PARISH PRIESTS AND THEIR PEOPLE.
[Illustration: FROM THE XV. CENT. MS., EGERTON 2019, f. 142.]
PARISH PRIESTS AND THEIR PEOPLE
IN THE MIDDLE AGES IN ENGLAND.
BY THE REV. EDWARD L. CUTTS, D.D.,
AUTHOR OF “TURNING POINTS OF ENGLISH CHURCH HISTORY,”
“A DICTIONARY OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND,”
“A HANDY BOOK OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND,” ETC.
PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OE THE TRACT COMMITTEE.
LONDON:
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE.
NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, W.C.
43, QUEEN VICTORIA STREET, E.C.
BRIGHTON: 129, NORTH STREET.
NEW YORK: E & J. B. YOUNG AND CO.
1898.
PREFACE.
A great mass of material has of late years been brought within reach of
the student, bearing upon the history of the religious life and customs of
the English people during the period from their conversion, in the sixth
and seventh centuries, down to the Reformation of the Church of England in
the sixteenth century; but this material is still to be found only in
great libraries, and is therefore hardly within reach of the general
reader.
The following chapters contain the results of some study of the subject
among the treasures of the library of the British Museum; much of those
results, it is believed, will be new, and all, it is hoped, useful, to the
large number of general readers who happily, in these days, take an
intelligent interest in English Church history.
The book might have been made shorter and lighter by giving fewer extracts
from the original documents; but much of the history is new, and it
seemed desirable to support it by sufficient evidence. The extracts have
been, as far as possible, so chosen that each shall give some additional
incidental touch to the filling up of the general picture.
The photographic reproductions of illuminations from MSS. of various
dates, illustrating ecclesiastical ceremonies and clerical costumes, are
enough in themselves to give a certain value to the book which contains
and describes them.
The writer is bound to make grateful acknowledgment of his obligations to
the Bishop of Oxford, who, amidst his incessant occupations, was so kind
to an old friend as to read through the rough proof of the book, pointing
out some _corrigenda_, making some suggestions, and indicating some
additional sources of information; all which, while it leaves the book the
better for what the bishop has done for it, does not make him responsible
for its remaining imperfections.
The writer has also to express his thanks to the Rev. Professor Skeat,
Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Cambridge, and to the Rev. Dr. Cunningham,
formerly Professor of Economic Science, K.C.L., for their kind replies to
inquiries on matters on which they are authorities; and to some others who
kindly looked over portions of the book dealing with matters of which they
have special knowledge.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I. OUR HEATHEN FOREFATHERS.
The land only partially reclaimed, 1--The Anglo-Saxon conquest,
2--Civil constitution, 4--Religion, 7--Structural temples, 8--Priests,
11.
CHAPTER II. THE CONVERSION OF THE ENGLISH.
Conversion of the heptarchic kingdoms, 14--Its method,
16--Illustrations from the history of Jutland, Norway, etc., 17--The
cathedral centres, 20--Details of mission work, 21--Mission stations,
24.
CHAPTER III. THE MONASTIC PHASE OF THE CHURCH.
Multiplication of monasteries, 28: in Kent, 29; Northumbria, 29; East
Anglia, 31; Wessex, 31; Mercia, 31--List of other Saxon monasteries,
33--Constitution of the religious houses, 35--Their destruction by the
Danes, 37--Rebuilding in the reigns of Edgar and Canute, 37.
CHAPTER IV. DIOCESAN AND PAROCHIAL ORGANIZATION.
Character of the new converts, 38--Coming of Archbishop Theodore,
40--Union of the Heptarchic Churches, 41--Subdivision of dioceses,
41--Introduction of the parochial system, 43--Northumbria made a
second province, 49--Multiplication of parishes, 50--Different classes
of churches, 53--Number of parishes at the Norman Conquest, 54.
CHAPTER V. THE SAXON CLERGY.
Laws of the heptarchic kingdoms: of Ethelbert, 57; of Ine, 57; of
Wihtred, 57--Council of Clovesho (747), 60--Laws of Alfred, 65; of
Athelstan, 66--Canons of Edgar, 66--Laws of Ethelred, 72--Canons of
Elfric, 74--Privilege of sanctuary, 75--Tithe and other payments,
78--Observance of Sunday and holy days, 79--Slavery, 81--Manumission,
81.
CHAPTER VI. THE NORMAN CONQUEST.
Foreign bishops and abbots introduced, 84--Parochial clergy
undisturbed, 85--Papal supremacy, 85--Separation of civil and
ecclesiastical Courts, 86--Norman cathedrals and churches, 87--Revival
of monasticism, 90--Appropriation of parochial benefices, 91.
