There were cells attached to the Cluniac house of Bermondsey at Aldersgate, Cripplegate and Holborn.
Carthusians.—Bruno first instituted the Order at Chartreux, in the diocese of Grenoble in France, about 1080. The rule was confirmed by Pope Alexander III. about 1174. This was the most strict of any of the religious Orders. The monks never ate flesh, and were obliged to fast on bread, water and salt one day in every week. No one was permitted to go out of the bounds of the monastery except the priors and procurators or proctors, and they only upon the necessary affairs of their houses. When the Order was brought to England in 1178 the first house was started at Witham, in Somersetshire. In all there were nine houses of the Order in England. One of these was the Charterhouse of London, which was not founded until 1371 by Sir Walter Manny, K.G.
Until Henry II. founded the Carthusian house at Witham it is said that there was no such thing known in England as a monk’s cell, as we understand the term. It was a peculiarity of the Carthusian Order, and when it was first introduced it was regarded as a startling novelty for any privacy or anything approaching solitude to be tolerated in a monastery. The Carthusian system never found much favour in England.
Cistercians.—The Cistercian Order was named after Cistertium or Cîteaux, in the bishopric of Chalons in Burgundy, where it was founded in 1098 by Robert, Abbot of Molesme, in that province. St. Bernard was a great promoter of the Order, and founded an abbey at Clairvaux about 1116, and after him the members of the Order were sometimes named Bernardines.
It was usual to plant these monasteries in solitary and uncultivated places, and no other house, even of their own Order, was allowed to be built within a certain distance of the original establishment. This makes it surprising to learn that there were two separate houses of this Order in the near neighbourhood of London.