should sleep
-with the nuns or be taken by them into the choir during divine
-service[940]. Injunctions sent to Redlingfield in 1514 also directed that
-boys should not sleep in the dormitory[941]; and Bishop Kentwode in the
-directions he sent to St Helen's in London ordered that none but 'mayd
-learners' should be received into that nunnery[942]. In the year 1433
-Catherine de la Pole, abbess of Barking, petitioned Henry V. for a sum of
-money due to her for the maintenance of Edward and Jasper Tudor, sons of
-Catherine, the queen dowager, by Owen Tudor. It seems that these boys were
-receiving their education at this abbey[943]. But the popularity of the
-convent even as an educational establishment began to decrease at the
-close of the 14th century. Judging from the Paston Letters it was no
-longer customary in Norfolk to send girls to board with the nuns; they
-were sent to stay away from home with some other country family.
-
-Other offices held by members of the convent are as follows:
-_thesaurissa_,--the nun bursar who was responsible for the revenues coming
-through the Church; the _precentrix_ and _succentrix_,--the leaders and
-teachers of the choir, who are sometimes mentioned together (Campsey); the
-_cameraria_ or chambress,--who saw to the wardrobe; the _infirmaria_ or
-keeper of the infirmary,--who took charge of the sick nuns; the
-_refectuaria_,--who had the care of the refectory or dining hall; the
-_elemosinaria_,--who distributed alms; the _magistra noviciarum_,--who
-taught the novices. The _cantarista_ occurs in connection with Sheppey; no
-doubt she is identical with the _precentrix_ of other places. The further
-designations of _tutrix_, or teacher, occurs in connection with
-Shaftesbury, and _eruditrix_, instructress, in connection with Thetford; I
-have not come across these terms elsewhere.
-
-All these appointments were made by the superior of the house and declared
-in the presence of the convent, and all except those of chaplain and
-kitchener seem to have been permanent. The chaplain was probably changed
-because it was a privilege to go about with the abbess, and the kitchener
-because of the hard work her duties involved. On the death of the abbess
-often the prioress, sometimes the cellaress, was appointed to succeed her,
-but not necessarily so.
-
-Having so far treated of the duties of the convent inmates, we will
-examine the form of admission for novices and the daily routine of the
-nun.
-
-According to the rhymed rule of St Benedict (l. 2155) the girl who was old
-enough to be admitted as nun into a religious community was granted entry
-as a novice and after two months had 'the law' read to her, and then the
-question was put if she wished to stay or to go. If she stayed, it was for
-six months; after which, if still desirous of being received, she
-proffered her petition to the abbess. If after twelve months she still
-persisted in her resolution, she was received as a member of the convent
-and pronounced these words before the altar: 'Suscipe me, domine, secundum
-eloquium tuum, et vivam. Et non confundas me in expectatione mea.' The
-formal profession or consecration was undertaken by the bishop, who
-visited the nunnery periodically, but as these visits were often years
-apart, it is probable that the declaration made before the superior of a
-house and the priest constituted a novice a member of a convent, and for
-all practical purposes made her a nun. Fosbroke is of opinion that the
-girl who entered at the age of twelve made profession after she had passed
-a year in the community: he adds that she was consecrated by the bishop
-when she had reached the age of twenty-five and not before[944]. But it
-is impossible to draw a line between profession and consecration, as the
-'non-professed' nun was invariably the nun who had not been installed by
-the bishop. In 1521 at the visitation of Rusper the settlement consisted
-of the prioress, one professed nun and two nuns entered on the list as not
-professed, of whom one declared that she had lived there awaiting
-profession for twelve years, the other for three[945]. Women who had been
-professed at one house were sometimes inmates of another; and I have not
-found any remark which leads to the inference that this was thought
-objectionable. A nun residing at Rusper was afterwards prioress of
-Easebourne. The record of a visitation at Davington in Kent (1511) shows
-that the convent contained four inmates, of whom two were professed nuns.
-The one, professed at Cambridge, had been there for twenty years; the
-other, professed at Malling, had been there for ten. The other two inmates
-entered on the list as not professed were girls of ten and fifteen[946].
-
-The consecration of nuns was a very ancient and solemn rite. Several forms
-of the office as celebrated in England are in existence[947]. One comes
-from the monastery of St Mary's, Winchester, and is contained in a
-manuscript written probably soon after 1500; the directions are in
-English, but the words in which the bishop addressed the maidens and their
-answers are in Latin. Another manuscript written about 1480 contains the
-office as used in the diocese of Lincoln, with prayers in English and
-rubrics in Latin; it contains also various directions and addresses
-omitted in the other manuscript. A third is throughout in English.
-
-These forms of consecration show that after the celebration of the office
-of high mass in church the prospective nuns entered, each bearing a habit,
-a veil, a ring and a scroll. The form of interrogation they were put
-through and the prayers they recited during the installation are given.
-The declaration was made by the nuns in Latin and runs as follows: 'I,
-sister ..., promise steadfastness (stabilitatem), continuance in virtue
-(conversionem morum meorum), and obedience before God and all His saints.'
-We also have the declaration of four nuns who were installed by the
-bishop of Ely at Chatteris, which is couched in similar terms[948]. The
-nun in this case made her promise 'in accordance with the rule of St
-Benedict in this place, Chatteris, built in honour of St Mary, in the
-presence of the reverend father in Christ, William, bishop of Ely,' adding
-'I subscribe this with my own hand,' whereupon she made the sign of the
-cross on the scroll which she carried in her hand and from which she had
-read her declaration. The form of declaration made at Rusper in Sussex in
-the year 1484 is similar, but the nun further promises 'to live without
-property (sine proprio)' of her own[949].
-
-For several days after her consecration the nun lived in retirement,
-strictly observing the rule of silence. She then resumed her ordinary
-duties in church, cloister, refectory and dormitory. She usually kept
-within the convent close, but she was not altogether cut off from
-intercourse with the outside world. The rhymed rule of St Benedict of the
-north, transcribing the passages which refer to the monk's going abroad if
-need be, adapts them to the use of the nun (l. 2450), 'when a sister is
-going to her father, mother, or other friends, she shall take formal leave
-of the convent.' And if she is away on an errand (l. 1967), she shall not
-stay away for a meal though invited to do so unless she has asked leave
-before going. And again (l. 1957) if she be away during Lent and cannot
-attend service in church she shall not forget to keep the hours by saying
-her prayers. And again (l. 2094), when nuns go away into the country they
-shall wear 'more honest' clothes (that is clothes more clearly showing
-their profession), which they can take off on coming home for simpler
-ones. From passages such as these we gather that nuns sometimes stayed
-away from their convent, leave of absence having been procured; and that
-besides pilgrimages and business, friendly intercourse with their
-relatives might take them away from the convent for a time.
-
-The day at the convent was divided by the canonical hours, stated times
-fixed by ecclesiastical law for prayer and devotion[950]. The hours since
-the 6th century were seven in number, viz. matins, prime, tierce, sext,
-none, vespers or evensong, and compline.
-
-During winter a night office was said in church at the eighth hour, that
-is at two o'clock in the morning, when the _matutinae laudes_ were sung,
-but the time for that was variable. 'Then shall they rise to sing and
-read, and after that she who has need may have meditations' (Rhymed rule,
-l. 1166). Between Easter and winter however the rule says 'that the nuns
-shall unto matins rise when the day begins to dawn that they their letters
-well may know.' Injunctions sent to Easebourne in 1524 direct the prioress
-to hold matins at the sixth hour, that is at midnight. Matins were
-followed by a period of rest, probably till five o'clock, when the nuns
-rose and assembled in the choir to celebrate the office of prime. This was
-followed by business transacted in the chapter house, by a meal and by
-work. According to the prose versions of the Benedictine rule children
-were taught between prime and tierce.
-
-At tierce a short chapter-mass was sung followed by continued study; 'from
-terce to sext the nuns shall read lessons' (l. 1905). At eight the nuns
-assembled in the choir for the celebration of High Mass, the principal
-service of the day, after which came the chief meal. This was served in
-the refectory; 'the convent when they sit at meat for to read shall not
-forget' (l. 1739); and while reading went on 'if any of them need aught
-softly with signs they shall it crave' (l. 1754). The time of the meal was
-moveable. In summer the nuns were to eat at the sext, but on Wednesdays
-and Fridays they were to fast till nones, that is noon, except 'they swink
-and sweat in hay or corn with travail great' (l. 1768), when the time
-might be altered at the will of the superior. Between December and Lent
-they always ate at nones. If they eat early 'then shall they sleep and
-silence keep' (l. 1910) till nones, from which time till evensong work was
-resumed.
-
-About three o'clock, vespers, that is evensong, once more assembled the
-convent inmates in church. The celebration of evensong partook of the
-solemnity of the celebration of high mass. In the monks' houses at high
-mass and at vespers the youths who were supported there for the purpose
-attended and joined the brethren in their choral service. In the nuns'
-houses the arrangements for the girls who dwelt with the nuns were
-similar, at least in some cases. After vespers came supper, and then 'the
-nuns could sit where they would and read lessons of holy writ or else the
-lives of holy men' (l. 1791), until the tolling of the bell summoned them
-to the chapter-house, where they joined their superior. Compline
-completed the religious exercises of the day. After this the nuns retired
-to the dormitory, where silence unbroken was to be observed. Inside the
-dormitory, curtains, in some houses if not in all, were hung so as to
-separate bed from bed.
-
-The celebration of the hours formed at all times the great feature of
-monastic life, and in itself involved a considerable amount of labour,
-especially during the later period, when the ritual of service had become
-very elaborate. Indolence and ease might creep in between whiles,
-deterioration might take place in the occupations of the nuns between
-hours, but the observance of the hours themselves constituted the nun's
-privilege and her _raison d'etre_, and was at all times zealously upheld.
-
-
-Sec. 3. The Foundation and Internal Arrangements of Sion[951].
-
-Before leaving the subject of women's convent life in England in the later
-Middle Ages, it will be interesting to devote some attention to the
-foundation and interior arrangements of Sion, a convent founded under
-peculiar circumstances at a time when it was no longer usual to found or
-endow religious settlements. The information relating to Sion has been
-characterised as the most valuable record we possess of monastic life in
-the 15th century. It refers to one short period only and bears out what
-has already been put forward with regard to other nunneries. The interests
-of the women who joined this convent centred round devotional practices
-and a highly elaborated convent routine.
-
-The settlement of Sion belonged to the order of St Bridget of Sweden, and
-was the only house of its kind in England. It was situated in beautiful
-surroundings near Isleworth on the Thames, and was so richly endowed that
-at the time of the dissolution its income far exceeded that of any other
-nunnery, not excepting the time-honoured settlements of Shaftesbury and
-Barking. It was the only English community of women which escaped being
-scattered at the time of the Reformation. Its convent of nuns removed to
-Holland, but returned to the old house for a time after the accession of
-Queen Mary. At the close of her reign the nuns again went abroad and after
-various vicissitudes settled at Lisbon, where the convent continued to be
-recruited from English homes till the beginning of this century. Then the
-nine sisters of which the convent consisted came to England, and settled
-at Chudleigh, near Newton-Abbot, in Devonshire.
-
-A few words in passing must be devoted to the nun and saint Bridget[952]
-of Sweden, founder of the order which took her name--a woman of
-acquirements and influence. She was born of a kingly race in 1304, and
-from the house of a powerful father passed to that of a powerful husband;
-but the responsibilities of a large household and the care of a family of
-seven children did not draw her attention from social and political
-affairs. She was strongly imbued with the need of reform in religion, and
-believed in the possibility of effecting a change by encouraging
-monasticism. A large part of her property and much of her time were
-devoted to enlarging the religious settlement of Wadstena. She then went
-on a pilgrimage to Santiago in Spain, after which husband and wife
-separated, each to embrace convent life. Bridget, or Birgitta as her
-people called her, dwelt at Wadstena, which she reformed according to
-rules which she believed she had received direct from heaven. She also
-wrote some 'Revelations,' which in their strong invective recall the
-Revelations of St Hildegard of Bingen with this difference, that St
-Bridget with open directness spoke of the dangers which she thought were
-gathering around Sweden. The tone of these writings brought her into
-difficulties. She escaped from them by removing to Rome in 1350, where she
-lived for over twenty years. Here she was looked upon as the
-representative of the Church party which strongly censured the Pope for
-continuing to dwell at Avignon. This party looked upon Bridget as the
-chosen mouthpiece of God. Her power of prophecy was generally recognised
-after her threatening visions about the state of things in Sweden had
-proved true. Settlements on the plan of that of Wadstena rapidly
-multiplied during her lifetime in Sweden and in North Germany. It was
-partly owing to her influence that the first attempt was made to translate
-the Bible into Swedish, and she is looked upon by the Swedes as one of
-that faithful band who worked for their national regeneration. She died in
-1372 and was officially canonised a saint in 1391[953].
-
-A great feature of the order of St Bridget was that its settlements
-consisted of a double community of men and women who combined for purposes
-of divine service, but were otherwise separate, each community having its
-own conventual buildings separately enclosed. The convent of nuns,
-according to Bridget's stipulation, numbered sixty women including the
-abbess, and in accordance with a fanciful notion, such as one comes across
-in the Middle Ages, these women had associated with them thirteen priests,
-who represented the apostles, four deacons who represented the great
-doctors of the Church, and eight lay brothers; the lady abbess was at the
-head of this double community. The order in its development abroad
-endeavoured to influence all classes. It encouraged charity, promoted
-education and collected books. But in England its tone fell in with that
-of other nunneries in the 15th century; the interests of Sion were
-entirely devotional and its large library seems to have contained
-religious works only.
-
-I am not aware of any mention of Bridget in contemporary English
-literature previous to the introduction of her order into this country,
-which took place at the beginning of the 15th century. In the year 1406
-Philippa, daughter of Henry IV, was sent to Lund in Sweden to be married
-to King Eric XIII (1382-1445), under whose rule the crowns of Sweden,
-Denmark and Norway were united. The princess travelled under the charge of
-Henry, third Baron Fitzhugh, who held an important position at the court
-of Henry IV; he was made Constable of England at the coronation of Henry
-V, and seems to have been on terms of intimacy with both these monarchs.
-By some means Fitzhugh's attention was drawn to the monastery of Wadstena,
-the chronicle of which records his visit to it. He volunteered to found a
-branch of the order of St Bridget in England, and promised the gift of a
-manor, Hinton near Cambridge, on condition that some of the order took
-possession of it within three years.
-
-In consequence of Fitzhugh's visit and offer a priest and two deacons
-professing the order of St Bridget were elected at Wadstena in 1408, and
-sent to England. Blunt considers it probable[954] that it was by the
-advice of Fitzhugh that Henry V about this time devoted manors at Sheen
-and Isleworth to religious purposes. Carthusian monks were settled at
-Sheen, nuns of St Bridget were settled at Isleworth,--and the two
-settlements were called respectively Bethlehem and Sion. In February of
-1415 Henry V in the presence of the bishop of London laid the foundation
-stone of a building destined for the nuns near Twickenham, and in March
-the royal charter was drawn up and signed. By this the members of the new
-settlement were bound 'to celebrate Divine Service for ever for our
-healthful estate while we live and for our souls when we shall have
-departed this life, and for the souls of our most dear lord and father
-(Henry IV) late king of England, and Mary his late wife, etc.' Before the
-close of the year four consecrated Swedish sisters, three novices and two
-brothers arrived in England from Wadstena. They were sent by the king and
-queen of Sweden and were sped on their way by the archbishop of Lund and
-other dignitaries.
-
-The settlement at Sion had been granted an income of a thousand marks, to
-be drawn from the royal exchequer until the permanent endowments made to
-it should amount to that sum. In 1418 Pope Martin V received the house
-under his special protection; the first profession or monastic engagement
-took place two years later. Twenty-four nuns, five priests, two deacons
-and four lay brothers pronounced their vows before archbishop Chicheley of
-Canterbury (1420). And before the close of Henry's reign (1422) the house
-was endowed with manors and spiritualities, scattered over the land from
-Kent to the Lake district, which were chiefly appropriated from the
-possessions of alien priories.
-
-The appropriation of alien priories forms an interesting episode in the
-history of English monasticism, for it constitutes a prelude to the
-dissolution of monasteries generally. While men were becoming critical of
-religious institutions owing to the spread of Lollard doctrines, the
-Lancastrian kings appropriated the lands and the revenues of alien
-priories and made use of them to fortify the Church and monasticism, thus
-counteracting influences which in the first instance had made the
-appropriation of these houses possible.
-
-The number of alien priories in England is differently quoted as a hundred
-and a hundred and forty[955]. Most of them had been founded soon after the
-Conquest, when the gift of a manor on English soil to a foreign house had
-brought over from France a few monks and nuns, who after defraying the
-expenses of their houses remitted any surplus revenue or else forwarded a
-sum of money in lieu of it to the parent house. When the relations between
-France and England became strained it appeared advisable to sever the
-connection between the foreign house and its English colonies. Edward I,
-when he determined on war with France, appropriated the revenues of alien
-priories for a time, and his successors frequently did the same; the
-dangers to which these cells were exposed causing some foreign houses to
-sever the connection by selling their English property.
-
-The alien cells occupied by nuns were very few. Amesbury, which had been
-constituted a cell to Fontevraud, regained its independent standing during
-the wars with France[956]; Westwood[957], another cell of Fontevraud, and
-Levenestre or Liminster in Surrey, a cell of Almanache in Normandy, were
-dispersed, and the abbess of Almanache treated for the sale of the
-property[958].
-
-After many attempts to interfere with foreign cells Henry V resolved on
-their final sequestration (1414), and it was part of the property thus
-appropriated which was bestowed on the houses called Bethlehem and Sion.
-
-The chief information we have on the conventual life of the women
-assembled at Sion is contained in a set of 'additional rules' written in
-English 'for the sisters of the order of St Saviour and St Bridget'[959].
-The same rules exist in a manuscript of contemporaneous date adapted to
-the use of the brothers, whose duties, save in a few particulars, were
-similar. They acted as priests and confessors to the double community. The
-chapel had a double chancel, each with its separate stalls; it was divided
-by a 'crate' or grille which did not prevent the brothers and sisters from
-being visible to each other during divine service. The gate of this grille
-was kept locked, and was only opened for the entrance and departure of the
-clergy when they said mass at the altar of the sisters' chapel. The lay
-brothers of the settlement acted as labourers, and had no part in the
-government of the house.
-
-The additional rules for the sisters are grouped together in fifty-nine
-chapters, and contain most elaborate directions not only as to the
-occupation, behaviour and special duties of the various inmates of the
-convent, but for exigencies of every kind. After directions about the
-holding of the Chapter, lists of defaults are worked out, grouped under
-the headings of light, grievous, more grievous and most grievous (c. 1-7).
-'A careful consideration of this code of "defaultes" and their penalties,'
-says Blunt[960], 'leads to the conclusion that it was intended as an
-exhaustive list of _possible_ crimes, and that it offers no ground for
-believing that the Sisters of Sion were ever guilty of them or ever
-incurred the severer punishments enjoined in connection with them.' Among
-'light defaults' we note such as neglect in religious observance and in
-washing; among 'grievous defaults,' despising the common doctrine as
-taught by the holy fathers, and going unconfessed for fourteen days. 'More
-grievous defaults' are such as sowing discord, theft, and using sorcery or
-witchcraft; 'most grievous defaults' are manslaughter, fleshly sin, and
-blasphemy. We gather from the directions that one mode of severe
-punishment was imprisonment, whereas 'discipline' was administered
-regularly by the sisters to each other. The power of the abbess over the
-members of the convent was absolute; she is spoken of in these rules
-sometimes as sovereign, sometimes as majesty. It was she who decreed
-punishment and penance, and when the bishop enjoined correction in
-consequence of an enquiry, she decided upon and administered it.
-Twenty-eight questions, which the bishop on the occasion of his visitation
-was allowed to put to the abbess and the convent, are given (c. 10). They
-refer to devotional duties, to the observance of fasts, etc. One question
-(nr 10) enquires of the sisters how they are occupied when they are not at
-divine service or at conventual observances; another (nr 18) if there be
-an inventory or register of the books of the library, and how they and
-other books of study are kept; again another (nr 26) enquires as to the
-state of the infirmary.
-
-A caution against slander suggests a curious idea of equity. If any sister
-bring an accusation against another before the bishop, she shall not be
-heard 'unless bound to the pain if she fail in proof, that she whom she
-accuses shall have, if she be found guilty.'
-
-Among the men who necessarily had access to the women's conventual
-buildings, physicians, workmen and labourers are enumerated.
-
-The election of a new abbess (c. 12) was effected by the sisters alone
-within three days of the occurrence of a vacancy. It was not managed in
-quite the same way as elsewhere. The prioress proposed a name, and if the
-sisters voted unanimously in favour of it, the election was called 'by the
-way of the Holy Ghost.' But if they did not agree, they named a candidate
-and the ballot was repeated till a sufficient majority was obtained. The
-election was not valid unless confirmed by the bishop. When the abbess
-pronounced the words of her 'obedience' she was supported by a learned man
-of law or notary, besides the confessor of the house and two brothers. The
-confessor was appointed at the discretion of the abbess herself, the
-'sadder' or elderly sisters and the brothers; but the other appointments
-were made by the abbess alone (c. 13). She appointed the sisters to office
-and could remove them. As elsewhere, she was obliged to do so in the
-chapter-house in the presence of the convent.
-
-The rules of keeping silence, the year of proof, and the instruction and
-profession of novices, are fully discussed (c. 15). The account of how the
-sisters were professed is supplemented by Aungier[961]. He gives an
-additional description of the ceremony in church, probably of somewhat
-later date, and of the interrogatory through which the bishop put the
-prospective nun. The first question which he put was to this effect: 'Art
-thou free and unfettered by any bond of the Church, or of wedlock; of vow,
-or of excommunication?' to which she made answer, 'I am truly free.' The
-bishop then asked: 'Does not shame, or perchance grief of worldly
-adversity, urge thee to a religious profession, or perhaps the multitude
-of thy debts compel thee?' To which she answered: 'Neither grief nor shame
-incites me to this, but a fervent love of Christ; and I have already paid
-all my debts according to my power,' etc. I have not met with similar
-questions in any other place.
-
-In the additional rules directions are also given about singing and
-keeping the hours and the festivals (c. 18-44). The day at Sion was
-divided by the seven 'hours' in the usual way. At the hours in chapel the
-'sadder' or elder sisters sang together with the younger ones or
-'song-sisters.' The 'observance of the altar' at both masses belonged to
-the brothers; it was so arranged that the brothers' service came first and
-the sisters' began when that of the brothers ended. In addition to the
-usual hours and masses two ceremonies were daily observed at Sion. One was
-the singing of the psalm _De Profundis_ at an open grave to which the
-whole convent wended its way after tierce. The other consisted of a prayer
-addressed to Mary in chapel before evensong, from which none of the
-sisters was to absent herself except for an important reason.
-
-A number of festivals were celebrated at Sion with special services and
-processions (c. 29). Among them were the feast of the Circumcision, the
-translation of St Bridget and the day of St John the Baptist 'when their
-feasts fall on Sunday and not else'; also Palm Sunday, St Mark's day,
-Rogation Sunday, St Peter and St Paul, St Anne's, Michaelmas, all the
-feasts of Our Lady and all the principal or high double feasts of the
-year. On these occasions the sisters walked two and two in procession, and
-the sister who was sexton bore the 'image of our lady' after the cross,
-and two torches were carried on either side a little before the image. The
-additional rules contain directions to the sisters on the arrangement of
-divine service on these occasions, and further directions in the rule for
-the brothers minutely describe the elaborate ritual which took place.
-
-The additional rules also contain a full description of the duties of each
-appointment in the convent (c. 45). The choir in church was led by a
-_chauntres_ and _subchauntres_ who should be 'cunning and perfect in
-reading and singing.' It was the duty of the _ebdomary_, or weekly
-appointed nun (c. 46), to be one of the first in choir; she was 'to
-abstayn and withdrawe herself from alle thynges that wyke that myght lette
-her to performe her office.' When the abbess did not execute the service
-the ebdomary began the _Invitatory_; and she always gave the third
-blessing after the abbess had read the third lesson. She also fulfilled
-the office of the abbess at the principal feasts, except in such things as
-belonged exclusively to the abbess.
-
-We hear also of the duties of the sexton, _sexteyne_ (c. 48), who kept the
-church ornaments and the altar 'whole and sound, fair, clean and honest,'
-and who saw to the washing of altar-cloths, _awbes_ or surplices. She was
-not allowed to touch or wash the hallowed _corporas_ or cloths with bare
-hands, but was obliged to wear linen gloves, and in starching the cloths
-she was directed to use starch made of herbs only. The sexton had in her
-keeping wax, lamps, oil and all other things belonging to the church; she
-had to provide for the church _syngynge_ or communion _brede_, _sudarys_,
-wax-candles, tallow-candles, wax rolls, tapers, torches, mats, _uattes_,
-and _roundlettes_; and she provided for the _penners_, pens, ink,
-inkhorns, tables, and all else that the abbess asked of her. Also she
-opened and shut the doors and windows of the sisters' choir and common
-places, lighted and extinguished tapers and candles, and snuffed them 'in
-such wise and in such time that the sisters be not grieved with the
-savour.'
-
-It was the duty of the sexton to ring the bells in the women's part of the
-house; the ringing of a bell regulated throughout the life of those
-assembled at Sion. It roused the brothers and sisters from sleep, summoned
-them to church, called them to meals, and ever and anon gave notice for a
-devotional pause in whatever occupation was going on at the moment. When
-one of the community passed away from life the large or curfew bell was
-tolled continuously.
-
-Another appointment in the women's convent was that of the _legister_ or
-reader at meals (c. 50), who was directed to read out distinctly and
-openly, that all might understand, whatever the abbess or chauntress had
-assigned. On one day of the week she read out the rule. Absolute silence
-reigned during meals. If anyone had a communication to make, this was done
-by means of signs, used also at other times when silence was to be
-observed. A curious 'table of signs used during the hours of silence by
-the sisters and brothers in the monastery of Sion' was drawn up by Thomas
-Betsone[962], one of the brothers. Together with other tables of the kind,
-it suggests the origin of the method by which the deaf and dumb were
-formerly taught.
-
-At Sion the abbess had her meals with the sisters, sitting at a high table
-while they sat at side tables (c. 51-52), and the servitors or lay sisters
-waited. When they had done the sisters wiped their knives and spoons on
-the napkins (without washing them?); they were to guard against spotting
-the cloth, and spilling the food, and were directed to put away their cups
-and spoons honest and clean (without washing them?) into the 'coffyns'
-which were kept underneath the table, or in some other place ordered by
-the abbess. At the end of a meal the sisters swept together the crumbs
-with their napkins, and then, at a sign from the abbess, they bore the
-food away to the serving-house. The youngest sister took the first dish,
-and each one carried away something according to age. The language in
-which the utensils are described presents some difficulties. They carried
-away the drink and then 'the garnapes that they sette on, ther pottes and
-cruses, after thys, brede, hole, kytte, cantelles, ande crommes, and laste
-of alle salt,' ending evermore with the abbess or president, and inclining
-to each sister as they took them up and they again to them.
-
-The behaviour of the sisters to each other and to the abbess in the
-refectory, the dormitory, the chapter-house, etc. was carefully regulated
-(c. 53). The sisters when they met the abbess bowed to her, 'for love
-without reverence is but childish love.' The desire for refinement in
-bearing and behaviour is manifested throughout by these directions, and
-some of them are curious. Thus the sister who washed her hands was
-directed not to 'jutte up' the water on another, nor to spit in the
-lavatory, nor to presume to go without her veil and crown upon her head,
-except only in her cell, washing-house, etc. Judging from this reference
-to cells, the dormitory at Sion was divided by partitions or curtains, so
-that each sister practically had a room to herself.
-
-Many details are then given concerning the duties of the prioress and
-other appointments. The nuns appointed to enquire into shortcomings are
-here designated as _serchers_ (c. 55). The treasurer and her fellow kept
-the muniments of the monastery and its possessions in gold and silver in
-the treasury, in a large chest to which there were two keys, one kept by
-the treasurer and the other by her fellow (c. 56). These sisters also
-provided and paid for all necessary medicines, spices and powders, etc.
-
-Duties of no small importance devolved on the _chambres_, or mistress of
-the wardrobe, who saw to the raiment of the sisters and the brothers, both
-in regard to linen and to woollen clothes, shaping, sewing, making,
-repairing and keeping them from 'wormes,' and shaking them with 'the help
-of other sisters.' I transcribe in the original spelling the things she is
-told to provide: '_canuas for bedyng_, _fryses_, _blankettes_, _shetes_,
-_bolsters_, _pelowes_, _couerlites_, _cuschens_, _basens_, _stamens_,
-_rewle cotes_, _cowles_, _mantelles_, _wymples_, _veyles_, _crownes_,
-_pynnes_, _cappes_, _nyght kerchyfes_, _pylches_, _mantel furres_,
-_cuffes_, _gloues_, _hoses_, _shoes_, _botes_, _soles_, _sokkes_,
-_mugdors_ (sic), _gyrdelles_, _purses_, _knyues_, _laces_, _poyntes_,
-_nedelles_, _threde_,--_waschyng bolles and sope_,--(written in the
-margin) and for all other necessaries, as directed by the abbess, which
-shall not be over curious but plain and homely, without wearing of any
-strange colours of silk, gold or silver, having all things of honesty and
-profit and nothing of vanity after the rule, their knives unpointed and
-purses being double of linen cloth, and not silk.'
-
-In illustration of the office of the chambress, Blunt has published a
-document preserved in the Record Office, which contains the account of
-Dame Bridget Belgrave, chambress at Sion from Michaelmas 1536 to
-Michaelmas 1537, the year preceding the dissolution[963]. This shows that
-the chambress provided the material for the dress of the sisters and
-other items. She buys _russettes_, white cloth, _kerseys_, fryce, Holland
-cloth and other linen cloth mostly by the piece, which varies in the
-number of its yards; she provides soap, calf-skins, thread, needles and
-thimbles; she purchases new spectacles and has old ones mended. Among many
-other items of interest we find fox-skins, paper, and pins of divers
-sorts; she sets down a sum for burying poor folks, and 'expences at
-London,' from which we gather that she had been there; and pays 'rewards'
-and 'wages' to the _grome_, the _skynner_, and the _shumakers_.
-
-The duties of the cellaress stand next in the additional rules (c. 56),
-and they recall the complex duties belonging to the same post at Barking.
-Blunt has also illustrated these duties by publishing the accounts,
-rendered by Dame Agnes Merrett, for the last year preceding the
-dissolution[964]. This cellaress also charged herself with various sums
-received for hides, calf-skins and wool-felles or sheep-skins. She
-received payment for boarding My Lady Kyngeston and her servants, and
-sister Elizabeth Nelson. She received rent from various tenants and
-managed the home farm at Isleworth. We hear of her buying horses, cattle,
-hogs and peacocks for its storing. Its dairy was managed by paid servants.
-This cellaress, like her fellow at Barking, purchased provisions and fish
-for the use of the convent, but her entries are more numerous and infer a
-higher standard of living, perhaps due to the fact that these accounts are
-more than a hundred years later than the 'charge of the cellaress at
-Barking.' The cellaress at Sion also bought salt salmon, herrings by the
-barrel, and red herrings by the 'caade'; also _stubbe_ eels. She further
-bought spices, fruits, sugar, nutmegs, almonds, currants, ginger,
-isinglass, pepper, cinnamon, cloves, mace, _figge doodes_ (sic),
-_topnettes_ (sic), great raisins, prunes, saffron and rice. Her 'foreign
-payments' include seed for the garden, boat-hire, and expenses at London,
-by which we see that she too, like the chambress of the house, had been
-there. Among her other expenses are _rewards_ to the 'clerke of the
-kechyn,' the 'baily of the husbandry,' the 'keper of the covent (convent)
-garden,' and the 'cookes.' Members of the convent were deputed by the
-abbess to look after the sick (c. 57), and the writer insists upon the
-need of gentleness and patience in dealing with them.
-
-'Often change their beds and clothes,' he says, 'give them medicines, lay
-to them plaisters and minister to them meat and drink, fire and water,
-and all other necessaries night and day, as need requires after the
-counsel of the physicians, and precept of the sovereign; do not be
-squeamish in washing and wiping them by avoiding them, be not angry nor
-hasty, nor impatient though one have the vomit, another the flux, another
-the frenzy, and now sings, now cries, now laughs, now weeps, now chides,
-now is frightened, now is wroth, now well apayde, for there be some
-sickness vexing the sick so greatly and provoking them to ire that the
-matter drawn up to the brain alienates the mind. And therefore those in
-attendance should have much patience with them, that thereby they may
-secure an everlasting crown.'
-
-Aungier has also reprinted lists of the capabilities of indulgence granted
-to Sion, and of the pardons secured by those who offered prayers in the
-chapel there[965]. This shows one of the means by which money was secured
-to religious houses in the 15th century. Indulgences were granted at Sion
-on almost every festival in the year. By 'devoutly giving somewhat to the
-reparation of the said monastery' and offering prayers on Midlent Sunday,
-the visitor at Sion might secure pardon extending from a hundred days to
-'clean remission of all sin except in the points which are reserved to the
-Pope.' To give alms on the feast of St Bridget, the patron saint of the
-house, secured to him who sought help 'pardon and clean remission in all
-cases reserved and unreserved,' according to the wording of the document.
-This power, as the manuscript informs us, had been granted 'by diverse
-holy fathers, popes at Rome, archbishops, bishops, cardinals and legates.'
-Aungier supplements it by printing a document which came from Norfolk on
-the capabilities of pardon possessed by different religious houses[966].
-There are entries in this referring to the 'pardoun of beyds' of the
-Charterhouse of Mount Grace and of the Charterhouse at Sheen, and to the
-pardon of beads at Sion and at the 'Crossed Friars' beside London Tower.
-
-A number of devotional books were written for the nuns at Sion; some in
-Latin, some in English. A few of the service books of the house have been
-preserved. Among them is the Martyrology which was in daily use among the
-brothers and which contains historical memoranda, accounts of the saints,
-the records of the deaths of the sisters, brothers and benefactors of the
-house between 1422 and 1639, and extracts from religious writers. This
-martyrology accompanied the women's convent on their wanderings, and since
-their return it has been acquired by the British Museum[967]. A
-translation of it into English was made by Richard Whytford ([Dagger]
-1542), a brother of Sion, 'for the edificacyon of certayn religyous
-persones unlerned that dayly dyd rede the same martiloge in Latyn not
-understandynge what they redde[968].' Whytford wrote other religious
-books, among them the 'Pype or Tonne of Perfection'; the 'Fruyte of
-redempcyon,' which is now held to be by 'Simon, the anker of London,' has
-been attributed to him.
-
-Among other books written for the nuns is a curious discourse in English
-by Thomas Fishbourne, father confessor in 1420, to which is added a
-portion of the gospel of St Peter ad Vincula[969]. It contains a
-discussion on the nature of pardons and indulgences, particularly of those
-procured at Rome. Symon Wynter, another brother of the house (1428), wrote
-a treatise for them in praise of the Virgin (Regina Coeli)[970]; and
-Thomas Prestius wrote instructions for the novices[971]. The house owned a
-large library, to the celebrity of which Sir Richard Sutton added by a
-splendid work printed at his expense by Wynkyn de Worde in 1519 and called
-in honour of the monastery 'The Orchard of Syon[972]'.
-
-The most important work in English however compiled for the nuns was a
-devotional treatise on divine service with a translation into English of
-the Offices, called the 'Mirror of Our Lady,' first printed in 1530, the
-authorship of which is attributed by its latest editor, Blunt, to Thomas
-Gascoigne (1403-1458)[973]. Gascoigne was an eminent divine, at one time
-Chancellor of the University of Oxford; he caused the life of St Bridget
-to be translated into English and bequeathed most of his books by will to
-the sisters at Sion. The Offices in this book are amplified, and Blunt was
-much struck by the similarity of many passages to the Book of Common
-Prayer. The purpose of the writer is expressed in the following
-words[974]:
-
-'As many of you, though you can sing and read, yet you cannot see what
-the meaning thereof is.... I have drawn your legend and all your service
-into English, that you see by the understanding thereof, how worthy and
-holy praising of our glorious Lady is contained therein, and the more
-devoutly and knowingly sing it and read it, and say it to her worship.'
-
-The 'Mirror of Our Lady' is very instructive with regard to the just
-estimation of the position and feelings of religious women during the
-later Middle Ages. There is much in it that is eloquent, refined, and
-beautiful, but its insistence on detail is sometimes wearisome. The style
-of the writer is fitly illustrated by the following passages, which are
-taken from the introductory treatise on the reading of religious
-books[975]. The wording of the original is retained as closely as
-possible, but the spelling is modernized.
-
-'Devout reading of holy books is called one of the parts of contemplation,
-for it causes much grace and comfort to the soul if it be well and
-discreetly used. And much reading is often lost for lack of diligence,
-that it is not intended as it ought to be. Therefore if you will profit in
-reading you must keep these five things. First you ought to take heed what
-you read, that it be such thing as is speedwell for you to read and
-convenient to the degree you stand in. For you ought to read no worldly
-matters nor worldly books, namely such as are without reason of ghostly
-edification or belong not to the need of the house; you ought also to read
-no books that speak of vanities and trifles, and much less no books of
-evil or occasion to evil. For since your holy rule forbids you all vain
-and idle words in all times and places, by the same it forbids you reading
-of all vain and idle things, for reading is a manner of speaking. The
-second, when you begin to read or to hear such books of ghostly fruit as
-accord for you to read or to hear, that then you dispose yourselves
-thereto with meek reverence and devotion.... The third that you labour to
-understand the same thing that you read. For Cato taught his son to read
-so his precepts that he understand them. For it is, he says, great
-negligence to read and not to understand. And therefore when you read by
-yourself alone you ought not to be hasty to read much at once but you
-ought to abide thereupon, and sometimes read a thing again twice or thrice
-or oftener till you understand it clearly. For St Austin said that no man
-should ween to understand a thing sufficiently in any wise by once
-reading. And if you cannot understand what you read, ask of others that
-can teach you. And they that can ought not to be loth to teach others....
-The fourth thing that is to be kept in reading is that you dress so your
-intent that your reading and study be not only for to be cunning or for to
-be able to speak it forth to others, but principally to inform yourself
-and to set it forth in your own living.... The fifth thing is discretion.
-So that according to the matter you arrange your reading. For you must
-understand that different books speak in different wise. For some books
-are made to inform the understanding and to tell how spiritual persons
-ought to be governed in all their living that they may know how they shall
-live and what they shall do, how they shall labour in cleansing their
-conscience and in getting virtues, how they shall withstand temptation and
-suffer tribulations, and how they shall pray and occupy themselves with
-ghostly exercise, with many such other full holy doctrines.... Other books
-there be that are made to quicken and to stir up the affections of the
-soul, as some that tell of the sorrows and dreads of death and of doom and
-of pains, to stir up the affection of dread and of sorrow for sin. Some
-tell of the great benefits of our Lord God, how He made us and bought us
-and what love and mercy He shewed continually to us to stir up our
-affections of love and of hope in Him. Some tell of the joys of heaven, to
-stir up the affections of joy to desire thitherward. And some tell of the
-foulness and wretchedness of sin, to stir up the affections of hate and
-loathing thereagainst.'
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XI.
-
-MONASTIC REFORM PREVIOUS TO THE REFORMATION.
-
-  'For sum (nunnes) bene devowte, holy, and towarde,
-  And holden the ryght way to blysse;
-  And sum bene feble, lewde, and frowarde,
-  Now god amend that ys amys!'
-                              (_From_ '_Why I cannot be a nun_,' l. 311.)
-
-
-Sec. 1. Visitations of Nunneries in England.
-
-The changes which came over convent life towards the close of the Middle
-Ages and modified its tenor can be studied in the efforts made to reform
-monastic life in the centuries preceding the Reformation. Both in England
-and abroad the heads of many houses were zealous in removing abuses which
-their predecessors had suffered to creep in, and in checking tendencies
-the deteriorating effect of which now first came to be realized. The bull
-promulgated by Pope Benedict XII in 1336 with a view to reforming the
-Benedictine order had been accepted with a reservation in England and had
-left matters in Germany practically untouched. But in the 15th century a
-movement in favour of reform was inaugurated within the religious orders
-themselves; it was increased by pressure brought to bear on monastic
-houses from without. For the prelates of the Church as well as others were
-eager to interfere with monastic settlements, all the more as such
-interference frequently tended to the increase of their own prerogative.
-But in spite of the devoted earnestness of many individuals and the
-readiness of convents to accept correction, the movement failed to restore
-its former glory to an institution which in common with other influential
-institutions of the Middle Ages appeared doomed to decay.
-
-The attempts of the monastic orders to restore vigour to themselves, and
-the efforts of the Church to promote monastic reform, were largely
-furthered by the desire to counteract the dangers to the established
-religion which threatened from the spread of heretical teaching.
-
-In England a critical attitude towards monastic institutions and the
-Church was the outcome of Wyclif's ([Dagger] 1384) influence. It was
-checked for the time being by the alliance of the Church with the
-Lancastrian kings (after 1399) in favour of a reactionary policy. Several
-monasteries were endowed by these kings, among them houses of Carthusian
-monks and Sion, as mentioned above. Reforms were instituted and the
-prelates of the Church eagerly resumed their powers of visitation. By so
-doing they succeeded in checking monastic abuses, which continued to exist
-for a longer period on the Continent and there assumed much greater
-proportions.
-
-In Germany, owing partly to its scattered provinces, partly to the want of
-concerted action between the dignitaries of Church and State, monasteries
-throughout the 14th century were left to drift in the way they listed,
-often in the direction of indifferentism, often in that of positive evil.
-The abuses of convent life at the beginning of the 15th century were far
-greater there than in England, and the efforts at reform were
-proportionally greater and more strenuous. In Germany also the effort to
-counteract the effect of heretical doctrines by way of reform was
-decisive. For, as we shall see later on, monastic reforms on a large scale
-were instituted immediately after the Church Council at Constance (1415)
-which condemned Hus to the stake.
-
-The accounts of visitations instituted by the diocesan give us an insight
-into the abuses which threatened life in the nunnery at different periods.
-The diocesan was bound to visit the religious settlements situated within
-his diocese periodically, with the exception of those which had secured
-exemption through the Pope. For some time before the movement in favour of
-monastic reform began, these visitations appear to have taken place at
-irregular intervals and at periods often many years apart. But afterwards
-they became frequent, and called forth injunctions which give us an idea
-of the abuses which needed correction. Later still these powers of
-visitation of the diocesan were extended by means of special permits
-secured from Rome. Towards the close of the 15th century we find the
-prelates of the Church eager to interfere with monasteries, and regain a
-hold on those which had been removed from their influence.
-
-The visitation of a religious house in all cases was so conducted that the
-diocesan previously sent word to the convent announcing his arrival. After
-assisting at mass in the chapel, he repaired to the chapter-house and
-there severally interrogated the superior of the house and its inmates as
-to the state of affairs. Their depositions were taken down in writing and
-were discussed at headquarters. A list of injunctions rectifying such
-matters as called for correction was then forwarded in writing to the
-superior of the house.
-
-Among the earliest injunctions forwarded to a nunnery which I have come
-across are those sent to Godstow after a visitation held in 1279 by John
-Peckham, archbishop of Canterbury[976]. The first part treats of the
-celebration of the divine offices and of the part novices are to take in
-the singing. The feast of St John which is celebrated by childish
-festivities (puerilia solemnia), no doubt in accordance with an ancient
-folk custom, is not to be extended to a second day. Directions are then
-given about going outside precincts and staying away on business. The nuns
-are directed not to converse with the neighbouring students at Oxford
-(scholares Oxonii) unless they have permission to do so from the abbess,
-and to knit no bonds of friendship with them, 'because such affection
-often brings harmful thoughts.'
-
-The attraction which the students at Oxford exerted on the nuns of Godstow
-has a counterpart at a later date in the effect which intercourse with the
-students at Cambridge had on the nuns of St Radegund's. When John Alcock,
-bishop of Ely ([Dagger] 1500), proposed the dissolution of this nunnery he
-urged that the nearness of the university had led to the demoralisation of
-the prioress and the nuns[977].
