MONASTIC REFORM PREVIOUS TO THE REFORMATION.
‘For sum (nunnes) bene devowte, holy, and towarde,
And holden the ryght way to blysse;
And sum bene feble, lewde, and frowarde,
Now god amend that ys amys!’
(_From_ ‘_Why I cannot be a nun_,’ l. 311.)
§ 1. Visitations of Nunneries in England.
The changes which came over convent life towards the close of the Middle
Ages and modified its tenor can be studied in the efforts made to reform
monastic life in the centuries preceding the Reformation. Both in England
and abroad the heads of many houses were zealous in removing abuses which
their predecessors had suffered to creep in, and in checking tendencies
the deteriorating effect of which now first came to be realized. The bull
promulgated by Pope Benedict XII in 1336 with a view to reforming the
Benedictine order had been accepted with a reservation in England and had
left matters in Germany practically untouched. But in the 15th century a
movement in favour of reform was inaugurated within the religious orders
themselves; it was increased by pressure brought to bear on monastic
houses from without. For the prelates of the Church as well as others were
eager to interfere with monastic settlements, all the more as such
interference frequently tended to the increase of their own prerogative.
But in spite of the devoted earnestness of many individuals and the
readiness of convents to accept correction, the movement failed to restore
its former glory to an institution which in common with other influential
institutions of the Middle Ages appeared doomed to decay.
The attempts of the monastic orders to restore vigour to themselves, and
the efforts of the Church to promote monastic reform, were largely
furthered by the desire to counteract the dangers to the established
religion which threatened from the spread of heretical teaching.
In England a critical attitude towards monastic institutions and the
Church was the outcome of Wyclif’s († 1384) influence. It was checked for
the time being by the alliance of the Church with the Lancastrian kings
(after 1399) in favour of a reactionary policy. Several monasteries were
endowed by these kings, among them houses of Carthusian monks and Sion, as
mentioned above. Reforms were instituted and the prelates of the Church
eagerly resumed their powers of visitation. By so doing they succeeded in
checking monastic abuses, which continued to exist for a longer period on
the Continent and there assumed much greater proportions.
In Germany, owing partly to its scattered provinces, partly to the want of
concerted action between the dignitaries of Church and State, monasteries
throughout the 14th century were left to drift in the way they listed,
often in the direction of indifferentism, often in that of positive evil.
The abuses of convent life at the beginning of the 15th century were far
greater there than in England, and the efforts at reform were
proportionally greater and more strenuous. In Germany also the effort to
counteract the effect of heretical doctrines by way of reform was
decisive. For, as we shall see later on, monastic reforms on a large scale
were instituted immediately after the Church Council at Constance (1415)
which condemned Hus to the stake.
The accounts of visitations instituted by the diocesan give us an insight
into the abuses which threatened life in the nunnery at different periods.
The diocesan was bound to visit the religious settlements situated within
his diocese periodically, with the exception of those which had secured
exemption through the Pope. For some time before the movement in favour of
monastic reform began, these visitations appear to have taken place at
irregular intervals and at periods often many years apart. But afterwards
they became frequent, and called forth injunctions which give us an idea
of the abuses which needed correction. Later still these powers of
visitation of the diocesan were extended by means of special permits
secured from Rome. Towards the close of the 15th century we find the
prelates of the Church eager to interfere with monasteries, and regain a
hold on those which had been removed from their influence.
The visitation of a religious house in all cases was so conducted that the
diocesan previously sent word to the convent announcing his arrival. After
assisting at mass in the chapel, he repaired to the chapter-house and
there severally interrogated the superior of the house and its inmates as
to the state of affairs. Their depositions were taken down in writing and
were discussed at headquarters. A list of injunctions rectifying such
matters as called for correction was then forwarded in writing to the
superior of the house.
Among the earliest injunctions forwarded to a nunnery which I have come
across are those sent to Godstow after a visitation held in 1279 by John
Peckham, archbishop of Canterbury[976]. The first part treats of the
celebration of the divine offices and of the part novices are to take in
the singing. The feast of St John which is celebrated by childish
festivities (puerilia solemnia), no doubt in accordance with an ancient
folk custom, is not to be extended to a second day. Directions are then
given about going outside precincts and staying away on business. The nuns
are directed not to converse with the neighbouring students at Oxford
(scholares Oxonii) unless they have permission to do so from the abbess,
and to knit no bonds of friendship with them, ‘because such affection
often brings harmful thoughts.’
The attraction which the students at Oxford exerted on the nuns of Godstow
has a counterpart at a later date in the effect which intercourse with the
students at Cambridge had on the nuns of St Radegund’s. When John Alcock,
bishop of Ely († 1500), proposed the dissolution of this nunnery he urged
that the nearness of the university had led to the demoralisation of the
prioress and the nuns[977].
In the directions forwarded to Godstow we also find it enjoined that
secular and religious visitors shall dine in the guest-house (hospitalaria
communi) or in the chamber of the abbess, and on no account within the
convent precincts with the nuns. Directions are also given as to the
wearing of simple clothes, in which matter ‘the rule of Benedict’ (sic)
shall be observed. These directions are not easy to understand. ‘Linings
of dyed woollen (imposterum burneto[978]),’ say they, ‘shall not be worn;
nor red dresses (rugatas tunicas) nor other unseemly clothes wide at the
sides.’
Archbishop Peckham, who reformed abuses at Godstow, addressed a mandate
to the abbess of Romsey in 1286 against a certain prebendary William
Shyrlock, who seems to have been one of the residential canons of the
place. He is not to presume to enter the cloister or the church while
suspicions are entertained against him, and the nuns are not to converse
with him in the house or elsewhere, for he is accused of living a
dishonest and dissolute life[979]. No aspersion in this case is cast on
the doings of the nuns.
A serious scandal is said to have occurred about the year 1303 in the
Cistercian nunnery of Swine in Yorkshire, but details concerning its
nature are not forthcoming. In consequence of an enquiry into the state of
the house the prioress resigned, and her successor also absented herself,
it is alleged, on account of some scandal[980].
The nunneries which were cells to abbeys of men were exempt from the
visitation of the diocesan; they were inspected by the abbot of the parent
house, who enquired into abuses and enjoined corrections. A mandate of
this description which was forwarded to Sopwell nunnery, a cell of St
Alban’s, by the abbot in 1338 is in existence. The nuns are directed to
observe silence in the church, the cloister, the refectory, and the
dormitory. No sister shall hold converse with secular persons in the
parlour unless she is wearing a cowl and a veil; and tailors and others
who are employed shall work in some place assigned to them outside the
convent precincts[981].
Among the injunctions sent to Chatteris in Cambridgeshire in the year 1345
the following are worth noticing: Nuns shall not keep fowls, dogs or small
birds (aviculae) within the convent precincts, nor bring them into church
during divine service, and they shall not, from a wish to reform them,
take into their employ servants who are known for their bad ways[982].
In April of the year 1397 a visitation of the nunnery of Nun-Monkton in
Yorkshire was conducted by Thomas Dalby, archdeacon of Richmond, who acted
for the archbishop of York[983]. He accused the prioress Margaret Fairfax
of allowing various kinds of fur to be worn in her house, especially grey
fur. He also objected to the wearing of silk veils and to the prioress
herself acting as treasurer (bursaria) of the house, and charged her with
having alienated its property to the value of a hundred marks. He
censured her for entertaining John Munkton, and inviting him to dinner in
her chamber, and for allowing the use of unusual vestments and clothes;
for too readily receiving back nuns who had disgraced their profession
(lapsae fornicatione); and for allowing nuns to receive gifts from friends
to support them. He also complained that John Munkton behaved badly, had
dallied (ludit) with the prioress at meals in her chamber, and had been
served there with drink.
Injunctions were forwarded in the following July to rectify these matters,
and directing the prioress to have no communication with _Dominus_ John
Munkton, William Snowe or Thomas Pape, except in the presence of the nuns.
The usual vestments were to be worn in church, and the nuns were enjoined
not to wear silk garments (paneis), silk veils, precious furs, finger
rings, and embroidered or ornamental _jupes_, in English called gowns,
like secular women. They were not to neglect the commemoration of the dead
under penalty of being deprived of special clothes (carentiae camisarum?)
for two whole weeks.