CHAPTER VII. THE FOUNDATION OF VICARAGES.
Mode of appropriation of parishes, 95--Evil results, 97--Ordination of
vicarages, 98--Its conditions, 99--Not always fulfilled, 108--Abuses,
109.
CHAPTER VIII. PAROCHIAL CHAPELS.
Chapels-of-ease for hamlets, 110--Some of them elevated into churches,
110--Rights of mother churches safeguarded, 121--Free chapels, 123.
CHAPTER IX. THE PARISH PRIEST--HIS BIRTH AND EDUCATION.
Saxon clergy largely taken from the higher classes, 127--The career
opened up by the Church to all classes, 129; even to serfs,
130--Education of the clergy, 131--The Universities, 136--Schools of
thought, 136--The scholastic theology, 137--The contemplative,
138--Oxford: its colleges, 140--The students, 141--Ordination,
144--Institution, 146.
CHAPTER X. PARSONAGE HOUSES.
Like lay houses, 149--Examples at West Dean and Alfriston, Sussex,
152--Descriptions of: at Kelvedon, 154; Kingston-on-Thames, Bulmer,
Ingrave, 155; Ingatestone, 156; Little Bromley, North Benfleet, 157;
West Hanningfield, 158--Hospitality, 158--Smaller houses,
160--Dilapidations, 162.
CHAPTER XI. FURNITURE AND DRESS.
Sumptuary laws, 164--Disregard of them, 167--Contemporary pictures,
169--Extracts from wills, 172--Introduction of sober colours,
174--Wills, 175.
CHAPTER XII. FABRIC AND FURNITURE OF CHURCHES, AND OFFICIAL VESTMENTS.
Grandeur of the churches compared with domestic buildings,
184--Furniture of churches, 187, 190--List of necessary things,
189--Clerical vestments: pallium, chasuble, 191; stole, maniple,
amice, dalmatic, 192; cope, surplice, 193; amyss, 194--Fanciful
symbolism, 196; a bishop in “full canonicals,” 198.
CHAPTER XIII. THE PUBLIC SERVICES IN CHURCH.
Matins, mass, and evensong, 200--Sunday attendance, 201--Communion,
200--Laxity of practice, 204--Week-day services, 205--The Bidding
Prayer, 207--Bede Roll, 211--Chantry services, 212.
CHAPTER XIV. PREACHING AND TEACHING.
Not neglected, 214--Manuals of teaching, 214; Archbishop Peckham’s,
216--Helps for preachers, 223--Analysis of sin, 226; _Arbor Virtutum_,
229; _Arbor Viciorum_, 230--Types and antitypes, 231.
CHAPTER XV. INSTRUCTIONS FOR PARISH PRIESTS.
Analysis of a book of that title by John Myrk, 232--The personal
character and conduct which befit a priest, 233--A parish priest’s
duties, 234--Non-communicating attendance at Holy Communion, 235,
_note_--The “holy loaf,” 235--Behaviour of the people in church,
236--The people’s way of joining in the mass, 236--Behaviour in
churchyard, 238--Visitation of the sick, 239.
CHAPTER XVI. POPULAR RELIGION.
Education more common than is supposed, 241--Books for the laity in
French and English, 242--Creed and Vision of “Piers Plowman,” the
tracts of Richard of Hampole and Wiclif, 242--“Lay Folks’ Mass-book,”
243--Primers, 249--Religious poetry: Cædmon, 250; “The Love of Christ
for Man’s Soul,” 255; “The Complaint of Christ,” 256.
CHAPTER XVII. THE CELIBACY OF THE CLERGY.
Object of the obligation, 258--Opposition to it, 259--Introduced late
in the Saxon period, 260--Endeavour to enforce it in Norman and later
times, 261--Evasion of the canons, 268--Legal complications,
270--Popular view, 271--Disabilities of sons of the clergy,
273--Dispensations for it, 275.
CHAPTER XVIII. VISITATION ARTICLES AND RETURNS.
Visitation of parishes, 279--Visitation questions, 280--Examples from
returns to the questions, 285--Popular estimation of the clergy, 289.
CHAPTER XIX. PROVISION FOR OLD AGE.
Assistant chaplain, 290--Coadjutor assigned, 291--A leprous vicar,
294--Retirement on a pension, 295--A retiring vicar builds for himself
a “reclusorium” in the churchyard, 295--Parish chaplain retires on a
pension, 296--Death and burial, 296.
