for her comyns for xxj monethes ... vj l. viij s iiij d. ... Item paid to dame Alice Wafyr for her comyns for xxj monethes ... vj l. viij s iiij d. ... Item paid to vij susters of the same place for their comons for xxj monethis ... xxj li. vj s viij d. Item paid to dame Johan Knollys for her comyns for v monethis xvj s viij d. ... Item paid for brede and ale and fewell departyd amongs the susters by a yere and a half lij s. Item paid for ij bushell of pesyn departyd amongs the susters in Lente xvj d.
for her comyns for xxj monethes ... vj l. viij s iiij d. ... Item paid to dame Alice Wafyr for her comyns for xxj monethes ... vj l. viij s iiij d. ... Item paid to vij susters of the same place for their comons for xxj monethis ... xxj li. vj s viij d. Item paid to dame Johan Knollys for her comyns for v monethis xvj s viij d. ... Item paid for brede and ale and fewell departyd amongs the susters by a yere and a half lij s. Item paid for ij bushell of pesyn departyd amongs the susters in Lente xvj d.
The rest of the section contains notices of special pittances, paid sometimes in money and sometimes in kind; for instance 10s.6d.is paid for “Maundy Ale” and 10d.for wine on two Maundy Thursdays, but the sisters also get “Maundy money” amounting to 21d.One interesting item runs: “delyvered of the rente in Cambrigge amongs the susters for the tyme of this accompte xlviij s”; these rents, which are entered among the receipts, were no doubt ear-marked for the nuns, possibly aspeculiafor the purchase of clothes, possibly as a pittance[1041]. The same system of housekeeping was obviously also in vogue at St Michael’s, Stamford, at the time of Alnwick’s visitation; but the account rolls of this house are not easy to interpret, because although they contain no reference to catering, other than certain pittances and feasts on Maundy Thursday and other festal occasions, neither do they contain any reference to commons money. No separate cellaress’ accounts have survived to throw any furtherlight upon the subject. At Elstow Abbey some years later the practice of paying “commons” money was well established[1042].
It is tempting to conjecture what considerations may have prevailed to make some houses substitute money grants for the provision of food in kind. The tendency certainly grew with the custom of formingfamiliaewhich messed separately and it certainly increased with time. Even at Catesby, which we saw to be a typical example of communal housekeeping in 1414-5, it seems to have become customary to give money for some at least of the victuals in 1442. The tendency also grew with poverty, as appears from Alnwick’s visitations, though it is not clear whence the nuns obtained the wherewithal to feed themselves adequately, unless they had the use of extra funds of their own. It may also be conjectured that the system would be easier to work in a town than in the depths of the country. In a town the nuns could buy in the open market, and it was as easy for individuals to buy in small quantities as for the cellaress to buy wholesale. In the country, however, the convent would not only be more dependent on the home farm, but such purchases as had to be made at occasional fairs and weekly markets could more easily be made in bulk, a consideration which also accounts for the fact that the barrels and cades of salt fish for Lent were usually laid in wholesale by the cellaress. Moreover it would often be convenient for a town house to lease out the greater number of its demesnes and to depend upon what it could purchase for its daily fare. St Mary de Pré is particularly interesting in this respect; the 1486-8 account shows no sign of any home farm; the income of the house is derived almost entirely from “rents of assise and rents farm” within the town of St Albans and in other places and from tithes, and the proportion of farms or leases is noticeably large. Even the bread and beer distributed among the sisters did not come from a home farm; it was bought with 52s.received from the Abbot of St Albans for that purpose; the kitchener of the parent abbeysimilarly provided the nuns with 12s., “for potage money departyd amongs the susters for a yere,” and at the forester’s office they received 8s.for their fuel.
Occasional references show what a variety of household charges the nuns sometimes had to bear out of theirpeculia, and the other sources of their private income. At Campsey in 1532, for instance,
the subprioress says that the prioress will not allow her servants to go out upon the necessary errands of the nuns, but they hire outsiders at their own cost and Dame Isabella Norwiche says that sick nuns in the time of their sickness bear the cost of what is needful to them and it is not provided at the charge of the house[1043].
the subprioress says that the prioress will not allow her servants to go out upon the necessary errands of the nuns, but they hire outsiders at their own cost and Dame Isabella Norwiche says that sick nuns in the time of their sickness bear the cost of what is needful to them and it is not provided at the charge of the house[1043].
At Sheppey also, in 1511, there was no infirmary and when ill the nuns had to hire women for themselves and pay for them out of their own money[1044]. At Langley in 1440 Alnwick ordered that each nun should have yearly a cartload of fuel, cut at the cost of the house, but carried at the cost of the nuns[1045]. At Wherwell there was a custom by which, on the first occasion that a nun took her turn in reading from the pulpit, a certain sum of money or a pittance was exacted from her for the benefit of the convent, a custom forbidden by Bishop John of Pontoise in 1302[1046]; and there is mention of another pittance in 1311, when Bishop Woodlock ordered that for digging the grave and preparing the coffin of a nun who had died and for pittances to the sisters on the day of her burial, the goods of the deceased nun should not be expended, because she ought not to have private property, but the common goods of the church were to be spent; which seems like locking the stable door after the horse has gone[1047].