-
-In the directions forwarded to Godstow we also find it enjoined that
-secular and religious visitors shall dine in the guest-house (hospitalaria
-communi) or in the chamber of the abbess, and on no account within the
-convent precincts with the nuns. Directions are also given as to the
-wearing of simple clothes, in which matter 'the rule of Benedict' (sic)
-shall be observed. These directions are not easy to understand. 'Linings
-of dyed woollen (imposterum burneto[978]),' say they, 'shall not be worn;
-nor red dresses (rugatas tunicas) nor other unseemly clothes wide at the
-sides.'
-
-Archbishop Peckham, who reformed abuses at Godstow, addressed a mandate
-to the abbess of Romsey in 1286 against a certain prebendary William
-Shyrlock, who seems to have been one of the residential canons of the
-place. He is not to presume to enter the cloister or the church while
-suspicions are entertained against him, and the nuns are not to converse
-with him in the house or elsewhere, for he is accused of living a
-dishonest and dissolute life[979]. No aspersion in this case is cast on
-the doings of the nuns.
-
-A serious scandal is said to have occurred about the year 1303 in the
-Cistercian nunnery of Swine in Yorkshire, but details concerning its
-nature are not forthcoming. In consequence of an enquiry into the state of
-the house the prioress resigned, and her successor also absented herself,
-it is alleged, on account of some scandal[980].
-
-The nunneries which were cells to abbeys of men were exempt from the
-visitation of the diocesan; they were inspected by the abbot of the parent
-house, who enquired into abuses and enjoined corrections. A mandate of
-this description which was forwarded to Sopwell nunnery, a cell of St
-Alban's, by the abbot in 1338 is in existence. The nuns are directed to
-observe silence in the church, the cloister, the refectory, and the
-dormitory. No sister shall hold converse with secular persons in the
-parlour unless she is wearing a cowl and a veil; and tailors and others
-who are employed shall work in some place assigned to them outside the
-convent precincts[981].
-
-Among the injunctions sent to Chatteris in Cambridgeshire in the year 1345
-the following are worth noticing: Nuns shall not keep fowls, dogs or small
-birds (aviculae) within the convent precincts, nor bring them into church
-during divine service, and they shall not, from a wish to reform them,
-take into their employ servants who are known for their bad ways[982].
-
-In April of the year 1397 a visitation of the nunnery of Nun-Monkton in
-Yorkshire was conducted by Thomas Dalby, archdeacon of Richmond, who acted
-for the archbishop of York[983]. He accused the prioress Margaret Fairfax
-of allowing various kinds of fur to be worn in her house, especially grey
-fur. He also objected to the wearing of silk veils and to the prioress
-herself acting as treasurer (bursaria) of the house, and charged her with
-having alienated its property to the value of a hundred marks. He
-censured her for entertaining John Munkton, and inviting him to dinner in
-her chamber, and for allowing the use of unusual vestments and clothes;
-for too readily receiving back nuns who had disgraced their profession
-(lapsae fornicatione); and for allowing nuns to receive gifts from friends
-to support them. He also complained that John Munkton behaved badly, had
-dallied (ludit) with the prioress at meals in her chamber, and had been
-served there with drink.
-
-Injunctions were forwarded in the following July to rectify these matters,
-and directing the prioress to have no communication with _Dominus_ John
-Munkton, William Snowe or Thomas Pape, except in the presence of the nuns.
-The usual vestments were to be worn in church, and the nuns were enjoined
-not to wear silk garments (paneis), silk veils, precious furs, finger
-rings, and embroidered or ornamental _jupes_, in English called gowns,
-like secular women. They were not to neglect the commemoration of the dead
-under penalty of being deprived of special clothes (carentiae camisarum?)
-for two whole weeks.
-
-The general tenor of these injunctions argues a want of management on the
-part of the lady superior and a tendency to luxury among the nuns. As time
-wore on complaints about mismanagement of revenues became more frequent,
-but they were accompanied by evidence of increasing poverty, especially in
-the smaller houses, which shows that the lady superior was labouring under
-difficulties for which she was not altogether responsible.
-
-A serious blow was dealt to the monastic system by the Black Death, which
-began in 1349. It produced a temporary collapse of discipline and
-indifference to religion[984], and resulted in changes in the state of
-agriculture and the position of the labourer, which affected the poorer
-and smaller houses in a disastrous manner.
-
-Thus we read about Thetford, a small Benedictine nunnery in Norfolk[985],
-that the nuns' revenues had much decreased through mortality and
-inundation since 1349, and that when Henry V levied a tax on religious
-houses, Thetford, which consisted at the time of a prioress and nine nuns,
-was excused on the plea of poverty. The increasing poverty of the house is
-evident from accounts of visitations between 1514 1520[986]. On one
-occasion the nuns declared they were short of service books; on another
-that the prioress received illiterate and deformed persons (indoctae et
-deformes) into the house; and again that there was great poverty and that
-the few novices had no teacher.
-
-Again we read of Malling in Kent that it was excused from payments in
-1404; in 1349 the bishop of Rochester had found it so decayed as to be
-hardly capable of restoration[987]. Two abbesses had died of the
-pestilence; there were only eight inmates left in the house, four of whom
-were professed and four non-professed.
-
-Malling recovered itself, but not so Wyrthorp in Northamptonshire, where
-Emma de Pinchbeck and many of the Austin nuns fell victims to the
-pestilence[988]. The archbishop appointed Agnes Bowes as prioress, but the
-convent was beyond recovery. In 1354 Sir Th. Holland, the patron of the
-house, petitioned that it should be united to the nunnery at Stamford, to
-which its prioress and the one remaining nun removed[989]. In the royal
-licence which secured this change it is stated 'that the convent being
-poorly endowed was by the pestilence which lately prevailed reduced to
-such poverty that all the nuns but one on account of penury had
-dispersed.' In the course of the 14th century other nunneries complained
-of insufficient revenue and poverty, among them Seton in Cumberland[990],
-St Sepulchre's at Canterbury in 1359[991], and Rusper and Easebourne which
-were both situated in Sussex.
-
-In a few cases accounts are preserved of successive visitations to the
-same nunnery extending over a number of years, which afford a valuable
-record of part of the life-history of the house. The visitations conducted
-between 1442 and 1527 at Rusper and at Easebourne are most instructive as
-showing the gradual collapse which many of the smaller houses experienced.
-
-The chief complaint made during the visitation of Rusper in 1442 was that
-the prioress of the house had failed to render account to the sisterhood
-during the term she had held office[992]. She was consequently enjoined by
-the bishop of Chichester to produce an account year by year and submit it
-to him and to the sisterhood. Some thirty years later in 1478 upon enquiry
-it was found that the convent was in debt, and the bishop asked for an
-inventory of the house, which was drawn up for him. The community at this
-time consisted of the prioress and five nuns, four of whom are entered as
-professed, one as non-professed.
-
-Again in 1484 the bishop visited Rusper, and three nuns were consecrated
-on this occasion. But the house had entered on a downward course of
-poverty and decay. In 1485 Rusper was exempted from paying subsidy on the
-plea of poverty. During the visitation of 1521 the nuns referred their
-pecuniary poverty to the onerous expenses caused by the too frequent
-visits of friends and relations who came to stay with the prioress, while
-the prioress herself referred the poverty to other reasons, but agreed
-that the house was fast going to ruin. No complaints were made at the
-visitation three years later (1524), except against a certain William
-Tychen, who sowed discord. Again in 1527 the prioress and nuns deposed
-that all was well in the house, but that its poverty was extreme and that
-it was on the brink of ruin.
-
-The accounts of the visitations to Easebourne[993] are even more
-instructive, for there the deteriorating effects of mismanagement and
-poverty were increased by want of discipline and quarrelsomeness among the
-nuns. In 1414 the community consisted of the prioress and six or seven
-nuns. In 1437 and 1439 its poverty was already so great that letters
-patent were secured on the plea of insufficient revenue, exonerating the
-prioress and her convent from certain payments called for by the clergy.
-In 1441 the house was in debt to the amount of L40, and here also the
-convent cast the blame of mismanagement on the head of the house,
-referring the debts to 'costly expenses of the prioress, who frequently
-rides abroad, and pretends she does so on the common business of the
-house, though it is not so, with a train of attendants much too large, and
-tarries long abroad, and she feasts sumptuously both at home and
-abroad.... And while she does so the members of the convent are made to
-work like hired workwomen, and they receive nothing whatever for their own
-use from their work, but the prioress takes the whole profit.'
-
-In reply to their complaints the bishop forbade the prioress to compel the
-sisters to continual work; 'and if they should wish of their own accord to
-work, they shall be free to do so, but yet so that they may receive for
-themselves the half part of what they gain by their hands; the other part
-shall be converted to the advantage of the house and unburdening its
-debts.' But discharging those debts was no easy matter. The prioress was
-commanded to sell her costly fur trimmings for the advantage of the house,
-and if she rode abroad to spend only what was needful, and to content
-herself with four horses. The administration of temporal goods was taken
-from her altogether and given to 'Master Thomas Boleyn and John Lylis,
-Esquire.' But under their management the debt of L40 had increased in nine
-years to L66; and in 1475, as again in 1485 and 1489, the house had to be
-excused from payments. Rumours of an unfavourable character about what
-went on in the house now reached the bishop, and before the next
-visitation in 1478, the prioress Agnes Tauke was summoned to Chichester,
-where she promised on her oath before the bishop and others to resign her
-office if called upon to do so.
-
-The deposition made by her nuns during the ensuing visitation confirmed
-the unfavourable rumours; two nuns had left the priory ostensibly for
-their health and were abroad in apostasy. One nun referred this conduct to
-neglect on the part of the prioress, another to that of the chaplain, John
-Smyth, who confessed to having sealed or caused to be sealed a licence to
-one of the nuns to go out of the priory after having had criminal
-intercourse with her. Other complaints were made against the prioress,
-'that she had her kinsmen staying with her for weeks at the priory and
-gave them the best food, while the nuns had the worst'; also that she was
-herself of bad character. But these recriminations were not accepted by
-the bishop. The desire of Agnes Tauke to improve matters was accepted as
-genuine and she was not called upon to resign.
-
-Discontent however remained a standing characteristic of the nuns at
-Easebourne. At the visitation of 1521 the prioress deposed that the nuns
-lived honestly and religiously according to the rule of St Augustine (sic)
-and were sufficiently obedient to her, but the nun sexton blamed the
-prioress for 'not making up any account annually as she ought in presence
-of the sisters concerning her administration of goods,' and another nun
-deposed that she neglected to provide for the sisters the sum of thirteen
-shillings and four pence in money to which they were entitled. Again in
-1524 the prioress deposed that all was well, but the sub-prioress
-complained of disobedience, both among the professed and the non-professed
-nuns, who on their side complained of harshness of treatment. The bishop
-believed the complaints of the latter and blamed the behaviour of the
-sub-prioress, who submitted to correction.
-
-The recriminations of the nuns at Easebourne recall a picture drawn about
-this time by Langland (c. 1390) in the _Vision of Piers the Ploughman_, in
-which Wrath personified as a friar describes how he stirred up quarrels in
-a nunnery. In its earliest version the poem omits these passages; and
-Langland, so ready to abuse and ridicule monk and friar, is chary in his
-references to nuns. In the later versions of his poem (text B and C)
-'Wrath' is described as acting first as gardener and then as cook in a
-nunnery, where in the character of 'the prioress' potager and of 'other
-poor ladies,' he 'made them broths of various scandals.' Among the stories
-he set going was
-
-              ... 'that Dame Johane was a bastard
-  And Dame Clarice a knight's daughter, a cuckold was her sire,
-  And Dame Purnell a priest's concubine, she will never become prioress,
-  For she had a child in cherry time, all our chapter it wist.'
-
-In consequence the nuns fall to quarrelling among themselves and end with
-attacking one another bodily. The picture, even if overdrawn, proves, in
-conjunction with the temper of the nuns at Easebourne, that peaceableness
-no longer formed the invariable concomitant of convent life during the
-15th century.
-
-Various particulars in the history of men's houses corroborate the fact
-that considerable changes were going on inside the monastic body during
-the 15th century.
-
-Reference has been made to the fluctuations in the history of alien
-priories. Some of the foreign houses, aware of the dangers to which their
-English colonies were exposed, advocated the sale of their property in
-England. Numerous grammar-schools and colleges profited by the change or
-owed their foundation directly to it. As early as 1390 William Wykeham
-bought estates of alien priories for New College, his foundation at
-Oxford. Waynfleet, bishop of Worcester, who in 1415 founded St Mary
-Magdalen College at Oxford, annexed to it Sele, an alien priory which had
-been admitted to denizenship[994]. It is noteworthy that some religious
-houses about this time dissolved of their own accord. Thus the master and
-brethren of St John's hospital at Oxford obtained leave from Henry VI to
-convey their house to Waynfleet[995]. The Austin priory of Selborne,
-which 'had become a desert convent without canons or prior,' was likewise
-annexed to St Mary Magdalen College, a change which was ratified by a bull
-from Innocent VIII in 1486[996].
-
-It has already been said that a change of attitude towards religious
-institutions on the part of the public was the direct outcome of the
-spread of Wyclif's teaching. In 1410 Sir John Oldcastle, the so-called
-leader of the Lollards, who was burnt for heresy eight years later, made a
-proposal in the House of Commons which is curious in various ways. It was
-to the effect that their temporalities should be taken from bishop, abbot
-and prior, and the revenues of their possessions employed to pay a
-standing army, to augment the income of the noblemen and gentry, to endow
-a hundred hospitals and to make small payments to the clergy[997]. No
-notice in this case was taken of the donors or representatives of the
-settlement, to whom land and tenements upon default, or neglect of those
-to whom they were granted, otherwise reverted. The proposal was
-accompanied by a list of monasteries which might be appropriated, but the
-proposal was summarily quashed.
-
-The Church Council held at Basel (from 1418), at which English prelates
-also were present, was emphatic in urging the need of monastic reform. It
-would be interesting to ascertain if this was prompted solely by the
-feeling that the recognised abuses of convent life lowered religion in
-general estimation, or if suspicions were entertained that religious
-houses might be harbouring unorthodox elements. Great efforts at reform
-were made within the Benedictine order; chapters were held by the abbots
-at regular intervals and the system of visitations formulated for mutual
-supervision and control by the various monasteries once more received
-attention. We shall see this system in full operation on the Continent. In
-England we have accounts of several chapters of Benedictine abbots held
-between 1422 and 1426, in which reports of extensive visitations were
-given[998]. The chapter of 1473 appointed the abbot of St Albans (Alboin,
-1464-1476) to visit at Glastonbury, and the abbot of Eynsham to visit at
-St Albans[999].
-
-Churchmen on all sides were eager to promote monastic reforms and
-interfere with monastic privileges. In 1418 Pope Martin V sent a bull to
-the archbishop of Canterbury bidding him hold visitations regularly[1000].
-But the story of the gradual encroachment of the Church on monastic
-privilege and property is less striking in England than abroad, for the
-independent spirit of individual houses was less strong, and convents
-generally, especially those of women, seem to have yielded without
-opposition to the claims made by energetic churchmen. Some monasteries of
-men, however, resented interference and maintained their rights. An
-episode in this struggle deserves attention, as it reflects unfavourably
-on two nunneries which were dependencies of the abbey of St Albans. There
-was a long-standing jealousy between the lord abbot of St Albans and the
-lord primate of Canterbury, renewed by a quarrel between Abbot Wallingford
-and Archbishop Bourchier, which had been decided in favour of the former.
-The abbey enjoyed exemption from episcopal visitation, not only for itself
-but for its dependencies or cells, among which were the nunneries of
-Sopwell and St Mary Pree. In 1489 Archbishop Morton of Canterbury secured
-a Papal bull[1001] which empowered him to visit all the monasteries of his
-diocese, those subject to his visitation and those exempt from it. And
-this, as the document says, 'not only because the former strictness of
-life is abandoned ... but also because life is luxurious and dissolute.'
-
-In consequence of the authority conferred by this bull the primate penned
-a letter[1002] to the abbot of St Albans containing charges of a serious
-nature. After a few opening sentences it continues in the following
-strain:
-
-'... Moreover, among other grave enormities and wicked crimes of which you
-are accused and for which you are noted and defamed, you admitted a
-certain married woman named Elena Germyn, who some time ago wrongfully
-left her husband and lived in adultery with another man, to be sister and
-nun in the house or priory of Pre, which you hold to be in your
-jurisdiction; and there you appointed her prioress notwithstanding her
-husband was living and is alive now. Further, brother Thomas Sudbury, your
-fellow-monk, publicly and notoriously and without interference or
-punishment from you, associated and still associates with this woman on
-terms of intimacy, like others among your brethren and fellow-monks who
-had access and still have access to her and to others elsewhere as to a
-brothel or house of ill fame. And not only in the house of Pre but also in
-the nunnery of Sopwell, which you contend is under your jurisdiction also,
-you change the prioresses and superiors (praesidentes) again and again at
-your will and caprice, deposing good and religious women and promoting to
-the highest dignity the worthless and wicked, so that religion is cast
-aside, virtue is neglected, and many expenses are incurred by
-reprehensible practices through your introducing certain of your brethren
-who are thieves and notorious villains to preside there as guardians to
-manage the goods of the priories, which more correctly speaking are
-wasted, and those places which were religious are rendered and reputed
-profane and impious, and so far impoverished by your doings and the doings
-of those with you as to be brought to the verge of ruin.
-
-'Similarly in dealing with other cells of monks which you say are subject
-to you within the monastery of the glorious protomartyr Alban, you have
-dilapidated the common property in its possessions and jewels; you have
-cut down, sold and alienated indiscriminately copses, woods, underwood,
-oaks and other forest trees to the value of 8000 marks and more; while
-those of your brethren and fellow-monks, who, as is reported, are given
-over to all the evils of the world, neglecting the service of God, and
-openly and continually consorting with harlots and loose women within the
-precincts and without, you knowingly defend instead of punishing them;
-others too you protect who are covetous of honour and promotion and bent
-on ministering to your cupidity, and who steal and make away with chalices
-and other jewels of the church, going so far as to extract sacrilegiously
-precious stones from the very shrine of St Alban.'
-
-This letter is dated 1490, and is addressed to William, presumably William
-Wallingford, as he became abbot in 1476; it is however confidently
-asserted that he died in 1484. But this date may need revision. For he was
-succeeded by his prior Thomas Ramryge, who was not elected till 1492; 'at
-all events this period of eight years is very obscure,' says the historian
-of St Albans[1003]. Concerning William Wallingford we know that the
-chapter of Benedictine abbots held at Northampton in 1480 appointed him to
-visit all the monasteries situated in the diocese of Lincoln, but that he
-deputed two of his convent to do so[1004]. His successor Ramryge wrote a
-book 'on the doings of the abbots, monks and benefactors of the monastery
-of St Albans' in which Wallingford appears of a character very different
-from that suggested by Morton's letter. 'Prudent and wise in the
-management of his abbey and resolute in the defence of its rights,' says
-Dugdale on the authority of Ramryge, 'he was successful too in resisting
-the claims of Archbishop Bourchier (Morton's predecessor) which upon
-appeal to Rome were decided in his favour.' He completed the high altar at
-St Albans and set up a printing-press in his monastery between 1480 and
-1486.
-
-In face of this evidence the language used by Morton appears somewhat
-violent. Unfortunately no additional information is forthcoming from the
-nunneries of St Mary Pree and Sopwell. We have an account rendered by the
-prioress Christina Basset of Pree for the year 1485-1486, four years
-previous to the date of Morton's letter, entries in which show that
-Christina Basset had succeeded Alice Wafer, who had been deposed for
-mismanagement of the revenues, but continued to live in the convent[1005].
-About Sopwell we only know that Wallingford appointed a commission in 1480
-to set aside the prioress Joan Chapell on account of old age and infirmity
-in favour of Elizabeth Webb, one of the nuns[1006].
-
-It were idle to deny that the state of discipline in many houses was bad,
-but the circumstances under which Morton's letter was penned argue that
-the charges made in it should be accepted with some reservation.
-
-It remains to cast a glance on the views expressed on the state of
-monasteries in general literature in the 15th century, from which we
-gather that the religious settlement was fast sinking in popular
-estimation. Two poems in this connection deserve especial attention, the
-'Land of Cockayne,' a spirited satire on monastic life generally, written
-about 1430, and a poem of somewhat later date preserved in fragments only,
-which has been published under the title, 'Why I cannot be a nun.'
-
-The 'Land of Cockayne'[1007] describes in flowing rhyme a country 'of joy
-and bliss,' where flow rivers of oil, milk, honey and wine, and where
-stands a fair abbey of white and grey monks. Their house in accordance
-with the popular fancy is a delightful abode constructed out of food and
-sweetmeats with shingles of 'flour-cakes', and the cloister is of crystal
-with a garden in which spices and flowers grow. The monks dwell here in
-the greatest comfort; some are old, some are young; at times they are
-engaged in prayer, at times they seek diversion away from home. Another
-abbey, 'a fair nunnery,' stands at no great distance, the inmates of which
-live in the like ease and carelessness. Here too there is a river of milk,
-the nuns wear silken clothing, and when it is hot they take a boat and go
-to bathe in the river. They here meet the monks and disport themselves
-together, throwing off all restraint.
-
-Clever and much to the point as this poem appeared to the laymen who had
-come to look upon convent life as a life of idleness and self-indulgence,
-its historical importance is exceeded by the poem, 'Why I cannot be a
-nun[1008].' It is generally spoken of as the production of a woman on the
-ground of its reflecting a woman's experiences, but there is no direct
-evidence on the point; its author writes as one unattached to a nunnery,
-and by the remark that he knows more than he chooses to tell is perhaps
-concealing his ignorance.
-
-It consists of an adaptation to a different purpose of the story of the
-'Ghostly Abbey,' which was peopled with personified Virtues[1009], and to
-which reference has been made in previous chapters of this work. Here
-personified Vices are described as having taken possession of the abbey.
-The poem is divided into two parts, of which it seems doubtful through the
-state of the manuscript which ought to come first. As it stands printed it
-begins abruptly with a description of how commissioners received the
-charge to ride all over England to seek out nunneries and enquire into
-their state. They visited the houses of Kent and are represented as
-returning to the father of the writer, who asks them how they have sped
-and how the nuns fared (l. 28). When he has heard their report he tells
-his daughter, who wishes to become a nun, that he will have none of it.
-The girl is sore aggrieved; she deplores her ill-luck and continues in
-this strain:
-
-  'Then it befell on a morn of May
-  In the same year as I said before,
-  My pensiveness would not away
-  But ever waxed more and more.
-  I walked alone and wept full sore
-  With sighings and with mourning.
-  I said but little and thought the more
-  But what I thought no man need hear.
-  And in a garden I disported me
-  Every day at divers hours
-  To behold and for to see
-  The sweet effect of April flowers.
-  The fair herbs and gentle flowers
-  And birds singing on every spray;
-  But my longing and sadness
-  For all this sport would not away.'
-
-She kneels to Jesus, the king of heavenly bliss, and tells Him how she is
-destitute of good counsel and would commit her cause to Him. She then
-falls asleep and a fair lady appears to her, who calls her by name
-(Kateryne, l. 122), and who on being asked says her name is Experience,
-and that she has come with the help of Christ Jesus, adding 'such things
-as I shall show thee I trust shall set thy heart at rest.' She takes the
-girl by the hand and leads her through a meadow fair and green to a house
-of 'women regular,' a cloister, 'a house of nuns in truth of divers orders
-old and young, but not well governed,' for here self-will reigns instead
-of discipline. 'Perhaps you would like to know who was dwelling here; of
-some I will tell you, of others keep counsel; so I was taught when I was
-young,' says the writer. The first lady they encounter in the house is
-Dame Pride, who is held in great repute, while poor Dame Meekness sits
-alone and forsaken. Dame Hypocrite sits there with her book, while Dame
-Devout and her few companions have been put outside by Dame Sloth and Dame
-Vainglory. In the convent remain Dame Envy 'who can sow strife in every
-state,' Dame Love-Inordinate, Dame Lust, Dame Wanton and Dame Nice, all of
-whom take scant heed of God's service. 'Dame Chastity, I dare well say,
-in that convent had little cheer, she was often on the point of going her
-way, she was so little beloved there; some loved her in their hearts full
-dear, but others did not and set nothing by her, but gave her good leave
-to go.' Walking about under the guidance of Experience the writer also
-comes upon Dame Envy who bore the keys and seldom went from home. In vain
-she sought for Dame Patience and Dame Charity; they were not in the
-convent but dwelt outside 'without strife' in a chamber where good women
-sought their company. Meanwhile Dame Disobedient set the prioress at
-nought; a fact especially distressing to the writer, 'for subjects should
-ever be diligent in word, in will, in deed, to please their sovereign' (l.
-273). Indeed she declared, when she saw no reverence, she would stay in
-the house no longer. She and Experience left and sat down on the grass
-outside the gates to discuss what they had seen. Experience explained that
-for the most part nuns are such as they have seen (l. 310); not all, she
-adds; 'some are devout, holy and blessed, and hold the right way to bliss,
-but some are weak, lewd, and forward; God amend what is amiss.' She passed
-away and the writer awakes, convinced that she certainly does not care to
-go and live in a nunnery. 'Peradventure,' the writer adds, 'some man will
-say and so it really seems to him that I soon forsook the perfect way for
-a fantasy or a dream, but dream it was not, nor a fantasy, but unto me
-welcome information (gratius mene).'
-
-The other part of the poem advises the 'ladies dear,' who have taken the
-habit which is a holy thing, to let their lives correspond with their
-outward array. The writer enlarges on the good conversation and the
-virtues of the holy women who were professed in the past, and enumerates
-as models of virtuous living a number of women saints chiefly of English
-origin.
-
-Productions such as this clearly show in what direction the estimation of
-religious houses and their inmates was tending. The nature of devotional
-pursuits and keeping the houses was not yet called into question, but
-apart from its religious significance the nunnery had little to recommend
-it. As places of residence these houses still attracted a certain number
-of unmarried women, and as centres of education still exerted some
-influence, but the high standard they had at one period maintained was a
-thing of the past.
-
-
-Sec. 2. Reforms in Germany.
-
-The history of monastic reform on the Continent previous to the
-Reformation supplies us with many interesting particulars both of the
-position of monasteries generally and of the convent life of women. Though
-religious settlements had been little interfered with before the Church
-Council at Constance, extensive reforms were undertaken subsequent to it
-in order to secure a return of discipline. The movement was inaugurated
-from within the religious orders, and led to the union of different houses
-into so-called congregations. But its peaceable character was soon marred
-by the introduction of political and party interests. Thirty years after
-the first convent reforms, it was no longer a question of how far the
-well-being and right living of monk and nun should be secured, but how far
-religious settlements could be made amenable to external interference and
-who should have the right of interfering with them.
-
-For this complication the instability of political life is partly
-responsible. The authority of the Pope had greatly decreased, and, at the
-beginning of the 15th century, the Emperor no longer kept the balance
-between the contending parties. The prelates of the Church, many of whom
-were independent temporal princes, had succeeded in allying themselves to
-the impoverished, but influential, nobility. In South Germany especially
-the Church was becoming more and more aristocratic; birth, not merit,
-secured admission and promotion in the ecclesiastical body. The townships
-were generally opposed to the Church and the nobility; they emphatically
-insisted on their rights, but their combined efforts to make their
-influence felt in the constitution had signally failed. Apart from them
-stood the princes and minor potentates, who tried to coerce the nobility,
-in many cases succeeded in depriving their prelates of their rights, and
-availed themselves of the general relaxation of authority to promote their
-own selfish ends.
-
-To these different representatives of power the monastery became debatable
-ground, where the diocesan, the township and the prince of the land in
-turn claimed the right of interference and where in many instances their
-interests clashed. The greater settlements, which held directly from the
-Emperor, were not drawn into the conflict; it was round the lesser ones
-that contention chiefly raged.
-
-One of the most interesting movements in the direction of monastic reform
-is associated with the Benedictine monk Johannes von Minden ([Dagger]
-1439) who, as representative of the abbot of the house of Reinhausen near
-Goettingen, was present at the general chapter of Benedictine abbots held
-near Constance in 1417[1010]. Johannes returned to his convent burning
-with reformatory zeal, which his abbot and fellow-monks would not
-countenance. He left his convent and after many hardships was enabled by
-the help of a rich patroness to settle at Bursfeld, where he realized some
-of his ideas[1011]. His views agreed with those of Johannes Rode ([Dagger]
-1439), a Carthusian, who had become abbot of the Benedictine monastery of
-St Matthias at Trier, and the joint efforts of these men resulted in a
-scheme of mutual supervision and control of different houses by means of
-periodical visitations undertaken by members of the Benedictine order. The
-settlements which agreed to the innovation joined in a union or so-called
-congregation, to which Bursfeld gave its name. The union or congregation
-of Bursfeld was eventually joined by one hundred and thirty-six
-monasteries of men and sixty-four of women. The purpose of the union was
-not to attempt any new departure, but to guarantee the maintenance of
-discipline as a means of securing the return of prosperity.
-
-The nunnery of Langendorf, near Weissenfels in Saxony, was incorporated
-into the union of Bursfeld, and a comprehensive scheme of rules[1012],
-which gives us an insight into the tone and tendency of the German
-mediaeval nunnery on the reformed plan, was drawn up for its use. The rules
-recall those contemporaneously drafted for the monastery of Sion in
-England. We have in them similar directions concerning an elaborate
-ritual, similar exhortations to soberness of living and gentleness of
-manner; the information on convent life and daily routine is equally
-explicit; and we hear of the different appointments inside the convent,
-and of the several duties of its members. There is also an exhaustive list
-of possible failings and crimes, followed by directions as to correction
-and punishment. Cats, dogs and other animals are not to be kept by the
-nuns, as they detract from seriousness; if a nun feels sleepy during
-hours, she shall ask leave to withdraw rather than fall asleep; if a nun
-dies of an infectious disease, her corpse shall not be carried into
-church, but the burial service shall take place outside. No member of the
-convent shall be chosen abbess unless she has attained the age of
-twenty-nine,--a provision which I have not come across elsewhere. The
-abbess has under her the same staff of officers whose duties have already
-been described. There is the prioress, the sub-prioress, the teacher of
-the novices, the cellaress, the chauntress, the sub-chauntress, the
-sexton, the keeper of books, the chambress, the infirmaress, the portress
-and others. We are told how novices made profession and how the hours of
-the Virgin were to be kept. We are also informed of the occupations of the
-nuns between hours, and learn that they were active in many ways. There
-are references to the transcribing of books, to binding books, to
-preparing parchment, and also to spinning and weaving; but the
-transcribing of books is pronounced the more important work, since it is
-more akin to spiritual interests. Further we hear about visits paid by the
-nuns, and about the reception of visitors. Only professed religious women
-were to be received on a visit inside the convent precincts; other
-visitors were to dwell and take their meals outside.
-
-In the case of this nunnery it is unknown how far the convent showed
-readiness to join the congregation of Bursfeld, or how far it was
-persuaded or coerced into doing so. The movement in favour of monastic
-reform entered on a new stage with the advent of the zealous and
-influential reformer, Johann Busch ([Dagger] after 1479), the promoter of
-the congregation of Windesheim. The work of Busch is the more interesting
-as he has left a detailed account of it. His book 'On monastic reform'
-describes the changes he advocated and the means by which he effected them
-during a contest of over thirty years[1013]. He was a native of Zwolle in
-the Netherlands and entered the Austin convent of Windesheim, where he
-attracted so much attention that he was summoned to Wittenberg in Saxony
-(1437), and there conducted monastic reforms at the desire of the prior.
-He remained in Saxony for many years, residing sometimes at one place,
-sometimes at another, and pursued his plans so ardently that he
-occasionally transcended the limits of his authority[1014]. His success in
-persuading convents to reconsider their tenor of life and in inducing lay
-princes and prelates to assist him in his efforts was so great that
-Cardinal Cusanus, of whom we shall hear more, pronounced him especially
-fitted to act as a monastic reformer (1451). His book contains a detailed
-account of his work in connection with about twenty nunneries. His great
-merit and that of the congregation of Windesheim was the introduction of
-German devotional books.
-
-From these and other descriptions we gather that many nunneries willingly
-accepted the proposed changes in so far as they were designed to raise the
-standard of teaching and to improve the system of discipline, but that
-opposition was made where the changes tended to interfere with the
-position and prestige of the settlement. In some cases a compromise was
-effected by the energetic and intelligent conduct of the lady superior; in
-others the direct refusal of the nuns to conform resulted in open force
-being brought to bear on them. Scenes were enacted which recall the
-turbulence of early Christian times, and show how strong a sense of
-independence still lived in some convents.
-
-Among the Austin nunneries which gave Busch endless trouble was that of
-Derneburg, near Hildesheim, where he was appointed to visit as father
-confessor between 1440 and 1442[1015]. The nuns there were in the habit of
-dining out continually, and when exception was taken to this, gave as an
-excuse that relatives and friends were always ready to entertain them at
-meals, but refused to furnish contributions in kind towards the support of
-the convent. Busch got over this difficulty by pleading with the lay
-people, but his action in the matter still further roused the rebellious
-spirit of the nuns. On one occasion his life was attempted at their
-instigation; on another, when he went to inspect their cellar, they locked
-him in and left him there. As a consequence of this he refused from that
-time forward to be the first to go on any tour of inspection. His efforts
-to impress these nuns were in vain, and finally he asked for the
-assistance of the bishop of Hildesheim and the abbot of the Cistercian
-house of Marienrode; as a consequence the rebels were conveyed away from
-Derneburg to other convents, and their house was given into the hands of
-Cistercian nuns. Similar difficulties occurred at Wennigsen, at Mariensee
-and at Werder, where the Duke of Hannover interfered in the most arbitrary
-manner[1016]. At Wienhausen the abbess and convent refused to conform to
-the rule of St Benedict, though the additional authority of their diocesan
-and of Duke Otto of Brunswick was brought to bear on them[1017]. Forcible
-measures were resorted to in this case also. The abbess was deposed and
-she and her nuns were carried away in a chariot to other nunneries, and
-nuns from the reformed house of Derneburg were installed in their place.
-
-At the Cistercian nunnery of St Georg, near Halle, the nuns at first
-declared that they were exempt from the visits of the diocesan, and
-refused admission to the delegates. After prolonged opposition they
-yielded to Busch[1018]. At Heiningen the nuns pleaded poverty as an excuse
-for staying away from home[1019]. Many settlements complained of poverty
-and insufficient revenue, among which was Frankenberg, near Goslar[1020].
-The nuns of Dorstad earned money by taking pupils from outside the
-precincts[1021], and other houses, among them that of Neuwerk, received
-girls and boarded and educated them. Busch however forbade their doing so
-on the ground that intercourse with secular interests was harmful. At
-Neuwerk, which was a Cistercian nunnery at Erfurt[1022], the wealth of the
-community in vessels, vestments, and books was quite a revelation to
-Busch. The house owned thirty books of devotion (the convent at the time
-consisted of thirty inmates), a number which appeared to Busch so
-considerable that he did not insist on the nuns adopting the service-book
-in use at Windesheim, as this change would have rendered their books
-useless to them.
-
-The nuns at Neuwerk readily accepted the proposed reforms, and received
-nuns from the reformed nunnery of Heiningen who dwelt with them for three
-years and helped them to restore their system of religious discipline and
-teaching. The abbess Armengard von Rheden, of the wealthy Benedictine
-nunnery of Fischbeck on the Weser[1023], also agreed to receive nuns from
-a reformed house into her establishment as teachers.
-
-Full details are preserved of the reform of the nunnery of
-Marienberg[1024] near Helmstaedt in Saxony, the prioress of which, Helena
-von Iltzen, hearing of the work of Busch, sought his assistance in matters
-of reform. Her house is said to have belonged to no order in particular.
-When she applied to Busch he was resident provost (after 1459) of the
-Austin canonry of Suelte near Hildesheim. He travelled to Bronopie, a
-nunnery situated outside Campen on the confines of Holland, to consult
-with the prioress, who accordingly deputed two nuns of her convent, Ida
-and Tecla, and one lay sister Aleydis, to repair with him to Marienberg.
-Of the two nuns Ida had been chosen for her knowledge of religious
-service, Tecla for her powers of instruction. Busch describes how he
-travelled across Germany with these women in a waggon drawn by four
-horses, and how on their arrival at Marienberg Ida was appointed to act as
-sub-prioress, and Tecla as teacher, and how the prioress of the house
-reserved to herself the management of temporal affairs only. Tecla is
-described as well versed in grammar (grammatica competenter docta); she
-instructed the inmates of the house in scholastic knowledge (scientiis
-scholasticalibus) with such success that her pupils after three years were
-able to read Holy Writ, and readily composed letters and missives in
-correct Latin (litteras sive missas in bona latina magistraliter
-dictarent). 'I have seen and examined these myself,' says Busch.
-
-After three years the illness of Ida made the nuns desirous of returning
-to their own convent, and Busch again undertook to escort them. A proof of
-the affection they had won during their stay and of the regret that was
-felt at their departure is afforded by the letters which passed between
-them and their friends. They were staying for some nights at the nunnery
-of Heiningen on their journey home when two letters reached them. In one
-the nuns wrote describing their grief. 'When we see your empty places in
-the choir, the refectory, and the dormitory, we are filled with sorrow and
-weep.' And they wish that the distance which separates them were not so
-great, then at least they might go to visit their friends. When Tecla's
-pupils (the letter says) entered the schoolroom for their lessons on the
-Saturday, they wept so much that the prioress, who was in great grief
-herself, was constrained to try to comfort them. The other letter, a short
-one specially addressed to Tecla, was written by these pupils: this
-accompanied the longer letter, and in it they assured her of their
-continued admiration and devotion. Ida, Tecla and Aleydis in reply sent
-two letters to Marienberg. A longer one was addressed by them to the
-convent collectively, and a shorter one by Tecla to her pupils, in which
-she praises them for having written such a good Latin letter and assures
-them that she is glad to think of her stay with them, since it has been
-productive of such good results.
-
-The nunnery of Marienberg, which had so readily accepted reforms, acted as
-advocate of similar changes to other houses. Busch tells us that the
-nunnery of Marienborn situated not far from it, and the nunnery at Stendal
-in Brandenburg, accepted reforms at its instigation[1025].
-
-In the records of Busch comparatively few charges of a coarse nature are
-brought against nunneries, but he adds an account of two nuns who were in
-apostasy, and who were persuaded by him to return to their convents. One
-had left her convent and had adopted lay clothing[1026]; the story of the
-other, Sophie, an illegitimate daughter of Wilhelm, duke of Brunswick,
-reads like a romance[1027]. The girl had been stowed away in the convent
-of Mariensee by her relatives for convenience, but indifferent to vows
-unwillingly accepted, she ran away and for seven years lived in the world,
-tasting few of the sweets of life and much of its bitterness. At last,
-broken in spirit by the loss of her child, she was persuaded by Busch to
-come and live in the convent of Derneburg, the members of which received
-her with tender pity for her sufferings and treated her with loving care.
-Finally she agreed to return to the nunnery she had originally left, glad
-of the peace which she found there.
-
-Some of the nunneries on which pressure was brought to bear by the
-monastic reformers altogether ceased to exist. The historian of the
-diocese of Speyer (Rheinbayern) tells us that the Benedictine nunnery of
-Schoenfeld was interfered with in 1443 and fell into decay, and that its
-property was appropriated; that the Cistercian nunnery of Ramsen also
-ceased to exist, owing to feuds between Count Johann II of Nassau and the
-abbot of Morimund, who both claimed the right of interference; and that
-the dissolution of Kleinfrankenthal, a settlement of Austin nuns situated
-in the same diocese, was declared in 1431 by Pope Eugenius IV on account
-of the evil ways of the nuns[1028].
-
-The historian of the reforms undertaken in the diocese of Trier notifies
-many important changes[1029]. He considers that the nuns in many convents
-had drifted away from the former strictness of discipline and lived as
-Austin canonesses, returning to the world if they chose to get married.
-Many of these settlements now accepted stricter rules of life, and among
-them were the nunnery of Marienberg (diocese of Trier), the abbess of
-which, Isengard von Greiffenklau ([Dagger] 1469), had come under the
-influence of Johannes Rode--and Oberwerth, which owed reform to its abbess
-Adelheid Helchen (1468-1505).
-
-On the other hand Elisabeth von Seckendorff, abbess of the time-honoured
-nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstaett, refused to see that a changed
-condition of things demanded reform. The bishop of Eichstaett made his
-power felt; she was deposed, and Sophie was summoned from the nunnery of
-St Maria at Coeln, and made abbess in her stead (1456-1475)[1030].
-
-We have detailed accounts of reforms in South Germany from the pen of
-another contemporary writer, Felix Fabri ([Dagger] 1502), a Dominican
-friar of Ulm[1031]. He tells us how Elisabeth Krelin ([Dagger] 1480),
-abbess of the important Cistercian nunnery, Heggbach, a woman of great
-intelligence and strong character, effected reforms in her house on her
-sole responsibility. These changes were productive of such good results
-that many nuns left the houses to which they belonged and came to live
-under her. Gredanna von Freyberg ([Dagger] 1481), abbess of the ancient
-and wealthy Benedictine nunnery of Urspring, hearing of these changes,
-came on a visit to Heggbach, where she made friends with the abbess, and
-when she left she was bent on carrying out similar changes in her own
-convent. But here she met with opposition. Her nuns, who were members of
-the nobility, aware that the changes advocated meant interference with the
-liberty they enjoyed, divided for and against her, and those who were
-against her appealed to their relatives for support. Gredanna in vain
-asked for help from the abbot of the monastery of St Georg in the Black
-Forest to which her house was allied; he dared not interfere, and it was
-only when the archduchess Mechthild of Austria called upon him to do so,
-that he summoned nuns from the reformed nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstaett
-and with them and some monks came to Urspring. But the rebellious nuns,
-nothing daunted, shut themselves up in the outlying buildings of the
-infirmary, which they barricaded; the soldiers were called out but from a
-religious dread refused to attack them. Nothing remained short of placing
-these 'amazons' as Fabri calls them in a state of siege; the pangs of
-hunger at last forced them to yield. The reforms which Gredanna then
-effected were productive of such beneficial results that the house
-regained a high standing.
-
-The reform of Soeflingen near Ulm[1032], an account of which we also owe to
-Fabri, affords one more of many examples of the tyranny of interference.
-This house belonged to the order of St Clare, and like all the houses of
-this order was subject to the Franciscan friars, who had the exclusive
-right of control over them.
-
-The Franciscans of Ulm having accepted reforms in consequence of the papal
-bull of 1484, the town authorities of Ulm called upon the nuns to do the
-same, and Fabri relates how 'a number of burghers accompanied by religious
-doctors of various orders, by noblemen, their followers, and by members of
-the town-gilds, armed and unarmed, marched upon Soeflingen in a great
-crowd, as though to fight for the glory of God.' They conveyed with them a
-new abbess and a number of nuns of the reformed order of St Clare, whom
-they meant to instal at Soeflingen. But here they were met by open
-defiance. The lady superior, Christine Stroelin ([Dagger] 1489), shouted
-that she could not and would not be deposed, and her nuns vented their
-indignation in threats and blasphemy. Not by promises, not by threats,
-could they be persuaded to leave their lady superior. They rushed through
-the buildings, snatched up coffers and boxes, and followed Christine out
-of the house. Their loyalty and unanimity in defending their rights awaken
-feelings in their favour which are confirmed when we find the bishop of
-the diocese disapproving of the forcible measures resorted to by the
-citizens; endless quarrels and discussions ensued. The abbess Christine,
-after staying at various places, returned to Soeflingen and was reinstated
-in her rights, on condition of adopting certain reforms; some of her nuns
-came back with her, but others refused to do so and went to live in other
-nunneries.
-
-Details concerning the 'reform' of one other nunnery are worth recording
-because they show how a representative of the Church openly attempted to
-curtail the privileges of a powerful nunnery. The struggle of the nunnery
-of Sonnenburg in the Tyrol with the Cardinal Legate Nicolas Cusanus
-([Dagger] 1464), bishop of Brixen, has been the subject of close
-historical enquiry, as its importance far exceeds the interests of those
-immediately concerned[1033]. In this struggle the representative of the
-Pope came into open conflict with the prince of the land, Sigmund,
-archduke of Austria and duke of Tyrol, who defied the Cardinal and obliged
-him to flee the country and seek refuge at Rome. The quarrel which began
-over the nunnery ended with the ban of excommunication being pronounced
-against Sigmund, and with his appeal to a Church Council against the
-authority of the Papal Curia.