CHAPTER XX. THE PARISH CLERK.
Ancient office, 298--Its duties, 299--Stipend, 301--Sometimes students
for orders, 302--Gilds of parish clerks, 303--Chaucer’s parish clerk,
304.
CHAPTER XXI. CUSTOMS.
Sanctuary for persons, 306; and property, 307--Belonged to some
persons, 308--Pilgrimage, 308--Special ceremonies, 311--Lights,
311--Miracles and passion plays, 315--Fairs, markets, and sports in
the churchyard, 316--Church ales, 317.
CHAPTER XXII. ABUSES.
Papal invasions of the rights of patronage, 319--The intrusion of
foreigners into benefices, 320--Abuse of patronage by the Crown,
321--Pluralities, 323--Farming of benefices, 324--Holding of benefices
by men in minor orders, 324--Absenteeism, 330--Serfdom, 332.
CHAPTER XXIII. THE CATHEDRAL.
Served by secular canons, 334--Organization of its clerical staff,
334--The dignitaries, 335--The dean and chapter, 335--Monastic
cathedral, 336--Archdeacons, 337--Synods and visitations, 337--Lincoln
Cathedral, 338--Bishop’s palace, 339--The close, 340--Residentiary
houses, 341--Vicars’ court, 341--Chantries, 342--Chapter house,
342--Common room, 344--The first dean and canons, 343--Revenues of
the bishop, 344; of the dean and dignitaries, 345; of the
prebendaries, 350; of the archdeacons, 353; of the vicars choral, 354;
of the chantry priests, 355; of the choristers, 356--Lay officers,
356--Chichester Cathedral, 359--Revenues of bishop, dean, dignitaries,
prebendaries, archdeacons, and vicars choral, 360-362--Prince bishops,
363.
CHAPTER XXIV. MONKS AND FRIARS.
Character of the monks, 365--Place of the monasteries in social life,
366--Influence upon the parishes, 369--Friars, their origin;
organization, 370--Work, 373--Rivalry with parish clergy,
374--Character, 377--Faults of the system, 378.
CHAPTER XXV. THE “TAXATIO” OF POPE NICHOLAS IV.
Origin of firstfruits and tenths, 380--Taxation of a specimen deanery,
381--Number of parishes, 384--Value of parochial benefices,
386--Number of clergy, 389.
CHAPTER XXVI. THE “VALOR ECCLESIASTICUS” OF HENRY VIII.
Number of parishes, 394--Income, 395--Sources of income,
397--Comparative value of money in 1292, 1534, and 1890,
404--Economical status of parochial clergy, 406.
CHAPTER XXVII. DOMESTIC CHAPELS.
Early existence, 408--Saxon, 409--Norman, 409--Edwardian, 410--Later,
411.
CHAPTER XXVIII. THE CHANTRY.
Characteristic work of the centuries, 438--Definition of a chantry,
438--“Brotherhood” of the religious houses, 439--A chantry a kind of
monument, 441--Began in thirteenth century, 442--Their distribution
over the country, 443--Foundation deed of Daundy’s chantry,
444--Chantry of the Black Prince, 446--Burghersh chantry, 447--Chantry
of Richard III., 447; of Henry VII., 447--Parochial benefices
appropriated to chantries, 449--Nomination to, 451--Chantry chapels
within the church, 453; at Winchester, 453; Tewkesbury, 454--Additions
to the fabric of the church, 454--Separate building in the churchyard,
455--Temporary chantries for a term of years, 457--Mortuary services,
458--Remuneration of chantry priests, 461--Number of cantarists,
464--Their character, 465--Hour of their services, 466--Some chantries
were chapels-of-ease, 467--Some were grammar schools, 469.
CHAPTER XXIX. GILDS.
Definition, 473--Trade gilds, 475--Religious gilds, 476--For the
augmentation of Divine service, 478--For the maintenance of bridges,
roads, chantries, 478--Services, 479--Social gilds, 482--Methods of
obtaining better services and pastoral care, 483.
CHAPTER XXX. THE MEDIÆVAL TOWNS.
Description of, 486--Parochial history of the towns, 489--Peculiar
jurisdictions, the origin of town parishes, 490--Norwich, 490--London,
492--Exeter, 497--Bristol, 499--York, 503--Ipswich, 506--Burton,
508--St. Edmund’s Bury, 510--St. Albans, 513--Manchester,
514--Rotherham, 516--Sheffield, 519--Newark, 523--Recluses,
526--Bridge-chapels, 527--London Bridge, 529.
