8 - MONASTERIES AND THE LANDSCAPE

Summary

The type of property acquired by religious houses and their economic basis varied according to their location and size; the wealth and generosity of their founders, and their ability to promote endowments among family, peer group, and tenants; and the need and inclination of the communities themselves to develop their economic activities. The type of property conveyed to the religious orders varied as well: land, rents, and services deriving from land, natural materials, mills and ovens which yielded revenue from those who used them, spiritualia (churches and tithes), and fairs and markets which could bring valuable tolls and profits. This chapter examines the location and nature of the endowments received by the monastic houses in Yorkshire in order to demonstrate the impact which the expansion of the religious orders had on the pattern of landholding and settlement in the county. Chapter 9 explores the way in which these assets were exploited to produce a financial basis for the religious houses of the county.

First, however, a few words must be devoted to the Cistercian attitude to the economy, since part of the aim of these two chapters must be to discover if, as they were to claim, the White Monks were genuinely different in their practices. The Cistercian outlook on the type of financial assets which were deemed to be acceptable was a distinctive, though not unique one; but the chronology of Cistercian thought on economic matters is still a matter of lively debate. The Exordium parvum, chapter XV, ‘The Institutes of those monks who departed from Molesme’, contains several important statements about Cistercian economic practice.