medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
From: "Cormack, Margaret Jean" <[log in to unmask]>
>I'm assuming that Ecco's, and for that matter Ellis's portrayal of large
monasteries as having a complete set of "in house" craftsmen is accurate
i think that that is an entirely safe assumption, meg --to judge by the large
number of "craftsmen" listed as witnesses in the 11-12th c. monastic charters
(the number of witnesses falls off sharply after the later 12th c., reflecting
a fundamental juridical change around that time):
tailors, barbers, smiths (fabers), millers, cooks, carpenters (particularly
always found in charters dealing with mills, which were frequently very close
to the monastery and were, after all, a wood-based technology), masons (esp.
when there was a building program in progress), etc.
it's frequently difficult to tell which of these guys might have been monks,
which lay brothers, which pure laymen --they are frequently just named at the
end of the "ex parte monochorum" list.
my *feeling* is that the old Benedictine foundations which were just outside
the walls of most "cities" (i.e., seats of bishops) in France --like Ellis'
Shrewsbury-- were, of necessity, more or less self-contained communities, at
least until the "rebirth" of the towns from the end of the 11th c.
and, of course, the new foundations of, say, the likes of the Cistercians,
being Out in the Country, were certainly self-contained.
c
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