The general tenor of these injunctions argues a want of management on the
part of the lady superior and a tendency to luxury among the nuns. As time
wore on complaints about mismanagement of revenues became more frequent,
but they were accompanied by evidence of increasing poverty, especially in
the smaller houses, which shows that the lady superior was labouring under
difficulties for which she was not altogether responsible.
A serious blow was dealt to the monastic system by the Black Death, which
began in 1349. It produced a temporary collapse of discipline and
indifference to religion[984], and resulted in changes in the state of
agriculture and the position of the labourer, which affected the poorer
and smaller houses in a disastrous manner.
Thus we read about Thetford, a small Benedictine nunnery in Norfolk[985],
that the nuns’ revenues had much decreased through mortality and
inundation since 1349, and that when Henry V levied a tax on religious
houses, Thetford, which consisted at the time of a prioress and nine nuns,
was excused on the plea of poverty. The increasing poverty of the house is
evident from accounts of visitations between 1514 1520[986]. On one
occasion the nuns declared they were short of service books; on another
that the prioress received illiterate and deformed persons (indoctae et
deformes) into the house; and again that there was great poverty and that
the few novices had no teacher.
Again we read of Malling in Kent that it was excused from payments in
1404; in 1349 the bishop of Rochester had found it so decayed as to be
hardly capable of restoration[987]. Two abbesses had died of the
pestilence; there were only eight inmates left in the house, four of whom
were professed and four non-professed.
Malling recovered itself, but not so Wyrthorp in Northamptonshire, where
Emma de Pinchbeck and many of the Austin nuns fell victims to the
pestilence[988]. The archbishop appointed Agnes Bowes as prioress, but the
convent was beyond recovery. In 1354 Sir Th. Holland, the patron of the
house, petitioned that it should be united to the nunnery at Stamford, to
which its prioress and the one remaining nun removed[989]. In the royal
licence which secured this change it is stated ‘that the convent being
poorly endowed was by the pestilence which lately prevailed reduced to
such poverty that all the nuns but one on account of penury had
dispersed.’ In the course of the 14th century other nunneries complained
of insufficient revenue and poverty, among them Seton in Cumberland[990],
St Sepulchre’s at Canterbury in 1359[991], and Rusper and Easebourne which
were both situated in Sussex.
In a few cases accounts are preserved of successive visitations to the
same nunnery extending over a number of years, which afford a valuable
record of part of the life-history of the house. The visitations conducted
between 1442 and 1527 at Rusper and at Easebourne are most instructive as
showing the gradual collapse which many of the smaller houses experienced.
The chief complaint made during the visitation of Rusper in 1442 was that
the prioress of the house had failed to render account to the sisterhood
during the term she had held office[992]. She was consequently enjoined by
the bishop of Chichester to produce an account year by year and submit it
to him and to the sisterhood. Some thirty years later in 1478 upon enquiry
it was found that the convent was in debt, and the bishop asked for an
inventory of the house, which was drawn up for him. The community at this
time consisted of the prioress and five nuns, four of whom are entered as
professed, one as non-professed.
Again in 1484 the bishop visited Rusper, and three nuns were consecrated
on this occasion. But the house had entered on a downward course of
poverty and decay. In 1485 Rusper was exempted from paying subsidy on the
plea of poverty. During the visitation of 1521 the nuns referred their
pecuniary poverty to the onerous expenses caused by the too frequent
visits of friends and relations who came to stay with the prioress, while
the prioress herself referred the poverty to other reasons, but agreed
that the house was fast going to ruin. No complaints were made at the
visitation three years later (1524), except against a certain William
Tychen, who sowed discord. Again in 1527 the prioress and nuns deposed
that all was well in the house, but that its poverty was extreme and that
it was on the brink of ruin.
The accounts of the visitations to Easebourne[993] are even more
instructive, for there the deteriorating effects of mismanagement and
poverty were increased by want of discipline and quarrelsomeness among the
nuns. In 1414 the community consisted of the prioress and six or seven
nuns. In 1437 and 1439 its poverty was already so great that letters
patent were secured on the plea of insufficient revenue, exonerating the
prioress and her convent from certain payments called for by the clergy.
In 1441 the house was in debt to the amount of £40, and here also the
convent cast the blame of mismanagement on the head of the house,
referring the debts to ‘costly expenses of the prioress, who frequently
rides abroad, and pretends she does so on the common business of the
house, though it is not so, with a train of attendants much too large, and
tarries long abroad, and she feasts sumptuously both at home and
abroad.... And while she does so the members of the convent are made to
work like hired workwomen, and they receive nothing whatever for their own
use from their work, but the prioress takes the whole profit.’
In reply to their complaints the bishop forbade the prioress to compel the
sisters to continual work; ‘and if they should wish of their own accord to
work, they shall be free to do so, but yet so that they may receive for
themselves the half part of what they gain by their hands; the other part
shall be converted to the advantage of the house and unburdening its
debts.’ But discharging those debts was no easy matter. The prioress was
commanded to sell her costly fur trimmings for the advantage of the house,
and if she rode abroad to spend only what was needful, and to content
herself with four horses. The administration of temporal goods was taken
from her altogether and given to ‘Master Thomas Boleyn and John Lylis,
Esquire.’ But under their management the debt of £40 had increased in nine
years to £66; and in 1475, as again in 1485 and 1489, the house had to be
excused from payments. Rumours of an unfavourable character about what
went on in the house now reached the bishop, and before the next
visitation in 1478, the prioress Agnes Tauke was summoned to Chichester,
where she promised on her oath before the bishop and others to resign her
office if called upon to do so.
The deposition made by her nuns during the ensuing visitation confirmed
the unfavourable rumours; two nuns had left the priory ostensibly for
their health and were abroad in apostasy. One nun referred this conduct to
neglect on the part of the prioress, another to that of the chaplain, John
Smyth, who confessed to having sealed or caused to be sealed a licence to
one of the nuns to go out of the priory after having had criminal
intercourse with her. Other complaints were made against the prioress,
‘that she had her kinsmen staying with her for weeks at the priory and
gave them the best food, while the nuns had the worst’; also that she was
herself of bad character. But these recriminations were not accepted by
the bishop. The desire of Agnes Tauke to improve matters was accepted as
genuine and she was not called upon to resign.
Discontent however remained a standing characteristic of the nuns at
Easebourne. At the visitation of 1521 the prioress deposed that the nuns
lived honestly and religiously according to the rule of St Augustine (sic)
and were sufficiently obedient to her, but the nun sexton blamed the
prioress for ‘not making up any account annually as she ought in presence
of the sisters concerning her administration of goods,’ and another nun
deposed that she neglected to provide for the sisters the sum of thirteen
shillings and four pence in money to which they were entitled. Again in
1524 the prioress deposed that all was well, but the sub-prioress
complained of disobedience, both among the professed and the non-professed
nuns, who on their side complained of harshness of treatment. The bishop
believed the complaints of the latter and blamed the behaviour of the
sub-prioress, who submitted to correction.
The recriminations of the nuns at Easebourne recall a picture drawn about
this time by Langland (c. 1390) in the _Vision of Piers the Ploughman_, in
which Wrath personified as a friar describes how he stirred up quarrels in
a nunnery. In its earliest version the poem omits these passages; and
Langland, so ready to abuse and ridicule monk and friar, is chary in his
references to nuns. In the later versions of his poem (text B and C)
‘Wrath’ is described as acting first as gardener and then as cook in a
nunnery, where in the character of ‘the prioress’ potager and of ‘other
poor ladies,’ he ‘made them broths of various scandals.’ Among the stories
he set going was
... ‘that Dame Johane was a bastard
And Dame Clarice a knight’s daughter, a cuckold was her sire,
And Dame Purnell a priest’s concubine, she will never become prioress,
For she had a child in cherry time, all our chapter it wist.’
In consequence the nuns fall to quarrelling among themselves and end with
attacking one another bodily. The picture, even if overdrawn, proves, in
conjunction with the temper of the nuns at Easebourne, that peaceableness
no longer formed the invariable concomitant of convent life during the
15th century.