-
-Sonnenburg was the wealthiest and most influential Benedictine settlement
-of women in the land. It was in existence as early as the 11th century and
-had extensive powers of jurisdiction which repeatedly brought its abbess
-into conflict with her rival in power, the bishop of Brixen. Against him
-she had sought and secured the protection of the archduke; but at the time
-of the appointment of Cusanus as bishop, the settlement of a matter of
-temporal administration between herself and the bishopric was pending.
-Cusanus had obtained from Rome exceptional powers of monastic visitation,
-powers such as were conferred at a later date on the Cardinal Legate
-Ximenes in Spain and on the Cardinal Legate Wolsey in England. By virtue
-of these powers Cusanus at once transferred the affair with the abbess
-from the temporal domain to the spiritual, and in his character of
-monastic visitor and reformer sent a manifesto to the abbess and nuns to
-the effect that after the coming festival of Corpus Christi they were on
-no account to absent themselves from the convent or to receive visitors.
-The abbess, Verena von Stuben, and her convent, which consisted at the
-time of seven nuns, ignored this command, obedience to which would have
-cut off intercourse with the archduke and made attention to the pending
-matter of business impossible. More closely pressed, the abbess gave an
-evasive answer and lodged a complaint with Sigmund, in which she and the
-convent declared themselves ready to accept the desired change (p.
-66[1034]) but said that they were convinced that such a course at the
-present moment would be fatal to their position. It was clear to them that
-Cusanus was bent on their ruin. The archduke to whom they appealed
-declared that the prelate was transgressing the limits of his authority,
-and intimated to him that he would not have the temporalities of the
-house interfered with,--a decision to which Cusanus for the moment
-deferred.
-
-The documents relating to the further progress of this quarrel are
-numerous. A kind of chronicle was kept at Sonnenburg written partly by the
-nuns, partly by the abbess, into which copies of over two hundred letters
-and documents were inserted. It bears the title 'On what occurred between
-Cardinal Cusanus and the abbess Verena,' and is now in the library at
-Innsbruck[1035].
-
-Foiled in his first attempt to gain control over Sonnenburg, Cusanus now
-devoted his attention to other religious communities. He took under his
-protection a number of recluses, called sylvan sisters, 'Waldschwestern'
-(p. 63), and having secured further powers from Rome, attempted to
-interfere with the convent of Minoresses or Poor Clares at Brixen (p. 87).
-But these nuns, though they were low-born and uneducated, were as stubborn
-as their high-born and learned sisters on the Sonnenburg; Verena's conduct
-may have given them the courage to oppose the Cardinal. Their lady
-superior was forcibly removed at his instigation, but they appealed
-against him at Rome, and though their opposition was censured, Cusanus was
-directed to place the matter in the hands of the Franciscans at Nuernberg,
-who declared themselves willing to institute the desired reforms. Nuns
-from the convent of St Clare at Nuernberg were despatched to Brixen, and
-the tone of the house was raised without its privileges being forfeited.
-
-On the strength of his increased visitatorial powers Cusanus (1453)
-returned to the charge at Sonnenburg, but its inmates would give no
-official declaration of their intentions (p. 90). Accordingly the bishop
-of Eichstaett was summoned to hold a visitation there, but he was refused
-admission by the nuns. However a second deputation came which could not be
-warded off, and the convent gave the desired information; the result of
-which was that injunctions were forwarded confining the authority of the
-abbess to the control of the nuns, and practically despoiling her of her
-property. Strict seclusion was to be observed, and the house was to be
-furnished with a key, which was to be given to a person appointed by
-Cusanus. The management of the monastic property was to be in the hands of
-a bailiff who was to render account to the bishop direct, not to the
-abbess. Scant wonder that the abbess Verena, indignant at the order and
-despairing of help from without, offered to resign. Her offer delighted
-the legate, who forthwith despatched Afra von Velseck to undertake the
-management of affairs at the convent, with the command that she was to
-take no step without previously consulting him (p. 94). It seems that
-Cusanus entertained the idea of appropriating the temporalities of the
-nunnery altogether, and transferring them to the use of monks, who were to
-be subject to his friend and ally, the abbot of Tegernsee (p. 95). He
-afterwards gave up the plan, 'since the nobility,' as he wrote (p. 127),
-'look upon this house as a home for their daughters and are opposed to my
-plan.'
-
-At this juncture things took an unexpected turn. Verena consulted with her
-friends in the matter of the pension on which she was to retire (p. 109);
-and Cusanus was angered by the objections they raised to his proposals.
-There was a stormy interchange of letters between him and the abbess (p.
-124), which ended in Verena's resuming her authority, and in Afra's
-deposition. Cusanus sent an armed escort to fetch away his protegee and
-threatened excommunication to the convent. In vain was a complaint against
-him sent by the nuns to Rome; Cusanus had anticipated them. The Pope
-censured the nuns' conduct, affirmed Cusanus' authority, and cast
-imputations on the character of the abbess, which were indignantly
-resented in a second letter forwarded to the Pope by the nuns.
-
-The archduke Sigmund now tried to interfere in the interest of peace. A
-second visitation was undertaken, and a list of injunctions was drawn up
-for the nuns (p. 133). Among these we note that nuns from a reformed
-convent were to come and live as teachers at Sonnenburg; the abbess was
-henceforth to have no separate household, she was forbidden to go out
-without asking leave from the diocesan, she was not to go on pilgrimages
-or visit health resorts, and she was not to be present at weddings.
-
-But the abbess and the convent refused to accept these injunctions, and
-they were accordingly placed under an interdict. The hospital belonging to
-the house and its property were confiscated, the chaplains were forbidden
-to celebrate mass, and the ban of excommunication was pronounced against
-the nuns and was reiterated by the priest of the nearest church on feast
-days and on Sundays. This was a great humiliation to the nuns and helped
-to lower them in general estimation.
-
-Sigmund was absent at the time. Soon after his return Pope Nicolas V, the
-patron of Cusanus, died (1455), and his successor Calixtus III warned the
-Cardinal against pushing things to extremes (p. 161). Sigmund also
-pleaded in favour of the nuns that they were staying within precincts, and
-that Verena was an estimable woman. Cusanus in answer contended that what
-he had done, he had done with the sanction of Rome, and that he had
-excommunicated and deposed Verena solely on account of her disobedience;
-and he then acknowledged that she was a thoroughly honest and excellent
-manager. In his letters to the abbot of Tegernsee, written about the same
-time, he speaks of Verena as a very Jezebel who is full of wiles against
-him (p. 153). 'Maybe she will pretend obedience to deceive me,' he wrote
-among other things, 'but the devil of pride has her soul in his possession
-and will prevent her from really humbling herself.' But the relations
-between Sigmund and his bishop were becoming strained in other respects.
-The first breach of the peace occurred when the abbess came to Innsbruck
-to seek support. Cusanus despatched a deacon to prevent her being
-received, and Sigmund had the deacon cast into prison.
-
-The nuns on the Sonnenburg were in a sorry plight. They dared not leave
-the house, the usual tithes were not brought to them and there had been no
-ingathering of the produce of their own harvest, for Cusanus threatened
-excommunication to anyone having intercourse with them or looking after
-their interests. They were nigh upon starvation (p. 277), and had recourse
-to an unlawful step. They took a band of armed men into their service and
-directed them to gather the tribute due to them. But the soldiers sent by
-the archbishop put these men to flight and then stormed the cloister. The
-nuns fled into the adjoining woods and found refuge in a house. 'But we
-were betrayed and had to fly again,' they wrote in their chronicle;
-'during three days we were pursued and sought by the troops, repeatedly we
-were so near to them that we saw them and they saw us. But the Virgin Mary
-helped us to escape from them.' Afra von Velseck had been put in
-possession of their empty house, but Cusanus could not support her;
-fearful of Sigmund he had fled from his bishopric and repaired to Rome.
-The archduke conducted the nuns back and begged Verena to resign, offering
-her a house near Innsbruck (p. 309). An envoy was accordingly despatched
-to Rome to proffer terms of submission to Cusanus if only he would take
-the ban of excommunication from the nuns. The bishop at last yielded to
-the Pope's command, though with a sufficiently bad grace. 'I send you a
-copy of Verena's letter to me,' he wrote to the envoy Natz, 'she tells
-lies as usual.' And on the margin of her letter, as a comment on her
-declaration that she had repeatedly sought absolution, he added the words,
-'this is a lie.'
-
-Penance in its extreme form was undergone by the convent (p. 311), but as
-Cusanus persistently denied to Sigmund the right of appointing a new
-abbess, many letters passed before the conditions of peace were settled
-and ratified. The correspondence, as Jaeger remarks (p. 315), throws an
-interesting light on the character of the women concerned. Verena, who
-throughout maintained a proud dignity, retired from the convent on a
-pension; Afra, who had resorted to various intrigues, finally renounced
-all claims, and Barbara Schoendorfer came over from Brixen and was
-installed as abbess.
-
-Thus ended the quarrel about the privileges of Sonnenburg, which lasted
-six years and led to the curtailment of many of its rights. The story
-proves the inability of convents to preserve their independence, and shows
-how their weakness was made the excuse for interference from without to
-the detriment of the abbess in her position as landowner.
-
-It remains to enquire how far the improvements effected in monastic life
-by peaceful and by forcible means were lasting, and in what position the
-nunnery stood at the beginning of the 16th century.
-
-Some valuable information is given on the general state of monasticism by
-a number of addresses delivered by Tritheim, abbot of Sponheim ([Dagger]
-1516), before the assembled chapter of Benedictine abbots between 1490 and
-1492[1036]. Tritheim takes high rank among the older humanists; he was an
-enlightened man according to the notions of his age, and collected a
-wonderful and comprehensive library of books in many languages at
-Sponheim. His interest in necromancy afterwards brought reproach on him
-and he left his convent, but at the time when he pleaded before the
-assembled abbots he was full of enthusiasm for his order and full of
-regrets concerning it. In his address 'on the ruin of the Benedictine
-order,' he pointed out how effectually the Bursfeld and other
-congregations had worked in the past, but the beneficial results they
-effected had passed away and little of their influence remained. If only
-those who are vowed to religion, says Tritheim, would care more for
-learning, which has been made so much more accessible by the invention of
-printing, the outlook would not be so utterly hopeless.
-
-In these addresses Tritheim takes no account of nunneries, but we can
-discover his attitude towards nuns in an address to a convent[1037], the
-keynote of which is that the women assembled there should cultivate love,
-lowliness and patience under tribulation. The address is gentle and
-dignified, but it shows that Tritheim, in common with other men of the
-time, attached importance to nunneries chiefly for the piety they
-cultivated. His belief in this respect is shared by the zealous reformer
-Geiler von Kaisersberg ([Dagger] 1500), who preached many sermons before
-the nuns of the convents of St Mary Magdalen (Reuerinnen), and of St
-Stephan at Strasburg, and who likewise saw the beauty of a nun's vocation
-only in her devotional and contemplative attitude. We gather from his
-sermons, many of which are preserved in the form in which they were
-written out by nuns[1038], that a clear line of demarcation existed in his
-mind between reformed and unreformed convents, and that while emphatic in
-denouncing the ungodly ways of the inmates of unreformed houses, life in a
-reformed house was comparable in his eyes to Paradise. Geiler's efforts as
-a reformer were so far crowned by success that the convent of St Mary
-Magdalen to which he had devoted his efforts, outlived the attacks to
-which it was exposed at the time of the Reformation.
-
-The fact that Tritheim insists only on the devotional attitude of nuns is
-the more noticeable as he visited at the convent of Seebach, the abbess of
-which, Richmondis van der Horst, was equally praised for her own abilities
-and the superior tone she maintained in her convent. For instances were
-not wanting which show that intellectual tastes were still strong in some
-nunneries and that women living the convent life were themselves authors
-and took a certain amount of interest in the revival of classical
-learning, as we shall see later.
-
-Thus Butzbach (called Premontanus, [Dagger] 1526), a pupil of Hegius, who
-became a monk at Laach and was an admirer of Tritheim, was in
-correspondence with Aleydis Ruyskop ([Dagger] 1507), a nun at
-Rolandswerth, who had written seven homilies on St Paul in Latin and
-translated a German treatise on the mass into Latin. He dedicated to her
-his work on 'Distinguished learned women,' which he took from the work of
-the Italian Benedictine Jacopo of Bergamo, but from delicacy of feeling
-he omitted what Jacopo had inserted in praise of women's influence as
-wives and mothers[1039]. In this work Butzbach compares Aleydis to
-Hrotsvith, to Hildegard and to Elisabeth of Schoenau. He also wrote to
-Gertrud von Buechel, a nun who practised the art of painting at
-Rolandswerth, and he refers to Barbara Dalberg, niece of the bishop of
-Worms, who was a nun at Marienberg, and to Ursula Cantor, who, he
-declares, was without equal in her knowledge of theology.
-
-But in spite of these instances and others, a growing indifference is
-apparent, both among the advocates of the new culture and in the outer
-world generally, to the intellectual occupation of women, and the training
-of girls. In their far-reaching plans for an improved system of education
-the humanists leave girls out of count, and dwell on their qualities of
-heart rather than on their qualities of mind. That the training of the
-mental faculties must be profitable in all cases for women does not occur
-to them, though the idea is advanced with regard to men.
-
-At the close of the 15th century Wimpheling ([Dagger] 1528) wrote a work
-on matters of education entitled _Germania_. It is a conception of ideal
-citizenship, and in it he insists that the burghers of Strasburg must let
-their sons receive a higher education and learn Latin in the 'gymnasium,'
-of which he gives his plan, regardless of the vocation they intend to
-embrace. Only a short chapter[1040] of the book refers to the training of
-girls. Their parents are cautioned against placing them in nunneries,
-which in the writer's mind are little better than brothels. He advises
-their being trained at home for domestic life and made to spin and weave
-like the daughters of Augustus.
-
-Similar tendencies are reflected in the works of Erasmus ([Dagger] 1536).
-His Colloquies or Conversations introduce us to a number of women under
-various aspects; and the want of purpose in convent life, the danger of
-masterfulness in wives, the anomalous position of loose women, and the
-general need there was of cultivating domestic qualities, are all in turn
-discussed.
-
-Two Colloquies turn on the convent life of women. In the first[1041] a
-girl of seventeen declares herself averse to matrimony, and expresses her
-intention of becoming a nun. The man who argues with her represents to her
-that if she be resolved to keep her maidenhood, she can do so by remaining
-with her parents and need not make herself from a free woman into a slave.
-'If you have a mind to read, pray or sing,' he says, 'you can go into your
-chamber as much and as often as you please. When you have enough of
-retirement, you can go to church, hear anthems, prayers, and sermons, and
-if you see any matron or virgin remarkable for piety in whose company you
-may get good, or any man who is endowed with singular probity from whom
-you can gain for your bettering, you can have their conversation, and
-choose the preacher who preaches Christ most purely. When once you are in
-the cloister, all these things, which are of great assistance in promoting
-true piety, you lose at once.' And he enlarges on the formalities of
-convent life, 'which of themselves signify nothing to the advancement of
-piety and make no one more acceptable in the eyes of Christ, who only
-looks to purity of mind.' The girl asks him if he be against the
-institution of monastic life. He replies, 'By no means. But as I will not
-persuade anyone against it who is already in it, so I would undoubtedly
-caution all young women, especially those of a generous temper, not to
-precipitate themselves unadvisedly into that state from which there is no
-getting out afterwards, and the more so because their chastity is more in
-danger in the cloister than out of it, and you may do whatever is done
-there as well at home.'
-
-His arguments however are in vain; the girl goes into a convent. But the
-next Colloquy, called the 'Penitent Virgin[1042],' describes how she
-changed her mind and came out again. She was intimidated by the nuns
-through feigned apparitions, and when she had been in the house six days
-she sent for her parents and declared that she would sooner die than
-remain there.
-
-Another Colloquy[1043] shows how masterfulness in a wife destroyed all
-possibility of domestic peace and happiness; yet another[1044] how a woman
-of loose life was persuaded to adopt other ways on purely reasonable
-grounds. Again we have a young mother who is persuaded to tend her child
-herself, since the promotion of its bodily welfare does much towards
-saving its soul[1045]. The most striking illustration however of the fact
-that in the eyes of Erasmus the position of woman was changing is afforded
-by the 'Parliament of Women[1046],' in which a great deal of talk leads to
-no result. Cornelia opens and closes the sitting, and urges that it is
-advisable that women should reconsider their position, for men, she says,
-are excluding women from all honourable employments and making them 'into
-their laundresses and cooks, while they manage everything according to
-their own pleasure.' But the assembled women dwell on irrelevant detail
-and harp on the distributions of class in a manner which shows that those
-qualities which made their participation in public affairs possible or
-advisable were utterly wanting among them. Erasmus passes no remarks
-derogatory to women as such, and yet he leaves us to infer that they
-cannot do better than devote their attention exclusively to domestic
-concerns.
-
-Judging by his writings and those of others who were active in the cause
-of progress, there was a growing feeling that the domestic virtues needed
-cultivation. A change in the position of women was not only imminent but
-was felt to be desirable, and probably it was in conformity with what
-women themselves wished. Both in England and on the Continent the idea
-that virginity was in itself pleasing to God was no longer in the
-foreground of the moral consciousness of the age; it was felt that the
-duties of a mother took higher rank, and that the truest vocation of woman
-was to be found in the circle of home. This view, as we shall see
-presently, tallied with the views taken by the Protestant reformers and
-prepared the way for the dissolution of nunneries.
-
-
-
-
-CHAPTER XII.
-
-THE DISSOLUTION.
-
-  'In church, chapell and priory
-  Abby, hospitall and nunry,
-      Sparing nother man nor woman,
-  Coopes, albes, holy ornamentes,
-  Crosses, chalecys, sensurs and rentes,
-  Convertyng all to usys prophane.'
-                          _The Blaspheming English Lutherans_, verse 33.
-
-  'The Abbaies went doune because of there pride,
-  And made the more covetus riche for a tyme,
-  There leivenges dispercid one everi syde,
-  Where wonce was somme praier, now placis for swyne.'
-                          Quoted by Furnival from Douce MS. 365, l. 95.
-
-
-Sec. 1. The Dissolution in England.
-
-The movement of the 16th century commonly spoken of as the Reformation was
-the forcible manifestation of a revolution in thought which had long been
-preparing. This period may fitly be likened to a watershed between the
-socialistic tendencies of the Middle Ages and the individualistic
-tendencies which have mainly prevailed since. It forms the height which
-limits average modern conceptions, but which can be made the standpoint
-from which a more comprehensive view of things past and present becomes
-possible. Like other great epochs in history it is characterised by a
-sense of assurance, aspiration, and optimism,--and by wasted possibilities
-which give its study an ever renewed interest. The political, social, and
-intellectual changes which accompanied the Reformation are especially
-interesting nowadays when the standards which were then formulated are
-felt to be no longer final. The progressive thought of to-day, heretical
-though the assertion may sound to some, has become markedly insensible to
-the tenets which the reformers of the 16th century propounded and in which
-Protestantism found its strength and its safeguard. While paying due
-deference to the courage of the men who heralded what was advance if
-measured by such needs as they realised, the thinker of to-day dwells not
-so much on the factors of civilisation which those men turned to account
-as on those which they disregarded;--he is attracted by Erasmus, not by
-Luther, and looks more to him who worked in the interest of reform than to
-him who worked in the interest of the Reformation.
-
-Among the important social changes effected by the Reformation the
-dissolution of the monasteries forms a small but a significant feature, a
-feature pregnant with meaning if considered in the light of the changing
-standards of family and sex morality. For those who attacked the Church of
-Rome in her fundamentals, while differing in points of doctrine, were at
-one in the belief that the state of morality needed amendment, and that
-marriage supplied the means of effecting the desired change. In open
-antagonism to principles which formed the groundwork of monasticism, they
-declared celibacy odious and the vow of chastity contradictory to
-scriptural teaching and in itself foolish and presumptuous.
-
-The language in which Luther, Bullinger and Becon inculcated these
-principles is often offensive to modern ears. Their views are wanting in
-good taste, but consistency cannot be denied them. For these men were
-logical in condemning the unmarried state at every point, attacking it
-equally in the priest, the monk, the nun and the professed wanton. The
-changed attitude towards loose women has repeatedly been referred to in
-the course of this work, and it has been pointed out how such women, at
-one time not without power, had been steadily sinking in general
-estimation. Society, bent on having a clear line drawn between them and
-other women, had interfered with them in many ways, and had succeeded in
-stamping them as a class, to its own profit and to their disadvantage. But
-even at the close of the Middle Ages these women retained certain rights,
-such as that of having free quarters in the town, which the advocates of
-the new faith openly attacked and summarily swept away. Zealous if
-somewhat brutal in the cause of an improved morality, they maintained that
-marriage was the most acceptable state before God and that a woman had no
-claim to consideration except in her capacity as wife and mother.
-
-The calling of the nun was doomed to fall a sacrifice to this teaching.
-Her vocation was in antagonism to the doctrines of the party of progress,
-and where not directly attacked was regarded with a scarcely less fatal
-indifference. It has been shown that great efforts were made before the
-Reformation to reform life in nunneries, but various obstacles, and among
-them a growing indifference to the intellectual training and interests of
-women, were in the way of their permanent improvement. The nun was chiefly
-estimated by her devotional pursuits, and when the rupture came with Rome
-and these devotional pursuits were declared meaningless, individuals who
-were driven from their homes might be pitied, and voices here and there
-might be raised deploring the loss of the possibilities secured by the
-convent, but no active efforts were made to preserve the system, nothing
-was attempted to save an institution, the _raison d'etre_ of which had
-vanished.
-
-Previous to the Reformation the efforts of churchmen on the Continent to
-reform convent life had led in several instances to the disbanding of a
-convent. In England like results ensued from the conduct of churchmen, who
-in their efforts to regenerate society by raising the tone of religion,
-rank with the older humanists abroad. These men had no intention of
-interfering with the institution of monasticism as such, but were bent on
-removing certain abuses. Among them were John Alcock, bishop of Ely,
-Fisher, bishop of Rochester, and Cardinal Wolsey; they appropriated a
-number of decayed convents on the plea of promoting religious education,
-and their action may be said to have paved the way towards a general
-dissolution.
-
-Among the monasteries dissolved by them were several belonging to nuns,
-and the fact is noteworthy that wherever the property of women was
-appropriated, it was appropriated to the use of men. Considering that the
-revenues of these houses had been granted for women and had been
-administered by women for centuries, this fact appears somewhat
-regrettable from the woman's point of view. But no blame attaches on this
-account to the men, for their attitude was in keeping with progressive
-thought generally and was shared by women themselves. Thus Margaret
-Beaufort ([Dagger] 1509) the mother of Henry VII, whose college
-foundations have given her lasting fame, seems never to have been struck
-by the thought that advantages might accrue from promoting education among
-women also. She founded Christ's College at Cambridge, planned the
-foundation there of St John's, and instituted divinity professorships both
-at Oxford and at Cambridge. But her efforts, in which she was supported
-by Fisher, bishop of Rochester, were entirely devoted to securing an
-improved education for the clergy.
-
-The nunnery of St Radegund's at Cambridge was among the first
-establishments appropriated in the interest of the higher religious
-education of men on the plea of decay and deterioration. It had supported
-a convent of twelve nuns as late as 1460, but in 1496 it was dissolved.
-The change was effected by John Alcock, bishop of Ely ([Dagger] 1500), a
-man of liberal spirit who ranks high among contemporary ecclesiastics. The
-king's licence[1047] for the dissolution of the house contains words to
-the effect that it had fallen into decay owing to neglect, improvidence,
-and the dissolute dispositions of the prioress and convent, which were
-referable to the close proximity of Cambridge. The house had only two
-inmates, of whom one had been professed elsewhere and the other was a
-girl. The bishop asked leave to declare the house dissolved in order to
-appropriate its possessions and revenues to the foundation of a college of
-one master (magister), six fellows (socii) and a certain number of
-students (scolares). These numbers show that the property of the house was
-not inconsiderable. The sanction of Pope Alexander III having been
-obtained[1048], the nunnery of St Radegund was transformed into Jesus
-College, Cambridge[1049].
-
-This instance paved the way for others. The suppression of the smaller
-monasteries for the purpose of founding and endowing seats of learning on
-a large scale was advocated by Cardinal Wolsey soon after his accession to
-power. He was advanced to the chancellorship in 1513 and was nominated
-cardinal by the Pope in 1515, and among the first houses which he
-dissolved were the two nunneries of Bromhall in Berkshire and Lillechurch
-in Kent.
-
-In a letter about Bromhall addressed to the bishop of Salisbury[1050]
-Wolsey directs him to 'proceed against enormities, misgovernance and
-slanderous living, long time heretofore had, used, and continued by the
-prioress and nuns.' The nuns were to be removed 'to other places of that
-religion, where you best and most conveniently bestow them, especially
-where they may be brought and induced unto better and more religious
-living.' Henry VIII asked in a letter to the bishop that the deeds and
-evidences of the convent 'by reason of the vacation of the said place'
-might be delivered to his messenger[1051]. It is not clear whether the
-inmates returned to the world or were transferred to other nunneries. In
-1522 it was found that the prioress Joan Rawlins had resigned, her only
-two nuns had abandoned the house, and it was granted to St John's College,
-Cambridge, by the interest and procurement of Fisher, bishop of
-Rochester[1052].
-
-Full information is preserved about the charges brought against the nuns
-at Lillechurch. From records at Cambridge we learn on what pleas
-proceedings were taken. The house formerly contained sixteen nuns, but for
-some years past there had been only three or four. It stood in a public
-place, that is on the road to Rochester, and was frequented by clerics,
-and the nuns were notorious for neglect of their duties and incontinence.
-Moreover the foundations at Cambridge made by Margaret Beaufort needed
-subsidizing, and public feeling was against the house. Depositions were
-taken in writing from which we see that the prioress was dead, and that
-one of the three inmates had yielded to temptation some eight or nine
-years before. In answer to the question: 'Alas, madam, how happened this
-with you?'--she replied: 'And I had been happy I might have caused this
-thing to have been unknown and hidden.'--Together with her two companions
-she agreed to sign the form of surrender (dated 1521), which was worded as
-follows. 'Not compelled by fear or dread, nor circumvented by guile or
-deceit, out of my own free will, for certain just and lawful reasons (I)
-do resign and renounce all my right, title, interest and possession that I
-have had and now have in the aforesaid monastery.' We do not know what
-became of these women. Their house was given over to Bishop Fisher, and
-by letters patent it also passed to St John's College, Cambridge[1053].
-
-Regarding the charges of immorality brought against the inmates of
-convents in this and in other instances, it has been repeatedly pointed
-out by students that such accusations should be received with a
-reservation, for the occurrence may have taken place before the nun's
-admission to the house. The conventionalities of the time were curiously
-loose in some respects; the court of Henry VIII could boast of scant
-respect even for the conjugal tie, and a woman of the upper classes who
-disgraced herself naturally took refuge in a convent, where she could hope
-in some measure to redeem her character. The fact that Anne Boleyn, who
-was averse to the whole monastic system, at one time thought of retiring
-into a nunnery, is quoted as a case in point[1054].
-
-The readiness of Wolsey to dissolve decayed convents and to appropriate
-their property grew apace with his increase of power. In no case is it
-recorded that he was deterred by opposition. In 1524 he appropriated St
-Frideswith's, a house of Austin canons at Oxford, and made it the nucleus
-of his great college[1055]. His legatine powers being further extended by
-a bull of the same year and the royal consent being obtained[1056], twenty
-small convents were dissolved by him during the next few years[1057].
-Among them we note two nunneries, Wykes in Essex, and Littlemore in
-Oxfordshire[1058]. But little is known of the number and character of
-their inmates at the time. Two further bulls[1059] were obtained by Wolsey
-from Pope Clement (1523-34) for diminishing the number of monasteries and
-suppressing houses of less than twelve inmates. Gasquet, to whom we are
-indebted for a detailed account of the dissolution, shows that Clement,
-who was hard pressed by the Lutheran agitation at the time, only
-reluctantly yielded to Wolsey's request[1060].
-
-Wolsey's proceedings in the matter, however, roused considerable local
-dissatisfaction and brought censure on him from the king. 'They say not
-that all that is ill gotten is bestowed on the colleges,' Henry wrote to
-him on the eve of his fall, 'but that the college is the cloak for
-covering mischiefs.' The king's ire was further roused by the cardinal's
-accepting the appointment of Isabel Jordan as abbess of Wilton, a house
-which was under royal patronage, and where the acceptance of the abbess
-belonged to the king. Anne Boleyn was in the ascendant in Henry's favour
-at the time, and wanted the post for someone else. But on enquiry at
-Wilton the unsuitability of this person became apparent. 'As touching the
-matter of Wilton,' Henry wrote to Anne, 'my lord cardinal has had the nuns
-before him and examined them, Master Bell being present, who has certified
-to me that for a truth she has confessed herself (which we would have
-abbess) to have had two children by sundry priests, and further since has
-been kept by a servant of Lord Broke that was, and not long ago; wherefore
-I would not for all the world clog your conscience nor mine to make her
-ruler of a house who is of such ungodly demeanour, nor I trust, you would
-not that neither for brother nor sister I should so stain mine honour and
-conscience[1061].' It is evident from this letter that whatever the
-character of the women received into the house might be, the antecedents
-of the lady superior were no matter of indifference. In this case the
-king's objection to one person and the unsuitability of the other led to
-the appointment of a third[1062].
-
-From the year 1527 all other questions were swallowed up by the momentous
-question of the king's divorce. Wolsey, who refused to comply with his
-wishes, went into retirement in 1529 and died in the following year. The
-management of affairs then passed into the hands of those who in this
-country represented the ruthless and reckless spirit of rebellion which
-had broken loose abroad. However several years passed before the attempt
-to appropriate the revenues of monasteries was resumed.
-
-In the intervening period of increasing social and political unrest we
-note the publication, some time before 1529, of the 'Supplication for
-beggars,' with which London was flooded[1063]. It was an attack on the
-existing religious and monastic orders by the pamphleteer Simon Fish
-([Dagger] c. 1530). Based on the grossest misrepresentations this
-supplication, in a humorous style admirably suited to catch popular
-attention, set forth the poverty of the people, the immorality of those
-who were vowed to religion, and the lewdness of unattached women, and
-declared that if church and monastic property were put to a better use
-these evils would be remedied. The king, who was on the eve of a rupture
-with Rome, lent a willing ear to this 'supplication,' and it so fell in
-with the general belief in coming changes that the refutation of its
-falsehoods and the severe criticism of Luther written in reply by Thomas
-More passed for the most part unheeded[1064].
-
-Another incident which reflects the spirit of the time in its
-contrarieties and instability, is the way in which Elizabeth Barton, of
-the parish of Aldington, the so-called Maid or Nun of Kent, rose to
-celebrity or notoriety. Her foresight of coming events had been received
-as genuine by many men of distinction, but her visions concerning the
-king's projected divorce were fiercely resented by the king's partisans.
-Bishop Fisher wept tears of joy over her, Wolsey received her as a
-champion of Queen Katherine's cause, and even Thomas More showed some
-interest in her, while Cromwell accused her of rank superstition and
-induced Henry to take proceedings against her[1065]. She had been a
-servant girl, but at the instigation of the clergy at Canterbury had been
-received into St Sepulchre's nunnery, where she lived for seven years and
-was looked upon with special favour by the Carthusian monks of
-Charterhouse and Sheen, and the inmates of the monastery of Sion. At the
-beginning of 1533 the king was married to Anne, and in the autumn of the
-same year Elizabeth Barton was accused of treasonable incitement and made
-to do public penance. Later a bill of attainder was brought in against
-her, and as Gasquet has shown[1066], she was condemned without a hearing
-and executed at Tyburn with several Carthusian monks who were inculpated
-with her on the charge of treason. Henry also made an attempt to get rid
-of Bishop Fisher and of Sir Thomas More by causing them to be accused of
-favouring her 'conspiracy,' but the evidence against them was too slight
-to admit of criminal proceedings. It was on the charge of declaring that
-Henry was not the supreme head of the Church that Fisher suffered death
-(June, 1535), and on the yet slighter charge of declining to give an
-opinion on the matter, that More was executed a fortnight later[1067].
-
-The parliament of 1533 had passed the act abolishing appeals to the Court
-of Rome, and among other rights had transferred that of monastic
-visitation from the Pope to the king. In the following year a further
-division was made,--the king claimed to be recognised as the head of the
-Church. It was part of Henry's policy to avoid openly attacking any part
-of the old system; gradual changes were brought about which undermined
-prerogatives without making a decided break. Cromwell was appointed
-vicegerent in ecclesiastical matters, and it was on the plea of securing
-the recognition of the king's supremacy that he deputed a number of
-visitors or agents to conduct monastic visitations on a large scale, and
-to secure all possible information about religious houses. His plan and
-the way in which it was carried out struck a mortal blow at the whole
-monastic system.
-
-The agents employed by Cromwell were naturally laymen, and the authority
-of the diocesan was suspended while they were at work. Great powers were
-conferred on them. A list of the instructions they received is in
-existence; and we gather from it that monks and nuns were put through
-searching interrogatories concerning the property of their house, the
-number of its inmates, its founders and privileges, its maintenance of
-discipline, and the right conduct of its inmates. The agents then enjoined
-severance from the Pope or any other foreign superior, and directed those
-who had taken the vow, whether men or women, henceforth to observe strict
-seclusion. A daily lesson in scripture was to be read; the celebration of
-the hours was to be curtailed; profession made under the age of
-twenty-four was declared invalid; and 'other special injunctions,' says
-the document, might 'be added by the visitors as the place and nature of
-accounts rendered (or comperts) shall require,' subject to the wisdom and
-discretion of Cromwell[1068].
-
-The character of the visitors engaged in this task has been variously
-estimated. Among them was Dr Legh ([Dagger] 1545) who is described by a
-contemporary as a doctor of low quality. He wrote to Cromwell (July, 1535)
-recommending himself and Layton ([Dagger] 1544) for the purpose of
-visitation[1069]. Layton had previously acted for Cromwell in conducting
-visitations at Sheen and Sion in the affair of Elizabeth Barton. Legh
-afterwards complained that he did not act as he himself did in regard to
-enforcing injunctions[1070], but Legh, even in the eyes of his companion
-John ap Rice, another visitor with whom he had started for the western
-countries, was needlessly severe. 'At Laycock (nunnery),' wrote ap
-Rice[1071], 'we can find no excesses. Master (Legh) everywhere restrains
-the heads, the brethren and sisters from going forth; and no women of what
-estate soever are allowed to visit religious men's houses and vice versa.
-I think this is over strict, for as many of these houses stand by
-husbandry they must fall to decay if the heads are not allowed to go out.'
-
-We have seen, in connection with matters on the Continent, that the heads
-of houses who were landowners felt it impossible to conform to the rule of
-always keeping within the precincts. The injunction in this case gave rise
-to a number of letters of complaint addressed by the heads of monasteries
-to Cromwell[1072]. Cecil Bodman, abbess of Wilton, wrote to him as
-follows[1073].
-
-'Dr Legh the king's visitor and your deputy, on visiting my house, has
-given injunction that not only all my sisters but that I should keep
-continually within the precincts. For myself personally I am content; but
-as the house is in great debt, and is not likely to improve without good
-husbandry, which cannot be exercised so well by any other as by myself, I
-beg you will allow me, in company with two or three of the sad (serious)
-and discreet sisters of the house, to supervise such things abroad as
-shall be for its profit. I do not propose to lodge any night abroad,
-except by inevitable necessity I cannot return. I beg also, that whenever
-any father, mother, brother, sister, or nigh kinsfolk of my sisters, come
-unto them, they may have licence to speak with them in the hall in my
-presence. Wilton, 5 Sept.' (1535).
-
-Another injunction which was felt to be a calamity was the order
-declaring that profession made under twenty-four was invalid. 'No greater
-blow could have been struck at the whole theory of religious life,' says
-Gasquet[1074], 'than the interference with the vows contained in the order
-to dismiss those who were under twenty-four years of age or who had been
-professed at the age of twenty. The visitors, it is clear, had no scruple
-about their power to dispense with the solemn obligations of the monastic
-profession. They freely extended it to any who would go, in their idea
-that the more they could induce to leave their convents, the better
-pleased both the king and Cromwell would be.'
-
-How far inmates of convents availed themselves of the permission to go is
-difficult to establish. Margaret Vernon, abbess of Little Marlow in
-Buckinghamshire, who was left with only one nun, did not feel unwilling to
-give up her house, and wrote to Cromwell as follows[1075].
-
-'After all due commendations had unto your good mastership, with my most
-humble thanks for the great cost made on me and my poor maidens at my last
-being with your mastership, furthermore may it please you to understand
-that your visitors have been here of late, who have discharged three of my
-sisters, the one is dame Catheryn, the other two are the young women who
-were last professed, which is not a little to my discomfort; nevertheless
-I must be content with the king's pleasure. But now as touching mine own
-part, I most humbly beseech you so special a good master unto me your poor
-bedewoman, to give me your best advice and counsel what way shall be best
-for me to take, seeing there shall be none left here but myself and this
-poor maiden; and if it will please your goodness to take this house into
-your own hands either for yourself, or for my own (master) your son, I
-would be glad with all my heart to give it into your mastership's hands,
-with that you will command me to do therein. Trusting and nothing doubting
-in your goodness, that you will so provide for us that we shall have such
-honest living that we shall not be driven by necessity either to beg or to
-fall to other inconvenience. And thus I offer myself and all mine unto
-your most high and prudent wisdom, as unto him that is my only refuge and
-comfort in this world, beseeching God of His goodness to put in you His
-Holy Spirit, that you may do all things to His laud and glory. By your own
-assured bedewoman M(argaret) V(ernon).'
-
-Some time afterwards she was in London, trying to get an interview with
-Cromwell, and eventually she became governess to his son[1076]. The
-property of her nunnery, together with that of Ankerwyke in
-Buckinghamshire, and several monasteries of men, was granted by Henry in
-1537 to the newly founded abbey of Bisham, but at the general dissolution
-it fell to the crown[1077].
-
-Another petition touching the matter of dismissing youthful convent
-inmates was addressed to Cromwell by Jane G(o)wryng[1078], in which she
-begs that four inmates of her house, whose ages are between fifteen and
-twenty-five and who are in secular apparel may resume their habits or else
-have licence to dwell in the close of the house till they are twenty-four.
-Also she wishes to know if two girls of twelve and thirteen, the one deaf
-and dumb, the other an idiot, shall depart or not. Again a letter was
-addressed to Cromwell, asking that a natural daughter of Cardinal Wolsey
-might continue at Shaftesbury till she be old enough to take the
-vow[1079].
-
-Modern writers are agreed that the effect of these visitations was
-disastrous to authority and discipline within the convent, not so much
-through the infringement of privileges as through the feeling of
-uncertainty and restlessness which they created. Visitation was dreaded in
-itself. With reference to Barking nunnery Sir Thomas Audley wrote to
-Cromwell: 'I am informed that Dr Lee is substituted by you to visit all
-the religious houses in the diocese of London. My suit at this time to you
-is that it may please you to spare the house at Barking[1080].'
-
-In point of fact the visitations were conducted in a manner which left
-those immediately concerned in no doubt as to the ultimate object in view.
-In court circles likewise men were aware that the monastic system was
-threatened by dangerous and far-reaching changes. While Cromwell's agents
-were on their tours of inspection Chapuys, the French ambassador (Sept.
-1535) wrote as follows[1081]: 'There is a report that the king intends the
-religious of all orders to be free to leave their habits and marry. And if
-they will stay in their houses they must live in poverty. He intends to
-take the rest of the revenue and will do stranger things still.' And two
-months later he wrote that the king meant to exclude the abbots from the
-House of Lords for fear of their opposition to his intentions regarding
-the spoliation of monasteries[1082].
-
-The one merit Cromwell's visitors can claim is despatch, for in six
-months, between July 1535 and February 1536, the information on the
-monasteries was collected throughout the country and laid before
-Parliament. Gasquet has shown that the House of Lords was the same which
-had been packed for passing the act of divorce, and that the king, bent on
-carrying his purpose, bullied the Commons into its acceptance[1083].
-
-The preamble to the bill is couched in strong terms and begins as
-follows[1084]: 'Forasmuch as manifest sins, vicious, carnal, and
-abominable living is daily used and committed amongst the little and small
-abbeys, priories, and other religious houses of monks, canons and nuns,
-where the congregation of such religious persons is under the number of
-twelve persons, whereby the governors of such religious houses and their
-convent spoil, destroy, consume and utterly waste, as well their churches,
-monasteries, priories, principal houses, farms, granges, lands, tenements
-and hereditaments, as the ornaments of their churches and their goods and
-chattels, to the high displeasure of Almighty God, slander of good
-religion, and to the great infamy of the king's highness and the realm, if
-redress should not be had thereof,' ... and it goes on to say that since
-visitations have produced no results, and bad living continues, the Lords
-and Commons, after deliberation, have resolved to put the possessions of
-these religious houses to a better use, and that the king and his heirs
-shall for ever enjoy all houses that are not above the clear annual value
-of L200 in like manner as the heads of houses at present enjoy it, but
-that the king by 'his most excellent charity' is pleased to grant pensions
-to those whom he deprives.
-
-Touching the evidence on which action was taken writers of the Elizabethan
-era speak of the so-called Black Book, the existence of which has since
-been disproved[1085]. Latimer in a sermon preached in 1549 refers to the
-'enormities' which were brought to the knowledge of the house; we hold a
-clue to these in the letters forwarded by Cromwell's agents when on their
-tours of inspection, and in their 'comperts' or accounts rendered. The
-condensed accounts (comperta compertorum) rendered by Layton and Legh for
-the province of York including one hundred and twenty monasteries are
-extant, as also two other reports, one on twenty-four houses in Norfolk,
-another on ten[1086].
-
-It has been remarked that the evidence collected differs according to the
-character of the informers; the reports of Tregonwell for example are by
-no means so full of scandal as those of Layton and Legh. Moreover Layton
-and Legh gave a specially bad character to houses in the north where, as
-we shall see later on, both the people and the gentry were in favour of
-their continuance. It should also be noted that the state of the lesser
-houses which fell under the act was not uniformly worse than that of the
-larger. Many difficulties of course stood in the way of the men who
-collected evidence. They were received with suspicion and hatred, which
-their proceedings were not likely to dissipate, and they naturally lent a
-willing ear to any one who gave information of the character required. It
-has been shown that in several instances their reports were directly
-contradicted by those made by the leading men in the different counties,
-who after the passing of the act were appointed to make a new and exact
-survey, so that, considering the evidence forthcoming from both sides, it
-seems reasonable to accept that while the mode of life within convents no
-longer compared favourably with the mode of life outside them, their
-standard had not fallen so low, as to render these institutions uniformly
-despicable.
-
-An example of how the visitors were received is afforded by a letter from
-Layton to Cromwell, in which he describes how after meeting Legh in the
-north they visited Chicksand, a Gilbertine house in Bedfordshire[1087].
-The nuns here at first refused to admit him, and when he forced an
-entrance the two prioresses would not admit the accusations made against
-two of their nuns, 'nor the parties concerned, nor the nuns, only one old
-beldame.' He tried intimidation and was told by the prioress 'that they
-were bound by their religion never to confess the secret faults done among
-them except only to their visitor of religion, and to that they were sworn
-every one of them at their first admission.'
-
-A similar esprit de corps was manifested by a house of Gilbertine
-canons[1088]. Layton in the same letter gives a bad character to the
-nunnery of Harwold, in Bedfordshire, which was inhabited by Austin
-canonesses[1089], and the inmates of which had been foolish enough to sign
-a Latin document in favour of Lord Mordaunt without knowing what it
-contained.
-
-The accusations brought by the visitors can be summarised under two
-headings, superstitions and scandalous living. The accounts of
-superstitions are full of most interesting particulars for the student of
-art and of folklore; the properties which were attached to relics, the
-character of the images and paintings which were held in reverence, and
-the construction of saint-images, will amply repay study[1090]. The
-instances of scandalous living recorded are numerous and affect alike the
-inmates of men's and of women's houses. Coloured as they may be to suit
-the temper of inquisitor and informer, there is no denying that they point
-to an advanced state of monastic decay.
