Journal of Medieval Monastic Studies

This article re-examines Gildas’s attitude to excommunication in surviving fragments of his letter to Finnian, utilized in Irish canon collections of the seventh and eighth centuries. It compares Gildas’s approach to that of Patrick in his open letter excommunicating the followers of Coroticus and, subsequently, to the two synods attributed to Patrick. While Patrick actively relies on excommunication as a disciplinary tool, Gildas offers an exegetically original critique of the abuse of excommunication. These contrary approaches are also reflected in the two ‘Patrician’ synods. Attempts to rehabilitate the opposing positions of Gildas and Patrick on excommunication in seventh- and eighth-century Ireland suggest memories of a connected intergenerational crisis between secular and ecclesiastical authority in the early insular church.

During the twelfth century, Durham Cathedral Priory founded a dependent daughter house at Coldingham, Berwickshire. In founding Coldingham Priory, the Durham monks encountered an older monastic heritage present in the peninsular: that of the seventh-century St Æbbe (d. 683). Æbbe’s own monastic foundation at Coludi urbs had long since been destroyed, but her presence had not entirely dispersed from the region and, following the rediscovery of her tomb and surviving relics, her cult was established at Coldingham. By the close of the twelfth century, this cult had become predominantly focused on a clifftop oratory two miles from the priory where, it was believed, Æbbe’s original monastery had stood. The case study of the creation of Æbbe’s cult offers important insight into the ways in which myths and memories were remembered, rewritten, and adapted in order that the priory could connect its present to its monastic predecessor. In the case of Coldingham Priory, this took the form of establishing a spiritual heritage that linked the new priory to the saintly abbess. This article highlights the ways in which Coldingham Priory presented their connection to their spiritual ancestor, Æbbe, considering how a balance was found between monastic and lay association with the cult, and revealing how the cult’s establishment suggests that the monks of Coldingham were pressing for greater independence than Durham was willing to grant.

Scholars have often noted similarities between the Grandmontine Order’s concept of poverty and the Franciscan one. This article argues that the two groups fundamentally differed in their approach. The Grandmontines only admired material poverty when it was an outward sign of spiritual poverty, defined as the renunciation of the world, the self, and the will. More often than not, however, material poverty forced hermits to go back into the world to survive, going against their eremitic ideals of spiritual poverty. Instead of renouncing all ownership and prizing the lack of material goods as the Franciscans did, Grandmontines owned what they needed to survive apart from the world, trusting that by not going into the world, God willing, they would inspire the world to give them what they needed.

The Coventry dispute has long been identified as an important episode in the history of the twelfth-century English Church, yet the events of the dispute itself have often been overlooked. One such aspect is the role played by Alan, abbot of Tewkesbury, which hitherto has gone unnoticed by historians. This is surprising as, due to the paucity of sources for the conflict, Alan’s letter is an important record for the dispute. This article discusses the process of the Coventry dispute, the important role played by Alan, and our understanding of what happened. It analyses the surviving sources of the conflict, contextualizes the Coventry dispute in the broader canvas of twelfth-century church conflicts, and argues that Alan’s involvement at Coventry had more to do with his concerns for similar events at Canterbury, rather than any special affection for the Coventry monks.

The early twelfth century has long been recognized as a period of monastic expansion and adaptation, in which old rules (such as the rules of Benedict and Augustine) were reshaped to fit new forms of life. This process of adaptation continued into the later twelfth and early thirteenth centuries, as the founders of new religious communities continued to grapple with perennial problems and questions. A particularly intractable set of questions related to the care of nuns (the cura monialium), and to the practicalities of reconciling spiritual equality with bodily difference. This article explores two interlinked responses to these questions, namely the Institutes of the Order of Sempringham, and the legislation of the Dominican convent of San Sisto, Rome. The rule of Augustine, with its emphasis on preaching and pastoral care, could be adapted to provide a self-regulating, homeostatic solution to some of the problems of the cura monialium. A particularly innovative feature of the Institutes of the Order of Sempringham was the use of a complex series of windows and doors, which could be adopted by other groups seeking to balance the tension between institutional integrity and physical segregation.

Through a case study of the only religious order founded in Hungary, that of the Paulines (Ordo Sancti Pauli Primi Eremitae), this article analyses the geographical background, chronological context, and originality of centralized monastic liturgies (e.g. Cistercian, Premonstratensian, Dominican, Franciscan, Carmelite). It argues to the conclusion that such Uses were deeply embedded in the regional background of the order’s foundation. Their formative period can be determined by comparing their distinctive features with different historical layers of the related diocesan tradition. However, all the regional features are subject to a creative revision that makes the order’s Use distinct and characteristic.

This paper begins by reviewing the evidence for the authorship of The Annals of Dunstable Priory following the recent publication of the first English translation of the text. Having established the polyvocal authorship of the annals, it goes on to argue for the ways in which the text represents the views and opinions of the textual community responsible for its production. In particular, it examines the multiple layers of the religious community’s identity and its place within the wider world of thirteenth-century England. The investigation reveals how the concern for recording the rights, privileges, and memories of the priory and township reflect broader trends in the thirteenth century, including an increased reliance on the written word and administrative processes.

The online portal of the research project Germania Sacra offers a database for clerical institutions in the Holy Roman Empire. The monastic database ‘Klöster und Stifte des Alten Reiches’ provides basic information about the institutions and fields queries regarding affiliations to religious orders, the duration of these affiliations, dates of foundation, dissolution, and geographical locations. The results are displayed on interactive maps that visualize the monastic landscape of the medieval and early modern periods. The entries of communities in the database also list numerous clerics associated with the respective religious houses.