It is interesting to trace the attitude of ecclesiastic authorities to these various manifestations ofproprietas. The bishops found some difficulty in persuading nuns, accustomed to expend money for themselves and to dine infamiliaein separate rooms, accustomed also to receive gifts and legacies in money and kind, that they must hold all things in common. At Arthington, in 1307, two nuns, Agnes de Screvyn (who had resigned the postof Prioress in 1303) and Isabella Couvel, asserted that certain animals and goods belonging to the priory were their private property and Archbishop Greenfield bids the Prioress admonish them to resign these within three days “to lawful and honest uses,” according to her judgment[1048]. Similarly Bishop Bokyngham writes to Heynings in 1392:
We order that cows, sows, capons, hens and all animals of any kind soever, together with wild or tame birds, which are held by certain of the nuns (whether with or without licence) ... shall be delivered up to the common use of the convent within three days, without the alienation or subtraction of any of them[1049].
We order that cows, sows, capons, hens and all animals of any kind soever, together with wild or tame birds, which are held by certain of the nuns (whether with or without licence) ... shall be delivered up to the common use of the convent within three days, without the alienation or subtraction of any of them[1049].
In the light of these passages it is interesting to find that cows and pigs are among the legacies sometimes left to nuns[1050]. At Nuncoton, in 1440, where certain nuns were in the habit of wandering in their gardens and gathering herbs instead of attending Compline,
Dame Alice Aunselle prays that they may all live in common and that no nun may have anything, such as cups and the like, as her own; but that if any such there be, they be kept in common by their common servant and that they may not have houses or separate gardens appointed, as it were, to them[1051],
Dame Alice Aunselle prays that they may all live in common and that no nun may have anything, such as cups and the like, as her own; but that if any such there be, they be kept in common by their common servant and that they may not have houses or separate gardens appointed, as it were, to them[1051],
which illustrates how easily the household system slid intoproprietas. It was sometimes even necessary to forbid nuns to make wills and bequeath their property. This was forbidden by the Council of Oxford in 1222[1052]and in 1387 William of Wykeham sent a stern injunction to the nuns of Romsey, pointing out that by making wills they were falling into the sin of property[1053].In 1394, on the death of Joan Furmage, Abbess of Shaftesbury,
the bishop ordered the Abbey to be sequestrated and annulled the will by which she had alienated the goods of the house in bequests to friends, declaring such a disposition to be injurious to the community and contrary to the usage of religious women[1054].
the bishop ordered the Abbey to be sequestrated and annulled the will by which she had alienated the goods of the house in bequests to friends, declaring such a disposition to be injurious to the community and contrary to the usage of religious women[1054].
The history of the attitude of ecclesiastical authorities to two sources of private income, thepeculiumand the gifts from friends to individuals, is of even greater significance than these attempts to cope with private goods, for it shows how powerless the bishops were against the steady weakening of discipline in monastic houses. Here, as in the enclosure struggle and the struggle againstfamiliae, they were forced into compromise at best and at worst into acquiescence. At its first appearance the custom of giving apeculiumto individuals was severely condemned as a manifest breach of the rule:
“Moneys shall not be assigned to each separately for clothes,” says the Council of Oxford in 1222, “But such shall be diligently attended to by certain persons deputed to this purpose, chamberers or chambresses, who according to the need of each and the resources of the house, shall minister garments to them.... Also it shall not be lawful for the chamberer or chambress to give to any monk, canon or nun, monies or anything else for clothes, nor shall it be lawful for monk, canon or nun to receive anything; otherwise let the chamberer be deposed from office and the monk, canon or nun go without new clothes for that year”[1055].
“Moneys shall not be assigned to each separately for clothes,” says the Council of Oxford in 1222, “But such shall be diligently attended to by certain persons deputed to this purpose, chamberers or chambresses, who according to the need of each and the resources of the house, shall minister garments to them.... Also it shall not be lawful for the chamberer or chambress to give to any monk, canon or nun, monies or anything else for clothes, nor shall it be lawful for monk, canon or nun to receive anything; otherwise let the chamberer be deposed from office and the monk, canon or nun go without new clothes for that year”[1055].
