CLARENDON, CONSTITUTIONS OF, a body of English laws issued at Clarendon in 1164, by which Henry II. endeavoured to settle the relations between Church and State. Though they purported to declare the usages on the subject which prevailed in the reign of Henry I. they were never accepted by the clergy, and were formally renounced by the king at Avranches in September 1172. Some of them, however, were in part at least, as they all purported to be, declaratory of ancient usage and remained in force after the royal renunciation. Of the sixteen provisions the one which provoked the greatest opposition was that which declared in effect that criminous clerks were to be summoned to the king’s court, and from there, after formal accusation and defence, sent to the proper ecclesiastical court for trial. If found guilty they were to be degraded and sent back to the king’s court for punishment. Another provision, which in spite of all opposition obtained a permanent place in English law, declared that all suits even between clerk and clerk concerning advowsons and presentations should be tried in the king’s court. By other provisions appeals to Rome without the licence of the king were forbidden. None of the clergy were to leave the realm, nor were the king’s tenants-in-chief and ministers to be excommunicated or their lands interdicted without the royal permission. Pleas of debt, whether involving a question of good faith or not, were to be in the jurisdiction of the king’s courts. Two most interesting provisions, to which the clergy offered no opposition, were: (1) if a dispute arose between a clerk and a layman concerning a tenement which the clerk claimed as free-alms (frankalmoign) and the layman as a lay-fee, it should be determined by the recognition of twelve lawful men before the king’s justice whether it belonged to free-alms or lay-fee, and if it were found to belong to free-alms then the plea was to be held in the ecclesiastical court, but if to lay-fee, in the court of the king or of one of his magnates; (2) a declaration of the procedure for election to bishoprics and royal abbeys, generally considered to state the terms of the settlement made between Henry I. and Anselm in 1107.
Authorities.—J.C. Robertson, Materials for History of Thomas Becket, Rolls Series (1875-1885); Sir F. Pollock and F.W. Maitland, History of English Law before the Time of Ed. I. (Cambridge, 1898), and F.W. Maitland, Roman Canon Law in the Church of England (1898); the text of the Constitutions is printed by W. Stubbs in Select Charters (Oxford, 1895).
(G. J. T.)
CLARES, POOR, otherwise Clarisses, Franciscan nuns, so called from their foundress, St Clara (q.v.). She was professed by St Francis in the Portiuncula in 1212, and two years later she and her first companions were established in the convent of St Damian’s at Assisi. The nuns formed the “Second Order of St Francis,” the friars being the “First Order,” and the Tertiaries (q.v.) the “Third.” Before Clara’s death in 1253, the Second Order had spread all over Italy and into Spain, France and Germany; in England they were introduced c. 1293 and established in London, outside Aldgate, where their name of Minoresses survives in the Minories; there were only two other English houses before the Dissolution. St Francis gave the nuns no rule, but only a “Form of Life” and a “Last Will,” each only five lines long, and coming to no more than an inculcation of his idea of evangelical poverty. Something more than this became necessary as soon as the institute began to spread; and during Francis’s absence in the East, 1219, his supporter Cardinal Hugolino composed a rule which made the Franciscan nuns practically a species of unduly strict Benedictines, St Francis’s special characteristics being eliminated. St Clara made it her life work to have this rule altered, and to get the Franciscan character of the Second Order restored; in 1247 a “Second Rule” was approved which went a long way towards satisfying her desires, and finally in 1253 a “Third,” which practically gave what she wanted. This rule has come to be known as the “Rule of the Clares”; it is one of great poverty, seclusion and austerity of life. Most of the convents adopted it, but several clung to that of 1247. To bring about conformity, St Bonaventura, while general (1264), obtained papal permission to modify the rule of 1253, somewhat mitigating its austerities and allowing the convents to have fixed incomes,—thus assimilating them to the Conventual Franciscans as opposed to the Spirituals. This rule was adopted in many convents, but many more adhered to the strict rule of 1253. Indeed a counter-tendency towards a greater strictness set in, and a number of reforms were initiated, introducing an appalling austerity of life. The most important of these reforms were the Coletines (St Colette, c. 1400) and the Capucines (c. 1540; see [Capuchins]). The half-dozen forms of the Franciscan rule for women here mentioned are still in use in different convents, and there are also a great number of religious institutes for women based on the rule of the Tertiaries. By the term “Poor Clares” the Coletine nuns are now commonly understood; there are various convents of these nuns, as of other Franciscans, in England and Ireland. Franciscan nuns have always been very numerous; there are now about 150 convents of the various observances of the Second Order, in every part of the world, besides innumerable institutions of Tertiaries.
See Helyot, Hist. des ordres religieux (1792), vii. cc. 25-28 and 38-42; Wetzer and Welte, Kirchenlexikon (2nd ed.), art. “Clara”; Max Heimbucher, Orden und Kongregationen (1896), i. §§ 47, 48, who gives references to all the literature. For a scientific study of the beginnings see Lempp, “Die Anfänge des Klarissenordens” in Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte, xiii. (1892), 181 ff.
(E. C. B.)
CLARET (from the Fr. vin claret, mod. clairet, wine of a light clear colour, from Lat. clarus, clear), the English name for the red Bordeaux wines. The term was originally used in France for light-yellow or light-red wines, as distinguished from the vins rouges and the vins blancs; later it was applied to red wines generally, but is rarely used in French, and never with the particular English meaning (see [Wine]).