-
-It has been estimated that the lesser houses including those of monks and
-nuns which fell under the act numbered about three hundred and eighty;
-they were to surrender to the crown within a year. Of these the women's
-houses, owing to their comparative poverty, were relatively more numerous
-than those of the men. Out of about one hundred and thirty nunneries which
-existed at this period only fifteen were exempt through having a yearly
-income exceeding L200, but in addition to these over twenty by some means
-or other secured a reprieve.
-
-As the act abolishing the lesser houses was based on the assumption of
-their corruption, the heads of some of the houses which bore a good
-character asked leave on this ground to remain. Among those who wrote to
-Cromwell in this sense was Jane Messyndyne, prioress of a convent of about
-ten nuns at Legbourne in Leicestershire, who pleaded that no fault had
-been found with her house[1091]. 'And whereas,' she wrote, 'we do hear
-that a great number of abbeys shall be punished, suppressed and put down
-because of their misliving, and that all abbeys and priories under the
-value of L200 be at our most noble prince's pleasure to suppress and put
-down, yet if it may please your goodness we trust in God you shall hear no
-complaints against us neither in our living nor hospitality keeping.' But
-petitions such as hers apparently passed unheeded, for in the autumn of
-the same year (Sept. 1536), the process of dissolution was going on at her
-house[1092].
-
-There seems no doubt that in many cases where the lesser houses were
-allowed to remain bribery was resorted to, perhaps backed by the
-intervention of friends. Payments into the Royal Exchequer were made by a
-large proportion of the lesser houses which continued unmolested, and
-among them were a number of nunneries which paid sums ranging from L20 to
-L400[1093]. Among these was Brusyard in Bedfordshire, a small settlement
-of nuns of the order of St Clare, the abbess of which wrote to Cromwell
-seeking his intervention[1094]; she ultimately secured a reprieve and paid
-the sum of L20[1095]. Alice Fitzherbert, abbess of the nunnery of
-Polesworth in Warwickshire, to which an exceptionally good character was
-given, bought a reprieve for L50, on the intervention it is said of
-friends[1096]. Again the abbess of Delapray, who is characterised as a
-very sickly and aged woman, secured a reprieve and paid L266. The agent
-Tregonwell had reported well of Godstow[1097]. Its inmates all bore a good
-character excepting one who, some thirteen years ago, had broken her vow
-while living in another convent, had been transferred to Delapray by the
-bishop of Lincoln and had since lived virtuously. Margaret Tewkesbury the
-abbess wrote to Cromwell begging him to accept a little fee and to forward
-the letter she enclosed to the king[1098]. Her convent was allowed to
-remain.
-
-The attempt of the prioress of Catesby to save her house in a similar
-manner was fruitless. The house bore an excellent character according to
-Tregonwell[1099], and his opinion was confirmed by the commissioners who
-came down later (May, 1536) to take an exact survey. 'We found the house,'
-they wrote to Cromwell[1100], 'in very perfect order, the prioress a wise,
-discreet, and religious woman with nine devout nuns under her as good as
-we have seen. The house stands where it is a relief to the poor, as we
-hear by divers trustworthy reports. If any religious house is to stand,
-none is more meet for the king's charity than Catesby. We have not found
-any such elsewhere....' But the recommendation was insufficient and Joyce
-Bykeley, 'late prioress,' addressed herself directly to Cromwell.--'Dr
-Gwent informed you last night,' she wrote[1101], 'that the queen had moved
-the king for me and offered him 2000 marks for the house at Catesby, but
-has not yet a perfect answer. I beg you, in my great sorrow, get the king
-to grant that the house may stand and get me years of payment for the 2000
-marks. You shall have 100 marks of me to buy you a gelding and my prayers
-during my life and all my sisters during their lives. I hope you have not
-forgotten the report the commissioners sent of me and my sisters....' But
-her letter was of no avail. Somehow she had incurred the king's
-displeasure[1102], and the order to dissolve her convent was not
-countermanded.
-
-The sums paid by some nunneries appear enormous compared with their yearly
-income. Thus the convent of Pollesloe, with a yearly income of L164, paid
-the sum of L400 into the Royal Exchequer; Laycock, with an income of L168,
-paid L300, and the nuns of St Mary at Chester, with an income of L66, paid
-L160; other sums paid are given by Gasquet[1103].
-
-Among the lesser houses reprieved was St Mary's, Winchester, one of the
-nunneries dating from the Anglo-Saxon period, but which in course of time
-had decreased. The report of the commissioners who came down to take stock
-of the contents of the settlement provides us with many interesting
-particulars[1104]. The number of persons residing in the monastery at the
-time was over a hundred. The abbess Elizabeth Shelley presided over a
-convent of twenty-six nuns, twenty-two of whom were professed and four
-novices. The nuns are designated in this report by the old term
-'mynchyns.' With the exception of one who desired 'capacity,' that is
-liberty to return to the world, they all declared their intention of going
-into other houses. Five lay sisters also dwelt there, thirteen
-women-servants and twenty-six girls, some of whom were the daughters of
-knights receiving their education. Of the women-servants one belonged to
-the abbess who lived in a house of her own with her gentlewoman; the
-prioress, sub-prioress, sexton, and perhaps one other nun, lived in
-separate houses and each had her servant. There were also a number of
-priests and other men designated as officers of the household. Among them
-was a general receiver and his servant, a clerk and his servant, a
-gardener (curtyar), a caterer, a bottler (botyler?), a cook, an undercook,
-a baker, a convent cook, an under convent cook, a brewer, a miller,
-several porters and 'children of the high altar,' and two men enjoying
-corrodies, that is free quarters and means of subsistence. The yearly
-income of this vast establishment was assessed at L179, and the house
-therefore came under the act. But the abbess, Elizabeth Shelley, who is
-described as a person of spirit and talent, found means to avert the
-storm. The sum L333 was paid by her into the Royal Exchequer[1105], and
-(in August 1536) letters patent were obtained by which the abbey was
-refounded with all its property excepting some valuable manors[1106].
-
-Other convents which at the same time secured a licence to remain[1107]
-were the Benedictine convent of Chatteris with Anne Seton[1108] as
-prioress; the Austin convent of Gracedieu in Leicestershire; the convent
-of the order of St Clare of Dennis; also the nuns of St Andrew's, Marricks
-in Yorkshire under Christabel Cooper, and of St Mary's, Heyninges, in
-Lincolnshire under Joan Sandford[1109]. No payment is recorded in
-connection with any of these houses so far as I have been able to
-ascertain.
-
-Among the reprieves that of the Austin nuns or White Ladies at Gracedieu
-is noteworthy, as the report of Cromwell's agents (Feb. 1536) had charged
-two of its inmates with incontinence, and among other superstitions
-countenanced by the convent, mentioned their holding in reverence the
-girdle and part of the tunic of St Francis which were supposed to help
-women in their confinement[1110]. But the special commissioners a few
-months later spoke of the prioress Agnes Litherland and her convent of
-fifteen nuns in the highest terms, describing them as of good and virtuous
-conversation and living, and saying that all of them desired their house
-to remain[1111].
-
-The convent of Dennis, which secured a licence at the same time, was one
-of the few settlements of nuns of St Clare, the abbess of which, Elizabeth
-Throgmerton, was renowned for her liberal sympathies. In 1528 a wealthy
-London merchant was imprisoned for distributing Tyndale's books and other
-practices of the sort, and he pleaded among other reasons for exculpation
-that, the abbess of Dennis wishing to borrow Tyndale's _Enchiridion_, he
-had lent it to her and had spent much money on restoring her house[1112].
-Legh in a letter to Cromwell[1113] described how on visiting Dennis he was
-met by the weeping nuns, who were all ready to return to the world, a
-statement in direct contradiction to the fact that the house was not
-dissolved.
-
-The work of dissolution began in April 1536 and continued without
-interruption throughout the summer. Gasquet holds that the women suffered
-more than the men by being turned adrift[1114]. 'Many things combined to
-render the dissolution of conventual establishments and the disbanding of
-the religious more terrible to nuns than to monks. A woman compelled to
-exchange the secluded life of a cloister with all its aids to piety for an
-existence in the world, to which she could never rightly belong, would be
-obviously in a more dangerous and undesirable position than a man.'
-
-By a provision of the act those who were professed were to receive
-pensions, but the number of inmates of the lesser houses to whom they were
-granted was comparatively small[1115]. Moreover pensions were not
-apportioned with regard to the needs of subsistence, but to the wealth of
-the house, so that even those who received them were in a great measure
-thrown on their own resources. The number of professed nuns, as is
-apparent from the accounts given of St Mary's, Winchester, and other
-houses, was relatively small compared with the number of servants and
-dependents. These in some cases received a small 'award' but were thrown
-out of employment, while the recipients of alms from the house were
-likewise deprived of their means of living, and went to swell the ranks
-of those who were dissatisfied with the innovation. While the process of
-dissolution was going on (July 1536) Chapuys the French ambassador wrote
-as follows[1116]: 'It is a lamentable thing to see a legion of monks and
-nuns who have been chased from their monasteries wandering miserably
-hither and thither seeking means to live; and several honest men have told
-me that what with monks, nuns, and persons dependent on the monasteries
-suppressed, there were over 20,000 who knew not how to live.' His estimate
-may have reference to the ultimate effect of the act[1117]. The immediate
-results of the suppression were, however, disastrous throughout the
-country, and the dissatisfaction which the suppression caused went far to
-rouse the latent discontent of the northern provinces into open rebellion.
-
-It was in Lincolnshire, in October, that the commissioners first met with
-opposition. From here a rising spread northwards to Scotland, and under
-the name of the 'Pilgrimage of Grace' drew votaries from the lay and
-religious classes alike. The insurgents claimed among other things that
-the innovations in religion should be disowned, and that despoiled
-monasteries should be restored. They pursued the visitors Layton and Legh
-with unrelenting hatred on account of their extortions; Legh was in danger
-of his life and barely escaped their fury[1118]. The rising assumed such
-proportions that the king was seriously alarmed; an army was sent to the
-north, strenuous efforts were made to win over the powerful northern
-barons, and concessions were made and rescinded with much shameful
-double-dealing. Beyond the effect it had on religious houses, the story of
-the rebellion, on which a new light has recently been thrown by the
-publication of letters which passed at the time[1119], does not concern us
-here. Wherever the insurgents spread they seized on despoiled monasteries
-and reinstated their superiors and inmates; among other houses the nunnery
-of Seton in Cumberland was restored for a time[1120]. But in proportion as
-the king regained his authority, terrible bloodshed followed; the
-representatives of the chief families and the abbots who had joined in the
-rising were hanged, burnt, or beheaded, and their property confiscated by
-attainder. Cromwell, who was still on the high road to prosperity,
-availed himself of the rebellion to institute a general suppression, which
-was speedily and summarily carried into effect. In the autumn of 1537, the
-fear of systematic revolt being quelled, the suppression began and
-extended over the whole of 1538 and 1539. No further evidence was
-collected, no act was passed till April 1539, when a provision was made by
-which all monasteries which were dissolved or surrendered fell to the
-king[1121]. The commissioners came down on each house in succession,
-beginning with the less wealthy and influential ones, and used every means
-to secure a free surrender. Even then a certain reticence in the
-proceedings was observed which went far to blind contemporaries to the
-vastness of the ultimate object in view, for every effort was made to keep
-up the fiction that Henry was doing no more than correcting abuses and
-accepting free surrenders. But the study of documents proves things to
-have been otherwise. The promise of a pension was held out on condition of
-a voluntary surrender, but where hesitation was shown in accepting, the
-effect of threats of deprivation was tried. The visitor Bedyll wrote that
-he advised the monks of Charterhouse rather to 'surrender than abide the
-extremity of the king's law[1122],' and many of the forms of surrender
-which are extant remain unsigned. On others the name of the superior is
-the only signature, on others again the names of the superior and the
-members of the convent are entered in the same hand. Considering the
-helpless position in which religious houses were placed, it seems a matter
-for wonder that any opposition was made.
-
-It is interesting to find that as late as (Jan.) 1538, two years after the
-passing of the first bill, the heads of houses were asked to believe that
-there was no wish for a general suppression[1123], and that a grant of
-continuance was made (May 1538) to the nunneries of Kirkless and
-Nunappleton in Yorkshire[1124]. In Yorkshire there was a strong feeling in
-favour of nunneries,--'in which our daughters (are) brought up in virtue,'
-as Aske, one of the leaders of the rebellion, put it[1125], and owing
-doubtless to the opposition made by the rebels, a number of lesser
-nunneries in the north which came under the act escaped dissolution.
-Among them besides Kirkless and Nunappleton were Swine and Nun-Kelyng;
-there is no evidence that they secured a licence at the time. The fact
-that Kirkless remained and gained a reprieve in 1538 is the more
-noticeable as the commissioners had in the first instance reported
-unfavourably on the state of the house[1126].
-
-In February 1538 a courtier wrote to Lord Lisle[1127], 'the abbeys go down
-as fast as they may and are surrendered to the king,' adding the pious
-wish: 'I pray God send you one among them to your part.' For the property
-of religious houses which were appropriated to the king was now frequently
-granted to courtiers, or to those who were quick enough to avail
-themselves of their opportunities in the general scramble.
-
-Several of the agents who had previously conducted visitations were among
-those who carried on the work of the dissolution. Among them London
-([Dagger] 1543) has been characterised as 'the most terrible of all the
-monastic spoilers'; his letters remain to show in what spirit he stripped
-the houses of their property, seized relics and defaced and destroyed
-everything he could lay hands on[1128]. There is a letter extant which
-Katherine Bulkeley, abbess of Godstow, wrote to Cromwell complaining of
-him[1129]. He came down to her house (Nov. 1537), ostensibly to hold a
-visitation, but really bent on securing a surrender.
-
-'... Dr London, which as your lordship does well know was against my
-promotion and has ever since borne me great malice and grudge like my
-mortal enemy, is suddenly come unto me with a great rout with him and here
-does threaten me and my sisters saying that he has the king's commission
-to suppress my house in spite of my teeth. And when he saw that I was
-content that he should do all things according to his commission and
-showed him plain that I would never surrender to his hand being my ancient
-enemy, now he begins to entreat me and to inveigle my sisters one by one
-otherwise than I ever heard tell that any of the king's subjects have been
-handled, and here tarries and continues to my great cost and charge, and
-will not take my answer that I will not surrender till I know the king's
-gracious commandment and your lordship's ...' and more to the same
-purpose.
-
-London on the following day wrote to Cromwell[1130] asking that the
-'mynchyns' or nuns of her house, many of whom were aged and without
-friends, should be generously dealt with (in the matter of a pension).
-Stories were current[1131] at the time about insults to which the nuns
-were exposed by the agents. Although it seems probable that there was no
-excessive delicacy used in their treatment, no direct complaints except
-those of the abbess of Godstow have been preserved.
-
-The last pages of the history of several of the great abbeys are full of
-traits of heroism; one cannot read without sympathy of the way in which
-for example the abbot of Glastonbury identified himself with the system to
-which he belonged, and perished with it rather than be divided from it.
-The staunch faith of the friars no less commands respect. The heads of
-women's houses naturally made less opposition. However Florence Bannerman,
-abbess of Amesbury, refused every attempt to bribe or force her into a
-surrender. After considerable delay she was deposed in December 1539, and
-was succeeded by Joan Darrell who surrendered the house at the king's
-bidding[1132], and accepted the comparatively high pension of L100.
-
-To some of the heads of houses it seemed incredible that the old system
-was passing away for ever, and they surrendered in the belief that their
-deprivation was only temporary. Elizabeth Shelley, abbess of St Mary's,
-Winchester, who in 1535 had saved her house, accepted the surrender but
-continued to dwell at Winchester with a number of her nuns, and when she
-died bequeathed a silver chalice which she had saved to the college in the
-city on condition that it should be given back to St Mary's if the convent
-were restored[1133]. The fact that she succeeded in carrying away a
-chalice appears exceptional, for the inmates of convents who were expelled
-seem as a rule to have taken with them nothing except perhaps their books
-of devotion.
-
-The story of the dissolution repeats itself in every convent. The
-inventory of the house having been taken, the lead was torn from the
-roofs, and sold together with the bells; the relics and pictures were
-packed in sacks and sent up to London to be burnt.
-
-The plate and jewels of the house, the amount of which was considerable in
-the houses of men and in some of women (for example in Barking) were also
-forwarded to London to be broken up and melted; in a few instances they
-were sold. The house's property in furniture, utensils and vestments was
-sold there and then. The superiors and convent inmates were then turned
-away, and the buildings that had so long been held in reverence were
-either devoted to some profane use or else left to decay.
-
-The inventory taken at the dissolution of the ancient Benedictine nunnery
-of Wherwell in Hampshire has been preserved among others, and shows how
-such a house was dealt with[1134]. There is a list of the inmates of the
-convent and of the pensions granted to them; the abbess in this case
-received a yearly pension of L40, and her nuns' pensions ranged from L3.
-6_s._ 8_d._ to L6. We then get a list of the dwellings of which the
-settlement was composed. The houses and buildings 'assigned to remain'
-were as follows: 'the abbess' lodging with the houses within the quadrant,
-as the water leads from the east side of the cloister to the gate, the
-farmery, the mill and millhouse with the slaughter-house adjoining, the
-brewing and baking houses with the granaries to the same, the barn and
-stables in the outer court.' The list of dwellings 'deemed to be
-superfluous' follows. 'The church, choir, and steeple covered with lead,
-the cloister covered with tiles and certain gutters of lead, the chapter
-house, the refectory (ffrayter), the dormitory, the convent kitchen and
-all the old lodgings between the granary and the hall door covered with
-tiles.' Then follow accounts of the lead and bells remaining, of the
-jewels, plate and silver 'reserved for the king's use,' and of the
-ornaments, goods and chattels which were sold. We further gather that the
-debts of the house were paid and that rewards and wages were given to the
-chaplain, officers and servants before they were turned away.
-
-As mentioned above the pensions given differed greatly, and the heads of
-wealthy houses were allowed considerable sums. Thus Elizabeth Souche,
-abbess of Shaftesbury, the yearly income of which house was taxed at
-L1166, received L133 a year and all her nuns to the number of fifty-five
-were pensioned. Dorothy Barley, abbess of Barking, a house taxed at L862,
-received a yearly pension of L133; while Elizabeth Shelley, abbess of St
-Mary's, Winchester, received only L26 a year. The prioress of St Andrew's,
-Marricks, a small house, received L5 annually, and her nuns a pension of
-from twenty to forty shillings each. Gasquet points out that a large
-number of those who were pensioned died during the first few years after
-the surrender[1135]. Probably many of them were old, but there is extant a
-pension roll of the year 1553 (reign of Philip and Mary) from which can be
-gathered that a certain number of pensioned monks and nuns were then alive
-and continued to draw their pensions. Gasquet further remarks that only a
-few of the nuns who were turned away are known to have married[1136];
-considering that hardly any are known to have left their convents
-voluntarily, and that many of the younger ones were turned away through
-the act of 1535, this seems only natural.
-
-Eye-witnesses as well as Cromwell's agents have left descriptions which
-give a striking picture of the brutality of the proceedings[1137]. But the
-hardships to which the convent inmates were exposed, the terrible waste of
-their property, and the senseless destruction of priceless art treasures,
-must not blind us to the fact that the breaking up of the monastic system
-was but an incident in one of the most momentous revolutions within
-historic record. The dissolution of the monasteries at the time of the
-Reformation, to be rightly estimated, must be considered as part of a
-wider change which was remoulding society on an altered basis.
-
-It is interesting to compare the view taken of monastic life at the time
-of the dissolution with the attitude taken towards convents in the
-following period. Some writings, as for example Lindesay in the play of
-the _Three Estates_, acted in the North in 1535[1138], severely censure
-the inclinations which are fostered in the convent.
-
-But strong as the feeling against convents and their inmates was in some
-instances at the time of the Reformation, when the system was once removed
-little antagonism remained towards those who had represented it. The
-thought of the nun, fifty years after she had passed away in England,
-roused no acrimony. Shakspere had no prejudice against her, and Milton was
-so far impressed in her favour that he represented 'Melancholy' under the
-form of a 'pensive nun, devout and pure,--Sober, steadfast and demure.' It
-was only at a much later period that the agitation raised by the fear of
-returning 'Popery' caused men to rake up scandals connected with convents
-and to make bugbears out of them.
-
-The losses incurred by the destruction of the convents were not however
-slow in making themselves felt; but as indifference towards women's
-intellectual interests had made part of the movement, a considerable time
-went by before the loss of the educational possibilities which the convent
-had secured to women was deplored. 'In the convents,' says Gasquet[1139],
-'the female portion of the population found their only teachers, the rich
-as well as the poor, and the destruction of these religious houses by
-Henry was the absolute extinction of any systematic education for women
-during a long period.' While devotion to domestic duties, exclusive of all
-other interests, continued to be claimed from women, the loss of their
-schools was a matter of indifference to society in general. But in
-proportion as shortcomings in women were felt, the thought arose that
-these might be due to want of training. The words in which the divine,
-Fuller ([Dagger] 1661), expressed such thoughts in the 17th century are
-well worth recalling. The vow of celibacy in his eyes remained a thing of
-evil, but short of this the convents had not been wholly bad.
-
-'They were good she schools wherein the girls and maids of the
-neighbourhood were taught to read and work; and sometimes a little Latin
-was taught them therein. Yea, give me leave to say, if such feminine
-foundations had still continued, provided no vow were obtruded upon them,
-(virginity is least kept where it is most constrained,) haply the weaker
-sex, besides the avoiding modern inconveniences, might be heightened to a
-higher perfection than hitherto hath been attained[1140].'
-
-
-Sec. 2. The Memoir of Charitas Pirckheimer.
-
-A memoir is extant from the pen of the abbess of a convent at Nuernberg. It
-was written (1524-28) during the stormy period following upon the outbreak
-of the Lutheran agitation, and it helps us to realize the effect which the
-rupture with Rome had on a convent of nuns. Charitas Pirckheimer, the
-author of this memoir, was the sister of Wilibald Pirckheimer ([Dagger]
-1530), a well-known humanist, and through him she was in touch with some
-of the leading representatives of learning and art of her day. She was
-well advanced in life and had many years of active influence behind her
-when the troubles began of which she has left a graphic description.
-
-An examination of the contents of her memoir must stand as a specimen of
-the effects which the Reformation had on women's convent life on the
-Continent, effects which varied in almost every town and every province.
-For the breaking up of the monastic system abroad had none of the
-continuity and completeness it had in England. The absence of centralised
-temporal and spiritual authority left the separate townships and
-principalities free to accept or reject the change of faith as they chose.
-The towns were ruled by councils on which the decision in the first place
-depended, and in the principalities the change depended on the attitude of
-prince and magnate, so that the succession of the prince of a different
-faith, or the conquest of one province by another, repeatedly led to a
-change of religion. In some districts the first stormy outbreak was
-followed by a reaction in favour of Rome, and convents which had disbanded
-were restored on a narrowed basis; in others the monastic system which had
-received a severe shock continued prostrate for many years. But even in
-those districts where the change of faith was permanently accepted, its
-influence on conventual establishments was so varied that an account of
-the way in which it put an end to nunneries lies beyond the scope of this
-work. It must suffice to point out that some convents, chiefly unreformed
-ones, disbanded or surrendered under the general feeling of restlessness;
-and that others were attacked and destroyed during the atrocities of the
-Peasants' War. The heads of others again, with a clearsightedness one
-cannot but admire, rejected Romish usages and beliefs in favour of the
-Lutheran faith, and their houses have continued to this day as homes for
-unmarried women of the aristocracy. Others were suffered to remain under
-the condition that no new members should be admitted, but that the old
-ones should be left in possession of their house till they died. To this
-latter class belonged the convent of St Clara at Nuernberg which we are
-about to discuss.
-
-The convent dated its existence from the year 1279, in which several nuns
-from Soeflingen, near Ulm, joined a number of religious women who were
-living together at Nuernberg, and prevailed upon them to adopt the rule of
-St Clara and place themselves under the guardianship of the Franciscan
-friars who had settled in Nuernberg in 1226[1141]. It has been mentioned
-above that the nuns of this order, usually designated as Poor Clares, did
-not themselves manage that property of theirs which lay outside the
-precincts; they observed strict seclusion and were chiefly absorbed by
-devotional pursuits. Under the influence of the movement of monastic
-reform described in a previous chapter, Clara Gundelfingen (1450-1460),
-abbess of the house at Nuernberg, had greatly improved its discipline, and
-nuns were despatched from thence to convents at Brixen, Bamberg and other
-places to effect similar changes. There was another convent of nuns at
-Nuernberg dedicated to St Katherine which was under the supervision of the
-Dominican friars, but the convent of St Clara was the more important one
-and seems to have been largely recruited from members of wealthy burgher
-families. In 1476 it secured a bull from the Pope by which its use was
-altogether reserved to women who were born in Nuernberg.
-
-Charitas Pirckheimer came to live in the house (1478) at the age of
-twelve. She was one of a family of seven sisters and one brother; all the
-sisters entered convents, excepting one who married, and they were in time
-joined by three of the five daughters of their brother[1142]. These facts
-show that the women of most cultivated and influential families still felt
-convent life congenial. The Dominican writer Nider ([Dagger] 1438),
-speaking of convent life in the districts about Nuernberg, remarks that he
-had nowhere else found so many virtuous, chaste and industrious
-virgins[1143]. Of the members of the Pirckheimer family who became nuns,
-Clara ([Dagger] 1533) joined her sister Charitas and acted as secretary to
-her for many years; her letters show her to have been of a lively and
-sanguine disposition[1144]. Walpurg, another sister, lived as a nun in the
-convent of St Clara at Muenich; Katharina became prioress at Geisenfeld,
-and Sabina and Euphemia entered the ancient Benedictine settlement of
-Bergen near Neuburg, of which they successively became abbesses. Sabina
-(1521-29), like her sister Charitas, was a great admirer of Albrecht
-Duerer, whom she consulted on the subject of illuminations done at her
-house[1145]. A number of her letters remain to show that she held opinions
-of her own on some points of doctrine and watched the progress of affairs
-at Nuernberg with interest[1146]. Her sister Euphemia (1529-47), who
-succeeded her, experienced even greater hardships than Charitas, for when
-Palgrave, Otto Heinrich of Neuburg, accepted the Protestant faith (1544),
-she and her nuns were expelled from their convent, and spent several years
-staying first at one place then at another, till the victory which the
-emperor Karl V won at Muehlberg (1547) made it possible for them to return
-to Bergen.
-
-Charitas on entering the house at Nuernberg found herself among the
-daughters of family friends and relations. She contracted a lasting
-friendship with Apollonia Tucher, who was afterwards elected to the office
-of prioress, which she held for many years. Apollonia was nearly related
-to Anton Tucher ([Dagger] 1524), one of the wealthiest and most
-influential men of the town, and to Sixtus Tucher ([Dagger] 1507), a
-learned divine who was made provost of the church of St Lorenz, and in
-this capacity instructed the nuns of St Clara and provided them with
-religious literature. Scheurl ([Dagger] 1542), a nephew of Apollonia and a
-distinguished jurist, who came to settle at Nuernberg, greatly admired
-Charitas. We shall return to him later on.
-
-Felicitas Grundherrin, another nun, who was made portress in 1503, wrote
-letters to her father which throw an additional light on the conduct and
-the experiences of the nuns during the period of religious contention.
-There were sixty inmates at that time, and among them we find the chief
-families of the town represented.
-
-We are not informed at what age Charitas made profession. In 1494 she was
-joined by her sister Clara, and a few years later, when we first hear of
-her and her sister in connection with their brother, she was engaged in
-teaching the novices.
-
-The career of Wilibald Pirckheimer, a man of considerable literary
-ability, is interesting, as it forms the centre of the intellectual and
-artistic life of Nuernberg, which at that time was achieving some of its
-greatest triumphs. The friend of Albrecht Duerer and of the leading
-humanists, he was himself full of enthusiasm for the revived interest in
-classic culture, and filled with that liberal appreciation of merit
-regardless of origin and nationality which is one of the attractive traits
-of the movement. In compliance with the taste of his age he had studied in
-Italy, and shortly after his return to Nuernberg, on the occasion of their
-father's death (1501), he lent his sisters, Charitas and Clara, a copy of
-the hymns of the Christian poet Prudentius, and an unnamed portion of
-Jerome's works, for their comfort and perusal; Charitas thanked him for
-the loan in a Latin letter in which we get our first glimpse of her[1147].
-She says that she has been interested to find among the hymns some which
-are habitually sung in the choir and the authorship of which was unknown
-to her, and she begs she may keep Jerome's writings for some time longer,
-as they afford her so much delight. She refers to the frequent loans of
-books from her brother and assures him how much she depends on him for her
-education, begging him to visit and further instruct her. She has some
-knowledge of scripture, she says, but barely enough to instruct the
-novices.
-
-In the year 1487 Celtes ([Dagger] 1508), a celebrated Latin scholar and
-poet, was crowned poet laureate by the Emperor Friedrich III at Nuernberg,
-and received at his hands the doctor's degree and a laurel wreath.
-Afterwards he travelled about in Germany, rousing interest in the revival
-of classical studies wherever he went, and encouraging those who were
-interested in learning to band together in societies (sodalitates) for the
-purpose of editing and publishing the classics. During a stay at a
-monastery in Regensburg (1501) he had come across the forgotten dramas of
-the nun Hrotsvith. They seemed to him so worthy of attention that he had
-them published at Nuernberg in a beautiful illustrated edition. We do not
-know if he was previously acquainted with Charitas; but he sent her a
-copy of the dramas, and she wrote a grateful reply[1148]. She begins by
-deploring the news she has heard that Celtes has been attacked and
-plundered by robbers. 'A few days ago,' she writes, 'I received the
-interesting writings of the learned virgin Hrotsvith, sent to me by you
-for no merits of my own, for which I express and owe you eternal
-gratitude. I rejoice that He who bestows powers of mind (largitor ingenii)
-and grants wisdom to men who are great and learned in the law, should not
-have denied to the frail and humbler sex some of the crumbs from the
-tables of wisdom. In this learned virgin the words of the apostle are
-verified that God chooses the humble to confound the strong....'
-
-Celtes was charmed by this letter, and was inspired to compose a Latin
-ode[1149] in praise of Charitas. In it he addressed her as the crown and
-star of womanhood, praised her for her knowledge of Latin, in which she
-worthily followed in the steps of a learned father and a learned brother,
-and enlarged on the pleasure her letter had brought. With the ode he sent
-a copy of a work on the city of Nuernberg lately published by him, and
-Charitas in reply sent a long letter which is most instructive in regard
-to the light it throws on her general attitude towards humanist
-culture[1150]. While delighted by the gifts and the attentions of so
-distinguished a man as Celtes, she felt critical towards the heathen
-element in him, which seemed to her incompatible with the claims of a
-higher morality. The letter is too long to reproduce in full, but the
-following are some of its most noteworthy passages. 'I am your unworthy
-pupil, but a great admirer of yours and a well-wisher for your salvation,
-and as such I would earnestly and with all my heart entreat you not indeed
-to give up the pursuit of worldly wisdom, but to put it to higher uses,
-that is to pass from heathen writings to holy scripture, from what is
-earthly to what is divine, from the created to the Creator.... Indeed
-neither knowledge nor any subject of investigation which is from God is to
-be contemned, but mystic theology and a good virtuous life must be ranked
-highest. For human understanding is weak and may fail us, but true faith
-and a good conscience never can. I therefore put before you, most learned
-doctor, when you have enquired into all under the sun, that the wisest of
-men said, Vanity of vanities.... In the same friendly spirit I would beg
-you to give up celebrating the unseemly tales of Jupiter, Venus, Diana,
-and other heathen beings whose souls are burning in Gehenna and who are
-condemned by right-minded men as detestable and deserving of oblivion;
-make the saints of God your friends by honouring their names and their
-memory, that they may guide you to the eternal home when you leave this
-earth.'
-
-At the end of her letter she begged to be excused writing in this strain
-in words which suggest that her brother had urged her to speak out her
-mind, and a further letter of hers addressed to Wilibald says that she is
-forwarding to him a copy of her letter to Celtes[1151]. She begs he will
-not bring him to the grating without sending her word previously, and
-expresses the belief that Celtes will not take umbrage.
-
-We hear no more of their intercourse. Celtes soon afterwards left
-Nuernberg, and when Helena Meichnerin, abbess of the convent, resigned on
-account of some complaints of the town council, Charitas was chosen abbess
-(1503). Her acceptance of the post was made conditional by the Franciscan
-friars on her giving up her Latin correspondence[1152], and there can be
-no doubt that this prohibition was primarily aimed at her intercourse with
-men like Celtes, who was known to be very lax in his morality, and whose
-sympathies in regard to learning were in direct opposition to the narrow
-religious views of the friars. Charitas conformed, but Wilibald's anger
-was roused, and he wrote to Celtes: 'You know that my sister Charitas has
-been chosen abbess. Imagine, those soft-footed men ([Greek: chulopodes])
-have forbidden her to write Latin for the future. Observe their caution,
-not to say roguery[1153].'
-
-Charitas apparently wrote no more Latin letters, but her brother's friends
-continued to take an interest in her. Wilibald had a sincere regard for
-her abilities and frequently wrote of her to his friends. Other members of
-the humanist circle sought her out. Scheurl, the young jurist mentioned
-above, sent her from Bologna a copy of his 'Uses of the mass' (Utilitates
-missae) with a flattering letter which was presented to her by the provost
-Tucher (1506)[1154]. It is overflowing with youthful enthusiasm, and says
-that of all the women he has met there are only two who are distinguished
-by abilities and intellect, knowledge and wealth, virtue and beauty, and
-are comparable to the daughters of Laelius and Hortensius and to Cornelia,
-mother of the Gracchi; the one is Cassandra (Fedele, poetess[1155]) in
-Venice, the other is Charitas in Nuernberg. He expatiates on the merits of
-the Pirckheimer family generally, and says Charitas is following the
-example of her relatives in preferring a book to wool, a pen to the
-distaff, a stilus to a needle. At a later stage of his career (1515)
-Scheurl wrote that it was usual for men who were distinguished in mind and
-power to admire and respect the abilities, learning and moral excellence
-of this abbess[1156].
-
-In 1513 Wilibald published an edition of Plutarch's essay 'On retribution'
-which he had translated from Greek into Latin, and dedicated it to his
-sister Charitas in a long and flattering epistle[1157]. Mindful no doubt
-of the influences about her and referring to difficulties in his own
-career, he spoke in the highest terms of the Stoic philosophers and of the
-help their writings afforded. 'Accept this gift on paper which, if I judge
-rightly, will not be displeasing to you,' he says, 'and carefully peruse
-the writings of this pagan author (gentilis). And you will soon see that
-the philosophers of antiquity did not stray far from the truth.' Charitas
-was able to appreciate this point of view and admitted in her reply that
-he had sent her a jewel more precious than gold and silver[1158]. Speaking
-of Plutarch she confessed that 'he writes not like an unbelieving heathen
-but like a learned divine and imitator of Christian perfection. It is a
-wonderful circumstance which has filled me with joy and surprise.' But she
-thought her brother's praise of her excessive. 'I am not learned myself,
-only the friend of those who are learned; I am no writer, I only enjoy
-reading the writings of others; I am unworthy of so precious a gift,
-though in truth you have done well and wisely in placing the word Charitas
-at the head of your work. For Charity is the virtue which makes all good
-things to be shared, and that Charity which is the Divine Spirit itself
-will reward you here and in the life to come, where honest efforts will be
-fully requited.'
-
-A short time afterwards Pirckheimer dedicated to his sister Clara, who was
-now teaching the novices, a 'Collection of the Moral Sentences of Nilus.'
-It was a translation from Greek and Latin, and the title was ornamented
-with a design by Duerer[1159]. He sent it 'to prevent her feeling any
-jealousy of her sister.' Clara shared her sister's tastes and was herself
-an ardent reader. When the New Testament edited by Erasmus appeared,
-Pirckheimer wrote to him that his sisters, who zealously read his
-writings, took great delight in this book also, and he says that they had
-greater insight into it than many men who were proud of their learning.
-They would have written themselves, he adds, if they had not felt shy of
-so great a man. Erasmus on one occasion compared the daughters of Sir
-Thomas More to the sisters of Wilibald Pirckheimer. Some writings of the
-humanist Reuchlin were also perused by them[1160].
-
-Wilibald further dedicated to Charitas his edition of the works of
-Fulgentius (1519), in a long preface in which he describes the difficulty
-he had had in procuring the manuscript from the library of his friend
-Tritheim, how he had despaired of deciphering it till the learned
-Cochlaeus came to his rescue, and how sure he felt that his sister would
-look upon the book as a treasure[1161]. The translation of the sermons of
-Gregorius Nazianzenus, an important undertaking, he also accomplished
-mainly for the use of his sisters[1162].
-
-Besides their devotional and intellectual interests, the nuns at St Clara
-made their own clothes, and seem to have had some ability in sewing, for
-when the imperial robes which were kept at Nuernberg were to be carried to
-Aachen for the coronation of the Emperor Karl V, they were first given
-into the hands of the nuns to be looked over and mended[1163].
-
-An interesting light is thrown on the less serious side of the character
-of Charitas by an amusing German letter which she wrote to Duerer and two
-envoys of Nuernberg who were staying at Augsburg in 1518 on the occasion of
-the Imperial Diet. From there they had sent her a missive penned in a
-jovial hour, and Charitas in reply wrote[1164]: 'I received your friendly
-letter with special delight and read it with such attention that my eyes
-were often brim full, but more from laughing than any other emotion. Many
-thanks to you that in spite of your great business and your amusements you
-should have taken the trouble to give directions to this little nun about
-cloister-life, of which you have a clear mirror before you at present....'
-And she begs the envoy Spengler to study accounts with a view to advising
-her how to waste everything till nothing remains, and begs Duerer, 'who is
-such a draughtsman and genius,' to give his attention to the buildings, so
-that when she has the choir rebuilt he may help and advise her how to
-introduce larger windows so that the nuns' eyes may be less dim.
-
-From these various notices we conclude that time passed not unpleasantly
-or unprofitably with the abbess of St Clara before those contentions began
-which followed upon the attack made on the established religion by Luther.
-In Nuernberg, as in most other cities, the feeling was general that the
-life of the prelacy was degenerate and that the Papacy was a hotbed of
-abuse. Luther's opposition to the Pope was therefore greeted with
-acclamation both by the enlightened men of the town, who felt that the
-tyranny of the Church was a stumblingblock in the way of progress, and by
-the people, who readily seized the idea that the means were now given them
-to break through class tyranny. Wilibald Pirckheimer was among those who
-without hesitation sided with the Lutheran agitation, but Charitas thought
-otherwise. The abbess of the convent of St Clara at Eger forwarded to her
-some of the fierce attacks on Luther from the pen of Emser ([Dagger]
-1527), and Charitas was so delighted with them that she had them read out
-aloud to the nuns during meals, and was prompted to write a letter to
-their author[1165].
-
-This letter became a source of great annoyance to her. It fell into the
-hands of Emser's enemies, and was published with an abusive running
-comment on Charitas[1166]. Even Wilibald was annoyed and declared she
-would have done better not to have written it. He strongly supported the
-Lutheran agitation at the time, and Eck, who suspected him of having
-written the attack on himself, entitled 'Eccius Dedolatus,' for personal
-reasons inscribed Wilibald's name on the Papal ban. There is extant from
-Wilibald's pen a fragment in which he expresses doubts as to the
-rightfulness of convent life generally[1167], but he gradually modified
-his views. The violence and narrowness of the representatives of the party
-of progress in Nuernberg were little to his taste. On the plea of
-ill-health he withdrew from the council, and took no part in the stormy
-discussions of 1523, when the rupture with Rome was declared complete
-and decisions arrived at, momentous for the future of the new faith not
-only in Nuernberg, but in Germany generally.
-
-At this juncture the memoir of Charitas[1168] begins. She describes the
-effect of the Lutheran teaching; how ceremonies are being abolished, rules
-and vows declared vain, so that many monks and nuns are leaving their
-cloisters, putting off convent garb and marrying and otherwise doing as
-they choose.
-
-'These various reasons brought us many troubles and difficulties,' she
-writes (p. 2), 'for many powerful and evil-minded persons came to see the
-friends they had in our cloister, and argued with them and told them of
-the new teaching, how the religious profession was a thing of evil and
-temptation in which it was not possible to keep holy, and that we were all
-of the devil. Some would take their children, sisters and relatives out of
-the cloister by force and by the help of admonitions and promises of which
-they doubtless would not have kept half. This arguing and disputing went
-on for a long time and was often accompanied by great anger and abuse. But
-since none of the nuns by God's grace was moved to go, the fault was laid
-on the Franciscans, and everyone said they encouraged us, so that it would
-be impossible to convince us of the new belief while we had them as
-preachers and confessors.'
-
-The friars had long been odious for their determined class feeling,
-religious intolerance, and encouragement of superstitions; it was obvious
-that the advocates of change would direct their attacks against them.
-Charitas, fully aware of the emergency, assembled the nuns and put before
-them the danger of being given over to 'wild priests and apostate monks,'
-and with their consent decided to hand in a 'supplication' to the town
-council. This council was presided over by three leading men (triumviri),
-of whom one named Nuetzel was the so-called representative (pfleger) of the
-convent, another named Ebner had a daughter among the nuns, and the third,
-Geuder, was the brother-in-law of Charitas. She consulted Wilibald on the
-matter of the supplication, but forthwith wrote and despatched a letter to
-each of these three men, begging and claiming the protection of her
-privileges.
-
-The supplication itself (p. 12) was carefully worded, and requested that
-the connection between the Franciscans and the nuns might not be severed,
-contradicting the charges which were brought against the former. They do
-not forbid the nuns to read the Evangels and other books, Charitas
-says,--'if they did so we should not obey them.' The nuns have the Old and
-the New Testament in daily use in the German and the Latin versions.
-Charitas denies despising the married state or retaining nuns by force.
-'But as we compel no one, so too we claim not to be compelled, and to
-remain free in mind as well as in body. But this cannot be if we are given
-over to strange priests, which would be destruction to our community ...,'
-and more to a like purpose.
-
-The supplication was handed in at the beginning of 1524, but after
-considerable delay the councillors postponed giving a definite reply to
-it. In the meantime Charitas was much annoyed by the mother of one of her
-nuns who tried to persuade her daughter to leave the convent, and finding
-her words of no avail, appealed to the town council (p. 19) for an order
-to take her 'out of this prison' as she called it, into which she had sent
-her nine years before at the age of fourteen. Charitas also sent in a
-statement of the case (p. 28), but again no reply was vouchsafed her.
-
-The letters which Clara wrote to her brother about this time help us to
-realise the situation. All her letters are undated, but in one she thanks
-Wilibald for his advice about the supplication, and says that if divine
-service should really be abolished she means to devote herself more to
-reading, for 'the dear beloved old writers surely were no fools[1169].' In
-another she thanks him for the loan of books and says a work of Erasmus
-(probably _De libero arbitrio_) has pleased the sisters by its moderation.
-As to Charitas 'she finds great comfort in her beloved old Cyprian, in
-whose writings she reads day and night. She sends greetings and the
-message that she prefers Cyprian to all these new evangelists who strut
-about in cut garments and golden chains[1170].'
-
-Though Clara did not lose her cheerfulness, Charitas, who saw further, was
-full of apprehension. From what her sister says she regretted the severe
-tone of her letter to Geuder[1171]. On other occasions also she was led to
-indignant utterances which she afterwards regretted[1172].
-
-A gap occurs at this period in her memoir which she resumed writing in
-March 1525, after the religious disputation had taken place at Nuernberg.
-After many stormy scenes, 'the preachers of the Evangel,' as they called
-themselves, decided to carry out their intentions without waiting for the
-decision of a Church Council. The immediate result of the decision was an
-attack on all religious houses. But in the convent of St Clara the
-determined and reckless energy of the reformers was matched by indignant
-protest and unyielding opposition on the part of the abbess.
-
-Charitas has described in full (p. 33) how a deputation from the town
-council asked to be admitted into her house, and how they informed her and
-the assembled nuns that their connection with the Franciscans was at an
-end; a 'reformed' preacher had been appointed to preach in the church of
-the nuns, and they were left the choice among several men who would act to
-them as confessors. Much argument followed, but Charitas maintained that
-her house and the Franciscans had always been closely connected. 'If we
-yield it is only to force and we turn to God,' she said, 'and before Him
-we lodge a protest and declare that we are forced against our will, and
-that we reject and discountenance all your proposals.' The assembled nuns
-rose to their feet to shew their approval of her speech, and the
-deputation in vain tried the effect of persuasion. Charitas scorned the
-idea of having anything to do with apostate monks; and the deputation
-retired after blaming the women for behaving in a most ungrateful manner.