Similarly, in the Constitutions of the legate Ottobon in 1268, thepeculiumis grouped with other forms of property; ch.XLenacts that no religious is to possess property and that the head of the house is to make diligent search for such property twice a year[1056], and ch.XLIenacts that no money is to be given to a religious for clothes, shoes and other necessities, but he is to begiven the article itself[1057]. In 1438 a severe injunction from Bishop Spofford of Hereford to the nuns of Aconbury shows the close connection between thepeculiumand the privatecameraof the nuns[1058]. Yet in 1380 we find a bishop of Salisbury assigning a weekly allowance of 2d.to each nun of Shaftesbury from the issues of the house[1059]; and in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries nuns regularly complain to their visitors when their allowances are in arrears and the bishops regularly ordain that the money is to be paid[1060]. In the thirteenth century it is a fault in the Prioress to give the nuns apeculium; in the fifteenth century it is a fault to withhold it.
The custom as to presents from friends was that the nuns might receive gifts, only by the permission of their superior, to whom everything must be shown[1061]. Thus Archbishop Wickwane writes to Nunappleton in 1281: “that no nun shall appropriate to herself any gift, garment or shoes of the gift of anyone, without the consent and assignment of the prioress”[1062]; Archbishop Greenfield in 1315 forbids the nuns of Rosedale to accept or give any presents without the consent of the Prioress[1063]; and Archbishop Bowet in 1411 enacts that any nun of Hampole receiving gifts orlegaciesfrom friends is at once on returning to reveal them to the Prioress[1064]. Occasionally a Prioress, whether out of zeal for the Rule or for some other reason, showed herself unwilling to allow the nuns to receive presents. The nuns ofFlixton in 1514 complained: “that they receive no annual pensions and that the prioress is angry when anything is given to them by their friends”[1065]and Alnwick in 1441 wrote to the Prioress of Ankerwyke, whose nuns complained both of insufficient clothes and of her bad temper when their friends came to see them,
And what euer thise saide frendes wyll gyfe your sustres in relefe of thaym as in hire habyte and sustenaunce, ye suffre your sustres to take hit, so that no abuse of euel come therbye noyther to the place ne to the persones therof[1066].
And what euer thise saide frendes wyll gyfe your sustres in relefe of thaym as in hire habyte and sustenaunce, ye suffre your sustres to take hit, so that no abuse of euel come therbye noyther to the place ne to the persones therof[1066].
It was indeed almost a necessity to encourage the reception of presents, when (as so often happened towards the close of the middle ages) nuns were dependent for clothes upon their friends. But with Bishop Praty ordering that the nuns of Easebourne shall receive half the sums paid them for their work, and with Bishop Alnwick encouraging presents and enforcing the payment ofpeculia, it is plain that the Lady Poverty had fallen upon evil days.
FISH OUT OF WATER
De sorte qu’une Religieuse hors de sa clôture est comme une pierre hors de son centre; comme un arbre hors de terre; comme Adam et Eve hors du Paradis terrestre; comme le corbeau hors de l’arche qui ne s’arreste qu’à des charognes; comme un poisson hors de l’eau, selon le grand Saint Antoine et Saint Bernard; comme une brebis hors de sa bergerie et en danger d’estre devorée des loups, selon Saint Theodore Studite; comme un oiseau hors de son nid et une grenouille hors de son marais, selon le même Saint Bernard; comme un mort hors de son tombeau, qui infecte les personnes qui s’en approchent, selon Pierre le Vénérable et la Règle attribuée à Saint Jérôme; et par consequent dans un état tout à fait opposé à la vie Régulière qu’elle a embrassée.J. B. Thiers(1681).
De sorte qu’une Religieuse hors de sa clôture est comme une pierre hors de son centre; comme un arbre hors de terre; comme Adam et Eve hors du Paradis terrestre; comme le corbeau hors de l’arche qui ne s’arreste qu’à des charognes; comme un poisson hors de l’eau, selon le grand Saint Antoine et Saint Bernard; comme une brebis hors de sa bergerie et en danger d’estre devorée des loups, selon Saint Theodore Studite; comme un oiseau hors de son nid et une grenouille hors de son marais, selon le même Saint Bernard; comme un mort hors de son tombeau, qui infecte les personnes qui s’en approchent, selon Pierre le Vénérable et la Règle attribuée à Saint Jérôme; et par consequent dans un état tout à fait opposé à la vie Régulière qu’elle a embrassée.
