APPENDIX IV (continued 6)
Reading edition
[1689]
I seigh his sleves purfiled at the hond With grys, and that the fyneste of a lond. Chaucer, Prologue, ll. 193-4.
[1690] Linc. Reg. Memo. Bokyngham, f. 343d.
[1691] Hereford Reg. Spofford, I, f. 77d.
[1692] V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 181.
[1693] Ib. p. 126.
[1694] Dugdale, Mon. IV, p. 194.
[1695] V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 119, 120, 127, 164, 168, 174-5, 181, 183, 240.
[1696] Linc. Visit. II, p. 176; Alnwick’s Visit. MS. ff. 26d, 38.
[1697] V.C.H. Essex, II, 124.
[1698] Norwich Visit. p. 274.
[1699] V.C.H. Hants. II, p. 130, where the date is wrongly given as 1512.
[1700] See below, p. 663.
[1701] Prologue, ll. 146-9. Chaucer was certainly a dog-lover: a passage in the Book of the Duchess (ll. 387 ff.) puts it beyond doubt:
I was go walked fro my tree, And as I wente ther cam by me A whelp, that fauned me as I stood That hadde y-folowed, and coude no good. Hit com and creep to me as lowe, Right as hit badde me y-knowe, Hild doun his heed and joyned his eres, And leyde al smothe doun his heres. I wolde han caught hit, and anoon Hit fledde, and was fro me goon.
[1702] The Book of the Knight of La Tour-Landry, ed. T. Wright (E.E.T.S. revised ed. 1906), pp. 28-9.
[1703] Printed in The Cambridge Songs, ed. Karl Breul (1915), No. 29, p. 62; and in Denkmäler, ed. Müllenhoff und Scherer, Deutscher Poesie und Prosa aus dem VIII-XII Jahrhundert (Berlin, 1892), I, pp. 51-3 (No. XXIV). I have ventured to attempt a translation.
[1704] Skelton, Selected Poems, ed. W. H. Williams (1902). pp. 57 ff.
[1705] Translation by Robin Flower in The Poem Book of the Gael, ed. Eleanor Hull (1913), p. 132. The poem has also been translated by Kuno Meyer and by Alfred Perceval Graves.
[1706] Quoted in Fosbroke, Brit. Monachism, II, p. 34.
[1707] Oeuvres Choisies de Gresset (Coll. Bibliothèque Nationale), pp. 3 ff. There is an eighteenth century English translation (1759) by J. G. Cooper in Chalmers, English Poets, XV, pp. 528-36.
[1708] Summarised in V.C.H. Oxon. II, pp. 76-7.
[1709] When the nuns exhorted her to abstain from his company, she replied “quod ipsum amavit et amare volet.” Linc. Epis. Reg. Visit. Atwater, f. 87.
[1710] See above, p. 58.
[1711] So also was Nunkeeling, where there was a particularly violent election struggle, but no mention of immorality.
[1712] V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 159.
[1713] Ib. pp. 167-9.
[1714] Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, pp. 456-7.
[1715] V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 187-9. A Prioress was deposed here for incontinence in 1494.
[1716] V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 239-40.
[1717] Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, pp. 457-8. Queen Isabella, wife of Edward II, is referred to.
[1718] See above, p. 427.
[1719] Cal. of Papal Letters, III, p. 1345.
[1720] Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, pp. 355, 358-62. Another nun apostatised and lived a dissolute life for some time in the world, returning in 1337. Ib. p. 363.
[1721] V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 179-81. The house was in an unsatisfactory condition as early as 1268. Reg. Walter Giffard, pp. 147-8.
[1722] V.C.H. Yorks. III, pp. 129-30.
[1723] Ib. III, p. 113. The house seems to have been in much the same condition later. A nun had run away in 1372 and the misdeeds of the bad prioress Eleanor came to light in 1396. Ib. 114-5.
[1724] Ib. p. 124.
[1725] Ib. p. 126.
[1726] Ib. p. 161. In 1535 Archbishop Lee found that a nun here, Joan Hutton, “hath lyved incontinentlie and unchast and hath broght forth a child of her bodie begotten.” Yorks. Arch. Journ. XVI, p. 453.
[1727] V.C.H. Yorks. III, p. 164.
[1728] Ib. p. 164.
[1729] Ib. p. 116 and Yorks. Arch. Journ. IX, p. 334.
[1730] Ib. pp. 176-7.
[1731] Ib. p. 175.
[1732] Dugdale, Mon. IV, p. 194; see also Cal. of Pap. Letters, X, p. 471.
[1733] Ib. p. 183.
[1734] It may be noted that five nunneries had already disappeared between 1300 and 1500, viz. Waterbeach (transferred to Denny, 1348), Wothorpe (annexed to St Michael’s, Stamford, 1354) and St Stephen’s, Foukeholme, all of which owed their end to the Black Death; Lyminster (dissolved as an alien priory, 1414); and Rowney (suppressed on account of poverty, 1459).
[1735] Gray, Priory of St Radegund, pp. 44-5. For evidence of the decay of the nunnery during the last half of the fifteenth century, see ib. pp. 39-44.
[1736] Eckenstein, Woman under Mon. p. 436.
[1737] Dugdale, Mon. IV. p. 378.
[1738] Selected Poems of John Skelton, ed. W. H. Williams (1902), p. 113. There is an interesting compertum at Dr Rayne’s visitation of Studley in 1530 to the effect that “the woods of the priory had been much diminished by the late prioress and also by Thomas Cardinal of York for the construction of his College in the University of Oxford.” V.C.H. Oxon. II, p. 78.
[1739] See above, Note F.
[1740] See above, p. 480.
[1741] Dugdale, Mon. IV, p. 288.
[1742] Uhland, Alte hoch- und niederdeutsche Volkslieder (1844-5), II, p. 854 (No. 329); also in R. v. Liliencron, Deutsches Leben im Volkslied um 1530 (1884), p. 226, and (in a slightly different and modernised version) in L. A. v. Arnim and Clemens Brentano, Des Knaben Wunderhorn (Reclam edit.), p. 24.
