Table Of ContentSpiritual Economies
THE MIDDLE AGES SERIES
Ruth Mazo Karras, Series Editor
Edward Peters, Founding Editor
A complete list of books in the series
is available from the publisher.
Spiritual Economies
Female Monasticism in
Later Medieval England
NANCY BRADLEY WARREN
PENN
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS Philadelphia
Copyright © 2001 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 21
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4011
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Warren, Nancy Bradley.
Spiritual economies : female monasticism in later medieval England / Nancy Bradley Warren.
p. cm — (The Middle Ages series)
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 0-8122-3583-5 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Monasticism and religious orders for women—England—History—Middle Ages,
600-1500. 2. England-Church history-1066-1485. I. Title. II. Series.
BX4220.G7W372001
271'.90042'0902-dc21 00-048885
Contents
Preface vii
Part I Monastic Identities in Theory and Practice
1
Vows and Visitations: Textual Transactions and the
Shaping of Monastic Identity 3
2 The Value of the Mother Tongue: Vernacular Translations
of Monastic Rules for Women 30
3 Accounting for Themselves: Nuns' Everyday Practices and
Alternative Monastic Identities 55
Part II Beyond the Convent Wall: Female Monasticism in
Later Medieval Culture
4 A Coin of Changing Value: Monastic Paradigms and
Secular Women 73
5 Kings, Saints, and Nuns: Symbolic Capital and Political
Authority in Fifteenth-Century England 111
6 Liabilities and Assets: Holy Women in the
Literary Economy 134
7 Paying the Price: Holy Women and Political Conflict 163
Notes 183
Index 259
Acknowledgments 275
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Preface
In 1308, King Edward II founded a priory of Dominican friars at
King's Langley to fulfill a vow.1 The house was dependent on the Exchequer,
and, after a time, Edward II became dissatisfied with this state of affairs.
Because the Dominican friars could not own property, he sought to find a
means of endowing the house for the support of one hundred religious.2 To
this end, Edward II determined that the Dominican friars of Guildford should
surrender their house to a foundation of Dominican nuns to be created at
Dartford, who would in turn hold endowments for and be subject to the
Dominican friars of King's Langley3 Edward II sent several papal petitions
regarding his desires, but he did not receive papal approval to proceed until
November 1321. Before he could complete his intentions, though, he was
dethroned. Edward III finally completed the plans set in motion by his father.
In November 1349, he applied to the pope for confirmation of the house of
nuns at Dartford,4 and, the confirmation granted, the house at Dartford be-
came "the complement of Langley priory"5
The Dominican sisters "were subject in spirituals to the Friars Preacher of
King's Langley," and the prior of King's Langley appointed the friars who were
to reside at Dartford with the nuns.6 In December 1356, Edward III granted
the prioress and sisters license to acquire property to the value of £300 to
sustain their community and that of the friars of King's Langley.7 In the ensu-
ing years, Dartford received numerous endowments, always destined to sup-
port not only the sisters but also the friars at King's Langley
In spite of its obligation to support King's Langley, Dartford became, in
the course of its history, extraordinarily wealthy. At the dissolution, Dartford
had a gross annual income of £488 per annum, which made it the seventh
richest nunnery in England.8 In the early sixteenth century, the prioress,
Elizabeth Cressener, drew up the Rentale giving detailed records of the house's
holdings of land and property together with the rents and services owed to the
house.9 This document testifies not only to the wealth of the house but also to
the nuns' skill in business practices.
That the Dartford nuns were capable managers is not surprising, since
the house was a center of female education, including Latin learning. Extracts
from the records of the Masters-General of the Dominican Order include
permission given in 1481 for "Sister Jane Fitzh'er" to have "a preceptor in
grammar and the Latin tongue."10 The house possessed numerous books,11
and not only novices and nuns but also daughters (and even some sons) of the
local nobility and gentry were educated at Dartford.12
I began with this brief account of Dartford's foundation and history be-
cause it provides a snapshot of the key issues I address in this book. First and
foremost, the case of Dartford highlights the involvements of women religious
in multiple, mutually informing systems of production and exchange. From
the community's beginning, the Dartford nuns were enmeshed in material,
symbolic, textual, political, and spiritual economies in ways which at times
harmonized with and at times conflicted with each other. Exploring the rela-
tionships among these systems and considering their importance for the con-
struction of religious identities are at the foundation of my methodology in
this book. I therefore consider a wide range of sources, from monastic rules to
nunneries' financial accounts, from devotional treatises to works traditionally
designated as literary.
Furthermore, the case of Dartford demonstrates the permeability of the
convent wall. The Dartford nuns clearly had important connections with
King's Langley as well as frequent interaction with the larger community in
their business and educational affairs. I thus seek to breach the cloister wall,
which was not an impenetrable boundary in later medieval society but which
is so often treated as such in modern scholarship, in my study of female
monasticism. My analysis consequently considers the impact of "worldly"
forces (for instance, economic trends and political conflicts) on "religious" life
in nunneries as well as the "worldly" value of "religious" practices (for in-
stance, politically motivated acts of monastic foundation). In doing so, I hope
to breach other boundaries which have been erected in contemporary scholar-
ship on the Middle Ages, particularly those demarcating the sacred and the
secular, the material and the symbolic, the literary and the historical.13
Dartford's material success and the continued respect the community
enjoyed from benefactors illustrate that later-medieval English nunneries for
women were not, as has so often been argued, necessarily the victims of
financial and spiritual decline. Nor was Dartford a community in which the
viii Preface
