[Style:] MS. N is not only the most remote from the original in dialect, it has also been altered in language more than the others, partly from a desire to make the meaning plainer, partly from a dislike of any singularity of expression. The changes made may be classified as i. insertion of connecting particles, ‘and,’ ‘vor,’ ‘þeonne,’ N 144 &c.; ‘so uorð so’ in A is altered into ‘uor so’ Morton, 136/13: ii. expansions like ‘ȝe habbeð’ N 95, ‘he nout’ N 101, ‘to þer eorðe’ N 130, ‘þeo þinges’ N 160: iii. re-arrangement of words in a prose order, ‘kume hom’ N 102, ‘so’ N 115, ‘dreamen wel’ N 192: iv. substitution of nouns for pronouns, ‘nenne mon’ N 23; the writer has a peculiar affection for the word mon, so, ‘ase deð, among moni mon, sum uniseli ancre,’ Morton 128/23, where A has ‘monie’ without noun: v. elimination of words and expressions used in a figurative way, ‘hit is’ N 99 for ‘driueð,’ ‘kumeð—heouene’ N 170, destroying the alliteration. These alterations have tended to obscure the peculiar rhythmic movement of the prose, which was a feature of the original as of Sawles Warde, the Katherine Group, Hali Meidenhad and some smaller pieces. It is discernible in the other manuscripts, especially in elevated passages, as b 182-7, b 205-8, b 231-5, and the scribe of MS. A often shows by his punctuation that he recognized its existence.
[Introduction:] The Ancren Riwle, as it was called by Morton, the Ancrene Wisse (the Anchoresses’ Guide) as its title is in MS. A, was written for the instruction of three sisters, ‘gentile wummen,’ of whom the author says ‘ine blostme of ower ȝuweðe, uorheten alle worldes blissen ⁊ bicomen ancren’ (Morton, 192). Their dwelling is under the eaves of a church, they are ‘under chirche iancred’ (M. 142); there is but a wall between them and the Host (M. 262). They live in separate cells, for they send messages to one another by their attendant maids (M. 256), and they are fully provided for, ‘euerich of ou haueð of one ureond al þet hire is neod; ne þerf þet meiden sechen nouðer bread ne suuel, fur þene et his halle’ (M. 192). They are greatly beloved, ‘vor godleic ⁊ for ureoleic iȝerned of monie’ (M. 192); their whole life in so strict an order is as a martyrdom, ‘ȝe beoð niht ⁊ dei upe Godes rode’ (M. 348).
As they were not subject in their anchorhold to any recognized monastic rule, they sought some regulations for their way of life, and the treatise they received is represented, so far as the matter is concerned, best by MS. N. But a book so helpful was certain to be copied for the use of other anchorites, with suitable adaptations and possibly additions; such a copy is MS. A, made a considerable time after the original. It omits the important reference to the author, found only in MS. N, wherein he speaks of the practice of the lay brothers of the community to which he belonged (Morton, 24), the word ‘leawude’ in ‘ure leawude breðren’ (M. 412/8), and the passage addressed by the author to the ladies for whom the book was composed (M. 192) containing the biographical details quoted above: of the numerous additions the most interesting is that in which reference is made to the general adoption of the rule by anchoresses all over England, with such unanimity that it is as though they were all gathered within the walls of one convent at London, Oxford, Shrewsbury, or Chester (M. L. Review, ix. 470). As MS. T is imperfect at the beginning, its first leaf corresponding to Morton, p. 44, it cannot be known whether it left out the first passage (Morton, 24) mentioned above, but it does omit the second passage (Morton, 192), and further eliminates commendatory references to the sisters found in Morton, 48/2-4, 50/20-24; it is therefore adapted like A. So too is the French version; it contains some of the additions of A, and is subsequent to it. A third stage is reached when the book is recognized as profitable reading for others who are not anchorites, for nuns, as in the Latin version of MS. M, in which the first ritual part is abridged and the last wholly left out as inapplicable to those who have a definite rule of their own, such as the Cistercian sisters at Tarent, for whom Simon of Ghent may well have executed this translation. Similarly the extracts of MS. B were probably made for the use of seculars.
Hitherto no plausible guess as to the author has been made. Simon of Ghent, who died in 1315 A.D., is manifestly out of the question. Bishop Poor (d. 1237) has been drawn in solely because of his connexion with Tarent (Dugdale, v. 619), of which he was the principal benefactor. From internal evidence it may be gathered that the writer was a disciple of S. Bernard (1091-1153), whom he quotes some twelve times expressly, and from whose Liber Sententiarum he says he takes most of his sixth book; ‘hit is almest Seint Beornardes Sentence,’ Morton, 348/14. He was acquainted with Ailred of Rievaulx and with the treatise which Ailred wrote for his sister the anchoress (Morton, 368), of which he made extensive use. He belonged to some monastic order, for he speaks of ‘vre leawede breþren,’ and ‘ure ordre’ (Morton, 24). He appears to have been acquainted with other anchoresses (Morton, 102, 192, 410). There is a note of weariness at the end of the book, as of one already advanced in years, and indeed the accumulated experience of a long life must have gone to its making. He was a widely read man; he quotes from many authors, of whom, after S. Bernard, S. Augustine and S. Gregory were the chief, but he drew on the Bible twice as often as on all the others put together. Finally, the Scandinavian element in his native speech was exceptionally large, and French was so familiar to him as to colour his English far more than that of any previous writer.