J. B. Thiers(1681).
The famous chapterLXVIof the Benedictine Rule enunciated the principle that the professed monk should remain within the precincts of his cloister and eschew all wandering in the world[1067]. It is clear, however, that the Rule allowed a certain latitude and that monks and nuns were to be allowed to leave their houses under certain conditions and for necessary causes. Brethren working at a distance or going on a journey may be excused attendance at the divine office, if they cannot reach the church in time[1068]. Brethren sent upon an errand are forbidden to accept invitations to eat outside the house without the consent of their superior[1069]. Moreover longer journeys are plainly contemplated, in which they might have to spend a night or more outside their monastery[1070]. But no one might ever leave the cloister boundswithout the permission of the superior; and it was the obvious intention of St Benedict to reduce to a minimum all wandering in the world. Strictly speaking this system of enclosure applied equally to monks and to nuns; but from the earliest times it was considered to be a more vital necessity for the well being of the latter; and the history of the enclosure movement is in effect the history of an effort to add a fourth vow of claustration to the three cardinal vows of the nun[1071]. The reasons for this severity are sufficiently obvious, and show that curious contradiction of ideas which is so common in all general theories about women. On the one hand the immense importance attached by the medieval Church to the state of virginity, exemplified in St John Chrysostom’s remarks that Christian virgins are as far above the rest of mankind as are the angels, made it all important that this priceless jewel should not be exposed to danger in a wicked world[1072]. On the other hand the medieval contempt for the fragility of women led to a cynical conviction that only when they were shut up behind the high walls of the cloister was it possible to guarantee their virtue;aut virum aut murum oportet mulierem habere[1073]. Both views received support from thedeep-rooted idea as old as the Greeks and an unconscionable time in dying, that “a free woman should be bounded by the street door”[1074]. Medieval moralists were generally agreed that intercourse with the world was at the root of all those evils which dimmed the fair fame of the conventual system, by affording a constant temptation to frivolity and to grosser misconduct. Moreover the tongue of scandal was always busy and the nun’s reputation was safe only if she could be placed beyond reproach. Hence those regulations which Mr Coulton compares to “the minutely ingenious and degrading precautions of an oriental harem”[1075].
Based upon such considerations as these, the movement for the enclosure of nuns began very early in their history and continued with unabated vigour long after the Reformation[1076]. Some years before the compilation of the Benedictine Rule St Caesarius of Arles, in his Rule for nuns, had forbidden them ever to leave their monastery; and from the sixth to the eleventh century decrees were passed from time to time by various provincial councils, advocating a stricter enclosure of monks and nuns, but especially of the latter. Already by the twelfth century monasticism had declined from its first fervour, and it is significant that the reformed orders which sprang up during the great renaissance of that century all made a special effort to enforce enclosure upon their nuns. The nuns of Prémontré and Fontevrault were strictly enclosed and in the middle of the followingcentury the statutes promulgated by the Chapter-General of the Cistercian Order (1256-7) contain a clause ordering nuns to remain in their convents, except under certain specified conditions, while the rule given by Urban IV to the Franciscan nuns (1263) went further than any previous enactments in binding them by a vow of perpetual enclosure, against which no plea of necessity might avail. Various synods and councils continued to repeat the order that nuns were not to leave their houses, except for a reasonable cause, but it is plain from the evidence of ecclesiastics, moralists and episcopal visitations that the nuns all over Europe paid small heed to their words. Finally, at the beginning of the new century, came the first general regulation on the subject which was binding as a law upon the whole church, the famous BullPericuloso, promulgated by Boniface VIII about the year 1299.
This decree, often afterwards confirmed by Popes and Councils, remained the standard regulation upon the subject and in view of its cardinal importance its terms are worthy of notice:
Desiring to provide for the perilous and detestable state of certain nuns, who, having slackened the reins of decency and having shamelessly cast aside the modesty of their order and of their sex, sometimes gad about outside their monasteries in the dwellings of secular persons, and frequently admit suspected persons within the same monasteries, to the grave offence of Him to Whom they have, of their own will, vowed their innocence, to the opprobrium of religion and to the scandal of very many persons; we by the present constitution, which shall be irrefragably valid, decree with healthful intent that all and sundry nuns, present and future, to whatever order they belong and in whatever part of the world, shall henceforth remain perpetually enclosed within their monasteries; so that no nun tacitly or expressly professed in religion shall henceforth have or be able to have the power of going out of those monasteries for whatsoever reason or cause, unless perchance any be found manifestly suffering from a disease so great and of such a nature that she cannot, without grave danger or scandal, live together with others; and to no dishonest or even honest person shall entry or access be given by them, unless for a reasonable and manifest cause and by a special licence from the person to whom [the granting of such a licence] pertains; that so, altogether withdrawn from public and mundane sights, they may serve God more freely and, all opportunity for wantonness being removed, they may more diligently preserve for Him in all holiness their souls and their bodies.
Desiring to provide for the perilous and detestable state of certain nuns, who, having slackened the reins of decency and having shamelessly cast aside the modesty of their order and of their sex, sometimes gad about outside their monasteries in the dwellings of secular persons, and frequently admit suspected persons within the same monasteries, to the grave offence of Him to Whom they have, of their own will, vowed their innocence, to the opprobrium of religion and to the scandal of very many persons; we by the present constitution, which shall be irrefragably valid, decree with healthful intent that all and sundry nuns, present and future, to whatever order they belong and in whatever part of the world, shall henceforth remain perpetually enclosed within their monasteries; so that no nun tacitly or expressly professed in religion shall henceforth have or be able to have the power of going out of those monasteries for whatsoever reason or cause, unless perchance any be found manifestly suffering from a disease so great and of such a nature that she cannot, without grave danger or scandal, live together with others; and to no dishonest or even honest person shall entry or access be given by them, unless for a reasonable and manifest cause and by a special licence from the person to whom [the granting of such a licence] pertains; that so, altogether withdrawn from public and mundane sights, they may serve God more freely and, all opportunity for wantonness being removed, they may more diligently preserve for Him in all holiness their souls and their bodies.