-A second visit led to similar results; Charitas abode by her decision, the
-nuns wept, and the deputation retired after venting their indignation in
-threats.
-
-The hopes of the convent now centred in Nuetzel, their representative in
-the town council, and Charitas with her brother's approval wrote to him
-(p. 41) begging him to come to her. But the first words Nuetzel spoke
-dispelled every hope of assistance from that quarter; he blamed the nuns
-for opposing the council, and urged the advisability of their giving way.
-Charitas was most indignant and declared she was well aware that it was
-intended to force them to this new belief, but that they were agreed that
-neither in life nor in death would they listen to what the Church had not
-previously countenanced. She called upon the prioress to read out a second
-petition to the council asking to have their father confessor back or else
-to be left without one. She wanted Nuetzel to take charge of this petition,
-but he was only angered, and taking Charitas aside, represented to her
-that her opposition was a serious matter; her example was encouraging
-other women's convents to opposition, which would relent if she did. He
-said that by resigning and disbanding the convent bloodshed would be
-averted, and he spoke in praise of the new preacher. But Charitas remained
-unmoved. As he was leaving the house his daughter and the other nuns,
-whose fathers were members of the town council, went down on their knees
-to him imploring protection. He refused to listen, but was so far
-impressed that he never slept all the following night, as his wife
-afterwards told the nuns (p. 54).
-
-The convent's opposition to their plans was a source not only of annoyance
-but of apprehension to the town authorities. The peasants' rising was
-spreading in the direction of Nuernberg, and as popular feeling was against
-religious houses the argument that dissolving the house might help to
-avert a danger was not altogether unfounded. Nuetzel in a long
-expostulation (p. 55) shortly afterwards tried to impress this view on the
-abbess, but Charitas urged (p. 59) that other reasons besides hatred of
-the friars had roused the peasants to rebellion, and complained that the
-ill-feeling against her house was largely due to the reformed preachers,
-who declared they would not rest till they had driven monks and nuns out
-of the town (p. 62). Rightly or wrongly she held that Poliander, the
-reformed preacher who was now preaching in the convent church, had been
-promised a reward if he persuaded her or her nuns to leave the convent (p.
-67), and that his want of success aggravated his hatred of them. It was in
-vain that Nuetzel wrote in praise of him (p. 67). Charitas now looked upon
-Nuetzel as a dangerous enemy, and her sister Clara wrote to Wilibald[1173]
-begging him to advise the convent how to get rid of the man. In another
-letter[1174] she said that Charitas was seriously afraid of him.
-
-In place of the Franciscans a number of reformed preachers now preached
-before the nuns and the people in the convent church. Among them was
-Osiander, formerly a Carthusian, whose violence at a later period was
-censured and resented by his Protestant brethren; and the nuns were
-obliged to attend and to listen to a torrent of abuse and imprecation by
-him and others. 'I cannot and will not detail,' says Charitas in her
-memoir (p. 70), 'how they perverted Holy Writ to a strange meaning, how
-they cast down the doctrines of the Church and discarded all ceremonies;
-how they abused and reviled all religious orders and classes, and
-respected neither Pope nor Emperor, whom they openly called tyrant, devil,
-and Antichrist; how roughly and in what an unchristian-like spirit and
-against all brotherly love they abused us and charged us with great
-wickedness, for the purpose of rousing the people, whom they persuaded
-that an ungodly set like ourselves should be destroyed, our cloister
-broken open, ourselves dragged out by force, since we represented a
-despicable class, heretics, idolatrous and blasphemous people, who were
-eternally of the devil.'
-
-One might be tempted to look upon this description as an exaggeration were
-it not for a letter from Wilibald Pirckheimer to Melanchthon, in which he
-describes the outrages to which the nuns were exposed in similar terms.
-'The preachers scream, swear, and storm, and do everything in their power
-to rouse the hatred of the masses against the poor nuns; they openly say
-that as words were of no avail, recourse should be had to force,' and he
-wonders the cloister has not yet been attacked[1175].
-
-Under the pressure of popular opinion and increasing restlessness the
-Austin monks gave over their house, and they were followed by the
-Carmelites, the Benedictines, and the Carthusians. The Dominicans
-hesitated; the Franciscans refused to go. Charitas expresses wonder that
-the 'spiritual poison,' as she calls it, which the preachers several times
-a week tried to infuse into the nuns, took no effect, and that none of
-them expressed a desire to leave the convent (p. 85).
-
-Things had now come to such a pass that convents outside the city
-disbanded before the peasants' rising; and nuns from Pillenreuth and
-Engelthal sought refuge in the town with the nuns of St Clara (p. 86).
-These lived in daily fear of their house being stormed, for the people
-shouted and swore at them from below, threw stones into the choir, smashed
-the church windows, and sang insulting songs in the churchyard outside.
-But the nuns, nothing daunted, continued to keep the hours and to ring the
-bells, though they were every moment prepared for the worst. Clara in a
-letter to Wilibald described her own and her sister's fears in eloquent
-terms[1176]; and the nun Felicitas Grundherrin wrote to her father
-entreating him to abide by the old faith[1177]. In these days the nuns
-seem to have read a good deal of pamphlet literature, but they failed to
-see anything beyond an encouragement to violence and disorder in the whole
-Lutheran movement.
-
-A further attempt was made by the council to coerce the convent. A number
-of injunctions were sent to the abbess which were to be carried out within
-a month (p. 88). The first of these commanded her to absolve the nuns from
-their vow that they might enjoy 'Christian freedom'; another that she
-should send the young nuns home though they refused, 'since children
-should obey their parents.' The deputies who laid these injunctions before
-the abbess assured her that the council was prepared to restore to the
-nuns what they had brought to the convent; that they would give money to
-those who had brought nothing, and provide a dower for those who married.
-To these arguments Charitas replied that the nuns had made a vow not
-before her but before God, that it was not in her power to dispense them
-from it and that she would not urge them to disobedience. With a touch of
-bitterness she added that their mothers were continually at the convent
-grating urging them to go (p. 87). For the matrons of the town especially
-sided with the reformed preachers and cried shame on convent life. 'If it
-were not for the women and the preachers things would not be so bad,'
-Clara wrote on one occasion to Wilibald[1178], and on another she spoke of
-the sharp tongues and violent behaviour of the women.
-
-The deputation further claimed that the nuns should take off their convent
-clothes (p. 93), the sight of which they said gave umbrage. 'We are
-continually told,' Charitas replied, 'that our vows and our clothes
-threaten to cause a rising, but it is your preachers, to whom we are
-forced to listen, who try to provoke one by abusing and condemning us from
-the pulpit and charging us with vices and impurity to humour the people.'
-The command was also given to do away with the convent grating; and it was
-backed by the threat that if Charitas failed to comply with it the town
-authorities would throw open the house to all visitors. The heaviness of
-this blow was such that after the deputation had left Charitas summoned
-the nuns and asked their intentions severally. In the eyes of the whole
-convent throwing open the house involved turning it into a public resort
-of bad character. They felt they must yield or leave the house
-altogether, but they promised to abide by the decision of Charitas if she
-would stay and advise them. The intrepid abbess decided to do away with
-the grating at one window, declaring that they acted against the rule
-under protest and only temporarily. On the other points she sought the
-advice of learned men outside, but they advised compromise, for, to give
-her own words (p. 95), 'they said all chance was gone of gaining anything
-by opposition; we must yield if we did not want the house to go to ruin.
-People now did things by main force regardless of justice or equity,
-fearful neither of Pope nor Emperor, nor even of God except in word;
-things were such that these people said, What we will must be done, thus
-and not otherwise, declaring themselves more powerful than the Pope
-himself.'
-
-In the meantime the feelings against the nunnery were by no means
-unanimous. Geuder, the brother-in-law of Charitas, was emphatic at the
-council meeting in denouncing the throwing open of convents, which in his
-eyes also meant turning them into disreputable houses[1179]. But no amount
-of opposition made by him and others could prevent a scene from being
-enacted in the convent chapel, which was afterwards looked upon as
-disgraceful, not only by those who provoked it, but by outsiders whether
-partisans of the Lutheran movement or not. The repeated attempts to
-persuade the nuns to leave having failed and Charitas refusing to bid them
-go, two of the chief councillors, one of them Nuetzel, the representative
-of the convent's interests, and the widow of a councillor who had long
-clamoured for her daughter's release, repaired to the convent with a
-number of other persons, claimed to be admitted, and declared they had
-come to fetch their daughters away. The three nuns, who were between
-nineteen and twenty-three years of age, tried to hide, but Charitas bade
-them come forth, and they then sought refuge with her in the convent
-chapel. She has described in full how the young women besought her to
-protect them, how their parents and others abused and reviled them, and
-how in spite of their protests, their indignation and their tears, their
-relations at last resorted to violence. Four persons seized each nun and
-dragged and pushed her out of the chapel, while the women present shouted
-approval, and once outside their convent clothes were torn off and others
-substituted in their stead. After a scuffle and a scramble in which one
-nun was knocked over and her foot injured, they were carried to a
-chariot waiting outside and conveyed away.
-
-Charitas remained behind in grief and despair. 'I and all my nuns are so
-distressed at all this,' she wrote a few days later[1180], 'that I have
-almost wept out my eyes.... Nothing ever so went to my heart.' Indignation
-at the violence of the act became general in the town and spread beyond
-its confines. 'I never could have imagined women acting in such a cruel
-manner,' Sabina, the abbess of Bergen, wrote to Wilibald; and in another
-letter, apprehending the destruction of the convent at Nuernberg, she
-proposed that Charitas and her nuns should seek refuge with her[1181].
-
-But Charitas persisted in holding her ground, though with an aching heart.
-When the men who had fetched away their daughters sent word offering to
-pay for their maintenance during the time they had lived with her, she
-refused. Her trials in one direction had reached their climax,--the
-councillor Nuetzel, who admitted that things had gone too far, henceforth
-acted in a conciliatory spirit, and some approximation took place between
-them. Not that he ever tired of urging Charitas to desert her convent and
-her cause, but he now confined himself to persuasion and argument, and
-when one of the young nuns who had been carried off was so far reconciled
-to the world that she came to the convent window and urged her step-sister
-to return home, pretending that Nuetzel had sent her (p. 123), the
-councillor disclaimed having done so. His correspondence with Charitas,
-which she has faithfully inserted in her memoir, shows that she patiently
-listened to every argument in favour of the new doctrines. She had a
-conversation with the preacher Osiander which lasted four hours (p. 128),
-she listened to over a hundred sermons preached by the Lutherans, and she
-read their writings, yet she could find nothing to her taste and it seemed
-easy to her to confound their arguments. Her letters show that her
-unhappiness was great, for on one occasion she went so far as to put
-before Nuetzel (p. 122) what the result would be if women like themselves,
-many of whom were over sixty and several over seventy, returned to the
-world and tried to earn their living, as everyone said they ought to do.
-She declared she detained no one, the nuns were at liberty to go if they
-chose; everyone was giving her advice, she said, but she saw no salvation
-in the new doctrines, which did not appeal to her. Her readiness to listen
-to argument caused Nuetzel to set his hopes on a conference between
-Melanchthon and her (p. 133), and probably at the instigation of Wilibald,
-who was deeply grieved at the injustice done to his sisters without being
-able to give them direct help, Melanchthon, who was well known for his
-uprightness and conciliatory influence, came to Nuernberg towards the close
-of the year 1525. 'I am glad to hear Melanchthon is coming,' Charitas
-wrote; 'since I have heard he is an irreproachable, upright and
-justice-loving man, I do not suppose he can approve of what has been done
-here.'
-
-Nuetzel at once (p. 149) brought him to the convent. 'A few days later our
-representative came with Philip Melanchthon,' Charitas wrote, 'who spoke
-much about the new faith, but finding that we set our hopes more on the
-grace of God than on our works, he said we might as well seek our
-salvation in the cloister as in the world.' They had a long talk together
-and agreed on all points except on the subject of vows, for these the
-reformer declared were not binding, while Charitas maintained that a
-promise made to God must be kept. She describes Melanchthon as more
-moderate in his speech than she had ever known a Lutheran to be.
-Melanchthon, on hearing the various points of the case, blamed the
-councillors for having forbidden the Franciscans to confer with the
-convent, and for forcibly taking the nuns out of the cloister. 'I trust
-God has sent this Lutheran at the right hour,' Charitas wrote, 'for they
-were discussing whether or not to expel nuns generally, pull down their
-houses, and put the older inmates of those convents which would not
-surrender into one house, driving back the younger ones into the world'
-(p. 171).
-
-According to her account Melanchthon represented to the council that no
-convent at Wittenberg had been destroyed by force, and after a great deal
-of argument it was decreed to make one more effort to persuade the nuns to
-go, and failing this to leave them alone. No concessions were made with
-regard to the friars, the nuns remained without a minister to take their
-confessions and to administer the sacrament, but after all the nuns had
-been severally asked if they wished to stay or to go, and only one
-declared herself ready to leave the house, the rest were left in
-possession till the end of their days.
-
-With the account of the last visitation, which took place in 1528, the
-memoir of Charitas ends. From other sources we hear that short of
-annoyances about her income and a tax levied on the convent she remained
-unmolested, and passed the last few years of her life in peace. At the
-close of 1528, the fiftieth anniversary of her entering the convent, and
-the twenty-fifth year of her appointment as abbess, was celebrated with
-some amount of cheerfulness. Wilibald and others sent presents, and after
-dinner the nuns danced to the sound of the dulcimer (hackbrett), which the
-abbess played[1182]. Wilibald's interest in the convent continued, and
-towards the close of his life we find him busy writing a pamphlet in
-justification of the nuns[1183], in which he developed at some length the
-arguments against those who had oppressed and coerced them. He died in
-1530, and within a couple of years was followed by his sister Charitas
-(1533). Her sister Clara ruled the convent for a few months after her and
-was succeeded by Wilibald's daughter Charitas. The number of nuns was
-slowly but steadily dwindling; before the close of the century the house
-had fallen into the hands of the town council by default.
-
-The abbess Charitas Pirckheimer worthily represents the monastic life of
-women at the close of the Middle Ages. Faithful to the system she had
-embraced, she remained true to her convictions to the last, with a
-fearlessness, candour, and determination which give her attitude a touch
-of heroism. She is one among many staunch adherents to the old faith who
-experienced hardships which simple humanity and feelings of equity and
-justice alike condemned, but whose steadfastness could not save their
-cause from being lost.
-
-
-
-
-CONCLUSION.
-
-
-My task has drawn to its close. In a series of chapters, incompletely no
-doubt but I trust not superficially, the position of woman under
-monasticism has been brought before the reader, and some account has been
-given of the various aspects of convent life. In conclusion it seems well
-to pause and look back over the ground traversed, to take in at a glance
-what Catholic tradition, convent-life and saint-lore have done for women
-in the past. The area over which the reader has been taken is a wide one,
-and the ground in many directions remains unexplored. Still some of the
-most prominent landmarks have been noted, and some districts carefully
-examined. Thus while further information might be sought concerning many
-special points, it still seems legitimate to form a general survey and to
-draw certain conclusions.
-
-Turning back to the earliest period when Christianity with its new
-conceptions first came into contact with beliefs dating from a distant
-heathen era, we have seen how many sentiments and associations of ideas
-peculiar to pre-Christian times lived on and were absorbed into the new
-religion. The early representatives of Christianity, with a keen-sighted
-appreciation of the means by which a change of religion is most
-successfully effected, treated the older conceptions with tolerance, and
-by doing so made possible the establishment of new ideas in the old
-heathen setting. The legends and the cult of the saints contain a mine of
-wealth as yet little explored by the student of primitive civilization and
-folk-lore, a mine which has here been tapped at one vein only,--namely for
-the information it yields on the antiquity of beliefs which attach to
-certain women who are reckoned among the saints.
-
-Passing from the ground of tradition to that of history we have seen how
-the convent was looked upon with favour by women of the newly converted
-barbarian races, and how readily they availed themselves of the protection
-which the Christian religion held out to them. This development also
-needed to be studied side by side with previous social conditions in order
-to stand out in its true light, and it gained a new meaning when
-considered in connection with the elements of older folk tradition which
-it absorbed. The representatives of Christianity, profiting by a surviving
-love of independence among womankind, turned the energies of women into
-new channels, and giving scope to their activity in new directions,
-secured their help in the cause of peaceful progress. The outward
-conditions of life were such that the woman who joined the convent made
-her decision once for all. But provided she agreed to forego the claims of
-family and sex, an honourable independence was secured to her, and she was
-brought into contact with the highest aims of her age. At a period when
-monasteries, placed in the remote and uncultivated districts, radiated
-peace and civilization throughout the neighbourhood, many women devoted
-themselves to managing settlements which in the standard they attained,
-vied in excellence with the settlements managed by men.
-
-At the outset many married women left their husbands for the purpose of
-founding and governing convents; sometimes they founded convents the
-management of which they left to others, and themselves retired to them
-later in life. The prestige and advantages enjoyed by the heads of
-religious settlements were such that kings and queens frequently installed
-their daughters as abbesses in preference to seeking for them matrimonial
-alliances, and these princesses were joined by many daughters of the most
-influential families, who gladly availed themselves of the opportunity of
-embracing the religious vocation. Through their close contact with
-high-born women, convents maintained a high tone in manners, morals and
-general behaviour, and grew into important educational centres, the
-beneficent influence of which was generally recognised.
-
-The career open to the inmates of convents both in England and on the
-continent was greater than any other ever thrown open to women in the
-course of modern European history; abilities might raise the nun to the
-rank of abbess, a position of substantial authority. In the Kentish
-charter, to which reference has been made, the names of the abbesses as
-representatives of religion follow those of the bishops. In Saxony it fell
-to an abbess to act as representative of the emperor during his absence.
-As independent landowners, who held their property of and from king and
-emperor, the abbess took rank with the lords temporal and spiritual in the
-right of jurisdiction which they exercised, and in the right of being
-represented in Parliament or at the Imperial Diet as the case might be.
-
-While fulfilling the duties which devolved on them in virtue of their
-station, abbesses did not neglect their opportunities of keeping in touch
-with culture and of widening their mental horizon. In Anglo-Saxon England
-men who attained to distinction received their training in settlements
-governed by women. Histories and a chronicle of unique value were inspired
-by and drafted under the auspices of Saxon abbesses. For nuns Ealdhelm
-wrote his most famous treatises, and several valuable contemporary
-biographies, such as those of Sturmi and of Robert of Fontevraud, were
-written at the express desire of nuns. And while eager in encouraging
-productiveness in others, they were not slow in trying to develop their
-own literary powers. In the 6th century Radegund was writing epistles in
-verse under the tuition of an exiled Latin poet; to an Anglo-Saxon nun
-whose name is not recorded we owe one of the earliest and most interesting
-accounts extant of a journey to Palestine. In the 8th century the nun
-Lioba was trying her hand at Latin verse in a convent in Thanet; in the
-10th century the nun Hrotsvith in Saxony was composing Latin dramas on the
-model of Terence. The contributions of nuns to literature as well as
-incidental remarks show that the curriculum of study in the nunnery was as
-liberal as that accepted by monks, and embraced all available writing,
-whether by Christian or profane authors. While Scripture and the writings
-of the Fathers of the Church at all times formed the groundwork of
-monastic studies, Cicero at this period was read by the side of Boethius,
-Virgil by the side of Martianus Capella, Terence by the side of Isidor of
-Sevilla. From remarks made by Hrotsvith we see that the coarseness of the
-later Latin dramatists made no reason for their being forbidden to nuns,
-though she would have seen it otherwise; and Herrad was so far impressed
-by the wisdom of the heathen philosophers of antiquity that she pronounced
-this wisdom to be the 'product of the Holy Spirit also.' Throughout the
-literary world as represented by convents, the use of Latin was general,
-and made possible the even spread of culture in districts that were widely
-remote from each other and practically without intercourse.
-
-The educational influence of convents during centuries cannot be rated
-too highly. Not only did their inmates attain considerable knowledge, but
-education in a nunnery, as we saw from the remarks of Chaucer and others,
-secured an improved standing to those who were not professed. The fact
-that a considerable number of women's houses after the monastic revival of
-the 11th and 12th centuries were founded largely at the instigation of
-men, proves that the usefulness of these institutions was generally
-recognised.
-
-While devoted to reading and study which pre-eminently constituted the
-religious vocation, nuns during their leisure hours cultivated art in
-several of its branches. Spinning and weaving were necessarily practised
-in all settlements during many centuries, for the inmates of these
-settlements made the clothes which they wore. But weaving and embroidery,
-always essentially woman's work, found a new development in the convent,
-and works of marked excellence were produced both in England and abroad.
-The painstaking industry, which goes far in the production of such work,
-was reflected in the activity of women as scribes and illuminators, and
-the names of several nuns who were famous for their writing have been
-handed down to posterity. In the twofold domain of learning and art the
-climax of productiveness was reached in the person of Herrad, in whom a
-wide range of intellectual interests and a keen appreciation of study
-combined with considerable artistic skill and a certain amount of
-originality.
-
-Side by side with literary and artistic pursuits nuns were active in the
-cause of philanthropy. Several women who had the sufferings of their
-fellows at heart are numbered among the saints; and under the auspices of
-Hildegard a book was compiled on the uses of natural products in health
-and disease, which forms a landmark in the history of mediaeval medicine.
-
-With the consciousness of the needs of others came too a keener power of
-self-realisation. The attention of nuns was turned to the inner life, and
-here again their productiveness did not fail them. The contributions to
-mystical literature by nuns are numerous, and their writings, which took
-the form of spiritual biography, legendary romance, or devotional
-exercise, were greatly appreciated and widely read by their
-contemporaries. Even now-a-days they are recommended as devotional works
-by the Catholic Church.
-
-We have seen that the position of the convent was throughout influenced by
-the conditions of the world outside it; changes in outside political,
-intellectual and social life necessarily made themselves felt in the
-convent. Consequent upon the spread of the feudal system of land tenure,
-which in the interest of an improved military organisation reserved the
-holding of property for men, women forfeited their chance of founding and
-endowing independent monasteries, and the houses founded after the
-monastic revival never attained a position comparable with that of those
-dating from the earlier period. As monasteries were theoretically safe
-against infringement of their privileges by prince or bishop owing to
-their connection with Rome, the relation of the Pope to temporal rulers
-and to the greater ecclesiastics directly affected them, and when the
-power of the Pope was relaxed they were at the mercy of prince and bishop.
-We have seen how kings of England appropriated alien priories, and how
-wilfully princes abroad curtailed the privileges of nunneries, the support
-of their prelates giving countenance to these changes. At a later period a
-considerable number of women's convents were interfered with by churchmen,
-who on the plea of instituting reforms took advantage of their position to
-appropriate the convent property.
-
-A change of a different kind which affected the convent in its educational
-and intellectual standing was the growth of university centres, and the
-increased facilities afforded to the student of visiting different centres
-in succession. In the 9th century Bede who never stirred from his convent
-might attain intellectual excellence; such a course was impossible in the
-13th and 14th centuries when the centre of education lay in the
-disputations which animated the lecture room. Some of the progressive
-monasteries of men lessened the loss they felt by securing a house at the
-university to which they sent their more promising pupils, but the tone at
-the mediaeval university was such that one cannot wonder that no attempt
-was made in this direction by the convents of women. As a natural result
-their intellectual standard for a time remained stationary, and then,
-especially in the smaller and remoter settlements, it fell. This led to a
-want of interest in intellectual acquirements among nuns, and it was
-accompanied by a growing indifference in the outside world to the
-intellectual acquirements of women generally.
-
-Not that the desire to maintain a high standard had passed away from
-women's convents. The readiness with which many houses adopted the chance
-of betterment held out to them by the congregations of the 15th century,
-goes far to prove that nuns continued to identify the idea of salvation
-with a high moral tone and an application to study. But study now ran
-along a narrow groove, for the monastic reformers favoured devotional
-study only. The nuns, who were impressed by the excellence of the
-reformers' motives, and prevented by circumstances from forming opinions
-of their own in the matter, showed an increasing readiness to adopt their
-views. The friars led the way in this direction by cutting off the nuns,
-given into their care, from the management of outside affairs; they were
-followed by the order of Sion, and by the congregations of Bursfeld and
-Windesheim, all of which alike urged that the primary duty of a nun was
-sanctification of self. The interest of this movement lies in the
-voluminous devotional literature it called forth, a literature full of
-spiritual beauty, but in the production of which nuns, so far as we know,
-took no share. By writing out oral sermons they helped, however, to
-preserve and spread them. The change which had come over the convent life
-of women cramped rather than stimulated their intellectual vitality, and
-the system of which they made part was apparently beyond their control.
-The author of 'Holy Maidenhood' in the 13th century called the nun the
-free woman, and contrasted her with the wife who in his eyes was the
-slave. But Erasmus at the beginning of the 16th century urged that the
-woman who joined the convent by doing so became a slave, while she who
-remained outside was truly free. Erasmus also insisted on the fact that
-there was no reason why a woman should enter a convent, as she might as
-well stay in the world and remain unmarried if she so preferred. In point
-of fact social conditions had so far changed that society no longer called
-to the Church for protection of its daughters. For a time the convent
-ranked high as an educational establishment; then this use began to pass
-away also, and it was largely on account of the provision religious houses
-made for unmarried women that they still continued in favour with a
-portion of the community.
-
-Many historians have advocated the view that the Protestant reformers
-discovered the abuses of the monastic system, and finding these
-intolerable, swept the whole system away. The evidence adduced above in
-connection with the dissolution shows that matters were far otherwise,
-that the dissolution of convents was accompanied by many regrettable
-incidents, and that as far as England is concerned, it may confidently be
-called premature. For many years those who sought progress by peaceful
-educational means seemed to be confronted only by hopeless and sanguinary
-confusion; they passed away with the belief that the whole movement they
-had witnessed was opposed to real progress, holding the view that the
-Protestants were innovators of the worst and most dangerous kind.
-
-However, as far as convents are concerned, it seems as though the
-Protestant reformers, far from acting as innovators, had done no more than
-give violent and extreme application to forces which had for some time
-been at work. The dissolution was led up to by a succession of conventual
-changes, and before the outbreak of the Lutheran agitation, at least one
-well-wisher of the system in Germany, Tritheim, had despaired of putting
-this system to new and effective uses. Not that monasticism can be said to
-have generally outlived its purposes at the time of the Reformation. In
-some countries, as in France and Spain, it subsequently chronicled
-important developments. But where German elements were prevalent, convents
-were either swept away, or put to altogether different uses by the
-Protestants, or else allowed to continue on a very much narrowed basis by
-the Catholics. Many convents fell utterly to decay in course of time and
-ceased to exist at the beginning of this century, others again still
-linger on but are mere shadows of their former brilliant selves.
-
-The reason for these changes lay not altogether with those who professed
-religion in convents, they were part of a wider change which remoulded
-society on an altered basis. For the system of association, the groundwork
-of mediaeval strength and achievement, was altogether giving way at the
-time of the Reformation. The socialistic temper was superseded by
-individualistic tendencies which were opposed to the prerogatives
-conferred on the older associations. These tendencies have continued to
-the present with slight abatements, and have throughout proved averse to
-the continuation of monasticism which attained greatness through the
-spirit of association.
-
-Repelled through the violence and aggressiveness of the reformers, and
-provoked by the narrowness of Protestantism generally, some modern writers
-take the view that the Reformation was throughout opposed to real
-progress, and that mankind would have been richer had the reformers left
-undisturbed many of the institutions they destroyed. The revenues of these
-institutions would now have been at the disposal of those who would put
-them to public and not to personal uses. As far as convents, especially
-those of women, are concerned, I cannot but feel sceptical on both
-points. Granting even that these houses had been undisturbed, a
-possibility difficult to imagine, experience proves that it is hardly
-likely they could now be used to secure advantages such as they gave to
-women in the past. Certainly it is not in those districts where women's
-convents have lived on, securing economic independence to unmarried women
-as in North Germany, nor where they have lingered on along old lines as in
-Bavaria, that the wish for an improved education has arisen among women in
-modern times, nor does it seem at all likely that their revenues will ever
-be granted for such an object. It is in those countries where the change
-in social conditions has been most complete, and where women for a time
-entirely forfeited all the advantages which a higher education brings, and
-which were secured in so great a measure to women by convents in the past,
-that the modern movement for women's education has arisen.
-
-
-
-
-APPENDIX
-
-(to accompany p. 253).
-
-
-RHYTHMUS HERRADIS ABATISSAE PER QUEM HOHENBURGENSES VIRGUNCULAS AMABILITER
-SALUTAT ET AD VERI SPONSI FIDEM DILECTIONEMQUE SALUBRITER INVITAT.
-
-  Salve cohors virginum
-  Hohenburgiensium,
-  Albens quasi lilium
-  Amans dei filium.
-
-  Herrat devotissima,
-  Tua fidelissima,
-  Mater et ancillula,
-  Cantat tibi cantica.
-
-  Te salutat millies
-  Et exoptat indies,
-  Ut laeta victoria
-  Vincas transitoria.
-
-  O multorum speculum,
-  Sperne, sperne seculum,
-  Virtutes accumula,
-  Veri sponsi turmula.
-
-  Insistas luctamine,
-  Diros hostes sternere,
-  Te rex regum adjuvat,
-  Quia te desiderat.
-
-  Ipse tuum animum
-  Firmat contra Zabulum.
-  Ipse post victoriam
-  Dabit regni gloriam.
-
-  Te decent deliciae,
-  Debentur divitiae,
-  Tibi coeli curia,
-  Servat bona plurima.
-
-  Christus parat nuptias
-  Miras per delicias,
-  Hunc expectes principem
-  Te servando virginem.
-
-  Interim monilia
-  Circum des nobilia,
-  Et exornes faciem
-  Mentis purgans aciem.
-
-  Christus odit maculas,
-  Rugas spernit vetulas,
-  Pulchras vult virgunculas,
-  Turpes pellit feminas.
-
-  Fide cum turturea
-  Sponsum istum reclama,
-  Ut tua formositas
-  Fiat perpes claritas.
-
-  Vivens sine fraudibus
-  Es monenda laudibus,
-  Ut consummes optima
-  Tua gradus opera.
-
-  Ne vacilles dubia
-  Inter mundi flumina,
-  Verax deus praemia
-  Spondet post pericula.
-
-  Patere nunc aspera
-  Mundi spernens prospera.
-  Nunc sis crucis socia,
-  Regni consors postea.
-
-  Per hoc mare naviga,
-  Sanctitate gravida,
-  Dum de navi exeas
-  Sion sanctam teneas.
-
-  Sion turris coelica
-  Bella tenens atria,
-  Tibi fiat statio,
-  Acto vitae spatio.
-
-  Ibi rex virgineus
-  Et Mariae filius
-  Amplectens te reclamet
-  A moerore relevet.
-
-  Parvi pendens omnia
-  Tentatoris jocula,
-  Tunc gaudebis pleniter
-  Jubilando suaviter.
-
-  Stella maris fulgida,
-  Virgo mater unica,
-  Te conjugat filio
-  Foedere perpetuo.
-
-  Et me tecum trahere
-  Non cesses praecamine,
-  Ad sponsum dulcissimum
-  Virginalem filium.
-
-  Ut tuae victoriae,
-  Tuae magnae gloriae,
-  Particeps inveniat
-  De terrenis eruat.
-
-  Vale casta concio,
-  Mea jubilatio,
-  Vivas sine crimine,
-  Christum semper dilige.
-
-  Sit hic liber utilis,
-  Tibi delectabilis
-  Et non cesses volvere
-  Hunc in tuo pectore.
-
-  Ne more struthineo
-  Surrepat oblivio,
-  Et ne viam deseras
-  Antequam provenias.
-
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen
-  Amen Amen Amen.
-
-
-
-
-INDEX.
-
-
-The women here designated as saints are either included in the _Acta
-Sanctorum Bollandorum_, or else, this work waiting completion, are entered
-as saints in the 'Table Hagiographique' of Guerin, _Les Petits
-Bollandistes_, 1882, vol. 17.
-
-  abbess, position of, 87, 152, 203, 365 ff., 388
-
-  Abra, St, 14
-
-  Achachildis or Atzin, 34
-
-  Adela, 40, _see_ Adolana
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Gandersheim, 273
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Nivelles, 152 footnote
-
-  Adelheid, abbess at Quedlinburg, 152
-
-  Adelheid Helchen, abbess at Oberwerth, 421
-
-  Adelitia, nun, 213
-
-  Adeliz, abbess at Winchester, 210
-
-  Admunt, convent at, 237
-
-  Adolana, St, abbess at Pfaelzel, 124
-
-  Aebbe, St, abbess at Coldingham, 97, 101-103
-
-  Aebbe, mother of Lioba, 134
-
-  Aelfgifu or Emma, queen, makes a gift of hangings, 226
-
-  Aelflaed, abbess at Whitby, 90, 93, 94, 103-106, 124, 126, 225
-
-  Aelflaed, queen, makes a gift of hangings, 226
-
-  Aelfthrith, abbess at Repton, 108
-
-  Aethelburg, St, abbess at Barking, 111, 112
-
-  Aethelburg St, or Aubierge, abbess at Brie, 78
-
-  Aethelburg, abbess (at Hackness?), 94, 106
-
-  Aethelburg, queen, founds a convent at Liming, 84
-
-  Aetheldritha, abbess at Southminstre in Thanet, 87
-
-  Aethelthrith, St, or Etheldred or Awdry, 96-99, 101, 225
-
-  Aette, abbess at Folkestone, 87
-
-  Afra, St, of Augsburg, 31, 32-33
-
-  Afra von Velseck, nun, 425 ff.
-
-  Agatha, St, of Catania, 16, 17, 141
-
-  Agilbert, St, 76
-
-  Agius, interested in nuns, 154, 155, 157-159
-
-  Agnes, St, of Rome, 18, 167, 314, 327
-
-  Agnes, St, abbess at Poitiers, 52, 55-65
-
-  Agnes, St, princess of Bohemia, 293, 296-297, 298
-
-  Agnes, abbess at Quedlinburg, 233, 234
-
-  Agnes Ferrar, abbess at Shaftesbury, 365
-
-  Agnes Litherland, prioress at Gracedieu, 449
-
-  Agnes Merrett, cellaress at Sion, 393
-
-  Agnes Seyntel, prioress at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Agnes Terry, prioress at Catesby, 369
-
-  Ailred, his connection with nuns, 215, 218, 313-314, 321, 325
-
-  Alburgh or Aethelburgh, convent of St, _see_ Barking
-
-  Alena, St, 26
-
-  Aleydis, lay sister at Bronope, 419
-
-  Aleydis Ruyskop, nun at Rolandswerth, 428
-
-  Alice Fitzherbert, abbess at Polesworth, 447
-
-  Alice Henley, abbess at Godstow, 360
-
-  Alice Wafer, prioress at Pree, 410
-
-  alien priories, their number and appropriation, 386-387
-
-  Altwick, convent at, 273
-
-  Alwid, embroideress, 226
-
-  Amalberga, St, 23
-
-  Ambrosius, bishop of Milan, on Virginity, 14,
-    on St Agnes, 167
-
-  Amesbury, convent at, 194, 201, 203, 205, 454
-
-  ancre, defined, 312
-
-  'Ancren Riwle,' 311-325, 357
-
-  Angiltrud, nun, 138
-
-  Ankerwyke, convent at, 357, 443
-
-  Anna, duchess of Silesia, 295-296, 298
-
-  Anne Boleyn, intends to retire to a nunnery, 437
-
-  Anne Seton, prioress at Chatteris, 449
-
-  anonymous nun, author of 'Hodoeporicon' etc., 139 ff.
-
-  Anselm, archbishop of Canterbury, in connection with women, 184, 208-211
-
-  Anselma, nun, 213
-
-  Ansterbert, St, or Austreberta, 76
-
-  Anstrud, St, or Austrudis, 77
-
-  Apollonia Tucher, nun at Nuernberg, 460
-
-  Arles, convent at, 48-50, 52, 56, 226
-
-  armarium or bookcase, 216, 223
-
-  Armengard von Rheden, abbess at Fischbeck, 418
-
-  Atzin or Achachildis, 34
-
-  Augustine, rule of St, 196
-
-  Augustine, canons of, _see_ Austin or Black
-
-  Aurea, St, 76
-
-  Austreberta, _see_ Ansterbert
-
-  Austin or Black canons, 186, 196, 197, 209
-
-  Austin canonesses, 150, 197, 364, 371, 420
-
-  Austrudis, _see_ Anstrud
-
-  Awdry, _see_ Aethelthrith
-
-
-  Balbine, St, 30
-
-  Balthild, St, 71, 73, 74-78
-
-  Bamberg, convent of St Clara at, 459
-
-  Barbara Dalberg, nun at Marienberg, 429
-
-  Barbara Schoendorfer, abbess at Sonnenburg, 427
-
-  Barking, convent at, 111, 112, 113, 116, 121, 201, 203, 358, 363, 372,
-        377, 378, 443, 455
-
-  Basina, nun at Poitiers, 65, 67-69
-
-  Baudonivia, nun at Poitiers, 46, 52, 65
-
-  Bega, St, 89
-
-  Begu, nun at Hackness, 89, 93
-
-  beguine, defined, 331
-
-  Benedict, St, rule of, 50, 73, 74, 77, 186, 198, 215;
-    Anglo-Saxon version of, 312;
-    rhymed version of, 358 ff.
-
-  Benedictine nunneries, number of, in England, 204, 364
-
-  Bergen, convent at, 204, 460, 474
-
-  Berkley on Severn, convent at, 202
-
-  Berlindis, St, 26, 27, 31
-
-  Bernard of Clairvaux, 190, 258, 260
-
-  Berthegund, 69-70
-
-  Berthgit, nun, 139, also footnote
-
-  Berthild, St, or Bertilia, abbess at Chelles, 77
-
-  Bilihild, St, 29
-
-  Bingen, convent at, 263 ff.
-
-  Bischofsheim, convent at, 136, 137, 138
-
-  Bona, 211
-
-  Boniface, his correspondence with women, 118-142, 225, 232
-
-  Bourges, convent at, 230
-
-  Breslau, convent of St Clara at, 295
-
-  Bridget, St, of Ireland, 14 footnote
-
-  Bridget, St, of Sweden, 383 ff.
-
-  Bridget Belgrave, chambress at Sion, 392
-
-  Brie or Faremoutiers, convent at, 76, 77
-
-  Brixen, convent of St Clara at, 424, 459
-
-  Bromhall, convent at, 369, 436
-
-  Bronope, convent at, 418
-
-  Brunshausen, convent at, 155
-
-  Brusyard, convent at, 447
-
-  Buckland, convent at, 365
-
-  Bugga, correspondent of Boniface, 131-133
-
-  Bugga, daughter of King Centwin, 113
-
-  Bugga or Heaburg, 131
-
-  Burngith, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Bursfeld, congregation of, 415
-
-  Busch, reformer of nunneries, 417 ff.
-
-  Butzbach, his correspondence with nuns, 428
-
-
-  Caesaria, St, abbess at Arles, 48, 52, 56
-
-  Caesaria II, abbess at Arles, 56
-
-  Caesarius, St, rule of, 48-50, 226
-
-  Cambridge, convent of St Radegund at, 367, 380, 435 and footnote
-
-  cameraria, _see_ chambress
-
-  Campsey, convent at, 360, 376, 377, 378
-
-  Cangith, 128 footnote
-
-  Canonlegh, _see_ Legh
-
-  cantarista, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Canterbury, convent of St Sepulchre at, 403, 439
-
-  capellanissa, _see_ chaplain
-
-  Carrow, convent at, 378
-
-  Catesby, convent at, 368-369, 447-448
-
-  Cathari, 273, 281
-
-  Catherine de la Pole, abbess at Barking, 378
-
-  Cecil Bodman, abbess at Wilton, 438 footnote, 441
-
-  Cecilia, St, legend of, in English, 326
-
-  cellaress or celleraria, office of, 216, 368, 371 ff., 393
-
-  celleraria, _see_ cellaress
-
-  Celtes, his connection with nuns, 183, 461 ff.
-
-  chambress or cameraria, office of, 378, 392
-
-  Charitas Pirckheimer, abbess at Nuernberg, 458 ff.
-
-  Chartreuse, order of, 186, 199
-
-  chaplain, female, or capellanissa, office of, 376-378
-
-  Chatteris, convent at, 381, 401, 449
-
-  Chaucer on nuns, 361, 362
-
-  Chelles or Cala, convent at, 75, 77, 78, 82, 86
-
-  Chester, convent of St Mary at, 448
-
-  Chicksand, convent at, 445
-
-  Chlotildis, 41
-
-  Christiane, St, 25, 29
-
-  Christina, nun, 213
-
-  Christina, nun at Romsey, 207, 208
-
-  Christina, prioress at Mergate, 227
-
-  Christina Basset, prioress at St Mary Pree, 365, 410
-
-  Christine, abbess at Gandersheim, 159
-
-  Christine Stroelin, abbess at Soeflingen, 422
-
-  Chrodield, nun at Poitiers, 50, 66-69, 226
-
-  Chrothild, St, queen, 51
-
-  Chunigundis, abbess at Goess, 235
-
-  Chunihild, nun, 138, 139 footnote
-
-  Chunitrud, nun, 139
-
-  Citeaux, order of, 186, 189-192
-
-  Cistercian nunneries, number of, in England, 363
-
-  Clara, St, of Assisi, 296
-
-  Clara, St, convent of, at Brixen, Nuernberg, etc., _see_ Brixen,
-        Nuernberg, etc.
-
-  Clara Gundelfingen, abbess at Nuernberg, 459
-
-  Clara Pirckheimer, nun at Nuernberg, 459 ff.
-
-  Clares, Poor, or Nuns Minoresses, 364
-
-  Clemence, nun at Barking, 357
-
-  Clement, St, convent of, at York, _see_ York
-
-  Clugni, order of, 186, 187-189
-
-  Clugniac nunneries, number of, in England, 363
-
-  Coldingham, convent at, 97, 101, 102
-
-  Coeln, convent of St Maria at, 152 footnote, 421
-
-  Columban, St, rule of, 72, 73, 77
-
-  consecration of nuns, 380
-
-  Cordula, St, 283
-
-  Crabhouse, convent at, 358
-
-  Cunera, St, 21, 29, 43
-
-  Cusanus, as monastic reformer, 416, 422 ff.
-
-  Cuthberht, his connection with abbesses, 102-105, 225
-
-  Cuthburg, St, of Wimbourne, 106, 113, 116
-
-  Cuthburg, suffering torments in hell, 121
-
-  Cwenburg, St, of Wimbourne, 116
-
-  Cwenburg, nun at Watton, 91
-
-  Cyneburg, St, of Castor, 106, 107
-
-  Cynehild, nun, 135
-
-  Cyneswith, St, of Castor, 107
-
-  Cynethrith, abbess, 225
-
-
-  Davington, convent at, 357, 380
-
-  Delapray, convent at, 447
-
-  Dennis, convent at, 449, 450
-
-  Derneburg, convent at, 417, 420
-
-  Didimia, abbess at Poitiers, 65
-
-  Diemud, scribe, 236-237
-
-  Disibodenberg, nuns' convent attached to, 262
-
-  Dollendis, _see_ Rolendis
-
-  Dominican friars, abroad, 291, 295, 332;
-    in England, 309
-
-  Dominican nuns, 364
-
-  Dominican nunneries, number of, in England, 364
-
-  Dorothy Barley, abbess at Barking, 455
-
-  Dorstad, convent at, 418
-
-
-  Eadburg, abbess at Thanet, 120, 121, 122, 123, 225
-
-  Eadburga, 84
-
-  Eadgifu, abbess at Leominster, 202
-
-  Eadgith, nun at Barking, 112
-
-  Ealdgith, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Ealdhelm, interested in nuns, 112-115, 172, 226
-
-  Eangith, correspondent of Boniface, 118, 128-131
-
-  Eanswith, St, of Folkestone, 83
-
-  Earcongotha, St, 78, 85
-
-  Easebourne, convent at, 360, 366, 376, 403, 404-406
-
-  Easington, convent at, 93
-
-  East Dereham, convent at, 96
-
-  ebdomary, office of, 390
-
-  Ebsdorf, convent at, 236
-
-  Ecgburg, abbess at Repton, 109, 126
-
-  Edelind, abbess at Niedermuenster, 241
-
-  Edigna, St, 27
-
-  Edward's, St, convent of, at Shaftesbury, _see_ Shaftesbury
-
-  Eger, convent of St Clara at, 466
-
-  Eichstaett, convent of St Walburg at, 421
-
-  Einbeth or Einbetta, St, 40
-
-  Eleanor, queen, takes the veil at Amesbury, 201
-
-  elemosinaria, office of, 378
-
-  Elisabeth, St, of Thueringen and Hungary, 285, 295, 298-304
-
-  Elisabeth, St, nun at Schoenau, 257, 277-285, 429
-
-  Elisabeth Krelin, abbess at Heggbach, 421
-
-  Elisabeth von Mansfeld, nun at Helfta, 329
-
-  Elisabeth von Seckendorf, abbess at Eichstaett, 421
-
-  Elizabeth Barton, 439
-
-  Elizabeth Shelley, abbess at Winchester, 448, 449, 454, 455
-
-  Elizabeth Zouche, abbess at Shaftesbury, 455
-
-  Elizabeth Throgmerton, abbess at Dennis, 450
-
-  Elizabeth Walton, nun at Cambridge, 367, 368
-
-  Elizabeth Webb, prioress at Sopwell, 410
-
-  Ellandune, convent at, _see_ Wilton
-
-  Elstow, convent at, 204 footnote, 377
-
-  Ely, convent at, 95-106, 202, 225, 226
-
-  embroidery done by nuns, 224 ff.
-
-  Engelthal, convent at, 471
-
-  Eormenhild, St, abbess at Sheppey and Ely, 100
-
-  Erasmus, on canons, 195,
-    on the position of women, 429 ff.
-
-  Erfurt, convent at, 236
-
-  eruditrix, office of, 379
-
-  Essen, convent at, 148, 149, 151, 232
-
-  Ethel-, _see_ under Aethel-
-
-  Eufemia, abbess at Winchester, 366
-
-  Eulalia, abbess at Shaftesbury, 210
-
-  Eulalia, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Euphemia Pirckheimer, abbess at Bergen, 460
-
-  Eustadiola, St, abbess at Bourges, 230
-
-  Eutropia, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Eva, recluse, 211
-
-  Everhild, St, 111
-
-  'Exercitia Spiritualia,' by St Gertrud, 351 ff.
-
-  'Explanatio regulae St Benedicti,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-  'Explanatio symboli St Athanasii,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-  'Expositiones Evangeliorum,' by St Hildegard, 270
-
-
-  Fara, St, abbess at Brie, 76
-
-  Faremoutiers, convent at, _see_ Brie
-
-  Fecamp, convent at, 77
-
-  Felicitas Grundherrin, nun at Nuernberg, 460, 471
-
-  Fischbeck, convent at, 418
-
-  'Fliessende, das, Licht der Gottheit,' by Mechthild, 332 ff.
-
-  Flixton, convent at, 369, 377
-
-  Florence Bannerman, abbess at Amesbury, 454
-
-  Folkestone, convent at, 83, 87
-
-  Fontevraud, order of, 193-194, 205
-
-  Fortunatus, his connection with nuns, 58-64
-
-  Framehild, St, 76
-
-  Francis, St, of Assisi, 285, 291, 296, 301, 364
-
-  Franciscan friars and nuns, 291, 295, 302, 309, 364, 422
-
-  Frankenberg, convent at, 418
-
-  French, use of, in convents, 357 ff.
-
-  Frideswith, St, of Oxford, 110
-
-  Frigith, nun at Hackness, 93
-
-  Fuller, on nunneries, 457
-
-
-  Gandersheim, convent at, 148, 151, 152, 154 ff.
-
-  Gehulff, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Geiler, as a reformer of convents, 428
-
-  Geisenfeld, convent at, 460
-
-  Genevieve, St, of Paris, 26, 43, 51
-
-  Genovefa, 26
-
-  Georg, St, convent of, at Halle, _see_ Halle
-
-  Gerald Barri, on monasticism, 199
-
-  Gerberg I, abbess at Gandersheim, 159
-
-  Gerberg II, abbess at Gandersheim, 151, 153, 160, 162, 163, 166, 167,
-        182
-
-  Germana, St, 25, 29
-
-  Gertrud, St, nun at Helfta, 329, 346 ff.
-
-  Gertrud, St, of Nivelles, 7, 23
-
-  Gertrud, 26
-
-  Gertrud, abbess at Helfta, 329
-
-  Gertrud, abbess at Trebnitz, 293, 295, 296
-
-  Gertrud von Buechel, nun at Rolandswerth, 429
-
-  Gilbert of Sempringham, St, order of, 186, 213-221
-
-  Gisela, 147
-
-  Gisela, queen of Hungary, 233
-
-  Gisleberga, St, 43
-
-  Godam Hampton, nun at Barking, 366
-
-  Godeleva, St, or Godeleina, 24, 25, 29, 30
-
-  Godstow, convent at, 204 footnote, 206, 357, 360, 400, 447, 453
-
-  Goess, convent at, 235
-
-  Gracedieu, convent at, 449
-
-  Grandmont, order of, 186, 199
-
-  Gredanna von Freyberg, abbess at Urspring, 421
-
-  Gregory of Tours, his connection with nuns, 51 ff.
-
-  Gudila, St, 23
-
-  Gunthild, St, 7, 27, 35, 139 footnote
-
-  Guthlac, his connection with nuns, 108-110, 225
-
-  Gutta, scribe, 237
-
-
-  Hackness, convent at, 93, 94, 106
-
-  Hadewy, abbess at Herford, 147
-
-  'Hali Meidenhad,' 326-328
-
-  Halle, convent of St Georg at, 418
-
-  Hanbury, convent at, 100
-
-  Harwold, convent at, 446
-
-  Hartlepool, convent at, 88, 89, 90, 94
-
-  Hathumod, abbess at Gandersheim, 149, 154-159
-
-  Heaburg, called Bugga, nun, 128, 131
-
-  Hedwig, St, of Silesia, 291 ff., 298, 299
-
-  Hedwig, abbess at Neuss, 152 footnote
-
-  Hedwig, duchess of Swabia, 162, 233
-
-  Heggbach, convent at, 421
-
-  Heiningen, convent at, 236, 418, 419
-
-  Heiu, abbess at Hartlepool, 88, 89
-
-  Helen, St, 114
-
-  Helen, St, convent of, in London, _see_ London
-
-  Helena von Iltzen, prioress at Marienberg, 418
-
-  Helena Meichnerin, abbess at Nuernberg, 463
-
-  Helfta, convent at, 328 ff.
-
-  Hereswith, St, 78, 82, 96, 97
-
-  Hereswytha, abbess at Sheppey, 87
-
-  Herford, convent at, 147, 148, 149, 155
-
-  Heriburg, abbess at Watton, 91
-
-  Herlind, St, abbess at Maaseyck, 230-232
-
-  Hersende, abbess at Fontevraud, 194
-
-  Heyninges, convent of St Mary at, 449
-
-  Hidburg, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Hilarius, verses on recluses, 211
-
-  Hild, St, of Whitby, 82, 89 ff., 96
-
-  Hildegard, St, of Bingen, 256 ff., 429
-
-  Hildelith, St, abbess at Barking, 112, 113, 121
-
-  Hildemarque, 77
-
-  Hilp, 11, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  'Hodoeporicon' by anonymous nun, 139 ff.
-
-  Hohenburg, convent at, 22, 24, 238 ff.
-
-  'Hortus Deliciarum,' by Herrad, 238 ff.
-
-  Hrotsvith, abbess at Gandersheim, 160
-
-  Hrotsvith, nun at Gandersheim, 143, 153, 154-183, 429
-
-
-  Ida, St, ancestress of Liudolfings, 23 footnote
-
-  Ida, abbess at St Maria (on the Muenzenberg?), 152 footnote
-
-  Ida, ancestress of Karlings, 23
-
-  Ida, nun at Bronope, 419
-
-  Ida, nun at Gandersheim, 151, 152 footnote
-
-  Idonea, nun, 212
-
-  Iduberga, 43
-
-  Idung, on nuns, 198
-
-  infirmaria, 378
-
-  Ingetrud, abbess at Tours, 51, 58, 69, 70
-
-  Inthware or Iuthware, 30
-
-  Irmina, St, 40
-
-  Isabel Jordan, abbess at Wilton, 438
-
-  Isengard von Greiffenklau, 421
-
-  Itta, 43
-
-
-  Jane Gowryng, 443
-
-  Jane Messyndyne, 447
-
-  Joan Ashcomb, nun at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Joan Chapell, prioress at Sopwell, 410
-
-  Joan Darrell, abbess at Amesbury, 454
-
-  Joan Formage, abbess at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Joan Lancaster, prioress at Cambridge, 367, 368
-
-  Joan Sandford, prioress at Heyninges, 449
-
-  Joan Rawlins, prioress at Bromhall, 436
-
-  Johan or Jane Arundell, abbess at Legh, 368
-
-  Johanna de Northampton, prioress at Catesby, 368
-
-  John of Salisbury, on monks and nuns, 200, 201
-
-  Jouarre, convent at, 76
-
-  Joyce Bykeley, prioress at Catesby, 448
-
-  Juliana, St, legend of, 326, 327
-
-  Juliana, prioress at Bromhall, 369
-
-  Juliana Baucyn, abbess at Shaftesbury, 365
-
-  Justina, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Juthware, _see_ Inthware
-
-  Jutta, St, 338
-
-  Jutta, 'magistra,' at Disibodenberg, 262
-
-
-  Katharina Pirckheimer, prioress at Geisenfeld, 460
-
-  Katharine, St, life of, by Clemence of Barking, 357
-
-  Katherine Babington, nun at Campsey, 360
-
-  Katherine Bulkeley, abbess at Godstow, 453
-
-  Katherine Sayntlow, nun at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Katheryne Wyngate, nun at Elstow, 377
-
-  Kilburn, convent at, 206, 360, 376
-
-  Kirkless, convent at, 452, 453
-
-  kitchener or cook, office of, 216, 375
-
-  Kizzingen, convent at, 138, 273, 292, 293, 303
-
-  Kleinfrankenthal, convent at, 420
-
-  Krischmerge, 41
-
-  Kuemmerniss, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Kunigund, St, empress, 232
-
-  Kunigundis, St, 40
-
-
-  'Land of Cockayne,' 411
-
-  Langendorf, convent at, 415
-
-  Langland, on nuns, 406
-
-  Laon, convent at, 77
-
-  Las Huelgas, convent at, 191
-
-  Laycock, convent at, 441, 448
-
-  leader of the choir or precentrix, succentrix, cantarista, 216, 368,
-        378, 391
-
-  'Legatus Divinae Pietatis,' by St Gertrud, 348 ff.
-
-  Legbourne, convent at, 446
-
-  Legh, convent of, or Canonlegh or Minchenlegh, 358, 368
-
-  legister or reader, office of, 391
-
-  Leobgith, _see_ Lioba
-
-  Leominster, convent at, 202
-
-  Leonard, St, convent of, _see_ Stratford
-
-  Leubover, abbess at Poitiers, 65 ff., 226
-
-  Leukardis, scribe, 237
-
-  Liberata, St, or Liberatrix, 35, 37, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Lillechurch, convent at, 212, 436
-
-  Liming, convent at, 84, 87
-
-  Lindesay on convent life, 456
-
-  Linthildis, _see_ Lufthildis
-
-  Lioba, St, 117, 134 ff.
-
-  Littlemore, convent at, 437
-
-  Little Marlow, convent at, 442
-
-  Liutberg, recluse, 147
-
-  Livrade, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Liwid, embroideress, 226
-
-  London, convent of Poor Clares, or Minories, 364
-
-  London, convent of St Helen in, 378
-
-  Lucia, abbess at Shaftesbury, 366
-
-  Lucie, St, of Sampigny, 25
-
-  Lufthildis, St, 25, 26, 42
-
-  Lul, his correspondence with nuns, 134, 137, 138
-
-  Luene, convent at, 236
-
-  'Luve Ron,' 310
-
-
-  Maaseyck, convent at, 231-232
-
-  magistra noviciarum, _see_ mistress of the novices
-
-  Mallersdorf, convent at, 237
-
-  Malling, convent at, 204 footnote, 363, 380, 443 footnote
-
-  Margaret, St, legend of, 326
-
-  Margaret, St, queen of Scotland, 207-208, 289
-
-  Margaret Punder, prioress at Flixton, 369
-
-  Margaret Tewkesbury, abbess at Delapray, 447
-
-  Margaret Vernon, prioress at Little Marlow, 443
-
-  Maria, St, convent of, at Coeln etc., _see_ Coeln etc.
-
-  Mariahilf, 11, 35
-
-  Mariasif, 11
-
-  Marienberg, convent at, in Saxony, 418-419
-
-  Marienberg, convent at, near Trier, 421
-
-  Marienborn, convent at, 420
-
-  Mariensee, convent at, 417
-
-  Marricks, convent of St Andrew, 449, 456
-
-  Mary, St, the Virgin, 9, 10, 11
-
-  Mary and Martha, as types of activity, 305, 314, 324, 325
-
-  Mary, St, convent of, at Chester etc., _see_ Chester etc.
-
-  Mary, daughter of St Margaret, 207, 209
-
-  Mary of Blois, abbess at Romsey, 201, 212
-
-  Mathea Fabyan, nun at Barking, 377
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Essen, 151, 232
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Kizzingen, 292, 303
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Quedlinburg, 149, 151, 153, 232
-
-  Mathilde, abbess at Villich, 152 footnote
-
-  Matilda, abbess at Amesbury, 201
-
-  Matilda, abbess at Winchester, 210
-
-  Matilda, queen, 207 ff., 289 ff., 298
-
-  Matilda Sudbury, nun at Cambridge, 367
-
-  Maxima, abbess, 113
-
-  Mechthild, 7
-
-  Mechthild, beguine, 305, 329, 330, 331-340
-
-  Mechthild, nun at Helfta, 329, 330, 340-346
-
-  Mechthild von Wippra, nun, 329
-
-  Mechtund, St, 40
-
-  Mergate, convent at, 227
-
-  Mildburg, St, of Wenlock, 85, 121
-
-  Mildgith, St, 85
-
-  Mildthrith, St, of Thanet, 85-86
-
-  Minories, _see_ London, convent of Poor Clares
-
-  Minstre in Thanet, _see_ Thanet
-
-  mistress of the novices, magistra noviciarum, 217, 378
-
-  Modwen, St, 111 and footnote, 446 footnote
-
-  Montreuil-les-Dames, convent at, 191
-
-  Muenich, convent of St Clara at, 460
-
-  Muenzenberg, convent of St Maria on the, 152 footnote
-
-  mynchyn, use of word, 364 footnote, 368, 454
-
-
-  Neuss, convent at, 152 footnote
-
-  Neuwerk, convent at Erfurt, 418
-
-  Nider, on nuns, 459
-
-  Niedermuenster, convent, 241
-
-  Nigel Wirecker on monks and nuns, 200
-
-  Nivelles, convent at, 152 footnote
-
-  Norbert, St, order of, _see_ Premontre
-
-  Notburg, St, 34
-
-  Notburg, St, or Nuppurg, 26
-
-  Notburg, 24
-
-  Nunappleton, convent at, 452, 453
-
-  Nun-Cotham, convent at, 207 footnote
-
-  Nun-Kelyng, convent at, 453
-
-  Nun-Monkton, convent at, 357
-
-  Nunnaminster, _see_ Winchester, convent of St Mary at
-
-
-  Odilia, St, 22, 24, 240, 251
-
-  Ontkommer or Wilgefortis, St, 35-38, 43
-
-  'opus anglicum,' 228
-
-  'Order of Fair Ease,' on religious orders, 201
-
-  Osburg, 111 and footnote
-
-  Osburg, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Osgith, 113 footnote
-
-  Osith, St, 110
-
-  Oswen, St, or Osman, 30
-
-  Oxenfurt, convent at, 138
-
-
-  Paris, convent at, 51, 76
-
-  Paula, St, of Avila, 36 footnote
-
-  Pavilly, convent at, 76
-
-  Pega, St, 109, 110
-
-  Pellmerge, 41
-
-  Peter of Blois, corresponding with nuns, 213
-
-  Petronille, abbess at Fontevraud, 194
-
-  Pfaelzel or Palatiolum, convent at, 124
-
-  Pharaildis, St, 21, 22, 23, 27 footnote, 30, 34
-
-  Pietrussa, abbess at Trebnitz, 293, 295
-
-  Pillenreuth, convent at, 471
-
-  Poitiers, convent at, 51 ff.
-
-  Polesworth, convent at, 447
-
-  Pollesloe, convent at, 448
-
-  portress, office of, 217
-
-  Prague, convent of St Clara at, 296
-
-  precentrix, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Pree, convent of St Mary, 366, 408, 410
-
-  Premontre, order of, 186, 193-194
-
-  prioress, position and office of, 204, 216, 370 ff.
-
-  profession and consecration of nuns, 379-380
-
-  Pusinna, St, 147
-
-
-  Quedlinburg, convent, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 232, 233
-
-
-  Radegund, St, of Poitiers, 45, 51-65, 225
-
-  Radegund, St, or Radiane, 27, 29, 34, 35
-
-  Radegund, St, convent of, _see_ Cambridge, convent of St Radegund
-
-  Ramsen, convent at, 420
-
-  Redlingfield, convent at, 363, 377, 378
-
-  refectuaria, office of, 378
-
-  Regenfled, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Regenfrith, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Regina, St, 29
-
-  Reinild, St, abbess at Maaseyck, 230-232
-
-  Reinildis, St, 23
-
-  Relind, abbess at Hohenburg, 241
-
-  Repton, convent at, 108, 126, 202
-
-  Richardis, nun at Bingen, 272
-
-  Richmondis van der Horst, abbess at Seebach, 428
-
-  Rikkardis, nun at Gandersheim, 161, 163
-
-  Robert, St, founder of the order of Fontevraud, 193
-
-  Rolandswerth, convent at, 429
-
-  Rolendis, St, 27, 42
-
-  Romsey, convent at, 201, 207, 208, 209, 212, 357, 360, 378
-
-  Rosa, 211
-
-  Rosalia, St, of Palermo, 18
-
-  Rusper, convent at, 380, 381, 403, 404
-
-  Ryhall, convent at, 107
-
-
-  Sabina Pirckheimer, abbess at Bergen, 460, 474
-
-  Saethrith, St, or Syre, 77, 85, 96
-
-  Salaberg, St, 77
-
-  Scheurl, his connection with nuns, 460, 464
-
-  Scholastica, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Schoenau, convent at, 278 ff.
-
-  Schoenfeld, convent at, 420
-
-  Schwellmerge, 41
-
-  scrutatrix, _see_ sercher
-
-  Seebach, convent at, 428
-
-  Sempringham, order of, 186, 195, 201, 213-221
-
-  sercher or scrutatrix, 216
-
-  Seton, convent of, 403, 451
-
-  Sexburg, St, 84, 96, 100
-
-  sexton, office of, 370, 371, 390
-
-  Shaftesbury, convent of St Edward at, 203, 204, 210, 357, 365, 366, 376,
-        379, 455
-
-  Sheppey, convent at, 84, 87, 96, 100, 205, 379
-
-  Sigegith, 113
-
-  Sinningthwaite, convent at, 207
-
-  Sion, convent at, 360, 364, 383 ff., 439
-
-  Soeflingen, convent at, 422, 429
-
-  Soissons, convent at, 147
-
-  Sonnenburg, convent at, 422 ff.
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Eichstaett, 421
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Gandersheim, 151, 152
-
-  Sophie, abbess at Kizzingen, 273
-
-  Sophie, abbess (at Mainz?), 152 footnote
-
-  Sophie von Mansfeld, nun at Helfta, 329
-
-  Sopwell, convent at, 206, 357, 409, 410
-
-  Southminstre, convent at, 87
-
-  'Spiritual Convent or Ghostly Abbey,' 339, 377, 411
-
-  Stanford, convent at, 206
-
-  Stendal, convent at, 420
-
-  Strasburg, convent of St Mary Magdalen, 428, of St Stephan, 428
-
-  Stratford, convent of St Leonard at, 212, 358, 363
-
-  Streanshalch, _see_ Whitby
-
-  sub-prioress, office of, 370
-
-  succentrix, _see_ leader of the choir
-
-  Suitha, abbess, 134
-
-  Superba, 211
-
-  Sura, St, or Soteris or Zuwarda, 29
-
-  Swine, convent at, 207 footnote, 378, 453
-
-
-  Tart, convent at, 191
-
-  Tecla, correspondent of Boniface, 135, 138, 139
-
-  Tecla, nun at Barking, 113
-
-  Tecla, nun at Bronope, 419
-
-  Teclechildis, _see_ Theodohild
-
-  Tetbury, convent at, 117
-
-  Tetta, abbess at Herford, 147
-
-  Tetta, abbess at Wimbourne, 117, 135, 136
-
-  Thanet, convent at, or Minstre, 85, 86, 87, 120
-
-  thesaurissa, _see_ treasurer
-
-  Theodohild, St, or Teclechildis, of Jouarre, 76
-
-  Theofanu, abbess at Essen, 152 footnote, 232
-
-  Theorigitha, _see_ Torctgith
-
-  Thetford, convent at, 379, 402
-
-  Thomas Beket, his connection with nuns, 201, 212
-
-  Thomas de Hales, poem for nuns, 309 ff.
-
-  Tibba or Tilba, 107, 108, 110
-
-  Tinmouth, convent at, 82 footnote
-
-  Torctgith, St, or Theorigitha, 112
-
-  Tours, convent at, 51, 58, 69-70
-
-  treasurer or thesaurissa, 368, 378
-
-  Trebnitz, convent at, 292, 293, 294, 295
-
-  Trentham, convent at, 100
-
-  Tritheim, his connection with nuns, 428
-
-  tutrix, office of, 379
-
-
-  Uncumber, 38 footnote, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Urspring, convent at, 421
-
-  Ursula, St, 21, 25, 34, 40, 283, 284
-
-  Ursula Cantor, 429
-
-
-  Verbetta, St, 40
-
-  Verena, St, of Zurzach, 23, 24, 26, 31-32
-
-  Verena, St, 283
-
-  Verena von Stuben, abbess at Sonnenburg, 423 ff.
-
-  Villbetta, St, 40
-
-  Villich, convent at, 152
-
-
-  Wadstena, convent at, 384 ff.
-
-  Wala, abbess, 130
-
-  Walburg, St, or Waltpurgis, 11 footnote, 25, 26, 27, 139
-
-  Walpurg Pirckheimer, nun, 460
-
-  Walter Map, on monks and nuns, 200, 202
-
-  Waltpurgis, _see_ Walburg
-
-  Warbeth, 40
-
-  Watton, convent at, 91, 218-219, 220
-
-  Weedon, convent at, 100
-
-  Wende, convent at, 236
-
-  Wenlock, convent at, 86, 121
-
-  Wennigsen, convent at, 417
-
-  Werburg, St, 100
-
-  Werder, convent at, 417
-
-  Wessobrunn, nuns at, 236
-
-  Wethburg, abbess, 124, 126, 127, 132
-
-  Wherwell, convent at, 212, 455
-
-  Whitby or Streanshalch, convent at, 88-95, 103, 105, 106, 124, 202
-
-  Wibrandis, St, 40
-
-  Wienhausen, convent at, 235, 417
-
-  Wihtburg, St, 96
-
-  Wilbeth, 40
-
-  Wilcoma, abbess at Chelles, 86
-
-  Wilfrith, his connection with abbesses, 95 ff., 225
-
-  Wilgefortis, St, 35, _see_ Ontkommer
-
-  Wilibald Pirckheimer, his connection with nuns, 461 ff.
-
-  Wilnotha, abbess at Liming, 87
-
-  Wilton, convent at, or Ellandune, 203, 369, 438, 441
-
-  Wimbourne, convent at, 116, 117, 134, 202
-
-  Wimpheling, on nunneries, 429
-
-  Winchester, convent of St Mary at, or Nunnaminster, 184, 203, 210, 211,
-        366, 376, 380, 448, 454, 455
-
-  Windesheim, congregation of, 417 ff.
-
-  Winifred, St, 30
-
-  Winteney, convent at, 359
-
-  Wittewierum, convent at, 237
-
-  Wolfsindis, 29
-
-  Woodchester, convent at, 202 footnote
-
-  Wroxhall, convent at, 229, 363
-
-  Wykes, convent at, 437
-
-
-  York, convent of St Clement's at, 206
-
-
-  Zuwarda, _see_ Sura
-
-
-CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY J. & C. F. CLAY, AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS.
-
-
-
-
-FOOTNOTES:
-
-[1] The literature on this subject is daily accumulating. Among older
-authorities are Bachofen, _Das Mutterrecht_, 1861; Zmigrodski, _Die Mutter
-bei den Voelkern des arischen Stammes_, 1886; Pearson, K., _Ethic of Free
-Thought_, 1888.
-
-[2] Kriegk, G. L., _Deutsches Buergerthum im Mittelalter_, 1868, ch. 12-15.
-
-[3] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Eccles._ 5, ch. 14, 16, 19.
-
-[4] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 78.
-
-[5] Ibid. p. 881 ff.
-
-[6] Wuttke, _Deutscher Volksaberglaube_, 1869, p. 141; Weinhold, K.,
-_Deutsche Frauen_, 1882, vol. 1, p. 73.
-
-[7] Rochholz, E. L., _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, 1870, p. 191.
-
-[8] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Haar.'
-
-[9] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gunthildis, Sept. 12.
-
-[10] Bouquet, _Recueil Hist._, vol. 5, p. 690. Capitulare incerti anni, nr
-6, 'ut mulieres ad altare non ingrediantur.'
-
-[11] Montalembert, _Monks of the West_, 1, p. 359.
-
-[12] Jameson, _Legends of the Madonna_, 1857, Introd. xix.
-
-[13] Rhys, J., _Lectures on the origin and growth of religion as
-illustrated by Celtic Heathendom_, 1888, p. 102.
-
-[14] Frantz, C., _Versuch einer Geschichte des Marien und Annencultus_,
-1854, p. 54 ff.
-
-[15] Froissart, _Chronicle_, c. 162, in English translation; also Oberle,
-K. A., _Ueberreste germ. Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p. 153.
-
-[16] Menzel, _Christ. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Baum.'
-
-[17] Oberle, K. A., _Ueberreste germ. Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p.
-144.
-
-[18] Menzel, _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Himmelfahrt.'
-
-[19] Ibid., article 'Frauenberg'; also Oberle, K. A., _Ueberreste germ.
-Heidentums im Christentum_, 1883, p. 38.
-
-[20] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, 1870, p. 81, calls it Walburg;
-Reinsberg-Dueringsfeld, _Traditions et legendes de la Belgique_, 1870, p.
-286, calls it Fro or Frigg.
-
-[21] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, 1887, p. 379; also
-Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 257.
-
-[22] Comp. below, p. 35.
-
-[23] Bede, _Ecclesiastical History_, 1, ch. 30.
-
-[24] On English calendars, Piper, F., _Kalendarien und Martyrologien der
-Angelsachsen_, 1862; Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887.
-
-[25] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-62, vol. 2,
-Einleitung.
-
-[26] For France, Guettee, _Histoire de l'Eglise de France_, 1847-55, vol.
-1, p. 1; for England, Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878,
-pp. 1 ff.; for Germany, Friedrich, _Kirchengeschichte_, 1867, vol. 1, pp.
-86 ff.
-
-[27] Ducange, _Glossarium_: 'coenobium.'
-
-[28] Dupuy, A., _Histoire de S. Martin_, 1852, p. 176.
-
-[29] Gildas, _Epistle_, c. 66.
-
-[30] In Ireland we hear of nunneries founded by St Bridget in the fifth
-century, the chief of which was at Kildare; also that this saint crossed
-the Irish Sea and founded nunneries at Glastonbury in England and at
-Abernethy in Scotland. The accounts of the work of Bridget are numerous,
-but have not been subjected to criticism. Comp. _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Brigida, Feb. 1, and Lanigan, _Eccles. History of Ireland_, 1829, 1, pp.
-377 ff.
-
-[31] Ambrosius, _Opera_ (edit. Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Comp._ vol. 16), _De
-virginibus_, p. 187; (vol. 17) _Ad virginem devotam_, p. 579.
-
-[32] Hilarius, _Opera_ (edit. Migne, vol. 10), _Ad Abram_, p. 547.
-
-[33] Blunt, J. J., _Vestiges of Ancient Manners in Italy and Sicily_,
-1823, pp. 56 ff.
-
-[34] Menzel, W., _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Brust,' makes this
-statement. I do not see where he takes it from.
-
-[35] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agatha, Feb. 5.
-
-[36] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agnes, Jan. 21; St Rosalia, Sept. 4.
-
-[37] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cunera, June 12.
-
-[38] Kist, N. C., in _Kerkhistorisch Archiv_, Amsterdam, 1858, vol. 2, p.
-20.
-
-[39] _Vita St Meinwerci_, bishop of Paderborn (1009-39), written about
-1155 (Potthast), c. 37.
-
-[40] Hautcoeur, _Actes de Ste Pharailde_, 1882, Introduction, p. xc.
-
-[41] _A. SS. Boll._, Gloria posthuma St Bavonis, Oct. 1, p. 261.
-
-[42] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1852, vol. 3, pp.
-111, 123 ff.
-
-[43] _A. SS. Boll._, Vita St Leodgarii, Oct. 2.
-
-[44] Roth, K. L., 'St Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, pp. 91 ff.
-
-[45] Bonnell, H. E., _Anfaenge des karolingischen Hauses_, 1866, pp. 51,
-149 etc. It is noticeable that another woman-saint Ida (_A. SS. Boll._, St
-Ida, June 20) figures as ancestral mother of the Liudolfings, who became
-kings in Saxony and emperors of Germany, comp. Waitz, _Jahrbuecher des
-deutschen Reichs unter Heinrich I._ 1863, Nachtrag I.
-
-[46] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 207.
-
-[47] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-82.
-
-[48] _Lebensgeschichte der heil. Othilia._ Freiburg, 1852.
-
-[49] _Alsatia_, 1858-60, p. 268, contains local stories.
-
-[50] Roth, K. L., 'St Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, p. 95.
-
-[51] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, article 'Knieen.'
-
-[52] Du Bois de Beauchesne, _Madame Ste Notburg_, 1888, pp. 85, 197 etc.
-Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, and _A. SS. Boll._ so
-far, omit her.
-
-[53] Lefebure, F. A., _Ste Godeleine et son culte_, 1888. _A. SS. Boll._,
-St Godelewa, July 6.
-
-[54] _Wonderlyk Leven._ Cortryk 1800, anon., pp. 42, 45 etc.
-
-[55] Comp. below, ch. 4, Sec. 2.
-
-[56] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, 1870, pp. 26, 80 etc.
-
-[57] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, p. 389.
-
-[58] Clouet, _Histoire de Verdun_, p. 180; _A. SS. Boll._, St Lucie, Sept.
-9.
-
-[59] _A. SS. Boll._, St Germana, Oct. 1; Husenbeth, F. C., _Emblems of the
-Saints_, 1882.
-
-[60] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, p. 164.
-
-[61] Zacher, J., _St Genovefa Pfalzgraefin_, 1860, p. 55.
-
-[62] Menzel, _Christliche Symbolik_, article 'Aehre,' refers to _Notre
-Dame de trois epis_ in Elsass.
-
-[63] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, St Nothburga, nr
-2.
-
-[64] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1, p. 302;
-Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 76.
-
-[65] _A. SS. Boll._, St Alena, June 19; Menzel, W., _Christliche
-Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Arm.' Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne
-Belgique_, 1844, June 19.
-
-[66] Coremans, _L'annee etc._, p. 77.
-
-[67] Reinsberg-Dueringsfeld, _Traditions et legendes de la Belgique_, 1870,
-vol. 1, p. 99.
-
-[68] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gunthildis, Sept. 22.
-
-[69] _Imagines SS. Augustanorum_, 1601; also Stadler and Heim,
-_Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, St Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[70] Pharaildis has been depicted with one, _A. SS. Boll._, St Pharaildis,
-Jan. 4; also Verena, comp. below.
-
-[71] Husenbeth, F. C., _Emblems of the Saints_, 1870, mentions one
-instance.
-
-[72] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, 1870, p. 7.
-
-[73] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_; _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Rolendis, May 13.
-
-[74] _A. SS. Boll._, St Edigna, Feb. 26.
-
-[75] _A. SS. Boll._, St Christiane, July 26.
-
-[76] Rochholz, L., _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, p. 37.
-
-[77] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858-82, St
-Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[78] Ibid., Appendix, p. 998, footnote.
-
-[79] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Regina,
-nr 4.
-
-[80] Kist, N. C., 'Reenensche Kuneralegende' in _Kerkhistorisch Archiv_,
-Amsterdam, 1858, vol. 2, p. 5.
-
-[81] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Sura.
-
-[82] _A. SS. Boll._, St Germana, Oct. 1.
-
-[83] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythologie_, 1848, pp. 5 ff., 272
-ff.
-
-[84] Capgrave, _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516.
-
-[85] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887.
-
-[86] Capgrave, _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516. Comp. Surius, _Vitae SS._
-1617.
-
-[87] Hautcoeur, _Actes de Ste Pharailde_, 1882, Introd. cxxviiii.
-
-[88] Reinsberg-Dueringsfeld, _Traditions et legendes de la Belgique_, 1870,
-vol. 1, p. 288.
-
-[89] Lefebure, _Ste Godeleine et son culte_, p. 209.
-
-[90] Wauters, A., _Histoire des environs de Bruxelles_, 1852, vol. 1, p.
-304.
-
-[91] Rochholz, _Drei Gaugoettinnen_, 1870, p. 154.
-
-[92] Potthast, _Wegweiser durch die Geschichtszwerke des europ.
-Mittelalters_, 1862; Rochholz, _loc. cit._, p. 108, prints an early poetic
-version of the story in the vernacular.
-
-[93] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Mythologie_, 1887, p. 393.
-
-[94] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 254, footnote.
-
-[95] Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne Belgique_, pp. 61, 113, 158.
-
-[96] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 252.
-
-[97] Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne Belgique_, p. 76; Stadler und Heim,
-_Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, and the _A. SS. Boll._ pass her over.
-
-[98] Wessely, J. G., _Iconographie Gottes und der Heiligen_, 1874.
-
-[99] _A. SS. Boll._, St Afra, Aug. 5.
-
-[100] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 242.
-
-[101] Velserus, _Antiqua monumenta, Chronica der Stadt Augsp._ 1595; pp.
-4, 14, 17, 32, 88.
-
-[102] Rettberg, F. W., _Kirchengeschichte_, 1846, vol. 1, p. 147.
-
-[103] Friedrich, _Kirchengeschichte_, 1867, vol. 1, p. 413.
-
-[104] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St Notburg,
-nr 1. _A. SS. Boll._, St Notburga, Jan. 26.
-
-[105] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, Appendix,
-St Achachildis.
-
-[106] Birlinger, A., _Schwaebische Sagen_, vol. 2, p. 341.
-
-[107] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Radegundis, nr 3.
-
-[108] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythologie_, 1875, p. 896.
-
-[109] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Kumernissa.
-
-[110] _A. SS. Boll._, St Liberata, July 20.
-
-[111] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884.
-
-[112] I cannot account for the presence of the beard; St Paula, venerated
-at Avila in Spain, is also represented with one (Stadler und Heim).
-Macrobius (_Sal._ bk 3, c. 8) tells us that the Venus Barbata was
-represented in Cyprus in the form of a man with a beard and wearing female
-clothing, which shows that goddesses of this type were venerated during
-heathen times.
-
-[113] Grimm, J., _Deutsche Mythol._ 1875, p. 896.
-
-[114] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, p. 36.
-
-[115] Menzel, W., _Christl. Symbolik_, 1854, article 'Bart.'
-
-[116] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, pp. 31, 33, 36,
-42 etc.
-
-[117] Ibid. p. 32.
-
-[118] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Liberata, footnote, p. 807.
-
-[119] Sloet, _De heilige Ontkommer of Wilgeforthis_, 1884, pp. 5, 50 etc.
-Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, series III, vol. 3, p. 194, quotes the
-following sentence from Michael Woddes, _Dialogues_, 1554: '... if a wife
-were weary of her husband she offered Otes at Poules (St Paul's) at London
-to St Uncumber,' a proof that the veneration of Ontkommer had found its
-way into England.
-
-[120] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythologie_, 1848, pp. 5 ff., 272
-ff.
-
-[121] Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 149.
-
-[122] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Myth._, 1887, p. 344.
-
-[123] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 23.
-
-[124] Coremans, _L'annee de l'ancienne Belgique_, 1844, p. 148.
-
-[125] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, pp. 69 ff.
-
-[126] Cradles are frequently kept in churches in Bavaria, and form, I am
-told, part of the furniture which was formerly used at the celebration of
-the Nativity play at Christmas (Weihnachtskrippenspiel).
-
-[127] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 273.
-
-[128] Simrock, K., _Handbuch der deutschen Myth._, 1887, pp. 344, 349,
-gives lists of their names.
-
-[129] Grimm, _Woerterbuch_, 'Bett'; Mannhardt, W., _Germanische Mythen_,
-1858, p. 644.
-
-[130] Panzer, F., _Beitrag zur deutschen Mythol._, 1848, p. 180.
-
-[131] _A. SS. Boll._, St Einbetta, Sept. 16.
-
-[132] _A. SS. Boll._, St Kunegundis, June 16.
-
-[133] Panzer, _Beitrag zur deutschen Myth._, 1848, p. 379.
-
-[134] Menck-Dittmarsch, _Des Moselthals Sagen_, 1840, pp. 178, 258.
-
-[135] Grimm, _Woerterbuch_, 'Marge.'
-
-[136] Lersch, _Centralmuseum rheinl. Inschriften_, vol. 1, p. 23; also
-_Jahrbuecher des Vereins von Altertumsfreunden im Rheinlande_, Bonn: J.
-1852, Freudenberg, 'Darstellungen der Matres oder Matronae'; J. 1853,
-'Neue Matronensteine'; J. 1857, Eick, 'Matronensteine'; J. 1858, Becker,
-'Beitraege' etc.
-
-[137] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858, St
-Lufthildis.
-
-[138] Ibid. St Rolendis.
-
-[139] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cunera, June 12.
-
-[140] Fustel de Coulanges, _L'invasion germanique_, 1891; Gerard, P. A.
-F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864; Ozanam, _Civilisation
-chretienne chez les Francs_, 1855.
-
-[141] _A. SS. Boll._, St Caesaria, Jan. 12, _Regula_, pp. 730-737; also
-_A. SS. Boll._, St Caesarius episcopus, Aug. 27.
-
-[142] _A. SS. Boll._, St Caesaria, Jan. 12, _Regula_, c. 66.
-
-[143] Guettee, _Histoire de l'Eglise de France_, 1847, vol. 2, 46; Labbe,
-_Sacr. Conc. Collectio_, Conc. Agathense, canon nr 19.
-
-[144] Guettee, _Histoire de l'Eglise de France_, 1847, vol. 2, p. 109.
-
-[145] Keller, Ch., _Etude critique sur le texte de la vie de Ste
-Genevieve_, 1881; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Genovefa, Jan. 3.
-
-[146] Darboy, Mgr, _Sainte Clothilde_, 1865; also _A. SS. Boll._, St
-Chrothildis, June 3.
-
-[147] Giesebrecht, W., _Fraenkische Geschichte des Gregorius_, 1851,
-Einleitung xviii.
-
-[148] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106 (in Migne, _Patrol.
-Cursus Completus_, vol. 71).
-
-[149] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Martyrum_, ch. 5 (in Migne, _Patrol.
-Cursus Compl._, vol. 71).
-
-[150] _A. SS. Boll._, St Radegundis, Aug. 13 (contains both these
-accounts).
-
-[151] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887.
-
-[152] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 9, ch. 42.
-
-[153] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 3, ch. 7; Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch.
-2-4.
-
-[154] Giesebrecht, W., _Fraenkische Geschichte des Gregorius_, 1851,
-appendix.
-
-[155] Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch. 3.
-
-[156] Ibid., ch. 10.
-
-[157] Ibid., ch. 5.
-
-[158] Baudonivia, _Vita_, ch. 2.
-
-[159] _A. SS. Boll._, St Medardus, June 8.
-
-[160] Commentators are much exercised by this summary breaking of the
-marriage tie; some urge that Radegund's union had not been blessed by the
-Church. In the _A. SS._ it is argued that the Gallic bishop Medardus in
-pronouncing her divorce acted in ignorance of certain canons of the
-Church.
-
-[161] Fortunatus, _Vita_, c. 10.
-
-[162] Ibid., ch. 11; Baudonivia, _Vita_, ch. 6.
-
-[163] Ibid., _Vita_, ch. 12.
-
-[164] Stadler und Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, Johannes, nr 52;
-Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 23.
-
-[165] Fortunatus, _Vita_, ch. 26.
-
-[166] Lucchi, _Vie de Venantius Fortunatus_, ch. 85 (in Fortunatus, _Opera
-poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887).
-
-[167] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106.
-
-[168] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 111, 3, p.
-214.
-
-[169] Gerard, P. A. F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864, vol. 1,
-p. 272.
-
-[170] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 9, ch. 40.
-
-[171] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 11, 1, p. 76.
-
-[172] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 8, ch. 40.
-
-[173] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._ bk 7, ch. 36.
-
-[174] Baudonivia, _Vita_, c. 11.
-
-[175] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, bk 10, nr 9.
-
-[176] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, bk 2, nr 16.
-
-[177] Ibid., bk 6, nr 1.
-
-[178] Mone, F. J., _Lateinische Hymnen des Mittelalters_, 1853-5, vol 1,
-101; Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, note, p. 76.
-
-[179] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, Appendix, nr 2.
-
-[180] Ibid., bk 8, nr 1.
-
-[181] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, note 9, p. 213.
-
-[182] Ibid., Appendix, nr 16.
-
-[183] Ibid., nr 31.
-
-[184] Nisard, Ch., _Des poesies de Radegonde attribuees jusqu'ici a
-Fortunat_, 1889, p. 5.
-
-[185] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, edit. Nisard, 1887, note 111, 2, 3,
-etc., p. 284.
-
-[186] Ibid., 'De Excidio Thoringiae,' Appendix, nr 1.
-
-[187] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, Appendix, nr 3.
-
-[188] Ibid., bk 8, nr 8.
-
-[189] Ibid., bk 8, nr 6.
-
-[190] Ibid., bk 11, nr 10.
-
-[191] Ibid., bk 11, nr 9.
-
-[192] Fortunatus, _Opera poetica_, bk 11, nr 11.
-
-[193] Ibid., bk 11, nr 22.
-
-[194] Ibid., bk 11, nr 8.
-
-[195] Ibid., bk 11, nr 6.
-
-[196] Ibid., Appendix, nr 21.
-
-[197] Ibid., bk 11, nr 2.
-
-[198] Ibid., bk 11, nr 7.
-
-[199] Ibid., Appendix, nr 15.
-
-[200] Gregorius Tur., _De Gloria Confessorum_, ch. 106.
-
-[201] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, chs. 39-44; bk 10, chs. 15-17,
-20.
-
-[202] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 39.
-
-[203] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 41.
-
-[204] Ibid., bk 10, ch. 15.
-
-[205] Gregorius Tur., _Hist. Franc._, bk 9, ch. 33; bk 10, ch. 12.
-
-[206] _A. SS. Boll._, St Vedastus, Feb. 6.
-
-[207] _A. SS. Boll._, St Eleutherius, Feb. 20, _Vita_ 1, ch. 3 (Potthast,
-Wegweiser: '_Vita auctore anonymo sed antiquo_').
-
-[208] Gerard, P. A. F., _Histoire des Francs d'Austrasie_, 1864, vol. 1,
-p. 384.
-
-[209] Comp. throughout _A. SS. Boll._, St Wandregisilus, July 22; St
-Waningus, Jan. 9, etc.
-
-[210] Drapeyron, L., _La reine Brunehilde_, 1867.
-
-[211] Gregorius, Papa, _Epistolae_, liber 9, epist. 109 (in Migne,
-_Patrol. Cursus Compl._ vol. 77).
-
-[212] St Columban who went abroad and died in 615 should be kept distinct
-from St Columba who died in 597, sometimes also called Columban. Both of
-them wrote rules for monks (cf. _Dictionary of Nat. Biography_).
