Chapter Four
The Thirteenth Century, 1216–1299
Fig. 32. Conwy Castle and Town. Built in northwest Wales by Edward I (r. 1272–1307) on the site of a monastery favored by the native Welsh princes, the complex at Conwy included a walled town and a formidable curtain-walled castle. The project cost £15,000, a sum equal to over half of the English crown’s annual tax revenues at that time.
51. Letters of Queen Isabella of Angoulême
King John died shortly after issuing Magna Carta, to be succeeded by his nine-year-old son, Henry III (r. 1216–72). The young king’s widowed mother was a southern French noblewoman who had been betrothed to a neighboring Frenchman, Hugh de Lusignan the Elder, before King John managed to marry her instead. She was unpopular at the English royal court and was excluded from her son’s regency government, to her chagrin. At the time she wrote these letters, she had returned to France, where her young daughter Joanna, sister of the little king, was betrothed to Hugh de Lusignan the Younger, son of Isabella’s former fiancé.
Source: trans. A. Crawford, Letters of the Queens of England, 1100–1547 (Dover, NH: Alan Sutton Publishing, 1994), pp. 51–53.
Isabella, Queen of England, to Her Son, Henry III [ca 1218–19]
To her dearest son, Henry, by the grace of God, the illustrious king of England, lord of Ireland, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, count of Anjou, I Isabella, by the same grace of God, his humble mother, queen of England, always pray for your safety and good fortune.
Your Grace knows how often we have begged you that you should give us help and advice in our affairs, but so far you have done nothing. Therefore we attentively ask you again to dispatch your advice quickly to us, but do not just gratify us with words. You can see that without your help and advice, we cannot rule over or defend our land. And if the truces made with the king of France were to be broken, this part of the country has much to fear. Even if we had nothing to fear from the king himself, we do indeed have such neighbors who are as much to be feared as the said king of France. So without delay you must formulate such a plan which will benefit this part of the country which is yours and ours; it is necessary that you do this to ensure that neither you nor we should lose our land through your failure to give any advice or help. We even beg you to act on our behalf, that we can have for the time being some part of those lands which our husband, your father, bequeathed to us. You know truly how much we owe him, but even if our husband had bequeathed nothing to us, you ought by right to give us aid from your resources, so that we can defend our land, since on this your honor and advantage depend.
Wherefore we are sending over to you Sir Geoffrey de Bodeville and Sir Waleran, entrusting to them many matters which cannot be set down in writing to you, and you can trust them in what they say to you on our behalf concerning the benefit to you and us.
Isabella, Queen of England, to Pandulph, Bishop-Elect of Norwich [ca June 1219]
Dearest father and lord Pandulph, by the grace of God, bishop-elect of Norwich, chamberlain of our lord the pope and legate of the apostolic see, I Isabella, by the same grace, queen of England, lady of Ireland, duchess of Normandy and Aquitaine, and countess of Anjou, greetings.
You will know that we have offered to restore to Bartholomew de Podio, at the entreaty of our son, the king of England, and of his Council, in entirety all his land, his possessions and the rents he received before we came here, with the exception of our castles, and also all his hostages, save for his two sons, whom we desire to hold in fair and fitting custody until we are without fear that he will seek to do us wrong, as he once sought to wrong the count of Augi and the other barons of the land in spite of us. If he refused this offer of ours, we offered him the sure judgment of our court, but he totally rejected all this. We are very surprised that our son’s Council should have instructed Sir Hugh de Lusignan and Sir Geoffrey Neville, seneschal of Poitou, to support the said Bartholomew against us. Granted that the king our son, or his Council, does not order that we be attacked, nevertheless we know many who will trouble us on Bartholomew’s behalf, and our son’s Council should be aware lest it issues any instructions which result in our being driven away from our son’s Council and affairs. It will be very serious if we are removed from our son’s Council. You should know that we have been reliably informed that the aforesaid Bartholomew came into the presence of the king of France and made it known to him that our land was part of his fief; he asked that the king order us to reinstate him in his lands. I certainly think he does not regard our son the king of England very highly, in as much as Bartholomew himself, running hither and thither, is working to harm the king and his people. You should know that Sir Hugh de Lusignan and the seneschal are more eager to carry out this order against us, than they would be if ordered to help us. For if indeed they have been so ordered, until now they have done very little. So we ask you to have orders given, by a letter from the king our son, to Sir Hugh de Lusignan and the seneschal of Poitou to help us and to take counsel for our land and the land of our lord the king. Please write back to us what your will is.
Isabella, Queen of England, Countess of March and Angoulême, to Her Son, Henry III [1220]
To her dearest son, Henry, by the grace of God, king of England, lord of Ireland, duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, count of Anjou, Isabella, by the same grace queen of England, lady of Ireland, duchess of Normandy and Aquitaine, countess of Anjou and Angoulême, sends health and her maternal benediction.
We hereby signify to you that when the counts of March and Eu departed this life, the lord Hugh de Lusignan remained alone and without heirs in Poitou, and his friends would not permit that our daughter should be united to him in marriage, because her age is so tender, but counseled him to take a wife from whom he might speedily hope for an heir; and it was proposed that he should take a wife in France, which if he had done, all your land in Poitou and Gascony would be lost. We, therefore, seeing the great peril that might accrue if that marriage should take place, when our counselors could give us no advice, ourselves married the said Hugh, count of March; and God knows that we did this rather for your benefit than our own. Wherefore we entreat you, as our dear son, that this thing may be pleasing to you, seeing it conduces greatly to the profit of you and yours; and we earnestly pray you that you will restore to him his lawful right, that is, Niort, the castles of Exeter and Rockingham, and 3500 marks, which your father, our former husband, bequeathed to us; and so, if it please you, deal with him, who is so powerful, that he may not remain against you, since he can serve you well—for he is well-disposed to serve you faithfully with all his power; and we are certain and undertake that he shall serve you well if you restore to him his rights, and, therefore, we advise that you take opportune counsel on these matters; and when it shall please you, you may send for our daughter, your sister, by a trusty messenger and your letters patent, and we will send her to you.
Questions: What concerns does Isabella express? How politically active does she seem to have been? What were her goals? What cards did she hold? How do you explain her surprising course of action as described in the final letter? How do these letters compare with those of Eleanor of Aquitaine (doc. 38)?
52. Henry de Bracton’s Notebook: Cases from the Royal Courts
One of the works of Henry de Bracton, a prolific thirteenth-century legal writer, is a collection of summaries of cases from the royal courts. The following cases, all from the year 1230, have been selected to show women as plaintiffs and defendants in civil cases in the royal courts. They can usefully be read in conjunction with the twelfth-century legal treatise by Glanville (doc. 36).
Source: trans. E. Amt from Bracton’s Note-Book, ed. F.W. Maitland (London: C.J. Clay & Sons, 1887), vol. 2, pp. 315–16, 325, 331–32.
382. Muriel, who was the wife of William de Ros, presented herself on the fourth day versus John Marshal concerning a plea to be heard about one third of 60 acres with appurtenances in Wilton, and one third of the pasture of Stanhale, and one third of 16 acres of meadow with appurtenances in the same vill of Wilton, and one third of 4 acres of land and three dwellings with appurtenances in the same vill of Wilton, which thirds she claims versus John Marshal, and she calls to warrant Hugh de Ros, who responds that he is not obliged to warrant that land and meadow to her, because his father William de Ros, by whose gift she claims that land, died and a jury was impaneled previously by assent of the same John and Hugh concerning the 7 virgates [one quarter of a hide, a variable unit] of land with appurtenances in Wilton, to review whether the said William died seised [in possession] of that land or not.
And the jurors said that the same William died seised of the 7 virgates with appurtenances, by which she recovered seisin of one third of the said 7 virgates with appurtenances as her dower. And because no mention was then made in the oath of the said jurors of the aforementioned 60 acres of land nor of the pasture nor of the meadow nor of the 4 acres, and this was omitted by the forgetfulness of the clerks of the bench, provision was made that the said jurors would be re-summoned to certify whether the said William died seised of the aforesaid 60 acres, the meadow, and the pasture, like the 7 virgates of land concerning which they previously swore. The jurors say that the said William died seised of them, just as of the said 7 virgates. And therefore it was decided that Muriel should recover her seisin and John should be in mercy. And be it known that John did not come and had a day at the bench after the jury was re-summoned, and therefore a jury was impaneled for his default, just as in the principal plea. . . .
395. Matilda, abbess of Romsey, was summoned to respond to Roger Wascelin as to how she prevented the same Roger from appointing a suitable clergyman for the church of Stokes, which was vacant, etc., and the right of appointment belongs to the said Roger because the same abbess has granted and handed over to Roger the manor of Stokes with all its appurtenances, except certain things which were specifically excepted in her charter, for a term of seven years.
And the abbess, through Richard the clerk, her attorney by the king’s writ, . . . comes and acknowledges her charter and that she granted the said manor to him to farm for the said term, with all its appurtenances except aids and tallages of men, and except that no one holding land on that manor could marry his daughter outside the fief without first making a fine with the same abbess, and except fines and reliefs of free men, which she withholds for herself with certain other things, no mention being made of the advowson, and [she acknowledges] that the advowson belongs to that manor. And therefore it has been decided that Roger should recover his right of presentation to the same church as tenant, and the abbess is in mercy, and Roger should have a writ of non obstante [a writ defending his right] to the officer of the bishop of Winchester.
403. Alicia, countess of Eu, seeks versus Emma de Belfou 2 carrucates [a plowland, a variable unit] of land with appurtenances in Gunthorpe and in Judham as her right, of which a certain Beatrice her ancestor was seised in her demesne by fee and inheritance, in the time of King Henry [II], grandfather of the lord king, in the year and on the day when he was alive and dead, . . . and the right to that land descended from Beatrice to a certain Henry as son and heir, and from the said Henry to a certain John as son and heir, and from the said John to a certain Henry as son [and heir], and from the said Henry to the same Alicia as daughter and heir. . . .
And Emma comes and defends her right now in all times and places, and she says that she does not have to respond to this writ because at another time the plea about this land was in the lord king’s court, so that a fine was made between Hubert de Burgh, earl of Kent and justiciar of England, plaintiff, and the same Emma, by a chirograph [a handwritten document made in duplicate or triplicate from the same piece of parchment and cut or marked so as to prove its veracity], and that neither she nor anyone on her behalf has made a claim, etc.
And the countess comes and says that this ought not to disadvantage her, because she was then overseas, so that she could not make her claim. And Emma cannot deny this. And therefore it has been decided that she should respond.
And Emma says that she holds this land only for her lifetime, and that this land ought to revert to the said Hubert de Burgh after her death, by the charter made between them, and that this is attested both by the chirograph between them in the lord king’s court and by the charter of the lord king which testifies to this, and she calls the same Hubert de Burgh to warrant this for her.
The same countess through her words and by the same right seeks versus Oliva de Montbegon two carrucates of land with appurtenances in Tuckford as her right [by descent from the same Beatrice.]
And Oliva comes and defends her right now, etc., and she says that she does not have to answer, because the same countess seeks 2 carrucates of land with their appurtenances, and the advowson of the church of the same vill is among the appurtenances, and the same countess makes no exception of the advowson, and therefore she does not want to answer this writ, unless the court so decides.
And the countess says that she claims nothing in that advowson, and she did not put it in her writ, and her ancestors were enfeoffed with 7 carrucates in the same vill without the advowson because those who enfeoffed her ancestors kept that advowson for themselves, and therefore it seems to her that she ought to be answered. Afterward they made an agreement, saving the right of the lord king, if it please the lord king, without whom no agreement can stand. The agreement is that the said Oliva and her heirs will hold the said land with appurtenances from the said countess, etc., for that same service which she previously did for it to the lord king, and both of them will do all in their power to keep the accord.
Questions: What kinds of land tenure are claimed or enforced? What standards of proof are maintained? What is the role of the jury in the first case? How did women use the courts? How do these cases fit with Glanville’s treatise (doc. 36)?
53. Persecution and Expulsion of English Jews
Hostility toward the Jewish minority became more active in the thirteenth century. The following chronicle extracts and royal documents show official and unofficial discrimination against the Jews, culminating in their expulsion from England in 1290. The focus on those Jews who were moneylenders is obvious and clearly contributed to anti-Semitism, but it is important to note that Christians too practiced and profited from usury, even though it was forbidden by canon law.
Sources: ed. A.E. Bland, English Economic History: Select Documents (London: G. Bell and Sons, 1914), pp. 45–47, 50–51; Trokelowe, trans. E.P. Cheney, Readings in English History Drawn from the Original Sources (Boston: Ginn & Company, 1922), pp. 230–31.
Ordinances of Henry III, 1253
The king has provided and decreed . . . that no Jew may dwell in England unless he do the king service, and that as soon as a Jew is born, whether male or female, in some way he shall serve the king. And that there shall be no communities of the Jews in England except in those places where such communities were in the time of the lord king John, the king’s father. And that in their synagogues the Jews, one and all, shall worship in subdued tones according to their rite, so that Christians hear it not. And that all Jews shall answer to the rector of the parish in which they dwell for all parochial duties belonging to their houses. And that no Christian nurse shall hereafter suckle or nourish the male child of any Jew, and that no Christian man or woman shall serve any Jew or Jewess, nor eat with them, nor dwell in their house. And that no Jew or Jewess shall eat or buy meat in Lent. And that no Jew shall disparage the Christian faith, nor publicly dispute touching the same. And that no Jew shall have secret intercourse with any Christian woman, nor any Christian man with a Jewess. And that every Jew shall wear on his breast a conspicuous badge. And that no Jew shall enter any church or any chapel save in passing through, nor stay therein to the dishonor of Christ. And that no Jew shall in any way hinder another Jew who is willing to be converted to the Christian faith. And that no Jew shall be received in any town without the special license of the king, except in those towns where Jews have been accustomed to dwell.
Threatened Expulsion of Salle of Canterbury, 1253
The king, etc., to the sheriff of Kent, etc. Know that we caused to be assessed before us upon Salle [Solomon], a Jew, a tallage to be rendered on Wednesday next before Whitsunday in the thirty-seventh year of our reign, and because the same Jew did not render his tallage on the same day he received a command on our behalf before the justices [appointed to the guardianship of the Jews] that within three days after the aforesaid Wednesday he should make his way to the port of Dover to go forth with his wife and never to return, forfeiting his lands to the king. We command you that by oath of twelve good and lawful men you make diligent enquiry what lands he had on the same day, and who holds them, and how much they are worth . . . and that you enquire also by oath, what chattels he had in all chirographs outside the chest, and what they are worth, and to whose hands they have come, and that you have it proclaimed that none of Salle’s debtors shall hereafter render a penny to him—let the proclamation be made in every hundred, city, etc.—and that you take into our hand all the lands, rents and tenements and chattels aforesaid, and safely. . . . [Salle avoided deportation by paying the tallage, and the following year successfully petitioned Henry III to lower his tallage.]
John of Trokelowe’s Chronicle
At this time [in 1290] there were Jews dwelling among the Christians in every city and famous town in England. King Edward [I], with the advice of his nobles, ordered them to leave the country, and to depart without fail on one day, and this was the decree: that whatever Jew should be found in England after the first warning should either be plunged in the baptismal font and thus faithfully acknowledge Christ, the son of God, or should have his head cut off. Immediately the Jews, struck with the fear of death, left England, carrying all their possessions with them. When their vessels had set sail and been carried out to sea, storms arose, severe winds blew, their ships were shattered, and many were drowned. Certain ones driven upon the shores of France, by the judgment of God, perished miserably. At length the king of France was touched with pity, although these were enemies of God, and since they were God’s creatures, although ungrateful ones, he permitted them to dwell in his kingdom for a short time, and to settle in Amiens. When this was reported in Rome, and reached the ears of the pope, he burned with rage and bitterly denounced the king.
