Pastoral Care in Late Anglo-Saxon England

161 Pages·2005·10.13 MB·English

by  Francesca Tinti

Anglo-Saxon Studies 6
PASTORAL CARE IN
LATE ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND
Thetenthandeleventhcenturiessawanumberofverysignificantdevelop-
mentsinthehistoryoftheEnglishChurch,perhapsthemostsignificantbeing
theproliferationoflocalchurches,whichweretobethebasisofthemodern
parochial system. Using evidence from homilies, canon law, saints’ lives,
and liturgical and penitential sources, the articles collected in this volume
focus on the ways in which such developments were reflected in pastoral
care,consideringwhatitconsistedofatthistime,howitwasprovidedandby
whom.Startingwithaninvestigationofthesecularclergy,theirrecruitment
and patronage, the papers move on to examine a variety of aspects of late
Anglo-Saxon pastoral care, including church due payments, preaching,
baptism, penance, confession, visitation of the sick and archaeological
evidence of burial practice. Special attention is paid to the few surviving
manuscriptswhicharelikelytohavebeenusedinthefieldandtheevidence
they provide for the context, the actions and the verbal exchanges which
characterised pastoral provisions.
DrFRANCESCATINTIhasworkedasResearchAssociatefortheProsopog-
raphy of Anglo-Saxon England at the University of Cambridge. She is a
Fellow of Wolfson College, Cambridge and currently lectures in medieval
historyattheUniversityofBologna.
Anglo-Saxon Studies
ISSN 1475–2468
General Editors
John Hines
Catherine Cubitt
Volume 1: The Dramatic Liturgy of Anglo-Saxon England
M. Bradford Bedingfield
Volume 2: The Art of the Anglo-Saxon Goldsmith:
Fine Metalwork in Anglo-Saxon England:
its Practice and Practitioners
Elizabeth Coatsworth and Michael Pinder
Volume 3: The Ruler Portraits of Anglo-Saxon England
Catherine E. Karkov
Volume 4: Dying and Death in Late Anglo-Saxon England
Victoria Thompson
Volume 5: Landscapes of Monastic Foundation:
The Establishment of Religious Houses in East Anglia, c.650–1200
Tim Pestell
‘Anglo-SaxonStudies’aimstoprovideaforumforthebestscholarship
ontheAnglo-SaxonpeoplesintheperiodfromtheendofRomanBritain
totheNormanConquest,includingcomparativestudiesinvolvingadja-
cent populations and periods; both new research and major
re-assessments of central topics are welcomed.
Originally founded by Professor David Dumville as ‘Studies in
Anglo-SaxonHistory’,theserieshasnowbroadenedinscopeundernew
editorshiptotakeinanyoneoftheprincipaldisciplinesofarchaeology,
art history, history, language and literature, and inter- or multi-
disciplinary studies are encouraged.
Proposals or enquiries may be sent directly to the editors or the
publisher at the addresses given below; all submissions will receive
prompt and informed consideration.
Professor John Hines, Cardiff School of History and Archaeology,
Cardiff University, Colum Drive, Cardiff, Wales, UK CF10 3EU
Dr Catherine Cubitt, Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York,
The King’s Manor, York, England, UK YO1 7EP
Boydell&Brewer,POBox9,Woodbridge,Suffolk,England,UKIP12
3DF
PASTORAL CARE IN
LATE ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND
Edited by
Francesca Tinti
THE BOYDELL PRESS
© Editor and Contributors 2005
All Rights Reserved.Except as permitted under current legislation
no part of this work may be photocopied, stored in a retrieval system,
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The right of the Contributors to be identified
as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with
sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
First published 2005
The Boydell Press, Woodbridge
ISBN 1 84383 156 2
The Boydell Press is an imprint of Boydell & Brewer Ltd
PO Box 9, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 3DF, UK
and of Boydell & Brewer Inc.
668 Mt Hope Avenue, Rochester, NY 14620, USA
website: www.boydellandbrewer.com
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pastoral care in late Anglo-Saxon England / edited by Francesca Tinti.
p. cm. – (Anglo-Saxon studies, ISSN 1475–2468 ; 6)
Summary: “The role of pastoral care reconsidered in the context of major
changes within the Anglo-Saxon church” – Provided by publisher.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1–84383–156–2 (hardcover : alk. paper)
1. Pastoral theology – England – History. 2. Pastoral care – England –
History. 3. England – Church history. I. Tinti, Francesca,
1971– II. Title. III. Series.
BV4011.P3453 2005
253’.0942’09021–dc22 2005005792
This publication is printed on acid-free paper
Typeset by Pru Harrison, Hacheston, Suffolk
Printed in Great Britain by
Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Wiltshire
Contents
List of illustrations vi
List of contributors vii
Abbreviations viii
Introduction 1
FRANCESCA TINTI
1 The clergy in English dioceses c. 900–c. 1066 17
JULIA BARROW
2 The ‘costs’ of pastoral care: church dues in late Anglo-Saxon England 27