Various particulars in the history of men’s houses corroborate the fact
that considerable changes were going on inside the monastic body during
the 15th century.
Reference has been made to the fluctuations in the history of alien
priories. Some of the foreign houses, aware of the dangers to which their
English colonies were exposed, advocated the sale of their property in
England. Numerous grammar-schools and colleges profited by the change or
owed their foundation directly to it. As early as 1390 William Wykeham
bought estates of alien priories for New College, his foundation at
Oxford. Waynfleet, bishop of Worcester, who in 1415 founded St Mary
Magdalen College at Oxford, annexed to it Sele, an alien priory which had
been admitted to denizenship[994]. It is noteworthy that some religious
houses about this time dissolved of their own accord. Thus the master and
brethren of St John’s hospital at Oxford obtained leave from Henry VI to
convey their house to Waynfleet[995]. The Austin priory of Selborne,
which ‘had become a desert convent without canons or prior,’ was likewise
annexed to St Mary Magdalen College, a change which was ratified by a bull
from Innocent VIII in 1486[996].
It has already been said that a change of attitude towards religious
institutions on the part of the public was the direct outcome of the
spread of Wyclif’s teaching. In 1410 Sir John Oldcastle, the so-called
leader of the Lollards, who was burnt for heresy eight years later, made a
proposal in the House of Commons which is curious in various ways. It was
to the effect that their temporalities should be taken from bishop, abbot
and prior, and the revenues of their possessions employed to pay a
standing army, to augment the income of the noblemen and gentry, to endow
a hundred hospitals and to make small payments to the clergy[997]. No
notice in this case was taken of the donors or representatives of the
settlement, to whom land and tenements upon default, or neglect of those
to whom they were granted, otherwise reverted. The proposal was
accompanied by a list of monasteries which might be appropriated, but the
proposal was summarily quashed.
The Church Council held at Basel (from 1418), at which English prelates
also were present, was emphatic in urging the need of monastic reform. It
would be interesting to ascertain if this was prompted solely by the
feeling that the recognised abuses of convent life lowered religion in
general estimation, or if suspicions were entertained that religious
houses might be harbouring unorthodox elements. Great efforts at reform
were made within the Benedictine order; chapters were held by the abbots
at regular intervals and the system of visitations formulated for mutual
supervision and control by the various monasteries once more received
attention. We shall see this system in full operation on the Continent. In
England we have accounts of several chapters of Benedictine abbots held
between 1422 and 1426, in which reports of extensive visitations were
given[998]. The chapter of 1473 appointed the abbot of St Albans (Alboin,
1464-1476) to visit at Glastonbury, and the abbot of Eynsham to visit at
St Albans[999].
Churchmen on all sides were eager to promote monastic reforms and
interfere with monastic privileges. In 1418 Pope Martin V sent a bull to
the archbishop of Canterbury bidding him hold visitations regularly[1000].
But the story of the gradual encroachment of the Church on monastic
privilege and property is less striking in England than abroad, for the
independent spirit of individual houses was less strong, and convents
generally, especially those of women, seem to have yielded without
opposition to the claims made by energetic churchmen. Some monasteries of
men, however, resented interference and maintained their rights. An
episode in this struggle deserves attention, as it reflects unfavourably
on two nunneries which were dependencies of the abbey of St Albans. There
was a long-standing jealousy between the lord abbot of St Albans and the
lord primate of Canterbury, renewed by a quarrel between Abbot Wallingford
and Archbishop Bourchier, which had been decided in favour of the former.
The abbey enjoyed exemption from episcopal visitation, not only for itself
but for its dependencies or cells, among which were the nunneries of
Sopwell and St Mary Prée. In 1489 Archbishop Morton of Canterbury secured
a Papal bull[1001] which empowered him to visit all the monasteries of his
diocese, those subject to his visitation and those exempt from it. And
this, as the document says, ‘not only because the former strictness of
life is abandoned ... but also because life is luxurious and dissolute.’
In consequence of the authority conferred by this bull the primate penned
a letter[1002] to the abbot of St Albans containing charges of a serious
nature. After a few opening sentences it continues in the following
strain:
‘... Moreover, among other grave enormities and wicked crimes of which you
are accused and for which you are noted and defamed, you admitted a
certain married woman named Elena Germyn, who some time ago wrongfully
left her husband and lived in adultery with another man, to be sister and
nun in the house or priory of Pré, which you hold to be in your
jurisdiction; and there you appointed her prioress notwithstanding her
husband was living and is alive now. Further, brother Thomas Sudbury, your
fellow-monk, publicly and notoriously and without interference or
punishment from you, associated and still associates with this woman on
terms of intimacy, like others among your brethren and fellow-monks who
had access and still have access to her and to others elsewhere as to a
brothel or house of ill fame. And not only in the house of Pré but also in
the nunnery of Sopwell, which you contend is under your jurisdiction also,
you change the prioresses and superiors (praesidentes) again and again at
your will and caprice, deposing good and religious women and promoting to
the highest dignity the worthless and wicked, so that religion is cast
aside, virtue is neglected, and many expenses are incurred by
reprehensible practices through your introducing certain of your brethren
who are thieves and notorious villains to preside there as guardians to
manage the goods of the priories, which more correctly speaking are
wasted, and those places which were religious are rendered and reputed
profane and impious, and so far impoverished by your doings and the doings
of those with you as to be brought to the verge of ruin.
‘Similarly in dealing with other cells of monks which you say are subject
to you within the monastery of the glorious protomartyr Alban, you have
dilapidated the common property in its possessions and jewels; you have
cut down, sold and alienated indiscriminately copses, woods, underwood,
oaks and other forest trees to the value of 8000 marks and more; while
those of your brethren and fellow-monks, who, as is reported, are given
over to all the evils of the world, neglecting the service of God, and
openly and continually consorting with harlots and loose women within the
precincts and without, you knowingly defend instead of punishing them;
others too you protect who are covetous of honour and promotion and bent
on ministering to your cupidity, and who steal and make away with chalices
and other jewels of the church, going so far as to extract sacrilegiously
precious stones from the very shrine of St Alban.’
This letter is dated 1490, and is addressed to William, presumably William
Wallingford, as he became abbot in 1476; it is however confidently
asserted that he died in 1484. But this date may need revision. For he was
succeeded by his prior Thomas Ramryge, who was not elected till 1492; ‘at
all events this period of eight years is very obscure,’ says the historian
of St Albans[1003]. Concerning William Wallingford we know that the
chapter of Benedictine abbots held at Northampton in 1480 appointed him to
visit all the monasteries situated in the diocese of Lincoln, but that he
deputed two of his convent to do so[1004]. His successor Ramryge wrote a
book ‘on the doings of the abbots, monks and benefactors of the monastery
of St Albans’ in which Wallingford appears of a character very different
from that suggested by Morton’s letter. ‘Prudent and wise in the
management of his abbey and resolute in the defence of its rights,’ says
Dugdale on the authority of Ramryge, ‘he was successful too in resisting
the claims of Archbishop Bourchier (Morton’s predecessor) which upon
appeal to Rome were decided in his favour.’ He completed the high altar at
St Albans and set up a printing-press in his monastery between 1480 and
1486.
In face of this evidence the language used by Morton appears somewhat
violent. Unfortunately no additional information is forthcoming from the
nunneries of St Mary Prée and Sopwell. We have an account rendered by the
prioress Christina Basset of Prée for the year 1485-1486, four years
previous to the date of Morton’s letter, entries in which show that
Christina Basset had succeeded Alice Wafer, who had been deposed for
mismanagement of the revenues, but continued to live in the convent[1005].
About Sopwell we only know that Wallingford appointed a commission in 1480
to set aside the prioress Joan Chapell on account of old age and infirmity
in favour of Elizabeth Webb, one of the nuns[1006].
It were idle to deny that the state of discipline in many houses was bad,
but the circumstances under which Morton’s letter was penned argue that
the charges made in it should be accepted with some reservation.
It remains to cast a glance on the views expressed on the state of
monasteries in general literature in the 15th century, from which we
gather that the religious settlement was fast sinking in popular
estimation. Two poems in this connection deserve especial attention, the
‘Land of Cockayne,’ a spirited satire on monastic life generally, written
about 1430, and a poem of somewhat later date preserved in fragments only,
which has been published under the title, ‘Why I cannot be a nun.’