Edward I’s Order, 1290
Edward . . . to the treasurer and barons of the exchequer, greeting. Whereas formerly in our Parliament at Westminster on the quinzaine of Saint Michael in the third year of our reign, to the honor of God and the profit of the people of our realm, we ordained and decreed that no Jew thenceforth should lend anything at usury to any Christian on lands, rents or other things, but that they should live by their commerce and labor; and the same Jews, afterward maliciously deliberating among themselves, contriving a worse sort of usury called “courtesy,” have depressed our people aforesaid on all sides under the color thereof, the last offense doubling the first; whereby, for their crimes and to the honor of the crucified [Christ], we have caused those Jews to go forth from our realm as traitors: We, wishing to swerve not from our former choice, but rather to follow it, do make totally null and void all manner of penalties and usuries and every sort thereof, which could be demanded by actions by reason of the Jewry from any Christians of our realm for any times whatsoever; wishing that nothing be in any wise demanded from the Christians aforesaid by reason of the debts aforesaid, save only the principal sums which they received from the Jews aforesaid; the amount of which debts we will that the Christians aforesaid verify before you by the oath of three good and lawful men by whom the truth of the matter may be better known, and thereafter pay the same to us at terms convenient to them to be fixed by you. And therefore we command you that you cause our grace so piously granted to be read in the aforesaid exchequer, and to be enrolled on the rolls of the same exchequer, and to be carefully guarded, according to the form above noted. . . .
Questions: What seem to be Christian concerns about Jews? What evidence is there of a shift in English attitudes toward Jews over time? Are there any hints of sympathy for the Jews, any softening of older defamations, slanders, and crude caricatures (as seen in docs. 42, 50)?
54. The Ancrene Wisse
The monastic life was not the only way to dedicate oneself to religion; many men and even more women became anchorites and anchoresses, or hermits. While early Christian hermits had usually dwelt in near total isolation and very harsh conditions, the hermits of medieval England lived rather different lives. The following excerpts come from a set of guidelines produced for a small group of anchoresses, sometime in the first half of the thirteenth century.
Source: trans. J. Morton, The Nun’s Rule, Being the Ancren Riwle Modernised (London: De La More Press, 1905), pp. 164–65, 237–39, 278–79, 312–20; revised.
2. Of Temptations
. . . An anchoress thinks that she shall be most strongly tempted in the first twelve months after she shall have begun her monastic life, and in the twelve thereafter; and when, after many years, she feels them so strong, she is greatly amazed, and is afraid lest God may have quite forgotten her, and cast her off. No, it is not so! In the first years, it is nothing but ball-play; but now, observe well, by a comparison, how it fares. When a man has brought home a new wife, he, with great gentleness, observes her manners. Though he sees in her some thing that he does not approve, yet he takes no notice of it, and puts on a cheerful countenance toward her, and carefully uses every means to make her love him, affectionately in her heart; and when he is well assured that her love is truly fixed upon him, he may then, with safety, openly correct her faults, which he previously bore with as if he knew them not: he becomes very stern, and assumes a severe countenance, in order still to test whether her love toward him might give way. At last when he perceives that she has been completely instructed—that for nothing that he does to her does she love him less, but more and more, if possible, from day to day, then he shows her that he loves her sweetly, and does whatever she desires, as for one whom he loves and knows—then all that sorrow becomes joy. If Jesus Christ, your spouse, acts thus to you, my dear sisters, it should not seem strange to you. For in the beginning it is only courtship, to draw you into love; but as soon as he perceives that he is on a footing of affectionate familiarity with you, he will have less forbearance with you; but after the trial—in the end—then is the great joy. . . .
3. Confession shall be complete, that is, all said to one man, from childhood. When the poor widow would clean her house, she gathers into a heap, first of all, all the largest sweepings, and then shovels it out; after this, she comes again and heaps together all that was left before, and shovels it out also; again, upon the small dust, if it is very dusty, she sprinkles water, and sweeps it quite away after all the rest. In like manner must he that confesses himself, after the great sins, shovel out the small, and if the dust of light thoughts fly up too much, sprinkle tears on them, so they will not blind the eyes of the heart. Whoever hides anything has told nothing. . . . We are told of a holy man who lay on his deathbed, and was unwilling to confess a particular sin from his childhood, and his abbot urged him by all means to confess it. He answered and said that it was not necessary, because he was only a child when he did it. Reluctantly, however, at last, through the searching exhortations of the abbot, he told it, and died soon thereafter. After his death, he came one night and appeared to his abbot in snow-white garments, as one who was saved, and said that if he had not fully confessed that particular thing which he did in childhood, he should certainly have been condemned among those who are lost. . . .
4. Confession must also be candid, that is, made without any concealment, and not palliated by comparisons, nor gently touched upon. But the words should be spoken plainly according to the deeds. It is a sign of hatred when men reprehend severely a thing that is greatly hated. If you hate your sin, why do you speak of it in gentle terms? Why do you hide its foulness? Speak out its shame reproachfully, and rebuke it very sharply, if you would indeed confound the devil. “Sir,” says the woman, “I have had a lover,” or, “I have been foolish.” This is not plain confession. Put no cloak over it. Take away the accessories, that is, the circumstances. Uncover yourself and say, “Sir, I beg the mercy of God, and thine! I am a foul stud mare: a stinking whore.” Give your enemy a foul name, and call your sin by its name without disguise, that is, conceal nothing at all that is connected with it. Yet what is too foul may not be spoken. The foul deed need not be named by its own foul name. It is sufficient to speak of it in such a manner that the father confessor may clearly understand what you mean. . . .
6. Of Penance
. . . Let not anyone handle herself too gently, lest she deceive herself. She will not be able, for her life, to keep herself pure, nor to maintain her chastity without two things, as Saint Aelred [of Rievaulx] wrote to his sister. The first thing is giving pain to the flesh by fasting, by watching, by flagellations, by wearing coarse garments, by a hard bed, with sickness, and with much labor. The second thing is the moral qualities of the heart, such as devotion, compassion, mercy, pity, charity, humility, and other virtues of this kind. “Sir,” you answer me, “does God sell his grace? Is not grace a free gift?” My dear sisters, although purity is not bought from God, but is given freely, ingratitude resists it, and renders those who will not cheerfully submit to labor for it unworthy to possess so excellent a thing. Who was ever chaste amidst pleasures and ease, and carnal abundance? Who ever carried fire within her that did not burn? Shall not a pot that boils rapidly be emptied of some of the water, or have cold water cast into it, and the burning fuel withdrawn? The pot of the belly that is always boiling with food, and especially with drink, is such a near neighbor to that ill-disciplined member that it imparts to it the fire of its heat. Yet many anchoresses, more is the harm, are of such fleshly wisdom, and so exceedingly afraid lest their head ache, and lest their body be too enfeebled, and are so careful of their health, that the spirit is weakened and sickens in sin, and they who ought alone to heal their soul with contrition of heart and mortification of the flesh, become physicians and healers of the body. Did Saint Agatha do so? She who answered and said to our Lord’s messenger who brought her salve to heal her breasts, “Fleshly medicine I never applied to myself.” . . . Wisdom is the mother and the nurse of all virtues; but we often call that wisdom which is not wisdom. For it is true wisdom to prefer the health of the soul to that of the body, and, when we cannot have them both, to choose bodily hurt rather than, by too powerful temptations, the destruction of the soul. . . .
8. Of Domestic Matters
I said at the outset that you should not, like unwise people, promise to keep any of the external rules. I say the same still; nor do I write them down for any but you alone. I say this in order that other anchoresses may not say that I, by my own authority, am making new rules for them. Nor do I command that they observe them, and you may even change them, whenever you wish, for better ones. In regard to things of this kind that have been in use before, it matters little.
Enough has been said about sight, and of speech, and of the other senses. Now this last part, as I promised you at the commencement, is divided and separated into seven small sections.
Men esteem a thing to be less precious when they have it often, and therefore you should be, as lay brethren are, partakers of the holy communion only fifteen times a year: at midwinter [25 December]; Candlemas [2 February]; Twelfth-day [6 January]; on Sunday halfway between that and Easter, or our Lady’s day [25 March], if it is near the Sunday, because of its being a holiday; Easter day; the third Sunday thereafter; Holy Thursday [Ascension Day, forty days after Easter]; Whitsunday [Pentecost, six weeks after Easter]; and midsummer day [24 June]; Saint Mary Magdalen’s day [22 July]; the Assumption [15 August]; the Nativity [of the Virgin Mary, 8 September]; Saint Michael’s day [29 September]; All Saints’ day [1 November]; Saint Andrew’s day [30 November]. And before all these days, see that you make a full confession and undergo discipline; but never from any man, only from yourselves. And forego your pittance for one day. And if any thing happens out of the usual order, so that you cannot receive the sacrament at these set times, you may make up for it on the next Sunday, or if the other set time is near, you may wait till then.
You shall eat twice every day from Easter until the later Holyrood day [14 September], which is during harvest time, except on Fridays, and ember days [days of fasting and prayer in each season of the year], and procession days and vigils. In those days, and in the Advent, you shall not eat anything white, except when necessity requires it. The other half year you shall fast always, except on Sundays.
You shall eat no flesh nor lard except if you are gravely ill, and whoever is infirm may eat potage without scruple, and accustom yourselves to little drink. Nevertheless, dear sisters, your meat and your drink have seemed to me less than I would have it. Fast no day upon bread and water, unless you have permission. There are anchoresses who make their meals with their friends outside the convent. That is too much friendship, because, of all orders, this is most contrary to the order of an anchoress, who is quite dead to the world. . . . Make no banquetings, nor encourage any strange vagabond fellows to come to the gate; though no other evil may come of it but their immoderate talking, it might sometimes prevent heavenly thoughts.
It is not fit that an anchoress should be liberal with other men’s alms. Would we not laugh out loud to scorn a beggar who should invite men to a feast? Mary and Martha were two sisters, but their lives were different. You anchorites have taken to yourselves Mary’s part, whom our Lord himself commended. . . . Housewifery is Martha’s part, and Mary’s part is quietness and rest from all the world’s din, that nothing may hinder her from hearing the voice of God. And observe what God says, “that nothing shall take away this part from you.” Martha has her office; leave her alone, and sit with Mary stone-still at God’s feet, and listen to him alone. Martha’s office is to feed and clothe poor men, as befits the mistress of a house. Mary ought not to intermeddle in it, and if anyone blames her, God himself defends her for it, as holy writ bears witness. On the other hand, an anchoress ought to take sparingly only that which is necessary for her. How, then, can she be generous? She must live upon alms as frugally as she can, and not gather that she may give it away afterward. She is not a housewife. . . .
You shall not possess any beast, my dear sisters, except a cat. An anchoress that has cattle appears as Martha was, a better housewife than anchoress; nor can she in any wise be Mary, with peacefulness of heart. For then she must think of the cow’s fodder, and of the herdsman’s hire, flatter the hayward, defend herself when her cattle are shut up in the pinfold, and moreover pay the damage. . . . An anchoress ought not to have anything that draws her heart outward. Carry on no business. An anchoress that is a buyer and seller sells her soul to the chapman of hell. Do not take charge of other men’s property in your house, nor of their cattle, nor their clothes, neither receive under your care the church vestments, nor the chalice, unless force or great fear compels you, for much harm has often come from such caretaking. Let no man sleep within your walls. If, however, great necessity should cause your house to be used, see that, as long as it is used, you have inside there with you a woman of blameless life day and night.
Because no man sees you, nor do you see any man, you may be well content with your clothes, be they white, be they black; only see that they be plain, and warm, and well made, of skins well tawed; and have as many as you need, for your bed as well as for your back.
Next to your flesh you shall wear no flaxen cloth, unless it be of hard and coarse canvas. . . . You shall sleep in a garment and with a belt. Wear no iron, nor haircloth, nor hedgehog-skins; and do not beat yourselves with a scourge of leather thongs, nor a leaded one; and do not cause yourselves to bleed with holly nor with briars without leave of your confessor; and do not use too many flagellations at any time. Let your shoes be thick and warm. . . . Have neither ring, nor brooch, nor ornamented girdle, nor gloves, nor any such thing that is not proper for you to have. . . .
You shall not send, nor receive, nor write letters without leave. You shall have your hair cut four times a year to unburden your head, and be bled as often, and oftener if it is necessary; but if anyone can dispense with this, I will permit it. When you are bled, do nothing that may be irksome to you for three days, but talk with your maidens, and divert yourselves together with instructive tales. You may often do so when you feel dispirited, or are grieved about some worldly matter, or sick. Thus wisely take care of yourselves when you are bled, and keep yourselves in such rest that long thereafter you may labor the more vigorously in God’s service, and also when you feel any sickness, for it is great folly, for the sake of one day, to lose ten or twelve. Wash yourselves wheresoever it is necessary, as often as you please.
When an anchoress does not have her food at hand, let two women be employed, one who stays always at home, another who goes out when necessary; and let her be very plain, or of sufficient age. . . . Let neither of the women either carry to her mistress or bring from her any idle tales, or new tidings, nor sing to one another, nor speak any worldly speeches, nor laugh, nor play, so that any man who saw it might turn it to evil. . . . No servant of an anchoress ought, properly, to ask stated wages, except food and clothing, with which, and with God’s mercy, she may do well enough. . . . Whoever has any hope of so high a reward will gladly serve, and easily endure all grief and all pain. With ease and abundance men do not arrive at heaven. . . .
Questions: How hermit-like were anchoresses? Which aspects of the Ancrene Wisse would be relevant to ordinary laypeople? Which are specific to female anchoresses? What was the appeal of such a life? Why might it appeal more to women than to men?
55. Thomas of Eccleston on the Coming of the Friars Minor to England
The religious ferment of the High Middle Ages gave rise to many new religious orders, including the mendicant or “begging” orders, the Dominicans and Franciscans, in the early thirteenth century. In the extracts below, the Franciscan brother Thomas, later called “of Eccleston,” tells of the arrival of the Franciscans in England in 1224.
Source: trans. H. Rothwell, English Historical Documents, Vol. 3: 1189–1327 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1975), pp. 680–83.
Of the First Coming of the Friars Minor to England
In A.D. 1224, in the time of the lord pope Honorius [III], in the same year, that is, in which he confirmed the Rule of the blessed Francis, the eighth year of the reign of the lord king Henry [III], son of John, on [10 September,] the Tuesday after the feast of the nativity of the Blessed Virgin, which in that year fell on a Sunday, the friars minor first arrived in England at Dover, being four clerks and five laymen.
The clerks were these: first, Brother Agnellus of Pisa, in orders a deacon, in age about thirty, who had at the last general chapter been designated by the blessed Francis [of Assisi] as minister provincial for England: he had been custodian at Paris and had borne himself so discreetly as to win the highest favor among the brethren and lay folk alike by reason of his renowned holiness.
