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I remember reading somewhere that, in a hideous parody of the Incarnation, the Antichrist was to be the bastard child of a priest and a nun. (Didn't one of the HR Emperors have an ex-nun as his mother which gave rice to all kind of nasty propaganda ?)I don't know about the Antichrist but King (not Emperor) Henry I of Germany had a liaison with a woman he took out of a convent before he married his queen (and future saint) Mathilda. Given the haziness of marriage arrangements in the tenth century, it is not clear whether this was a marriage that he later repudiated but it is certainly probable that the woman and her relatives thought that his intentions were honorable. Mathilda herself was in a convent when he met her and her aunt, the Abbess, participated actively in arranging her marriage to Henry. It was apparently the habit of many of the aristocracy to stow their daughters for security and education in the wealthy canoness establishments. If marriage plans did not materialize the women stayed on but in most cases canonesses did not take binding vows of celibacy.Thietmar, by the way, says that Henry once got drunk on Easter Sunday and made love to Mathilda "in a diabolical manner" which resulted in the conception of a son who would later revolt against his brother Otto I and cause no end of trouble.Jo Ann