‘Sisters Under the Skin’? Anglo-Saxon Nuns and Nunneries in Southern England
The history of female monastic life in Anglo-Saxon England has generally been seen as falling into two distinct phases conveniently separated by the Carolingian Renaissance and the Viking invasions of the ninth century.
Fornicating with nuns in fifteenth-century Bologna
In September 1432 Giovanni di Giacomo Amicini, a Bolognese spicer (aromatarius), was prosecuted for abducting a professed sister, Antonia di Baldino da Logliano, from the Convent of the Poor Clares outside the city-gate on the via Santo Stefano.
The Customary of the Royal Convent of Las Huelgas of Burgos: Female Liturgy, Female Scribes
This article explores the medieval customary of the royal convent of Las Huelgas of Burgos, a hitherto unpublished document of critical importance for the knowledge of one of the most emblematic institutions of medieval Castile.
Book Tour: Heroines of the Medieval World by Sharon Bennett Connolly
This November, Medievalists.net is pleased to feature Sharon Connolly’s book tour for Heroines of the Medieval World. The book shares the stories of women, famous, infamous, and unknown, who shaped the course of medieval history.
Book Review: A Medieval Woman’s Companion by Susan Signe Morrison
Susan Signe Morrison’s book, “A Medieval Woman’s Companion” brings the contributions of medieval women, famous and obscure, to the forefront in this fantastic introductory text.
BOOK REVIEW: The Tapestry by Nancy Bilyeau
Joanna Stafford, our intrepid ex-Dominican super sleuth is at it again. This time, she’s hurled straight into the midst of plotting and deception at Henry VIII’s court.
The Nun’s Crown
The nun’s crown, a white linen circlet with overlapping bands forming a cross worn over her veil, formed part of the dress of monastic women in northern Germany.
‘Forget Your People and Your Father’s House’: Teresa de Cartagena and the Converso Identity
Religion is a very important factor to take into consideration in discussions about the identity of the conversos [converts] or New Christians, an emerging group in 15th-century Castile.
An Apostolic Vocation: The Formation of the Religious Life for the Dominican Sisters in the Thirteenth Century
The Dominican vocation sprang from complex historical understandings of the vita apostolica, and the Dominican women’s religio should be approached as part of these same contexts and perceptions.
Skirts and Politics: The Cistercian Monastery of Harvestehude and the Hamburg City Council
In 1482, Catharina Arndes lifted up her skirts in front of the archbishop’s chaplain. She was a respectable townswoman from Hamburg, and her action was carried out in defense of the Cistercian monastery of Harvestehude which was close to the city and where several of Catharina’s nieces lived as nuns.
Women’s monasticism in late medieval Bologna, 1200-1500
This dissertation explores the fluid relationship between monastic women and religious orders. I examine the roles of popes and their representatives, governing bodies of religious orders, and the nunneries themselves in outlining the contours of those relationships.
The influence of conflicting medieval church and social discourses on individual consciousness : dissociation in the visions of Hadewijch of Brabant
This article examines the influence of the conflicting dis- courses in the medieval church and its social context on the subconscious experiences of Hadewijch of Brabant, a 13th century Flemish visionary, mystical author, vernacular theologian and Beguine leader
Amending the Ascetic: Community and Character in the Old English Life of St. Mary of Egypt
Among the most eligible saints for such treatment, Mary of Egypt deserves particular consideration: her popularity is evidenced by over a hundred extant Greek manuscripts of her Life and her uniquely prominent position in the Lenten liturgical cycle in the Eastern Church.
Women, Heresy, and Crusade: Toward a Context for Jacques de Vitry’s Relationship to the Early Beguines
Grundmann‘s search for a founding figure is understandable in light of the problematic nature of Beguine institutional history. Beguine historiography has long struggled with the anomalous lack of clear foundation documents and accounts.
Living la vita apostolica: Life expectancy and mortality of nuns in late-medieval Holland
Living la vita apostolica: Life expectancy and mortality of nuns in late-medieval Holland Jaco Zuijderduijn (Utrecht University ) Centre for Global Economic History:…
Medieval Widowhood and Textual Guidance: The Corpus Revisions of Ancrene Wisse and the de Braose Anchoresses
In this article, I shall examine the lives of Loretta and her siblings as templates for the kind of audience imagined by the authors of the Ancrene Wisse Group and, in particular, by the author of Ancrene Wisse as he revised his original text.
BOOK REVIEWS: “The Chalice” by Nancy Bilyeau
My book review of Nancy Bilyeau’s, “The Chalice”.
Queenship, Nunneries and Royal Widowhood in Carolingian Europe
Fulk‟s letter therefore introduces us to some central aspects of Carolingian thinking about the appropriate behaviour of laywomen especially, and serves as a way into the principal themes of this article. In particular, it is noticeable that the archbishop highlighted his expectations of Richildis in two roles: her supposed misdemeanour was concerned specifically with a failure to meet her obligations as a widow and as a queen.
Herb-workers and Heretics: Beguines, Bakhtin and the Basques
During the Middle Ages and early Renaissance, the word beguine was used by women to identify themselves as members of a wide-spread and influential women’s movement. The same term was used by their detractors and overt opponents, with the highly charged negative meaning of “heretic.” The etymology of the term “beguine” and ultimate origins of the movement have never been satisfactorily explained.
Saint Patrick’s Purgatory: a fresco in Todi, Italy
This essay deals with the tradition of the revelation of Purgatory to St. Patrick on Station Island in Lough Derg, whose popularity is testified not only in literary texts in the various languages of Medieval Europe but also in a unique work of art in the convent of the Sisters of Saint Clair at Todi, Umbria
A shared imitation: Cistercian convents and crusader families in thirteenth-century Champagne
This article examines the relationship between Cistercian nunneries and the crusade movement and considers the role of gender in light of the new emphasis on penitential piety and suffering prevalent during the thirteenth century.
Elisabeth of Schönau: Visions and Female Intellectual Culture of the High Middle Ages
Elisabeth of Schönau (1128/29-1164/65) was a Rhineland Benedictine who wrote numerous visionary texts. These works addressed local problems in the cloister and community, reform within the Church, and theological questions.
Voices from a Distant Land: Fragments of a Twelfth-Century Nuns’ Letter Collection
In these fragments echo women’s voices speaking of their intersecting spiritual, economic, and personal concerns, voices offering us a rare glimpse both of the lives of Admont’s twelfth-century nuns and of their continuing interaction with the world outside the cloister.
Dead virgins: feminine sanctity in medieval Wales
Examines literature on the medieval traditions associated with Welsh holy women. Prerequisites for feminine sanctity; Biographical pattern of the female saints; Implications of the popularity of the Welsh women saints.
Power and Institutional Identity in Renaissance Venice: The Female Convents of S. M. delle Vergini and S. Zaccaria
Even though inmates of convents were the most regulated group in fifteenth and sixteenth-century Europe, canonesses and nuns at these two convents were able to generate and harness multiple sorts of power in a variety of ways.