[1743] Translated in Bithell, The Minnesingers (Halle, 1909), I, p. 200. I have been unable to trace the original. I have slightly altered the wording of the translation.
[1744] Karl Bartsch, Deutsche Liederdichter des zwölften bis vierzehnten Jahrhunderts (4th ed. Berlin, 1901), p. 379 (No. XCVIII, ll. 581-616). Slightly modernised version in Uhland, op. cit. II, p. 853 (No. 327).
[1745] Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie, V (1881), p. 545 (No. 28). A slightly different version in Moriz Haupt, Französische Volkslieder (Leipzig, 1877), p. 152.
[1746] In a round the last two lines of each verse are repeated as the first two lines of the following verse, and the refrain is repeated at the end of each verse. The songs lose much of their charm by being quoted in compressed form, for the cumulative effect of the repetition is exceedingly graceful and spirited.
[1747] Haupt, op. cit. p. 40.
[1748] Weckerlin, L’Ancienne Chanson Populaire en France (1887), p. 354.
[1749] Ib. p. 319.
[1750] Bujeaud, J., Chants et Chansons populaires des Provinces de l’ouest (1866), I, p. 137.
[1751] Ib. I, p. 132.
[1752] Romania, X, p. 391.
[1753] Ib. X, p. 395 (No. XLVIII).
[1754] Ib. VII, p. 72 (No. XX). Another version in De Puymaigre, Chants Populaires recueillis dans le Pays Messin (1865), p. 39 (No. X).
[1755] Ib. VII, p. 73 (No. XXI). Other versions in Jean Fleury, Littérature Orale de la Basse-Normandie (Paris, 1883), p. 311, and De Puymaigre, op. cit. p. 35 (No. IX), and note on p. 37. Compare Schiller’s ballad Der Ritter von Toggenburg.
[1756] Fleury, op. cit. p. 313.
[1757] Nigra, Canti Popolari del Piemonte (1888), No. 80, pp. 409-14.
[1758] T. Casini, Studi di Poesia antica (1913). There is a very racy French song called Le Comte Orry which deserves notice here: see H. C. Delloye, Chants et Chansons Populaires de la France (1re série), 1843.
[1759] Hagen, Carmina Medii Aevi (Berne, 1877), pp. 206-7. There is an exceedingly long and tedious sixteenth century French version, evidently founded on the Latin poem, in Montaiglon, Rec. de Poésies Françoises des XVIe et XVIIe siècles, t. VIII, pp. 170-5.
[1760] The Cambridge Songs, ed. Karl Breul (1915), No. 35, p. 16. See also Koegel, Geschichte der Deutschen Litteratur (1867), I, pp. 136-9.
[1761] Zeitschrift für romanische Philologie, V (1881), p. 544, No. 27. Also in Weckerlin, op. cit. p. 405 (under date 1614).
[1762] Rolland, Rec. de Chansons Populaires, II, p. 81.
[1763] Ib. I, pp. 226-7.
[1764] Weckerlin, op. cit. p. 355.
[1765] Haupt, Französische Volkslieder (1877), p. 84. A slightly different version in Weckerlin, op. cit. p. 297.
[1766] Haupt, op. cit. p. 63.
[1767] Weckerlin, op. cit. p. 262; also in E. Rolland, Rec. de Chansons Populaires (1883-90), t. II, p. 36.
[1768] “A gentle gallant went hunting in the wood and there he met a nun. She was so lovely, so fresh and so fair. Said the gentle gallant to her: ‘Come, sit with me in the shade and never more shalt thou be a little nun.’ ‘Gentle gallant, wait here for me; I will go and put off my habit and then I will come back to you in the shade.’ He waited for her three days and three nights and never came the fair one. The gentle gallant goes to the monastery and knocks at the great door; out comes the mother abbess: ‘What are you looking for, gentle gallant?’ ‘I am looking for a little nun, who promised to come into the shade.’ ‘You once had the quail at your feet and you let it fly away. Even so has flown the pretty nun.’” Nigra, Canti Populari del Piemonte (1888), No. 72, p. 381. With these two songs should be compared the English poem in Percy’s Reliques, called The Baffled Knight or Lady’s Policy, and the Somerset folksong, Blow away the morning dew, with its dénouement:
But when they came to her father’s gate So nimble she popped in, And said “There is a fool without And here’s the maid within. We have a flower in our garden We call it marygold— And if you will not when you may You shall not when you wolde.”
Folk Songs from Somerset (1st Series, 1910), ed. Cecil Sharp and Charles Marson, No. VIII, pp. 16-17.
[1769] Fleury, op. cit. p. 308. Other versions in De Puymaigre, op. cit. pp. 145-8 (Nos. XLV-XLVI).
[1770] Rolland, op. cit. IV, p. 31. Cf. versions on pp. 30, 32, 33. The theme recalls a pretty poem by Leigh Hunt:
If you become a nun, dear, A friar I will be; In any cell you run, dear, Pray look behind for me. The roses all turn pale, too; The doves all take the veil, too; The blind will see the show. What! you become a nun, my dear? I’ll not believe it, no! If you become a nun, dear, The bishop Love will be; The Cupids every one, dear, Will chant “We trust in thee.” The incense will go sighing, The candles fall a-dying, The water turn to wine; What! you go take the vows, my dear? You may—but they’ll be mine!
[1771] Rolland, op. cit. I, p. 253, cf. pp. 249-54.
[1772] Chants de Carnaval Florentins (Canti Carnascialeschi) de l’époque de Laurent le Magnifique. Pub. par P. M. Masson (Paris, 1913). For a copy of the song and for the suggestion that it refers to English nuns I am indebted to Mr E. J. Dent of King’s College, Cambridge. But the mention of Low Germany sounds more like German nuns.
[1773] Countess Martinengo-Cesaresco, Essays in the Study of Folksongs (Everyman’s Lib. Ed.), pp. 191-2.
