Medieval English Nunneries c. 1275 to 1535

by Eileen Power

the Pope having heard that Alice, who has been Prioress for about twenty years, has so dilapidated its goods, from which the Prioress for the time being is wont to administer to the nuns their food and clothing, that it is 200 marks in debt; that she specially cherishes two immodest nuns one of whom, her own (suam) sister, had apostatized and left the monastery and, remaining in the world, had had children, the other like the first in evil life and lewdness but not an apostate, and feeds and clothes them splendidly, whilst she feeds the other honest nuns meanly and for several years past has not provided them with clothing; that she has long kept and keeps Thomas Ferring, a secular priest, as companion at board and in bed (in commensalem et sibi contubernalem), who has long slept and still sleeps, contrary to the institutes of the order, within the monastery, beneath the dorter, in a certain chamber (domo), in which formerly no secular had ever been wont to sleep and in which the said priest and Alice meet together at will by day and night, to satisfy their lust (pro explenda libidine), on account of which and other enormous and scandalous crimes, which Alice has committed and still commits, there is grave and public scandal against her in those parts, to the great detriment of the monastery.

If these things were found to be true the commissioners were ordered to deprive the Prioress. In 1427 there occurred another very serious case of misconduct in a Prioress, which (as at Catesby) seems to have tainted the whole flock and is a still further illustration of the fact that a bad prioress often meant an ill-conducted house. By her own admission Isabel Hermyte, Prioress of Redlingfield in Suffolk, had never been to confession nor observed Sundays and principal double feasts since the last visitation, two years before. She and Joan Tates, a novice, had not slept in the dorter with the other nuns, but in a private chamber. She had laid violent hands on Agnes Brakle on St Luke’s day; and she had been alone with Thomas Langeland, bailiff, in private and suspicious places, to wit in a small hall with closed windows “and sub heggerowes.” Nor was the material condition of the house safer in her hands. There were only nine nuns instead of the statutory number of thirteen and only one chaplain instead of three; no annual account had been rendered, obits had been neglected, goods alienated and trees cut down without the knowledge and consent of the convent. Altogether she confessed that she was neither religious nor honest in conversation and the effect of her conduct upon her charges was only too apparent, for the novice Joan Tates confessed to incontinence and asserted that it had been provoked by the bad example of the Prioress. The result of this exposure was the voluntary resignation of the guilty woman, in order to save a scandal, and her banishment to the priory of Wix; the whole convent was ordered to fast on bread and beer on Fridays, and Joan Tates was to go in front of the solemn procession of the convent on the following Sunday, wearing no veil and clad in white flannel[258].

It is the darker side of convent life that these ancient scandals call up before our eyes. The system produced its saints as well as its sinners; we have only to remember the German nunnery of Helfta to be sure of that. The English nunneries of the later middle ages produced no great mystics, but there have come down to us word-pictures of at least two heads of houses worthy to rank with the best abbesses of any age; not women of genius, but good, competent housewives, careful in all things of the welfare of their nuns, practical as well as pious. The famous description of the Abbess Euphemia of Wherwell (1226-57) is too well-known to be quoted here in full[259]:

“It is most fitting,” says her convent chartulary, “that we should always perpetuate the memory, in our special prayers and suffrages, of one who ever worked for the glory of God, and for the weal of both our souls and bodies. For she increased the number of the Lord’s handmaids in this monastery from forty to eighty, to the exaltation of the worship of God. To her sisters, both in health and sickness, she administered the necessaries of life with piety, prudence, care and honesty. She also increased the sum allowed for garments by 12d. each. The example of her holy conversation and charity, in conjunction with her pious exhortations and regular discipline, caused each one to know how, in the words of the Apostle, to possess her vessel in sanctification and honour. She also, with maternal piety and careful forethought, built, for the use of both sick and sound, a new and large farmery away from the main buildings and in conjunction with it a dorter and other necessary offices. Beneath the farmery she constructed a watercourse, through which a stream flowed with sufficient force to carry off all refuse that might corrupt the air. Moreover she built there a place set apart for the refreshment of the soul, namely a chapel of the Blessed Virgin, which was erected outside the cloister behind the farmery. With the chapel she enclosed a large place, which was adorned on the north side with pleasant vines and trees. On the other side, by the river bank, she built offices for various uses, a space being left in the centre, where the nuns are able from time to time to enjoy the pure air. In these and in other numberless ways, the blessed mother Euphemia provided for the worship of God and the welfare of her sisters.”