FRANCESCA TINTI
3 Ælfric in Dorset and the landscape of pastoral care 52
JONATHAN WILCOX
4 Is there any evidence for the liturgy of parish churches in late Anglo- 63
Saxon England? The Red Book of Darley and the status of Old English
HELEN GITTOS
5 Remedies for ‘great transgressions’: penance and excommunication in 83
late Anglo-Saxon England
SARAH HAMILTON
6 The pastoral contract in late Anglo-Saxon England: priest and parishioner 106
in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Laud Miscellaneous 482
VICTORIA THOMPSON
7 Caring for the dead in late Anglo-Saxon England 121
DAWN M. HADLEY and JO BUCKBERRY
Index 148
Illustrations
1. Mandible from the execution cemetery at Walkington Wold (Yorks) 129
2. Tenth- to twelfth-century burials at Barrow-upon-Humber (Lincs) 133
3. Tenth-century burial from Pontefract (Yorks) 134
4. A coffined burial of tenth- or eleventh-century date from Swinegate, York 135
5. Reconstruction of a coffin lock from a tenth-century burial at York Minster 136
6. Late Anglo-Saxon burial at Fillingham (Lincs) 137
7. Sculpture from Weston (Yorks) 141
8. Tenth-century sculptures from northern England 142
vi
Contributors
Julia Barrow, University of Nottingham
Jo Buckberry, University of Bradford
Helen Gittos, University of Southampton
Dawn M. Hadley, University of Sheffield
Sarah Hamilton, University of Exeter
Francesca Tinti, University of Cambridge
Victoria Thompson, New York University in London and Birkbeck College,
London
Jonathan Wilcox, University of Iowa
vii
Abbreviations
ASE Anglo-Saxon England
B W. De G. Birch, ed.,Cartularium Saxonicum(London
1885–99), 3 vols
BAR British Archaeological Reports
CBA Council for British Archaeology
CCSL Corpus Christianorum Series Latina
Councils D. Whitelock, M. Brett and C.N.L. Brooke, ed.,Councils and
and Synods Synods with other Documents Relating to the English Church I:
AD 871–1204, 2 vols (Oxford, 1981)
EEMF Early English Manuscripts in Facsimile
EETS Early English Text Society
EME Early Medieval Europe
K J.M. Kemble,Codex Diplomaticus Aevi Saxonici, 6 vols
(London, 1839–48)
MGH Monumenta Germaniae Historica
os original series
PL Patrologiae cursus completus, series latina, ed. J.-P. Migne
(Paris, 1844–64)
S P. Sawyer,Anglo-Saxon Charters: an Annotated List and Bibli-
ography(London, 1968)
ss supplementary series
viii
Introduction
Francesca Tinti
‘Pastoralcare’isnoteasytodefine.Thephrasecanbestretchedtoaccommodate
differentdefinitions,whichobviouslydependonthehistoricalperiodforwhichit
isused.Ingeneraltermsitcanbeemployedtorefertoalltheactivitiescarriedout
by the clergy to assist and support the spiritual life of the laity.1 The adjective
‘pastoral’ derives from the image of the shepherd used in both the Old and the
NewTestamentsasametaphorforGod’scontinuousloveandcareofHispeople.
Sacramentshavealwayshadaspecialplaceamongtheactivitiesandtheliturgical
celebrationswhichconstitutepastoralcare,althoughintheearlyMiddleAgesthe
doctrine regulating them was still rather fluid. As will emerge from the articles
contained in this volume, late Anglo-Saxon sources give special attention to
baptism, penance and visitation of the sick. Pastoral care, however, also
comprised other more common tasks and activities, such as preaching. It had a
crucialroleinsomanyimportantfacetsofpeople’slivesthatastudyofthistopic
necessarily leads to a more general appreciation of the role of the Church in
society as a whole.
The publication of this volume stems from one fundamental premise: late
Anglo-Saxon pastoral care deserves to be studied for its own sake. For a long
time, in fact, the evidence for tenth- and eleventh-century Church organisation
and delivery of pastoral care has been treated as a useful tool to be employed
regressively, that is, to try to reconstruct the situation in the earlier period, for
whichtheevidenceisnoticeablyscarcer.Thisseemstohavebeenparticularlythe
casewiththosepublicationswhich,abouttenyearsago,ledtothedevelopmentof
the so-called ‘minster debate’.2 The debate arose following the emergence –
during the late 1980s and the early 1990s – of a specific hypothesis about the
1 GilesConstablehasdefinedpastoralcareas‘theperformanceofthoseceremoniesthatwereconsidered
centraltothesalvationoftheindividualChristianandthatweretheprimaryresponsibilityofordained
priestsworkinginparishchurchesunderthesupervisionofthediocesanbishoporhisrepresentative’:
G. Constable, ‘Monasteries, rural churches and the cura animarum in the early Middle Ages’, in
Cristianizzazioneedorganizzazioneecclesiasticadellecampagnenell’altomedioevo:espansionee
resistenze,Settimanedistudiodelcentroitalianodistudisull’altomedioevo28(Spoleto,1982),pp.
349–89, at p. 353.
2 E.CambridgeandD.Rollason,‘Debate:thepastoralorganizationoftheAnglo-SaxonChurch:areview
oftheMinsterHypothesis’,EME4.1(1995),pp.87–104;J.Blair,‘Debate:ecclesiasticalorganization
and pastoral care in Anglo-Saxon England’,EME4.2 (1995), pp. 193–212.
1