[1774] L. A. v. Arnim and Clemens Brentano, Des Knaben Wunderhorn (Reclam ed.), p. 50.
[1775] The Oxford Book of Ballads, ed. Quiller-Couch (1910), p. 635 (No. 125). In the long collection of ballads narrating Robin Hood’s career known as A Little Geste of Robin Hood and his Meiny (which was in print early in the sixteenth century) the Prioress is said to have conspired with her lover, one Sir Roger of Doncaster, to slay Robin. Ib. p. 574. In the version in Bishop Percy’s famous folio MS. “Red Roger” is described as stabbing the weakened outlaw, but losing his own life in the act. Bishop Percy’s Folio MS. ed. Hales and Furnivall (1867), I, pp. 50-58. “In ‘Le Morte de Robin Hode,’ a quite modern piece printed in Hone’s Every-day Book from an old collection of MS. songs in the Editor’s possession, the prioress is represented as the outlaw’s sister and as poisoning him.” Ib. p. 53.
[1776] Miracles de Nostre Dame par Personnages, pub. G. Paris and U. Robert (Soc. des Anc. Textes Français, 1876), t. I, pp. 311-51.
[1777] Translated in Evelyn Underhill, The Miracles of Our Lady Saint Mary (1905), pp. 195-200.
[1778] Caesarius of Heisterbach, II, pp. 41-2. “Although the buffet was hard,” says Caesarius, conscious perhaps that the Virgin had acted with less than her wonted gentleness, “she was utterly delivered from temptation by it. A grievous ill requires a grievous remedy.”
[1779] Gautier de Coincy, Miracles de N.D., ed. Poquet, p. 474.
[1780] Exempla of Jacques de Vitry, ed. Crane, p. 24. See variant in An Alphabet of Tales (E.E.T.S.), p. 321.
[1781] Caesarius of Heisterbach, Dial. Mirac. ed. Strange, I, pp. 222-3.
[1782] Wright, Latin Stories, p. 96.
[1783] Etienne de Bourbon, Anecdotes Historiques, ed. Lecoy de la Marche, p. 83 (translated in Taylor, The Medieval Mind, I, pp. 508-9).
[1784] I have used the version in An Alphabet of Tales (E.E.T.S.), pp. 11-12. For other versions, see Miracles de Nostre Dame (Soc. des Anc. Textes) I, pp. 59-100. For other versions, see Etienne de Bourbon, op. cit. p. 114, Wright, op. cit., p. 114, Barbazon et Méon, Nouveau Recueil de Fabliaux, II, p. 314, Dodici conti morali d’anonimo Senese: Teste inedite de sec. XIII (Bologna, 1862), No. 8; Small, Eng. Metrical Homilies, p. 164. There is a very interesting Ethiopian version (told of Sophia the abbess of Mount Carmel) in Miracles of the B.V.M. (Lady Meux MSS.), ed. E. A. Wallis Budge (1900), pp. 68-71. Most versions preserve the interesting detail that the nuns dislike their abbess and are anxious to betray her on account of her strictness and particularly because she will not give them easy licence to see their friends. In the French dramatic version Sister Isabel stays away from a sermon and gives as her excuse that a cousin came to see her, with some cloth to make a veil and a “surplis,” whereupon she is scolded and then pardoned by the Abbess.
[1785] Le Cento Novelle Antiche, ed. Gualteruzzi (Milan, 1825), No. 62. I quote the translation by A. C. Lee, The Decameron, its Sources and Analogues, p. 60.
[1786] Francesco da Barberino, Del Reggimento e Costumi di Donne, ed. Carlo Baudi di Vesme (Bologna, 1875), p. 273. See A. C. Lee, loc. cit.
[1787] A. C. Lee, op. cit. p. 125. The story is of Eastern origin and for its many analogues see ib. pp. 123-35.
[1788] Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles, ed. Th. Wright (Bib. Elzévirienne, 1858), t. I, pp. 81-4, 114-20, 283-7.
[1789] Montaiglon et Raynaud, Rec. Gén. des Fabliaux, III, pp. 137-44.
[1790] Ib. IV, pp. 128-32.
[1791] Barbazon et Méon, Nouv. Rec. de Fabliaux, IV, p. 250.
[1792] Erzählungen und Schwänke, hrsg. von Hans Lambel (Leipzig, 1888), No. VIII, pp. 309-22.
[1793] Koeppel, Studien zur Geschichte der italienischen Novelle in der englischen Litteratur des XVI Jahrhunderts (1892), p. 183.
[1794] King John by William Shakespeare together with the Troublesome Reign of King John, ed. F. G. Fleay, (1878), pp. 158-62.
[1795] Printed in A Selection from the Minor Poems of Dan John Lydgate, ed. J. O. Halliwell (Percy Soc. 1840), pp. 107-17. Professor MacCracken denies the authorship to Lydgate, see The Minor Poems of John Lydgate, ed. H. N. MacCracken (E.E.T.S. 1911), I, p. xlii (note).
[1796] The edition used is that of Joseph Strange in two volumes (Cologne, Bonn and Brussels, 1851). For a study of the life and times of Caesarius, see A. Kaufmann, Caesarius von Heisterbach, Ein Beitrag zur Kulturgeschichte des zwölften und dreizehnten Jahrhunderts (Cologne, 1850). For anecdotes from this source already quoted in the text, see pp. 27-9, 296-7, 511, 520 ff., etc.
[1797] Op. cit. I, pp. 1-2.
[1798] I.e. “Ave Maria, gratia plena.” The Virgin Mary was always the most potent help against the devil, as may be seen from any collection of her miracles (e.g. that made by Gautier de Coincy in French verse in the thirteenth century and edited by the Abbé Poquet).
[1799] Ib. I, pp. 125-7. For an abbreviated version of this story, taken from Caesarius, see An Alphabet of Tales (E.E.T.S.), pp. 178-9 (No. CCLV).