CHAPTER XXXI. DISCIPLINE.
Definition, 531--Exercise of, in Saxon times, 532--Norman and
subsequent times, 533--Examples of, among the clergy, 533, 537--Laity,
535--Resistance to, pictorial illustrations, 543--General sentences of
excommunication, 544.
CHAPTER XXXII. RELIGIOUS OPINIONS.
Schools of thought: progressive, 546; and conservative, 547--Religious
character of the centuries: twelfth, 547; thirteenth, 548; fourteenth,
549; Chaucer’s “Poore parson;” fifteenth, 552.
APPENDIX I.
The history of the parish of Whalley, 557.
APPENDIX II.
Comparative view of the returns of the “Taxatio,” the “Valor,” and the
modern “Clergy List” in the two rural deaneries of Barstaple, Essex,
562; and Brigg, Canterbury, 564.
APPENDIX III.
References to pictorial illustrations in MSS. in the British Museum,
567.
DESCRIPTION OF PLATES.
BURIAL OF THE DEAD _Frontispiece_
The illustration taken from a French MS. of the middle of the
fifteenth century [Egerton 2019, f. 142, British Museum] will reward a
careful study. Begin with the two pictures introduced into the broad
ornamental border at the bottom of the page. On the left are a pope,
an emperor, a king, and queen; on the right Death, on a black horse,
hurling his dart at them.
Go on to the initial D of the Psalm _Dilexi quoniam exaudiet Dominus
vocem_: “I am well pleased that the Lord hath heard the voice of my
complaint.” It represents a canon in surplice and canon’s fur hood,
giving absolution to a penitent who has been confessing to him (note
the pattern of the hanging at the back of the canon’s seat). Next
consider the picture in the middle of the border on the right. It
represents the priest in surplice and stole, with his clerk in albe
kneeling behind him and making the responses, administering the last
Sacrament to the dying person lying on the bed. Next turn to the
picture in the left-hand top corner of a woman in mourning, with an
apron tied about her, arranging the grave-clothes about the corpse,
and about to envelope it in its shroud. In the opposite corner, three
clerks in surplice and cope stand at a lectern singing the Psalms for
the departed; the pall which covers the coffin may be indistinctly
made out, and the great candlesticks with lighted candles on each side
of it. All these scenes lead us up to the principal subject, which is
the burial. The scene is a graveyard (note the grave crosses)
surrounded by a cloister, entered by a gate tower; the gables,
chimneys, and towers of a town are seen over the cloister roof; note
the skulls over the cloister arches, as though the space between the
groining and the timber roof were used as a charnel house. The priest
is asperging the corpse with holy water as the rude sextons lower the
body into the grave. Note that it is not enclosed in a coffin--that
was not used until comparatively recent times. He is assisted by two
other priests, all three vested in surplices and black copes with a
red-and-gold border; the clerk holds the holy-water vessel. Three
mourners in black cloak and hood stand behind. The story is not yet
finished. Above is seen our Lord in an opening through a radiant cloud
which sheds its beams of light over the scene; the departed soul
[de--parted = separated from the body] is mounting towards its Lord
with an attitude and look of rapture; Michael the Archangel is driving
back with the spear of the cross the evil angel disappointed of his
prey. Lastly, study the beautiful border. Is it fanciful to think that
the artist intended the vase of flowers standing upon the green earth
as a symbol of resurrection, and the exquisite scrolls and twining
foliage and many-coloured blossoms which surround the sad scenes of
death, to symbolize the beauty and glory which surround those whom
angels shall wait upon in death, and carry them to Paradise?
_To face page_
ORDINATION OF A PRIEST, LATE 12TH CENTURY 94
Gives the Eucharistic vestments of bishop and priest, a priest in cope
and others in albes, the altar and its coverings, and two forms of
chalice.
ORDINATION OF A DEACON, A.D. 1520 146
Gives the vestments of that period. The man in the group behind the
bishop, who is in surplice and hood and “biretta,” is probably the
archdeacon. Note the one candle on the altar, the bishop’s chair, the
piscina with its cruet, and the triptych.
(1) AN ARCHDEACON LECTURING A GROUP OF CLERGYMEN ON THEIR SECULAR
HABITS AND WEAPONS, 14TH CENTURY 174
He is habited in a red tunic and cap, the clergy in blue tunic and red
hose and red tunic and blue hose.
(2) AN ARCHDEACON’S VISITATION 174
A CLERICAL PROCESSION 190
The illustration is taken from a French Pontifical of the 14th century
in the British Museum [Tiberius, B. viii.], and represents part of the
ceremonial of the anointing and crowning of a king of France. We
choose it because it gives in one view several varieties of clerical
costume. There was very little difference between French and English
vestments, _e.g._ the only French characteristic here is that the
bishop’s cope is embroidered with fleur-de-lys. On the left of the
picture is the king, and behind him officers of state and courtiers.
An ecclesiastical procession has met him at the door of the Cathedral
of Rheims, and the archbishop, in albe, cope, and mitre, is sprinkling
him with holy water; the clerk bearing the holy-water pot, and the
cross-bearer, and the thurifer swinging his censer, are immediately
behind him. Then come a group of canons. One is clearly shown, and
easily recognized by the peculiar horned hood with its fringe of
“clocks.” Lastly are a group of bishops, the most conspicuous bearing
in his hands the ampulla, which contains the holy oil for the
anointing.
The photograph fails here as in other cases to give the colours which
define the costumes clearly and give brilliancy to the picture. The
king’s tunic is crimson, and that of the nobleman behind him blue. The
archbishop has a cope of blue _semée_ with gold fleur-de-lys; the
water-bearer, a surplice so transparent that the red tunic beneath
gives it a pink tinge; the cross-bearer, a blue dalmatic lined with
red over a surplice; the canon a pink cope over a white surplice, and
black hood. The first bishop wears a cope of blue, the second of red,
the third of pink. The background is diapered blue and red with a gold
pattern. The wall of the building is blue with a gold pattern; the
altar-cloth, red and blue with gold embroidery.
INTERIOR OF A CHURCH AT THE TIME OF MASS 204
A SERMON 215
The bishop in blue chasuble and white mitre, people in red and blue
tunics, two knights in chain armour, late 13th century.
(1) BAPTISM BY AFFUSION 233
The male sponsor holds the child over the font, while the priest pours
water over its head from a shallow vessel. He wears a long full
surplice, his stole is yellow _semée_ with small crosses and fringed.
The parish clerk stands behind him, 15th century.
(2) BAPTISM BY IMMERSION 233
Here the priest wears an albe apparelled and girded, and an amice, but
no stole; the sitting posture of the child occurs in other
representations, 14th century.
CONFIRMATION. (From a printed Pontifical, A.D. 1520) 238
The bishop wears albe, dalmatic, cope, and mitre, the other clergy
surplice and “biretta.”
(1) PRIEST IN SURPLICE, CARRYING CIBORIUM THROUGH THE STREET TO A
SICK PERSON, PRECEDED BY THE PARISH CLERK WITH TAPER AND BELL 240
The ciborium, partly covered with a cloth, as in the illustration,
which the priest carries, is silvered in the original illustration,
and consequently comes out very imperfectly in the photograph.
(2) PRIEST, ATTENDED BY CLERK, GIVING THE LAST SACRAMENT, 14TH
CENTURY 240
BISHOP AND DEACON IN ALBE AND TUNIC, ADMINISTERING HOLY
COMMUNION 246
Two clerics in surplice hold the housel cloth to catch any of the
sacred elements which might accidentally fall.
CONFESSION AT THE BEGINNING OF LENT 334
The priest in furred cope, the rood veiled; the altar has a red
frontal. The two men are in blue habit. The woman on the right is all
in black; the other, kneeling at a bench on the left, is in red gown
and blue hood.
MARRIAGE 410
It represents the marriage of the Count Waleran de St. Pol with the
sister of Richard, King of England. The count is in a blue robe, the
princess in cloth of gold embroidered with green; the groomsman in
red, the man behind him in blue, the prince in the background in an
ermine cape. The ladies attending the princess wear cloth of gold,
blue, green, etc.; the bishop is vested in a light green cope over an
apparelled rochet, and a white mitre. The bishop (and in other
representations of marriage) takes hold of the wrists of the parties
in joining their hands.
VESPERS OF THE DEAD 458
The mourners in black cloaks are at the east end of the stalls; the
pall over the coffin is red with a gold cross; the hearse has about
eighteen lighted tapers; the ecclesiastics seem to be friars in dark
brown habit (Franciscans).
MEDIÆVAL NORWICH. (From Braun’s “Theatrum”) 492
MEDIÆVAL EXETER. (From Braun’s “Theatrum”) 498
MEDIÆVAL BRISTOL. (From Braun’s “Theatrum”) 500
KNIGHTS DOING PENANCE AT THE SHRINE OF ST. EDMUND 535
The abbot is vested in a gorgeous cope and mitre; one of the monks
behind him also wears a cope over his monk’s habit.