There were two men living towards the end of the twelfth century who might answer to this description, Gilbert of Hoyland, Abbot of Swineshed in Lincolnshire (Dugdale, v. 336), and S. Gilbert of Sempringham. The former completed the treatise on the Canticum Canticorum begun by S. Bernard, in which the mystic interpretation is quite different from that which runs all through the Ancren Riwle. But for S. Gilbert (1089-1189) I think a good case can be made out. He was brought up in South Lincolnshire, where the Danish element was strong, and not far from the northern border of the Midland area, for Lincolnshire north of the Witham was more Northern than Midland. In later years his visitations took him often to his houses of Watton and Malton in Yorkshire. He received his early education mostly in France, and he probably visited that country often in later life; he spent more than a year there in 1147, 1148 A.D. To no other person would the recluses have been so likely to apply for a rule, since he was famous as the greatest director of pious women in England; ‘vir eximiae religionis, in feminarumque custodia gratiae singularis,’ says Trivet in his Annales; ‘vir plane mirabilis, et in custodia feminarum singularis,’ W. of Newburgh. His own foundation for women and men, the order of the Gilbertines, had its beginnings in an anchorhold which he built for seven maidens against the north wall of his own church of S. Andrew at Sempringham sometime about 1131 A.D. (Dugdale, vi, pt. 2, *ix). For these he framed a Rule, ‘dedit . . . eis praecepta vitae et disciplinae,’ and provided servants ‘puellas aliquas pauperculas in habitu seculari servientes.’ When, after a long visit to S. Bernard, he returned to England with his Institutiones confirmed by Eugenius III, his order was regularly founded, with himself as Master. The Rule of his nuns was framed on Cistercian lines, but with modifications from many sources. While it differs of necessity from regulations suitable to the life of the recluse, it shows the same extraordinary attention to details (‘non solum magna et maxime necessaria, verum etiam minima quaedam et abiecta . . . non omisit,’ Dugdale, *xiii) which is displayed in the Ancren Riwle. And the two Rules often agree in these details, as will be seen in the notes; the most remarkable example is the similarity of the devotions of the lay brethren of the order to which the writer belonged, as described in the AR (Morton, 24), to the rule for the Hours of the Fratres in the Sempringham Order (Dugdale, *lx). There are numerical differences in the number of Paternosters and Psalms, but the Gilbertine Rule, as we have it, is a revision, probably a relaxation, of Gilbert’s, and the principle is the same. This method of saying the Hours is given by the writer to the recluses as an alternative use to the more elaborate one already prescribed, and he adds, ‘Gif ei of ou wule don þus heo voleweð her, ase in oþre obseruances, muchel of ure ordre.’ Gilbert was intimate with Ailred of Rievaulx, and sought his advice in the case of the nun at Watton (Twysden, Decem Scriptores, i. col. 420). Unfortunately, no authenticated writing of his, save a formal letter addressed in his last days to the Canons of his Order (MS. Digby 36, f. 189 b), has come down to us. But the first of his biographers tells us that, when in the course of his constant visitations of his houses he rested for a time anywhere, he did not eat the bread of idleness, but among other occupations wrote books, ‘scripsit quandoque libros’ (Dugdale, *xv), and the writer of the Nova Legenda Anglie, i. 471, says ‘libros multos scripsit; verba eius nichil aliud quam sapientiam et scientiam sonuerunt.’ The first members of his Order would surely multiply copies of the works of their founder, and it is not likely that all of these have disappeared. The Ancren Riwle was probably one of them. But there is besides a group of writings which are seen in their true setting when regarded as a product of the Gilbertine movement; the table on [p. 356] gives the contents of three manuscripts which are in my opinion collections of the works of S. Gilbert. Among them is that ‘Englische boc of Seinte Margarete’ (M. 244/20) possessed by the recluses, as the writer of the AR knew.
There has been much dispute as to the language in which the AR was written. The older scholars, Dr. Thomas Smith (1696 A.D.), Wanley (1705), Planta (1802) had no doubt that it was Latin. Morton (1853) championed the English version, but some of his arguments were refuted, others shaken by Bramlette. Muhe, holding the priority of the Latin proved, was obliged to adopt an involved and improbable view of the relationship of MS. T to the other manuscripts. It should be observed that these scholars were unable to take into account the Corpus MS. and the French version. The first to pronounce from a knowledge of all the materials was G. C. Macaulay in the M. L. Review, xi. 61. He appears to have disposed effectually of the claim on behalf of the Latin version, but his arguments in favour of French as the original language are not convincing. It must suffice here to say that nothing he adduces appears to be so crucial as the passage at 58/79, or even 56/38, 56/54, 70/170. In a general comparison, the English has all the vigour and raciness of an original work, while the French gives the impression of being unidiomatic and wanting in spontaneity.
In the foot-notes p. 60, l. 12, add C after chepilt: p. 61, l. 17, read chirche: p. 65, l. 62, add C after grettere: p. 67, l. 96, read wullet C for wulh C., also at p. 75, l. 191.
[ A. The Seven Deadly Sins.]
The references throughout are to the Corpus MS., unless otherwise stated.
[1]. wildernesse: of the world; he has already said, ‘Iþisse wildernesse wende ure Louerdes folc, ase Exode telleð, touward tet eadie lond of Jerusalem . . . ⁊ ȝe, mine leoue sustren, wended bi þen ilke weie toward te heie Jerusalem,’ AR 196/28-30. Comp. ‘alse longe se we iðese westen of þesser woruld wandrið,’ OEH i. 243/3; ‘Claustrales in huius mundi deserto exulantes,’ Alanus de Insulis, 65. þer . . . in, in which; see 1/3: ‘ou vous aleȝ enȝ,’ F.