[1800] Used in the common medieval sense of entering a religious order.
[1801] Ib. I, pp. 328-30. At the end of this story the novice asks: “Why is it that the good Lord allows maidens so tender and so pure to be thus cruelly tormented by rough and foul spirits?” And the monk replies: “Thou hast experienced how if a bitter drink be first swallowed a sweet one tastes the sweeter, and how if black be placed beneath it, white is all the more dazzling. Read the Visions of Witinus, Godescalcus and others, to whom it was permitted to see the pains of the damned and the glory of the elect, and almost always it was the vision of punishment which came first. The Lord, wishing to show his bride his secret joys, permitteth well that she should first be tempted by some dreadful visions, that afterwards she may the better deserve to be made glad, and may know the distance between sweet and bitter, light and darkness.”
[1802] Ib. I, pp. 330-31.
[1803] Ib. II, pp. 68-9. “As I infer from this vision,” says the Novice, “an indiscreet fervour in prayers is not pleasing to the blessed Virgin, neither an undisciplined movement in genuflections.” On the other hand she did not like her devotees to hurry over their prayers, for Gautier de Coincy has a tale of a nun, Eulalie, who was accustomed to say at each office of the Virgin the full rosary of a hundred and fifty Aves; but she had much work to do and often hurried over her prayers, till one night she saw a vision of the mother of God, who promised her salvation and told her that the Ave Maria was a prayer which gave herself much joy; therefore she bade Eulalie not to hurry over it, but of her bounty permitted her to say a chaplet of fifty Aves, instead of the long rosary. See Gautier de Coincy, Les Miracles de la Sainte Vierge, ed. Poquet (Paris, 1857).
[1804] Ib. II, p. 100.
[1805] Ib. II, pp. 121-2.
[1806] Ib. II, pp. 122-3. For a variant in which the place of the two nuns is taken by two doctors of divinity, see An Alphabet of Tales (E.E.T.S.), pp. 274-5.
[1807] Ib. II, pp. 343-4. With these holy rivalries should be compared Caesarius’ tales of the drawing of apostles by lot. “It is a very common custom among the matrons of our province to choose an Apostle for their very own by the following lottery: the names of the twelve Apostles are written each on twelve tapers, which are blessed by the priest and laid on the altar at the same moment. Then the woman comes and draws a taper and whatsoever name that taper shall chance to bear, to that Apostle she renders special honour and service. A certain matron, having thus drawn St Andrew, and being displeased to have drawn him, laid the taper back on the altar and would have drawn another; but the same came to her hand again. Why should I make a long story? At length she drew one that pleased her, to whom she paid faithful devotion all the days of her life; nevertheless when she came to her last end and was at the point of death, she saw not him but the Blessed Andrew standing at her bedside. ‘Lo,’ he said, ‘I am that despised Andrew!’ from which we can gather that sometimes saints thrust themselves even of their own accord into men’s devotions.” Another matron was so much annoyed at drawing St Jude the Obscure instead of a more famous Apostle that she threw him behind the altar chest; whereupon the outraged Apostle visited her in a dream and not only rated her soundly but afflicted her with a palsy. See ib. II, pp. 129, 133, translated in Coulton, A Medieval Garner, pp. 259-60.
[1808] Several of the stories have, however, been translated by Mr Coulton, op. cit. Nos. 102-32.
[1809] Translated in Coulton, From St Francis to Dante (1907), p. 290; see ib. pp. 289-91, for a short account of Eudes Rigaud, also references on p. 395 (n. 17).
[1810] Regestrum Visitationum Archiepiscopi Rothamagensis, ed. Bonnin (1852). See analysis by L. Delisle in the Bibliothèque de l’École des Chartes, 1846.
[1811] There is however a copy of the Bishop’s letter of injunctions, sent on later, appended to his report of the state of Villarceaux in 1249 (Reg. pp. 44-5).
[1812] Walcott, M. E. C., English Minsters, II (The English Student’s Monasticon), pp. 210 and V.C.H. Dorset, II, p. 48.
[1813] V.C.H. Sussex, II, p. 121 and Dugdale, Mon. VI, pp. 1032-3. The later history of this cell can be traced from occasional references. It was a very small house and contained only a prioress and two nuns in 1380. Dugdale says that after the French wars Richard Earl of Arundel treated with the Abbess of Almenèches for the purchase of some lands belonging to Lyminster and in 1404 a papal brief enumerated the possessions of Almenèches in England and elsewhere, with a threat of penalties against all who should disturb them. Dugdale, Mon. VI, pp. 1032-3. Five years later a memorandum in the Register of Bishop Rede of Chichester notes the admission of a new Prioress, Nichola de Hereez, on the presentation of the Abbess and Convent of Almenèches, in place of Georgete la Cloutiere, deceased. Reg. Robert Rede (Sussex Rec. Soc. 1908), pp. 38-9. Clearly French women were ruling over the house, though the nuns may possibly have been English. Shortly afterwards Henry V finally dissolved the alien priories in England and the lands belonging to Lyminster were settled by Henry VI upon Eton College.
[1814] Reg. p. 236.
[1815] Walcott, op. cit. p. 141 and V.C.H. Norfolk, II, p. 463, and Dugdale, op. cit. p. 1057.
[1816] Walcott, op. cit. p. 173.
[1817] Reg. p. 94.
[1818] Ib. p. 261. In 1314-5 the Abbess of the Holy Trinity petitioned the King of England, complaining that she had been distrained in aid of the marriage of his eldest daughter, whereas she held all her lands in frank almoin. Rot. Parl. I, p. 331.
[1819] Irrespective of double houses such as the Magdalen of Rouen.
[1820] Reg. p. 202.
[1821] p. 73.
[1822] p. 471.
[1823] E.g. pp. 43, 207, 323, 361.
[1824] pp. 235, 374.
[1825] pp. 451, 490.
[1826] p. 194.
[1827] p. 299.
[1828] p. 194.
[1829] pp. 636-7.
[1830] p. 298.