The second was Brother Richard of Ingworth, an Englishman by birth, a priest and preacher, and an older man. He was the first of the order to preach to people north of the Alps. In course of time, under Brother John Parenti of happy memory, he was sent to Ireland to be minister provincial; he had been Brother Agnellus’s vicar in England while Agnellus himself went to the general chapter in which the translation was effected of the remains of Saint Francis and had set a notable example of exceeding holiness. When he had fulfilled a ministry faithful and well pleasing to God, he was absolved in the general chapter by Brother Albert of happy memory from holding any further offices among the brethren, and, fired by zeal for the faith, set out for Syria [on pilgrimage] and there, making a good death, fell on sleep.
The third was Brother Richard of Devon, also an Englishman by birth, in orders an acolyte, in age a youth; he left us many examples of long-suffering and obedience. For after he had traveled through diverse provinces under obedience, he lived, though frequently worn out by quartan fevers, for eleven whole years at the place [a small Franciscan house] at Romney.
The fourth was Brother William of Ashby, still a novice wearing the hood of a probationer, likewise English by birth, young in years and in standing. For a long time he endured various offices in praiseworthy fashion, the spirit of Jesus Christ aiding him, and he showed us examples of humility and poverty, love and gentleness, obedience and patience and every perfection. For when Brother Gregory, minister in France, asked him if he willed to go to England, he replied that he did not know. And when the minister marveled at this reply, Brother William at length said the reason he did not know what he wished was that his will was not his own but the minister’s. For this reason he willed whatsoever the minister willed him to will. Brother William of Nottingham testified of him that he was perfect in obedience, for when he offered him the choice of the place where he would live, he said that that place best pleased him which it pleased the brother to appoint for him. And because he was specially gifted with charm and a most prepossessing gentleness, he called forth the goodwill of many layfolk toward the order. Moreover, he brought into the way of salvation many persons of diverse positions, ages and ranks, and in many ways he gave convincing proof that sweet Jesus knew how to do marvelous things. . . . At a time of fleshly temptation he mutilated himself in his zeal for chastity. After which he sought the pope, who, though severely reproving him, granted him a dispensation so that he might celebrate the divine offices. After many years this same William died peacefully in London. . . .
These nine [members of the Franciscan mission] were out of charity conveyed across to England and courteously provided for in their need by the monks of Fécamp. When they reached Canterbury, they stayed for two days at the priory of the Holy Trinity, then without delay four of them set off to London, namely Brother Richard of Ingworth, Brother Richard of Devon, Brother Henry and Brother Melioratus. The other five went to the priests’ hospital, where they remained until they had found somewhere to live. In fact, a small room was soon afterward granted them underneath the schoolhouse, where they sat all day as if they were enclosed. But when the scholars returned home in the evening they went into the schoolhouse in which they had sat and there made themselves a fire and sat beside it. And sometimes they set on the fire a little pot containing dregs of beer when it was time to drink at the evening collation, and they put a dish in the pot and drank in turn, and one by one they spoke some edifying words. And one who was their associate in this unfeigned simplicity and holy poverty, and merited to be a partaker in it, bore witness that their drink was sometimes so thick that when it had to be heated they put water in and so drank it joyfully. . . .
Of the First Separation of the Brethren
Now when they reached London, the four brethren already named went to the Friars Preachers [the Dominicans], and were graciously received by them. They remained with them for fifteen days, eating and drinking what was set before them quite as if they were members of the house. After this, they rented a house for themselves in Cornhill and made cells for themselves in it, stuffing grasses into gaps in the cells. And they remained in that simple state until the following summer, with no chapel, for they had not yet been granted the privilege of setting up altars and celebrating the divine offices in their own places.
And without delay, before the feast of All Saints [1 November], and even before Brother Agnellus came to London, Brother Richard of Ingworth and Brother Richard of Devon set out for Oxford and there were similarly received in the friendliest manner by the Friars Preachers; they ate in their refectory and slept in their dormitory like members of their house for eight days. After that they rented a house for themselves in the parish of St. Ebbe’s, and there remained without a chapel until the following summer. There sweet Jesus sowed a grain of mustard-seed that afterward became greater than all herbs. From there Brother Richard of Ingworth and Brother Richard of Devon set out for Northampton and were taken in at the hospital there. Afterward they rented a house for themselves in the parish of St. Giles, where the first guardian was Brother Peter the Spaniard, he who wore an iron corselet next to his skin and gave many other examples of perfection. . . .
Sir John Travers first received the brethren in Cornhill and rented a house for them, and a certain Lombard, a layman, Henry by name, was made its guardian. He then for the first time learned to read, by night, in the church of Saint Peter, Cornhill. Afterward he was made vicar of the English province while Brother Agnellus was going to the general chapter. In the vicariate he had, however, as coadjutor Brother Richard of Ingworth. But he did not support such a high state of happiness unto the end, rather growing luxurious in these honors and estranged from his true self, and he apostatized from the order in pitiable fashion.
It is worthy of record that in the second year of the administration of Brother Peter, the fifth minister in England, in the thirty-second year, to wit, from the coming of the brethren to England, the brethren living in England in forty-nine places were numbered at twelve hundred and forty-two.
Questions: How was the Franciscan mission organized? What role does divine intervention play in Thomas’s story? What do we learn about the organization of the order in general? What characteristics of the Franciscan brothers were most highly prized? What signs are there of the absolute poverty promoted by the order?
56. The Baronial Cause: The Song of Lewes
Despite his early reaffirmation of Magna Carta, King Henry III (r. 1216–72) found his reign plagued by clashes with his barons, which eventually ended in civil war. The main issue was the barons’ insistence that the king should be guided by their advice rather than that of his “foreign favorites”—a problem foreshadowed in Magna Carta. Earl Simon de Montfort, formerly a close friend of the king, emerged as the leader of the rebellious barons in the 1260s and led them to an important victory over the king at the Battle of Lewes in 1264. A number of political songs supporting the baronial cause survive from this era; the excerpts below come from one such song, written shortly after the battle.
Source: trans. T. Wright, The Political Songs of England, from the Reign of John to That of Edward II (London: The Camden Society, 1839), pp. 72–73, 75–77, 96–101, 102, 103–6, 108–9, 110–11, 112–14, 114–17, 117–18, 120–21; revised.
Write quickly, O pen of mine, for, writing such things as follow, I bless and praise with my tongue thee, O right hand of God the Father, Lord of virtues, who gives prosperity at thy nod to thine own, whenever it is thy will. Let all those people now learn to put their trust in thee, whom they, who are now scattered, wished to destroy—they of whom the head is now taken, and the members are in captivity; the proud people is fallen; the faithful are filled with joy. Now England breathes in the hope of liberty; may the grace of God grant this land prosperity! The English were despised like dogs; but now they have raised their head over their vanquished enemies.
In the year of grace 1264, and on [14 May,] the Wednesday after the festival of Saint Pancras, the army of the English bore the brunt of a great battle at the castle of Lewes: for reasoning yielded to rage, and life to the sword. They met on the fourteenth of May, and began the battle of this terrible strife; which was fought in the county of Sussex, and in the bishopric of Chichester. The sword was powerful; many fell; truth prevailed; and the false men fled. For the Lord of valor resisted the perjured men, and defended those who were pure with the shield of truth. . . .
May the Lord bless Simon de Montfort! and also his sons and his army! who, exposing themselves magnanimously to death, fought valiantly, condoling the lamentable lot of the English who, trodden under foot in a manner scarcely to be described, and almost deprived of all their liberties, nay, of their lives, had languished under hard rulers, like the people of Israel under Pharaoh, groaning under a tyrannical devastation. . . . They call Simon a seducer and a traitor, but his deeds prove him to be a true man. Traitors fall off in time of need; they who do not fly from death are those who stand for the truth. . . .
The earl [Simon] had few men used to arms; the royal party was numerous, having assembled the disciplined and greatest warriors in England, such as were called the flower of the army of the kingdom; those who were prepared with arms from among the Londoners were three hundred set before several thousand, so they were contemptible to those, and were detested by those who were experienced. Much of the earl’s army was raw; fresh in arms, they knew little of war. The tender youth, only now girded with a sword, stands in the morning in battle accustoming himself to arms; what wonder if such an unpracticed tyro [a beginner] would fear, and if the powerless lamb dread the wolf? Thus those who fight for England are inferior in military discipline, and they are much fewer than the strong men who boasted in their own valor, because they thought they would safely, and without danger, swallow up, as it were, all of the earl’s helpers. Moreover, of those whom the earl had brought to the battle, and from whom he hoped for no little help, many soon withdrew from fear, and took flight as though they were amazed; and of three parts, one deserted. But the earl with a few faithful men never yielded. . . .
Lo! we are touching the root of the perturbation of the kingdom of which we are speaking, and of the dissension of the parties who fought the said battle. The objects at which these two parties aimed were different. The king, with his [supporters], wished thus to be free: . . . and they said he would cease to be king, deprived of the rights of a king, unless he could do whatever he pleased; they said it was no part of the duty of the magnates of the kingdom to determine whom he should prefer to his earldoms, or on whom he should confer the custody of castles, or whom he would have to administer justice to the people, and to be chancellor and treasurer of the kingdom. He wanted to have everyone at his own will, and counsellors from whatever nation he chose, and all ministers at his own discretion; while the barons of England were not to interfere with the king’s actions, the command of the prince having the force of law, and what he may dictate binding upon everybody at his pleasure. For [they argued that] every earl also is thus his own master, giving to every one of his own men both as much as he will, and to whom he will; he commits castles, lands, revenues, to whom he will; and although he be a subject, the king permits it all. Which, if he do well, is profitable to the doer; if not, he must himself see to it; the king will not hinder him from injuring himself. Why is the prince worse in condition, [they asked,] when the affairs of the baron, the knight, and the freeman, are thus managed? Therefore, [the king’s supporters argued,] they who wish to diminish the king’s power aim at making the king a slave, taking away his princely dignity; they wish by sedition to make the royal power captive and reduce it into guardianship and subjection, and to disinherit the king, making him unable to reign as fully as the kings who preceded him have done, who were in no way subjected to their people, but administered their own affairs at will, and conferred what they had to confer according to their own pleasure. This is the king’s argument, which has an appearance of fairness, and this is alleged in defense of the right of the kingdom.
But now let my pen turn to the other side: let me describe the object at which the barons aim; and when both sides have been heard, let the arguments be compared, and then let us come to a final judgment, so that it may be clear which side is the truest. The people are more prone to obey the truer party. Let therefore the party of the barons speak for itself, and proclaim in order by what zeal it is led. In the first place, this party protests openly that it has no designs against the kingly honor; no, it seeks the contrary, and tries to reform and magnify the kingly condition, just as if the kingdom were ravaged by enemies, for then it would not be reformed without the barons, who would be the most capable and proper persons for this purpose; and should anyone then hang back, the law would punish him as a perjurer and traitor to the king, who owes to his lord, when he is in danger, all the aid he can give to support the king’s honor, when the kingdom is, as it were, near its end by devastation.
The adversaries of the king are enemies who make war upon him, and counsellors who flatter the king, who seduce their prince with deceitful words, and who lead him into error by their double tongues: these are adversaries worse than those who are obstinate; it is these who pretend to be good while they are seducers, and procurers of their own advancement; they deceive the incautious, whom they render less vigilant by means of things that please them, whereby they are not provided against, but are considered as prudent advisers. Such men can deceive more than those who act openly, as they are able to make an outward appearance of being not hostile. What if such wretches, and such liars, should haunt the prince, capable of all malice, of fraud, of falsehood, excited by the spurs of envy, and should seek to do that extreme wickedness, by which they should sacrifice the privileges of the kingdom to their own ostentation, and they should contrive all kinds of hard reasons, which by degrees should confound the commonalty, should bruise and impoverish the mass of the people, and should subvert and infatuate the kingdom, so that no one could obtain justice, except he who would encourage the pride of such men as these by large supplies of money? Who could submit to the establishment of such an injury? And if such men, by their conduct, should change the state of the kingdom; if they should banish justice to put injustice in its place; if they should call in strangers and trample upon the natives; and if they should subdue the kingdom to foreigners; if they should not care for the magnates and nobles of the land, and should place contemptible persons over them; and if they should overthrow and humiliate the great; if they should pervert and turn upside down the order of things; if they should leave the measures that are best, to advance those which are worst—do not those who act thus devastate the kingdom? Although they do not make war upon it with foreign arms, yet they fight with diabolical arms, and they violate the constitution of the kingdom in a lamentable manner. . . .
Thus, in order that none of the aforesaid things may happen, which may hinder peace and good customs, but that the zeal of the experienced men may find what is most expedient for the utility of the many, why is a reform not permitted, with which no corruption shall be mixed? For the king’s mercy and the king’s majesty ought to approve the endeavors which amend grievous laws so that they may be milder, and become less onerous to men but more pleasing to God. . . .
Since it is clear that the barons have a right to do all this, it remains to answer the king’s arguments. The king wishes to be free by the removal of his guardians, and he wishes not to be subject to his inferiors, but to be placed over them; he wishes to command his subjects and not be commanded; he wishes to be humiliated neither to himself nor to those who are his officers. For the officers are not set over the king; on the contrary, they are rather the noble men who support the law. Otherwise there would not be one king of one state, but they to whom the king was subject would reign equally. Yet this inconvenience also, though it seems so great, is easily solved with the assistance of God: for we believe that God wills truth, and it is through him that we dissolve this doubt as follows. He by whom the universe is ruled in pure majesty is said to be, and is in truth, one king alone, who wants neither help whereby he may reign, nor even counsel, in as much as he cannot err. Therefore, all-powerful and all-knowing, he excels in infinite glory all those whom he has appointed to rule and, as it were, to reign under him over his people, who may fail, and who may err, and who cannot avail by their own independent strength, and vanquish their enemies by their own valor, nor govern kingdoms by their own wisdom, but in an evil manner wander in the track of error. They require help and counsel which should set them right. The king says, “I agree to your reasoning; but the choice of these must be left to my option; I will associate with myself whom I will, by whose support I will govern all things; and if my ministers should be insufficient, if they lack sense or power, or if they harbor evil designs, or are not faithful, but are perhaps traitors, I desire that you will explain, why I ought to be confined to certain persons, when I might succeed in obtaining better assistance?” The reason of this is quickly declared, if it be considered what the constraint on the king is: constraint does not necessarily deprive of liberty, nor does every restriction take away power. Princes desire free power; those who reign decline miserable servitude. To what will a free law bind kings?—to prevent them from being stained by an adulterated law. And this constraint is not one of slavery, but is rather an enlargement of the kingly faculty. . . .
It is hard to love one who does not love us; it is hard not to despise one who despises us; it is hard not to resist one who ruins us; we naturally applaud him who favors us. It is not the part of a prince to bruise, but to protect; neither is it the part of a prince to oppress, but rather to deserve the favor of his people by numerous benefits conferred upon them, as Christ by his grace has deserved the love of all. If a prince love his subjects, he will necessarily be repaid with love; if he reign justly, he will of necessity be honored; if the prince err, he ought to be recalled by those whom his unjust denial may have grieved, unless he be willing to be corrected; if he is willing to make amends, he ought to be both raised up and aided by these same persons. Let a prince maintain such a rule of reigning, that it may never be necessary for him to avoid depending on his own people. The ignorant princes who confound their subjects will find that those who are unconquered will not thus be tamed. If a prince thinks that he alone has more truth, more knowledge, and more intelligence than the whole people, that he abounds more in grace and the gifts of God, if it be not presumption, but it be truly so, then his instruction will visit the true hearts of his subjects with light, and will instruct his people with moderation. . . .
Therefore, let the community of the kingdom advise; and let it be known what the generality thinks to whom their own laws are best known. Nor are all those of the country so uninstructed, as not to know better than strangers the customs of their own kingdom, which have been bequeathed from father to son. They who are ruled by the laws know those laws best; they who experience them are best acquainted with them; and since it is their own affairs which are at stake, they will take more care, and will act with an eye to their own peace. They who want experience can know little; they who are not steadfast will profit the kingdom little. Hence it may be concluded that it concerns the community to see what sort of men ought justly to be chosen for the utility of the kingdom; they who are willing and know how, and are able to profit it, such men should be made the councilors and coadjutors of the king, to whom are known the various customs of their country, who feel that they suffer themselves when the kingdom suffers; and who will guard the kingdom, lest, if hurt be done to the whole, the parts have reason to grieve while they suffer along with it; who rejoice, when it has cause to rejoice, if they love it. . . . Therefore, let a prince seek such [councilors] as may condole with the community, who have a motherly fear lest the kingdom should suffer. But if anyone be not moved by the ruin of the many . . . he is not fit to rule over the many, since he is entirely devoted to his own interest, and to none other. A man who feels for others is agreeable to the community; but a man who does not feel for others, who possesses a hard heart, cares not if misfortunes fall upon the many—such walls are no defense against misfortunes. Therefore, if the king lacks the wisdom to choose by himself those who are capable of advising him, it is clear, from what has been said, what ought to be done. For it is a thing which concerns the community to see that miserable wretches not be made the leaders of the royal dignity, but the best and chosen men, and the most approved that can be found. For since the governance of the kingdom is either the safety or perdition of all, it is of great consequence who they are that have the custody of the kingdom, just as it is in a ship: all things are thrown into confusion if unskilled people guide it; if any one of the passengers belonging to it who is placed in the ship abuse the rudder, it matters not whether the ship be governed prosperously or not. So those who ought to rule the kingdom, let the care be given to them, if any one of the kingdom does not govern himself rightly; he goes on a wrong path which perhaps he has himself chosen. The affairs of the generality are best managed if the kingdom is directed in the way of truth. And, moreover, if the subjects labor to dissipate their property, those who are set over them may restrain their folly and temerity, lest by the presumption and imbecility of fools, the power of the kingdom be weakened, and courage be given to enemies against the kingdom. For whatever member of the body be destroyed, the strength of the body is diminished thereby. So if it be allowed even that men may abuse what belongs to themselves, when it be injurious to the kingdom, many others, immediately repeating the injurious liberty, will so multiply the wildness of error, that they will ruin the whole. Nor ought it properly to be named liberty, which permits fools to govern unwisely; but liberty is limited by the bounds of the law, and when those bounds are despised, it should be known as error. . . . Therefore the king’s argument concerning his subjects, who are ruled at their own choice by whom they will, is by this sufficiently answered and overthrown; since every one who is subject is ruled by one who is greater. For we say that no man is permitted to do all that he wishes, but that everyone has a lord who may correct him when he errs, and aid him when he does well, and who sometimes lifts him up when he falls. We give the first place to the community: we say also that the law rules over the king’s dignity; for we believe that the law is the light, without which we conclude that he who rules will wander from the right path. . . . If the king lacks this law, he will wander from the right track; if he does not hold it, he will err foully; its presence gives the power of reigning rightly, and its absence overturns the kingdom. . . . It is commonly said, “As the king wills, so goes the law,” but the truth is otherwise, for the law stands, but the king falls. Truth and charity and the zeal of salvation, this is the integrity of the law, the regimen of virtue: truth, light, charity, warmth, zeal. . . . Whatever the king may ordain, let it be consonant with these; for if it be otherwise, the commonalty will be made sorrowful; the people will be confounded, if either the king’s eye lacks truth, or the prince’s heart lacks charity, or he does not always moderately fulfill his zeal with severity.
These three things being supposed, whatever pleases the king may be done; but by their opposites the king resists the law. However, kicking against it does not hurt the spur; thus the instruction which was sent from heaven to Saint Paul teaches us. Thus the king is deprived of no inherited right, if there be made a provision in concordance with just law. For dissimulation shall not change the law, whose stable reason will stand without end. For this reason, if anything that is useful has been long put off, it is not to be criticized when adopted late. And let the king never set his private interest before that of the community, as if the salvation of all yields to him alone. For he is not set over them in order to live for himself; but that his people who are subject to him may be in safety. . . . Therefore if the prince will be warm with charity as much as possible toward the community, if he shall be solicitous to govern it well, and shall never rejoice at its destruction; wherefore if the king will love the magnates of the kingdom, although he should know alone, like a great prophet, whatever is needful for the ruling of the kingdom, whatever is becoming in him, whatever ought to be done, truly he will not conceal what he will decree from those without whom he cannot effect that which he will ordain. He will therefore negotiate with his people about bringing into effect the things which he will not think of doing by himself. . . . Oh! if princes sought the honor of God, they would rule their kingdoms rightly, and without error. If princes had the knowledge of God, they would exhibit their justice to all. Ignorant of the Lord, as though they were blind, they seek the praises of men, delighted only with vanity. . . . From all that has been said, it may be evident that it becomes a king to see, together with his nobles, what things are convenient for the government of the kingdom, and what things are expedient for the preservation of peace; and that the king have natives for his companions, not foreigners or favorites for his councillors or for the great nobles of the kingdom, who supplant others and abolish good customs. For such discord is a stepmother to peace, and produces battles, and plots treason. For as the envy of the devil introduced death [into the world], so hatred divides the troop. The king shall hold the natives in their rank, and by this governance he will have joy in reigning. But if he seeks to degrade his own people, if he perverts their rank, it is in vain for him to ask why, thus deranged, they do not obey him; in fact they would be fools if they did.
Questions: How is the account of the battle used to support the rightness of the barons’ cause? What does the baronial party want? What are the royalist arguments, and how does the author refute them? How is the political argument related to religious belief? How does this text compare with earlier articulations of royal power and its limits in the Policraticus (doc. 45) and Magna Carta (doc. 50)?
Fig. 33. Seals of Simon de Montfort and Eleanor de Montfort. Simon’s seal shows him engaged in the aristocratic pursuit of hunting, carrying a horn and accompanied by a hound. The seal of his wife Eleanor, which identifies her as countess of Leicester, likewise signals her high status through the inclusion of her family coat of arms.
57. The Miracles of Simon de Montfort
When Simon de Montfort was killed in battle at Evesham in 1265, royalists dismembered his body and distributed those grisly trophies to the earl’s enemies. The local canons of Evesham buried what remained of Simon’s corpse in their church, which became a shrine to the rebel leader; within a short time Simon was credited with hundreds of miracles, and many regarded him as a martyr. At the same time, as is clear from the miracles below, opinion about Simon’s cult remained divided, since he had died an excommunicate and rebel. As pilgrims began traveling to Evesham to take earth from the battlefield or visit the earl’s grave, Henry III moved to quash his adversary’s cult in the Dictum of Kenilworth, which forbade anyone to regard Simon as a saint or repeat stories of his “vain and fatuous marvels . . . on pain of bodily punishment.”
Source: trans. K.A. Smith from The Chronicle of William de Rishanger of the Barons’ Wars; The Miracles of Simon de Montfort, ed. J.O. Halliwell (London: Camden Society, 1840), pp. 69, 81, 84, 89–90, 92–93, 99–100, 109–10.
A sick woman from Elmley sent her daughter to draw water from the earl’s well [a spring said to have miraculously appeared on the battlefield at Evesham on the site of the earl’s death]. Returning from the well, the girl met some servants from the castle who asked what she had in her pitcher. She told them it was new beer from Evesham, but they replied, “No, you have water from the earl’s well.” They insisted on drinking some, whereupon they discovered that it was beer, as she had said, and let the girl go. But when she returned to her sick mother, it once again changed into water, which the infirm woman drank and was healed.
A certain miracle recounted to us by William, the rector of Werinton, is worthy of remembrance. After the Battle of Evesham, he collected some earth from the spot where the earl’s body had lain on the battlefield, and put it with some bread he had with him, and then gave the mixture as a holy sacrament to a mortally wounded layman. After the man had lain unconscious for two days, Earl Simon appeared to him in a dream and told him to ask the said William to take some of the hallowed earth and mix it with water for the wounded man to drink. And when this was done, the wounded man recovered.
John of Coventry, surnamed Farber, fell ill and died. When his wife saw the dead man, she cried out, “O Simon de Montfort, if you have done any good for God, and just as we believe you were martyred in the name of justice, show your power and restore this man!” And at once the dead man began to breathe again, and miraculously recovered after he had bent a penny [a symbolic promise to visit Simon’s shrine and offer a coin there]. The whole village of Coventry can attest to this.
William de la Horste of Bulne told the following story about his neighbor, Robert the deacon. In the second year after the Battle of Evesham, it happened that the said William held a great banquet. A quarrel broke out among the guests concerning the late earl, and Robert slandered the earl excessively, saying all manner of evil things about him. His host, William, warned him not to speak ill of the earl. At this moment Robert lost the power of speech and became paralyzed, so that he could only sit there like a corpse. After the other guests prayed for him, he began once again to breathe, and, taking William’s advice, promised to say nothing further against the earl. Thus he escaped from danger.
Stephen of Hull, Nicholas of Hull, John Good, and Walter Sygard, citizens of Hereford, recounted a miraculous story about Philip, chaplain of Brentley, who slandered the earl. This Philip declared, among other insulting things, “If Earl Simon is a saint, as they claim, let the devil break my neck, or some other miracle happen before I arrive home.” And so it happened just as he had asked, for as he was returning home by chance he saw a hare, and while chasing it he fell from his horse. He had been seized by a demon as punishment for insulting the earl; his sanity gone, he was seized and bound, and so has remained in chains from the feast of Saint John the Baptist to the translation of Saint Benedict, as the citizens of Hereford can attest.
Sir Osbert Giffard had long been suffering from a fever when, one night, Earl Simon appeared to him in a dream, telling him, “Find the armor which you took from me in battle, put it on, and you will be healed.” Upon waking, Osbert ordered his servants to search among the armor lying at the foot of his bed; they duly located the piece in question, put it on him, and so he was healed. The abbot of Evesham testifies to this, and he heard it from the mouth of Osbert himself.
Margaret, wife of William Mauncelle of Gloucester, who for some time had been an enemy of the earl, was struck by an affliction known as frenzy and went completely out of her senses for two days. Earl Simon appeared to her in a vision and asked her, “Why do you always speak ill of me?” Hearing this, that woman was moved to repent and beg his pardon for her wickedness. The earl pardoned her, and she asked him in turn what would happen to his enemies. He replied, “Some have repented, some will repent, and some will suffer an evil death without repenting.” After this, the woman was measured to Simon [so that she might offer a candle as long as her body at Simon’s shrine] and immediately recovered, as her neighbors testify.
A motet for the feast of Simon Montfort and his companions:
Save us, Simon Montfort,
Flower of all knighthood,
Who endured the harsh pains of death,
Protector of the English people.
The torments he endured while alive,
Were unheard of among the saints,
So great was his suffering!
His hands and feet cut off,
His head and body gravely wounded,
And his manly parts torn away.
Pray for us, Blessed Simon,
That we be made worthy of Christ’s promises.
Questions: What do the miracles tell us about the aftermath of the Second Barons’ War? Do these stories help explain why Henry III was so eager to suppress Simon’s cult? How do these miracles compare with those attributed to Thomas Becket (doc. 35)?
58. The Household Roll of Countess Eleanor of Leicester
The great households of medieval England were not only domestic spaces but venues for conspicuous consumption and hospitality, cultural patronage, and political maneuvering. In the thirteenth century it became customary for baronial households to keep written accounts of expenditures, and such records reveal how elites ate and drank, entertained, dressed, traveled, and maintained contact with friends and kin, while offering glimpses of humbler individuals—retainers, clerks, grooms, cooks, laundresses, messengers, and carters—whose labor kept great households running. This example details the expenditures of Eleanor, countess of Leicester and younger sister of King Henry III. In 1238 Eleanor secretly married the royal favorite Simon de Montfort, with whom she had seven children. When the Second Barons’ War broke out, Eleanor supported her husband against her royal brother. In the spring of 1265, the time period covered by these excerpts, Eleanor resided at Odiham Castle (Hampshire), a convenient base from which she remained in close contact with her husband, sons, and political allies. After her husband’s death at Evesham in August 1265, Eleanor fled to the French nunnery of Montargis, where she died a decade later.
Source: trans. M.W. Labarge, Mistress, Maids and Men: Baronial Life in the Thirteenth Century (London: Phoenix, 2003), pp. 195–201.
[Daily Expenditures]
On Saturday following [2 May], for the countess and the above-mentioned: Grain, 5 bushels of froille [wheat flour]. Wine, 2 sesters [a sester equals 4 gallons], 3 gallons. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: 300 herring from the castle stores. Fish, 3s. 6d. For 600 eggs, 22½d. Stable: Hay for 30 horses. Oats, 1 quarter [a quarter equals 9 bushels]. 7 bushels from the constable’s purchase.
Sum, 5s. 4½d.
On Sunday following [3 May], for the countess and the above-mentioned: Grain, 6 bushels of froille. Wine, 3 sesters. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: 1 ox and 1 pig from the castle stores; item, for 1 ox, 3 sheep, and 3 calves bought, 15s. 10d. Poultry, 5s. For 400 eggs, 15d. Milk for the week, 9 gallons from the castle. Stable: Hay for 30 horses. Oats, 2 quarters, 1 bushel from the constable’s purchase. For 4 geese bought, 16d.
Sum, 23s. 5d.
On Monday following [4 May], for the countess and the above-mentioned: Grain, 6 bushels of froille. Wine, 3 sesters; taken with Seman, ½ sester. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: Meat and hens previously reckoned, and 1 fresh ox, from the castle stores. 300 eggs, 11 ¼d. Stable: Hay for 36 horses. Oats, 2 quarters, 3 bushels, from the constable’s purchase.
Sum, 11 ¼ d.
For the wages of the grooms, as appears on the back [of this roll], 15s. 2d. Grain for the poor for 8 days, ½ quarter, and 13 gallons of ale. Grain for the dogs for 10 days, 3 quarters.
Sum, 15s. 2d.
On Wednesday following [6 May], for the countess and the above-mentioned: Grain, 6 bushels of froille. Wine, 2½ sesters, ½ gallon. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: Fish, 6s. 11d. Calf, 12d. For 400 eggs, 15d. Cheese for tarts, 9d. 50 herring from stores. Stable hay for 36 horses. Oats, 2 quarters, 3 bushels from the constable’s purchase.
Sum, 9s. 8d.
On Thursday following [7 May], for the countess and the above-mentioned: Grain, 6 bushels of froille. Wine, 2 sesters, 3 gallons. Ale, for 36 gallons, 17d. Kitchen: For 1 ox and 1 sheep, 7s. Calf, 10d. Hens, 2s. 6d. For 300 eggs, 11¼d. Stable: Hay for 36 horses. Oats, 2 quarters. 2 bushels from the constable’s purchase. Wax, from Friday the feast of Saint Mark [24 April; note that this is the clerk’s error; the feast fell on 25 April] until now, 13 pounds; for the chapel, 3 pounds. ½ pound of pepper for the foals.
Sum, 12s. 8¼ d.