References to other pictorial illustrations in MSS. in the British Museum
are given in Appendix III., p. 567.
PARISH PRIESTS AND THEIR PEOPLE.
CHAPTER I.
OUR HEATHEN FOREFATHERS.
When we have the pleasure of taking our Colonial visitors on railway
journeys across the length and breadth of England, and they see
cornfields, meadows, pastures, copses, succeed one another for mile after
mile, with frequent villages and country houses, what seems especially to
strike and delight them is the thoroughness and finish of the cultivation;
England seems to them, they say, like a succession of gardens, or, rather,
like one great garden. This is the result, we tell them, of two thousand
years of cultivation by an ever-increasing population.
On the other hand, we are helped to understand what the land was like at
the time of the settlement in it of our Saxon forefathers, by the
descriptions which our Colonial friends give us of their surroundings in
Australia or Africa, where the general face of the country is still in its
primeval state, the settlements of men are dotted sparsely here and there,
the flocks and herds roam over “bush” or “veldt,” and only just so much of
the land about the settlements is roughly cultivated as suffices the wants
of the settlers.
For in England, in those remote times of which we have first to speak, the
land was, for the most part, unreclaimed. If we call to mind that the
English population about the end of the sixth century could only have been
about a million souls--200,000 families--we shall realize how small a
portion of the land they could possibly have occupied. A large proportion
of the country was still primeval forest, there were extensive tracts of
moorland, the low-lying districts were mere and marsh, the mountainous
districts wild and desolate. The country harboured wolf and bear, wild
cattle and swine, beaver and badger, wild cat, fox, and marten, eagle,
hawk, and heron, and other creatures, most of which have entirely
disappeared, though some linger on, interesting survivals, in remote
corners of the land.
Their possession of the country by the English was the result of recent,
slow and desultory conquest. Independent parties of adventurers from the
country round about the mouth of the Elbe had crossed the German Ocean in
their keels, landed on the coast, or rowed up the rivers, and pushed
their way slowly against a tenacious resistance. Then, when a party of the
invaders had made good their conquest, came its division among the
conquerors.
Our own history tells us so little of the details of the Anglo-Saxon
conquest, that we have to call in what we know of the manners of their
Teutonic neighbours and Scandinavian relatives to help us to understand
it. The late Sir W. Dasent, in his “Burnt Njal,” says that the Norse
Viking, making an invasion with a view not to a mere raid, but to a
permanent settlement, would lay claim to the whole valley drained by the
river up which he had rowed his victorious keels; or, landing on the
coast, would climb some neighbouring height, point out the headlands which
he arbitrarily assigned as his boundaries on the coast, and claim all the
hinterland which he should be able to subdue. The chief would allot
extensive tracts to the subordinate leaders; and the freemen would be
settled, after their native custom of village communities, upon the most
fertile portions of the soil which their swords had helped to win. In the
broad alluvial lands of the river valleys there would be ample space for
several neighbouring townships; in forest clearings or fertile dales the
townships would be scattered at more or less wide intervals. The
unallotted lands belonged to the general community; it was Folk land, and
its allotment from time to time, probably, in theory needed confirmation
by a Folk-mote, but was practically made by the supreme chief.
Every township possessed a tract of arable land, which was divided by lot
yearly among the families of the freemen; a tract of meadow, which was
reserved for hay, cultivated and harvested by the common labour; a wide
expanse of pasture, into which each family had the right to turn a fixed
number of cattle and sheep; and into the forest, a fixed number of swine
to feed on the acorns, mast, and roots.[1] The people were rude
agriculturists, not manufacturers, not traders, not civilized enough to
profit by the civilization which the Romans had established in the
country; they stormed and sacked the towns, and left them deserted, and
selected only the most fertile spots for occupation.
It is a subject of dispute among our most learned historians to what
extent the native Britons were slain or retired before the invaders, or to
what extent they were taken as captives, or reappeared from their
fastnesses after the slaughter was over, to be the slaves of the
conquerors. When we first get glimpses of the situation of things after
the conquest, we find that the British language and religion have
disappeared from the Saxon half of the country; and this implies the
disappearance of the great body of the people. The fact of the continuance
of some ancient place-names, chiefly of great natural features, as hills
and rivers, and of a few British words for things for which the Teutons
had no names, would be sufficiently accounted for by the survival of a
very small remnant.