-
-[213] Bouquet, _Recueil Hist._, vol. 3, p. 478.
-
-[214] _A. SS. Boll._, St Desiderius, May 23.
-
-[215] Guettee, _Histoire de l'Eglise de France_, vol. 1, p. 317.
-
-[216] Opinions differ as to the original form of the rule of St Benedict.
-Comp. Benedictus, _Opera_, pp. 204 ff. (in Migne, _Patrologiae Cursus
-Complet._, vol. 66).
-
-[217] _A. SS. Boll._, St Filibertus, Aug. 20.
-
-[218] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, Appendix, gives
-the Charter.
-
-[219] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, p. 249.
-
-[220] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bathildis, Jan. 26 (contains both accounts).
-
-[221] Roth, P., _Geschichte des Beneficialwesens_, 1850, p. 86.
-
-[222] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bathildis, Jan. 26; _Vita_ 11., ch. 14.
-
-[223] _A. SS. Boll._, ibid., St Aurea, Oct. 4.
-
-[224] Ibid., St Filibertus, Aug. 20, _Vita_, ch. 5.
-
-[225] Ibid., St Austreberta, Feb. 10.
-
-[226] Regnault, _Vie de Ste Fare_, 1626.
-
-[227] _A. SS. Boll._, St Teclechildis, Oct. 10.
-
-[228] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bertilia, Jan. 3.
-
-[229] Ibid., St Salaberga, Sept. 22, _Vita_, ch. 8.
-
-[230] Ibid., St Austrudis, Oct. 17.
-
-[231] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 3, ch. 8; bk 4, ch. 23. Comp. below, ch.
-3, Sec. 1.
-
-[232] _History of the Anglo-Saxons_, transl. Thorpe, 1845, vol. 2, p. 247.
-
-[233] Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_. Rolls series, vol. 1,
-Preface, p. xxiii.
-
-[234] It is probable such settlements existed. Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol.
-3, p. 302, holds a religious foundation to have existed in Tinmouth
-founded 617-33, but in Bede, _Life of Cuthbert_, transl. Stevenson, T.,
-1887, ch. 3, it is referred to as a monastery formerly of men, now of
-'virgins.'
-
-[235] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Folkestone,' vol. 1, p. 451.
-
-[236] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 226: 'the life of Eanswith cannot be traced to any earlier authority
-than John of Tinmouth ([Dagger] c. 1380) whose account Capgrave ([Dagger]
-1484) embodied in his collection of saints' lives.' The work of Capgrave,
-_Catalogus SS. Angliae_, was printed in 1516; the _Kalendre of the newe
-Legende of Englande_, printed 1516 (Pynson), from which expressions are
-quoted in the text, is an abridged translation of it into English.
-
-[237] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Folkestone,' vol. 1, p. 451, nr 2.
-
-[238] Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1880,
-'Eanswitha'; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Eanswida, Aug. 31.
-
-[239] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Liming,' vol. 1, p. 452.
-
-[240] Jenkins, R. C., in _Gentleman's Magazine_, 1862, August, p. 196
-quotes this statement; I do not see where he takes it from.
-
-[241] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 144.
-
-[242] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 475.
-
-[243] Gocelinus, _Vita St Wereburgae_, c. 1 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-Compl._, vol. 155).
-
-[244] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 130 footnote.
-
-[245] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sheppey,' vol. 2, p. 49.
-
-[246] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 123.
-
-[247] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 3, ch. 8, transl. Gidley, 1870.
-
-[248] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thanet,' vol. 1, p. 447; Hardy, Th. D.,
-_Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, on lives of St Mildred, vol.
-1, p. 376; _A. SS. Boll._, St Mildreda, July 13.
-
-[249] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, July 13.
-
-[250] Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, article
-'Mildred' by Bishop Stubbs.
-
-[251] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thanet,' vol. 1, p. 447.
-
-[252] _A. SS. Boll._, St Milburga, Feb. 23.
-
-[253] Ibid., St Mildwida, Jan. 17.
-
-[254] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, Jan. 17.
-
-[255] 'Lives of Women Saints' (written about 1610) p. 64, edited by
-Horstman for the Early Engl. Text Soc., London, 1887.
-
-[256] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents_, 1869,
-vol. 3, p. 240.
-
-[257] 'Upmynstre, Suthmynstre, Folcanstan, Limming, Sceppeis.'
-
-[258] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Whitby,' vol. 1, p. 405.
-
-[259] Bede, _Eccl. Hist._, bk 4, ch. 23 transl. Gidley, 1870. Dugdale,
-_Monasticon_, 'Hartlepool,' vol. 6, p. 1618, places the foundation about
-the year 640.
-
-[260] Bede, _Eccl. Hist._ bk 3, chs. 24-25; bk 4, chs. 23-24.
-
-[261] _A. SS. Boll._, St Bega, Sept. 6; Tomlinson, G. C., _Life and
-Miracles of St Bega_, 1839.
-
-[262] _Carthularium abbathiae de Whiteby_, publ. Surtees Soc., 1879.
-
-[263] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 23, translat. Gidley, 1870, with
-additions and alterations.
-
-[264] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 5, ch. 3.
-
-[265] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 10; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 1,
-p. 233, mentions Easington only as a manor of Durham.
-
-[266] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Hackness,' vol. 3, p. 633.
-
-[267] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 23.
-
-[268] _Dictionary of Nat. Biography_, article 'Caedmon' by Henry Bradley.
-
-[269] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 24, transl. Gidley, 1870.
-
-[270] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' _Yorksh.
-Archaeolog. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 370. I do not know on what authority
-Haigh designates Heiu as saint.
-
-[271] Gray, de Birch, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 15.
-
-[272] Comp. below, p. 106.
-
-[273] Charlton, L., _History of Whitby_, 1779, p. 33.
-
-[274] Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_, Rolls series, vol. 1,
-Preface p. xxvii. This volume contains reprints of several accounts of the
-life of Wilfrith, including the one by Eddi.
-
-[275] _A. SS. Boll._, St Withburga, March 17; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'East
-Dereham,' vol. 2, p. 176.
-
-[276] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,'
-_Yorkshire Archaeol. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 352, decides in favour of
-Aethelric.
-
-[277] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 235.
-
-[278] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Coldingham,' vol. 6, p. 149. The promontory
-of St Abb's Head retains her name. She is believed to have founded another
-religious settlement at a place in Durham on the river Derwent called
-Ebbchester, and the village church there is dedicated to her (_Dict. of
-Nat. Biog._).
-
-[279] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[280] _A. SS. Boll._, St Etheldreda June 23, Thomas of Ely, _Vita_ ch. 41.
-
-[281] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 252 footnote.
-
-[282] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[283] _Kalendre of the newe Legende of Englande_, printed 1516 (Pynson)
-fol. 39 b.
-
-[284] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 19.
-
-[285] _Dictionary of National Biography_, 'Etheldreda, Saint.'
-
-[286] Bentham, _History of Ely_, 1817, p. 9.
-
-[287] Gocelinus, _Vita St Wereburgae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._
-vol. 155).
-
-[288] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 49, calls it
-Weedon in Northamptonshire; Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wedon,' vol. 6, p.
-1051, doubts its existence.
-
-[289] _Life of St Werburgh_, 1521, reprinted for the Early Engl. Text
-Soc., 1887.
-
-[290] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 49.
-
-[291] Livien, E. 'On early religious houses in Staffordshire,' _Journal of
-the British Archaeolog. Assoc._, vol. 29, p. 329. (The widespread cult of
-St Werburg may be due to there having been several saints of this name;
-comp. Stanton, R., _Menology_.)
-
-[292] Eddi, _Vita_, c. 34 (in Raine, _Historians of the Church of York_,
-Rolls series).
-
-[293] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 300, casts
-discredit on this story, which is told by Eddi, _Vita_, c. 38.
-
-[294] Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, pp. 301 ff.
-
-[295] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-pp. 297 ff.
-
-[296] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 10.
-
-[297] Bede, _Eccles. History_, bk 4, ch. 25.
-
-[298] The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle gives 679 as the date of the fire; Eddi's
-account represents Aebbe as alive in 681. Perhaps she died in 680; comp.
-Smith and Wace, _Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1877, Ebba, nr 1;
-also Bright, W., _Early English Church History_, 1878, p. 300, footnote.
-
-[299] Bright, W., ibid., p. 255, footnote.
-
-[300] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 312.
-
-[301] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 23.
-
-[302] Bede, _Life of St Cuthbert_, ch. 34.
-
-[303] Ibid., ch. 24.
-
-[304] Psalm lxxxix. 10 (The Vulgate here follows the LXX.; it would be
-interesting to know what sense they or indeed Bede gave to the passage).
-
-[305] Eccles. xi. 8.
-
-[306] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 4, ch. 26.
-
-[307] Eddi, _Vita_, c. 43.
-
-[308] Bright, W., _Early English History_, 1878, p. 448, from 686-691.
-
-[309] Haigh, D. H., 'On the monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' _Yorksh.
-Archaeol. Journal_, vol. 3, p. 375.
-
-[310] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Peterborough,' vol. 1, p. 377, nr 2, prints
-the charter.
-
-[311] Gough, R., _Parochial History of Castor_, 1819, p. 99.
-
-[312] 'Cum beatissimis sororibus meis Kyneburga et Kyneswida, quarum prior
-regina mutavit imperium in Christi ancillarum praesidens monasterio ...
-etc.'
-
-[313] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, 1862, vol. 1,
-p. 370.
-
-[314] _A. SS. Boll._, St Kineburga et St Kineswitha, virgines, March 6,
-argue the existence of a third sister.
-
-[315] Camden, _Britannia_, edit. 1789, vol. 2, pp. 219, 223.
-
-[316] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Repton,' vol. 6, p. 429; the abbesses he
-mentions should stand in this order: Alfritha, Edburga.
-
-[317] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Eccles. Documents_, 1869, vol. 3,
-p. 273.
-
-[318] Ibid., vol. 3, p. 274.
-
-[319] Birch, W. de Gray, _Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881.
-
-[320] _A. SS. Boll._, St Guthlac, April 11; Felix, _Vita_, c. 12.
-
-[321] Felix, _Vita_, c. 33.
-
-[322] Ibid., 'Egburgh abbatissa, Aldulfi regis filia'; Smith and Wace,
-_Dictionary of Christian Biography_, 1877, call her 'Eadburga (nr 3)'; two
-abbesses Ecgburh occur in the Durham list of abbesses, comp. Gray, W. de
-Birch, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 70.
-
-[323] Comp. below, ch. 4, Sec. 1.
-
-[324] Holdich, B., _History of Crowland Abbey_, 1816, p. 2.
-
-[325] Gray, W. de Birch, _Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881,
-Introd. p. l, footnote.
-
-[326] Brit. Mus. MS. Harleian Roll, Y 6, reproduced Gray, W. de Birch,
-_Memorials of St Guthlac of Crowland_, 1881, pp. 14, 16, etc.
-
-[327] Goodwin, C. W., _The Anglo-Saxon version of the life of St Guthlac_,
-1848, p. 93.
-
-[328] _A. SS. Boll._, St Pega sive Pegia, Jan. 8.
-
-[329] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ositha, Oct. 7.
-
-[330] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chich Priory,' vol. 6, p. 308.
-
-[331] Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, vol. 1, pp. 524
-ff.
-
-[332] _A. SS. Boll._, St Frideswida, Oct. 19; Dugdale, _Monasticon_,
-'Christ Church,' vol. 2, p. 134.
-
-[333] _Dictionary of National Biography_, Frideswide.
-
-[334] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 137: 'we have
-no records of Osburg till 1410.'
-
-[335] Ibid., p. 310: 'there is much obscurity in the history of St
-Modwenna. It seems that she must be distinguished from one or perhaps two
-other Irish saints....' Also Livien, E., 'On early religious houses in
-Staffordshire' in _Journal of the British Archaeol. Association_, vol. 29,
-p. 333; Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive Catalogue of Materials_, pp. 94 ff.
-
-[336] Stanton, R., _Menology of England and Wales_, 1887, p. 328.
-
-[337] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 4, chs. 7-10.
-
-[338] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 436.
-
-[339] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ethelburga, Oct. 11; Stanton, R., _Menology of
-England and Wales_, p. 485.
-
-[340] Stanton, R., _Menology_, calls her Theorigitha but says, p. 36, that
-she has no day.
-
-[341] _A. SS. Boll._, St Hildelitha, March 24.
-
-[342] Bede, _Eccles. Hist._, bk 5, ch. 18.
-
-[343] Capgrave, T., _Catalogus SS. Angliae_, 1516, fol. 10, b.
-
-[344] _Monumenta Moguntina_, edit. Jaffe, Epist. nr 2, written between 675
-and 705; Giles (Aldhelm, _Opera Omnia_, 1844, p. 90) calls her Osgith, a
-name which occurs several times in the Durham 'Liber Vitae.'
-
-[345] Aldhelm, _Opera_, edit. Giles, 1844, p. 103.
-
-[346] Ibid., p. 115, _De Basilica_, etc.
-
-[347] Ibid., p. 135, _De Laudibus Virginum_ (it is not known over which
-house Maxima presided); p. 203, _De octo Principalibus Vitiis_.
-
-[348] Ibid., p. 1, _De Laudibus Virginitatis_ (chapter references in the
-text are to this edition).
-
-[349] Mediaeval exegesis interpreted in these four ways, comp. Cassian
-Erem., _De Spiritu Sc._, c. 8.
-
-[350] I take 'crustu' to go with 'crusta,' comp. Ducange.
-
-[351] _Monumenta Moguntina_, edit. Jaffe, Epist. nr 70.
-
-[352] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sherbourne,' vol. 1, p. 331, footnote K.
-
-[353] Will. of Malmesbury, _History_, c. 31.
-
-[354] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, 'Aldhelm.'
-
-[355] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 88.
-
-[356] _A. SS. Boll._, St Cuthberga, Aug. 31.
-
-[357] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 88.
-
-[358] _Opera_ edit. Giles, 1844, p. 216; _Dict. of Nat. Biog._,
-'Aldfrith,' he is sometimes called Alfred.
-
-[359] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wimbourne,' vol. 2, p. 89, nr 2.
-
-[360] _Brit. Mus. MSS. Lansdowne_, 436 f., 38 b.
-
-[361] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Tetbury,' vol. 6, p. 1619.
-
-[362] _A. SS. Boll._, St Lioba, Sept. 28, c. 2.
-
-[363] Arndt, W., Introd. to translation into German (in Pertz,
-_Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit_, Jahrhundert 8, Band 2), p.
-xix.
-
-[364] Epist. nr 12. The only edition of the letters of Boniface which
-attempts chronological order is that of Jaffe, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_,
-1866, the numeration of which I have followed. Additional remarks on the
-dates of some of the letters are contained in Hahn, H., _Bonifaz und Lull,
-ihre angelsaechsischen Correspondenten_, 1883.
-
-[365] Willibaldus presb., _Vita Bonifacii_, edit. Jaffe, Ph., _Monumenta
-Moguntina_, 1866, pp. 422-506, c. 2.
-
-[366] Whether Eadburg of Thanet is identical with St Eadburga buried at
-Liming (comp. p. 84), is uncertain.
-
-[367] Epist. nr 10.
-
-[368] Epist. nr 112.
-
-[369] Epist. nr 32, written 735 (Jaffe); after 732 (Hahn).
-
-[370] Epist. nr 75.
-
-[371] Epist. nr 31.
-
-[372] Epist. nr 62.
-
-[373] Epist. nr 76.
-
-[374] Epist. nr 22, written 722 (Jaffe).
-
-[375] Epist. nr 39.
-
-[376] Epist. nr 46.
-
-[377] Epist. nr 72, 2 Cor. vii. 5.
-
-[378] Epist. nr 73.
-
-[379] Comp. Ps. cxix. 105.
-
-[380] Epist. nr 87.
-
-[381] Epist. nr 8; written between 709 and 712 (Hahn). Boniface is known
-to have travelled in the district of the Mosel; there is no other reason
-why this letter should be included in the correspondence.
-
-[382] John xv. 12.
-
-[383] Epist. nr 59; written 745 (Hahn).
-
-[384] Epist. nr 60.
-
-[385] Epist. nr 61.
-
-[386] Epist. nr 70; written after 748 (Hahn).
-
-[387] Epist. nr 13, written 717-19 (Hahn).
-
-[388] Jaffe, Ph., _loc. cit._, footnote, p. 64, quotes the lines Virg.
-_Aen._, 11. 369-70, of which this sentence seems an adaptation.
-
-[389] Comp. Psalm i. 2.
-
-[390] Romans x. 15.
-
-[391] Matth. xxv. 36.
-
-[392] Comp. Matth. xix. 28.
-
-[393] Epist. nr 14, written 719-22 (Jaffe). Haigh, D. H., 'On the
-monasteries of St Heiu and St Hild,' in _Yorkshire Archaeol. Journal_,
-vol. 3, p. 377, speaks of her as Cangith and holds her to have been abbess
-of Hackness.
-
-[394] Birch, W. de Gray, _Fasti Monastici Aevi Saxonici_, 1872, p. 68.
-
-[395] Matth. vii. 25.
-
-[396] Comp. Luc. xiv. 31.
-
-[397] Wisdom vi. 7 (Vulgate).
-
-[398] Wisdom iv. 12 (Vulgate).
-
-[399] There are some difficulties in this passage.
-
-[400] Daniel xiv. 33 (Vulgate).
-
-[401] Acts viii. 26.
-
-[402] Ps. cxix. 103.
-
-[403] Ps. xxxvi. 6.
-
-[404] Cp. Ps. cxli. 2.
-
-[405] Cp. 2 Cor. v. 12.
-
-[406] The name Bugga occurs frequently during this period.
-
-[407] Epist. nr 16, written 720-22 (Jaffe); I think somewhat later.
-
-[408] Epist. nr 86.
-
-[409] Epist. nr 88.
-
-[410] Epist. nrs 37, 38, 39.
-
-[411] Epist. nr 103, written shortly after 740 (Hahn).
-
-[412] Epist. nr 113.
-
-[413] Epist. nr 53.
-
-[414] Epist. nr 70.
-
-[415] Epist. nr 126.
-
-[416] Epist. nr 23; the verse runs as follows:
-
-  'Arbiter omnipotens, solus qui cuncta creavit,
-  In regno Patris semper qui lumine fulget,
-  Qua jugiter flagrans sic regnat gloria Christi,
-  Inlaesum servet semper te jure perenni.'
-
-[417] _A. SS. Boll._, St Lioba, Sept. 28, _Vita_, ch. 9.
-
-[418] Epist. nr 91, written between 737-41 (Hahn).
-
-[419] _Vita_, ch. 13.
-
-[420] Epist. nr 34.
-
-[421] Epist. nr 98, written 732-747 (Hahn).
-
-[422] _Vita_, ch. 14.
-
-[423] Epist. nr 93.
-
-[424] Epist. nr 126; also Epist. nr 68, written 748 (from the Pope on the
-consecration of abbot and abbess).
-
-[425] _Vita St Sturmi_ in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 2, p. 365.
-
-[426] In Jaffe, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_, 1866, p. 475.
-
-[427] Comp. above, p. 135.
-
-[428] _A. SS. Boll._, St Tecla, Oct. 15, casts discredit on Tecla's
-settling at Kizzingen and argues in favour of Oxenfurt. Kizzingen existed
-in the 15 c.; nothing is known concerning the later history of Oxenfurt.
-
-[429] Hahn, H., _Bonifaz und Lull, ihre angelsaechsischen Correspondenten_,
-1883, p. 138, footnote 4, considers her identical with the Cynehild of the
-correspondence.
-
-[430] Two letters, nrs 148, 149, in the correspondence are written by
-'Berthgyth,' apparently a nun in England who wished to go abroad, to her
-brother Baldhard, but judging by their contents ('I have been deserted by
-my parents,' etc.) it is improbable that she is identical with the nun
-referred to above.
-
-[431] Jaffe, Ph., _Monumenta Moguntina_, 1866, p. 490.
-
-[432] Comp. above, p. 25.
-
-[433] Comp. the attempt to identify Chunihilt with St Gunthildis, _A. SS.
-Boll._, Sept. 22.
-
-[434] Edit. Canisius, H., _Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2; this anonymous nun is
-sometimes considered identical with the sister of Wilibald and Wunebald,
-and therefore with St Walburg.
-
-[435] _Vita St Willibaldi_ (also called Hodoeporicon), edit. Canisius, H.,
-_Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2, ch. 2.
-
-[436] Bede, _Hist. Eccles._, bk 5, ch. 15.
-
-[437] For erasing writing from parchment.
-
-[438] _Vita St Wunebaldi_, edit. Canisius, H., _Thesaurus_, 1725, vol. 2.
-
-[439] Widukind, _Annalium libri tres_, year 924.
-
-[440] Giesebrecht, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit_, 4 ed. 1873,
-vol. 1.
-
-[441] Ex Vita Liutbergae in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 4, p. 158
-(Potthast, _Wegweiser_, written about 870).
-
-[442] Duemmler, E., _Geschichte des ostfraenkischen Reichs_, 1865, vol. 1,
-p. 348.
-
-[443] Translatio St Pusinnae in _A. SS. Boll._, April 23 (Potthast,
-_Wegweiser_, written probably by a monk of Corvei between 860-877).
-
-[444] Duemmler, E., _Geschichte des ostfraenkischen Reichs_, 1865, vol. 2,
-p. 336.
-
-[445] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Dioecese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 22.
-
-[446] Vita Mathildis Reg. (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 4, p. 283
-ff.), c. 26.
-
-[447] _Annales Quedliburgenses_, year 999.
-
-[448] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1826, vol. 1, p.
-45.
-
-[449] Luther, _An den Adel christl. Nation_, 1520, edit. Knaake, vol. 6,
-p. 440.
-
-[450] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, vol. 1, p. 529.
-
-[451] Engelhausen, _Chronicon_ (in Leibnitz, _Scriptores rer. Brunsv._
-1707, vol. 2), p. 978.
-
-[452] Comp. below, ch. 6, Sec. 1.
-
-[453] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Dioecese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 67, quoting 'Reimchronik,'
-
-  'Dat Bog segt, dat se so vele Wisheit konde,
-  Dat se ok wol gelerden Meistern wedderstunde.'
-
-[454] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, vol. 1, p. 626 ff.
-
-[455] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Dioecese und Stadt Hildesheim_, vol. 1, p.
-319.
-
-[456] 'De fundatione Brunswilarensis' (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Scriptores_,
-vol. 11, p. 394 footnote); Adelheid was abbess of Nivelles, Mathilde of
-Villich and Diedenkirchen, Theofanu of Essen, Hedwig of Neuss; Sophie and
-Ida, to whom reference has been made in the text, are said by Pertz to
-have presided over Gandersheim and St Maria at Coeln; Sophie certainly did
-not become abbess at Gandersheim, perhaps she went to Mainz; Ida probably
-presided over the convent of St Maria on the Muenzenberg, a dependency of
-Gandersheim.
-
-[457] Waitz, G., _Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte_, 1868, vol. 7, p. 258.
-
-[458] Reichstage, 1548-1594.
-
-[459] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-259.
-
-[460] Luentzel, _Geschichte der Dioecese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol.
-1, p. 67.
-
-[461] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-84.
-
-[462] Ebert, Ad., _Geschichte der Litteratur des Mittelalters_, 1887, vol.
-3, p. 429 footnote.
-
-[463] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Ganders._, 1734; also Luentzel,
-_Geschichte der Dioecese und Stadt Hildesheim_, 1858, vol. 1, pp. 33 ff.,
-63 ff.
-
-[464] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_ (in Pertz, _Mon. Germ.
-Scriptores_, vol. 4, pp. 166-189).
-
-[465] Hrotsvith, 'Carmen de Primordiis Coenobii Gandersh.,' in _Opera_,
-edit. Barack, 1858, p. 339 ff.
-
-[466] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 3.
-
-[467] Ibid. ch. 5.
-
-[468] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 9.
-
-[469] Ibid. ch. 15.
-
-[470] 'Carmen de Primordiis Coenobii Gandersh.,' line 273.
-
-[471] 'Carmen de Gestis Oddonis I,' in _Opera_, edit. Barack, 1858, p.
-302.
-
-[472] Agius, _Vita et Obitus Hathumodae_, ch. 11.
-
-[473] Koepke, R., _Deutschlands aelteste Dichterin_, 1869, p. 17.
-
-[474] Harenberg, _Historia Ecclesiae Gandersh._, 1734, p. 589.
-
-[475] Meibom, H., _Rerum German. Script._, 1688, vol. 1, p. 706, quoting
-Selneccer.
-
-[476] Hrotsvith, _Opera_, edit. Barack, 1858; Ebert, Ad., _Allgemeine
-Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887, vol. 3, p. 285 ff.
-
-[477] _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 6.
-
-[478] Piltz, O., _Die Dramen der Roswitha_, no date; Magnin, _Theatre de
-Hrotsvitha_, 1845.
-
-[479] Koepke, R., _Deutschlands aelteste Dichterin_, 1869, p. 28.
-
-[480] Hrotsvith, _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 54.
-
-[481] 'Maria,' _Opera_, p. 7.
-
-[482] _Opera_, edit. Barack, p. 2.
-
-[483] 'Ascensio Domini,' _Opera_, p. 37.
-
-[484] _Opera_, edit. Barack, Einleitung, p. 48.
-
-[485] 'Gongolf,' _Opera_, p. 43.
-
-[486] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 290.
-
-[487] 'Pelagius,' _Opera_, p. 63.
-
-[488] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 295.
-
-[489] 'Theophilus,' _Opera_, p. 79.
-
-[490] 'Proterius,' _Opera_, p. 97.
-
-[491] 'Dionysius,' _Opera_, p. 107.
-
-[492] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 300.
-
-[493] 'Agnes,' _Opera_, p. 117.
-
-[494] _Opera_, p. 133.
-
-[495] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 301.
-
-[496] _Opera_, p. 95.
-
-[497] _Opera_, p. 137.
-
-[498] Hudson, W. H., 'Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim,' _English Historical
-Review_, 1888.
-
-[499] 'Gallicanus,' _Opera_, p. 143.
-
-[500] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 316.
-
-[501] 'Dulcetius,' _Opera_, p. 174.
-
-[502] 'Calimachus,' _Opera_, p. 191.
-
-[503] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 321.
-
-[504] 'Abraham,' _Opera_, p. 213.
-
-[505] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 323.
-
-[506] 'Paphnutius,' _Opera_, p. 237.
-
-[507] Piltz, O., _Dramen der Roswitha_ (no date), p. 178, refers to
-Boethius, _In Categorias Aristotelis_, liber 1, 'de substantia'; and to
-_De musica_, liber 1.
-
-[508] The ancient course of university study included the seven 'liberal
-arts' and was divided into the _Trivium_ including grammar, dialectic and
-rhetoric, and the _Quadrivium_ including arithmetic, geometry, astronomy
-and music. The _Trivium_ was sometimes designated as _logic_ and the
-_Quadrivium_ as _physic_.
-
-[509] 'Sapientia,' _Opera_, p. 27.
-
-[510] Piltz, _Die Dramen der Roswitha_, p. 181, refers to Boethius, _De
-Arithmetica_, liber 1, cc. 9-22.
-
-[511] 'who favoured and improved these works before they were sent forth,'
-additional words of some manuscripts; _Opera_, edit. Barak, p. 140
-footnote.
-
-[512] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 305.
-
-[513] Ebert, _Allgemeine Geschichte der Litteratur des Abendlandes_, 1887,
-vol. 3, p. 311.
-
-[514] Koepke, _Die aelteste deutsche Dichterin_, 1869.
-
-[515] Comp. _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Roswitha.'
-
-[516] Labbe, _Sacror. Concil. Collectio_, 1763, years 789, 804, 811;
-Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, p. 146 ff.
-
-[517] Matth. Paris, _Historia Major Angliae_, sub anno.
-
-[518] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 184
-ff.; Ladewig, _Poppo von Stablo und die Klosterreform unter den Saliern_,
-1883.
-
-[519] _Wulfstan_, edit. Napier, Arthur, Berlin 1883, p. 156.
-
-[520] Tanner, T., _Notitia monastica_, edit. Nasmith, 1787, Introduction,
-p. ix.
-
-[521] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 341
-ff.; _A. SS. Boll._, St Stephanus abbas, April 17.
-
-[522] Janauschek, L., _Origines Cisterciensium_, 1877.
-
-[523] Dialogus inter Clun. et Cist. in Martene and Durand's _Thesaurus
-nov. Anecdot._ Paris, 1717, vol. 5, p. 1568.
-
-[524] Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia Occidentalis_, 1597, c. 15.
-
-[525] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, pp. 375,
-468 ff.
-
-[526] Hermannus, _De Mirac. St Mariae Laudun._ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-completus_, vol. 156), p. 1002.
-
-[527] Brunner, S., _Ein Cisterzienserbuch_, 1881, p. 612.
-
-[528] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 5, p. 376.
-
-[529] Birch, W. de Gray, _On the Date of Foundation ascribed to the
-Cistercian Abbeys of Great Britain_, 1870.
-
-[530] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rivaulx,' vol. 5, p. 274.
-
-[531] Ibid. 'Fountains,' vol. 5, p. 292, nrs I-XI.
-
-[532] _A. SS. Boll._, St Robertus, Feb. 25, contains two accounts of his
-life, the one by Baldric ([Dagger] 1130), the other by Andrea. Comp. also
-Helyot, _Hist, des ordres mon._, 1714, vol. 6, pp. 83 ff.
-
-[533] Differing from settlements of the Gilbertine order, in which there
-were lay sisters also.
-
-[534] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, pp. 156 ff.
-'Leben des heil. Norbert' (written before 1155) transl. by Hertel in
-Pertz, _Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit_.
-
-[535] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, p. 175;
-Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia occidentalis_, 1597, ch. 15.
-
-[536] Gonzague, _Monastere de Storrington_, 1884, p. 8.
-
-[537] They were Brodholm and Irford.
-
-[538] Sec. 3 of this chapter.
-
-[539] 'Peregrinatio Relig. ergo.'
-
-[540] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, pp. 11 ff.
-
-[541] Tanner, J., _Notitia Monastica_ edit. Nasmith, 1787, Introd. XI.
-
-[542] Rohrbacher, _Histoire universelle de l'eglise catholique_, 1868,
-vol. 6, p. 252.
-
-[543] Labbe, C., _Sacror. Conc. Collectio_, 1763, year 816, part 2.
-
-[544] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 2, p. 55.
-
-[545] Hugonin, 'Essai sur la fondation de l'ecole St Victor a Paris,'
-printed as an introduction to Hugo de St Victore, _Opera_ (in Migne,
-_Patrologiae Cursus Compl._ vol. 175).
-
-[546] Comp. below, ch. 9, Sec. 1.
-
-[547] Norgate, Kate, _History of the Angevin Kings_, 1887, vol. 1, p. 66.
-
-[548] Idung, _De quatuor questionibus_ in Pez, B., _Thesaurus anecdot.
-nov. 1721_, vol. 2.
-
-[549] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres monastiques_, 1714, vol. 7, pp. 366,
-406. Jacopo di Vitriaco, _Historia Occidentalis_, 1597, c. 15.
-
-[550] Giraldus Cambrensis, _Speculum Ecclesiae_, edit. Brewer, 1873.
-
-[551] Map, W., _De Nugis Curialium_ (written 1182-89), 1850, p. 38.
-
-[552] John of Salisbury, _Polycraticus_, edit. Giles, bk. VII. chs. 21-23.
-
-[553] Wirecker, N., _Brunellus_, 1662, p. 83.
-
-[554] Goldsmid, _Political Songs_, vol. 2, p. 64.
-
-[555] Freeman, _Norman Conquest_, 3rd edit. 1877, vol. 2, p. 609.
-
-[556] Ibid. p. 554; Map, _De Nugis Curialium_, 1850, p. 201 (Freeman: Map
-like other Norman writers speaks very ill of Godwin).
-
-[557] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6, p. 1618 (p. 1619 he says in
-connection with the destroyed nunnery Woodchester that the wife of Earl
-Godwin built it to make amends for her husband's fraud at Berkley).
-
-[558] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 470.
-
-[559] Ibid. 'Nunnaminster,' vol. 2, p. 451.
-
-[560] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 436.
-
-[561] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 472. The abbess does not even seem
-to have been represented (as she was at the Diet abroad).
-
-[562] Ibid. p. 472; and p. 473 footnote.
-
-[563] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 1, p. 472.
-
-[564] They were Godstow, Elstow, Malling.
-
-[565] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Amesbury,' vol. 2, p. 333; Freeman, _History
-of the Norman Conquest_ (3rd edit. 1877), vol. 2, p. 610; the event is
-dated 1177; perhaps the letters from John of Salisbury, _Epist._ edit.
-Giles, nrs 72, 74, are addressed to the abbess of Amesbury, who was
-deposed.
-
-[566] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 362.
-
-[567] Ibid. 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 422.
-
-[568] Ibid. 'St Clement's,' vol. 4, p. 323.
-
-[569] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Stanford,' vol. 4, p. 257.
-
-[570] Ibid. 'Sinningthwaite,' vol. 5, p. 463.
-
-[571] Ibid. 'Swine,' vol. 5, p. 494, nr 2; 'Nun-Cotham,' vol. 5, p. 676,
-nr 2.
-
-[572] _A. SS. Boll._, St Margaret, June 10.
-
-[573] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, Christina.
-
-[574] Brand, _History of Newcastle_, vol. 1, p. 204.
-
-[575] Freeman, _History of William Rufus_, vol. 2, pp. 596, 682.
-
-[576] Will. of Malmesbury, _Gesta Reg._ (Rolls Series), pp. 279, 470, 493.
-
-[577] Orderic Vitalis, _Eccles. Hist._, transl. by Forester, 1847, vol. 3,
-p. 12.
-
-[578] Eadmer, _Historia_ (Rolls Series), p. 122.
-
-[579] Comp. below, ch. 8, Sec. 2.
-
-[580] Anselm of Canterbury, _Epistolae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus
-completus_, vol. 159), the numeration of which is followed in the text.
-
-[581] Hilarius, _Versus et ludi_, edit. Champollion-Figeac, 1838, p. 1.
-(Champollion prints Clinton, which he no doubt misread for Winton.)
-
-[582] Milner, J., _History of Winchester_, 1823, vol. 1, p. 212.
-
-[583] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wherwell,' vol. 2, p. 634.
-
-[584] Ibid. 'St Mary's Abbey,' vol. 2, p. 452.
-
-[585] Ibid. 'Lillechurch,' vol. 4, p. 378, charter nr 2.
-
-[586] Ibid. 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 506.
-
-[587] Norgate, Kate, _History of the Angevin Kings_, 1887, vol. 1, p. 469.
-
-[588] Beket, _Epistolae_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus compl._, vol. 190), nr
-196.
-
-[589] Petrus Blesiensis, _Epistolae_, edit. Giles, letters nrs 35, 36, 55,
-239.
-
-[590] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gilbert, Feb. 4, contain two short lives;
-Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6 inserted between pp. 946, 947, contains a
-longer account, the 'Institutiones,' and various references to Gilbert;
-_Dict. of Nat. Biography_ refers to a MS. account at Oxford, Digby, 36,
-Bodleian.
-
-[591] Helyot, _Histoire des ordres mon._, 1714, vol. 2, p. 190.
-
-[592] _Dict. of Nat. Biography._
-
-[593] _A. SS. Boll._, St Gilbert, Feb. 4, _Vita_, nr 2, ch. 3; Dugdale,
-_Vita_, p. xi.
-
-[594] The 'precentrix' is strictly speaking the leader of the choir. Cf.
-below ch. 10 Sec. 2.
-
-[595] Dugdale, _Institutiones_, p. lxxxii.
-
-[596] _Dict. of Nat. Biography._
-
-[597] Ailred, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus comp._, vol. 195), p.
-789. 'De sanctimoniali de Wattun.'
-
-[598] Oliver, G., _History of Beverley and Watton_, 1829, p. 520 ff.; cf.
-above, p. 91.
-
-[599] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, vol. 6, p. xcviii.
-
-[600] Report in _Athenaeum_, Oct. 7, 1893.
-
-[601] Oliver, G., _History of Beverley and Watton_, 1829, p. 531.
-
-[602] Wattenbach, W., _Schriftwesen im Mittelalter_, 2nd edit. 1875, p.
-374.
-
-[603] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 3 vols. 1866-71, vol.
-1, p. 214.
-
-[604] Cf. above, p. 122.
-
-[605] Cf. above, pp. 122, 132.
-
-[606] Cf. above, p. 109.
-
-[607] Cf. above, p. 106.
-
-[608] Michel, F., _Etoffes de soie au moyen age_, 1852, vol. 2, p. 339,
-contains this and other references.
-
-[609] Eddi, _Vita Wilfredi_, c. 65 (it is unknown over which house she
-presided).
-
-[610] Cf. above, p. 63.
-
-[611] Haddon and Stubbs, _Councils and Ecclesiastical Documents_, 1869.
-
-[612] Cf. above, pp. 103, 115, 198, and below, ch. 11, Sec. 1.
-
-[613] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 142.
-
-[614] Michel, F., _Etoffes de soie pendant le moyen age_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-340.
-
-[615] Wharton, _Anglia Sacra_, vol. 1, p. 607.
-
-[616] Michel, F., _Etoffes de soie pendant le moyen age_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-338.
-
-[617] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 186 footnote.
-
-[618] Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated MSS._, 1892, p. 112.
-
-[619] For example in the South Kensington Museum, nr 594-1884, Italian
-chasuble; nr 1321-1864, panel of canvas, from Bock's Collection
-(_Descriptive Catalogue of Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[620] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 209,
-suggests that gold plaques may have been sewn into the work.
-
-[621] Cf. South Kensington Museum, nr 28-1892, a number of fragments of
-textile linen worked over in coloured silks and gold thread with scenes
-taken from the life of the Virgin. English work of the 14th century
-(_Descriptive Catalogue of Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[622] Michel, F., _Etoffes de soie pendant le moyen age_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-337, points out that the expression 'opus anglicum' was applied also to
-the work of the goldsmith; comp. Ducange, _Glossarium_, 'Anglicum.'
-'Loculus ille mirificus ... argento et auro gemmisque, anglico opere
-subtilitater ac pulcherrime decoratus.'
-
-[623] _Historia Major Angliae_, sub anno.
-
-[624] South Kensington Museum, nr 83-1864 (_Descriptive Catalogue of
-Tapestry and Embroidery_, 1888).
-
-[625] Ibid. p. 168.
-
-[626] _A. SS. Boll._, St Eustadiola, June 8. Vita, ch. 3.
-
-[627] _A. SS. Boll._, SS. Herlindis et Renild, March 22, ch. 5 (videlicet
-nendo et texendo, creando ac suendo, in auro quoque ac margaritis in
-serico componendo).
-
-[628] Ibid. ch. 12 (palliola ... multis modis variisque compositionibus
-diversae artis innumerabilibus ornamentis).
-
-[629] Stadler and Heim, _Vollstaendiges Heiligenlexicon_, 1858,
-'Harlindis.'
-
-[630] _Zeitschrift fuer Christl. Archaeologie_, edit. Schnuetgen, 1856,
-'Muensterkirche in Essen,' 1860, Beitraege.
-
-[631] Labarte, _Arts industriels au moyen age_, 1872, vol. 1, p. 341.
-
-[632] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 84.
-
-[633] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 2, p.
-326.
-
-[634] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 155.
-
-[635] Schultz, A., _Hoefisches Leben zur Zeit der Minnesinger_, 1889, cites
-many passages from the epics which refer to embroidery worn by heroes and
-heroines. A piece of work of special beauty described vol. 1, p. 326, had
-been made by an apostate nun.
-
-[636] Ekkehard IV., c. 10, in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Scriptores_, vol. 2, p.
-123.
-
-[637] Erath, _Codex diplom. Quedliburg._, 1764, p. 109.
-
-[638] Brunner, S., _Kunstgenossen der Klosterzelle_, 1863, vol. 2, p. 555.
-
-[639] Kugler, F., _Kleine Schriften_, 1853, vol. 1, pp. 635 ff.; part of
-the hanging is given by Muentz, E., _Tapisseries, broderies et dentelles_,
-1890, plate 2.
-
-[640] Fritsch, _Geschichte des Reichstifts Quedlinburg_, 1828, vol. 1, p.
-121.
-
-[641] Kugler, F., _Kleine Schriften_, 1853, vol. 1, p. 540.
-
-[642] Buesching, F. G., _Reise durch einige Muensterkirchen_, 1819, p. 235.
-
-[643] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 1866, vol. 1, p. 227.
-
-[644] Bock, F., _Geschichte der liturg. Gewaender_, 1866, vol. 3, pp. 201
-ff.
-
-[645] Ibid. 1866, vol. 3, p. 202.
-
-[646] Hefner, _Oberbair. Archiv_, 1830, vol. 1, p. 355.
-
-[647] Westermayer in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biog._, article 'Diemud';
-_Catalogus Cod. Lat. Bibliothecae Reg. Monac._, vol. 7, 1881, nrs 140,
-146-154.
-
-[648] Wattenbach, W., _Schriftwesen im Mittelalter_, 2nd edit. 1875, p.
-374.
-
-[649] Ibid. p. 177.
-
-[650] Ibid. p. 304.
-
-[651] Ibid. p. 374.
-
-[652] Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated MSS._, 1892, p. 216.
-
-[653] Michel, F., _Etoffes de soie pendant le moyen age_, 1852, vol. 2, p.
-350.
-
-[654] _Reproductions par la Societe pour la conservation des monuments de
-l'Alsace_, Sept livraisons containing Plates 1-53 inclusive (till 1895).
-
-[655] Silbermann, J. A., _Beschreibung von Hohenburg_, 1781.
-
-[656] Roth, K. L., 'Der Odilienberg' in _Alsatia_, 1856, vol. 1, pp. 91
-ff.
-
-[657] Comp. above, pp. 22, 24.
-
-[658] Wiegand, in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Relind.'
-
-[659] It is possible but hardly probable that the miniaturist in colouring
-the picture gave free play to his fancy.
-
-[660] Gerard, Ch., _Les artistes de l'Alsace_, 1872, p. 92.
-
-[661] Ibid.; Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818. p. 16,
-footnote.
-
-[662] The monument is represented in Schoepflin, _Alsatia Illustrata_,
-1751, vol. 1, ad pag. 797.
-
-[663] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, with sheets
-of illustrations, which in a few copies are coloured.
-
-[664] Woltman, in _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Herrad.'
-
-[665] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, Vorwort p.
-xi.
-
-[666] Cf. above, p. 180.
-
-[667] Engelhardt, _Herrad von Landsperg und ihr Werk_, 1818, p. 104.
-
-[668] Piper, F., _Kalendarien und Martyrologien der Angelsachsen_, 1862.
-
-[669] Apparently following the 'Psychomachia' of Prudentius, a Christian
-poet of the 5th century.
-
-[670] Gerard, Ch., _Les artistes de l'Alsace_, 1872, Introd. p. xix., p.
-46, footnote.
-
-[671] Probably with reference to Job xxxix., 14-15.
-
-[672] Hildegardis, _Opera_, 1882 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol.
-197, which contains the acts of the saint reprinted from _A. SS. Boll._,
-St Hildegardis, Sept. 17; her life written by Godefrid and Theodor; the
-'Acta Inquisitionis'; the article by Dr Reuss, and the fullest collection
-of the saint's works hitherto published).
-
-[673] Roth, F. W., _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth und die Schriften von
-Ekbert und Emecho von Schoenau_, 1884.
-
-[674] 'Annales Palidenses' in Pertz, _Mon. Germ. Script._, vol. 16, p. 90.
-
-[675] Neander, _Der heil. Bernard und seine Zeit_, 1848.
-
-[676] _Opera_ (_Vita_, c. 17), p. 104.
-
-[677] _Opera_, 'Scivias,' pp. 383-738.
-
-[678] Ibid. (_Vita_, c. 5), p. 94.
-
-[679] Giesebrecht, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit_, vol. 4, p.
-505.
-
-[680] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 29), p. 189.
-
-[681] _Opera_ (Responsum), p. 189.
-
-[682] Ibid. 'Epistolae,' pp. 1-382.
-
-[683] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877,
-pp. 19 ff.
-
-[684] Ibid. pp. 53 ff.
-
-[685] Schneegans, W., _Kloster Disibodenberg_; Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und
-Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, pp. 45 ff.
-
-[686] _Opera_ (Responsum to Bernard), p. 190.