[1831] p. 572.
[1832] p. 419.
[1833] p. 298.
[1834] p. 298.
[1835] p. 268.
[1836] pp. 456, 486, 512.
[1837] pp. 419, 451, 491, 598, 634.
[1838] p. 94.
[1839] p. 323.
[1840] p. 338.
[1841] p. 456.
[1842] pp. 16, 121, 201, 326, 512, 588.
[1843] pp. 166, 194.
[1844] E.g. at St Désir de Lisieux (1249), at Bondeville (1259), and at St Saëns (1262). At Bival (1257 and 1259) such a roll was kept. See pp. 62, 299, 339, 348, 451.
[1845] pp. 16, 60, 62, 73, 121, 197, 199, 201, 220, 266, 339, 348, 431, 512.
[1846] pp. 43, 44, 220, 305, 326.
[1847] pp. 43, 44, 326, 431, 588, 602.
[1848] p. 348.
[1849] p. 410.
[1850] See e.g. pp. 100, 274, 299, 339, 361, 402, 407, 410, 451, 468, 471, 523, 602, 619.
[1851] p. 468.
[1852] p. 100.
[1853] p. 361.
[1854] pp. 487, 598, 615.
[1855] pp. 100, 572, 592.
[1856] The exact definition of these measures is a thorny subject, but probably the modius was roughly a quarter and the mina a little more.
[1857] The list of rents in kind is an interesting illustration of the monastic economy; such rents were probably retained, where estates belonged to large communities, for some time after they were commuted for money on secular lands.
[1858] The same which they sold in 1261.
[1859] pp. 273-4. Compare the inventory of Bondeville, ib. p. 299.
[1860] p. 299.
[1861] p. 457.
[1862] p. 384.
[1863] p. 316.
[1864] p. 16.
[1865] pp. 401, 456, 471, 512.
[1866] pp. 187, 273, 310, 338.
[1867] p. 380.
[1868] p. 419.
[1869] p. 491.
[1870] p. 522.
[1871] p. 522: he probably means vicar.
[1872] p. 111.
[1873] p. 217.
[1874] pp. 610, 636.
[1875] pp. 197, 295.
[1876] p. 166.
[1877] p. 285.
[1878] For other references to the fondness of nuns for ginger see the Life of Christina von Stommeln: “Item per annum cum dimidio non comedit aliud quam gingiber” (Acta SS. t. IV, p. 454 A). Also the Ancren Riwle, p. 316: “Of a man whom ye distrust receive ye neither less nor more—not so much as a race of ginger.” Cf. ib. p. 279.
[1879] pp. 384, 431, 472, 517, 564.
[1880] See pp. 793-4 for the inquisition. The name of the house is not given and the editor places the list in the appendix, but the date is 1257 and from internal evidence it is quite clear that it refers to the resignation of Marie, prioress of Bondeville.
[1881] p. 793.
[1882] pp. 111, 133, 217, 298, 410.
[1883] p. 6.
[1884] p. 610.
[1885] pp. 44, 115, 166, 255, 273, 338, 419, 451, 457, 491, 500, 522, 550.
[1886] p. 522, compare p. 550.
[1887] pp. 166, 194.
[1888] p. 500.
[1889] p. 273.
[1890] p. 457.
[1891] p. 115.
[1892] p. 15.
[1893] pp. 384, 431, 472.
[1894] p. 44.
[1895] p. 575.
[1896] p. 486.
[1897] p. 487.
[1898] pp. 283, 319, 361.
[1899] p. 457.
[1900] p. 305.
[1901] pp. 281, 402.
[1902] pp. 384, 431, 817.
[1903] pp. 268, 299, 339. On one occasion the number is given as 12. p. 207.
[1904] pp. 43, 534. However in 1268 Rigaud noted that they ought to do so monthly. p. 602.
[1905] p. 412.
[1906] p. 62, but in 1267 Rigaud noted that they were obliged to do so seven times a year. p. 600.
[1907] pp. 293, 517, 564.
[1908] pp. 298, 487. In 1255 he noted that they did so seven times a year and ordered fortnightly confessions and communions instead (p. 217), but from the later visitations it appears that the seven times rule referred only to lay brothers and sisters.
[1909] p. 410.
[1910] (St Amand), pp. 121, 202, 326, 456; (St Désir de Lisieux), p. 199; (St Sauveur d’Evreux), pp. 220, 305.
[1911] p. 82.
[1912] p. 374.
[1913] p. 419.
[1914] p. 522.
[1915] p. 245.
[1916] p. 517 (Montivilliers).
[1917] pp. 43, 44 (Villarceaux); 117, 146 (Bival); 170, 310 (St Saëns); 261 (Caen); 285, 486 (St Amand); 305 (St Sauveur); 348 (Bondeville).
[1918] pp. 15 (St Amand); 60 (St Léger de Préaux).
[1919] p. 43.
[1920] pp. 15, 121 (St Amand); 207 (St Aubin).
[1921] p. 207 (Bival).
[1922] p. 207 (St Aubin).
[1923] pp. 197, 295, 591 (St Léger-de-Préaux); 201 (St Amand); 261 (Caen).
[1924] p. 170 (St Saëns).
[1925] pp. 16 (St Amand): 62, 199 (St Désir de Lisieux); 60 (St Léger de Préaux); 170, 187 (St Saëns).
[1926] pp. 62 (St Désir de Lisieux); 884 (Montivilliers).
[1927] p. 16.
[1928] p. 121.
[1929] p. 512.
[1930] p. 338.
[1931] p. 384.
[1932] pp. 44, 468.
[1933] pp. 431, 451, 472, 517, 564, 600, 624. Cf. also p. 652, below.
[1934] pp. 384, 431, 472, 517, 600. Cf. St Saëns, p. 451.
[1935] p. 638.
[1936] p. 431.
[1937] pp. 111, 285, 486, 625.
[1938] pp. 111, 166, 170, 194.
[1939] p. 94. Cf. p. 261: “Una non clamat aliam” (1256).
