Monastic Life in the Medieval British Isles: Essays in Honour of Janet Burton

274 Pages·2019·23.44 MB·English

by  Karen Stober, Emilia Jamroziak, Julie Kerr

MONASTIC LIFE
IN THE MEDIEVAL
BRITISH ISLES
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MONASTIC LIFE
IN THE MEDIEVAL
BRITISH ISLES
Essays in Honour of Janet Burton
EDITED BY
KAREN STÖBER, JULIE KERR
AND EMILIA JAMROZIAK
UNIVERSITY OF WALES PRESS
2018
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© The Contributors, 2018
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any material form
(including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether
or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the
written permission of the copyright owner except in accordance with the provisions of
the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. Applications for the copyright owner’s
written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed
to the University of Wales Press, University Registry, King Edward VII Avenue,
Cardiff CF10 3NS.
www.uwp.co.uk
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-78683-322-8 (hardback)
978-1-78683-318-1 (paperback)
e-ISBN: 978-1-78683-319-8
The right of The Contributors to be identified as authors of this work has been asserted
by them in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents
Act 1988.
Typeset by Marie Doherty
Printed by CPI Antony Rowe, Melksham
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CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vii
List of illustrations ix
List of abbreviations xi
List of contributors xiii
Introduction xv
Karen Stöber and Emilia Jamroziak
Part I: Monastic and religious orders in Britain
1. Cistercian histories in late medieval England, and beyond 3
James Clark
2. ‘Like a mother between father and sons.’ The role of 27
the prior in later medieval English monasteries
Martin Heale
3. Formed by word and example: the training of novices 41
in fourteenth-century Dublin
Colmán Ó Clabaigh
4. Strata Florida: a former Welsh Cistercian Abbey and its future 53
David Austin
Part II: Religious and laity
5. The world of bishops in religious orders in medieval Ireland, 71
1050–1230
Edel Bhreathnach
6. Art, architecture, piety and patronage at Rievaulx Abbey, 89
c.1300–1538
Michael Carter
7. The last days of Bridlington Priory 105
Claire Cross
8. Galwegians and Gauls: Aelred of Rievaulx’s dramatisation 115
of xenophobia in Relatio de Standardo
Marsha L. Dutton
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vi w Contents
9. The cloister of the soul: Robert Grosseteste and 127
the monastic houses of his diocese
Philippa Hoskin
10. The abbey of St Benet of Holme and the English rising 139
of 1381
Andrew Prescott
Part III: Women in the medieval monastic world
11. Looking for medieval female religious in Britain and 161
Ireland: sources, methodologies and pitfalls
Kimm Curran
12. ‘As for a nun’: corrodies, nunneries and the laity 173
Brian Golding
13. Preaching to nuns in the Norwich diocese on the eve 189
of the Reformation: the evidence from visitation records
Veronica O’Mara
Select Bibliography 213
Bibliography of Janet Burton’s publications 219
Index 225
Tabula Gratulatoria 236
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The editors are indebted to the help and encouragement of many people
in the making of this book. We would like to thank the University of
Wales Press and especially Llion Wigley and Siân Chapman for their support
and patience throughout this project. We are grateful to our contributors for
producing their chapters cheerfully despite the tight deadlines and strict word
limit, and to all those who have participated in the Tabula Gratulatoria.
Our thanks to Dani Leiva for his evocative drawing of Byland Abbey
which is on the front cover and which Dani drew specifically for this
Festschrift. Byland Abbey holds a special place in Janet’s heart and in her
research, making this a fitting tribute. We are indebted to William Marx, Our
Man in Lampeter, for without his conspiratorial help and support this project
would not have been possible. Throughout, William has provided us with the
necessary names, facts and figures, and he moreover compiled the list of Janet’s
publications – no mean feat. We thank Paul Watkins for the photograph of
Janet in the Founders’ Library. Paul managed to dupe Janet into posing for
this picture: we commend his guile.
Finally, we would like to thank everybody who has helped to keep this
project a secret from Janet, allowing us to surprise her with the presentation
of this book.
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ILLUSTRATIONS
Frontispiece: Janet Burton
Photograph: Paul Watkins.
FIGURE 1: The foundation history of Forde Abbey as preserved in the 18
early fifteenth-century genealogy of the Courtenay earls of Devon,
now held at Powderham Castle (fol. 5v).
© Powderham Estate and Exeter Digital Humanities.
FIGURE 2: The former monastery of Strata Florida (red shading) 55
in its topography looking westwards towards the Irish Sea. With kind
permission of the Royal Commission on Ancient and Historical
Monuments of Wales.
FIGURE 3: The Great Abbey site. Property of the Strata Florida Trust, 57
in the darker shade of grey. © David Austin.
FIGURE 4: What is currently known of the abbey precinct as redesigned 58
in 1184 and functioning at its height in the thirteenth century.
© David Austin.
FIGURE 5: Speculative plan of a possible earlier monastery under 60
Strata Florida Cistercian Abbey. © David Austin.
FIGURE 6: Strata Florida House and designed landscape in 1765. 62
© David Austin.
FIGURE 7: Bishop Gilbert of Limerick’s De statu ecclesiae, Durham 72
Cathedral Library, MS B.II.35, fol. 36v. © Durham Cathedral Library.
FIGURE 8: Rievaulx Abbey, presbytery, c.1220. 90
Photograph: Michael Carter.
FIGURE 9: Rievaulx Abbey, fragmentary sculpture of Christ in Majesty, 93
c.1260–70. Photograph: Historic England.
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