Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-m6dg7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-14T03:56:50.033Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

60 - Daily Life in Late Medieval Monasteries

from Part IV - Forms of Monasticism in the Late Middle Ages

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 January 2020

Alison I. Beach
Affiliation:
Ohio State University
Isabelle Cochelin
Affiliation:
University of Toronto
Get access

Summary

In November 1519, Cardinal Wolsey (d. 1530), the most powerful religious leader in England, presented a series of proposed reforms to the Benedictine order of monks. Although Wolsey’s proposals have not survived, the Benedictines’ response to them has. In a letter to the cardinal, the order pleaded that the reforms should not be adopted since they would lead to “flight and apostasy,” and that “in our age (with the world now drawing to its close) those who seek austerity of life and regular observance are very few and very rare.” Many contemporary critics agreed with Wolsey on the necessity of monastic reforms. Indeed, the closing centuries of the Middle Ages had witnessed a host of monastic criticism. From humanists such as Erasmus to poets such as William Langland (d. c. 1386) or Chaucer (d. 1400), late medieval monks and nuns were frequently the subject of derision for, among other things, their perceived wealth and slothfulness.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Boureau, Alain. “Prout moris est iure: les moines et la question de la coutume (XIIe–XIIIe siècle).” Revue historique 303 (2001): 363402.Google Scholar
Bynum, Caroline Walker. Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women. Berkeley, CA, 1987.Google Scholar
Clark, James, ed. The Religious Orders in Pre-Reformation England. Woodbridge, 2002.Google Scholar
Gribbin, Joseph A. The Premonstratensian Order in Late Medieval England. Woodbridge, 2001.Google Scholar
Heale, Martin. The Dependent Priories of Medieval English Monasteries. Woodbridge, 2004.Google Scholar
Harvey, Barbara F. Living and Dying in England, 1100–1540. Oxford, 1993.Google Scholar
Harvey, Barbara F.Monastic Pittances in the Middle Ages.” In Food in Late Medieval England, edited by Woolgar, C. M., Serjeantson, D., and Waldron, T., 215–27. Oxford, 2006.Google Scholar
Hogg, James. “The Carthusians: History and Heritage.” In The Carthusians in the Low Countries: Studies in Monastic History and Heritage, edited by Pansters, Krijn, 3156. Leuven, 2014.Google Scholar
Hotchin, Julie. “Guidance for Men Who Minister to Women in the Liber de Reformatione Monasteriorum of Johannes Busch.” In What Nature Does Not Teach: Didactic Literature in the Medieval and Early-Modern Periods, edited by Ruys, J. F., 231–60. Turnhout, 2008.Google Scholar
Johnson, Sherri Franks. Monastic Women and Religious Orders in Late Medieval Bologna. Cambridge, 2014.Google Scholar
Knowles, David. The Religious Orders in England. 3 vols. Cambridge, 1948–59.Google Scholar
Knudsen, Christian. “Promiscuous Monks and Naughty Nuns: Poverty, Sex and Apostasy in Later Medieval England.” In Poverty and Prosperity: The Rich and the Poor in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, edited by Scott, A. and Kosso, C., 7582. Turnhout, 2012.Google Scholar
Makowski, Elizabeth M. English Nuns and the Law in the Middle Ages: Cloistered Nuns and Their Lawyers 1293–1540. Woodbridge, 2011.Google Scholar
McDonald, Peter. “The Papacy and Monastic Observance in the Later Middle Ages: The Benedictina in England.” Journal of Religious History 14 (1986): 117–32.Google Scholar
Mecham, June L. Shared Communities, Shared Devotions: Gender, Material Culture and Monasticism in Late Medieval Germany, edited by Beach, Alison I., Berman, Constance H., and Bitel, Lisa M.. Turnhout, 2014.Google Scholar
Mixson, James, and Roest, Bert, eds. A Companion to Observant Reform in the Late Middle Ages and Beyond. Leiden, 2015.Google Scholar
Oliva, Marilyn. The Convent and the Community in Late Medieval England: Female Monasteries in the Diocese of Norwich, 1350–1540. Woodbridge, 1998.Google Scholar
Salih, Sarah. Versions of Virginity in Late Medieval England. Woodbridge, 2001.Google Scholar
Stöber, Karen. Late Medieval Monasteries and Their Patrons: England and Wales, c.1300–1540. Woodbridge, 2007.Google Scholar
Tillotson, John H.Visitation and Reform of the Yorkshire Nunneries in the Fourteenth Century.” Northern History: A Review of the History of the North of England and the Borders 30 (1994): 121.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×