[1940] p. 201.
[1941] p. 293.
[1942] Ancren Riwle, tr. Gasquet, pp. 151, 192.
[1943] p. 518. An amusing example of convent amenities on these occasions and particularly of the way in which the younger nuns seized a chance of “getting even” with their elders is to be found in Johann Busch’s account of his visitation of Dorstadt (in the Liber de Reformatione Monasteriorum described below, App. III). At this house it was the custom for the chapter disciplines to be administered to the whole convent by two of the youngest nuns, who then received discipline themselves. “And,” says Busch, “they had somewhat large rods and beat each other somewhat severely, because the younger nuns were ordained to give disciplines for this reason, that they were stronger than the others. I asked one of them after confession whether she ever gave one more or sharper blows than another. She answered, ‘Truly I do. I hit more sharply and as much as I can her who in my judgment deserves more.’ This girl was about eight or ten years old. I asked one elderly sister, who was prioress in another monastery of her order, but because she was unwilling to reform was expelled from it, whether she received severe disciplines from them. She replied, ‘I have counted ten or eight strokes, which she has often given me as hard as she could, within the space in which “Misereatur tui” is read.’ Then I said to her, ‘You ought to make her a sign, that she may understand that you have had enough.’ She answered, ‘When I do that, she hits me all the more. And I dare not say anything to her on account of the prioress’s presence, but I think to myself: I must bear these on account of my sins, because the prioress and all the seniors receive from them as much as they like to give, without contradiction.’ And she added, ‘before her profession I used to teach her and often beat her with a rod: now she pays me back as she likes.’” Busch, Chron. Wind. et Liber de Ref. Mon., ed. Grube, pp. 644-5.
[1944] p. 235.
[1945] p. 591.
[1946] pp. 624-5.
[1947] pp. 512, 588.
[1948] p. 550.
[1949] p. 348. Perhaps one of these is referred to in 1251 when Rigaud noted “Ibi est quedam filia cuiusdam burgensis de Vallibus que stulta est” (p. 111). It may however refer to a boarder.
[1950] p. 111.
[1951] pp 348, 615.
[1952] p. 187.
[1953] p. 268.
[1954] p. 412.
[1955] p. 293.
[1956] p. 431.
[1957] pp. 472, 517, 564.
[1958] pp. 170, 187, 522 (St Saëns); 201, 326, 401, 512 (St Amand); 298, 348, 455 (Bondeville); 73, 220, 305 (St Sauveur); 117, 146 (Bival); 199, 296 (St Désir de Lisieux); 295-6, 592 (St Léger de Préaux); 402 (Villarceaux); 412 (St Aubin).
[1959] See Rule of St Benedict, tr. Gasquet, pp. 95-6: “When receiving new clothes the monks shall always give back the old ones at the same time, to be put away in the clothes room for the poor. For it is sufficient that a monk have two cowls, as well for night wear as for the convenience of washing. Anything else is superfluous and must be cut off.”
[1960] pp. 384, 517, 564 (Montivilliers); 295 (St Léger de Préaux); 62 (St Désir de Lisieux); 220, 305 (St Sauveur).
[1961] p. 512.
[1962] p. 305.
[1963] pp. 44-5.
[1964] “Abbatissa dat cuilibet moniali per annum xii solidos pro vestibus tantummodo, et singule earum provident sibi de residuo.” p. 339; cf. p. 299. Cf. also Almenèches in 1250, p. 82.
[1965] p. 384.
[1966] p. 207.
[1967] p. 82.
[1968] p. 550.
[1969] p. 587.
[1970] p. 615.
[1971] pp. 62, 199, 296.
[1972] p. 100.
[1973] pp. 115, 273, 285. Cf. injunctions to Villarceaux in 1249, quoted above.
[1974] p. 82.
[1975] Cf. the case of Johanna Martel at St Saëns, p, 338, quoted below, p. 668.
[1976] p. 235
[1977] p. 374.
[1978] pp. 384, 431, 472, 517, 564. In 1260 the injunction was: “Item quod omnes sane insimul comederent; item inhibuimus ne in refectorio per conventicula et colligationes comederent sed sederent in mensis indifferenter et escis communibus vescerentur” (p. 384).
[1979] pp. 170, 380, 522.
[1980] pp. 60, 197, 295.
[1981] p. 146.
[1982] p. 572.
[1983] p. 220.
[1984] pp. 111, 217, 571. The oven room of St Amand was looked after by a lay brother, p. 588.
[1985] p. 73.
[1986] p. 82.
[1987] p. 111. “Quod moniales non vendant nec distrahant filum et lor fusees.”
[1988] pp. 202, 283, 326, 401, 456, 486, 512, 588 (St Amand); 73, 624 (St Sauveur); 518 (Montivilliers); 451 (St Saëns); 534 (Villarceaux).
[1989] Ancren Riwle, tr. Gasquet, p. 318.
[1990] The custom of depositing valuables in a monastery for safety was very general. Caesarius of Heisterbach has an entertaining anecdote on the point: “A certain usurer committed a large sum of his money to a certain cellarer of our order to be kept for him. The monk sealed it up and put it in a safe place together with the money belonging to the monastery. Afterwards the usurer came to ask for his deposit, but when the cellarer opened the chest, he found neither that nor his own money. And when he beheld that the locks of the chest were intact and the seals of the bags unbroken and that there was no suspicion of theft, he understood that the money of the usurer had eaten up the money of the monastery.” Caes. of Heist., Dial. Mirac. ed. Strange (1851), I, p. 108. For another example of goods being deposited for safety in a nunnery see V.C.H. Herts. IV, p. 431 (note 40). A certain Joan Sturmyn entrusted goods to the value of £50 to the keeping of Alice Wafer, Prioress of St Mary de Pré (near St Albans), which afterwards gave rise to a case in chancery, 1480-5.
[1991] Coulton, Monastic Schools in the Middle Ages (Medieval Studies, No. 10) quoting from Martène, Thesaurus, IV, col. 175, § IV.
[1992] See references to convent schools by Gerson and by Erasmus quoted in Coulton, op. cit. pp. 22-3, note 17.
[1993] Or grandnieces (nepotulas).
[1994] p. 217.
[1995] p. 298.
[1996] p. 410.
[1997] p. 571.
[1998] p. 615.
[1999] Coulton, op. cit. p. 5.
[2000] p. 282.
[2001] p. 324.
[2002] p. 572.
[2003] p. 602.
[2004] p. 380.
[2005] p. 419.
[2006] p. 412: “Item ne pueros admitterent ad nutriendum.”
[2007] p. 146.
[2008] p. 486.
[2009] p. 60.
[2010] p. 220.
[2011] p. 305.
[2012] pp. 610, 636.
[2013] pp. 43, 44.
[2014] pp. 115, 207, 255, 283, 319.
[2015] p. 361.
[2016] pp. 412, 471, 550, 587.
[2017] p. 310.
[2018] p. 338.
[2019] p. 380.
[2020] p. 419.
[2021] pp. 451, 491.
[2022] pp. 201, 285.
[2023] p. 486.
[2024] p. 512.
[2025] p. 588.
[2026] p. 281.
[2027] p. 323.
[2028] p. 571.
[2029] pp. 44, 572.
[2030] p. 207.
[2031] p. 564.
[2032] pp. 43, 82, 146, 348.
[2033] pp. 348, 410.
[2034] p. 117.
[2035] p. 146.
[2036] pp. 146, 207, 220, 235, 255, 283, 305, 319, 348, 419, 624, 636.
[2037] pp. 43, 207, 255, 283, 305.
[2038] pp. 43, 326.
[2039] p. 117.
[2040] p. 348.
[2041] p. 220.
[2042] pp. 43, 117, 220, 235, 268, 486, 491, 534, 550.
[2043] p. 587.
[2044] p. 44.
[2045] p. 285.
[2046] pp. 43, 197, 296, 338, 348, 374, 380, 419, 451, 455, 486, 491, 534, 591, 624.
[2047] p. 187 (1254); in 1259 it is again complained that the nuns stay for a long time when they have licence to go outside and on three other occasions it is noted that the nuns go out alone; in 1262 a penance was enjoined on the Prioress for allowing one nun to do so. See pp. 338, 380, 419, 451, 491.
[2048] p. 197.
[2049] p. 295.
[2050] p. 591.
[2051] p. 298; cf. p. 455.
[2052] p. 281; cf. pp. 146, 486, 588.
[2053] pp. 293, 517.
[2054] p. 587.
[2055] p. 412.
[2056] p. 471.
[2057] See above, pp. 542 ff.
[2058] p. 44.
[2059] p. 166.
[2060] p. 197.
[2061] p. 261.
[2062] p. 384.
[2063] pp. 431, 517.
[2064] p. 486.
[2065] See above p. 311 and E. K. Chambers, The Medieval Stage, I, ch. XV, passim.
[2066] p. 73.
[2067] pp. 305, 624.
[2068] p. 295.
[2069] p. 95.
[2070] p. 201.
[2071] p. 602; compare a similar case at Legbourne, above, p. 412.
[2072] p. 43.
[2073] pp. 518, 564.
[2074] p. 16.
[2075] pp. 73, 207, 220, 305, 624.
[2076] Montaiglon, Recueil de Poésies Françoises des XVIe et XVIIe siècles, t. VIII, pp. 171, 173.
[2077] pp. 43-4.
[2078] But a better example of his wit is shown in his repartee to another’s pun, quoted in Coulton, A Medieval Garner, p. 289. “A clerical buffoon once ventured to ask him across the table, ‘What is the difference, my lord, betwixt Rigaud and Ribaud [rascal]?’ ‘Only this board’s breadth,’ replied the Archbishop.” The jest is however widespread, mutatis mutandis, in the east as well as in the west. It is told of one John Scot, ‘What difference is there between sot and scot?’ ‘Just the breadth of the table.’ Calendar of Jests, Epigrams, Epitaphs etc. (Edinburgh 1753); it also occurs in Gladwin’s Persian Moonshee and in several Indian collections of facetiae. W. A. Clouston, Popular Tales and Fictions (1887) I, p. 51.
[2079] p. 207.
[2080] p. 146.
[2081] p. 207.
[2082] p. 338.
[2083] p. 522.
[2084] p. 82.
[2085] p. 326.
[2086] p. 456.
[2087] p. 638.
[2088] See pp. 645-6, above.
[2089] Reg. p. 348.
[2090] p. 199.
[2091] p. 575. Cf. the case of the Priory of Couz, when it was visited in 1283 by Simon of Beaulieu, Archbishop of Bourges. Baluze, Miscellanea, I, 281.
[2092] pp. 43-4. Notice the disjointed character of the report and the repetition of charges, e.g. against Johanna of Alto Villari (who is probably the same as Johanna of Aululari) the cellaress and the Prioress. This probably indicates that it is a verbatim report of evidence taken down from the lips of the nuns, as they came before the Archbishop.
[2093] pp. 44-5.
[2094] p. 117.
[2095] p. 82.
[2096] p. 6.
[2097] p. 207.
[2098] p. 268.
[2099] p. 207.
[2100] A similar charge was made at the convent of St Saëns in 1264 where scandal imputed to Nicholaa, a notoriously immoral nun, “quod ipsa nondum erat mensis elapsus fecerat abortivum”; but the Archbishop apparently disbelieved the charge. p. 491. See p. 669, below.
[2101] p. 255.
[2102] p. 283.
[2103] p. 412.
[2104] p. 471.
[2105] p. 500.
[2106] It is noticeable how often in these visitations the nuns are reported to have been led astray by priests; but when one considers the character borne by many of the parochial and other clergy of the diocese, as it is recorded in the Register, this is hardly surprising.
[2107] pp. 550, 587.
[2108] p. 587.