-
-[687] Ibid. (_Vita_ c. 14), p. 101.
-
-[688] Ibid. (_Vita_ c. 19), p. 105.
-
-[689] Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, p.
-53.
-
-[690] _Opera_ (_Vita_ c. 21), p. 106.
-
-[691] Ibid.
-
-[692] Ibid. (Acta Inquisitionis), p. 136.
-
-[693] Ibid. (Epist. nr 4), p. 154.
-
-[694] _Opera_, p. 383.
-
-[695] _Opera_ (lib. 2, visio 7), p. 555.
-
-[696] _Opera_ (lib. 3, visio 11), p. 709.
-
-[697] _Opera_ (lib. 3, visio 13), p. 733.
-
-[698] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 1), p. 145.
-
-[699] _Opera_ (Responsum), p. 145.
-
-[700] This interpretation is given by Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken
-der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, p. 157.
-
-[701] Jessen, 'Ueber die medic. naturhist. Werke der heil. Hildegardis,'
-in _Kaiserl. Acad. der Wissenschaften, Wien, Naturwissensch. Abth._ vol.
-45 (1862), pp. 97 ff.
-
-[702] _Opera_, 'Physica,' pp. 1117-1352.
-
-[703] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders im
-Mittelalter,' in _Archiv fuer pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, p. 286.
-
-[704] Haeser, H., _Lehrbuch der Geschichte der Medizin_, 1875, vol. 1, p.
-640.
-
-[705] Jessen, _Botanik der Gegenwart und Vorzeit_, 1864, pp. 120-127.
-
-[706] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-83; an example of the musical notation as an appendix in Schmelzeis, _Das
-Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879.
-
-[707] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-78, 'Expositiones Evangeliorum.'
-
-[708] _Opera_, 'Explanatio regulae St Benedicti,' pp. 1053-1069.
-
-[709] Ibid. 'Explanatio symboli St Athanasii,' pp. 1066-1093.
-
-[710] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-38.
-
-[711] _Opera_, 'Solutiones triginta octo quaestionum,' pp. 1038-1053.
-
-[712] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-79.
-
-[713] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 12), p. 164.
-
-[714] Ibid. (Epist. nr 6), p. 157.
-
-[715] Ibid. (Epist. nr 11), p. 163.
-
-[716] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 62), p. 281.
-
-[717] Ibid. (Epist. nr 49), p. 253.
-
-[718] Ibid. (Epist. nr 22), p. 178.
-
-[719] Ibid. (Epist. nr 5), p. 156.
-
-[720] Ibid. (Epist. nr 10), p. 161.
-
-[721] _Opera_ (Epist. nr 100), p. 321.
-
-[722] Ibid. (Epist. nr 101), p. 322.
-
-[723] Ibid. (Epist. nr 96), p. 317.
-
-[724] Ibid. (Epist. nr 48), p. 243; cf. below, p. 281.
-
-[725] Ibid. (_Vita_, c. 44), p. 122; also p. 142 (Reuss here
-misunderstands the _Acta Inquisitionis_, p. 138), comp. Schmelzeis, _Das
-Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879, pp. 538 ff.
-
-[726] _Opera_, 'Liber divinorum Operum,' pp. 739-1037.
-
-[727] Ibid. (visio 4), pp. 807 ff.
-
-[728] _Opera_ (visio 5, c. 36), p. 934.
-
-[729] Ibid. (visio 5, c. 43), p. 945.
-
-[730] Ibid. (visio 10, c. 25), p. 1026.
-
-[731] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877,
-pp. 95 ff.
-
-[732] Line 1401.
-
-[733] Cf. _The Nunns prophesie ... concerning the rise and downfall of ...
-the ... Jesuits_, 1680.
-
-[734] _Predictions sur la revolution de la Belgique._ Amsterdam, 1832.
-
-[735] _Opera_, 'Vita St Rupertis,' pp. 1081-1092.
-
-[736] Ibid. 'Vita St Disibodi,' pp. 1093-1116.
-
-[737] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877, p.
-75, footnote.
-
-[738] _Opera_, p. 90; _A. SS. Boll._ St Hildegardis, Sept. 17.
-
-[739] Schmelzeis, _Das Leben und Wirken der heil. Hildegardis_, 1879.
-
-[740] Linde, _Handschriften der koenigl. Bibliothek in Wiesbaden_, 1877.
-
-[741] _Opera_, p. 140, footnote.
-
-[742] Roth, F. W. E., _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884,
-Vorwort, p. cv.
-
-[743] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, Vorwort, pp.
-cvii. ff.
-
-[744] Ibid. 'Liber Visionum primus,' Prologus, p. 1.
-
-[745] Ibid. 'Liber Visionum secundus,' c. 31, p. 53; Anlage, p. 153.
-
-[746] Ibid. 'Liber Viarum Dei,' pp. 88-122.
-
-[747] Ibid. Vorwort, p. cix.
-
-[748] Ibid. 'Liber Viarum Dei,' c. 10, p. 92.
-
-[749] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, 'Liber Viarum
-Dei,' c. 13, p. 100.
-
-[750] Ibid. p. 104.
-
-[751] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, 'Liber Viarum
-Dei,' c. 20, p. 122.
-
-[752] Ibid. pp. 70, 178.
-
-[753] Ibid. p. 74.
-
-[754] Ibid. 'De Sacro Exercitu Virginum Coloniensium,' pp. 123-153.
-
-[755] Ibid. Vorwort, pp. cxi ff. Roth discusses the history of the
-development of this legend.
-
-[756] Comp. above, p. 40.
-
-[757] _A. SS. Boll._, St Ursula, Oct. 21.
-
-[758] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, Vorwort, p.
-cxxiv; Hardy, Th. D., _Descriptive catalogue of MS. material_, 1858, vol.
-2, p. 417.
-
-[759] Roth, _Die Visionen der heil. Elisabeth_ etc. 1884, p. 253.
-
-[760] _A. SS. Boll._, St Elisabetha, June 18.
-
-[761] _A. SS. Boll._, St Severinus, Jan. 8.
-
-[762] _A. SS. Boll._, St Magnericus, July 25, _Vita_, c. 49.
-
-[763] Creighton, C., _History of Epidemics in England_, vol. 1, 1891, p.
-85.
-
-[764] Ibid. p. 97.
-
-[765] Muratori, _Antiquitates Italiae_, 1738. Pope Hadrian I to Karl the
-Great, vol. 3, p. 581.
-
-[766] Salles, F., _Annales de l'ordre de Malte, ou des hospitaliers de St
-Jean de Jerusalem_, 1889.
-
-[767] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Hospital of St Gregory,' vol. 6, p. 615, nr
-1.
-
-[768] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Herbaldoun,' vol. 6, p. 653; Creighton, C.,
-_History of Epidemics_, vol. 1, 1891, p. 87.
-
-[769] Map, W., _De Nugis Curialium_, 1850, p. 228.
-
-[770] Ailred, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Completus_, vol. 195), p.
-368.
-
-[771] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Giles in the Fields,' vol. 6, p. 635.
-
-[772] Creighton, C., _History of Epidemics in England_, vol. 1, 1891, p.
-88.
-
-[773] Hormayr, 'Die Grafen von Andechs und Tyrol,' _Saemtl. Werke_, vol. 3.
-
-[774] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv fuer pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-311.
-
-[775] _Allgemeine deutsche Biographie_, article 'Hedwig.'
-
-[776] Stenzel, G. A. H., _Scriptores rerum Siles._, Breslau 1835, 'Vita St
-Hedwigis' vol. 2, pp. 1-114; also _A. SS. Boll._, St Hedwig, Oct. 17.
-
-[777] _Verein fuer das Museum schles. Alterthuemer_, edit. Luchs, H., 1870.
-Also Luchs, H., _Schlesische Fuerstenbilder_, 1872.
-
-[778] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv fuer pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-275.
-
-[779] Wolfskron, _Bilder der Hedwigslegende_, 1846.
-
-[780] Stenzel, G. A. H., _Scriptores rer. Siles._, 1835, 'Vita Annae
-ducissae Sil.' vol. 2, p. 127.
-
-[781] _A. SS. Boll._, St Agnes de Bohemia, March 6, print two accounts, of
-uncertain date.
-
-[782] _A. SS. Boll._, Ibid., print these letters.
-
-[783] _A. SS. Boll._, Ibid., _Vita_ 1, ch. 32.
-
-[784] Montalembert, C., _Histoire de Ste Elisabeth de Hongrie, duchesse de
-Thuringe_, edition de luxe 1878, with preface by Gautier, contains
-reproductions of some of those pictures; Potthast, A., _Wegweiser_,
-enumerates a number of accounts of the life of St Elisabeth.
-
-[785] Rieger, L., prints this 'Leben der heil. Elisabeth' in _Literarisch.
-Verein_, 1843, and discusses early MS. accounts of her life.
-
-[786] Justi, C. W., _Elisabeth, die Heilige_, 1797.
-
-[787] Montalembert, C., _Histoire de Ste Elisabeth de Hongrie_, 1836, 7th
-edit. 1855.
-
-[788] Wegele, F. X., 'Die heil. Elisabeth von Thueringen' in Sybel,
-_Historische Zeitschrift_, 1861, pp. 351-397, which I have followed in the
-text.
-
-[789] Virchow, R., 'Zur Geschichte des Aussatzes, besonders in
-Deutschland,' in _Archiv fuer pathol. Anatomie_, vol. 18, article 2, p.
-313.
-
-[790] _Allgemeine deutsche Biographie_, article 'Konrad von Marburg.'
-
-[791] Haureau, _Histoire de la philosophie scolastique_, 1850, vol. 1, pp.
-319 ff.
-
-[792] _Dictionary of National Biography_, article 'Hales, Thomas.'
-
-[793] 'A luve ron,' edit. Morris, _Old English Miscellany_, p. 93, for the
-Early Engl. Text Soc. 1872.
-
-[794] Edit. Morton for the Camden Soc. 1853.
-
-[795] 'Die angelsaechsischen Prosabearbeitungen der Benedictinerregel,'
-edit. Schroeer, 1885 (in Grein, _Bibliothek der angels. Prosa_, vol. 2), p.
-9.
-
-[796] Schroeer, Winteney _Version der Regula St Benedicti_, 1888, p. 13.
-
-[797] 'De vita eremetica' (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol. 32, by
-an oversight it is included among the works of St Augustine), p. 145.
-
-[798] Anselm, _Opera_ (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._, vol. 158),
-'Meditationes' (nr 15-17), pp. 786 ff.
-
-[799] Edit. Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 7, p. 304.
-
-[800] _Scenes and characters of the Middle Ages_, 1872, pp. 93-151.
-
-[801] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 1, p. 693.
-
-[802] Brink, B. ten, _Early English Literature_, trans. Kennedy, 1883, p.
-205.
-
-[803] First advanced by Morton, _Ancren Riwle_, Introd. pp. xii-xv; it is
-supported neither by tradition nor by documentary evidence.
-
-[804] Dalgairns, Introd. to Hylton, _Scale of Perfection_, 1870, thinks it
-possible that the author was a Dominican friar.
-
-[805] Comp. throughout _Ancren Riwle_, edit. Morton for the Camden Soc.
-1853.
-
-[806] That is bands or ligatures to be used after the letting of blood.
-
-[807] _Old English Homilies_, First Series, edit. Morris, 1867, p. 268.
-
-[808] _Hali Meidenhad_, edit. Cockayne, for the Early English Text Soc.,
-1866.
-
-[809] Comp. _Revelationes Gertrudianae ac Mechtildianae_, edit. Oudin, for
-the Benedictines of Solesmes 1875, 2 vols., which contain the works of
-these three nuns; Mechthild von Magdeburg, _Offenbarungen, oder Das
-Fliessende Licht der Gottheit_, edit. Gall Morel, 1869; Preger, W.,
-_Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874, vol. 1, pp.
-70-132.
-
-[810] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, Praefatio.
-
-[811] Ibid. vol. 1, pp. 497 ff.
-
-[812] Comp. Preger, 'Dante's Matelda,' Acad. Vortrag, 1873; Paquelin and
-Scartazzini, 'Zur Matelda-Frage' in _Jahrbuch der Dante Gesellschaft_,
-Berlin, 1877, pp. 405, 411; Lubin, _Osservazioni sulla Matilda svelata_,
-1878.
-
-[813] _Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie_, article 'Mechthild' by Strauch,
-Ph.
-
-[814] Keller, L., _Die Reformation und die aelteren Reformparteien_, 1885,
-pp. 29 ff.; also Hallman, E., _Geschichte des Ursprungs der Beguinen_,
-1843.
-
-[815] Mechthild von Magdeburg, _Offenbarungen, oder Das Fliessende Licht
-der Gottheit_, edit. Gall Morel, 1869; the abridged Latin version in
-_Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, pp. 423-710.
-
-[816] Heinrich not to be confounded with Heinrich who translated her work.
-
-[817] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, pp. 298, 329, 332, etc.
-
-[818] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 542; vol. 2, pp. 325, 330.
-
-[819] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, etc. edit. Gall Morel, p. 3 'Wie die
-minne und die kuneginne zesamene sprachen.'
-
-[820] Ibid. p. 6 'Von den megden der seele und von der minne schlage.'
-
-[821] Ibid. p. 18 'Von der minne weg,' etc.
-
-[822] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 43 'Wie die minne vraget,' etc.
-
-[823] Ibid. p. 38 'Wie die bekantnisse und die sele sprechent zesamne,'
-etc.
-
-[824] Ibid. p. 232 'Wie bekantnisse sprichet zu dem gewissede.'
-
-[825] Ibid. p. 30 'Von der armen dirnen' (I have retained the designation
-'saint' where it is used in the allegory).
-
-[826] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 210 'Da Johannes Baptista der armen
-dirnen messe sang.'
-
-[827] Ibid. p. 46 'Wie sich die minnende sele gesellet gotte,' etc.
-
-[828] Ibid. p. 82 'Von der helle,' etc.
-
-[829] Ibid. p. 270 'Ein wenig von dem paradyso.'
-
-[830] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 52 'Von diseme buche,' etc.
-
-[831] Ibid. p. 90 'Dis buch ist von gotte komen,' etc.
-
-[832] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 110 'Von einer vrowe, etc.'
-
-[833] Ibid. p. 68 'Von siben dingen die alle priester sollent haben.'
-
-[834] Ibid. p. 171 'Wie ein prior, etc.'; p. 177 'Von der regele eines
-kanoniken, etc.'; p. 178 'Got gebet herschaft.'
-
-[835] Ibid. p. 198 'Wie boese pfafheit sol genidert werden.'
-
-[836] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, p. 524.
-
-[837] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 115 'Von sehs tugenden St Domenicus';
-p. 116 'Dur sehszehen ding hat got predierorden liep'; ibid. 'Von
-vierhande crone bruder Heinrichs'; p. 154 'Von sehsleie kleider, etc.'
-
-[838] Ibid. p. 166 'Von funfleie nuwe heligen.'
-
-[839] _A. SS. Boll._, St Peter of the Dominican Order, April 29.
-
-[840] Ibid., St Jutta vidua, May 5, appendix.
-
-[841] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 256 'Wie ein predierbruder wart
-gesehen.'
-
-[842] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 243 'Von der not eines urluges.'
-
-[843] Ibid. p. 249 'Von einem geistlichen closter.'
-
-[844] Comp. below, ch. 11, Sec. 1.
-
-[845] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 68 'Von dem angenge aller dinge'; p.
-107 'Von der heligen drivaltekeit, etc.'; p. 147 'Von sante marien gebet,
-etc.'
-
-[846] Ibid. p. 14 'In disen weg zuhet die sele, etc.'
-
-[847] Ibid. p. 16 'Von der pfrunde trost und minne.'
-
-[848] Mechthild, _Offenbarungen_, p. 98 'Von zwein ungeleichen dingen,
-etc.'
-
-[849] Ibid. p. 214 'Bekorunge, die welt und ein gut ende pruefent uns.'
-
-[850] 'Liber Specialis Gratiae,' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-2, pp. 1-421.
-
-[851] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2, p. 727.
-
-[852] Preger, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874,
-vol. 1, p. 87.
-
-[853] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 1, ch. 30, De angelis), p. 102.
-
-[854] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 2, ch. 2, De vinea domini), p. 137.
-
-[855] Cf. Gal. v. 22-3, to which Mechthild adds.
-
-[856] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,'
-bk 1, ch. 10, De veneratione imaginis Christi), p. 31.
-
-[857] Ibid. vol. 2 ('Liber Specialis Gratiae,' bk 2, ch. 23, De coquina
-domini), p. 165.
-
-[858] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 2 (bk 2, ch. 43, De nomine et
-utilitate hujus libri), p. 192.
-
-[859] Ibid. vol. 1, pp. 46, 269.
-
-[860] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 218.
-
-[861] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, pp. 1 ff. on her life.
-
-[862] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 14.
-
-[863] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 23.
-
-[864] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 227.
-
-[865] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 27.
-
-[866] Ibid. vol. 1, p. 39.
-
-[867] 'Legatus Divinae Pietatis' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, pp. 1 ff.
-
-[868] 'Legatus Divinae Pietatis' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, p. 61.
-
-[869] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, p. 113.
-
-[870] _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol. 1, p. 351.
-
-[871] Preger, W., _Geschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter_, 1874,
-vol. 1, p. 78.
-
-[872] 'Exercitia Spiritualia,' in _Revelationes_, etc. edit. Oudin, vol.
-1, pp. 617-720.
-
-[873] Ibid. pp. 701 ff.
-
-[874] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507 footnote.
-
-[875] Ibid. 'Davington,' vol. 4, p. 288.
-
-[876] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 365, charter nr 7.
-
-[877] Jusserand, J., _Histoire litteraire du Peuple Anglais_, 1894, pp.
-121 ff., 235 ff.
-
-[878] _Romania_, edit. Meyer et Paris, vol. 13, p. 400.
-
-[879] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Ankerwyke,' vol. 4, p. 229, charter nr 4.
-
-[880] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 471, charter nr 21.
-
-[881] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 441.
-
-[882] Ibid. 'Legh,' vol. 6, p. 333, footnote _t_. MS. Harleian 3660.
-
-[883] Bateson, M., 'Register of Crabhouse Nunnery' (no date), _Norfolk and
-Norwich Archaeol. Society_.
-
-[884] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Littlemore,' vol. 4, p. 490, charter nr 14.
-
-[885] Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 2, pp. 60 ff.
-
-[886] This supposition is based on certain peculiarities in the language
-of the rule for men. Cf. 'Die angelsaechsischen Prosabearbeitungen der
-Benedictinerregel,' edit. Schroeer, 1885 (in Grein, _Bibliotek der angels.
-Prosa_, vol. 2) Einleitung, p. xviii.
-
-[887] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Godstow,' vol. 4, p. 357, charter nr 23.
-
-[888] Lansdowne MS. 436.
-
-[889] _Early English Text Soc._, nr 100. Arundel MS. 396.
-
-[890] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 424.
-
-[891] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal visitations of the Benedictine nunnery of
-Easebourne' in _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 12. According to
-Bradshaw, H., 'Note on service books' (printed as an appendix in
-Middleton, J. H., _Illuminated Manuscripts_, 1892) the missal was used for
-celebration of the mass; while the breviary contained the services for the
-hours, including the _antiphony_ (anthems to the psalms)--the _legenda_
-(long lessons used at matins),--the psalter (psalms arranged for use at
-hours),--and the collects (short lessons used at all the hours except
-matins). In the list above, these are enumerated as separate books. He
-further says that the _ordinale_ contained general rules for the right
-understanding and use of the service books. It is noteworthy that this is
-in French in the list of books at Easebourne.
-
-[892] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Ritualia_, 1882, vol. 3, p. 357 footnotes.
-
-[893] _Placita de Quo Warranto_ published by Command.
-
-[894] _Placita de Quo Warranto_, pp. 11, 97, 232, 233.
-
-[895] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Malling,' vol. 3, p. 381, charter nr 5.
-
-[896] Ibid. 'Stratford,' vol. 4, p. 119, charter nr 3.
-
-[897] Ibid. 'Wroxhall,' vol. 4, p. 88.
-
-[898] Ibid. 'Redlingfield,' vol. 4, p. 25, charter nr 2.
-
-[899] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888,
-appendices to vols. 1 and 2.
-
-[900] The word 'mynchyn' was I believe never applied to them.
-
-[901] Holstenius, _Codex regularum_, 1759, vol. 3, p. 34.
-
-[902] Cf. above, p. 204.
-
-[903] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 473.
-
-[904] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary Pree,' vol. 3, p. 353, charter nr 9.
-
-[905] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 474.
-
-[906] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Benedictine Nunnery of
-Easebourne,' _Sussex Archaeol. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 7.
-
-[907] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 452,
-footnote.
-
-[908] Ibid. 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 473.
-
-[909] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 441, charter nr 8.
-
-[910] Schroeer, _Winteney Version der regula St Benedicti_, 1888, p. 16.
-
-[911] Edit. Koelbing, _Englische Studien_, vol. 2, pp. 60 ff. (line
-references in the text throughout this section are to this version).
-
-[912] Shermann, A. J., _Hist. Coll. Jesus Cantab._, edit. Halliwell, 1840,
-p. 16.
-
-[913] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Langley,' vol. 4, p. 220.
-
-[914] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Ritualia_, 1882, vol. 3, p. 358 footnote.
-
-[915] Cf. above, p. 206.
-
-[916] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Catesby,' vol. 4, p. 635.
-
-[917] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Bromhall,' vol. 4, p. 506.
-
-[918] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_,
-pp. 185, 190, 318.
-
-[919] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wilton,' vol. 2, p. 317.
-
-[920] Benedictus, _Regula_, c. 65 (in Migne, _Patrol. Cursus Compl._ vol.
-66).
-
-[921] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 437, footnote _k_.
-
-[922] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 445 Computus.
-
-[923] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, charter nr 15.
-
-[924] I am unable to ascertain the quantity indicated by the 'piece.'
-
-[925] I am unable to ascertain the difference between 'stubbe' and
-'shafte.'
-
-[926] Rogers, Th., _Six Centuries of Work and Wages_, 1884, p. 101.
-
-[927] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's, Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 451,
-charter nr 4.
-
-[928] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-290.
-
-[929] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Shaftesbury,' vol. 2, p. 472.
-
-[930] Ibid. 'St Mary, Winchester,' vol. 2, p. 451, charter nr 4.
-
-[931] Ibid. 'Kilburn,' vol. 3, p. 424.
-
-[932] Blaauw, W. A., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Benedictine Nunnery of
-Easebourne,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 9, p. 15.
-
-[933] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-138.
-
-[934] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Elstow,' vol. 3, p. 411, charter nr 8.
-
-[935] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 438, footnote _b_.
-
-[936] 'Here begynneth a matere' etc. (by John Alcock (?)), printed by
-Wynkyn de Worde (1500), last page but one.
-
-[937] _Six Centuries of Work and Wages_, 1884, p. 166.
-
-[938] Rye, W., _Carrow Abbey_, 1889, p. 48 ff.
-
-[939] Skelton, _Poetical Works_, 1843, vol. 1, p. 51, 'Phyllyp Sparowe.'
-
-[940] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507, footnote _p_.
-
-[941] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich (1492-1532)_, p.
-140.
-
-[942] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Helen's,' vol. 4, p. 551, charter nr 3.
-
-[943] Ibid. 'Barking,' vol. 1, p. 437, footnote _m_.
-
-[944] Fosbroke, _British Monachism_, 1843, p. 176.
-
-[945] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen, at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 256.
-
-[946] Bateson, M., 'Visitations of Archbishop Warham in 1511,' in _English
-Hist. Review_, vol. 6, 1891, p. 28.
-
-[947] Maskell, W., _Monumenta Rit._, 1882, vol. 3, p. 331, 'The order of
-consecration of Nuns,' from Cambridge Fol. Mm. 3. 13, and Lansdown MS.,
-388; p. 360 'The manner to make a Nun,' from Cotton MS., Vespasian A. 25,
-fol. 12.
-
-[948] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614.
-
-[949] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Arch. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 256.
-
-[950] Comp. Smith and Cheetham, _Dictionary of Christian Antiquities_,
-1875, article 'Hours of Prayer.'
-
-[951] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840; _Myroure of
-Oure Ladye_, Early English Text Soc., 1873, Introduction by Blunt, J. H.
-
-[952] Hammerich, _Den hellige Birgitta_, 1863.
-
-[953] _A. SS. Boll._, St Birgitta vidua, Oct. 8.
-
-[954] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xiv.
-
-[955] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol. 1,
-p. 42.
-
-[956] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Amesbury,' vol. 1, p. 333.
-
-[957] Ibid. 'Westwood,' vol. 6, p. 1004.
-
-[958] Ibid. 'Levenestre,' vol. 6, p. 1032.
-
-[959] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 249 ff.,
-from Arundel MS. nr 146 (chapter references throughout the text in this
-chapter are to this reprint).
-
-[960] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxxv.
-
-[961] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, pp. 312
-ff., from Additional MS. nr 5208.
-
-[962] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, pp. 405 ff.
-'A table of signs.'
-
-[963] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxvi.
-
-[964] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xxix.
-
-[965] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 421,
-'Indulgentia monasterii de Syon,' MS. Ashmol. nr 750; p. 422, 'The Pardon
-of the monastery of Shene which is Syon,' MS. Harleian 4012, art. 9.
-
-[966] Ibid. p. 426, footnotes.
-
-[967] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. xlv. B. M. Addit. MS., nr 22285.
-
-[968] Printed by Wynkyn de Worde (?), 1526; reprinted for the Bradshaw
-Society, 1893.
-
-[969] Aungier, G. J., _History and Antiquities of Syon_, 1840, p. 529. MS.
-Harleian 2321, fol. 17 ff.
-
-[970] Ibid. p. 527.
-
-[971] Ibid. p. 527.
-
-[972] Ibid. p. 526.
-
-[973] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, Introd. p. ix.
-
-[974] Ibid. p. 2.
-
-[975] _Myroure of Oure Ladye_, pp. 65 ff.
-
-[976] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Godstow,' vol. 4, p. 357, Charter nr 16.
-
-[977] Ibid. 'St Radegund's,' vol. 4, p. 215, Charter nr 3.
-
-[978] Ducange, 'burnetum, pannus ex lana tincta confectus.'
-
-[979] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Rumsey,' vol. 2, p. 507, footnote _p_.
-
-[980] Ibid. 'Swine,' vol. 5, p. 493.
-
-[981] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 362, charter nr 7.
-
-[982] Ibid. 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614, charter nr 11.
-
-[983] Ibid. 'Nun-Monkton,' vol. 4, p. 192, charter nr 2.
-
-[984] Gasquet, A., _The Great Pestilence_, 1893, Introd. p. xvi.
-
-[985] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Thetford,' vol. 4, p. 475.
-
-[986] Jessopp, A., _Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich, 1492-1532_, pp.
-90, 155.
-
-[987] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Malling,' vol. 3, p. 382; Gasquet, A., _The
-Great Pestilence_, 1893, pp. 104, 106.
-
-[988] Gasquet, p. 137.
-
-[989] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wyrthorp,' vol. 4, p. 266.
-
-[990] Ibid. 'Seton,' vol. 4, p. 226, charter nr 2.
-
-[991] Ibid. 'St Sepulchre's,' vol. 4, p. 413, footnote _l_.
-
-[992] Way, A., 'Notices of the Benedictine Priory of St Mary Magdalen at
-Rusper,' _Sussex Archaeol. Collections_, vol. 5, p. 244; Dugdale,
-_Monasticon_, 'Rusper,' vol. 4, p. 586.
-
-[993] Blaauw, W. H., 'Episcopal Visitations of the Priory of Easebourne,'
-_Sussex Archaeol. Collections_, vol. 9, pp. 1-32; Dugdale, _Monasticon_,
-'Easebourn,' vol. 4, p. 423.
-
-[994] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Sele,' vol. 4, p. 668.
-
-[995] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St John's,' vol. 6, p. 678.
-
-[996] Ibid. 'Selbourne,' vol. 6, p. 510.
-
-[997] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol.
-1, p. 52.
-
-[998] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, pp. 413, 419, 462.
-
-[999] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 205.
-
-[1000] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, p. 390.
-
-[1001] Ibid. 1737, vol. 3, p. 630.
-
-[1002] Ibid. Year 1490, vol. 3, p. 632. Froude without taking into
-consideration the circumstances under which this letter was penned takes
-its contents as conclusive evidence of the abuses of the monastic system
-at the time of the Reformation. Comp. _History of England_, 1893, vol. 2,
-p. 304; _Life and Letters of Erasmus_, 1894, p. 18.
-
-[1003] Newcome, P., _History of the Abbacy of St Albans_, 1793, p. 399.
-
-[1004] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Albans,' vol. 2, p. 206, footnote _c_;
-'the Book of Ramryge,' MS. Cotton. Nero D. VII.
-
-[1005] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary de Pree,' vol. 3, p. 353, charter
-nr 9.
-
-[1006] Ibid. 'Sopwell,' vol. 3, p. 363.
-
-[1007] 'Land of Cockayne,' in _Early English Lives of Saints_, etc.,
-Philological Society, 1858, p. 156.
-
-[1008] 'Why I cannot be a nun,' in _Early English Lives of Saints_, etc.,
-Philological Society, 1858, p. 138.
-
-[1009] Comp. above, pp. 339, 377.
-
-[1010] Moehler, J. A., _Kirchengeschichte_, edit. 1867, vol. 2, pp. 612 ff.
-
-[1011] Comp. Leuckfeld, _Antiquitates Bursfeldenses_, 1713; Pez,
-_Bibliotheca ascetica_, vol. 8, nrs 6 ff.
-
-[1012] Discussed in Klemm, G. F., _Die Frauen_, vol. 4, p. 181, using
-_Ordinarius_ preserved at Dresden (MS. L. 92).
-
-[1013] Busch, J., _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_ (written between
-1470-1475), edit. Grube, 1887.
-
-[1014] _Deutsche Allgemeine Biographie_, article 'Busch, Joh.'
-
-[1015] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Derneburg,' p. 588.
-
-[1016] Ibid. 'Wennigsen,' 'Mariensee,' 'Werder' pp. 555 ff.
-
-[1017] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Wienhausen,' p. 629.
-
-[1018] Ibid. 'St Georg in Halle,' p. 568.
-
-[1019] Ibid. 'Heiningen,' p. 600.
-
-[1020] Ibid. 'Frankenberg,' p. 607.
-
-[1021] Ibid. 'Dorstad,' p. 644.
-
-[1022] Ibid. 'Neuwerk,' p. 609.
-
-[1023] Ibid. 'Fischbeck,' p. 640.
-
-[1024] Ibid. 'Marienberg,' p. 618.
-
-[1025] Busch, _Liber de reformatione monasteriorum_, 'Marienborn,'
-'Stendal,' p. 622.
-
-[1026] Ibid. pp. 664 ff.
-
-[1027] Ibid. pp. 659 ff.
-
-[1028] Remling, F. X., _Urkundl. Geschichte der Abteien und Kloester in
-Rheinbayern_, 1836, 'Schoenfeld,' vol. 1, p. 165; 'Ramsen,' vol. 1, p. 263;
-'Kleinfrankenthal,' vol. 2, p. 79.
-
-[1029] Marx, J., _Geschichte des Erzstifts Trier_, 1860, vol. 3, p. 466
-(Benedictine nunneries, pp. 457-511, Cistercian nunneries, pp. 579-593).
-
-[1030] Brusch, C., _Chronol. Mon. Germ._, 1682, p. 508.
-
-[1031] Fabri, F., _De Civitate Ulmensi_, edit. Veesenmeyer, Liter. Verein,
-Stuttgart, 1889, pp. 180 ff.
-
-[1032] Fabri, F., _De Civitate Ulmensi_, pp. 202 ff.
-
-[1033] Jaeger, A., _Der Streit des Cardinals N. von Cusa mit dem Herzoge
-Sigmund von Oesterreich_, 1861, 2 vols, (the struggle over Sonnenburg is
-in vol. 1).
-
-[1034] Ibid. vol. 1 (page references in the text throughout this section
-are to the above account).
-
-[1035] Jaeger, A., _Der Streit des Cardinals N. von Cusa_ etc., 1861,
-Vorwort, p. x.
-
-[1036] Tritheim, _Opera pia et spiritualia_, edit. Busaeus, 1604,
-'Orationes,' pp. 840-916.
-
-[1037] Tritheim, _Opera_, etc., Epist. nr 3, p. 921 (written 1485).
-
-[1038] Geiler, _Predigten Teutsch_, 1508; _Seelen-Paradies_, 1510, etc.
-
-[1039] Information on those works of Butzbach which are not published is
-given in the second supplementary volume, pp. 439 ff. of Hutten, U. v.,
-_Opera_, edit. Boecking, 1857.
-
-[1040] Wimpheling, _Germania_, transl. Martin, E., 1885, ch. 77.
-
-[1041] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, transl. Bailey, edit. Johnson, 1878, 'The
-Virgin averse to Matrimony,' vol. 1, p. 225.
-
-[1042] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, 'The Penitent Virgin,' vol. 1, p. 237.
-
-[1043] Ibid. 'The Uneasy Wife,' vol. 1, p. 241.
-
-[1044] Ibid. 'The Young Man and Harlot,' vol. 1, p. 291.
-
-[1045] Ibid. 'The Lying-in Woman,' vol. 1, p. 441.
-
-[1046] Erasmus, _Colloquies_, 'The Assembly or Parliament of Women,' vol.
-2, p. 203.
-
-[1047] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Radegund's,' vol. 4, p. 215, charter nr
-3.
-
-[1048] Gasquet, F. A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888,
-vol. 1, p. 62.
-
-[1049] At a meeting of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society (reported in the
-_Academy_, Feb. 23, 1895), Mr T. D. Atkinson read a paper on 'The
-Conventual Buildings of the priory of St Radegund,' illustrated by a plan
-showing such of the college buildings as were probably monastic, and also
-the position of some foundations discovered in the previous summer.
-According to this paper the present cloister occupies the same position as
-that of the nuns, and the conventual church was converted into a college
-chapel by Alcock. The college hall which is upstairs is the old refectory,
-the rooms below being very likely used as butteries, as they still are.
-The present kitchen is probably on the site of the old monastic kitchen,
-and very likely the rooms originally assigned to the Master are those
-which had been occupied by the prioress. Further details of arrangement
-were given about the dormitory, the chapter house, the calefactory and
-common-room, etc., from which we gather that the men who occupied the
-nunnery buildings, put these to much the same uses as they had served
-before.
-
-[1050] Fiddes, 'Life of Card. Wolsey,' 1726, _Collect._, p. 100.
-
-[1051] Ibid. p. 99.
-
-[1052] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Bromhall,' vol. 4, p. 506.
-
-[1053] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Lillechurch,' vol. 4, p. 379, footnote _e_.
-
-[1054] Gairdner, J., _Letters and papers of the reign of Henry VIII_,
-Rolls Series, vol. 10, Preface, p. 43, footnote, and nr 890.
-
-[1055] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Frideswith's,' vol. 2, p. 138. Fiddes,
-'Life of Card. Wolsey,' 1726, _Collect._, p. 95.
-
-[1056] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, 'Bull' (Sept. 1524), vol. 3, p. 703;
-'Breve regium,' ibid. p. 705.
-
-[1057] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Frideswith's,' vol. 2, p. 138, footnote
-_x_.
-
-[1058] Ibid. 'Wykes,' vol. 4, p. 513; 'Littlemore,' vol. 4, p. 490, nr 12.
-
-[1059] Rymer, _Foedera_, 'Bulla pro monasteriis supprimendis,' vol. 6, p.
-116; 'Bulla pro uniendis monasteriis,' p. 137.
-
-[1060] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, 1888, vol.
-1, pp. 101 ff.
-
-[1061] Blunt, _The Reformation of the Church of England_, 1882, vol. 1, p.
-92, footnote, says that the lady in question was 'Eleanor the daughter of
-Cary who had lately married (Anne's) sister Margaret.'
-
-[1062] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wilton,' vol. 2, p. 317, gives the
-correspondence. The abbess who succeeded to Isabel Jordan was probably
-Cecil Bodman or Bodenham, of whom more p. 441.
-
-[1063] Fish, S., 'A Supplicacyon for the Beggers,' republished _Early
-Engl. Text Soc._, 1871.
-
-[1064] More, Th., 'The Supplycacyon of Soulys,' 1529 (?).
-
-[1065] Wright, Th., _Three chapters of letters on the Suppression_ (Camden
-Soc., 1843), nrs 6-11.
-
-[1066] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII and the English Monasteries_, vol. 1, pp.
-110-150.
-
-[1067] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 8, Preface, pp. 33
-ff.
-
-[1068] Wilkins, D., _Concilia_, 1737, vol. 3, p. 755.
-
-[1069] _Dict. of Nat. Biography_, article 'Legh, Sir Thomas.'
-
-[1070] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 56.
-
-[1071] Gairdner, J., _Letters_ etc., vol. 9, nr 139.
-
-[1072] Ibid. Preface, p. 20.
-
-[1073] Ibid. vol. 9, nr 280.
-
-[1074] Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 273.
-
-[1075] Wright, _Three chapters of letters_, p. 55.
-
-[1076] Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 276; Ellis, H., _Original
-Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 11, says that after resigning at Little
-Marlow she became abbess at Malling.
-
-[1077] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Little Marlow,' vol. 4, p. 419;
-'Ankerwyke,' vol. 4, p. 229.
-
-[1078] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 1075 (her house
-is unknown).
-
-[1079] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 91.
-
-[1080] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 74.
-
-[1081] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 357.
-
-[1082] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 732.
-
-[1083] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 293.
-
-[1084] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 107.
-
-[1085] Ibid. p. 114; Gasquet, _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 1, p. 303.
-
-[1086] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1087] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 91.
-
-[1088] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 38.
-
-[1089] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Harwold,' vol. 6, p. 330.
-
-[1090] Ellis, H., _Original Letters_, speaks of the image of Our Lady of
-Caversham which was plated all over with silver, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 79;
-of that of St Modwen of Burton on Trent with her red cowl and staff,
-Series 3, vol. 3, p. 104; of the 'huge and great image' of Darvellgathern
-held in great veneration in Wales, Series 1, vol. 2, p. 82; and of others,
-which were brought to London and burnt.
-
-[1091] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 116.
-
-[1092] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 47.
-
-[1093] Ibid. Appendix 1.
-
-[1094] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 9, nr 1094.
-
-[1095] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1096] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 139.
-
-[1097] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 37.
-
-[1098] Ibid. p. 116.
-
-[1099] Ibid. p. 39.
-
-[1100] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 129.
-
-[1101] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 383 (1536).
-
-[1102] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 136.
-
-[1103] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1104] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's,' vol. 2, p. 451, charter nr 4.
-
-[1105] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, App. 1.
-
-[1106] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc. vol. 11, nr 385 (20).
-
-[1107] Ibid. (22, 23, 35).
-
-[1108] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Chatteris,' vol. 2, p. 614, calls her 'Anne
-Gayton.'
-
-[1109] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_, vol. 11, nr 519 (11); nr 1217
-(26).
-
-[1110] Ibid. vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1111] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 206; Gairdner, J.,
-_Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, Preface, p. 46.
-
-[1112] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Dennis,' vol. 6, p. 1549.
-
-[1113] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 117.
-
-[1114] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 203.
-
-[1115] Ibid. vol. 2, pp. 449 ff.
-
-[1116] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 11, nr 42.
-
-[1117] Ibid. vol. 11, Preface, p. 12.
-
-[1118] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, pp. 84 ff.
-
-[1119] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vols. 11, 12.
-
-[1120] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Seton,' vol. 4, p. 226.
-
-[1121] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 340.
-
-[1122] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 12, pt 2, nr 27.
-
-[1123] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 279.
-
-[1124] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 13, pt 1, nr 1115
-(19), nr 1519 (44).
-
-[1125] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 222.
-
-[1126] Gairdner, J., _Letters and Papers_ etc., vol. 10, nr 364.
-
-[1127] Ibid. vol. 13, pt 1, nr 235.
-
-[1128] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3.
-
-[1129] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 229.
-
-[1130] Wright, _Three chapters_ etc., p. 227.
-
-[1131] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 225.
-
-[1132] Ibid. 456.
-
-[1133] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'St Mary's,' vol. 2, p. 451; Gasquet, A.,
-_Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 476.
-
-[1134] Dugdale, _Monasticon_, 'Wherwell,' vol. 2, p. 634.
-
-[1135] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 481.
-
-[1136] Ibid. p. 479.
-
-[1137] Ellis, H., _Orig. Letters_, Series 3, vol. 3, p. 34, gives an
-interesting account.
-
-[1138] Lindesay, _Ane Satyre of the thrie Estaits_, edit, by Hall for the
-Early Engl. Text Soc., 1869, pp. 420 ff.
-
-[1139] Gasquet, A., _Henry VIII_ etc., vol. 2, p. 221.
-
-[1140] Fuller, Th., _Church History_, edit. Brewer, 1845, vol. 3, p. 336.
-
-[1141] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, 1878, pp. 14 ff.
-
-[1142] Ibid. pp. 67 ff.
-
-[1143] Nider, Jos., _Formicarius_, bk. 1, ch. 4 (p. 8, edit. 1517).
-
-[1144] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirkheimer, ihre Schwestern und Nichten_,
-1826, contains some of Clara's letters.
-
-[1145] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 67.
-
-[1146] 'Briefe der Aebtissin Sabina,' edit. Lochner in _Zeitschrift fuer
-hist. Theologie_, vol. 36, 1866.
-
-[1147] Pirckheimer, B., _Opera_, edit. Goldast, 1610, p. 345; Binder, F.,
-_Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 52.
-
-[1148] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, edit. Goldast, 1610, p. 341; Binder, F.,
-_Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 81.
-
-[1149] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 343; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-84.
-
-[1150] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 342; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-85.
-
-[1151] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 344; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-87.
-
-[1152] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 88.
-
-[1153] Ibid. p. 220, note 26.
-
-[1154] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 340; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-89.
-
-[1155] Born in Venice in 1465, was acquainted both with Latin and Greek,
-and studied history, philosophy and theology. She disputed at Padua in
-public, wrote several learned treatises, and was much admired and
-esteemed.
-
-[1156] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 96.
-
-[1157] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 230; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-55.
-
-[1158] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 344; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-58.
-
-[1159] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 65, footnote.
-
-[1160] Ibid. p. 66.
-
-[1161] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 247; Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p.
-61.
-
-[1162] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 62
-
-[1163] Ibid. p. 35.
-
-[1164] Thausing, M., _Duerer's Briefe_ etc., 1872, p. 167.
-
-[1165] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 105.
-
-[1166] _Eyn Missyve oder Sendbrief_ etc., 1523.
-
-[1167] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 375.
-
-[1168] 'Pirkheimer, Charitas': _Denkwuerdigkeiten aus dem
-Reformationszeitalter_, herausg. Hoefler, C., _Quellensammlung fuer fraenk.
-Geschichte_, vol. 4, 1852 (page references in the text to this edition).
-
-[1169] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., 1826, p. 104.
-
-[1170] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirckheimer_, p. 125, from an unpublished
-letter.
-
-[1171] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 110.
-
-[1172] Ibid., p. 118 (on a letter written to Nuetzel).
-
-[1173] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 106.
-
-[1174] Ibid. p. 109.
-
-[1175] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, p. 374.
-
-[1176] Muench, E., _Charitas Pirckheimer_ etc., p. 108.
-
-[1177] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirckheimer_, p. 118.
-
-[1178] Ibid. p. 150, from an unpublished letter.
-
-[1179] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 153.
-
-[1180] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 161.
-
-[1181] 'Briefe der Aebtissin Sabina,' edit. Lochner in _Zeitschrift fuer
-hist. Theologie_, vol. 36, 1866, pp. 542, 545.
-
-[1182] Binder, F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, pp. 183 ff.
-
-[1183] Pirckheimer, _Opera_, 'Oratio apologetica,' pp. 375-385; Binder,
-F., _Charitas Pirkheimer_, p. 198.
-
-
-
-
-Transcriber's Notes:
-
-Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_.
-
-The original text includes Greek characters that have been replaced with
-transliterations in this text version.
-
-The original text includes a Dagger symbol that is represented as [Dagger]
-in this text version.
-
-Footnote 487 appears on page 164 of the text, but there is no
-corresponding marker on the page.
-
-
-
-
-
-
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