The Bull further, in order to avoid any excuse for wandering abroad in search of alms, forbids the reception into any non-mendicant order of more sisters than can be supported without penury by the goods of the house; and, in order to prevent nuns being forced to attend lawcourts in person, requires all secular and ecclesiastical authorities to allow them to plead by proctors in their courts; but if an Abbess or Prioress has to do personal homage to a secular lord for any fief and it cannot be done by a proctor, she may leave her house with honest and fit companions and do the homage, returning home immediately. Finally Ordinaries are enjoined to take order as soon as may be for proper enclosure where there is none to provide that it is strictly kept according to the terms of the decree, and to see that all is completed by Ash Wednesday, notifying any reasonable impediment within eight days of Candlemas[1077].
For the next three centuries Councils and Bishops struggled manfully to put into force the BullPericuloso, but without success; the constant repetition of the order that nuns should not leave their convents is the measure of its failure. In the various reformed orders, which were founded in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the insistence upon enclosure bears witness to the importance which was attached to it as a vital condition of reform: Boniface IX’s ordinances for the Dominicans (1402), St Francis of Paula’s rule for his order in Calabria (1435), the rule of the Order of the Annunciation, founded by Jeanne, daughter of Louis XI, at the close of the fifteenth century, Johann Busch’s reforms in Saxony, the reformed rules given by Étienne Poncher, Bishop of Paris, to the nuns of Chelles, Montmartre and Malnouë (1506) and by Geoffrey de Saint Belin, Bishop of Poitiers, to the nuns of the Holy Cross, Poitiers (1511), all insist upon strict enclosure[1078]. Similarly a long list might be drawn up of general and provincial councils and synods which repeated the ordinance, culminating in the great general Council of Trent, which renewed the decreePericulosoand was itselffollowed by another long series of provincial councils, which endeavoured to put its decree into force. But these efforts were still attended by very imperfect success, for the worldly nuns of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries chafed at the irksome restriction no less than did their predecessors of the middle ages. When, in 1681, Jean-Baptiste Thiers published his treatise on the enclosure of nuns he announced his reason to be that no point of ecclesiastical discipline was in his day more completely neglected and ignored[1079].
This brief sketch of the enclosure movement in the Western Church is necessary to a right understanding of the special attempts which were made in England to keep the nuns in their cloisters by means of an absolute enforcement of the Benedictine Rule. Visitatorial injunctions on this subject during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and up to the Reformation were based upon three enactments: the constitutions of the legate Ottobon in 1268, the vigorous reforms of Archbishop Peckham (1279-92) and the BullPericuloso. The Cardinal Legate Ottobon had come to England in 1265, on the restoration of Henry III after Evesham, with the purpose of punishing bishops and clergy who had supported the party of Simon de Montfort and the barons. When peace was finally signed in 1267, largely by his intervention, he was able to turn his attention to general abuses prevalent in the English church and one of the reforms which he attempted to enforce was the stricter enclosure of nuns. ChapterLIIof hisConstitutions[Quod moniales a certis locis non exeant] is an amplification of the Benedictine rule of enclosure, made far more rigid and severe. “Lest by repeated intercourse with secular folk the quiet and contemplation of the nuns should be troubled,” minute regulations were laid down as to their movements. They were allowed to enter their chapel, chapter,dorter and frater at due and fixed times; otherwise they were to remain in the cloister; and none of these places were to be entered by seculars, save very seldom and for some sufficient reason. No nun was to converse with any man, except seriously and in a public place, and at least one other nun was always to be present at such conversations. No nun was to have a meal outside the house except with the permission of the superior and then only with a relative, or some person from whose company no suspicion could arise. All other places, beyond those specified, were entirely forbidden to the nuns, with the exception, in certain circumstances, of the infirmary. No nun was to go to the different offices, except the obedientiaries, whose duties rendered it necessary and they were never to go without a companion. The Abbess or head of the house was never to leave it, except for its evident advantage or for urgent necessity, and she was always to have an honest companion, while the lesser nuns were never to be given licence to go out, except for some fit cause and in company with another nun. Finally nuns were not to leave their convents for public processions, but were to hold their processions within the precincts of their own houses. The legate strictly enjoined that “the prelates to whose jurisdiction belonged the visitation of each nunnery should cause these statutes to be observed”[1080].
