Parish life in mediæval England

by Francis Aidan Gasquet

“Pauper.—That is so, but not as thou meanest: the cross that we creep to and worship so highly that time is Christ himself that died on the cross that day for our sins and our sake. For the shape of man is a cross, and as He hung upon the rood He was a very cross. He is that cross, as all doctors say, to whom we pray and say, Ave crux, spes unica—‘Hail be thou Cross, our only hope,’ etc. And as Bede saith; for as much as Christ was most despised of mankind on Good Fryday, therefore Holy Church hath ordeyned that on the Good Fryday men should do Him that great high worship that day, not to the crosse that the priest holdeth in his hand, but to Hym that died for us all that day upon the crosse.”

Archbishop Simon Mepham (1327-1333) issued a special Constitution as to the way in which this solemn day was to be kept throughout England.

“We order and ordain,” he says, “that this holy day of Good Friday, on which our Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ after many stripes laid down His precious life on the Cross for the salvation of men, according to the custom of the Church should be passed in reading, silence, prayer and fasting with tearful sorrow.”

For which reason this Synod forbade all servile work on this great day; the archbishop adding, however, that this did not apply to the poor, and that the rich might show their charity to the poor by aiding them in work upon their land. The canonist Lyndwood points out, in commenting on this provision, that by “silence” the archbishop probably intends to prohibit all shouting or noise, all loud talking or disputes, which might interfere with the solemnity of this commemoration.

Holy Saturday.—The service of this day probably began at a late hour, as, according to primitive custom, it was the Office of a Vigil. The first act in the long Office was the blessing of the new fire, which had previously been struck by a steel out of flint. After a candle had been lit at the new fire, the procession passed from outside the western door, where this first portion of the ceremony had been held, into the church for the blessing of the Paschal Candle. The preparation of this symbol of “the risen Lord,” with the five glorified grains of incense, to remind all of His five sacred wounds, was one of the yearly parochial works. The charges for it are to be found in every book of church accounts: money was collected for the purpose, people gave presents towards it, and in some places—at St. Dunstan’s, Canterbury, for instance—goods in kind were placed in the hands of the wardens, in order that the hiring-out of them might pay for the annual “paschal.” To this practice of having their annual “paschal,” the people clung somewhat tenaciously on the change of religion; and as late as 1586, at Great Yarmouth, charges were made by the churchwardens for taking down and putting up “the Paschal.”

The Paschal, apparently, was commonly a lofty construction: a tall thick piece of wood painted to represent a candle, and ornamented, rested in the socket of the candlestick, and on the top of this, at a great height, was the real candle. For some reason not known, the wooden part was called by our English ancestors the “Judas of the Paschal.” On this day also, in every parish church, the font was hallowed with impressive and symbolic ceremonies.

Easter Day.—“On this day,” says an English fourteenth-century sermon book—“on this day all the people receive the Holy Communion.” This was apparently the universal custom; and although in preparation for this Easter duty the parishioners were advised to go to their parish priest at the beginning of Lent, there are indications that during the last days of Holy Week there was sometimes a press of penitents. At St. Mary’s, Dover, for example, in 1538 and 1539, the churchwardens enter in their expenses, “Item—paid to two priests at Easter to help shrive—2s.” And in 1540 the entry runs, “Item—paid to three priests to help shrive and to minister on Maunday Thursday, Easter even, and Easter day, 2s. 4d.”

Early in the morning of Easter, at the first streak of dawn, the people hastened to the church to be present when the Blessed Sacrament was brought by the priests from the sepulchre to the usual place where it hung over the altar. Sometimes the image of our Lord, which had been placed with it in the figurative tomb of the Easter sepulchre, was made movable, and on Easter day was placed on the altar in a standing position. This probably was the case at St. Mary’s, Cambridge, where in 1537 the churchwardens paid “for mending of the Vice for the Resurrection.” Generally, however, the crucifix was brought out of the place of repose and taken to some side altar, and there once more, as on Good Friday, all clergy and people knelt to honour it and kiss it. This was the practice in many large churches, and a description of the “Resurrection figure” is given in the Rites of Durham.

“There was in the Abbye church of Duresme,” says the writer, “a very solemn service uppon Easter day, between three and four of the cloche in the morninge in honour of the Resurrection, where two of the oldest monkes came to the sepulchre, being sett upp upon Good Friday after the Passion, all covered with red velvett and embrodered with gold, and then did sence it, either monke with a pair of silver sencers sitting on their knees before the Sepulchre. Then they both rising came to the sepulchre, out of the which, with great devotion and reverence, they tooke a marvelous beautiful image of our Saviour, representing the Resurrection, with a cross in his hand, in the breast whereof was enclosed in bright christall the Holy Sacrament of the Altar, through the which christall the Blessed Host was conspicuous to the beholders. Then, after the elevation of the said picture, carryed by the said two monkes uppon a faire velvett cushion all embrodered, singinge the anthem of Christus resurgens, they brought it to the high altar, settinge that on the midst thereof, whereon it stood, the two monkes kneelinge on their knees before the altar and senceing it, all the time that the rest of the whole quire was in singinge the aforesaid anthem of Christus resurgens. The which anthem being ended, the two monkes took up the cushions and the picture from the altar, supportinge it betwixt them, proceeding in procession from the high altar to the South quire door, where there was four antient gentlemen belonginge to the prior, appointed to attend their cominge, holding up a moste rich canopye of purple velvett, tacked round about with redd silk and gold fringe; and at every corner did stand one of these gentlemen to beare it over the said image, with the Holy Sacrament carried by two monkes round about the church, the whole quire waiting uppon it with goodly torches and great store of other lights till they came to the high altar againe, whereon they did place the said image, there to remaine untill the Ascension day.”

An English Easter custom is referred to in more than one book of sermons.