In their native seats the social condition of these Angle and Saxon
freemen was patriarchal and primitive; they venerated their chiefs as
Woden-born; they elected one of them as their leader in battle; but they
did not obey them as their subjects. On questions of general importance
the chiefs and wise men advised the Folk-mote, and the people said “Aye”
or “No.” But their circumstances in their new conquests led to changes. It
was necessary to maintain some sort of permanent military organization not
only for the defence of their new possessions, and the extension of their
conquests against the old inhabitants of the island, but also against the
encroachments of rival tribes of their own countrymen. And a supreme
chief, to whom all paid a kind of religious veneration, who exercised
permanent military authority over lesser chiefs and people, soon became a
king; limited, however, in power by the ancient institutions of the
Council of the wise men, and the assent or dissent of the Folk-mote.
The several parties of invaders gradually extended their conquests until
they met, and then made treaties or fought battles with one another,
until, finally, by the end of the sixth century, they had organized
themselves into seven independent kingdoms.
The freemen of each Township managed their own affairs in a town meeting;
a number of neighbouring townships were grouped into what was called by
the Saxons south of the Humber a Hundred, by the Angles north of the
Humber a Wapentake; and each township sent four or five of its freemen to
represent it in the Hundred-mote every three months. Three times a year,
in summer, autumn, and midwinter, a general meeting of the freemen was
held--a Folk-mote--at some central place; to which every township was
required to send so many footmen armed with sword, spear, and shield, and
so many horsemen properly equipped. At these Folk-motes affairs of general
interest were determined, justice was administered by the chief and
priests,[2] and probably it was at these meetings that the great acts of
national worship were celebrated. Except for these periodical meetings,
the scattered townships existed in great isolation. A striking
illustration of this isolation is afforded by laws of Wihtred of Kent and
of Ine of the West Saxons, which enact--or perhaps merely record an
ancient unwritten law--that if any stranger approached a township off the
highway without shouting or sounding a horn to announce his coming, he
might be slain as a thief, and his relatives have no redress. A subsequent
law of Edgar[3] enacts that if he have with him an ox or a dog, with a
bell hanging to his neck, and sounding at every step, that should be taken
as sufficient warning, otherwise he must sound his horn. The local
exclusiveness produced by this isolation, the suspicion and dislike of
strangers, survive to this day in secluded villages in the wilder parts of
the country.
* * * * *
These Teutonic tribes were heathen at the time of their coming into the
land. Of their religion and its observances our own historians have given
no detailed account, and few incidental notices. Our names for the days of
the week, Sun-day, Moon-day, Tuisco’s-day, Woden’s-day, Thor’s-day,
Frya’s-day, Saeter’s-day, make it certain that our Anglo-Saxon ancestors
worshipped the same gods as their Scandinavian neighbours, and probable
that their religion as a whole was similar. Their supreme god was Odin or
Woden, with whom were associated the twelve Æsir and their goddess-wives,
and a multitude of other supernatural beings. In their belief in an
All-father, superior to all the gods and goddesses--we recognize a relic
of an earlier monotheism. They had structural temples, and in connection
with their temples they had idols, priests, altars, and sacrifices. They
believed in the immortality of the soul, in an intermediate state, and a
final heaven and hell. The souls of the brave and good, they believed,
went to Asgard, the abode of the Æsir; there the warriors all day enjoyed
the fierce delight of combat, and in the evening all their wounds healed,
and they spent the night in feasting in Valhalla, the hall of the gods;
the wicked went to Niflheim, a place of pain and terror. But the time
would come when the earth, and sun, and stars, and Valhalla, and the gods,
and giants, and elves, should be consumed in a great and general
conflagration, and then Gimli and Nastrond, the eternal heaven and hell,
should be revealed. Gimli--a new earth adorned with green meadows, where
the fields bring forth without culture, and calamities are unknown; where
there is a palace more shining than the sun, and where religious and
well-minded men shall abide for ever; Nastrond--a place full of serpents
who vomit forth venom, in which shall wade evil men and women, and
murderers and adulterers.
A knowledge of their religious customs would help us to judge what
hindrance they opposed to the reception of the system of the Christian
Church; or, on the other hand, what facilities they offered for the
substitution of one for the other; but it is only from the assumption that
the religious customs of our English ancestors were similar to those of
the Norsemen that we are able to form to ourselves any conception on the
subject.
In Iceland, conformably to the constitution of its government, each
several district (the island was divided into four districts) had its
priest who not only presided over the religious rites of the people, but
also directed the deliberations of the people when their laws were made,
and presided over the administration of justice (Neander, “Church Hist.,”
v. 418).
Sir W. Dasent says that after the Norse conqueror had marked out his
boundaries and settled his people on their holdings, and chosen a site for
his own rude timber hall, he erected in its neighbourhood a temple in
which his followers might worship the gods of their forefathers, and that
this was one means of maintaining their habitual attachment to his
leadership.[4] The evidence leads to the conclusion that both
Scandinavians and Teutons had very few structural temples, perhaps only
one to each tribe or nation; and perhaps only three great annual occasions
of tribal or national worship. We get a glimpse of one of these structural
temples in the story of the conversion of Norway.[5] The great temple at
Mære, in the Drontheim district, contained wooden images of the gods; the
people assembled there thrice a year at midwinter, spring, and harvest;
the people feasted on horseflesh slain in sacrifice, and wine blessed in
the name and in honour of the gods; and human victims were sometimes
offered.
The English townships, generally, it is probable, had no structural
temples, but sacred places of resort, as an open space in the forest, or a
hilltop, or a striking mass of rock, or a notable tree or well. The
religious observances at such places would probably not be a regular
worship of the gods, but such superstitions as the passing of children
through clefts in rocks and trees, dropping pins into wells, and others;
these superstitions survived for centuries, for they are forbidden by a
law of Canute,[6] and one of them, the consultation of wells, so late as
by a canon of Archbishop Anselm;[7] and, in spite of laws, and canons, and
civilization, and a thousand years of Christianity, some of them survive
among the peasantry of remote districts to this very day.
In the “Ecclesiastical History” of Bede, we find notices of only three
structural heathen temples in England. The first is that at Godmundingham,
which Coifi, the chief of the king’s priests, with the assent of King
Edwin and his counsellors and thanes, defiled and destroyed on the
acceptance of Christianity at the preaching of Paulinus. Of this we read
that it had a _fanum_, enclosed with _septis_, which contained _idola_ and
_aras_;[8] and since the temple was set on fire and thus destroyed, it
seems likely that the fanum was of timber. The second temple named is the
building east of Canterbury, in which King Ethelbert was accustomed to
worship while yet a heathen, which, on the king’s conversion, was
consecrated as a church and dedicated to St. Pancras, and was soon
afterwards incorporated into the monastery of SS. Peter and Paul built on
the site. This was probably a stone building, and recent researches have
brought to light what are possibly remains of it. The third temple is that
in which Redwald, King of the East Anglians, after his conversion at the
Court of Ethelbert, worshipped Christ at one altar, while his queen
continued the old heathen worship at another altar in the same building.
It will be observed that all these were the temples of kings, and this
accords with the supposition that such structural temples existed only in
the chief places for worship of tribes and nations; just as the twelve
tribes of Israel had only one great national temple, while they had
numerous altars on the “high places” all over the country.[9]
Again, there is a remarkable absence all through the history of any
mention of, or allusion to, the existence of a priesthood ministering
among the people. The only priest clearly mentioned is the worldly-minded
Coifi spoken of above, but as he is mentioned as “the chief of the king’s
priests,” we assume that there was a staff of them, probably attached to
the king’s temple at Godmundingham. We suppose that Ethelbert of Kent, and
Redwald of East Anglia, would also have a priest or priests attached to
their temples; but we find no trace or indication of any others.
This all tends to confirm our belief that there were few structural
temples, one for each kingdom, or perhaps one for each of the great tribes
which had coalesced into a kingdom; and that the priests were only a small
staff attached to each of these temples; while all the rest of the temples
were open-air places to which the neighbouring inhabitants resorted for
minor observances, without the assistance of any formal priesthood.
Another possible source of information on the subject is the ancient
place-names. Godmundingham naturally invites consideration, and looks
promising at first sight; but analyzed and interpreted it means the home
of the sons of Godmund, and Godmund merely means “protection of God” as a
_name_.[10]
The Saxon word Hearh[11] means either a temple or an idol.[12] Hearga is
the word by which the _fanum_ at Godmundingham and Redwald’s _fanum_ is
translated in Alfred’s version of Bede. It seems possible that this word
may be the root of such place-names as Harrow-on-the-Hill, Harrowgate,
Yorks, and Harrowden, Northants. Such place-names as Wednesbury,
Wedensfield, Satterthwaite, Satterleigh, Baldersby, Balderstone,
Bulderton, and those of which Thor or Thur is the first syllable, may
possibly indicate places where a temple or an idol or well has existed of
Woden, or Saeter, or Baldur, or Thor; as Thrus Kell (Thor’s Well) in
Craven.[13]