It will be realised that these injunctions were exceedingly severe and that the visitors were not likely to find their task a sinecure. There is little evidence for determining how far any serious attempt was made to enforce the legate’s Constitutions[1081], but if we may judge from the language of Peckham, some ten years later, any attempts which may have been made had not been strikingly successful. One of the first actions of this energetic archbishop on his elevation to the see of Canterbury was to carry out a visitation of the nunneries of Barking andGodstow and to send to both houses injunctions laying great stress on strict enclosure (1279). In 1281 he followed up these injunctions by two general decrees for the enclosure of nuns; and in 1284 he visited the three nunneries of Romsey, Holy Sepulchre (Canterbury) and Usk and sent injunctions enforcing the Constitutions of 1281[1082]. In these injunctions he laid down with great exactness the conditions to be observed in granting nuns permission to leave their convents. The Godstow injunction runs thus:
For the purpose of obtaining a surer witness to chastity, we ordain that nuns shall not leave the precincts of the monastery, save for necessary business which cannot be performed by any other persons. Hence we condemn for ever, by these present [letters] those sojourns which were wont to be made in the houses of friends, for the sake of pleasure and of escaping from discipline [ad solatium et ad subterfugium disciplinae]. And when it shall befall any [nuns] to go out for any necessity, we strictly order these four [conditions] to be observed. First, that they be permitted to go out only in safe and mature company, as well of nuns as of secular persons helping them. Secondly that having at once performed their business, so far as it can be by them performed, they return to their house; and if the performance of the business demand a delay of several days, after the first or second day it shall be left to proctors to finish it. Thirdly that they never lodge in the precincts of men of religion or in the houses of clergy, or in other suspected habitations. Fourthly that no one absent herself from the sight of her companion or companions, in any place where human conversation might be held, nor listen to any secret whispering, except in the presence of the nuns her companions, unless perchance father or mother, brother or sister have something private to say to her[1083].
For the purpose of obtaining a surer witness to chastity, we ordain that nuns shall not leave the precincts of the monastery, save for necessary business which cannot be performed by any other persons. Hence we condemn for ever, by these present [letters] those sojourns which were wont to be made in the houses of friends, for the sake of pleasure and of escaping from discipline [ad solatium et ad subterfugium disciplinae]. And when it shall befall any [nuns] to go out for any necessity, we strictly order these four [conditions] to be observed. First, that they be permitted to go out only in safe and mature company, as well of nuns as of secular persons helping them. Secondly that having at once performed their business, so far as it can be by them performed, they return to their house; and if the performance of the business demand a delay of several days, after the first or second day it shall be left to proctors to finish it. Thirdly that they never lodge in the precincts of men of religion or in the houses of clergy, or in other suspected habitations. Fourthly that no one absent herself from the sight of her companion or companions, in any place where human conversation might be held, nor listen to any secret whispering, except in the presence of the nuns her companions, unless perchance father or mother, brother or sister have something private to say to her[1083].
The Barking injunctions are slightly different and the first condition imposed therein is interesting: “That they be sent forth only for a necessary and inevitable cause, that is in particular the imminent death of a parent, beyond which cause we can hardly imagine any other which would be sufficient”[1084]. These injunctions are very severe, since they limit the occasions upon which a nun might leave her convent to the performance of some negotiation connected with the business of the house andto attendance at the deathbeds of relatives and entirely forbid all visits for pleasure to the houses of friends.
In 1281 Peckham published a mandate directed against the seducers of nuns; after excommunicating all who committed or attempted to commit this crime and declaring that absolution for the sentence could be given only by a Bishop or by the Pope (except on the point of death), he proceeded to deal with the question of the enclosure of nuns, on the ground that their wandering in the world gave opportunity for such crimes, and sternly forbade them to pay visits for the sake of recreation, even to the closest relatives, or to remain out of their houses for more than two days on business[1085]. The same year he also dealt with the subject in the course of a set of constitutions, concerning various abuses, which he considered to be in need of reform. The language of the chapter in which he treats of the claustration of nuns is in parts the same as that of the ordinance against seducers, but it is less severe, for it enacts only that nuns shall not stay “more than three natural days for the sake of recreation, or more than six days for any necessary reason, save in case of illness.” Moreover the Archbishop adds: “we do not extend this ordinance to those who are obliged to beg necessities of life, while they are begging”[1086]. It was this modified version of his ordinance which he tried to impose in his visitation of 1284, for at Romsey he recognised that the nuns might be leaving the house for recreation and not merely uponthe business of the convent; the Abbess, for instance, is to take her three coadjutresses with her when she goes out on business, and two of them if she gocausa solatii. At this house he forbade nuns to go out without a companion, or to stay for more than three days with seculars and condemned their practice of eating and drinking in the town: no nun, either on leaving or returning to the convent, was to enter any house in the town of Romsey, or to eat or drink there, and no cleric or secular man or woman was to give them any food outside the precincts[1087]. At St Sepulchre (Canterbury) Peckham regulated the visits of nuns to confessors outside the house, and at Usk he ordered that no nun was to go out without suitable companions, or to stay more than three or four days in the houses of secular persons[1088].
The next effort made in England to enforce enclosure upon nuns was the result of Boniface VIII’s BullPericuloso. Bishops’ registers about the year 1300 sometimes contain copies of this severe enactment. One of the earliest efforts to carry it out was made by Simon of Ghent, Bishop of Salisbury, who on November 28th, 1299, issued a long letter to the Abbess of Wilton (obviously inserted in the register as a specimen of a circular sent to each nunnery in the diocese), embodying the text of the bull and ordering her to put it into force, and in 1303 he issued a mandate for the enclosure of the nuns of Shaftesbury, Wilton, Amesbury, Lacock, Tarrant Keynes and Kington[1089]. The Register of Godfrey Giffard, Bishop of Worcester, contains a note in the year 1300:
As to the shutting up of nuns. It is expedient that a letter of warning be sent according to the form of the constitution and directed to every house of nuns, that they do what is necessary for their inclusion and cause themselves to be enclosed this side the Gule of August.
As to the shutting up of nuns. It is expedient that a letter of warning be sent according to the form of the constitution and directed to every house of nuns, that they do what is necessary for their inclusion and cause themselves to be enclosed this side the Gule of August.
The Bishop seems however from the beginning to have doubted his capacity to carry out the decree, for further on the register contains another note, “As to whether it is expedient to enclose the nuns of the diocese of Worcester”[1090]. An undated note ofInhibiciones facte monialibus de Werewellin the Register of John of Pontoise, Bishop of Winchester, among other documents belonging to 1299-1300, is probably in part a result ofPericuloso:
We forbid on pain of excommunication any nun or sister to go outside the bounds of the monastery until we have made some ordinance concerning enclosure. Item let no one be received as nun or sister until we have enquired more fully into the resources of the house. Item we order the abbess to remove all secular women and to receive none henceforth as boarders in their house. Item let her permit no secular clerk or layman to enter the cloister to speak with the nuns[1091].
We forbid on pain of excommunication any nun or sister to go outside the bounds of the monastery until we have made some ordinance concerning enclosure. Item let no one be received as nun or sister until we have enquired more fully into the resources of the house. Item we order the abbess to remove all secular women and to receive none henceforth as boarders in their house. Item let her permit no secular clerk or layman to enter the cloister to speak with the nuns[1091].
But the most detailed information as to the efforts of a conscientious bishop to enforce Boniface VIII’s decree in England is contained in the Register of Bishop Dalderby of Lincoln. Dalderby was a new broom in the diocese and he determined to sweep clean. On June 17th, 1300, he directed a mandate to the archdeacons of his diocese ordering each to associate with himself some other mature and honest man and to visit the religious houses in his own archdeaconry, explaining the terms of the new bull intelligibly to the nuns and ordering them to remain within their nunneries and to permit no one to enter the precincts contrary to the tenour of the decree, until the Bishop should be able to visit them in person; the heads of the houses were to be specially warned to carry out the decree and for better security a sealed copy of it was to be deposited in each house by the commissioners[1092].
In the course of the next two months Dalderby visited, either in person or by commissioners, Marlow, Burnham, Flamstead, Markyate, Elstow, Goring, Studley, Godstow, Delapré (Northampton) and Sewardsley[1093]. At each house the bull was carefully explained to the nuns in the vulgar tongue, they were ordered to obey it and a copy was left with them. But this campaign was not unattended with difficulties. The nuns were bitterly opposed to the restriction of a freedom to which they were accustomed and which they heartily enjoyed, and an entry in Dalderby’s Register, describing his visitation of Markyate, shows that even in the middle ages a bishop’s lot was not a happy one:
On July 3rd, in the first year [of his consecration], the Bishop visited the house of nuns of Markyate and on the following day he caused to be recited before the nuns of the same [house] in chapter the statute put forth by the lord Pope Boniface VIII concerning the enclosureof nuns, explained it in the vulgar tongue and giving them a copy of the same statute under his seal, ordered them in virtue of obedience henceforth to observe it in the matter of enclosure and of all things contained in it, and especially to close all doors by which entrance is had into the inner places of their house and to permit no person, whether dishonest or honest, to enter in to them, without reasonable and manifest cause and licence from the person to whom [the granting of such a licence] pertains. Furthermore he specially enjoined the Prioress to observe the said statute in all its articles and to cause it to be observed by the others. But when the Bishop was going away, certain of the nuns, disobedient to these injunctions, hurled the said statute at his back and over his head, and as well the Prioress as the convent appeared to consent to those who threw it, following the bishop to the outer gate of the house and declaring unanimously that they were not content in any way to observe such a statute. On account of which, the Bishop, who was then directing his steps to Dunstable, returned the next day and having made inquisition as to the matters concerned in the said statute, imposed a penance on four nuns, whom he found guilty and on the whole convent for their consent, as is more fully contained in his letters of correction sent to the aforesaid house.
On July 3rd, in the first year [of his consecration], the Bishop visited the house of nuns of Markyate and on the following day he caused to be recited before the nuns of the same [house] in chapter the statute put forth by the lord Pope Boniface VIII concerning the enclosureof nuns, explained it in the vulgar tongue and giving them a copy of the same statute under his seal, ordered them in virtue of obedience henceforth to observe it in the matter of enclosure and of all things contained in it, and especially to close all doors by which entrance is had into the inner places of their house and to permit no person, whether dishonest or honest, to enter in to them, without reasonable and manifest cause and licence from the person to whom [the granting of such a licence] pertains. Furthermore he specially enjoined the Prioress to observe the said statute in all its articles and to cause it to be observed by the others. But when the Bishop was going away, certain of the nuns, disobedient to these injunctions, hurled the said statute at his back and over his head, and as well the Prioress as the convent appeared to consent to those who threw it, following the bishop to the outer gate of the house and declaring unanimously that they were not content in any way to observe such a statute. On account of which, the Bishop, who was then directing his steps to Dunstable, returned the next day and having made inquisition as to the matters concerned in the said statute, imposed a penance on four nuns, whom he found guilty and on the whole convent for their consent, as is more fully contained in his letters of correction sent to the aforesaid house.
Afterwards he sent letters to the recalcitrant convent warning them for the third time (they had already been warned once by the Official of the Archdeacon of Bedford and a second time at the visitation which has just been described) to keep the new decree, on pain of the major excommunication, from which only the Pope could absolve them[1094].
There was opposition at other convents, too, though we hear of no more attacks on the episcopal shoulders. On August 19th Dalderby wrote as follows to Master Benedict de Feriby, rector of Broughton, Northants (a church in the presentation of the Abbess and Convent of Delapré):
It has come to our ears, by clamorous rumour, that some of the nuns of our diocese, spurning good obedience, slackening the reins of honesty and shamelessly casting aside the modesty of their sex, despise the papal statute concerning enclosure directed to them, as well as our injunctions made to them upon the subject, and frequent cities and other public places outside their monasteries, and mingle in the haunts of men;
It has come to our ears, by clamorous rumour, that some of the nuns of our diocese, spurning good obedience, slackening the reins of honesty and shamelessly casting aside the modesty of their sex, despise the papal statute concerning enclosure directed to them, as well as our injunctions made to them upon the subject, and frequent cities and other public places outside their monasteries, and mingle in the haunts of men;
he proceeded to order Feriby to visit nunneries wherever he considered it expedient to do so, and to punish those who were guilty of breaking the statute, signifying to the Bishop, by acertain date, the names of all who had been accused of doing so, whether they had been found guilty or not[1095]. This mandate is no doubt in part explained by two other letters which he dispatched on the same day; one of them was directed to the Archdeacon of Northampton and set forth (in language which often repeatsverbatimthe phrases of the papal bull) that at the Bishop’s recent visitation of Delapré (Northampton) he had found three nuns in apostasy, having cast off their habits after being a long time professed, and left their house to live a secular life in the world[1096]. The other letter contains a sentence of the greater excommunication against a nun of Sewardsley, for similar conduct[1097]. These cases of apostasy were less rare than might be imagined; Dalderby had to deal with two others during his episcopate, one at St Michael’s, Stamford[1098], and the other at Goring[1099]; and during the rule of his predecessor Sutton three nuns had escaped from Godstow and one from Wothorpe[1100]. They illustrate the undoubted truth that it was only the existence (already in the thirteenth century) of very grave disorders, which led reformers like Ottobon, Peckham and Boniface VIII to “beat the air” with such severe restrictions.
These three documents, the Constitutions of Ottobon and of Peckham and the BullPericuloso, were the standard decrees on the subject of the claustration of nuns in England and were used as a model by visitors in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. William of Wykeham, for example, in the exceptionally full and formal injunctions which he sent to Romsey and to Wherwell in 1387 continually refers by name to Ottobon and to Peckham, and the wording of the BullPericulosois followedverbatimin the mandate directed by Bishop Grandisson of Exeter to Canonsleigh in 1329 and in the commission sent by his successor Bishop Brantyngham to two canons of Exeter in 1376, concerning the wanderings of the nuns of Polsloe. But a study of the visitation documents of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries makes it clear that the nuns never really made any attempt to obey the regulations which imposed a strict enclosure upon them; and that the bishops upon whom fell the brunt ofadministeringPericulosothemselves allowed a considerable latitude, directing their efforts towards regulating the conditions under which nuns left their convents, rather than to keeping them within the precincts.Le mieux est l’ennemi du bienand the steady opposition of the nuns forced a compromise upon their visitors. The canonist John of Ayton, reciting the decrees of Ottobon and of Boniface, with their injunction that bishops shall “cause them to be observed,” exclaims