Nor was she less prudent in ruling secular business: “she also so conducted herself with regard to exterior affairs,” says the admiring chronicler, “that she seemed to have the spirit of a man rather than of a woman.” She levelled the court of the abbey manor and built a new hall, and round the walled court “she made gardens and vineyards and shrubberies in places that were formerly useless and barren and which now became both serviceable and pleasant”; she repaired the manor-houses at Tufton and at Middleton; when the bell tower of the dorter fell down, she built a new one “of commanding height and of exquisite workmanship”; and one of the last acts of her life was to take down the unsteady old presbytery and to lay with her own hands, “having invoked the grace of the Holy Spirit, with prayers and tears,” the foundation stone of a new building, which she lived to see completed:

These and other innumerable works our good superior Euphemia performed for the advantage of the house, but she was none the less zealous in works of charity, gladly and freely exercising hospitality, so that she and her daughters might find favour with One Whom Lot and Abraham and others have pleased by the grace of hospitality. Moreover, because she greatly loved to honour duly the House of God and the place where His glory dwells, she adorned the church with crosses, reliquaries, precious stones, vestments and books.

Finally, she “who had devoted herself when amongst us to the service of His house and the habitation of His glory, found the due reward for her merits with our Lord Jesus Christ,” and died amid the blessings of her sisters.

Less famous is the name of another mighty builder, who ruled, some two centuries later, the little Augustinian nunnery of Crabhouse in Norfolk[260]. Joan Wiggenhall was (as has already been pointed out) a lady of good family and had influential friends; she was installed as Prioress in 1420, and began to build at once. In her first year she demolished a tumble-down old barn and caused it to be remade; this cost £45. 9s. 6d., irrespective of the timber cut upon the estate and of the tiles from the old barn, but the friends of the house helped and Sir John Ingoldesthorpe gave £20 “to his dyinge,” and the Archdeacon of Lincoln 10 marks. Cheered by this, the Prioress continued her operations; in her second year she persuaded the Prior of Shouldham to co-operate with her in roofing the chancel of Wiggenhall St Peter’s, towards which she paid 20 marks, and she also made the north end of her own chamber for 10 marks, and in her third year she walled the chancel of St Peter’s and completed the south end of her chamber. Then she began the great work of her life, the church of the nunnery itself, and for three years this was the chief topic of conversation in all the villages round, and the favourite charity of all her neighbours:

“Also in the iiij yere of the same Jone Prioresse,” runs the account in Crabhouse Register, “Ffor myschefe that was on the chyrche whiche myght not be reparid but if it were newe maid, with the counseyle of here frendys dide it take downe, trostynge to the helpe of oure Lorde and to the grete charite of goode cristen men and so with helpe of the persone before seyde (her cousin, Edmund Perys, the parson of Watlington) and other goode frendes as schal be shewyd aftyrward, be the steringe of oure Lorde and procuringe of the person forseyde sche wrowght there upon iij yere and more contynuali and made it, blessyd be God, whiche chirche cost cccc mark, whereof William Harald that lithe in the chapel of Our Lady payde for the ledynge of the chirch vij skore mark. And xl li. payede we for the roofe, the whiche xl li. we hadde of Richard Steynour, Cytesen of Norwiche, and more hadde we nought of the good whiche he bequeathe us on his ded-bedde in the same Cyte, a worthly place clepyd Tomlonde whiche was with holde fro us be untrewe man his seketoures. God for his mekyl mercy of the wronge make the ryghte.”

The indignant complaint of the nuns, balked of their “worthly place clepyd Tomlonde,” is very typical; there was always an executor in hell as the middle ages pictured it, and a popular proverb affirmed that “too secuturs and an overseere make thre theves”[261]. In this case, however, other friends were ready to make up for the deficiencies of those untrue men: