Medieval English Nunneries c. 1275 to 1535 Part 7

v contre oxen and iij western oxen fatt, ... xviij leane contre oxen workers, xij leane contre sterys of ij or iij yere age, xxviij yeryngs, x.x.xviii kene and heifors ... xxvi cattle of thys yere, an horse, j olde baye, a dunne, a whyte and an amblelyng grey, vj geldings and horse for the plow and harowe, with v mares, xliij hogges of dyvers sorts, in wethers and lammys cccc{x.x.x}, ... and in beryng ewes vij{c}, ... in twelvemonthyngs, ewes and wethers vi{c}x.x.xv ... in lambys at this present daye v{c}lx[349].

How these lean country oxen, the "one old bay, a dun, a white and an ambling grey," bring the quiet English landscape before the reader's eyes.

Time is as nothing; and the ploughman trudging over the brown furrows, the slow, warm beasts, breathing heavily in the darkness of their byre, are little changed from what they were five hundred years ago--save that our beasts to-day are larger and fatter, thanks to turnips and Mr Bakewell.

Kingdoms rise and fall, but the seasons never alter, and the farm servant, conning these old accounts, would find nothing in them but the life he knew:

This is the year's round he must go To make and then to win the seed: In winter to sow and in March to hoe Michaelmas plowing, Epiphany sheep; Come June there is the gra.s.s to mow, At Lammas all the vill must reap.

From dawn till dusk, from Easter till Lent Here are the laws that he must keep: Out and home goes he, back-bent, Heavy, patient, slow as of old Father, granfer, ancestor went O'er Suss.e.x weald and Yorks.h.i.+re wold.

O what see you from your gray hill?

The sun is low, the air all gold, Warm lies the slumbrous land and still.

I see the river with deep and shallow, I see the ford, I hear the mill; I see the cattle upon the fallow; And there the manor half in trees, And there the church and the acre hallow Where lie your dead in their feretories....

I see the yews and the thatch between The smoke that tells of cottage and hearth, And all as it has ever been From the beginning of this old earth[350].

The farm labourer to-day would well understand all these items of expenditure, which the monastic treasuress laboriously enters in her account. He would understand that heavy section headed "Repair of Carts and Ploughs." He would understand the purchases of grain for seed, or for the food of livestock, of a cow here, a couple of oxen there, of whip-cord and horse-collars, traces and sack-cloth and bran for a sick horse. Farm expenses are always the same. The items which throw light on sheep-farming are very interesting, in view of the good income which monastic houses in pastoral districts made by the sale of their wool. The Prioress of Catesby's account for 1414-5 notes:

In expences about was.h.i.+ng and shearing of sheep v s vj d. In ale bought for caudles ij s. In pitchers viij d. In ale about the carriage of peas to the sheepcote iv d ob. In a tressel bought for new milk viij d. In nails for a door there iv d ob. In thatching the sheepcote viij d. In amending walls about the sheepcote ix d;

and in her inventory of stock she accounts for

118 sheep received of stock, whereof there was delivered to the kitchen after shearing by tally 14, in murrain before shearing 12, and there remains 101; and for 5 wethers of stock and 2 purchased, whereof in murrain before shearing 3, and there remains 4; and for 144 lambs of issues of all ewes, whereof in murrain 23; and there remains 121[351].

The nuns of Gracedieu in the same spring had a flock of 103 ewes and 52 lambs; and there is mention in their accounts of the sale of 30 stone of wool to a neighbour[351]; and the nuns of Sheppey, as the inventory quoted above bears witness, had a very large flock indeed.

Some of the most interesting entries in the accounts are the payments for extra labour at busy seasons, to weed corn, make hay, shear sheep, thresh and winnow. The busiest season of all, the climax of the farmer's year, was harvest time; and most monastic accounts give it a separate heading.

The nuns of St Michael's, Stamford, year after year record the date "when we began to reap" and the payments to reapers and c.o.c.kers for the first four or five weeks and to carters for the fortnight afterwards. Extra workers, both men and women, came in from among the cottagers of the manor and of neighbouring manors; in some parts of the country migrant harvesters came, as they do to-day, from distant uplands to help on the farms of the rich cornland. To oversee them a special reap-reeve was hired at a higher rate (the nuns of St Michael's paid him 13_s._ 8_d._ in 1378); gloves were given to the reapers to protect them from thistles[352]; special t.i.thers were hired to set aside the sheaves due to the convent as t.i.thes (the convent paid "to one t.i.ther of Wothorpe," an appropriated church, "10_s._, and to two of our t.i.thers 13_s._ 4_d._"). The honest Tusser sets out the usage in jingling rhyme:

Grant haruest lord more by a penie or twoo to call on his fellowes the better to doo: Giue gloues to thy reapers, a larges to crie, and dailie to loiterers haue a good eie.

Reape wel, scatter not, gather cleane that is shorne, binde faste, shock apace, haue an eie to thy corne.

Lode safe, carrie home, follow time being faire, goue iust in the barne, it is out of despaire.

t.i.the dulie and trulie, with hartie good will that G.o.d and his blessing may dwell with thee still: Though Parson neglecteth his dutie for this, thank thou thy Lord G.o.d, and giue erie man his[353].

Usually the workers got their board during harvest and very well they fared. The careful treasuresses of St Michael's get in beef and mutton and fish for them, to say nothing of eggs and bread and oatmeal and foaming jugs of beer. Porringers and platters have to be laid in for them to feed from; and since they work until the sun goes down, candles must be bought to light the board in the summer dusk. At the end of all, when the last sheaf was carried to the barn and the last gleaner had left the fields, the nuns entertained their harvesters to a mighty feast.

It was a time for hard work and for good fellows.h.i.+p. Says Tusser:

In haruest time, haruest folke, seruants and all, should make all togither good cheere in the hall: And fill out the black boule of bleith to their song, and let them be merie all haruest time long.

Once ended thy haruest let none be begilde, please such as did helpe thee, man, woman and childe.

Thus dooing, with alway such helpe as they can, those winnest the praise of the labouring man[354].

The final feast was a.s.sociated with the custom of giving a goose to all who had not overturned a load in carrying during harvest, and the nuns of St Michael's always enter it in their accounts as "the expenses of the sickle goose" or harvest goose.

For all this good feasting, yet art thou not loose till ploughman thou giuest his haruest home goose.

Though goose go in stubble, I pa.s.se not for that, let goose haue a goose, be she leane, be she fat[355].

An echo of old English gaiety sounds very pleasantly through these harvest expenses.

(5) _The wages sheet._ The last set of expenses which the monastic housewife entered upon her roll was the wages sheet of the household, the payments for the year, or for a shorter period, of all her male and female dependents, together with the cost of their livery and of their allowance of "mixture," when the convent gave them these. We saw in the last chapter that the nuns were the centre of a small community of farm and household servants, ranging from the reverend chaplains and dignified bailiff through all grades of standing and usefulness, down to the smallest kitchen-maid and the gardener's boy.

Such is the tale of the account rolls. It may be objected by some that this talk of tenement-building, and livestock, ploughshares and harvest-home has little to do with monastic life, since it is but the common routine of every manor. But this is the very reason for describing it. The nunneries of England were firmly founded on the soil and the nuns were housewives and ladies of the manor, as were their sisters in the world. This homely business was half their lives; they knew the kine in the byre and the corn in the granary, as well as the service-books upon their stalls. The sound of their singing went up to heaven mingled with the shout of the ploughmen in the field and the clatter of churns in the dairy. When a prioress' negligence lets the sheepfold fall into disrepair, so that the young lambs die of the damp, it is made a charge against her to the bishop, together with more spiritual crimes. The routine of the farm goes on side by side with the routine of the chapel. These account rolls give us the material basis for the complicated structure of monastic life. This is how nuns won their livelihood; this is how they spent it.

CHAPTER IV

MONASTIC HOUSEWIVES

Some respit to husbands the weather may send, But huswiues affaires haue neuer an end.

TUSSER, _Fiue Hundred Pointes of Good Husbandrie_ (1573).

Every monastic house may be considered from two points of view, as a religious and as a social unit. From the religious point of view it is a house of prayer, its centre is the church, its _raison d'etre_ the daily round of offices. From the social point of view it is a community of human beings, who require to be fed and clothed; it is often a landowner on a large scale; it maintains a more or less elaborate household of servants and dependents; it runs a home farm; it buys and sells and keeps accounts.

The nun must perforce combine the functions of Martha and of Mary; she is no less a housewife than is the lady of the manor, her neighbour. The monastic routine of bed and board did not work without much careful organisation; and it is worth while to study the method by which this organisation was carried out.

The daily business of a monastery was in the hands of a number of officials, chosen from among the older and more experienced of the inmates and known as _obedientiaries_. These obedientiaries, as Mr C. T. Flower has pointed out in a useful article[356], fall into two cla.s.ses: (1) executive officials, charged with the general government of a house, such as the abbess, prioress, subprioress and treasuress, and (2) nuns charged with particular functions, such as the chantress, sacrist, fratress, infirmaress, mistress of the novices, chambress and cellaress. The number of obedientiaries differed with the size of the house. In large houses the work had naturally to be divided among a large number of officials and those whose offices were heaviest had a.s.sistants to help them. A list of the twenty-six nuns of Romsey in 1502, for instance, distinguishes besides the abbess, a prioress, subprioress, four chantresses, an almoness, cellaress, sacrist and four subsacrists, kitcheness, fratress, infirmaress and mistress of the school of novices[357]. But in a small house there was less need of differentiation, and though complaint is sometimes made of the doubling of offices (perhaps from jealousy or a desire to partic.i.p.ate in the doubtful sweets of office), one nun must often have performed many functions. It is common, for instance, to find the head of the house acting as treasuress, a practice which undoubtedly had its dangers.

The following were the most important obedientiaries, whose duties are distinguished in the larger convents. (1) The _Treasuress_, or more often two treasuresses. Her duty was to receive all the money paid, from whatever source, to the house and to superintend disburs.e.m.e.nts; she had the general management of business and held the same position as a college bursar to-day. (2) The _Chantress_ or _Precentrix_ had the management of the church services, trained the novices in singing and usually looked after the library. (3) The _Sacrist_ had the care of the church fabric, with the plate, vestments and altar cloths and of the lighting of the whole house, for which she had to buy the wax and tallow and wicks and hire the candle-makers. (4) The _Fratress_ had charge of the frater or refectory, kept the chairs and tables in repair, purchased the cloths and dishes, superintended the laying of meals and kept the lavatory clean. (5) The _Almoness_ had charge of the almsgiving. (6) The _Chambress_ ordained everything to do with the wardrobe of the nuns; the _Additions to the Rules of Syon_ thus describe her work:

The Chaumbress schal haue al the clothes in her warde, that perteyne to the bodyly araymente of sustres and brethern, nyghte and day, in ther celles and fermery, as wel of lynnen as of wollen; schapynge, sewynge, makyng, repayryng and kepyng them from wormes, schakyng them by the help of certayne sustres depute to her, that they be not deuoured and consumed of moughtes. So that sche schal puruey for canuas for bedyng, fryses, blankettes, schetes, bolsters, pelowes, couerlites, cuschens, basens, stamens, rewle cotes, cowles, mantelles, wymples, veyles, crounes, pynnes, cappes, nyght kerchyfes, pylches, mantel furres, cuffes, gloues, hoses, schoes, botes, soles, sokkes, mugdors, gyrdelles, purses, knyues, laces, poyntes, nedelles, threde, wasching bolles and sope and for al suche other necessaryes after the disposicion of the abbes, whiche in no wyse schal be ouer curyous, but playne and homly, witheoute weuynge of any straunge colours of sylke, golde, or syluer, hauynge al thynge of honeste and profyte, and nothyng of vanyte, after the rewle; ther knyues unpoynted and purses beyng double of lynnen clothe and not of sylke[358].

(7) The _Cellaress_ looked after the food of the house and the domestic servants, and usually superintended the management of the home farm. It was her business to lay in all stores, obtaining some from the home farm and some by purchase in the village market, or at periodical fairs. She had to order the meals, to engage and dismiss servants and to see to all repairs. As one writer very well says, her "manifold duties appear to have been a combination of those belonging to the offices of steward, butler and farmer's wife"[359]. The _Rules_ of Syon again deserves quotation:

The Celeres schal puruey for mete and drynke for seke and hole, and for mete and drynke, clothe and wages, for seruantes of householde outwarde, and sche shall haue all the vessel and stuffe of housholde under her kepynge and rewle, kepynge it klene, hole and honeste. So that whan sche receyueth newe, sche moste restore the olde to the abbes. Ordenyng for alle necessaryes longynge to al houses of offices concernyng the bodyly fode of man, in the bakhows, brewhows, kychen, b.u.t.try, pantry, celer, freytour, fermery, parlour and suche other, bothe outewarde and inwarde, for straungers and dwellers, attendyng diligently that the napery and al other thynge in her office be honest, profitable and plesaunte to al, after her power, as sche is commaunded by her souereyne[360].

A very detailed set of instructions how to cater for a large abbey is to be found in a Barking doc.u.ment called the _Charthe longynge to the office of the Celeresse of the Monasterye of Barkinge_[361]. (8) The _Kitcheness_ superintended the kitchen, under the direction of the cellaress. (9) The _Infirmaress_ had charge of the sick in the infirmary; the author of the _Additions to the Rules_ of Syon, a person of all too vivid imagination, charges her often to

chaunge ther beddes and clothes, geue them medycynes, ley to ther plastres and mynyster to them mete and drynke, fyre and water and al other necessaryes, nyghte and day, as nede requyrethe, after counsel of the phisicians, ... not squames to wasche them, and wype them, nor auoyde them, not angry nor hasty, or unpacient thof one haue the vomet, another the fluxe, another the frensy, which nowe syngethe, now wel apayde, ffor ther be some sekenesses vexynge the seke so gretly and prouokynge them to ire, that the mater drawen up to the brayne alyenthe the mendes[362].

(10) The _Mistress of the Novices_ acted as schoolmistress to the novices, teaching them all that they had to learn and superintending their general behaviour.

Certain of these obedientiaries, more especially the cellaress, chambress and sacrist, had the control and expenditure of part of the convent's income, because their departments involved a certain number of purchases; indeed while the treasuress acted as bursar, the housekeeping of the convent was in the hands of the cellaress and chambress. Every well organised nunnery therefore divided up its revenues, allocating so much to the church, so much to clothing, so much to food, etc. Rules for the disposition of the income of a house were sometimes drawn up by a more than usually thrifty treasuress for the guidance of her successors, and kept in the register or chartulary of the nunnery. The Register of Crabhouse Priory contains one such doc.u.ment written (in the oddest French of Stratford-atte-Bowe) during the second half of the fourteenth century:

"The wise men of religion who have possessions," says this careful dame, "consider according to the amount of their goods how much they can spend each year and according to the sum of their income they ordain to divers necessities their portions in due measure. And in order that when the time comes the convent should not fail to have what is necessary according to the sum of our goods, we have ordained their portions to divers necessary things. To wit, for bread and beer, all the produce of our lands and tenements in Tilney and all the produce of our half church of St Peter in Wiggenhall, and, if it be necessary, all the produce of our land in Gyldenegore. For meat and fish and for herrings and for _feri_ and _a.s.ser_[363] and for cloves is set aside all the produce of our houses and rents in Lynn and in North Lynn and in Gaywood. For clothing and shoes all the produce of our meadow in Setchy, ... and the remnant of the land in Setchy and in West Winch is ordained for the purchase of salt. For the prioress'

chamber, for tablecloths and towels and _tabites_[364] in linen and saye, and for other things which are needed for guests and for the household, is set aside all the produce of our land and tenements in Thorpland and in Wallington. For the repair of our houses and of our church in Crabhouse and for sea d.y.k.es and marsh d.y.k.es and for the wages of our household and for other petty expenses is ordained all the produce of our lands, tenements and rents in Wiggenhall, with the exception of the pasture for our beasts and of our fuel. Similarly the breeding of stock, and all the profits which may be drawn from our beasts in Tilney, in Wiggenhall and in Thorpland, and in all other places (saving the stock for our larder, and draught-beasts for carts and ploughs and saving four-and-twenty cows and a bull) are a.s.signed and ordained for the repair of new houses and new d.y.k.es, to the common profit of the house[365]."

This practice of earmarking certain sources of income may be ill.u.s.trated from almost any monastic chartulary, for it was common for benefactors to earmark donations of land and rent to certain special purposes, more especially for the clothing of the nuns, for the support of the infirmary, or for a special pittance from the kitchen[366]. Similarly bishops appropriating churches to monastic houses sometimes set aside the proceeds for special purposes[367]. The result of the practice was that the obedientiaries of certain departments, more especially the cellaress, chambress and sacrist, had to keep careful accounts of their receipts and expenditure, which were submitted annually to the treasuress, when she was making up her big account. Very few separate obedientiaries' accounts survive for nunneries, partly because the majority were small and the treasuress not infrequently acted as cellaress and did the general catering herself. Cellaresses' accounts, however, survive for Syon and Barking, chambresses' accounts for Syon and St Michael's Stamford (the latter merely recording the payment to the nuns of their allowances) and sacrists' accounts for Syon and Elstow[368]. In one column these accounts set out the sources from which the office derives its income. This might come to the obedientiary in one of two ways, either directly from the churches, manors or rents appropriated to her, or by the hands of the treasuress, who received and paid her the rents due to her office, or if no revenues were appropriated to it, allocated her a lump sum out of the general revenues of the house. Thus at Syon the cellaress drew her income from the sale of hides, oxhides and fleeces (from slaughtered animals and sheep at the farm), the sale of wood, and the profits of a dairy farm at Isleworth, while the chambress simply answered for a sum of 10 paid to her by the treasuresses. In another column the obedientiary would enter her expenditure. This might take two forms. According to the Benedictine rule and to the rule of the newly founded and strict Brigittine house of Syon, all clothes and food were provided for the nuns by the chambress and cellaress; and accordingly their accounts contain a complete picture of the communal housekeeping. In the later middle ages, however, it became the almost universal custom to pay the nuns a money allowance instead of clothing, a practice which deprived the office of chambress of nearly all its duties and possibly accounts for the rarity of chambresses' account rolls. The Syon chambress' account is an example of the first or regular method; the St Michael's, Stamford, account of the second. More rarely the nuns received money allowances for a portion of their food. The growth of this custom of paying money allowances will be described in a later chapter[369]; here it will suffice to consider the housekeeping of a nunnery in which that business was entirely in the hands of the chambress and cellaress.

The accounts throw an interesting light on the provision of clothes for a convent and its servants. An account of Dame Bridget Belgrave, chambress of Syon (who had to look after the brothers as well as the sisters of the house) has survived for the year 1536-7. It shows her buying "russettes,"

"white clothe," "kerseys," "gryce," "Holand cloth and other lynen cloth,"

paying for the spinning of hemp and flax, for the weaving of cloth, for the dressing of calves' skins and currying of leather, and for 3000 "pynnes of dyuerse sortes." She pays wages to "the yoman of the warderobe," "the grome," the skinner and the shoemakers and she tips the "sealer" of leather in the market place[370]. Treasuresses' accounts also often give interesting information about the purchase and making up of various kinds of material. At St Radegund's, Cambridge, the nuns were in receipt of an annual dress allowance, but the house made many purchases of stuff for the livery of its household and in 1449-50 the account records payments

to a certain woman hired to spin 21 lbs. of wool, 22_d._; and to Alice Pavyer hired for the same work, containing in the gross 36 lbs. of woollen thread 6_s._; and paid to Roger Rede of Hinton for warping certain woollen thread 1-1/2_d._; and to the same hired to weave 77 ells of woollen cloth for the livery of the servants 3_s._ 5_d._; and paid to the wife of John Howdelowe for fulling the said cloth 3_s._ 6_d._; and paid to a certain shearman for shearing (i.e. finis.h.i.+ng the surface of) the said cloth 14-1/2_d._

The next year the nuns make similar payments for cleaning, spinning, weaving, warping, fulling and shearing wool (an interesting ill.u.s.tration of the subdivision of the cloth industry) and disburse 9_s._ 9_d._ to William Judde of St Ives for dyeing and making up this cloth into green and blue liveries for the servants of the house[371].

The cellaresses' accounts, which show us how the nun-housekeeper catered for the community, are even more interesting than the chambresses'