The ‘Land of Cockayne’[1007] describes in flowing rhyme a country ‘of joy
and bliss,’ where flow rivers of oil, milk, honey and wine, and where
stands a fair abbey of white and grey monks. Their house in accordance
with the popular fancy is a delightful abode constructed out of food and
sweetmeats with shingles of ‘flour-cakes’, and the cloister is of crystal
with a garden in which spices and flowers grow. The monks dwell here in
the greatest comfort; some are old, some are young; at times they are
engaged in prayer, at times they seek diversion away from home. Another
abbey, ‘a fair nunnery,’ stands at no great distance, the inmates of which
live in the like ease and carelessness. Here too there is a river of milk,
the nuns wear silken clothing, and when it is hot they take a boat and go
to bathe in the river. They here meet the monks and disport themselves
together, throwing off all restraint.
Clever and much to the point as this poem appeared to the laymen who had
come to look upon convent life as a life of idleness and self-indulgence,
its historical importance is exceeded by the poem, ‘Why I cannot be a
nun[1008].’ It is generally spoken of as the production of a woman on the
ground of its reflecting a woman’s experiences, but there is no direct
evidence on the point; its author writes as one unattached to a nunnery,
and by the remark that he knows more than he chooses to tell is perhaps
concealing his ignorance.
It consists of an adaptation to a different purpose of the story of the
‘Ghostly Abbey,’ which was peopled with personified Virtues[1009], and to
which reference has been made in previous chapters of this work. Here
personified Vices are described as having taken possession of the abbey.
The poem is divided into two parts, of which it seems doubtful through the
state of the manuscript which ought to come first. As it stands printed it
begins abruptly with a description of how commissioners received the
charge to ride all over England to seek out nunneries and enquire into
their state. They visited the houses of Kent and are represented as
returning to the father of the writer, who asks them how they have sped
and how the nuns fared (l. 28). When he has heard their report he tells
his daughter, who wishes to become a nun, that he will have none of it.
The girl is sore aggrieved; she deplores her ill-luck and continues in
this strain:
‘Then it befell on a morn of May
In the same year as I said before,
My pensiveness would not away
But ever waxed more and more.
I walked alone and wept full sore
With sighings and with mourning.
I said but little and thought the more
But what I thought no man need hear.
And in a garden I disported me
Every day at divers hours
To behold and for to see
The sweet effect of April flowers.
The fair herbs and gentle flowers
And birds singing on every spray;
But my longing and sadness
For all this sport would not away.’
She kneels to Jesus, the king of heavenly bliss, and tells Him how she is
destitute of good counsel and would commit her cause to Him. She then
falls asleep and a fair lady appears to her, who calls her by name
(Kateryne, l. 122), and who on being asked says her name is Experience,
and that she has come with the help of Christ Jesus, adding ‘such things
as I shall show thee I trust shall set thy heart at rest.’ She takes the
girl by the hand and leads her through a meadow fair and green to a house
of ‘women regular,’ a cloister, ‘a house of nuns in truth of divers orders
old and young, but not well governed,’ for here self-will reigns instead
of discipline. ‘Perhaps you would like to know who was dwelling here; of
some I will tell you, of others keep counsel; so I was taught when I was
young,’ says the writer. The first lady they encounter in the house is
Dame Pride, who is held in great repute, while poor Dame Meekness sits
alone and forsaken. Dame Hypocrite sits there with her book, while Dame
Devout and her few companions have been put outside by Dame Sloth and Dame
Vainglory. In the convent remain Dame Envy ‘who can sow strife in every
state,’ Dame Love-Inordinate, Dame Lust, Dame Wanton and Dame Nice, all of
whom take scant heed of God’s service. ‘Dame Chastity, I dare well say,
in that convent had little cheer, she was often on the point of going her
way, she was so little beloved there; some loved her in their hearts full
dear, but others did not and set nothing by her, but gave her good leave
to go.’ Walking about under the guidance of Experience the writer also
comes upon Dame Envy who bore the keys and seldom went from home. In vain
she sought for Dame Patience and Dame Charity; they were not in the
convent but dwelt outside ‘without strife’ in a chamber where good women
sought their company. Meanwhile Dame Disobedient set the prioress at
nought; a fact especially distressing to the writer, ‘for subjects should
ever be diligent in word, in will, in deed, to please their sovereign’ (l.
273). Indeed she declared, when she saw no reverence, she would stay in
the house no longer. She and Experience left and sat down on the grass
outside the gates to discuss what they had seen. Experience explained that
for the most part nuns are such as they have seen (l. 310); not all, she
adds; ‘some are devout, holy and blessed, and hold the right way to bliss,
but some are weak, lewd, and forward; God amend what is amiss.’ She passed
away and the writer awakes, convinced that she certainly does not care to
go and live in a nunnery. ‘Peradventure,’ the writer adds, ‘some man will
say and so it really seems to him that I soon forsook the perfect way for
a fantasy or a dream, but dream it was not, nor a fantasy, but unto me
welcome information (gratius mene).’
The other part of the poem advises the ‘ladies dear,’ who have taken the
habit which is a holy thing, to let their lives correspond with their
outward array. The writer enlarges on the good conversation and the
virtues of the holy women who were professed in the past, and enumerates
as models of virtuous living a number of women saints chiefly of English
origin.
Productions such as this clearly show in what direction the estimation of
religious houses and their inmates was tending. The nature of devotional
pursuits and keeping the houses was not yet called into question, but
apart from its religious significance the nunnery had little to recommend
it. As places of residence these houses still attracted a certain number
of unmarried women, and as centres of education still exerted some
influence, but the high standard they had at one period maintained was a
thing of the past.
§ 2. Reforms in Germany.
The history of monastic reform on the Continent previous to the
Reformation supplies us with many interesting particulars both of the
position of monasteries generally and of the convent life of women. Though
religious settlements had been little interfered with before the Church
Council at Constance, extensive reforms were undertaken subsequent to it
in order to secure a return of discipline. The movement was inaugurated
from within the religious orders, and led to the union of different houses
into so-called congregations. But its peaceable character was soon marred
by the introduction of political and party interests. Thirty years after
the first convent reforms, it was no longer a question of how far the
well-being and right living of monk and nun should be secured, but how far
religious settlements could be made amenable to external interference and
who should have the right of interfering with them.
For this complication the instability of political life is partly
responsible. The authority of the Pope had greatly decreased, and, at the
beginning of the 15th century, the Emperor no longer kept the balance
between the contending parties. The prelates of the Church, many of whom
were independent temporal princes, had succeeded in allying themselves to
the impoverished, but influential, nobility. In South Germany especially
the Church was becoming more and more aristocratic; birth, not merit,
secured admission and promotion in the ecclesiastical body. The townships
were generally opposed to the Church and the nobility; they emphatically
insisted on their rights, but their combined efforts to make their
influence felt in the constitution had signally failed. Apart from them
stood the princes and minor potentates, who tried to coerce the nobility,
in many cases succeeded in depriving their prelates of their rights, and
availed themselves of the general relaxation of authority to promote their
own selfish ends.
To these different representatives of power the monastery became debatable
ground, where the diocesan, the township and the prince of the land in
turn claimed the right of interference and where in many instances their
interests clashed. The greater settlements, which held directly from the
Emperor, were not drawn into the conflict; it was round the lesser ones
that contention chiefly raged.
One of the most interesting movements in the direction of monastic reform
is associated with the Benedictine monk Johannes von Minden († 1439) who,
as representative of the abbot of the house of Reinhausen near Göttingen,
was present at the general chapter of Benedictine abbots held near
Constance in 1417[1010]. Johannes returned to his convent burning with
reformatory zeal, which his abbot and fellow-monks would not countenance.
He left his convent and after many hardships was enabled by the help of a
rich patroness to settle at Bursfeld, where he realized some of his
ideas[1011]. His views agreed with those of Johannes Rode († 1439), a
Carthusian, who had become abbot of the Benedictine monastery of St
Matthias at Trier, and the joint efforts of these men resulted in a scheme
of mutual supervision and control of different houses by means of
periodical visitations undertaken by members of the Benedictine order. The
settlements which agreed to the innovation joined in a union or so-called
congregation, to which Bursfeld gave its name. The union or congregation
of Bursfeld was eventually joined by one hundred and thirty-six
monasteries of men and sixty-four of women. The purpose of the union was
not to attempt any new departure, but to guarantee the maintenance of
discipline as a means of securing the return of prosperity.
The nunnery of Langendorf, near Weissenfels in Saxony, was incorporated
into the union of Bursfeld, and a comprehensive scheme of rules[1012],
which gives us an insight into the tone and tendency of the German
mediæval nunnery on the reformed plan, was drawn up for its use. The rules
recall those contemporaneously drafted for the monastery of Sion in
England. We have in them similar directions concerning an elaborate
ritual, similar exhortations to soberness of living and gentleness of
manner; the information on convent life and daily routine is equally
explicit; and we hear of the different appointments inside the convent,
and of the several duties of its members. There is also an exhaustive list
of possible failings and crimes, followed by directions as to correction
and punishment. Cats, dogs and other animals are not to be kept by the
nuns, as they detract from seriousness; if a nun feels sleepy during
hours, she shall ask leave to withdraw rather than fall asleep; if a nun
dies of an infectious disease, her corpse shall not be carried into
church, but the burial service shall take place outside. No member of the
convent shall be chosen abbess unless she has attained the age of
twenty-nine,--a provision which I have not come across elsewhere. The
abbess has under her the same staff of officers whose duties have already
been described. There is the prioress, the sub-prioress, the teacher of
the novices, the cellaress, the chauntress, the sub-chauntress, the
sexton, the keeper of books, the chambress, the infirmaress, the portress
and others. We are told how novices made profession and how the hours of
the Virgin were to be kept. We are also informed of the occupations of the
nuns between hours, and learn that they were active in many ways. There
are references to the transcribing of books, to binding books, to
preparing parchment, and also to spinning and weaving; but the
transcribing of books is pronounced the more important work, since it is
more akin to spiritual interests. Further we hear about visits paid by the
nuns, and about the reception of visitors. Only professed religious women
were to be received on a visit inside the convent precincts; other
visitors were to dwell and take their meals outside.
In the case of this nunnery it is unknown how far the convent showed
readiness to join the congregation of Bursfeld, or how far it was
persuaded or coerced into doing so. The movement in favour of monastic
reform entered on a new stage with the advent of the zealous and
influential reformer, Johann Busch († after 1479), the promoter of the
congregation of Windesheim. The work of Busch is the more interesting as
he has left a detailed account of it. His book ‘On monastic reform’
describes the changes he advocated and the means by which he effected them
during a contest of over thirty years[1013]. He was a native of Zwolle in
the Netherlands and entered the Austin convent of Windesheim, where he
attracted so much attention that he was summoned to Wittenberg in Saxony
(1437), and there conducted monastic reforms at the desire of the prior.
He remained in Saxony for many years, residing sometimes at one place,
sometimes at another, and pursued his plans so ardently that he
occasionally transcended the limits of his authority[1014]. His success in
persuading convents to reconsider their tenor of life and in inducing lay
princes and prelates to assist him in his efforts was so great that
Cardinal Cusanus, of whom we shall hear more, pronounced him especially
fitted to act as a monastic reformer (1451). His book contains a detailed
account of his work in connection with about twenty nunneries. His great
merit and that of the congregation of Windesheim was the introduction of
German devotional books.
From these and other descriptions we gather that many nunneries willingly
accepted the proposed changes in so far as they were designed to raise the
standard of teaching and to improve the system of discipline, but that
opposition was made where the changes tended to interfere with the
position and prestige of the settlement. In some cases a compromise was
effected by the energetic and intelligent conduct of the lady superior; in
others the direct refusal of the nuns to conform resulted in open force
being brought to bear on them. Scenes were enacted which recall the
turbulence of early Christian times, and show how strong a sense of
independence still lived in some convents.
Among the Austin nunneries which gave Busch endless trouble was that of
Derneburg, near Hildesheim, where he was appointed to visit as father
confessor between 1440 and 1442[1015]. The nuns there were in the habit of
dining out continually, and when exception was taken to this, gave as an
excuse that relatives and friends were always ready to entertain them at
meals, but refused to furnish contributions in kind towards the support of
the convent. Busch got over this difficulty by pleading with the lay
people, but his action in the matter still further roused the rebellious
spirit of the nuns. On one occasion his life was attempted at their
instigation; on another, when he went to inspect their cellar, they locked
him in and left him there. As a consequence of this he refused from that
time forward to be the first to go on any tour of inspection. His efforts
to impress these nuns were in vain, and finally he asked for the
assistance of the bishop of Hildesheim and the abbot of the Cistercian
house of Marienrode; as a consequence the rebels were conveyed away from
Derneburg to other convents, and their house was given into the hands of
Cistercian nuns. Similar difficulties occurred at Wennigsen, at Mariensee
and at Werder, where the Duke of Hannover interfered in the most arbitrary
manner[1016]. At Wienhausen the abbess and convent refused to conform to
the rule of St Benedict, though the additional authority of their diocesan
and of Duke Otto of Brunswick was brought to bear on them[1017]. Forcible
measures were resorted to in this case also. The abbess was deposed and
she and her nuns were carried away in a chariot to other nunneries, and
nuns from the reformed house of Derneburg were installed in their place.
At the Cistercian nunnery of St Georg, near Halle, the nuns at first
declared that they were exempt from the visits of the diocesan, and
refused admission to the delegates. After prolonged opposition they
yielded to Busch[1018]. At Heiningen the nuns pleaded poverty as an excuse
for staying away from home[1019]. Many settlements complained of poverty
and insufficient revenue, among which was Frankenberg, near Goslar[1020].
The nuns of Dorstad earned money by taking pupils from outside the
precincts[1021], and other houses, among them that of Neuwerk, received
girls and boarded and educated them. Busch however forbade their doing so
on the ground that intercourse with secular interests was harmful. At
Neuwerk, which was a Cistercian nunnery at Erfurt[1022], the wealth of the
community in vessels, vestments, and books was quite a revelation to
Busch. The house owned thirty books of devotion (the convent at the time
consisted of thirty inmates), a number which appeared to Busch so
considerable that he did not insist on the nuns adopting the service-book
in use at Windesheim, as this change would have rendered their books
useless to them.
The nuns at Neuwerk readily accepted the proposed reforms, and received
nuns from the reformed nunnery of Heiningen who dwelt with them for three
years and helped them to restore their system of religious discipline and
teaching. The abbess Armengard von Rheden, of the wealthy Benedictine
nunnery of Fischbeck on the Weser[1023], also agreed to receive nuns from
a reformed house into her establishment as teachers.
Full details are preserved of the reform of the nunnery of
Marienberg[1024] near Helmstädt in Saxony, the prioress of which, Helena
von Iltzen, hearing of the work of Busch, sought his assistance in matters
of reform. Her house is said to have belonged to no order in particular.
When she applied to Busch he was resident provost (after 1459) of the
Austin canonry of Sülte near Hildesheim. He travelled to Bronopie, a
nunnery situated outside Campen on the confines of Holland, to consult
with the prioress, who accordingly deputed two nuns of her convent, Ida
and Tecla, and one lay sister Aleydis, to repair with him to Marienberg.
Of the two nuns Ida had been chosen for her knowledge of religious
service, Tecla for her powers of instruction. Busch describes how he
travelled across Germany with these women in a waggon drawn by four
horses, and how on their arrival at Marienberg Ida was appointed to act as
sub-prioress, and Tecla as teacher, and how the prioress of the house
reserved to herself the management of temporal affairs only. Tecla is
described as well versed in grammar (grammatica competenter docta); she
instructed the inmates of the house in scholastic knowledge (scientiis
scholasticalibus) with such success that her pupils after three years were
able to read Holy Writ, and readily composed letters and missives in
correct Latin (litteras sive missas in bona latina magistraliter
dictarent). ‘I have seen and examined these myself,’ says Busch.
