Early Double Monasteries / A Paper read before the Heretics' Society on December 6th, 1914

by Constance Stoney

EARLY
DOUBLE MONASTERIES

A Paper read before the Heretics' Society
on December 6th, 1914

BY

CONSTANCE STONEY

NEWNHAM COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

Cambridge:
DEIGHTON, BELL & CO., LIMITED.
London:
G. BELL & SONS, LIMITED.
1915

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EARLY
DOUBLE MONASTERIES.

The system of double monasteries, or monasteries for both men and women, is as old as that of Christian monasticism itself, though the phrase "monasteria duplicia"[1] dates from about the C6. The term was also sometimes applied to twin monasteries for men; Bede uses it in this sense with reference to Wearmouth and Yarrow, while he generally speaks of a double monastery as "monasterium virginum."