On Friday following [8 May], for the countess and hers, and Sir Richard of Havering: Grain, 5 bushels of froille. Wine, 2 sesters, 3 gallons. Ale, for 160 gallons, 10s. at ¾d. per gallon; item, for 200 gals., 7s. 8d. at ½d. per gal. Kitchen: 250 herring from stores. Fish, 4s. 4d. Eggs, 6d. Stable: Hay for 36 horses. Oats, 2 quarters, 6 bushels from the constable’s purchase. For the carriage of ale, 4d.
Sum, 22s. 10d.
On Saturday following [9 May], for the Countess and hers: Grain, 5 bus. of froille. Wine, 2½ sesters; sent to Lady Catherine Lovel, 2 sesters; carried with Sir Richard the Chaplain, ½ sester. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: 100 herring. Fish, 12s. 1d. Eggs 2s. 4d. 18 stockfish, for 3 days. Stable: Hay for 38 horses. Oats, 2 quarters, from the purchase of the constable.
Sum, 14s. 5d.
On Sunday following [10 May], for the countess, Lady Catherine Lovel being present: Grain, 6 bushels of froille. Wine, 4 sesters; sent with the above- mentioned Lady, ½ sester. Ale, previously reckoned. Kitchen: Carcasses, 6s. 8d. Lard, 16d. Poultry, 5s. 8d. Eggs, previously reckoned. For the expenses of the dogs in taking 1 stag, by Michael of Kemsing, 6d. Stable: Hay for 32 horses. Oats, 2 quarters from the constable’s purchase. For 4 geese 14 ½d.
Sum, 15s. 2½d.
For 2 quarters of malt wheat, 8 quarters, 2 bushels of malt barley, and 4 quarters of malt oats bought from Lady Wimarc of Odiham by the constable, soon after the countess’s arrival, 43s. 9½d. For the expenses of William the Carter going to Porchester with 3 horses, to obtain 1 tun [a tun equals 252 gallons] of wine, 3s.
Sum, 46s. 9½d.
Wax delivered to Sir Richard of Havering by order of the countess, 20 pounds; for the household, 3 pounds.
[Miscellaneous Payments]
By Gobion
| For 5 housings for the foals of the countess, bought by Richard Gobion | 4s. 2d. |
| For cart-clouts, grease, and small harness for the long cart | 20½d. |
| For the expenses of Robert de Conesgrave and 2 grooms with 2 horses, taking the robes of the king of Germany to Kenilworth, on Saturday after the finding of the Holy Cross [9 May] | 2s. |
By Seman
| For 1 new cart bought, bound with iron, and another repaired, by Seman, on Rogation Monday [11 May] | 34s. |
| Paid to John de Murcia, on the same day, by the same Seman | 10s. |
| Given to the barber of Reading for coming twice to Odiham, with 1 horse hired for his use, to bleed a damsel [one of the Countess’s companions] | 2s. 8d. |
| For letters of the lord king and the countess carried to the prioress of Amesbury, by the same | 4d. |
| For the expenses of W. the Carter seeking 1 tun of wine at Staines | 12d. |
| For 2 pairs of shoes and 1 pair of hose, for the use of Robert de Valle | 16d. |
| For the expenses of Seman going to Portsmouth | 8d. |
| For the expenses of the same to Reading | 12d. |
| For the shoes of Petronilla the laundress, of the Easter term | 12d. |
| Given to Roger, the barber of the Lord Edward, on Rogation Monday [11 May], by order of the countess | 14s. 4d. |
| For the expenses of Gobithesti going to the earl [the countess’s husband, Simon de Montfort], on the vigil of the Ascension [13 May], with a guide and rented mount | 2s. |
| On Ascension Day [14 May], given to the messenger of the countess of Isle, by order of the countess | 12d. |
| On the following day [15 May], for the expenses of Bolettus going to Pevensey | 8d. |
| On Saturday [16 May], for 2 grooms seeking a robe from Joce, at London for 3 days | 8d. |
| For letters of the countess carried to the countess of the Isle | 4d. |
| On Thursday after Ascension Day [21 May], given to a certain groom coming from William of Wortham | 6d. |
| On the same day, for the expenses of Bolettus going to Pevensey | 7½d. |
| For 1 gilded plate bought at London, of a weight of 17d., for the use of the Damsel Eleanor de Montfort [the countess’s daughter] | 2s. 10d. |
[Wages]
| Advanced to Perrot of the chamber on his wages of the 49th year, beginning at the feast of Saint Michael [29 September] | 3s. |
| To Roger of the chamber, on the same | 3s. |
| For 2 carts hired from London to Kenilworth, with 2 tuns of wine sent there by order of the countess in Pentecost week, with the expenses of Colin going with them | 18s. 6d. |
Wages paid from the Saturday before the feast of the Apostles Philip and James [25 April], on which day they were set to wages, to the Saturday following, with both days reckoned:
To 3 huntsmen of Sir Guy de Montfort, for 8 days, 3s. 4d., because the master takes 2d. a day, by order of the countess. To the huntsman of Sir Henry of Almain and his groom, 2s. 3d., for the master likewise, 2d. per day. To 2 grooms tending the foals of the countess for the same time, 2s. To two grooms for Sir Fulk Constable, 21d. To 1 groom for John Scot, 12d. To 1 groom for Andrew and Thomas Mabile, 12d. To 1 groom tending the sick horses, 12d. To 1 groom of Michael of Kemsing, for 6 days, 9d. To 1 groom tending the greyhounds of the countess, for 8 days, 12d. To 1 groom of Brother J., for the same time, 12d.
| On Friday after Pentecost [29 May], to Gobithesti going to Hereford to the earl | 18d. |
| On the same day, for carrying letters of the countess to Sir Richard of Demsing and returning to Porchester | 7d. |
| For the expenses of 1 horse and a groom, seeking the barber of Reading and bringing him back | 8d. |
| On Saturday [30 May], for Bolettus going to the countesses of the Isle and of Lincoln | 6d. |
| On Sunday [31 May], for 1 groom going to Pevensey | 1d. |
| For 1 horse hired for the use of Dobbe the Parker driving the countess by night to Portchester | 10d. |
| Given to the carter of Wintney coming with the prioress’s chariot to the same place | 18d. |
| To 2 grooms of the abbot of Waverley coming with 2 palfreys | 12d. |
| To Picard, messenger of the earl, on Wednesday after Trinity [3 June] | 6d. |
| For the dinners of the grooms and carters | 6d. |
| For the expenses of W. the clerk at London, for 4 days in Pentecost week | 5s. 6d. |
| For 1 silk girdle for the use of Sir Amaury de Montfort, by order of the countess | 3s. |
| For letters of the countess carried to Kenilworth on Friday after Trinity [5 June] | 5d. |
| For the expenses of Hicqe the tailor going from Odiham to Kenilworth and returning to Portchester, on Trinity Sunday [31 May] for 5 days, with 14d. given for hiring 1 horse | 3s. 10½d. |
| For a sheath for the knives of the countess | 3d. |
| For baths at Odiham | 3d. |
| For locks for the chests of the chandlery | 2d. |
For the countess’s offerings from Easter [5 April] to the octave of Trinity [7 June], with the first day reckoned, 19s. 1d., by the hand of John Scot.
Questions: What were the key components of the household’s diet? How much did it vary? How much of the food and fodder consumed was grown or raised on the countess’s land, as opposed to bought? Apart from food, what were the household’s major expenditures? How was social hierarchy manifested within the household? How did the countess keep in touch with the outside world?
59. Summonses to Parliament
During the turmoil of Henry III’s reign (1216–72), the formal royal council, consisting of the barons and the higher clergy, was gradually enlarged to include representative knights, townsmen, and lower clergy. At the same time it came to be known by a new name, “Parliament.” By the end of the century it was customary for all these groups to be included when the general business of the kingdom was to be discussed—though more selective groups might be summoned to advise the king on more specific items. The following writs from 1295 are typical parliamentary summonses issued by Edward I (r. 1272–1307).
Source: trans. E.P. Cheyney, Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, 1st ser. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Department of History, 1902), vol. 1, no. 6, pp. 33–35; revised.
Summons of a Bishop
The king to the venerable father in Christ, Robert, by the same grace archbishop of Canterbury, primate of all England, greeting. As a most just law, established by the careful providence of sacred princes, exhorts and decrees that what affects all should be approved by all, so also, very evidently should common danger be met by means provided in common. You know sufficiently well, and it is now, we believe, divulged through all regions of the world, how the king of France [Philip IV] fraudulently and craftily deprives us of our land of Gascony, by withholding it unjustly from us. Now, however, not satisfied with the before-mentioned fraud and injustice, having gathered together for the conquest of our kingdom a very great fleet, and a vast multitude of warriors, with which he has made a hostile attack on our kingdom and the inhabitants of the same kingdom, he now proposes to wipe the English language from the earth altogether, if his power should correspond to the detestable proposition of the contemplated injustice, which God forbid. Because, therefore, darts seen beforehand do less injury, and your interest especially, as that of the rest of the citizens of the same realm, is concerned in this affair, we command you, strictly enjoining you in the fidelity and love which binds you to us, that on [13 November,] the Sunday after the feast of Saint Martin this coming winter, you be present in person at Westminster, citing beforehand the dean and chapter of your church, the archdeacons and all the clergy of your diocese, causing the same dean and archdeacons in their own persons, and the said chapter by one suitable proctor, and the said clergy by two, to be present along with you, having full and sufficient power from the same chapter and clergy, to consider, ordain and provide, along with us and with the rest of the prelates and principal men and other inhabitants of our kingdom, how the dangers and threatened evils of this kind are to be met. Witness: the king at Wangham, the thirtieth day of September.
Summons of a Baron
The king to his beloved and faithful relative, Edmund, earl of Cornwall, greeting. Because we wish to have a consultation and meeting with you and the rest of the principal men of our kingdom, in order to seek remedies against the dangers which in these days are threatening our whole kingdom, we command you, strictly enjoining you in the fidelity and love which binds you to us, that on [13 November,] the Sunday after the feast of Saint Martin this coming winter, you be present in person at Westminster, for considering, ordaining, and doing along with us and with the prelates, and the rest of the principal men and other inhabitants of our kingdom, whatever may be necessary for meeting dangers of this kind. Witness: the king at Canterbury, the first of October.
Summons of Representatives of Shires and Towns
The king to the sheriff of Northamptonshire. Since we intend to have a consultation and meeting with the earls, barons, and other principal men of our kingdom with regard to providing remedies against the dangers which are in these days threatening the same kingdom, and on that account have commanded them to be with us on [13 November,] the Sunday after the feast of Saint Martin this coming winter, at Westminster, to consider, ordain, and do whatever may be necessary to avoid these dangers, we strictly require you to cause two knights from the aforesaid county, two citizens from each city in the same county, and two burgesses from each borough, of those who are especially discreet and capable of work, to be elected without delay, and to have them come to us at the aforesaid time and place.
Moreover, the said knights are to have full and sufficient power for themselves and for the community of the aforesaid county, and the said citizens and burgesses for themselves and the communities of the aforesaid cities and boroughs separately, then and there for doing what shall then be ordained according to the common counsel in the premises; so that the aforesaid business shall not remain unfinished in any way for defect of this power. And you shall have there the names of the knights, citizens and burgesses, and this writ. Witness: the king at Canterbury on the third day of October.
Questions: What is the main purpose of this parliament? How does it compare with what Magna Carta (doc. 50) called the “common council of the kingdom?” Why has it changed? How do the writs to the bishop, baron, and sheriff differ? What do we learn about the upcoming parliament and its various members?
60. London Coroners’ Rolls
From the thirteenth century on, all sudden or unexpected deaths in England had to be investigated by the local coroner, and the testimony recorded in these cases gives us some of our most vivid glimpses into the daily activities of common folk. In the following cases, several aspects of the legal procedures surrounding an unexpected death are evident. The person who found a body (or witnessed the death) was obligated to notify the local authorities and to provide other people (“sureties” or guarantors) who would ensure his or her appearance in court as needed. Similarly, the nearest neighbors were also “attached” (required to give sureties for a court appearance). Of major concern to the investigators were the chattels, or moveable possessions, belonging to any suspect in a crime—because the chattels of a convicted felon would be forfeit to the king. The king also confiscated objects that had been the means of an accidental death. Finally, suspects who could get into a church before being arrested could claim sanctuary, and the secular authorities would not touch them there, but they would never be able to come out again, unless they agreed to “abjure the realm” (to go immediately into exile from England).
Source: trans. H.T. Riley, Memorials of London and London Life in the XIIIth, XIVth, and XVth Centuries (London: Longmans, Green, & Company, 1868), pp. 1–19; revised.
Death of John Fuatard
On Thursday [19 March], the morrow of Saint Edward the king and martyr, . . . in [1276,] the fourth year of the reign of King Edward [I], Gregory de Rokesley, the chamberlain, and the sheriffs of the city of London were notified that one John Fuatard was lying dead, by a death other than his rightful death, in the house of John of Blechingley, in the parish of Saint Michael Candlewick Street, in the ward of Thomas of Basing. Upon hearing this, the chamberlain and sheriffs went there, and calling together the good men of that ward, and of the ward of John Horn, made diligent inquisition into how this happened.
These men say, on the fealty in which they are bound to our lord the king, that on [8 March,] the Sunday before the feast of Saint Gregory in this year, while the said John Fuatard and one John le Clerk were playing together [a game of] tiles in the churchyard of St. Mary in Southwark, the aforesaid John, who was clerk of St. Mary Magdalen in Southwark, when throwing the tile in his turn, and quite against his own will, struck John Fuatard with his tile on the right side of the head, making a wound two inches in length, and penetrating to the brain. Suffering from the effects of this, he lived from that Sunday until Saint Edward’s Day [18 March], when, by reason of this wound, he died. When the body was viewed, no other wound, hurt, or bruise appeared upon it. Being asked what became of John after he did this, they say that he went immediately to the church of St. Mary Magdalen in Southwark, but has never since been seen in the city. Being asked about his chattels, they say that he had no goods or chattels.
And John of Blechingley was attached [required to provide two sureties for his cooperation], and Sarria, his wife, by two sureties; and John of Longmynd, who dwelt in the same house, by two sureties. And the first neighbor, Henry de Lyre, fishmonger, the second, Robert de Long, fishmonger, the third, Roger of Bedwell, skinner, and the fourth, Alan of Enfield Well, were attached, each by two sureties.
Death of Henry Green
On [14 June, the] Sunday before the feast of Saint Botolph in the year aforesaid, the chamberlain and sheriffs were notified that one Henry Green, water-carrier, was lying drowned in the River Thames, in the ward of Castle Baynard, in the parish of St. Andrew, and at the hithe [small harbor] of Castle Baynard. Upon hearing this, they went there, and having called together the good men of that ward, and of the ward of Simon of Hadstock, made diligent inquisition into how this happened.
These men say that on the preceding Thursday, the said Henry, having come to St. Paul’s Wharf with a tub, and intending to take up water with the tub, attempted to place it upon the wharf; after which it so happened that, from the weight of the water in the tub, as he was standing upon the board of the aforesaid boat, the boat moved away from the wharf, and he fell between it and the quay into the water, and so by mischance was drowned. Being asked if they believe anyone else to be guilty or suspected of that death, or otherwise, they say that it was no other than a misadventure, as before stated. And the body was viewed; upon which no wound, hurt or bruise appeared. And the boat was appraised, with the whole of its tackle, and the tub, at 5s. 6d.
And the two neighbors nearest to the place where the mischance took place were attached, as were the two nearest neighbors to the place where the body was found.
Death of John le Hancrete
On [30 September, the] Wednesday after the feast of Saint Michael in the year aforesaid, the chamberlain and sheriffs were notified that one John le Hancrete was lying dead by a death other than his rightful death, in the house of William the Cooper in the ward of Anketil de Auvergne, in the parish of St. Brigid. Upon hearing which, the said chamberlain and sheriffs went there, and upon the oath of the good men of that ward diligent inquisition was made about this.
These men say that the said John came from a certain feast that had been held in the city of London to the house of the before-named William, being very drunk, that is, on the Monday before, at the hour of Vespers, where he had rented his bed by the day; and that then, intending to lie down upon it, he took a lighted candle for the purpose of making up his bed. When this was done, he left the candle burning and fell asleep on the bed. And the candle being thus left without anyone to look after it, its flame caught the straw of the bed upon which John was lying; and accordingly, he, as well as the bed and the straw aforesaid, was burned, through the flame of the candle so spreading, at about the hour of midnight. And so, languishing from the effects of this, he lived until the next Tuesday following, at the hour of matins [after midnight], on which day and hour he died from the burning aforesaid. Being asked if they hold anyone suspected of John’s death, they say they do not. And the body was viewed, upon which no wound or hurt appeared, except the aforesaid burns.
And the two nearest neighbors were attached, by sureties. And William the Cooper was attached, in whose house he was burned; and Fynea, the wife of the same William, was attached, and also Remund, the son of William.
Death of Matilda, Wife of Henry le Coffeur
On [12 February, 1277,] the Friday after Ash Wednesday, in the fifth year of the reign of King Edward, the said chamberlain and sheriffs were notified that one Matilda, wife of Henry le Coffeur, was lying dead, by a death other than her rightful death, in the house of the said Henry, in the parish of Saint Nicholas Shambles, in the ward of Anketil de Auvergne. On hearing which, the chamberlain and sheriffs went there, and having called together the good men of that ward, and of the ward of John of Blackthorn, made diligent inquisition about this.
These men say that as the said Matilda was coming from West Cheap toward the church guest hall, being drunk, she fell upon the pavement opposite the church of St. Martin, and so broke her right arm, upon the Sunday before Christmas, and immediately after the hour of curfew. Upon being carried from that place to her husband Henry’s house, she survived in a deteriorating state from that day until the Monday before Ash Wednesday, on which day she died. They hold no one suspected. The body was viewed, upon which no injury appeared, except the broken arm, as aforesaid.
And the two nearest neighbors were attached, each by two sureties. And the said Henry was attached, in whose house she died, by two sureties.
Death of Simon of Winchester
On Monday [5 April 1277,] the morrow of the close of Easter, in the fifth year of King Edward, the said chamberlain and sheriffs were notified that one Simon of Winchester, taverner, was lying dead etc., in the parish of St. Martin, in Ironmonger Lane in the ward of Cheap, in a house belonging to Robert the surgeon, of Friday Street, in which house the said Simon kept a tavern. On hearing this, the chamberlain and sheriffs went there, and calling together the good men of that ward and of Bassishaw, and of the ward of Henry de Frowke, made diligent inquisition into how this had happened.
The jurors say that on [5 December, 1276,] the eve of Saint Nicholas . . . , a dispute arose between the said Simon and a certain man who said that he was called “Roger of Westminster,” and who was Simon’s servant. And on the next day also, they were seen by the neighbors in the same house and tavern, abusing each other and quarreling, by reason of the same dispute; and on the same night they slept there, in the same room together. But as soon as this Roger saw that the said Simon was sound asleep, he seized a knife and cut Simon’s throat completely through so that the head was entirely severed from the body. After this, he dragged the body out, and put it in a certain secret spot, a dark and narrow place between two walls in the same house, where coals were usually kept; this place was somewhat long, and not quite two feet wide. And on the following day, the same Roger, as was his custom, set out the bench of the tavern, and sold wine there. And as the said Simon had not been seen by the neighbors all that day, they asked Roger what had become of his master; whereupon he made answer that he had gone to Westminster, to recover some debts that were owing to him there; and on the second and third days he gave the same answer. At twilight, however, on the third day, he departed by the outer door, locking it with the key, and carrying off with him a silver cup, a robe, and some bedclothes, which had belonged to the same Simon. Afterward he returned, and threw the key into the house of Hamon Cook, a near neighbor, telling him that he was going to seek the said Simon, his master, and asking him to give him the key if he came back.
And from that day the house remained closed and empty until [31 December,] the eve of our Lord’s circumcision following; that day John Doget, a taverner, taking with him Gilbert of Colchester, went to the house aforesaid to recover a debt which the said Simon owed to him for wines. But when he found the door closed and locked, he enquired after the key, of the neighbors who were standing about; hearing of this, Hamon immediately gave him the key. Upon entering the tavern with Gilbert, John found there one tun full of wine, and another half full, which he himself had sold to Simon for 50s., and this he at once ordered to be taken out by the porters . . . and put in a cart . . . and taken to his own house, for the debt due to him, together with some small tables, canvas cloths, gallons, and wooden potels [half-gallon measures], 2s. in value. This being done, John Doget shut the door of the house, carrying away its key with him; from that time the house was empty, no one having entered it until [16 March,] the Tuesday before Palm Sunday. Upon that day, the aforesaid Master Robert, to whom the house belonged, came and broke open the door for lack of a key, and so entering it, immediately put Michael le Oynter in possession of it. This Michael, on [3 April,] the Saturday in Easter week, went there alone, to examine all the facilities belonging to the house, and see which of them needed to be cleansed of filth and dust. But when he came to the narrow and dark place aforesaid, he found the headless body there, and seeing it, he sent word to the chamberlain and sheriffs.
Being asked if anyone else lived in the house, other than those two persons, or if anyone else had been seen or heard in that house with them on the night the felony was committed, or if any other person had had frequent or special access to the house by day or night, from which mischief might have arisen, they say not beyond the usual resort that all persons have to a tavern. Being asked if the said Roger had any well-known or special [friend] in the city, or outside it, to whose house he was accustomed to go, they say they understand that he had not, seeing that he was a stranger, and had been in the service of this Simon hardly a fortnight. Being asked therefore where he had taken the goods he had carried off, they say that, seeing that the house was near to the Jewry [the neighborhood where the Jews lived], they believe that he took them to the Jewry; but to whose house they know not. Being asked what became of the head so cut off, they say they know not, nor can they ascertain anything about it. They say also that the said Roger escaped by stealth, and has not since been seen. He had no chattels.
And the four nearest neighbors were attached, by sureties, as were all the persons whose names are above-mentioned.
Death of William le Pannere
On Friday [21 January, 1278], the morrow of Saints Fabian and Sebastian, in the sixth year of the reign of King Edward, son of King Henry, Gregory de Rokesley, chamberlain of London, and John Adrien and Walter the English, sheriffs of the same city, were notified that one William le Pannere, skinner, was lying dead in the market of West Cheap, near the Conduit in the ward of Cheap. On hearing this, the chamberlain and sheriffs went there; and calling together the good men of that ward, and of the ward of Henry de Frowyk, where he lived, made diligent inquisition into how this happened.
These men say that while the said William, on the Friday before-mentioned, was passing through the middle of West Cheap, and had reached the place where he was now lying dead, being greatly weakened through having been bled [for medical reasons or to promote general wellness] on Thursday, the before-mentioned feast, and having had too much blood taken from him through excessive bleeding, he fell upon the pavement and suddenly died. They hold no one suspected of the death of the said William, his death being thus sudden. And the body being viewed, there was no wound or hurt found upon it.
And Joanna, the wife of the dead man, was attached, by two sureties. The two neighbors were also attached, who dwelled next to him, as were the two neighbors who lived nearest to the Conduit, where he was found dead.
Death of Henry of Llanfair
[In May 1278,] the said chamberlain and sheriffs were notified that one Henry of Llanfair was lying dead in the house of Sibil le Feron, in the ward of Cheap, in the parish of Colechurch. Upon hearing this . . . and having called together the good men of that ward, and of the ward of John of Blackthorn, and the ward of Henry de Frowyk, they made diligent inquisition about this.
These men say that one Richard of Codesfold fled to the church of St. Mary Staining Lane in London, by reason of a certain robbery being imputed to him by one William of London, cutler, and the same William pursued him on his flight there. It so happened that on the night [of 5 May], in the present year, there were many persons watching about the aforesaid church, to catch him in case he came out, and a certain Henry of Llanfair, ironmonger, one of the persons on the watch, hearing a noise in the church, and so fearing that the same Richard was about to get out by another part of the church, and so escape through an opening that there was in a certain glass window therein, went to examine it. The said Richard and one Thomas, who was then the clerk of that church, perceived this, and the said Thomas, seizing a lance (without an iron head), struck at Henry through the hole in the window, and wounded him between the nose and the eye, penetrating almost to the brain. From the effects of which wound he suffered until [19 May,] the day of Saint Dunstan, when he died at about the third hour. They say also that both Richard and Thomas are guilty of that felony, seeing that Richard was consenting in it.
And the said Thomas was taken, and imprisoned in Newgate [Prison], and afterward delivered before Hamon Haweteyn, justiciar of Newgate. And the said Richard still keeps himself within the before-named church. Being asked if they hold any more persons suspected as to that death, they say they do not. [The suspects] have no lands or chattels. And the body was viewed, upon which no other injury or wound was found, save only the aforesaid wound.
And the two neighbors nearest to the spot where he was wounded were attached, as were the two neighbors nearest to the place where he died; and the said Sibil was attached, in whose house he died.
Death of William Cole
On Thursday [11 August, 1278], the morrow of Saint Laurence the martyr, in the sixth year of the reign of King Edward, the chamberlain of our lord the king in the same city, and the sheriffs, were notified that a certain man, William Cole by name, a citizen of London, was lying dead, by a death other than his rightful death, in the ward of William of Hadstock, and the parish of St. Dunstan, near the Tower of London. On hearing this, the chamberlain and sheriffs went there, and calling together the good men of the ward and of the two nearest wards, namely those of Wolmar of Essex and Nicholas of Winchester, made diligent inquisition into how this had happened.
These men say that on [27 July,] the Wednesday after the feast of Saint James the Apostle, the said William was in the fields of the village of Stratford [near London], getting in his corn [grain]; and that one John (whose surname they do not know), parish-clerk of the same village, came into the same fields on that day, and secretly took and carried off certain sheaves [bundles of grain] belonging to the said William and certain neighbors of his. Whereupon it so happened that the said William met this same John, and rebuked him for carrying off the sheaves, and took them away from him, upon which the said John went to one Richard, chaplain to the prioress of Stratford (but as to whose surname they are ignorant), and also to one John de Scheld, and made grievous complaint to them that the said William had taken the sheaves away from him. Being greatly moved at this, they went to the aforesaid fields, and finding the said William there, suddenly rushed upon him and threw him on the ground, beating him with sticks both behind and in front, all over the body, from his neck down to the soles of his feet, and then left him in the fields for dead. Afterward, he was carried to the village of Stratford, where he lay suffering from the effects of those blows, down to [6 August,] the Saturday before the feast of Saint Laurence. On that day he was carried in a cart to London, and still lived on from that day to Thursday [11 August,] the morrow of Saint Laurence, early in the morning of which he died, from the before-mentioned blows.
And the body was viewed, which was black and blue all over, and quite crushed by excessive and most grievous blows, from the neck down to the soles of the feet, as before-mentioned. Being asked what became of [the suspects], after committing the felony aforesaid, they say that they fled forthwith to the parish church of the same village, and afterward secretly escaped from it, and have never since been found. Being asked if they hold anyone else suspected of his death, they say they do not, but only the before-named Richard the chaplain, and John de Scheld; who on hearing the complaint of the before-mentioned John the clerk, went off in haste to the fields to avenge him. But whether the same John [the clerk] was present when the said William was so slain, or whether he gave any blow, they cannot ascertain. Being asked about the goods and chattels of those felons, they say that they know nothing about them, because [the felons] are foreigners [not Londoners].
And the four nearest neighbors were attached, by sureties.
Questions: What procedures are followed in these cases? What are the standards of evidence? In what situation did people who committed homicide find themselves? What do these records tell us about everyday life in thirteenth-century London? What kinds of social bonds and social stresses do we see at work? What role did drink and drunkenness play in everyday life and death?
61. Plan of the Village of Wharram Percy
During the two-and-a-half centuries after the Norman Conquest, as the population of England grew from perhaps 2 million to 4.5 million or more, the countryside was more densely settled and the land more intensively exploited. The majority of English men and women remained peasants living in small settlements such as that of Wharram Percy in North Yorkshire. Archaeological excavations carried out at Wharram Percy between 1950 and 1990 added substantially to our understanding of medieval English peasant life. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the site comprised thirty-seven longhouse-style dwellings, each surrounded by a farmyard and a long, narrow croft where inhabitants cultivated fruits, vegetables, and legumes. Houses, constructed of wood crucks and frames with walls of mud and straw, included long, narrow living spaces with open fire pits, and designated areas to shelter valuable animals. The tofts faced a central street and a common green, and were surrounded by open fields. The village was abandoned around 1500 during England’s wool boom, when the surrounding lands were repurposed for grazing sheep.
Source: M. Beresford and J. Hurst, Wharram Percy: Deserted Medieval Village (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990), p. 49.
Fig. 34. Plan of Wharram Percy, reconstructed on the basis of multiple twentieth- century excavations of the site.
Questions: How would the village layout have facilitated community bonds? What tensions might the layout have encouraged? What values and hierarchies are discernible in the plan?
62. Manorial Life, from the Hundred Rolls
In 1279 the royal government launched a census of land tenures in a large number of English counties, organized by hundreds (subdivisions of shires). The resulting records, known as the Hundred Rolls, are like Domesday Book in giving us a remarkably detailed picture of the conditions on individual manors, including the terms on which named individual peasants farmed their land. Here are the results from the manor of Alwalton in Huntingdonshire.
Source: trans. E.P. Cheyney, Translations and Reprints from the Original Sources of European History, 1st ser. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Department of History, 1896), vol. 3, no. 5, pp. 4–7.
The abbot of Peterborough holds the manor of Alwalton and vill from the lord king directly; which manor and vill with its appurtenances the lord Edward, formerly king of England, gave to the said abbot and convent of that place in free, pure, and perpetual alms. And the court of the said manor with its garden contains one-half an acre. And to the whole of the said vill of Alwalton belong 5 hides and a half and 1 virgate of land and a half; of which each hide contains 5 virgates of land and each virgate contains 25 acres. Of these hides the said abbot has in demesne 1 hide and a half of land and half a virgate, which contain as above. Likewise he has there 8 acres of meadow. Also he has there separable pasture which contains 1 acre. Likewise he has there 3 water mills. Likewise he has there a common fish-pond with a fish-weir on the bank of the Nene, which begins at Wildlake and extends to the mill of Newton and contains in length 2 leagues. Likewise he has there a ferry with a boat.
Free Tenants. Thomas le Boteler holds a messuage with a courtyard which contains 1 rood [a quarter acre], and 3 acres of land, by charter, paying thence yearly to the said abbot 14s.
Likewise the rector of the church of Alwalton holds 1 virgate of land with its appurtenances, with which the said church was anciently endowed. Likewise the said rector has a holding the tenant of which holds 1 rood of ground by paying to the said rector yearly 1d.
And the abbot of Peterborough is patron of the church.