After three years the illness of Ida made the nuns desirous of returning
to their own convent, and Busch again undertook to escort them. A proof of
the affection they had won during their stay and of the regret that was
felt at their departure is afforded by the letters which passed between
them and their friends. They were staying for some nights at the nunnery
of Heiningen on their journey home when two letters reached them. In one
the nuns wrote describing their grief. ‘When we see your empty places in
the choir, the refectory, and the dormitory, we are filled with sorrow and
weep.’ And they wish that the distance which separates them were not so
great, then at least they might go to visit their friends. When Tecla’s
pupils (the letter says) entered the schoolroom for their lessons on the
Saturday, they wept so much that the prioress, who was in great grief
herself, was constrained to try to comfort them. The other letter, a short
one specially addressed to Tecla, was written by these pupils: this
accompanied the longer letter, and in it they assured her of their
continued admiration and devotion. Ida, Tecla and Aleydis in reply sent
two letters to Marienberg. A longer one was addressed by them to the
convent collectively, and a shorter one by Tecla to her pupils, in which
she praises them for having written such a good Latin letter and assures
them that she is glad to think of her stay with them, since it has been
productive of such good results.
The nunnery of Marienberg, which had so readily accepted reforms, acted as
advocate of similar changes to other houses. Busch tells us that the
nunnery of Marienborn situated not far from it, and the nunnery at Stendal
in Brandenburg, accepted reforms at its instigation[1025].
In the records of Busch comparatively few charges of a coarse nature are
brought against nunneries, but he adds an account of two nuns who were in
apostasy, and who were persuaded by him to return to their convents. One
had left her convent and had adopted lay clothing[1026]; the story of the
other, Sophie, an illegitimate daughter of Wilhelm, duke of Brunswick,
reads like a romance[1027]. The girl had been stowed away in the convent
of Mariensee by her relatives for convenience, but indifferent to vows
unwillingly accepted, she ran away and for seven years lived in the world,
tasting few of the sweets of life and much of its bitterness. At last,
broken in spirit by the loss of her child, she was persuaded by Busch to
come and live in the convent of Derneburg, the members of which received
her with tender pity for her sufferings and treated her with loving care.
Finally she agreed to return to the nunnery she had originally left, glad
of the peace which she found there.
Some of the nunneries on which pressure was brought to bear by the
monastic reformers altogether ceased to exist. The historian of the
diocese of Speyer (Rheinbayern) tells us that the Benedictine nunnery of
Schönfeld was interfered with in 1443 and fell into decay, and that its
property was appropriated; that the Cistercian nunnery of Ramsen also
ceased to exist, owing to feuds between Count Johann II of Nassau and the
abbot of Morimund, who both claimed the right of interference; and that
the dissolution of Kleinfrankenthal, a settlement of Austin nuns situated
in the same diocese, was declared in 1431 by Pope Eugenius IV on account
of the evil ways of the nuns[1028].
The historian of the reforms undertaken in the diocese of Trier notifies
many important changes[1029]. He considers that the nuns in many convents
had drifted away from the former strictness of discipline and lived as
Austin canonesses, returning to the world if they chose to get married.
Many of these settlements now accepted stricter rules of life, and among
them were the nunnery of Marienberg (diocese of Trier), the abbess of
which, Isengard von Greiffenklau († 1469), had come under the influence of
Johannes Rode--and Oberwerth, which owed reform to its abbess Adelheid
Helchen (1468-1505).
On the other hand Elisabeth von Seckendorff, abbess of the time-honoured
nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstätt, refused to see that a changed
condition of things demanded reform. The bishop of Eichstätt made his
power felt; she was deposed, and Sophie was summoned from the nunnery of
St Maria at Cöln, and made abbess in her stead (1456-1475)[1030].
We have detailed accounts of reforms in South Germany from the pen of
another contemporary writer, Felix Fabri († 1502), a Dominican friar of
Ulm[1031]. He tells us how Elisabeth Krelin († 1480), abbess of the
important Cistercian nunnery, Heggbach, a woman of great intelligence and
strong character, effected reforms in her house on her sole
responsibility. These changes were productive of such good results that
many nuns left the houses to which they belonged and came to live under
her. Gredanna von Freyberg († 1481), abbess of the ancient and wealthy
Benedictine nunnery of Urspring, hearing of these changes, came on a visit
to Heggbach, where she made friends with the abbess, and when she left she
was bent on carrying out similar changes in her own convent. But here she
met with opposition. Her nuns, who were members of the nobility, aware
that the changes advocated meant interference with the liberty they
enjoyed, divided for and against her, and those who were against her
appealed to their relatives for support. Gredanna in vain asked for help
from the abbot of the monastery of St Georg in the Black Forest to which
her house was allied; he dared not interfere, and it was only when the
archduchess Mechthild of Austria called upon him to do so, that he
summoned nuns from the reformed nunnery of St Walburg at Eichstätt and
with them and some monks came to Urspring. But the rebellious nuns,
nothing daunted, shut themselves up in the outlying buildings of the
infirmary, which they barricaded; the soldiers were called out but from a
religious dread refused to attack them. Nothing remained short of placing
these ‘amazons’ as Fabri calls them in a state of siege; the pangs of
hunger at last forced them to yield. The reforms which Gredanna then
effected were productive of such beneficial results that the house
regained a high standing.
The reform of Söflingen near Ulm[1032], an account of which we also owe to
Fabri, affords one more of many examples of the tyranny of interference.
This house belonged to the order of St Clare, and like all the houses of
this order was subject to the Franciscan friars, who had the exclusive
right of control over them.
The Franciscans of Ulm having accepted reforms in consequence of the papal
bull of 1484, the town authorities of Ulm called upon the nuns to do the
same, and Fabri relates how ‘a number of burghers accompanied by religious
doctors of various orders, by noblemen, their followers, and by members of
the town-gilds, armed and unarmed, marched upon Söflingen in a great
crowd, as though to fight for the glory of God.’ They conveyed with them a
new abbess and a number of nuns of the reformed order of St Clare, whom
they meant to instal at Söflingen. But here they were met by open
defiance. The lady superior, Christine Strölin († 1489), shouted that she
could not and would not be deposed, and her nuns vented their indignation
in threats and blasphemy. Not by promises, not by threats, could they be
persuaded to leave their lady superior. They rushed through the buildings,
snatched up coffers and boxes, and followed Christine out of the house.
Their loyalty and unanimity in defending their rights awaken feelings in
their favour which are confirmed when we find the bishop of the diocese
disapproving of the forcible measures resorted to by the citizens; endless
quarrels and discussions ensued. The abbess Christine, after staying at
various places, returned to Söflingen and was reinstated in her rights, on
condition of adopting certain reforms; some of her nuns came back with
her, but others refused to do so and went to live in other nunneries.
Details concerning the ‘reform’ of one other nunnery are worth recording
because they show how a representative of the Church openly attempted to
curtail the privileges of a powerful nunnery. The struggle of the nunnery
of Sonnenburg in the Tyrol with the Cardinal Legate Nicolas Cusanus (†
1464), bishop of Brixen, has been the subject of close historical enquiry,
as its importance far exceeds the interests of those immediately
concerned[1033]. In this struggle the representative of the Pope came into
open conflict with the prince of the land, Sigmund, archduke of Austria
and duke of Tyrol, who defied the Cardinal and obliged him to flee the
country and seek refuge at Rome. The quarrel which began over the nunnery
ended with the ban of excommunication being pronounced against Sigmund,
and with his appeal to a Church Council against the authority of the Papal
Curia.
Sonnenburg was the wealthiest and most influential Benedictine settlement
of women in the land. It was in existence as early as the 11th century and
had extensive powers of jurisdiction which repeatedly brought its abbess
into conflict with her rival in power, the bishop of Brixen. Against him
she had sought and secured the protection of the archduke; but at the time
of the appointment of Cusanus as bishop, the settlement of a matter of
temporal administration between herself and the bishopric was pending.