[2109] p. 619.
[2110] p. 187.
[2111] p. 338.
[2112] See above, p. 667, note 6.
[2113] p. 491.
[2114] p. 522.
[2115] p. 566.
[2116] p. 598.
[2117] Or rather on loose sheets, which were not intended for official preservation and have survived only by accident.
[2118] I.e. abbot. These German Augustinians never used the term abbas, but used praepositus instead.
[2119] Des Augustinerpropstes Iohannes Busch Chronicon Windeshemense und Liber de Reformatione Monasteriorum ... bearbeitet v. Dr Karl Grube (Hist. Com. der Provinz. Sachsen. Halle, 1886).
[2120] The nunneries dealt with by Busch are the following (A. = Austin, B. = Benedictine, C. = Cistercian, M.M. = penitentiary order of St Mary Magdalen, following the Cistercian rule): (1) Wennigsen (S. of Hanover, dioc. Minden, A.); (2) Mariensee (N. of Hanover, dioc. Minden, C.); (3) Barsinghausen (S. of Hanover, dioc. Minden, A.); (4) Marienwerder (N. of Hanover, dioc. Minden, A.); (5) St George, or Marienkammer (in Glaucha, a suburb of Halle, dioc. Magdeburg, C.); (6) Magdalenenkloster, Hildesheim (dioc. Hildesheim, M.M.); (7) Derneburg (W. of Hildesheim, dioc. Hildesheim, A.); (8) Escherde (S.W. of Hildesheim, B.); (9) Heiningen (in Hanover, between Wolfenbüttel and Goslar, dioc. Hildesheim, A.); (10) Stederburg (near Brunswick, dioc. Hildesheim, A.); (11) Frankenburg (in Goslar, dioc. Hildesheim, M.M.); (12) Kloster zum hl. Kreuze (Holy Cross) or Neuwerk, Erfurt (dioc. Mainz, A.); (13) St Cyriac’s in Erfurt (dioc. Mainz, B.); (14) Weissfrauenkloster (White Ladies) in Erfurt (dioc. Mainz, M.M.); (15) St Martin’s in Erfurt (dioc. Mainz, C.); (16) Marienberg (near Helmstedt, dioc. Halberstadt, A.); (17) Marienborn (near Helmstedt, dioc. Halberstadt, A.); (18) Weinhausen (near Lüneburg, dioc. Hildesheim, C.); (19) Weissfrauenkloster (White Ladies) in Magdeburg (dioc. Magdeburg, M.M.); (20) Wülfinghausen (near Wittenberg, dioc. Hildesheim, A.); (21) Fischbeck (near Rinteln on the Weser, in Hessen-Nassau, dioc. Minden, A.); (22) Dorstadt (near Wolfenbüttel, dioc. Hildesheim, A.); (23) Stendal (in the mark of Brandenburg, A.). Also (24) Bewerwijk in N. Holland (Franciscan tertiaries), and (25) Segeberchhus in Lübeck, both houses of lay sisters.
[2121] But see Liber, pp. 600, 637, 640.
[2122] Liber, p. 580.
[2123] Liber, p. 591.
[2124] Ib. p. 610. For interesting lists of money and goods put into common stock by Busch see also pp. 614, 616, 617, 633.
[2125] Ib. pp. 633-4.
[2126] Ib. p. 633.
[2127] Ib. pp. 571-2.
[2128] See ib. pp. 572, 591.
[2129] Liber, pp. 573-4. Compare the exertions of Berthold, Prior of Sülte, to provide the poor nuns of Heiningen with sufficient stores of food and to pay off their debts, ib. pp. 601-2; see also, p. 599.
[2130] Ib. p. 614.
[2131] Ib. p. 582.
[2132] Ib. p. 643.
[2133] Ib. p. 614.
[2134] Ib. p. 567.
[2135] Liber, pp. 582-3; compare pp. 603, 638.
[2136] Ib. p. 639.
[2137] Ib. p. 633.
[2138] Liber, p. 587.
[2139] Ib. p. 599.
[2140] Ib. p. 617. Compare Marienwerder, ib. pp. 567-8.
[2141] Ib. pp. 630-2.
[2142] Ib. p. 642.
[2143] Liber, p. 581.
[2144] Ib. pp. 615, 652-3. But the praepositus of Erfurt, when he saw the result of the reforms, was delighted and thanked Busch.
[2145] Liber, pp. 555-62.
[2146] Liber, pp. 562-5.
[2147] See ib. pp. 591-7.
[2148] Liber, pp. 575-6.
[2149] Ib. p. 589.
[2150] Liber, pp. 597-8.
[2151] Ib. pp. 580, 607, 612, 619, 628, 631, 635, 642, 649, 651.
[2152] Ib. pp. 618-22.
[2153] Liber, pp. 622-7.
[2154] Liber, pp. 624-5.
[2155] Ib. p. 625. For the learning of reformed nuns, see pp. 576, 607, 642.
[2156] See e.g. ib. pp. 585-6, 636, 640.
[2157] Ib. p. 596.
[2158] In course of publication, edited by Mr A. Hamilton Thompson. The printed portion is cited in the text as Linc. Visit. II, and the unprinted portion as Alnwick’s Visit. MS.
[2159] Bishop Lowth says: “This MS. belonged to Wykeham himself, for the injunctions are the original drafts corrected. It came afterwards into the hands of Robert Shirborn, Master of St Cross Hospital, afterwards Bishop of Chichester.” It contains a long series of documents relating to a controversy between the Bishop and the masters of St Cross Hospital and injunctions sent to the Cathedral Church of Winchester, the monasteries of Hyde, Merton, Romsey and Wherwell, and the Hospital of St Thomas the Martyr, Southwark, covering the years 1386 and 1387. It is of the highest interest and should certainly be published. My thanks are due to Dr Moyle, Bursar of New College, for permission to transcribe the injunctions sent to the two nunneries.
[2160] Foreign books mentioned only in ch. XIII are not included here.