Villeins. Hugh Miller holds 1 virgate of land in villeinage by paying thence to the said abbot 3s. 1d. Likewise the same Hugh works through the whole year except 1 week at Christmas, 1 week at Easter, and 1 at Whitsuntide [Pentecost, forty days after Easter], that is in each week 3 days, each day with 1 man, and in autumn each day with 2 men, performing the said works at the will of the said abbot as in plowing and other work. Likewise he gives 1 bushel of wheat for benseed and 18 sheaves of oats for foddercorn [feed for animals]. Likewise he gives 3 hens and 1 cock yearly and 5 eggs at Easter. Likewise he does carrying to Peterborough and to Jakele and nowhere else, at the will of the said abbot. Likewise if he sells a brood mare in his courtyard for 10s. or more, he shall give to the said abbot 4d., and if for less he shall give nothing to the aforesaid. He gives also merchet [a payment upon his daughter’s marriage] and heriot [a death tax], and is tallaged at the feast of Saint Michael [29 September], at the will of the said abbot. There are also there 27 other villeins, viz. John of Ganesoupe, Robert son of Walter, Ralph son of the reeve, Emma at Pertre, William son of Reginald, Thomas son of Gunnilda, Eda widow of Ralph, Ralph Reeve, William Reeve, William son of William Reeve, Thomas Flegg, Henry Abbot, William Hereward, Serle son of William Reeve, Walter Palmer, William Abbot, Henry Serle; each of whom holds 1 virgate of land in villeinage, paying and doing in all things, each for himself, to the said abbot yearly just as the said Hugh Miller. There are also 5 other villeins, viz. Simon Mariot, Robert of Hastone, Thomas Smith, John Mustard, and William Carter, each of whom holds half a virgate of land by paying and doing in all things half of the whole service which Hugh Miller pays and does.
Cotters. Henry, son of the miller, holds a cottage with a croft which contains 1 rood, paying yearly to the said abbot 2s. for it. Likewise he works for 3 days carrying hay and doing other works at the will of the said abbot, each day with 1 man, and in autumn 1 day in cutting grain with 1 man.
Likewise Ralph Miller holds a cottage with a croft which contains a rood, paying to the said abbot 2s.; and he works just as the said Henry.
Likewise William Arnold holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, paying to the abbot 2d.; and he works just as the said Henry.
Likewise Hugh Day holds a cottage with a croft which contains 1 rood, paying to the abbot 8d.; and he works just as the said Henry.
Likewise Sara, widow of Matthew Miller, holds a cottage and a croft which contains half a rood, paying to the said abbot 4d.; and she works just as the said Henry.
Likewise Sara, widow of William Miller, holds a cottage and a croft which contains half a rood, paying to the abbot 4d.; and she works just as the said Henry.
Likewise William Kendale holds a cottage and a croft which contains 1 rood, paying to the abbot 8d.; and he works just as the said Henry. . . . [Here ten other cottars are named, their holdings, varying from a half rood to an acre, specified, and their payments and services indicated.]
Likewise William Drake holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, paying to the abbot 6d.; and he works just as the said Henry.
There are there also 6 other cotters, viz. William Drake Jr., Amycia the widow, Alice the widow, Robert son of Eda, William Pepper, and William Coleman, each of whom holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, paying and doing in all things, each for himself, just as the said William Drake.
Likewise William Russel holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, paying to the abbot 8d.; and he works in all things just as the said Henry Miller.
There are, moreover, 5 other cotters there, viz. Walter Pestel, Ralph Shepherd, Henry Abbot, Matilda Tut, and Jordan Mustard, each of whom holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, paying thence and doing in all things to the said abbot just as the said William Russel.
Likewise Beatrice of Hampton holds a cottage and a croft which contains 1 rood, paying to the abbot 12d.; and she works in all things just as the said Henry.
Likewise Hugh Miller holds 3 acres of land, paying to the abbot 42d.
Likewise Thomas, son of Richard, holds a cottage with a croft which contains half a rood, and 3 acres of land, paying to the abbot 4s.; and he works just as the said Henry.
Likewise Ralph Reeve holds a cottage with a croft which contains 1 rood, and 1 acre of land, paying to the abbot 2s.; and he works just as the said Henry.
Likewise each of the said cottagers, except the widows, gives yearly after Christmas a penny which is called head-penny.
Questions: What is the population of the manor? What obligations do the peasants have to their lord? What goods does the manor produce? How does the position of individual peasants vary? What do we learn about women’s roles within the rural economy?
63. The Statutes of Merton College, Oxford
Scholars had gathered in the city of Oxford by the mid-twelfth century; in the early thirteenth century such academic communities in a number of European cities organized themselves into the new universities, which continued to grow over the centuries to come. Oxford’s university was made up of small colleges and halls of scholars, such as Merton College, founded in 1274 by the document excerpted below.
Source: trans. A.F. Leach, Educational Charters and Documents, 598 to 1909 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1911), pp. 181–87; revised.
1. Of the Grant of the Manors of Maldon and Farleigh
In the name of the most glorious and undivided Trinity, Father, and Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.
I, Walter of Merton, clerk, formerly chancellor of the illustrious lord the king of England, trusting in the goodness of the great maker of property and possessions, confidently relying on the grace of him who disposes the desires of men to good and directs them at his will, and after anxiously turning over in my mind what I can contribute to the honor of his name in return for those things which he has abundantly contributed to me in my life, before the disturbances that lately arose in England founded and established a house, which I wished and directed should be entitled or called “of the Scholars of Merton,” on my own property acquired by my own labors at Maldon in the county of Surrey, for the perpetual maintenance of scholars studying in the schools, for the health of my soul . . . , [and] now, when the peace of England has been re-established and the former disturbances have been quieted, with stable mind I approve, establish and confirm, and grant and assign to them the place of their habitation and house at Oxford, where a university of students flourishes, on my own land adjoining Saint John’s church; which I wish to be called “the House of the Scholars of Merton” and in it I decree the scholars shall dwell forever. And to this house, or to the scholars forever dwelling in the same, by the grant of the highest, I have transferred my manors of Maldon and Farleigh with their appurtenances, which I gave in the time of disturbance, for the perpetual maintenance of the same scholars and the ministers of the altar who shall reside there, and now, when the peace of the realm has been restored, I grant and approve and with deliberate judgment ratify and confirm the same transfer of my own free will. And I decree that these manors with other property acquired or to be acquired by me for them shall always remain with the same scholars and brethren in the form and on the conditions underwritten to be continually observed in time to come, the Lord willing, as regards the persons as well as their rule of life.
2. Of the Lawyers and Scholars Living in the House
This form, then, I constitute and decree to be for ever observed, that in this house, called the House of the Scholars of Merton, there shall forever be scholars devoted to learning, and bound to devote their time to the study of arts, philosophy, canon law or theology. And the greater part of them shall devote themselves to the study of the liberal arts and philosophy, until at the will of the warden and fellows, as being persons who have been laudably proficient in them, they transfer themselves to the study of theology. But four or five of them shall be allowed by the provision of their superior, he declaring that they are able and apt for this, to study canon law. And the same superior may dispense them for a time to hear lectures in civil law if it shall appear expedient. There shall be also in the assembly a grammarian who shall devote his whole time to a grammar school, and books and other necessaries shall be provided for him from the possessions of the house; and he shall have the care of those who are applying themselves to the study of grammar; and even the seniors, if they have any doubts in their own faculties, shall have resort to him without blushing; and under his mastership the scholars themselves, if and when it shall seem to be for the benefit of their own readiness, shall speak Latin or the vulgar idiom [French], and he shall be bound to instruct each of them faithfully to the utmost of his ability. . . .
7. Of the Deans’ Duties, etc.
Some of the more discreet of the aforesaid scholars shall be elected to take charge, under the warden and as his assistants, of the less advanced and oversee their progress in learning and conduct. So that over every twenty, or ten, if necessary, there shall be a president, and more ample provision as appears proper shall be made for them while they diligently fulfill their charge of the rest. Also, in each chamber in which the aforesaid scholars live there shall be one older than the rest, who shall superintend his fellows, and shall report to the warden of the house himself and the rest of the prepositors having charge and to the assembly of scholars itself, if necessary, on their progress in morals and studies.
8. Of the Scholars’ Table
Moreover, the scholars studying in the house shall have a common table under the warden and other prepositors, the twenty men and deans, and also as far as possible a uniform dress.
40. Of the Education of the Boys, etc.
But whereas I have exchanged the succession to which my heirs and kindred were entitled in my freehold property by the custom of the realm for this charity, under the eye of God, as aforesaid, I will and decree that if any little ones of the aforesaid kindred become orphans or otherwise, through their parents’ poverty, lack support while they are receiving primary instruction in the rudiments, then the warden shall have up to thirteen of them educated in the aforesaid house, until they can become proficient in the university, if they shall be found to be capable; and from these, those who are found able and fit shall be taken to fill the places of the scholars, as set out above.
And lest there should break out in the said house or society, the plague which through the temptations of the flesh so often vexes the incautious, all service in the said house, at least in the court of the house of the scholars and of the manor of Maldon and elsewhere, as far as may be, shall always be done by men. . . .
Questions: What are Walter’s reasons for founding the college? Who will the students and teachers be? What do we learn of the curriculum? How will the college be organized? Who is included in, and who is excluded from, the college?
64. Roger Bacon’s Account of his Academic Career
The great English scholar Roger Bacon lectured at the universities of Oxford and Paris before joining the Franciscans around 1256. As a Franciscan friar at a time of official concern about unorthodox teachings and writings within the order, he was bound by a general ban on Franciscans disseminating their work. But in 1266 Pope Clement IV, impressed by Bacon’s reputation, wrote to him requesting a summary of his work. In response, Bacon produced three books in less than two years. The excerpts below describe his reaction to the papal order and various aspects of his academic career.
Source: trans. G.G. Coulton, Social Life in Britain from the Conquest to the Reformation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1918), pp. 130–36; revised.
To the most holy father and lord Pope Clement, supreme pontiff by the grace of God, your servant writes as follows, kissing in spirit the blessed feet of your holiness. . . .
I recall how for ten years I have now been an exile from that fame which I formerly won in the schools; and I recognize my own littleness, my manifold ignorance, my stammering speech and scratching pen. With all this I wonder at your wisdom, which now deigns to demand works of philosophy from me who am now unheard of among all men, as though I were already buried and eaten up by oblivion. . . . The head of the Church has made a request of the unworthy sole of the Church’s foot; the vicar of Christ and governor of the whole world deigns to solicit me, who am scarcely to be reckoned among the atoms of the universe! . . . My gratitude is not small; nay, it behooves me to be the most grateful of men, since your holiness has requested of me that very thing which I have yearned for with burning desire, which I have toiled for with bitter sweat, which I have pushed forward at great expense. Nevertheless, the foundations are not yet laid—the very stones and timber—until I shall have diligently investigated the mastery of sciences and languages, and other things requisite for building the edifice of wisdom. For the marvels of arts and sciences are subject to so many difficulties (and especially in these times of ours, when we are waiting for the days of Antichrist and his followers, on whose behalf the Devil is full of fury, that he may in diverse ways confound the study of wisdom, as I shall make plain in the later pages of my book) that only the prudence of the pope can remedy the situation. . . .
But this delay was necessary, and against my own will, who grieved then and grieve still at this. For, when you last wrote, the things which you believed me to have written had not yet been composed. In truth, before I became a friar, I composed no philosophical book; nor, since I came into this order, have I ever been asked to do so by those who are in authority over me. Nay, a grievous constitution has even been made to the contrary, under pain of loss of our book and of several days’ fasting on bread and water, if any writing done in a friary be communicated to others. But I could not get it copied in a fair hand except by scribes who are not friars; and such scribes would then make copies for themselves or for others, whether I wished it or not, even as things are so frequently published at Paris through the copyists’ frauds. Certainly, if I had been able to communicate my writings freely, I would have composed many books for my brother, who is a student, and for others of my friends. But when I saw no hope of publication I neglected to write. Wherefore, when I offered myself to your highness as ready, you must know that this meant I was ready to write books not yet written. . . . Nevertheless, the greatness and authority of your reverence kept me long idle, since at first I did not know what I could offer which would be worthy of your attention. Then, considering that nothing but something magnificent should be presented to your highness, . . . it is no wonder that I delayed in setting to work. . . . For the treatise on optics alone, which I send you here, could not be written by anyone else in less than a year . . . , nay, nor in less than ten. For, however well he knew the matter, he would need to make many experiments concerning these things, and to practice an almost infinite number of described figures, which demand much time, and to write it all out five or six times until he had one tried and trustworthy book. I say nothing here of other and greater subjects, until a more convenient time.
To this I add other, far more grievous causes of delay, which often drove me almost to despair. Truly, I thought of breaking off my work a hundred times; and, had it not been for the reverence due to the vicar of Christ, and the profit of mankind which could be procured through him alone, I would not have gone through with these impediments in this business—nay, not for all the churchmen in the world, however they might have sought me out and insisted.
The first impediment came through those who are set over me. Since you wrote nothing to them on my behalf, and since I could not nor should not reveal your secret to them, they press hard upon me, with unspeakable violence, that I, like the rest, should obey their will; which I could not do, bound as I was by your command to proceed with your work, notwithstanding any contrary command of my prelates. Know, therefore, that, not being excused by you, I was involved in more and more grievous hindrances than I can tell. . . .
Another kind of hindrance, which alone was enough to ruin the whole project, was my lack of money. For I had to spend more than 60 pounds in Parisian money in this matter, which I will fully account for in its own place. I marvel not that you had no thought of these expenses, seeing that you, sitting aloft over the whole world, must need think of so many weighty affairs that no man can measure the cogitations of your heart. . . . I myself, as you know, neither have money nor can have money; nor, by consequence, can I borrow, since I have no means of repaying. I sent therefore to my rich brother in our own country; but he, having taken the king’s part [in the Second Barons’ War], was driven from his home together with my mother and brothers and the whole family; nay, he was often seized by the enemy and ransomed. For this reason he was too impoverished and ruined to aid me, nor have I had any answer from him even unto this present day.
Considering, therefore, your reverence’s command, I solicited many great folk—some of whom you know well by face, but not their inward mind— saying that I had to carry out certain business for you in France (which business I did not complete) which could not be performed without great expense. But no tongue can tell how many of these men called me shameless, how many repulsed me, how many lured me with false hopes, and what confusion I suffered. Nay, not even my friends would believe me, seeing that I was unable to explain this business to them; thus this way was barred to me. At last, therefore, in greater anguish than I can express, I compelled poorer friends to give me succor, constraining them to spend all their substance, and to sell much and raise the rest through pledges, even often at usury; and I promised them that I would render you a full and faithful account of the expenses, and pledged my faith to procure full payment from you. . . .
My fourth reason [for thus insisting] is on my own account; for I have labored in many ways at science from my youth onwards, and at languages, and at all the aforesaid branches of learning; whereby I have collected much profitable learning and have also ordered other folk in that way. For I have sought the friendship of all wise men in this western world, and have caused young men to be instructed in tongues and figures and numbers and tables and instruments and many necessary things. And I have examined all things that are requisite to this work, and know now how we must proceed, and by what means, and what hindrances we must face; but how to proceed I know not, for lack of the aforesaid funds.
Yet, if any man would expend as much as I myself have already expended in my life, certainly a great part of the work might be completed. For during those twenty years when I labored especially in the study of wisdom, neglecting the opinions of the common sort, I expended more than £2,000 sterling on these things—on secret books, and various experiments, and languages and instruments and tables and such like matters; and also in seeking the friendship of wise men and in teaching others who should help me in languages, in figures, in numbers, in tables, in instruments, and in many other things. . . .