Cusanus had obtained from Rome exceptional powers of monastic visitation,
powers such as were conferred at a later date on the Cardinal Legate
Ximenes in Spain and on the Cardinal Legate Wolsey in England. By virtue
of these powers Cusanus at once transferred the affair with the abbess
from the temporal domain to the spiritual, and in his character of
monastic visitor and reformer sent a manifesto to the abbess and nuns to
the effect that after the coming festival of Corpus Christi they were on
no account to absent themselves from the convent or to receive visitors.
The abbess, Verena von Stuben, and her convent, which consisted at the
time of seven nuns, ignored this command, obedience to which would have
cut off intercourse with the archduke and made attention to the pending
matter of business impossible. More closely pressed, the abbess gave an
evasive answer and lodged a complaint with Sigmund, in which she and the
convent declared themselves ready to accept the desired change (p.
66[1034]) but said that they were convinced that such a course at the
present moment would be fatal to their position. It was clear to them that
Cusanus was bent on their ruin. The archduke to whom they appealed
declared that the prelate was transgressing the limits of his authority,
and intimated to him that he would not have the temporalities of the
house interfered with,--a decision to which Cusanus for the moment
deferred.
The documents relating to the further progress of this quarrel are
numerous. A kind of chronicle was kept at Sonnenburg written partly by the
nuns, partly by the abbess, into which copies of over two hundred letters
and documents were inserted. It bears the title ‘On what occurred between
Cardinal Cusanus and the abbess Verena,’ and is now in the library at
Innsbruck[1035].
Foiled in his first attempt to gain control over Sonnenburg, Cusanus now
devoted his attention to other religious communities. He took under his
protection a number of recluses, called sylvan sisters, ‘Waldschwestern’
(p. 63), and having secured further powers from Rome, attempted to
interfere with the convent of Minoresses or Poor Clares at Brixen (p. 87).
But these nuns, though they were low-born and uneducated, were as stubborn
as their high-born and learned sisters on the Sonnenburg; Verena’s conduct
may have given them the courage to oppose the Cardinal. Their lady
superior was forcibly removed at his instigation, but they appealed
against him at Rome, and though their opposition was censured, Cusanus was
directed to place the matter in the hands of the Franciscans at Nürnberg,
who declared themselves willing to institute the desired reforms. Nuns
from the convent of St Clare at Nürnberg were despatched to Brixen, and
the tone of the house was raised without its privileges being forfeited.
On the strength of his increased visitatorial powers Cusanus (1453)
returned to the charge at Sonnenburg, but its inmates would give no
official declaration of their intentions (p. 90). Accordingly the bishop
of Eichstätt was summoned to hold a visitation there, but he was refused
admission by the nuns. However a second deputation came which could not be
warded off, and the convent gave the desired information; the result of
which was that injunctions were forwarded confining the authority of the
abbess to the control of the nuns, and practically despoiling her of her
property. Strict seclusion was to be observed, and the house was to be
furnished with a key, which was to be given to a person appointed by
Cusanus. The management of the monastic property was to be in the hands of
a bailiff who was to render account to the bishop direct, not to the
abbess. Scant wonder that the abbess Verena, indignant at the order and
despairing of help from without, offered to resign. Her offer delighted
the legate, who forthwith despatched Afra von Velseck to undertake the
management of affairs at the convent, with the command that she was to
take no step without previously consulting him (p. 94). It seems that
Cusanus entertained the idea of appropriating the temporalities of the
nunnery altogether, and transferring them to the use of monks, who were to
be subject to his friend and ally, the abbot of Tegernsee (p. 95). He
afterwards gave up the plan, ‘since the nobility,’ as he wrote (p. 127),
‘look upon this house as a home for their daughters and are opposed to my
plan.’
At this juncture things took an unexpected turn. Verena consulted with her
friends in the matter of the pension on which she was to retire (p. 109);
and Cusanus was angered by the objections they raised to his proposals.
There was a stormy interchange of letters between him and the abbess (p.
124), which ended in Verena’s resuming her authority, and in Afra’s
deposition. Cusanus sent an armed escort to fetch away his protégée and
threatened excommunication to the convent. In vain was a complaint against
him sent by the nuns to Rome; Cusanus had anticipated them. The Pope
censured the nuns’ conduct, affirmed Cusanus’ authority, and cast
imputations on the character of the abbess, which were indignantly
resented in a second letter forwarded to the Pope by the nuns.
The archduke Sigmund now tried to interfere in the interest of peace. A
second visitation was undertaken, and a list of injunctions was drawn up
for the nuns (p. 133). Among these we note that nuns from a reformed
convent were to come and live as teachers at Sonnenburg; the abbess was
henceforth to have no separate household, she was forbidden to go out
without asking leave from the diocesan, she was not to go on pilgrimages
or visit health resorts, and she was not to be present at weddings.
But the abbess and the convent refused to accept these injunctions, and
they were accordingly placed under an interdict. The hospital belonging to
the house and its property were confiscated, the chaplains were forbidden
to celebrate mass, and the ban of excommunication was pronounced against
the nuns and was reiterated by the priest of the nearest church on feast
days and on Sundays. This was a great humiliation to the nuns and helped
to lower them in general estimation.
Sigmund was absent at the time. Soon after his return Pope Nicolas V, the
patron of Cusanus, died (1455), and his successor Calixtus III warned the
Cardinal against pushing things to extremes (p. 161). Sigmund also
pleaded in favour of the nuns that they were staying within precincts, and
that Verena was an estimable woman. Cusanus in answer contended that what
he had done, he had done with the sanction of Rome, and that he had
excommunicated and deposed Verena solely on account of her disobedience;
and he then acknowledged that she was a thoroughly honest and excellent
manager. In his letters to the abbot of Tegernsee, written about the same
time, he speaks of Verena as a very Jezebel who is full of wiles against
him (p. 153). ‘Maybe she will pretend obedience to deceive me,’ he wrote
among other things, ‘but the devil of pride has her soul in his possession
and will prevent her from really humbling herself.’ But the relations
between Sigmund and his bishop were becoming strained in other respects.
The first breach of the peace occurred when the abbess came to Innsbruck
to seek support. Cusanus despatched a deacon to prevent her being
received, and Sigmund had the deacon cast into prison.
The nuns on the Sonnenburg were in a sorry plight. They dared not leave
the house, the usual tithes were not brought to them and there had been no
ingathering of the produce of their own harvest, for Cusanus threatened
excommunication to anyone having intercourse with them or looking after
their interests. They were nigh upon starvation (p. 277), and had recourse
to an unlawful step. They took a band of armed men into their service and
directed them to gather the tribute due to them. But the soldiers sent by
the archbishop put these men to flight and then stormed the cloister. The
nuns fled into the adjoining woods and found refuge in a house. ‘But we
were betrayed and had to fly again,’ they wrote in their chronicle;
‘during three days we were pursued and sought by the troops, repeatedly we
were so near to them that we saw them and they saw us. But the Virgin Mary
helped us to escape from them.’ Afra von Velseck had been put in
possession of their empty house, but Cusanus could not support her;
fearful of Sigmund he had fled from his bishopric and repaired to Rome.
The archduke conducted the nuns back and begged Verena to resign, offering
her a house near Innsbruck (p. 309). An envoy was accordingly despatched
to Rome to proffer terms of submission to Cusanus if only he would take
the ban of excommunication from the nuns. The bishop at last yielded to
the Pope’s command, though with a sufficiently bad grace. ‘I send you a
copy of Verena’s letter to me,’ he wrote to the envoy Natz, ‘she tells
lies as usual.’ And on the margin of her letter, as a comment on her
declaration that she had repeatedly sought absolution, he added the words,
‘this is a lie.’
Penance in its extreme form was undergone by the convent (p. 311), but as
Cusanus persistently denied to Sigmund the right of appointing a new
abbess, many letters passed before the conditions of peace were settled
and ratified. The correspondence, as Jäger remarks (p. 315), throws an
interesting light on the character of the women concerned. Verena, who
throughout maintained a proud dignity, retired from the convent on a
pension; Afra, who had resorted to various intrigues, finally renounced
all claims, and Barbara Schöndorfer came over from Brixen and was
installed as abbess.
Thus ended the quarrel about the privileges of Sonnenburg, which lasted
six years and led to the curtailment of many of its rights. The story
proves the inability of convents to preserve their independence, and shows
how their weakness was made the excuse for interference from without to
the detriment of the abbess in her position as landowner.
