An Introduction to the History of Western Europe

by James Harvey Robinson

When landowners began to give and receive land as fiefs the property of the Church was naturally drawn into the feudal relations. A king, or other proprietor, might grant fiefs to churchmen as well as to laymen. The bishops became the vassals of the king or of other feudal lords by doing homage for a fief and swearing fidelity, just as any other vassal would do. An abbot sometimes placed his monastery under the protection of a neighboring lord by giving up his land and receiving it back again as a fief.

Fiefs held by churchmen not hereditary.

One great difference, however, existed between the church lands and the ordinary fiefs. According to the law of the Church, the bishops and abbots could not marry and so could have no children to whom they might transmit their property. Consequently, when a landholding churchman died, some one had to be chosen in his place who should enjoy his property and perform his duties. The rule of the Church had been, from time immemorial, that the clergy of the diocese should choose the bishop, their choice being ratified by the people. As the church law expresses it, "A bishop is therefore rightly appointed in the church of God when the people acclaim him who has been elected by the common vote of the clergy." As for the abbots, they were, according to the rule of St. Benedict, to be chosen by the members of the monastery.

Bishops and abbots practically chosen by the feudal lords.

In spite of these rules the bishops and abbots had come, in the tenth and eleventh centuries, to be selected, to all intents and purposes, by the various kings and feudal lords. It is true that the outward forms of a regular ("canonical") election were usually permitted; but the feudal lord made it clear whom he wished chosen, and if the wrong person was elected, he simply refused to hand over to him the lands attached to the bishopric or abbey. The lord could in this way control the choice of the prelates, for in order to become a real bishop or abbot one had not only to be elected, he had also to be solemnly "invested" with the appropriate powers of a bishop or abbot and with his lands.

Investiture.

Since, to the worldly minded, the spiritual powers attached to church offices possessed little attraction if no property went along with them, the feudal lord was really master of the situation. When his appointee was duly chosen he proceeded to the investiture. The new bishop or abbot first became the "man" of the feudal lord by doing him homage, and then the lord transferred to him the lands and rights attached to the office. No careful distinction appears to have been made between the property and the spiritual prerogatives. The lord often conferred both by bestowing upon a bishop the ring and the crosier, the emblems of religious authority. It seemed shocking enough that the lord, who was often a rough soldier, should dictate the selection of the bishops, but it was still more shocking that he should audaciously assume to confer spiritual powers with spiritual emblems. Yet even worse things might happen, since sometimes the lord, for his greater convenience, had himself made bishop.

Attitude of the Church towards its property.

Attitude of the king.

The Church itself naturally looked at the property attached to a benefice as a mere incident and considered the spiritual prerogatives the main thing. And since the clergy alone could rightly confer these, it was natural that they should claim the right to bestow ecclesiastical offices, including the lands ("temporalities") attached to them, upon whomsoever they pleased without consulting any layman whatever. Against this claim the king might urge that a simple minister of the Gospel, or a holy monk, was by no means necessarily fitted to manage the interests of a feudal state, such as the great archbishoprics and bishoprics, and even the abbeys, had become in Germany and elsewhere in the eleventh century.