Nevertheless, since your wisdom has so long been busied in church affairs and in various cares for the state, and since no man on the throne of the apostles can find much time for studies, and these things of which I write are very difficult and foreign to the sense of many men—therefore I was more solicitous to find a fit mediator for presentation to your reverence, than for the words of my own writings. . . . Wherefore I set my thoughts on a certain poor youth whom, some five or six years ago, I caused to be instructed in languages and mathematics and optics, wherein is the whole difficulty of the things which I now send. Moreover, I taught him freely by word of mouth, after receiving your command, since I felt that I could find none other at present who knew my mind so well. For this reason I decided to send him to you, as a ready mediator if your wisdom should deign to make use of him; and, if not, he could still carry my writings to your majesty. . . . He came to me in poverty, as a mere boy; I had him nourished and taught for the love of God, especially since I had found no other youth so able both for study and for [practical] life. And he has profited so far that he might earn all that he needs in great abundance, and better than any other scholar of Paris, although his age be only twenty years or twenty-one at most. . . .
Nor is it only for that cause that I send this messenger; but also that you may see how nothing is difficult to a man of diligence and confidence, though a negligent or craven-spirited scholar shuts himself away from all that is good. For this youth came to me at the age of fifteen, and in poverty, having neither livelihood nor sufficient masters nor patron to take pity on his destitution; nor did he learn for as long as a single year, since he must needs work as servant to those who gave him the necessities of life; nor in his studies did he find for two whole years any man who would teach him a single word; notwithstanding all of these impediments, he now knows a great deal by reason of his own confidence and diligence. . . . Thus I am fully persuaded that there is no difficulty of youth or of learning which may not be overcome, if men have the will to learn, as well as the confidence and diligence. Nor is there any such difficulty in languages or sciences, but only in teachers of these subjects themselves, who either will not or cannot teach. For, from our youth onwards, we find no profitable teachers; and therefore we languish our whole lives, and end by knowing very little. But if we had capable teachers, I am sure that we should learn more in one year than we now learn in twenty—all of which I am ready to prove in practice; and I will stake my head on my plan’s success.
I have labored much in sciences and languages. For forty years have I now labored since first I learned the alphabet; and I was always studious; and for all but two years of those forty I have constantly been at the university; and I have spent much money, as others commonly do. Yet I am assured that within a quarter of a year, or half a year at most, I could teach with my own mouth all that I know to a resolved and confident man, provided only that I had first written a compendious manual to follow. Yet it is well known that no man has labored in so many languages and sciences as I, nor has labored so hard to master them; for, before I became a friar, men marveled that I could live through such excessive labor; yet afterward I have been as studious as before; not, indeed, that I have worked so hard, for it was no longer necessary, by reason of my exercise in wisdom.
Questions: What obstacles did Bacon face in his scholarly career? How did he overcome them? Of what is he particularly proud? What are his present worries? What do we learn from him about the world of the early universities?
65. The Conquest of Wales
Norman knights established marcher lordships throughout much of Wales in the late eleventh century, but native Welsh princes reversed these advances by the late twelfth century. Henry III (r. 1216–72) stepped up efforts to enforce royal authority over Wales, and a new precedent was set in 1267 when the Welsh prince, Llwelyn ap Gruffud, agreed do homage to Henry and pay tribute in exchange for confirmation of his lands and title. Llwelyn alienated Henry’s son Edward I (r. 1272–1307) by repeatedly refusing to renew his homage and persisting in an alliance with the rebel de Montfort family, giving Edward an excuse to invade Wales. Edward’s major campaigns in 1276–77 and 1282–83 led to the loss of Welsh independence, the imposition of English law, and the building of towns for English settlers, protected in turn by an “iron ring” of great stone castles. The following account comes from by William Rishanger, an English monk of St. Albans who wrote around 1300.
Source: trans. K.A. Smith, from William Rishanger, Chronica, in Chronica et annales regnantes Henrico tertio et Edwardo primo, ed. H.T. Riley (London: Longman & Company, 1865), pp. 85–88, 90–92, 97–105.
In this year [1275] a Parliament was held at London, and messengers were sent to invite Llwelyn, prince of Wales, who had earlier scorned to attend the king’s coronation. And when the royal messengers admonished him to come in person and render the homage he owed to the king, he pretended that he did not dare enter England on account of the plots of some powerful men who served the king. And, thus, to guarantee his safety, the prince of Wales demanded as hostages the king’s son, Earl Gilbert of Gloucester, and Robert Burnell, the king’s chancellor. This angered the king, but nevertheless he brought the Parliament to completion, keeping the matter secret. . . . After the Parliament, he set out for Chester on the Welsh border, so that Prince Llwelyn could approach him more freely, and he sent messengers to the prince a second time, demanding that he do homage. When Llwelyn refused to obey the royal order, the king deposed the prince and summoned his army with the aim of taking his lands by force. . . .
In the year 1276, the countess of Leicester, widow of Simon de Montfort and sister of King Henry [III] of England, who had fled to France after the death of her husband and taken up residence among the Dominican nuns at Montargis [an abbey founded by her late husband’s sister], sent her daughter across the sea to Wales. She had been betrothed to Prince Llwelyn while her father was still living, and the girl’s brother Amaury was assigned to serve as the prince’s proxy in the marriage ceremony. Her party sailed to England on a suspicious journey, and their ship was sighted off the Scilly Islands off the Cornish coast, where it was unexpectedly overtaken by four vessels from Bristol. The travelers were seized and brought to the English king, who honorably detained the girl in the queen’s court, and kept her brother Amaury under guard, though not in chains, first at Corff Castle and later at Sherborne Castle. . . .
[In 1277] the king of England, advancing with his army from Chester into Wales, began work on the castle which is called Rhuddlan, and sent into western Wales a nobleman named Payen de Chensi, who laid waste to the land with fire and sword. . . . In that time the people of western Wales came to the English king seeking peace, and restored the castle of Stredewy and the surrounding lands to Payen, the leader of the king’s army in that region.
The prince of Wales, seeing that he could no longer resist the English king, who grew stronger every day, sought to make peace with him, and it was made on the following terms. All the Welsh captives who the English king held in chains were to be released and pardoned. Item, in order to have peace and the king’s goodwill, Llwelyn will pay 50,000 pounds sterling, and in return will receive the king’s goodwill and grace. Item, that the Four Cantrefs [the lands between the Rivers Conwy and Dee in the eastern part of Gwynedd], together with all those lands conquered by the king and his men, except the island of Anglesey, will remain unconditionally and in perpetuity under the rule of the king of England and his heirs. The island of Anglesey is granted to the prince, who will pay the king 1,000 marks a year for it, with payment to begin next Michaelmas, and he will give a further 5,000 marks to the king as an entry fine. And if the prince should die without heirs, the king of England will take possession of that island. Item, that the prince will come to England at Christmas to do homage to the king. Item, that the entire homage of Wales should remain with the king, with the exception of the five baronies within the borders of Snowdonia, since Llwelyn could not rightly be called “prince” if he did not have some barons serving him. Item, that he may retain the title of prince for his lifetime, and after his death the five aforesaid barons will do homage to the king of England and his heirs, in perpetuity. And in order to ensure that this is done, he has handed over as hostages ten Welsh noblemen, who risk imprisonment, the alienation of their lands, and the end of their freedom. And the nobility from all of the Cantrefs and Snowdonia have sworn on holy relics that if the prince ever breaks the aforesaid terms of peace, they will abandon him and act as his enemies until, having been so admonished, he mends his ways.
On account of this treaty the prince made peace with his brothers whom he had harmed. For he had three brothers, two of whom, Owain and Rhodri, he had thrown in prison; the third, Dafydd, was forced to flee and remained for many years with the king of England, by whom he was knighted in that war—contrary to the custom of that people—for his goodness and loyalty, and was given great rewards by the king. The king had granted Dafydd the castle of Denbigh in Wales, with lands valued at £1,000 a year, and had besides given him as a wife the recently widowed daughter of the earl of Derby. By the king’s favor Owain was released from prison, and Rhodri fled from his brother and died in England. The king built a strong castle at Lampader Vaur in western Wales, to combat the raids of the Welsh. To pay for this war, the king’s people granted him a subsidy of the twentieth part of their goods. . . .
Around that same time [in 1278], the king of England gave the daughter of Simon de Montfort, earl of Leicester, who (as was described earlier) had been captured by the men of Bristol and brought to the king, to the prince of Wales as his wife. The king paid for the wedding ceremony himself and he and the queen honored the occasion with their presence. . . .
In that year [1281], the prince of Wales’s brother Dafydd, forgetting the kindnesses of the English king who had promoted him and protected him from his brother’s persecutions, incited nearly all of Wales to rise up in rebellion against the king. And since the Welsh prince and nobles were easily swayed to sedition, Dafydd added to his first crime by treacherously seizing that noble and famous knight Roger de Clifford, whom the king had appointed Justiciar of Wales, in his castle at Hayward on Palm Sunday. When certain of Roger’s knights tried to resist, the unarmed men were cut down. After returning to his brother the prince, David raised an army, marched to Rhuddlan, and besieged the king’s castle there.
The king was celebrating Easter in Devizes, in the diocese of Sarum, when rumors of this uprising reached him. He ordered his army to be mustered as quickly as possible, and dispatched those troops he already had with him to Rhuddlan. Then the king secretly went to Amesbury to visit his mother, who was then living there. . . . The next day, with his mother’s leave, the king hastened to join the troops he had sent ahead into Wales. When he heard of the king’s arrival, the prince of Wales raised the siege of Rhuddlan and fled to a safe distance. Meanwhile, the castle of Lampader Vaur was captured by Rhys ap Maelgwn and Gryffin ap Maredudd, and many other castles in those regions were taken by other Welsh nobles. . . . In that time the archbishop of Canterbury traveled to Snowdonia and diligently tried to convince the prince of Wales and his brother to make peace, but having failed, he returned to England and pronounced the sentence of excommunication against them. . . .
In the year 1282, the king set out from Rhuddlan for Anglesey with a strong army, advancing toward Snowdonia. To make a way for his troops to cross the arm of the sea dividing the island from the mainland, he ordered boats lashed together to make an invincible bridge. . . . In that time the army of Gilbert de Clare, the earl of Gloucester, inflicted a great defeat on the Welsh in open battle at Lantilowhyr. Most of the Welsh were killed, while the count himself lost only five knights, including William of Valencia the younger, a relative of the English king. His army scattered by the earl of Gloucester, the prince of Wales entered the lands of Cardigan and Stredewy and laid waste to the lands of Rhys ap Maredudd, who had sided with the English king against the prince. The prince next moved toward Builth, where he left the main body of the Welsh army with a small number of men. When he and his companions arrived at Builth, suspecting nothing, they were attacked and killed by two noblemen, John Giffard and Edmund Mortimer. This happened on [11 December,] the Friday before the feast of Saint Luke. One of the men present recognized the prince’s body and cut off his head, which he sent to the English king. The head was displayed on the Tower of London, crowned with ivy.
Two monks wrote verses about the aforesaid Llwelyn. Here is what the Welsh monk wrote:
Here lies the tormentor of the English, Snowdonia’s defender,
Llwelyn, prince of the Welsh,
Beyond reproach was his behavior.
This jewel of his age, a blossom of kings past,
Was a model for kings yet to come,
His people’s leader, law, and light to the last.
And here is what the English monk wrote:
Here lies the prince of errors, a cruel plunderer,
Traitor to the English, a burning firebrand and robber.
Savage war-god of the Welsh, cruel murderer,
Evil scourge of good Christians,
Last dreg of the Trojans’ forsaken lineage.
Questions: What do we learn about the characters of Edward I and Llwelyn? Why did Edward invade Wales in 1276 and 1282? How did the English king assert his authority in Wales? Where does the chronicler reveal his bias? How might a Welsh chronicler have narrated these events?
66. Edward I’s Confirmation of Charters
Edward I (r. 1272–1307) called frequent Parliaments and considered them a tool of royal government. Generally a strong and successful king, he faced a crisis in the 1290s in which he needed Parliament’s support, and this led him to grant the following confirmation of Magna Carta, with some new concessions, in 1297.
Source: trans. G.C. Lee, Source-Book of English History: Leading Documents (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1900), pp. 184–85; revised.
1. Edward, by the grace of God king of England, lord of Ireland, and duke of Aquitaine, to all those that shall hear or see these present letters, greeting: Know that we, to the honor of God and of the holy Church, and to the profit of our realm, have granted for us and our heirs that the Charter of Liberties and the Charter of the Forest, which were made by common assent of all the realm, in the time of King Henry [III] our father, shall be kept in every point without breach. And we will that the same charters shall also be sent under our seal to our justices of the forest as to others, and to all sheriffs of shires, and to all other officers and to all our cities throughout the realm, together with our writs, in which it shall be contained that they cause the aforesaid charters to be published, and declare to the people that we have confirmed them in all points, and that our justices, sheriffs, mayors, and other officials, which under us have the laws of our land to guide, shall allow the said charters pleaded before them in judgment in all their points; that is to wit, the Great Charter as the common law and the Charter of the Forest according to the assize of the forest, for the welfare of our realm.
2. And we will that if from now on any judgment be given that is contrary to the points of the charter aforesaid, by the justices or by any other of our officials that hold pleas before them, it shall be null and void.
3. And we will that the same charters shall be sent under our seal to cathedral churches throughout our realm, there to remain, and shall be read before the people twice a year.
4. And that all archbishops and bishops shall pronounce the sentence of greater excommunication against all those that by word, deed, or counsel, do contrary to the aforesaid charters, or break or undo them in any point. And that the said courses be denounced and published by the aforesaid prelates twice a year. And if the same prelates or any of them be remiss in denouncing the said sentences, the archbishops of Canterbury and York for the time being, as is fitting, shall compel and distrain them to make that denunciation in the aforesaid form.
5. And because diverse people of our realm fear that the aids and tasks which they have given to us in the past toward our wars and other business, of their own grant and good-will, however they were made, might become a bondage to them and their heirs, because they might be at another time found in the rolls, and so likewise the prises [confiscations] taken throughout the realm by our ministers; we have granted that neither we nor our heirs shall draw such aids, tasks, nor prises, as a custom, because of anything that has been done in the past, whether it be by roll or any other precedent that may be found.
6. Moreover, we have granted for us and our heirs, as well to archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors, and other folk of holy Church, as also to earls, barons, and to all the commonalty of the land, that from now on we will only take such manner of aids, taxes or prises by the common consent of the realm, and for its common profit, except for the ancient aids and prises due and accustomed.
7. And for as much as the great part of the commonalty of the realm is sorely aggrieved by the maletote of wools, that is to wit, a toll of 40s. for every sack of wool, and have petitioned us to release the same, we have clearly released it at their request, and have granted for us and our heirs that we shall not take such thing or any other without their common assent and good will, saving to us and our heirs the custom of wools, skins, and leather granted before by the commonalty aforesaid. In witness of which things we have caused these our letters to be made patent. Witness: Edward, our son, at London, the tenth day of October, the twenty-fifth year of our reign.
And let be it remembered that this same charter in the same terms, word for word, was sealed in Flanders under the king’s great seal, that is to say at Ghent, the fifth day of November in the twenty-fifth year of the reign of our aforesaid lord the king, and sent into England.
Questions: Clauses 5 and 6 are considered the most important parts of this document. What do they promise? What are the implications of such a promise? How does the document show that Magna Carta was still politically important?