It remains to enquire how far the improvements effected in monastic life
by peaceful and by forcible means were lasting, and in what position the
nunnery stood at the beginning of the 16th century.
Some valuable information is given on the general state of monasticism by
a number of addresses delivered by Tritheim, abbot of Sponheim († 1516),
before the assembled chapter of Benedictine abbots between 1490 and
1492[1036]. Tritheim takes high rank among the older humanists; he was an
enlightened man according to the notions of his age, and collected a
wonderful and comprehensive library of books in many languages at
Sponheim. His interest in necromancy afterwards brought reproach on him
and he left his convent, but at the time when he pleaded before the
assembled abbots he was full of enthusiasm for his order and full of
regrets concerning it. In his address ‘on the ruin of the Benedictine
order,’ he pointed out how effectually the Bursfeld and other
congregations had worked in the past, but the beneficial results they
effected had passed away and little of their influence remained. If only
those who are vowed to religion, says Tritheim, would care more for
learning, which has been made so much more accessible by the invention of
printing, the outlook would not be so utterly hopeless.
In these addresses Tritheim takes no account of nunneries, but we can
discover his attitude towards nuns in an address to a convent[1037], the
keynote of which is that the women assembled there should cultivate love,
lowliness and patience under tribulation. The address is gentle and
dignified, but it shows that Tritheim, in common with other men of the
time, attached importance to nunneries chiefly for the piety they
cultivated. His belief in this respect is shared by the zealous reformer
Geiler von Kaisersberg († 1500), who preached many sermons before the nuns
of the convents of St Mary Magdalen (Reuerinnen), and of St Stephan at
Strasburg, and who likewise saw the beauty of a nun’s vocation only in her
devotional and contemplative attitude. We gather from his sermons, many of
which are preserved in the form in which they were written out by
nuns[1038], that a clear line of demarcation existed in his mind between
reformed and unreformed convents, and that while emphatic in denouncing
the ungodly ways of the inmates of unreformed houses, life in a reformed
house was comparable in his eyes to Paradise. Geiler’s efforts as a
reformer were so far crowned by success that the convent of St Mary
Magdalen to which he had devoted his efforts, outlived the attacks to
which it was exposed at the time of the Reformation.
The fact that Tritheim insists only on the devotional attitude of nuns is
the more noticeable as he visited at the convent of Seebach, the abbess of
which, Richmondis van der Horst, was equally praised for her own abilities
and the superior tone she maintained in her convent. For instances were
not wanting which show that intellectual tastes were still strong in some
nunneries and that women living the convent life were themselves authors
and took a certain amount of interest in the revival of classical
learning, as we shall see later.
Thus Butzbach (called Premontanus, † 1526), a pupil of Hegius, who became
a monk at Laach and was an admirer of Tritheim, was in correspondence with
Aleydis Ruyskop († 1507), a nun at Rolandswerth, who had written seven
homilies on St Paul in Latin and translated a German treatise on the mass
into Latin. He dedicated to her his work on ‘Distinguished learned women,’
which he took from the work of the Italian Benedictine Jacopo of Bergamo,
but from delicacy of feeling he omitted what Jacopo had inserted in praise
of women’s influence as wives and mothers[1039]. In this work Butzbach
compares Aleydis to Hrotsvith, to Hildegard and to Elisabeth of Schönau.
He also wrote to Gertrud von Büchel, a nun who practised the art of
painting at Rolandswerth, and he refers to Barbara Dalberg, niece of the
bishop of Worms, who was a nun at Marienberg, and to Ursula Cantor, who,
he declares, was without equal in her knowledge of theology.
But in spite of these instances and others, a growing indifference is
apparent, both among the advocates of the new culture and in the outer
world generally, to the intellectual occupation of women, and the training
of girls. In their far-reaching plans for an improved system of education
the humanists leave girls out of count, and dwell on their qualities of
heart rather than on their qualities of mind. That the training of the
mental faculties must be profitable in all cases for women does not occur
to them, though the idea is advanced with regard to men.
At the close of the 15th century Wimpheling († 1528) wrote a work on
matters of education entitled _Germania_. It is a conception of ideal
citizenship, and in it he insists that the burghers of Strasburg must let
their sons receive a higher education and learn Latin in the ‘gymnasium,’
of which he gives his plan, regardless of the vocation they intend to
embrace. Only a short chapter[1040] of the book refers to the training of
girls. Their parents are cautioned against placing them in nunneries,
which in the writer’s mind are little better than brothels. He advises
their being trained at home for domestic life and made to spin and weave
like the daughters of Augustus.
Similar tendencies are reflected in the works of Erasmus († 1536). His
Colloquies or Conversations introduce us to a number of women under
various aspects; and the want of purpose in convent life, the danger of
masterfulness in wives, the anomalous position of loose women, and the
general need there was of cultivating domestic qualities, are all in turn
discussed.
Two Colloquies turn on the convent life of women. In the first[1041] a
girl of seventeen declares herself averse to matrimony, and expresses her
intention of becoming a nun. The man who argues with her represents to her
that if she be resolved to keep her maidenhood, she can do so by remaining
with her parents and need not make herself from a free woman into a slave.
‘If you have a mind to read, pray or sing,’ he says, ‘you can go into your
chamber as much and as often as you please. When you have enough of
retirement, you can go to church, hear anthems, prayers, and sermons, and
if you see any matron or virgin remarkable for piety in whose company you
may get good, or any man who is endowed with singular probity from whom
you can gain for your bettering, you can have their conversation, and
choose the preacher who preaches Christ most purely. When once you are in
the cloister, all these things, which are of great assistance in promoting
true piety, you lose at once.’ And he enlarges on the formalities of
convent life, ‘which of themselves signify nothing to the advancement of
piety and make no one more acceptable in the eyes of Christ, who only
looks to purity of mind.’ The girl asks him if he be against the
institution of monastic life. He replies, ‘By no means. But as I will not
persuade anyone against it who is already in it, so I would undoubtedly
caution all young women, especially those of a generous temper, not to
precipitate themselves unadvisedly into that state from which there is no
getting out afterwards, and the more so because their chastity is more in
danger in the cloister than out of it, and you may do whatever is done
there as well at home.’
His arguments however are in vain; the girl goes into a convent. But the
next Colloquy, called the ‘Penitent Virgin[1042],’ describes how she
changed her mind and came out again. She was intimidated by the nuns
through feigned apparitions, and when she had been in the house six days
she sent for her parents and declared that she would sooner die than
remain there.
Another Colloquy[1043] shows how masterfulness in a wife destroyed all
possibility of domestic peace and happiness; yet another[1044] how a woman
of loose life was persuaded to adopt other ways on purely reasonable
grounds. Again we have a young mother who is persuaded to tend her child
herself, since the promotion of its bodily welfare does much towards
saving its soul[1045]. The most striking illustration however of the fact
that in the eyes of Erasmus the position of woman was changing is afforded
by the ‘Parliament of Women[1046],’ in which a great deal of talk leads to
no result. Cornelia opens and closes the sitting, and urges that it is
advisable that women should reconsider their position, for men, she says,
are excluding women from all honourable employments and making them ‘into
their laundresses and cooks, while they manage everything according to
their own pleasure.’ But the assembled women dwell on irrelevant detail
and harp on the distributions of class in a manner which shows that those
qualities which made their participation in public affairs possible or
advisable were utterly wanting among them. Erasmus passes no remarks
derogatory to women as such, and yet he leaves us to infer that they
cannot do better than devote their attention exclusively to domestic
concerns.
Judging by his writings and those of others who were active in the cause
of progress, there was a growing feeling that the domestic virtues needed
cultivation. A change in the position of women was not only imminent but
was felt to be desirable, and probably it was in conformity with what
women themselves wished. Both in England and on the Continent the idea
that virginity was in itself pleasing to God was no longer in the
foreground of the moral consciousness of the age; it was felt that the
duties of a mother took higher rank, and that the truest vocation of woman
was to be found in the circle of home. This view, as we shall see
presently, tallied with the views taken by the Protestant reformers and
prepared the way for the dissolution of nunneries.