Medieval Christianity: Women Monasticism

"Crown and Veil" offers a broad introduction to the history and visual culture of female monasticism in the Middle Ages, from the earliest communities of Late Antiquity to the Reformation. Scholars from numerous disciplines offer a wide range of perspectives not to be found in any other single book on the subject,placing the art, architecture, literature, liturgy, religious practices, and economic foundations of these communities within a wide historical and cultural context. Long considered marginal to mainstream history, nuns and canonesses in fact had a profound influence on medieval culture. Reverend and admired as models of piety, they commanded considerable prestige and exercised a significant degree of political power. Whether acting as producers or patrons of art, nuns were widely celebrated for their imaginative accomplishments. Focusing on the visual culture of female monastic communities in the German Empire, Frankish Gaul, Langobard Italy, and Anglo-Saxon England, this volume underscores the richness of largely unfamiliar material and its role in shaping distinctive forms of religious life. -Flap cover

"In this innovative and engaging work, Bruce L. Venarde uncovers a largely unknown story of women's religious lives and puts female monasticism in the mainstream of medieval ecclesiastical history. Venarde deftly interweaves narrative and statistical data to describe in broad historical context the multiplication of French and English nunneries during the central Middle Ages."--Jacket.

In this study of the manner in which medieval nuns lived, Penelope Johnson challenges facile stereotypes of nuns living passively under monastic rule, finding instead that collectively they were empowered by their communal privileges and status to think and act without many of the subordinate attitudes of secular women. In the words of one abbess comparing nuns with monks, they were "different as to their sex but equal in their monastic profession." Johnson researched more than two dozen nunneries in northern France from the eleventh century through the thirteenth century, balancing a qualitative reading of medieval monastic documents with a quantitative analysis of a lengthy thirteenth-century visitation record which allows an important comparison of nuns and monks. A fascinating look at the world of medieval spirituality, this work enriches our understanding of women's role in premodern Europe and in church history.

"This book depicts the lives of female monks within a monastery located in upper Egypt in the period 385-464 C.E. During this period, the monastery was headed by a monk named Shenoute; thirteen of his letters to the women under his care survive. These writings are fragmentary, only partially translated, little studied, and written in difficult-to-decipher Coptic. Despite these problems, Krawiec has used the letters to reconstruct a series of quarrels and events in the life of the White Monastery and to discern some of the key patterns in the participants' relationships to one another within the world as they perceived it." "The book begins by describing the monks' daily routine and argues that the monastery's culture was based on uniformity, in both material goods and emotional support. The female monks' relationship with Shenoute was colored by the physical separation of the female community from the male community. Krawiec examines how Shenoute constructed and exerted his authority in these conditions, and investigates the degree to which the women accepted it. Krawiec then investigates the role of gender both in Shenoute's presentation of his authority and in the women's reaction to it. She argues that Shenoute believed in a universal, "genderless" monasticism, appropriate for both men and women. However, alongside this dominant model, we can see a gendered monasticism created by the women's physical separation and Shenoute's own cultural assumptions about women." "Shenoute was able to have these two apparently incompatible views of the role of gender in monasticism co-exist in part because he structured the monastery as a family, idealized by its ascetic values. Krawiec shows that in this way Shenoute was able to combine egalitarian rhetoric and patriarchal structures. Krawiec concludes by examining how Shenoute's creation of the monastic community as a family affected female monks who had kin alongside them in the monastery."--Jacket.

Situated in a period that witnessed the genesis of institutions fundamental to this day, this path-breaking study offers a comprehensive look at how ancient Christian women initiated ascetic ways of living, and how these practices were then institutionalized. Using the organization of female asceticism began primarily as an urban movement. Crucially, it also originated with men and women living together, varying the model of the family, and thus fulfilling the dictum that "in Christ Jesus there is neither male nor female." The book then traces how, in the course of the fourth century, these early organizational forms underwent a transformation. Concurrent with the doctrinal struggles to redefine the Trinity, and with the formation of a new Christian elite, men such as Basil of Caesarea changed the institutional configuration of ascetic life in common: they emphasized the segregation of the sexes, and the supremacy of the rural over urban models. At the same time, ascetics became clerics, who increasingly used the female saints as symbols for the role of the new ecclesiastical elite. Earlier more varied models of ascetic life were either silenced or condemned as heretical; and those who had been in fact their reformers became known as the founding fathers of monasticism. -Flap cover.

"This volume of twelve interdisciplinary essays addresses the multifaceted nature of female religious identity in early modern Europe. By dismantling the boundaries between the academic disciplines of history, art history, musicology and literary studies it offers new cross-cultural readings essential to a more comprehensive understanding of the complexity of female spirituality in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries." "Utilising a wide range of archival material, encompassing art, architecture, writings and music commissioned or produced by nuns, the volume's main emphasis is on the limitations and potentials created by the boundaries of the convent. Each chapter explores how the personal and national circumstances in which the women lived affected the formation of their spirituality and the assertion of their social and political authority."--Jacket.

Given the lenght of the Middle Ages and the varieties of religious life experienced by women who lived in that era,the history of medieval religious women in western Europe is a topic enormous in scope.Current research in women's studies has proven that it is essential to study the activities and achievements of women in the past because those women can be an inspiration for persons who live in the present and their accomplishments can give guidance to those who plan for the future.The growing realization that women have made and continue to make important contributions to all aspects of human experience has produced a reading audience eager to learn more about women who were heretofore unknown or little known to students of the past.This volume on "Medieval Religious Women:Distant Echoes" is not only evidence of persons interested in writing and reading about a select group of women who lived in an important era in history,but it is also an attempt to expand our awareness of the activities and achievements of women who made significant contributions to their own age.-Introduction.

Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303)published a decree in 1298 that transformed long-lasting attitudes toward nuns into universal Church law.Referred to as "Periculoso",the first word of the Latin text,this decree announced that all nuns,no matter what rule they observed and no matter where their monasteries were located,were to be perpetually cloistered.
"Canon Law and Cloistered Women" provides the most thorough examination to date of the land-mark decree.Elizabeth Makowski surveys precedents for "Periculoso" as well as some of the problems Boniface VIII hoped to solve with his legislation.She further analyzes the commentary on "Periculoso",much of it written by practicing lawyers,which unveils late medieval attitudes toward nuns and their male counterparts.Finally,she concludes with a discussion of the attempts to enforce the legislation.-Back cover.

"Medieval Women Monastics:Wisdom's Wellsprings"makes medieval women's monastic tradition come alive in uniquely gifted women of prayer and action.Written by contemporary Benedictine women scholars and writers,it renders accessible the surprisingly varied accomplishments of medieval foresisters of wisdom who are rarely acknowledge by historians for their contributions to the culture of their era.-Back cover.